Summertime

And for the moment the living is easy. Two whole days of sunshine and the warmest temperatures so far have meant I have been able to ditch my flannel shirt, sweater, thick socks and fleece in favour of my lighter T-shirts and- oh my God I am also wearing shorts. Won't last though, never does for long so I don't put my thicker clothers "away" so much as move them to one side.

Adrian has actually been off on holiday for the last week or so and we have been out and about a bit. We had one whole day where we saw no horses at all, probably a record of some sort. On Bank Holiday Monday we ended up at the Botanical Gardens near Carmarthen which is where the above photographs were taken. It is a bit of a haunt of ours, a place we can go and have a wander and sort of get away from things here for a bit. They do a nice lunch menu as well. The photos show the glass house, a real must if you go there. The top photo is inside the glasshouse and the other shows it from the outside. The whole site is beautiful and there are plenty of places to walk and see no one at all which is also nice for us.

The good news here at the farm is that after two and a half years, Adrian has finally and at long last finished my poultry area. I feel I should hang out the flags and declare another Bank Holiday for the principality. I love poultry, they are busy creatures and take little looking after. The turkeys are bizarre birds, Stanley is nothing if not incredible. That's him below. He's something else isn't he? Trouble is they are so destructive that I had virtually no seedlings left. All my veg plots have to be netted off as well. Now although I shall miss having the birds wandering round the garden, at least I shall have some plants left. At least he and his woman Gidget won't end up as dinner.

Just a domestic type of day

You need those sometimes don't you? What with horses jumping out of stables, cats with parasites in their eye and the general hurly-burly of life up here, it sometimes does the heart good to just be...well, normal I suppose you could call it.

Don't know where the sun got to, the rest of the world seems bathed in sunshine and high temperatures and we have greyness and the temperature didn't get much above 60 degrees. Such is life up here.

I begin to get concerned about my vegetables about now. Everything is much further behind than I was used to in East Anglia or indeed further behind than the garden that belongs to the couple who live at the bottom of the hill. I had to put the runner bean plants out and sow the rest of the bean seed. I am still wary of putting out my morning glories, they are so sensitive but they also are screaming to go into the ground so I may have to give in to their plea and put them in tomorrow. I always grow sweet peas, Alderman peas, runner beans and morning glories on two structures that I pray are wind proof. The peas are a late variety that grow up to 6 feet high. The seeds I put in the ground rotted so I put some in gutter pipe in the greenhouse and they didn't come up either so as a last resort I have put a load in pots in the warm in the downstairs loo, it's warm in there because of the water boiler so with a bit of luck they will soon be on their way.

I also did a lot of baking today, something I enjoy but don't always get time to do. So we have a nice fruit cake, a load of Welsh cakes and I made a custard tart with our own eggs. It is a much darker colour than the ones you buy in the shops as the eggs are more "free range"-or rather "large garden". You can't say "free range" unless your hens receive no supplementary feed apparently.

One thing I didn't say yesterday was that while we were out, Tabby rang to say she had been contacted by a man that had found a young foal that was abandoned by it's mother and was in a state of collapse. He had tried one of the larger charities and got nowhere, would we take it? Tabby explained our situation with regard to equine flu, suggested he try Animal Health at the local council but if he got nowhere, he was to ring us back. He said if needs be he would bring it over in the back of his car as it was only the size of a labrador. In the interim Tabby spoke to Adrian, who agreed we would do our best for the animal, after all it is what we are here for. She tried several times to get back to the informant but by the time she reached him, he had had a reply from the major charity to say they would send a man out to have a look. I wonder what happened? I hope the animal got the help it deserved. We certainly would have done our very best.

Animals. Who'd have them?

I wonder sometimes.

Yesterday we ended up taking Seven to the vet. He had something in his eye that made him blink and made the eye weep. We had a look and saw a brown thing in his eye that seemed mobile but try as hard as we might we couldn't move it enough to let him shed it naturally so in the afternoon, we stuffed in a cat basket and away to the vet. We were a bit apprehensive because of course Seven is sort of semi feral but he was actually very cooperative.

The vet had a look, up close and personal like they do and then got a pair of tweezers, we held him down and she removed it. The only thing we can think it was was a fluke, or a parasite that normally gets into the skin but somehow got into his eye and partially under the third eye lid. Pardon me while I heave. The the vet removed a couple of sheep ticks, one of which was alive and wriggling (pardon me while I heave again) before we brought him home.

