Monday 4 June 2007

Another Busy weekend

Knowing that the sheep have a lot of fleece on them and it's getting warmer we are on "blow fly watch" so we decided that we would spray the sheep to give them some protection for a couple of weeks until a shearing day can be arranged. So again we've been watching the weather forecast as the sheep ideally need to be dry to ensure that the spray stays on their fleece, and for various reasons Sunday was the best day to do the job.
Saturday was a day of "silly" little jobs getting done. Some fencing moved near the small barn by a 3 or 4 metres, not much, but it means the sheep can keep a ditch clear of grass etc rather than either of us having to scythe it every couple of weeks.
Now that we've been here nearly 4 years, you start to notice bits of land that "if we moved that fence, some more grazing for the sheep" and to quote the youngest nephew "sheep are just woolly lawn mowers". How true!!!
Sunday we sprayed the sheep against the dreaded blow fly and part of the prevention is also to "dag out" i.e Clip the soiled fleece from around the sheep's bum!!! Guess who gets that job!!!!!
The trouble with having to use the blow fly spray, you need to be well protected, gloves, mask and overalls. So after a couple of hours you have broken out into a sweat.
Thankfully not many of the girls needed "a Brazilian" so to say!!!!!!! They are in need of shearing so that is a job for this month to arrange help for.
Here's the list,
Andrew to shear the large sheep, Denise being the light weight she is can't hold them to shear,
people to catch and turn the sheep,
wrap the fleeces,
keep the shearing area clean and
man the strings to turn the shearing machines off and on as required.
We try and make a fun day of it and on the whole everyone seems to have a good time.
Will as usual post on this blog when it's arranged

Denise

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