Saturday 18 July 2009

Animals just don't let you dwell on the past...

..thanks for the comments, the well wishes on both Twitter and facebook - there are a lot of really good people out there!

Today, Saturday, time to get the animals, and especially the llamas back in to routine, everyone likes routine, and animals like that, they like to know that the normal things in life carry on.

Clara seems to be fine after the traumas of the last week, though she occasionally goes looking for young Tilly, but she seems to be so relaxed that I feel she knew that something wasn't quite right!

Today, it was Wilbur, our young gelding who we hope to be our leading trekker, yes we would like to let people take our llamas out for a trek around the countryside of North Devon, but I think that is a "next" year task now, anyhow, it was Wilbur that had a very uncooperative day. He is normally such a star.

The girls are quite calm, and were happy to be rounded up and groomed. Clara in particular just stood there and enjoyed the attention. The boys though were in frivolous mood, and it took at least 4 attempts to round them up, but rounded up they were. They are actually in the biggest paddock, and trying to get them in to a 6' by 6' pen when they don't want to is to say a bit of a challenge.

Once in the pen, Vicki gave them a good groom, got the halters on both Cusco (not yet a year old, and our first own bred llama) and Wilbur, and we thought we would take them for a short walk.

Cusco, little devil, just lay down - that's it I'm not going anywhere he indicated, and Wilbur took two steps outside the pen, and just stopped, I'm not going anywhere either he seemed to say. He was coaxed a bit, but no, he wasn't interested. One of the tricks to get him in to the pen is food, and I don't think he had finished before we wanted to walk him. He won't get as much next time :-)

So, today, everyone was groomed (well Lima wasn't but as she is due to have her own cria soon, she's being spoilt), and no one was really walked. It was good fun though, and good to get back in to the routine!

Tomorrow, we 're off to learn all about shearing! watch this space!

1 comment:

  1. Hi, Kevin,
    I have been looking for a blog just like yours for almost a year. So glad I found you. We have several things in common: small herds (I have 3 girls--one bred, hopefully, and two at end of summer), live on farms, and have relatively new blogs. You live in a part of the world I have always longed to call my own, and have traveled several times to UK (next summer, if breeding goes well). Your post is great, and I look forward to watching your space. (not sure Blogger will let me choose my profile, so I am learningllamas and changingconnections at blogspot.com, as well as learningcurve.edublogs.org, plus another school blog, and am the blog coordinator for Discovery Educator Network's Pennsylvania leadership council blog. So, a busy blogger.

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