June 7, 2009: An Eventful First Week or so in Our New Home
It has been a crazy busy week here at Ffos Y Fran, our new farm. Before we give the highlights, last week we forgot to mention a funny thing that happened at the trials in Scotland.

One day early on in the trials, Angie was setting out sheep with Roy. The morning session went quite well and after it finished, we immediately started the afternoon trial on the brae (hill). This day Angie only had time to eat one-third of her lovely filled roll that Shiela made for Angie's lunch before she and Roy had to go up the hill to set out sheep. When they got to the top of the brae, Angie put her roll down on her jacket thinking she would eat it in between setting out sheep. Immediately she went and grabbed some sheep out of the pens and asked Roy up onto the sheep to take them across the brae to the post. He got up quite eagerly, lettuce leaf hanging out of his mouth. As he was lying waiting for Angie to shed some sheep, he had eaten the other two-thirds of her roll. The only thing left was the lettuce and red peppers. Apparently these were not to his liking. It was a long time to dinner! Everyday thereafter, Roy eagerly looked at Angie in the hopes he would get some more treasure, which was not to be. Nor did he get any Smarties that Shiela added to Angie's lunch to get us through the long afternoons.

Our first week in our new home has been very busy. We have managed to get our polytunnel (that's a cheaper version of a glasshouse) planted with all manner of veges and other goodies such as tomatoes, lettuces, strawberries, carrots, peas, beans etc. Many of these have already popped up their heads so the growing conditions in the polytunnel are excellent. We planted these veges when it was about 26-27 degrees celsius outside and nearly 40 (celsius; that's over 100 F) inside. It was stinking hot! So hot, in fact, that one day we decided to dive into the swimming pool, which was, at the time, unheated. Angie jumped in, swam to the other end and jumped out. Very refreshing. She then went and told Kelvin to take the plunge. He did...and came up with some unrepeatable words which clearly communicated he was not impressed at how cold it was. The pool was only 11 degrees. After asking for several days to get the pool turned on to get it heated, Kelvin jumped out of the pool and immediatey switched it on. It is now warm enough to enjoy a swim and not feel like a fresh (read: icy cold) mountain spring.

While we had a spell of absolutely fantastic weather, the thigh high grass we cut with our weed eaters (strimmers) dried beautifully making some really nice hay. We bagged it and have put it under cover for the winter. The only bags we had at hand were our local county council's recycling bags (blue bags). Somehow we don't think the council intended these bags to be used to bag hay but what better way to use a recycling bag if not to 'recycle' grass into winter sheep feed. Wonder if they will give us any more bags if we ask since we used our entire stock on the hay - about 60+ bags in total.

During the week we visited Mike and Nora. For ages now we have been meaning to get them a fruit tree for their garden so we finally had time to go and do this. Mike and Nora live at Brynberllan which is Welsh for Orchard Hill. We just had to buy them an apple tree for their orchard. Picking fruit trees is quite an art, as we discovered. The local nursery has a huge range of fruit trees, with many varieties of apple trees. We spent quite a lot of time there trying to select the perfect tree. We ended up buying a tree that was quite local to the area, and one that would produce apples that could be eaten right off the tree and apples that could be used for cooking. Nora is a super cook so somewhere in the future there will be apple pie in the offing.

During the week, Angie had a quick trip to Scotland. She managed to get over to Bobby and Shiela's place and arrived in time for a 'fun day.' A fun day at Bobby's involved a wee trial with Bobby judging and at least 3 others judging each run as well. At the end of each run, the scores were compared and Bobby pointed out various aspects of judging that we all might have missed. It was interesting to see the range of scores and the things for which people deducted points. A great way to learn about the finer points of judging. Angie finished third in this fun trial with Meg.

Anne Mock from the USA enjoying her singles run with Jan.

