Saturday night is quiz night ...

Ok.. so here we go.  Starter for 10 ....

Can you spot the odd one out in the following photograph taken in the parlour tonight?

No? ...  Need another clue?

 

Strange shaped udder??

 

Mmm ...  yes indeed.  Our lovely Welsh boy Macsen ...

 

 

As you may remember, Max now has free run of all the milkers.  His current girlfriend (for today) is the lovely Pebbles.  So, wherever Pebbles goes, Max follows. 

 

And here is Pebbles smiling for the camera whilst Max tucks into his dinner (typical bloke ..)

 

I must admit that it was quite amusing to see one of the big boys coming into the parlour.  Not that we had a lot of choice.  In came Pebbles, closely pursued by over 100kg of testosterone-fuelled male goat.  There's no stopping that in a hurry.

 

But he behaved rather well and I expect that we will see him again tomorrow now that he has figured out the system!

But it did raise a smile on a day that had not started very well at all.  I arrived very early in the barn this morning to find that we had lost our dear Lucy goat during the night.  Here she is lying behind her sister Marcie a few months ago:

 

She had been desperately poorly for a couple of weeks with the same illness that affected her sister Marcie about 18 months ago. We were treating her with whatever we could and she had been doing very well but on Thursday I felt that she was starting to lose heart and was not fighting any more. I did consider getting the vet in on Friday morning to send her to the big goat shed in the sky but she rallied on Thursday night and seemed to have got some of her fighting spirit back again. Even last night she still seemed to be trying. But sadly it was not to be and she left us sometime very early this morning.   RIP my lovely goatie girl.

Another little calf arrives

So there I was, minding my own business, bottling up lovely goatie milk for customers when David's dad suddenly appeared.  Apparently one of the cows was calving and it looked like she may need help.  With David away in Gloucestershire on a 'Goat Farm Walk', there was only the batty goatkeeper to lend a hand.

So, we picked up all the necessary paraphernalia like calving ropes, big bottles of lube and a rope halter and off we went in the truck to the field down the road.  Of course, she and the other Gracie Moos were on the far side of the field ... off we trudged.  When we arrived, there was one girl standing on her own and as we approached, she moo'd at us.  Strange, I thought.  They only usually make that particular moo when they have a calf with them.  As indeed she did ....  She had popped it out all by herself without any help from those humans.

Another little bull calf!

 

He is a solid little chap and was soon up and about.  He will be good company for the older boy who is growing up very quickly:

 

 

These little calves are so lucky - they really have 5 mums to look after them!

 

 

Lucky boys!

Well, with the mating season almost at an end, it was time to move the big boys around again this morning in preparation for some larger moves planned for the coming weekend.

First of all we brought Max and his ladies back into the barn from outside in the cattle yard.  Everyone inside spotted them straight away and so there was a bit of fighting as they all got back together.  Max will stay in with the ladies for the moment to catch all the stragglers who haven't been mated yet.  He was totally at home with over 100 girls around him!  Just takes the whole thing in his stride.  Here he is having dinner with a few of them:

Then we moved Fremlin and Beamish in together as they have finished their work now but we like to keep the boys in the main barn for the winter if we have the space.  It is warmer for them and they like to be with everyone else rather than outside where they can't see what is going on!

I expect those two will be snuggled up together tonight as they are very good friends.

So, the cattle yard is now vacant which means that David can bring the Gracie Moos back up to the farm for the winter - the grass is getting a bit short and the weather is starting to turn so best to get them into the yard where we can keep an eye on these new little calves as well.

Milking time was interesting as all the girls who had been outside with Max for a few weeks insisted on coming through the parlour, even though they are all dry and don't need milking.  It means they get a bit of extra food though! 

Betty, on the other hand, stayed over the 'dry' side of the barn and then strolled round to the back gate of the parlour where she waited patiently to be let inside.  Just a little snack to keep the strength up ..

And finally .. Katherine and Jess sent through a couple of photos of our little man in his new home.  Here he is with his new friend Socks and one of the girls:

The girls have decided to call him 'Toggy' (as he is a British Toggenburg).  Think it suits him!  They were also a bit concerned that he might get cold over the winter so convinced mum Pauline that she needed to buy him a proper goat-coat.  And here he is looking very smart:

I think he will probably be the most spoiled little goat in Kent!  He is a very lucky boy to have such a nice home.

Sunshine at last!

