Mad March weather!

Whilst we were doing last Saturday's blog it had started to snow lightly, but by late evening it got heavier and heavier.  We lost our electricity during the night and it came back on at 9.00am.  When we opened the back door on Sunday morning, this was the scene which greeted us!   Bummer!  My car is in the middle of this shot.  Quite pretty of course but it means lots of extra work - first job is to get the snow shovel out....

The boys were the first to be dug out with a large circular trench so that they could get at their morning haylage.    They were not bothered by the depth of snow although boredom soon sets in when they realise they can't get at their grass.  We also dug a trench leading from their field shelters to their poo piles to stop them completely messing the shelters overnight.

Next job was to get to the henhouse even though we know that the birds will not come out when they see the white stuff lying on the ground.  Couldn't get the gate open because the snow had drifted behind it and the white on the left of the photo is the snow filled fence.    Eventually another trench was dug to the henhouse door - and the girls steadfastly refused to budge.

At least the flowering heather can stand the depth of snow whilst all the crocuses have been flattened.  We managed to get into Inverness on Monday to find that there was no snow there whatsoever!  It's taken  all of this week for the snow to shift because of frosty nights but at last the boys have got most of their grass back now.  We had stopped the sugar beet last week but started it again when the snow returned.  We'll stop it again as of tomorrow.  They've also had their Verm-X granules for a week and are none the worse for another week of snow.  We hope that this will be the last time we have to mention snow until next winter!

More snow - and a budding alpaca farmer!

A look of resignation from Fergus as he eats his breakfast haylage in the snow again.  We all thought we'd got rid of the snow for a while, but no such luck.

We've had a couple of days this week when we were back into mid-winter.  Fortunately the temperature has stayed above zero most of the time, so the snow does shift.  Sometimes it has been really sunny, then it gets very dark, and we get dumped on again.  Here, the boys happily eat their haylage whilst in the background, on the hill road traffic came to a standstill as usual, skidding and sliding all over the place.  There's plenty of grit in the Council depots apparently, but we rarely see the gritting lorry.  Until a couple of years ago piles of grit were left on all the hill roads so that drivers could get themselves out of trouble - those were the good old days!  Now drivers have to find a friendly farmer with a tractor to pull them - clearly much cheaper for the Council to do it that way.

Last Sunday however it was cold but not so wintry and the boys had a visit from Rauridh, Callum and their dad Pete.  They were up from the Borders with mum Lesley and Rauridh likes to have his 'paca fix when he's in the area.  We're convinced that he's going to be an alpaca farmer later in life!  Here he is showing total control of the herd with his bowl of goodies!

Rauridh with Faro.

Now that's one happy junior alpaca farmer as he feeds Fergus and checks the thickness of his fleece.

Rauridh keeps his dad right on the finer points of feeding Wee Eck!  Unfortunately Callum missed the photo shoot - next visit for sure, Cal.

And finally...........I started with Fergus the Big Man, so I'll finish with him.  He's looking for food as usual.

A Busy Day

After a week of mixed but mild weather, today was a 'real beaut' with warm sunshine for most of the day.  A day to get things done and even the boys sensed there was a bit of action to come.  Left to right here are Gully, Gaucho and Rufus all looking as if butter wouldn't melt etc!  First job then - round up the guys and get them into the pen.

'Get ahead - get a hat' as the saying goes, Robbie in the catch pen wearing Fergus, who is at the front left, with Gully on the right.  Faro is behind wearing the blue halter and Fyta at the rear.  It was Robbie's turn to fit the halters today, we do it time about, and I joined him so that we could trim some nails.  For the first time we've had to trim Gully's back nails and he was as good as gold - Fergus was also obliging today!  We trimmed Wee Eck's fringe as we're convinced that he couldn't see through it -  now we can see his eyes quite clearly so he must have better vision.  I've noticed that Eck  has been chewing the gate bolt recently and wondered if he was teething, so we had a look at his teeth.  He had a discoloured tooth at the front and I've now discovered that it is missing but it looks as if there is a new tooth coming through.  Their incisors are deciduous as we know and a couple of years ago Fyta had double teeth at the front for a short while until a couple fell out.  Scary looking! 