So all was well that ended well there.

The weather report for today should have been light rain but in Wales that means heavy rain to the point of deluge with winds set to tear your hair out and a temperature 5 degrees lower than the rest of the UK which added to the wind chill makes it 10 degrees lower. There you go, I could be a weather forecaster of the telly couldn't I?

Adrian disappeared outside and didn't return and the finance lady wanted a word so I went on a reccie in the pouring rain and high winds to find him and Tabby out in the front paddock trying to entice the foal close enough to get a head collar on so they could bring her mother inside to warm up. The foal was having none of it and was cavorting round the field kicking her heels up and generally making a nuisance of herself while the two humans had to try not to care.

Tabby had just got a hand near her neck when there was a noise from the main barn where Chance and Sasha had been put to warm up. Now we know that Chance has a bit of a claustrophobia problem but usually if she is in the barn with Sasha she will settle.

Not so today. We heard the noise and looked at Chance trying to get over the stable door and all credit to her she nearly made it as well but somehow she lost it and ended up hanging over the stable door, front feet in the corridor and rears in the stable. The mare and foal were released to deal with this more urgent problem and the foal went into the field shelter with mum which was what was needed in the first place. Gee thanks.

Away to deal with Chance then. She was starting to get edgy now and was shaking in fear. What we didn't want was for her to struggle and hurt herself. Adrian tried several different ways to sort the problem but she is too heavy for him to lift up from either end (good way to be kicked as well) and her weight on the door meant he couldn't open it at all to try and get her into a better position so she could extricate herself. If she hadn't been quite so large that all feet were in fact firmly on the concrete that would have worked.

What to do, what to do?

Bolt cutters. Cut the hinges on the door and it should fall forward and she will move. Bolt cutters didn't work, hinges too big. I suddenly remembered the crow bar I keep in my wood shed (every woman should have a shed) so I fetched that and Adrian had to lever the stable door off and then pull it forward so that the mare could at last move out of danger. But stap me vitals, she didn't want to move then and just stood there. Waiting for a bus I suppose. We checked her over, doesn't seem to be any damage apart from a cut on her leg but we were very lucky that she didn't tear her stomach open on the tin strips that are across the top of the doors, some of them are pretty ragged. Then of course it was what do we do with her now?

In the end we had to move Humphrey and Sadie out of the other barn into the main barn and put Sasha and Chance down there and leave the back door of that open just in case she gets a panic attack and needs to be outside without one of us being there to help her.

So we have one stable without a door now. Chance is as happy as a clam apparently down in the other barn with Sasha but they can't stay there as the paddock is too small for them and the grass will be gone in 48 hours. Then of course there is the problem of we have been trying to keep everybody in seperate places so that we don't have any cross infection of the flu thing the horses have so we will have to juggle that one as well.

Let no man tell us that we have the idyllic life up here till they come and spend a week or two.

Impetus

One thing that I have found difficult about life here on the farm is maintaining the impetus. Adrian and I have a great deal of that of course, we live here and as I mentioned once before, if it fails we have nowhere to go.

However it is still a difficult thing to do, for us to maintain all our energies and to carry on motivating others to do the same.

At the moment whilst in the pseudo quarantine of the equine flu, it is very easy for Adrian, Tabby and me to take it easy, rest a bit and become reclusive up here. It is such a beautiful place and it is easy to forget about the rest of the world, letting it slip past us un-noticed, only surfacing for grocery shopping. I have to admit we did try to get a supermarket delivery only to find we are 2 numbers out on the post code and as such they don't deliver. That would make it even more attractive to stay right here and potter about with few interruptions. To stay in the garden and enjoy the summer weather (what little we get up here) is a huge attraction believe me.

But being a small and not very well funded charity we can't do that. I had a long talk to myself last night, like you do just before you drop off to sleep, and find that I am concerned that we aren't covering enough bases even without being able to take ponies to events. If we aren't careful, we will be forgotten and I don't want that to happen.

The ideas we had the other day need to be consolidated and "got on with" if we are not to falter at the next fence. We have come so far, so very far, we have raised the awareness of the local population and are moving in the right direction. We cannot allow equine flu to be our undoing because we have lost our motivation. Nearly a year after being told by two other major charities we should close, we are still here. Ok, it's a bit dodgy but we are still here and we can remain here if we push on and never let up. But it needs to be all of us that are involved with the Trust, not just a few, we all need to pull together.

