Marching into More Activity

It's been a busy month so far, with no significant rain until the last two days, which hopefully will green up our pastures and we'll get a late spurt of growth before winter. Having just had a southerly blow through, it's really starting to feel like autumn - and to date - woefully, still no wood in the wood shed.



Jennifer working on the framework for the woodshed. Plenty of 6 inch nails and nail clamps going into this little lot!

It has progressed now to a four wall dwelling, lacking only the roof and a few bits of trim - the corrugated iron has to be cut to size and nailed on and the door will follow 'later' ... Jennifer has currently rendered herself unable to do a lot due to ongoing back pain - her condition described by one provider as 'your chassis is wearing out'! Add a strained muscle and a pinched nerve to that and you get the picture.

Anyway, the cows and calves were separated at the beginning of the month. Bella and Bonnie bellowed for a few days - both for their two calves and for a boyfriend (which we are still trying to arrange) - but the two calves, Clarissa and Charlie, were pretty oblivious. They are with our two weaners, Zita and Zelda, and are gradually getting more friendly and letting us get closer to them.

Thursday 17 March was memorable as well as being St Patrick's Day, in that our biggest, finest ram lamb, Barry - was re-introduced to Annabel, Astra and Aroha. Bart, our second and slightly smaller (although not, apparently, where it counts) ram lamb, was singled off with our biggest ewe, Abigail (Barry's mum). Both encounters appear, to date, amicable. With the full moon (and a biggie it was too, the closest the moon has been to the earth in 18 years) on the 20th, we are hoping both these liaisons are fruitful.

We have also been busy getting quotes for plumbing up our second water tank, to collect the rainwater from the implement shed. We have now arranged this, and also have accepted a quote for inserting the well (where Honk the water diviner predicted water in the back yard), supplying and connecting the appropriate pump, plus a large main water line to a tap on the fence line. Brian, our wonderful 'digger man' has rebedded the new water tank, dug the trenches to lay the water line back to the downpipe on the shed and to connect the two water tanks to equalise, then Kevin, our great electrician, rushed to lay an electric line in the same trench from our garage to the implement bay (we can get the bay shed wired up later), Paul the plumber arrived to do both jobs, and it has been all go in our back yard for the last couple of days.

Brian dug the well. Honk the water diviner was spot on, except water was evident at about 1.5 metres, or 6ft - Honk had predicted 12 ft down. Note the walls are on the wood shed now

And then we got two days of rain ...