A very cold start to the day -14 here.

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A distant I.O.M.

Taken while out 'muck' spreading.

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From our kitchen window

We never get snow like this....
The kids love it.

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This should keep us going for a while...

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Heston Island

Taken from the shore road in Auchencairn

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Clearing the field is such fun....

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My Top Is Missing

An email sent to Pukka Pies and their response...

Well done Pukka Pies

ARGGGGGGH can you imagine our dispair,

When the boxes were opened and one lid wasn't there,

My Pukka Pies wrong, it's body incompleat,

With shock and pure anguish I fell off my seat,

With menacing looks we stared at each other,

My wife said 'sorry love we don't have another!'.

Then suddenly silence fell on the room,

Darkness, forboding a vision of DOOM,

As you will guess my wife got the top,

I only pray these mistakes they will stop.

A very hungry and sad

Sean.

Dear Sean

I thank you so much,

For your well thought out verse,

And would like to say sorry,

And of course reimburse.

Please forward your address,

Just as soon as you can,

Then a letter and cheque,

I will send by post man.

Thank you again,

You have quite made my day.

And I wish all complaints,

Could be made in this way!

Kind Regards

Ms Kerry Dickens

Customer Services Manager

November 5th GCUSA auction shoot

What a day we had, every drive worked like a dream with good 'flushes' and high flying birds.
Total tally for the day worked out as 171 birds for 783 shots over 6 drives with a very even ratio of 4.57 shots per bird.
Our American 'guns' were over the moon saying it had been the best day of their trip! (the 'tip' would support this).
A great way to start the season!
We are Lot 18 on page 12 of the catalogue with an estimated value of $70,000 - $ 90,000, the lot went for something in the region of £75,000.

True or False

A....  A child who's mum is in hospital gets a taxi to their school ?
B..... A registered alchoholic gets a taxi to make a 12 mile round trip to deliver a bottle of whisky to their house everyday ?
C..... A registered alchoholic gets a daily cash allowance to buy their drink and a free bus pass to get to the off license ?
D.... .A cat will be boarded at council expence if it's owner can not look after it ?

B, C and D are all true but we now know that A is not.
The child (A) has now had to start in a new school..... short term we hope.
B, C and D are happy, or seem to be.
I do believe that everyone should be looked after if needed, but could there be any chance of common sense?
Sorry for the 'rant' but as we are all being told to save money I'm starting to wonder why !

The Season Starts

Monday 1st November
The season starts, over the last few weeks things have changed quite a lot, about 5 weeks ago our  gamekeeper decided enough was enough and changed career.....
That's left myself and another the task of trying to get everything ready, hopefully this is now done.
Our first 'Shoot' is on Friday the 5th... it's not just any shoot though, it's part of an auction lot that sold for over £75,000 in New York and they bought a 200 bird day!
Well here's hoping everything is going to be OK....
I'll let you know

I just had to share this...

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Made for two by Fen

It's great when you hear from friends, but when their daughters are creating music like this it's even better....
The only problem is it makes one feel very old, please have a listen...
Thanks
Made for two by Fen

Feeding

Up bright and early bird feeding on one of the drives...it's rather chilly this morning.

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Sea Fishing

Didn't catch anything but the waves were fantastic....
Great fun!

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Frank and Zappa

Meet Frank and Zappa our two new cockerels.

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My first stick

This is my first attempt at a walking stick, I wonder if it will survive the first 'beat'....

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Two very content sheep

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Before the storm

About 30 seconds after this photo was taken the house was struck by lightning....
I now have a very ill 'laptop'...
Any ideas?

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Creating up

It was 10.30 by the time the birds were loaded, hard work but then again, what a way to end the day...
For the next 3 nights I'm on collection duty, picking up kids from the 'Wickerman' festival, that's going to make me feel old.

Just a photo

First day without rain for ages, 1500 Phesant and 4500 Partridge are being shipped out tomorrow so I hope it lasts...

Mini Tornado ?

This is just one of the sheds destroyed by the winds last night...
Even though the field looks like the footprint left by a tornado the death toll was low thank goodness.
Now for the repairs, a busy weekend ahead...

Fox visit

So after days of work making the release pens safe for the birds, strimming, patching holes, putting up electric fences and so on, to keep them in and the cunning fox out, the first 1200 are spending their first night in the real world. What a great sight to see them perching in the trees and rooting for grubs.
Things have not gone so well at home though, while we were all out it seems a fox has paid us a visit and has taken 2 of our chickens, Olive and Bessie, 2 out of 1200 I can live with but 2 out of 6 has left the hen house looking very empty, not good.

Looking East

Starting feeding early today as things have fallen behind due to the weekend weather. Just had to take this photo, what a start to the day.

Great waves

The strong winds make for a good sea but they have also blown the sheds around and washed away the Lobster pot...
Tomorrow is clean up day.