The goaties finally considered that it was dry enough to venture outside for a while today.  Not everyone was brave enough to cross the yard to the field but most of the girlies went out for a nibble in the sunshine.  It was lovely to see them all out again after the atrocious weather of last week.

Ginger is still up to her old tricks and I regularly open the barn in the morning to find her wandering about.  Or sometimes she is just snuggled up in a comfy place and can't be bothered to move. 

There are much warmer and more comfy places to lie in the barn but she seems to like lying around near the hay bales.  Obviously she must be warm enough otherwise she would move!

And the little black man is letting himself out for a wander as well.  He only tends to come out when we are around - just jumps over the hurdles.  Then, when he is bored, he just jumps back in again!

Life is full of naughty goats!

The patter of tiny feet

The first calf arrived early this afternoon to one of the older Gracie Moos.  Not wanting to disturb them, I could only get a quick photo from a distance ... the little brown blob is our new little bull calf.  What a very proud and attentive mum she is.

Webbed feet.  That's what we need.  And I heard that it snowed briefly in Devon today!!  Hideous driving conditions on the motorway but I made it safely to Parson's Green this morning in torrential rain.  Got absolutely soaked putting up the awning and setting up the stall but I was truly humbled when my first customer appeared shivering with cold, soaked to the skin and pushing his bicycle with hands so frozen he could hardly grip the handlebars. 

He had ridden all the way across London just to come and buy milk from me.  Thinking that the market opened at 9am, he had arrived nice and early at 8.30am.  And then had to wait in the pouring rain until the market actually opened at 10am.  I did offer him my thermal gloves for the ride home but he declined, saying that he would get warm again once he started cycling back.  I hope he made it safely back to a nice warm and dry house! 

It never ceases to amaze me what lengths some of my customers will go to.  I only do a few markets in London and yet there are many customers who travel miles out of their way to get to each one just to buy our raw milk.  Truly humbling, that's all I can say.  I take my hat off to them for their dedication.

In the midst of all the darkness and rain, the Chegworth Valley stall was a blaze of colour with all their delicious fruit juices out on display:

I have to say that I am rather partial to their Apple & Elderflower but was tempted today by the new Apple & Cranberry and the 'Winter Warmer' Spiced Apple - delicious warmed up!

Wye Market yesterday also started off rather damp but was brightened up by the arrival of my friend with her two dogs Maud and Eddie (who adores cheese):

By the time I got back home in the early afternoon, it was still freezing cold but the sun was shining and the Gracie Moos were munching away on a very nice bale of silage that David had kindly taken down to them in the morning.

And Marmite was back up in her usual resting place in the greenhouse:

 

DumDum was fast asleep cosily sandwiched between her friends Lara and Blossom:

 

 

New girls Shares and daughter Silver were resting together like a pair of bookends:

And sisters Twiggy and Twinkle were also snuggled up next to each other:

 

It's nice being a goat at Ellie's Dairy!

Happy Halloween!

Bit windy for broomsticks but I will try and get up there later!

Meanwhile, I managed to get a whole load of lovely local Bramleys and pears all peeled and chopped and into my slow cookers today with a little sugar and some cinnamon sticks.  Tomorrow I will separate it all into containers for freezing so that I have lots of lovely fresh stewed fruit for the winter.  Yum!  Might well use some for apple crumble for lunch with Julie tomorrow just to get the ball rolling!

Here at Ellie's Dairy we will be hearing the patter of tiny feet again soon.  Not the goats just yet, but the Gracie Moos.  David had told me that he was expecting calves sometime in December.  But, I got to thinking about it all yesterday and checked the dates that Benji the Bull had gone in with the ladies and .... it was 9 months ago today!  So, they could be due any time.  It has to be said that they are rather large at the moment.

 

And another of our special little men went off to a new home yesterday afternoon.  Pauline, our Wye Market Manager, had sadly lost one of her two goats over the weekend and wanted to get another goat to keep the remaining one company.  So she came long to visit yesterday afternoon with husband John and twin daughters Jessie and Catherine.  I had a certain little chap in mind for them:

 

 

And indeed, they were quite smitten with him.  He is such a sweet little man.  Very good-natured and, as you see, enjoys a good cuddle.  And so off he went to his new home!  What a lucky boy he is.  I will find out at the weekend how he is getting along when I see Pauline at Wye on Saturday.  The girls are under instruction to come up with a name for him before I see them!