One of the paddocks has a drainage problem and after each winter there is always a large pool in place.  We wanted the boys to get the benefit of the grass but firstly had to section off the pool.  Robbie spent more than an hour shifting most of the gates whilst the boys looked on, knowing that shortly they would get into the new grass. Here the gates are lying on the ground waiting to be connected.

After a stampede down to the new grass, the boys immediately start tucking in whilst Fyta checks out the gates.  The pool is out of sight on the right but there is a lot of boggy ground around it, just the sort of place for alpacas to wallow in given half a chance.  The boys were enjoying their new grass so much they had to be called later in the day for their supplement - normally they are waiting by the gate for it.

Couldn't resist taking this photo of a flock of Waxwings on our Scots Pine, having earlier descended on our Cotoneaster hedge and polished off what red berries were left after the Blackbirds, Fieldfares and Redwings had almost stripped the hedge throughout the winter.  Our digital camera doesn't take the best pictures but magnified, the tufts of feathers can be seen at the back of the birds' heads.  Lovely migratory birds which we don't often see in this part of the world. 

And finally............wanted to take this photo today in the Spring sunshine.  The Snowdrops and Crocuses are all out and the Daffodills are beginning to form heads.  There were two honey bees flying around the flowers, so considering we have been suffering from a lack of bees over the past few years, to see two honey bees this early in the year must be a good sign.  At the top right of the picture can be seen the covers for the winter over the Gunnera plant  and they will stay on until April until the worst of the frosts are over - hopefully.

Satisfaction guaranteed

Another day, another bowl of sugar beet!  Fidget enjoys his beet and insists on getting it all over his face.  We have reduced the amount of daily beet we are feeding the boys now and were going to stop it altogether but the sight of 8 boys lined up at the gate with a look of longing on their faces was too much for me  - I had to go and organise a  rapid hot water soaked bowlful each for them!

Fyta is eating his beet from the bowl, Fidget is in the background and then Rufus appears.  He has already scoffed his bowlful, plus some more, but insists on trying to push the others off their bowls. Rufus is a bit of a bully at feeding time.

A typical audible and visual warning between the boys - heads up, groaning or screeching in the hope that one of them backs off.  This has the makings of a bit of a 'stooshie' if one doesn't back down.

No eye to eye contact, Rufus looks away but they are still moaning at each other.  (Note that Fidget in the background is more interested in scoffing his food than getting involved with his sparring partners!)

Rufus chances his luck and moves in to get Fyta's food.   However, Fyta has a cunning plan to deal with this type of situation - see how his left foot is raised...........

Fyta's plan works as he puts his foot in the bowl putting Rufus off his stride!

Gotcha!    Get out of that one Rufus.............after Rufus moves away Fyta nudges the upturned bowl with his nose and eats the beet off the ground.  This trick never fails and if you look closely at Fyta's face you'd swear there is a smug look of satisfaction!

Frosty weather.

We've had a lot of overnight frosts this week and one day when a couple of inches of snow fell.  It's gone now so we are having clear days and frosty nights.  This is Gaucho enjoying his breakfast haylage.  He is one of those alpacas who always seem to have grass or hay sticking from their mouths!  Gaucho can have grass and moss sticking from either side of his mouth, eat his sugar beet or supplement and still have the stuff sticking from the sides of his mouth - how does he do that?  He's a lovely boy, gentle and gets on well with the others.  Gully is in the background here - having a scratch!

More of the boys and their breakfast with Fidget (front, left) wondering where his pile of haylage has gone (he's eaten it!)  Gully is in the middle with Gaucho on the right, Fyta behind and Rufus and Faro in the background.  Fergus and Wee Eck are out of shot, also munching on their haylage.

Frosties for breakfast!  Wee Eck enjoying his breakfast with the overnight frost showing clearly on his back.

This is the imprint left on the ground by an alpaca having slept outside all night in the frost.  Often there are 8 such imprints scattered around, not close together but spread about.

And finally............something to gladden the heart!  The Snowdrops have emerged from frozen ground with Daffodil and Crocus coming through more slowly.  It's a joy to see them again.