The end of the longest day.

Just caught this, been on the beach and had to drive up a very steep hill to 'catch up with the Sun'

The longest day starts

Looking out over Heston Island,

A very good BBQ... With no Lanb or Chicken

These better not be 'lamb burgers'

What a way to spend an evening...

Not a sound except for the sea,, I should have posted a video but nothing is happening.

On top of the World

Looking over the Solway.... Fantastic sea mist.

Checking the pot

I think we will leave it for today, the tides far to fast.

The Layers

Bessie, Lizzy, Fanny, Gladis, Dorris and Olive enjoying a few grubs....

The first batch

Here are some of the first batch of 'home hatched' Phesant.
Only another 8000 to go....
This group all hatched yesterday.

Troy and Molly

A rather confused Troy is wondering why this creature keeps head-butting him.

From small things.....

The main event of the week without any doubt has been the arrival of these two, the kids have called them 'Molly' and 'Cuddles'.
Both rejected by their mum's they have now come to live with us and with a bit of care and attention I hope they will become the backbone of our 'flock'. At the same time the chicken run has been built and we are now awaiting the delivery of six ex-battery hens, a happy retirement for them and some great eggs for us!

The game farm has now kicked into gear and in the last week we have set up the main indoor shed ready for the Pheasant chicks that will soon be emerging from the eggs we are collecting, at the same time we have set up the first 45 sheds on the 'field', ready for the Partridge that are due to arrive on the 20th, all we have to do now is connect the water and the gas. It's starting to get busy!

A Lucky Lamb

So this is how the story goes.....
Out in the fields, early morning, checking for new lambs.
Find a sheep that has just lambed but no lamb in sight, after taking a good look around and still not finding anything it's time to get on and put the missing lamb down to a Fox, but the sheep knows better!

Mum (no longer Sheep) pesters and leads to a Rabbit hole, set in one of those 'Horseshoe' shaped things, I'd say 'bunkers' you get on steep fields
All that could be seen was a little nose and two eyes deep down the hole, the 'mum' had used the shelter of the land and when the lamb had touched down on Earth it's back legs had gone straight down the hole, the more it wriggled the deeper it got!

'Trog' is now doing very well as can be seen, (little black face in the middle of the photo)

Beach Camping

All this for only £5 a night... Even in March

I shouldn't really be showing this but if you want to camp in SW Scotland you need to know.
This is 'Newton Beach' near Gatehouse of Fleet in Dumfries and Galloway, if you want to camp the way it was done before showers, toilet blocks, swimming pools and laid on entertainment, then this is the best place to go in SW Scotland.
As you can see, here the tent is pitched on the beach (check the tide hight) and open fires are a must. If you like it quiet then go any month except for July and August, but even when it's busy it's fun. In the busy months the 'locals', mainly from NE England, have a huge communal fire on the beach at night and take all the kids out on their boats during the day fishing.

Lobster pots

That's the first pot in, the top photo shows where the pot is (at the entrance to the cave mentioned in the last post), the second is looking along the coast towards the Dundrennan fireing range and the last shows the cliff I had to crawl down to get to the sea... not fun, I hate hights!
I'll be checking it on Monday, so fingures crossed!

17th Feb 2010 'Plumdally'

Spent today erecting a deer fence in preparation for the planting of about 500 Beach trees, it was so warm, so close to the bay and not a breath of wind. I must admit, I am really pleased with the photo of the Sun, it's looking SW across 'Barlocco Bay' and the 'Solway', you can see the famous 'Solway Mist' that used to enable the smugglers to disappear like ghosts. Just over the headland on this photo is a cave that is tall enough to hide a small sailing rigg and was used by the smugglers, it's also where we are placing our Lobster pots (keep an eye out for the pics) I'm looking forward to the rewards!

12th Feb 2010

Started to build the 'laying pens' today but due to the fantastic weather it was decided to go and do something else... Not only was it great fun but it will encourage loads of new growth, kill a lot of the 'ticks' and also help to get rid of 'Myxi' by killing the fleas.

We are building 50 small laying pens with 9 hens in each plus another 500 hens in the main pen, giving a total of 950 hens that now need to be caught over the next 4 weeks... here we go!

9th Feb 2010

Nice sunrise this morning, it's starting to feel 'Springy'
The bird rearing season is upon us again next week, bird catching, egg collecting, hatching, pen building and all the other things that need to be done. I'm looking to post regular photos, so keep taking a quick look to see how it's going, I wonder when the first one day old chick will appear!

A Great Video 8th Feb 2010

This video was created by a young girl from the village.... not what I was expecting but I think it's brilliant!

Today's shoot in photos 30th Jan 2010

A few photos taken on today's shoot, only a small rough shoot but the last of the season here. Very cold first thing but by the afternoon it was fantastic.