So any of you who read my blog and have ideas please get on with them. Things aren't going to happen by themselves, I have learned that you make your own luck to a certain degree and at the moment we definitely could do with some good luck.

Return of the Magnificent Seven

There, just when you thought it was going to be about a silly spaghetti western, I throw you a picture of a cat. Well, there you are, I guess you should never assume anything about me.

The cat in the picture is indeed named Seven and he has mysteriously reappeared again. When we moved here he was still semi feral, we had only just managed to entice him into the house. He sort of moved in on us at the other place, I already had 6 cats and didn't want another one, but this fluffy 6 month old silver tabby just wouldn't go away. We trapped him and tried to get one of the animal charities to take him but none would, their policy was to neuter and release in the area from which he was trapped. As we lived on a main road and I wasn't prepared to come home from work and find him dead on the road, we kept him and because we couldn't think of any suitable name, decided we would call him Seven as we already had the other 6. Ah well, I always have been a sucker.

When we moved here, Seven came along with us and the others but we quickly realised that he was a cat apart. When we finally let everybody out after a week or so he wandered off and we didn't see him for a month. I knew he was around because he whinges a lot, particularly if it is time to be fed but he wouldn't come in the house again for a while. That first winter he came in occasionally, we could tell the weather was going to be bad if Seven came in. The first summer we only saw him sporadically, a fleeting glimpse here and there. It became a bit of a "Where's Wally?" type of challenge for everybody that came, spot Seven if you can.

I think the longest he was ever AWOL was about 6 weeks one summer. It got to the point where I assumed that he had met with some accident and was no more. I was just beginning to get used to the idea when he appeared across the yard and then as quick as wink was gone again. When we did manage to get hold of him, we checked him over and he seemed to be well fed, sleek and despite the long coat, not a single matt on him. We came to the conclusion that he had found a little old lady's knee to sit on and that he only condescended to visit us on Bingo night. And so it stayed up until just recently.

Friday evening the cat flap went and there was the familiar whinging. Most strange as it is prime hunting time for cats up here, rats, mice and other small creatures abound and we didn't expect to see anything of him for several weeks yet. In fact, that very day I had wondered where he was so I must be a bit telepathic. But Seven was there, as large as life yet on close inspection, wasn't as fat as he has been, he has a few matts and his general condition wasn't as good as I have seen even in the worst of the winter. What is even more surprising is that he shows no inclination to disappear again. Most unlike him. I am beginning to wonder what his angle is or if the little old lady whose knee he has been cuddled up on has gone to a more permanent type of bingo game, if you get my drift. Something isn't right.

But never mind, I am the type of person who likes to know where my animals are, I never cared for his wandering off for weeks at a time though Adrian says that is what some cats do. Not my cats thank you. I would much rather have him drooling all over my knee than somebody else's so that I know he is alright.

So welcome home Seven.

You will have to excuse my sporadic appearance on the blog, we are sort of off and I don't always get round to updating myself. Back to normal by the 4th June I think.

Yesterday for instance we never really finished till about 9.30 when I washed the dishes so I didn't switch on...I am afraid I am not one of those people who burn the midnight oil, I am in bed with my book just after 10 every night unless we are out or entertaining (both very rare events).

Good day though yesterday, lots to think about really. First off I finally managed to learn how to do bigger resolutions on photographs on my 'pooter. I am a bit of a techno phobe/nerd. If I don't have to do something specific I don't sit on the box for hours learning all the subtle nuances that make up a computer, simply not interested. But there are times when you have to buckle down and do something you haven't done before and sorting out the resolution was yesterday's challenge. It was easy in the end, don't know why I was so wary of it. So the photographs have now gone off to be edited into our slot on Good Morning.

Didn't I tell you all that Adrian and I are going to be on the telly? Very exciting. It is for a downsizing thing, an advertisement I answered way back in November last year. We were chosen because we have changed our lifestyle and cut all the strings of the old life, no second home tucked away somewhere just in case, this is it. If it all goes down the tubes, we have nowhere to go. A very sobering thought that really motivates you to make a "go" of things.

