We are very busy at the moment!

As are most farmers and smallholders, spring is the busiest season with plenty of offspring turning up to add to the headcount.

This spring we have had 7 young goats born, mum Lucky had twins, mum Munchkin had twins and Breeze, bless her gave us triplets. In total we now have 19 goats!

Here are the triplets, just a week old and already causing mayhem!

We are not expecting any new llamas this year, but we have bought in 15 young lambs, all either orphans or unwanted triplets. Aged between a day old and 2 weeks old when they arrived they are all doing well, except for some that need a heavy dose of antibiotics to get over an ailment called "joint ill" which is something they can get shortly after birth when they do not get colostrum in time, or are born into mucky surroundings. Something that is all too common in orphan lambs and in a wet spring where the weather does not do anyone any favours.

So, a headcount, 19 llamas, 19 pygmy goats, 14 chickens, 15 lambs, 4 dogs and a cat! No wonder we're busy!

Next up, get the incubator going and let's have more chooks!

What a weekend of spring weather!

What a weekend of spring weather!

Well, apart from Sunday morning when it just rained.

Saturday though was great, wall to wall sunshine for most of the day, and today, Sunday the sun came out again in the afternoon, so we managed to get a lot done in the garden. We also managed to get some farm stuff done - the pygmy goat kids got to see sunshine, llama poo got picked up and mulched around the blueberry bushes, hay got shifted between barns, chickens coops got cleaned out, and a hay rack got lowered so the nanny goat didn't have to jump up to reach it - but the focus on the weekend was the vegetable plot and plants.

Great to see one of these today enjoying the warm sunshine as well.

A sure sign that spring is on its way!

The big job though was this:-

These last leeks had to make way for some new planting - the leeks would make a great addition to this evenings dinner as would these that are also starting to show, albeit just one or two.

Purple sprouting broccoli - a favourite.

After much back breaking the leek bed looked like this:-

And a row of peas sowed it looked like this:-

We also managed to pot up 80+ dahlias, sow lettuces, cucumbers, sweet corn in the propagator and sowed carrots and spring onions in a raised bed.

Time for a beer now!