Check it out, boys.

Robbie was topping up the sand pits today and this was the cause of great interest amongst the boys.  All except Faro of course who was standing a short distance away having checked out what was happening and decided it was pretty boring!  Gaucho is sniffing the sand and shortly after this, Fidget (far left) got into the sand pit for a closer inspection.

Echo (Wee Eck) has been the subject of much scrutiny by us this week.  We have suspected that he may be deaf when on one or two occasions he did not appear to hear us, but this week he was grazing completely on his own in a fold in the land which hid him from view.  When we found him only about 30 yards away, we called loudly several times and he carried on grazing, then suddenly he looked up, saw the herd was missing and ran towards us.  We now know he is not hearing things and explains some of his actions and reactions.  For instance, he frequently barges into the middle of the herd oblivious to the groaning, moaning and general gnashing of teeth going on around him.  He is only a wee chap so often the spitting goes over his head, literally, then he realises it's being directed at him and he spits back.  He obviously misses the audible warning signs going on all the time when the boys are in close proximity to one another.  The fact that he is deaf makes absolutely no difference to us of course as he is a real charmer - and a bandit! 

Here is Wee Eck with our other deaf boy, Gully, behind.  If you look closely at his front left foot, there is a white patch at the back.  Some alpacas carry the 'white spot gene' which is connected to deafness.  So, does Wee Eck carry this gene and is that why he is deaf?  He has black eyes and is solid black colour otherwise, but Gully has blue eyes which can be associated with deafness.   The Alpaca Vet, Leo Van Merwijk explains the 'blue eyed white' (BEW) alpaca condition very well in his June 2009 blog (www.dierenarts-en-alpaca.blogspot.com) and there is a link to a scientific paper on the subject.  I mention all of this because alpacas are well known for hiding physical ailments or abnormalities - obviously hard wired into their system so as not to appear to be the weak animal to any interested predator!  We know from Gully's behaviour that deafness is very hard to detect sometimes in an animal within the herd - we have to look very hard for a sign in him that he does not hear because he covers it so well.  Clearly, Eck is obviously also good at hiding his inability to hear as we spend a lot of time with our animals and we've only just managed to confirm it.  Wonder if anyone else has an alpaca within their herd who might be deaf and it has not been discovered?  Interesting!  Robbie is always saying that Wee Eck won't do as he's told - now we know why........he can't hear him!

I've crocheted this curly wurly scarf from Fergus (white) and Ardo Gottit (black) fleece.  I carded the two fleeces together before spinning them to see what it would look like.  I'm pleased with the result.   On the right is a ball of Gaucho's spun fleece and I've made a label for it.

And finally............the boys are having a nocturnal visitor in their field shelter.  Mr (or Mrs) Rabbit is becoming a pain in the rear end burrowing holes in the ground!  We blocked one hole with a boulder two nights ago only to discover this morning that the rabbit had made a hole right next to it and scrapped away all the earth and straw as shown above.  The rabbit is either not scared off by the boys in the area  or it's a very big rabbit and the boys are scared!!

Doggone!

Why is it that I never have my camera handy when something interesting happens?  Our neighbouring farmer's sheepdog decided to go walkies on his own along the road and this immediately had all the boys heading towards the fence and facing the threat.  Tails were up, ears pointed forward as they watched the dog.  By the time we got the camera the dog had wandered back to the farm but the boys watched it all the way - all except for Faro the guard!  His attention was taken up with the new threat of the camera - he does not like it being pointed at him and does not like posing.

Can't say the same about this trio of Gaucho (L), Gully and Wee Eck (R) who will pose endlessly and come right up to the camera lens if allowed to!

Our two (dirty) white boys, Fergus at the front with Fidget behind.

Rufus in the middle with Gully (L).

Fergus is a really laid back character so whilst some of the boys still keep an eye out for the dog and others start grazing, he decides its time to chill out and lie down.  Shortly after this Wee Eck came and touched his back which had Fergus spitting up in the air as a warning to keep off!

And finally, Gully showing his thick fleece which he's needed this winter like all the boys to keep the cold weather out.