Lovely Adhara achieved her KCGC Bronze obedience award today.
Meanwhile, Bess the alpaca has mated again, as it seems the timing wasn't quite right in her cycle the last time the stud visited. The other two alpacas are starting to look pregnant. Hopefully someone will be coming to shear them in the next few weeks.
Hobsey is around day 39 of her pregnancy. I think she is a bit uncomfortable in the warm weather, and is enjoying relaxing in the house. The garden is looking better but still needs a lot more work doing on it, and money spent on some new plants. :-)
Here's a video of using a Doppler to listen to a puppy's heartbeat inside Hobsey. Sorry about the cardboard boxes and general untidiness in the background. The study is being cleared up ready for the whelping box to go in here, and it has to get worse before it can get better.
Rana and her family came to visit over the weekend. Rana is Loki's daughter and Adhara's sister. It was wonderful to see her again and get to know what a beautiful poodle she has grown into with love and care from the lovely owners she deserves, and to see her interacting with her father and sister!
(Rana is the one with a red collar on)
Meanwhile, there are heartbeats in Hobsey too fast to be her. Things can still go wrong from this point, but we are hoping very much to have some Hobsey & Loki puppies around the 19th June.
The alpacas have been spat off again by visiting studs. Olivia and Poppy appear still on track to give birth around August. Bess unfortunately it seems has lost her pregnancy sometime over the winter, and has mated again with her beau in the hope it will work out for spring 2017.
Our hosting service unfortunately continues to have problems and the website has been down the last few days. We hope normal service will be resumed soon. Updates and contact information can be found on the blog and also on the facebook page.
Our hosting provider is having problems and the website is experiencing sporadic issues because of this. Apologies if you have tried to view it and had an error message, please retry later.
6 goslings hatched, and there is another clutch of eggs in the incubator and a few under a goose who has decided to go broody, so hopefully some more will be along soon. I hope this year to have some geese available to sell as well as some to eat.
Meanwhile, the youngest emu, whom we have now ascertained is male, and whom I have decided to call Siegfried, is getting bigger and pooier and smellier, and not very nice to have in the house. Because he needs to spend more time with his own kind, he has moved out into a pigsty where he can see and interact with the older female chicks (who are now called Odette and Odile). I don't leave him with them unattended, because of the obvious size discrepancy. While Odette and Odile seem to know Siegfried is another emu and are not aggressive towards him, they could seriously hurt him with a too-hard peck.
Loki today managed to catch and kill a rabbit, and spent most of the morning and the early afternoon carrying it about the garden and slowly eating it, until it began to rain and he had to come in.