In addition to a 'singles' competition, we also had a 'pairs' competition. A pairs competition is not to be confused with brace. Brace is one person, two dogs. Pairs is two people, two dogs trying to work together to get the sheep around a course. It was a huge amount of fun, and not as easy as it looks. Angie was paired with Ann Blomkvist from Sweden for two runs. The first dogs Angie and Ann ran were Meg (Angie) and Belle (Ann). They had a good-ish run and finished 2nd. Then they paired Ann's Jed with Angie's Jamie and won the fun event with a terrific run. Our prize(s): beer, which was duly taken home for Kelvin. Angie is now keen to have a go at Brace...but perhaps next year.

Bobby Dalziel (L) and Norman MacDonald (R) in the pairs competition.

Ann Blomkvist and Belle

Belle in action. You can see how high the rushes are in this field..almost as tall as Belle

Donald Johnston's Nick getting lost in the rushes.

The trip to Scotland was a whirlwind which saw Angie in Edinburgh for a time, and then a long trip home to Wales the same day. It was a painfully slow trip home as the M6 was a parking lot around Manchester which added an extra hour to an already long trip. Ten hours driving - groan.

This week also saw our sheep shorn. Unfortunately it rained on Friday so shearing was delayed until Saturday afternoon, and we had to go indoors as it rained Saturday as well. All of the sheep on the farm were walked down the road to the neighbour's shed. What better way to meet the neighbours than to take your sheep next door for shearing. And meet the neighbours we did. It seemed that there were more people in the shed than sheep! Oh, if only we could remember everyone's names. The nice thing about living in a rural community in Wales is that everyone comes along to help, irrespective of who's sheep are being shorn. Laughter, food, cups of tea and a job to be done seems to draw everyone together. It was nice to meet the neighbours, although many of them seemed to know quite a lot about us! Many commented on the exact number of dogs Kelvin had taken running that morning. We obviously have a very good neighbourhood watch service here, which is terrific.

On Friday we took a trip to 'town' (Carmarthen) and arrived home to find that one of our newest chickens had been severly attacked by two other chickens, most likely its mother who is as ill-tempered as they come. This young, and very pretty chicken had terrible wounds on her head and looked like it would not last the night. We had to separate this chicken from the others and Kelvin has been hand feeding it with warm milk and other goodies. It lasted the night on Friday night and today it is looking for its warm milk. She even started to stand on her feet again so it looks like this young one will make it. Her mother, well, we could just as well ring her neck...if we can ever catch her.
UPDATE June 8th: Unfortunately our beautiful wee hen died today. Kelvin buried her in the garden near the other chicks and sent her on her way with some wheat and corn.

On the topic of birds, we have a resident heron whom we have, as yet, been unable to catch on camera. Today it was sitting right in the middle of the lawn near the pond preening itself. Of course the cameras were inside and by the time we grabbed these, the heron had departed to the top field and just out of reach of the lens. We'll get a photo sometime and post it here.

The dogs have all been out on sheep this week, even the young ones - Cian, Steffi, Mike and Tim. All of them are desperate to work sheep but all are very different from each other. Bee had a turn too and she is coming along nicely. Angie has been taking it quietly with her but she is going to get out a bit more often now as she is terribly bored and ready to move on. Bee is like an energizer bunny. She is seemingly tireless and always. always enthusiastic. She has a very positive approach to sheep and a huge will to please so she is a dream to work with. There is a wee break in the trialling calendar at the moment which is just as well as there are plenty of things to do on the farm. This week our shed gets the concrete flooring put in so we will be able to get our kennels installed soon. The dogs are going to love their new accommodations.

Oh, one more thing...a few blogs ago we mused at how quickly Bailey would find the swimming pool. Well, the first day we were here she fell into the pool after mistaking the pool cover for a continuation of the pool decking. Thankfully we were there at the time and could drag her out because she could not get out of the pool on her own. We don't think there is any chance of her voluntarily going in the pool again...she is quite scared of it now but to be on the safe side, we are fastidious about shutting the door so she can't get near the pool on her own. We think she'll stick to the pond from now on.

More adventures next week...