Which brings me to part 2 of yesterday, a brainstorming half hour between Adrian and myself, Tabby and one of our volunteers who has come back despite the flu as she has no contact with horses. We came up with some good ideas that involve local people that will raise awarness of the Trust and hopefully some much needed cash as well. We aim to have something going on at least once a month. Not always easy and of course coming up for Christmas we get very busy with donkey things as you can imagine. Millie had 5 engagements last year. Nearly couldn't get her head through the door in the end. Anyway the July event is a 6 day sponsored ride that I will tell you more about as I have the details and we have come up with a couple of things into the autumn up to November. We like to keep busy.

Yesterday afternoon was taken up with a course that Adrian and I went to that was all about using animals as land management and the benefits to the environment. Quite interesting, all about grasses and forage and flowers and what animals are best used in certain circumstances.

It was nice to hear that our fields, although over stocked at present due to the flu, contain a lot of healthy options for horses as opposed to just grass. In the leaflet I was able to tick off 85% of the plants listed. Things like stitchworts, vetches, scabious; wild flowers that you don't see in fields that are fertilised and resown ever few years in order to maximise the nutrients of the grass in order to fatten up the animals on it quicker. We aren't in that game anyway and our equines don't need "good" grass. They prefer some of the more delicate herbs to forage. In one area of the woods in a sunny but very damp glade, we have a plant that I had never seen before and has been identified as lousewort. Not a particularly inspiring name or indeed an inspiring plant being only about an inch in height and width but the glade has a fair covering of it. We are told by them wot knows that the glade is a very good habitat and I suppose the lousewort proves it.

We are very keen to hang on to things like that, coming from East Anglia made us very aware of just how barren the arable landscape can be. Huge fields of oil seed rape, peas or wheat and very few wildflowers or wildlife to break it up. Wales has an abundance of both and I love walking and seeing something different every time. Not all that keen on the pole cat that took one of my remaing chickens the other evening but you have to take the rough with the smooth I guess. After all how many polecats are there around at all?

New Residents

Hopefully you will all pardon my absence yesterday, the day seemed to fly by and I moved from one thing to another. As I sit here now, I am trying to think what I actually achieved yesterday. Oh yes- I remember now.

Still lots of rain about though the clouds were a bit more spaced out today, a bit more blue sky. Interspersed with lots of the wet stuff of course. As we were on our own again I helped Adrian with some stables, we have had loads of damp and chilly ponies in and of course the donkeys aren't waterproof so they were in Tuesday night to be cleared out yesterday. The weather was supposed to be better last night so all were out, easier on us all though there were still a couple left over that we didn't do. Sorry Tabby.

I also took some photos of Star who came to the Trust on Tuesday, I told you about her. She is the lovely bay mare in the photo. As I said she has a home to go to hopefully but she is indeed a beautiful creature. What with photos, computers and a bit of necessary shopping at the end of the afternoon, that was yesterday shot to pieces.

Yesterday was also the day that the Trust became rightful owners of the abandoned Shetland you see in the other picture shown with Adrian and a rather unsure Merlin. Dropped over a farmer's fence about 2 weeks ago, the miniature Shetland is all of 2 ft 6 inches in height. Isn't he the biz though? Because all the nameless animals this year have to start with the letter "C" and because of his huge stature, Adrian has named him Cquirt. That's a soft "C" like in celandine or ceiling. We couldn't think of a better name for him. He does have small man syndrome and as he is still a stallion (a whole year to 18 months old!) he keeps trying to attract the ladies.

This afternoon he was giving the eye to some of the older mares as they were feeding in the horse walk. He gave it all he had, bit of a stamp and a paw, a flash of the bent neck and a fling of his very bad mane. We've all been there girls haven't we? The mares, all being twice his size (at least) were suitably unimpressed and the herd leader, a aging gelding named Barley just sort of told him to push off in a horse sort of way. Cquirt was unperturbed at being given the elbow but in truth he won't get anywhere with the mares, they have seen it all before thank you. The would much rather read a good book I suspect.

Today was the first day of our 12 days off so we got some things in the garden done in between the showers; more wood shifted and I now have a sort of cold frame made out of an old window frame and some concrete blocks I found. Adrian has suggested that I might want to make a list of all the jobs that need doing that he can get on with when he has the time.

I doubt there are enough trees in the forest to make paper for the list.