Glynelwyn News - 2023
2023
Another year has absolutely flown by but then again, we have
certainly filled the year.
We decided we needed to start cutting down a bit on our workload as
we're not getting any younger but there is still a lot of life in us
'old dogs' yet.
The wonderful views that we have enjoyed over the years still give us the same thrill every time.
Dragons Breath over the valley
Double Rainbow
Sunset over the Preseli Hills
Winter Full Moon
More amazing sunsets
Over the previous Winter, we dug out the duck pond that had become overgrown with lilies. The ducks now have access to a lot more water to swim around in.
SHEEP : So, as a result of cutting back on the workload, as the current flock of sheep are
getting older, we do have a few casualties, generally over the
winter months and we are no longer replacing them, especially having
'wound up' Faithmead Yarns, albeit it, still having a good customer
base for the fleeces, once sheared around May time.
On that note, we lost a couple of our very special ones this past
year. Little Fennel Pumpkin (Corriedale) who was Special Needs from
2 weeks old and the little Ryeland Thumbelina who was also a bottle
fed lamb from birth.
Neither appeared to suffer any trauma etc, and we think both just suffered heart failure and passed away peacefully. At the type of writing (30the December 2023) we currently have 'Wonderful Wanda The Wensleydale' and the ever so tiddly Sweetpea (Coloured Ryeland) both living in the goat paddock and both going into their individual pens at night. Both are minus a lot of teeth and therefore need some extra feed and tlc to keep them safe.
Wanda has survived 2 episodes of being found laying down in mud and too exhausted to be able to stand up. Amazingly she has pulled through both times.
We do still rear a few molly lambs (orphan lambs) and thus still
filling our freezer in early winter each year, along with the
freezers of regular and loyal customers.
We also rear some of the
boy goats for meat, which has a delicious flavour and Dereks Goat
Goulash is just sublime. It means these boys get to live a very
happy albeit rather short life, but they do have a purpose and we
very much feel we are doing them justice.
On the sujbject of the goats, we are still have a registered herd of
Pedigree Anglo Nubians although again, we lost 4 this year, which
was very sad. Our best milker Lyra went down with ecoli-mastitis 2
day after kidding triplets and despite the vet and I giving our best
for 5 days, we had to admit defeat in the end and let her go. We
also said a VERY sad goodnight to our gorgeous Manuka who was only 9
but was beginning to suffer badly with her arthritis.
Manuka was our
bionic goat, whom many of you will remember, broke her leg at 2
weeks of age and ended up having the break plated. She always had a
weak leg and it was shorter than the other, but she managed
admirably and produced some fabulous kids, 2 of which are still with
us. Another one we had to have PTS was Lindyhop who produced a
couple of lovely kids in her short life, but her udder was damaged
and although we had vet intervention to try and correct it, she
persistently removed any remedial work that was done and in the
spring this year, she too was on the verge of mastitis due to
massive one sided udder. Lastly, dear old Jasmine who was also about
10 years old, started to suffer from a mystery illness and stopped
eating back at the beginning of the winter. The vet was puzled too
and we came to the conclusion there was likely something cancerous
going on in her stomach, which was very sad.
However, we still have Tayberry (retired from breeding), Peony,
Harriet and Harriet's daughter from this year - Hettie. Both Peony
and Harriet are in kid to the awesome Feenix once again and so end
of February and early March 2024, should see some new kids on the
block.
PIGS:
At the end of the summer we saw our last Pedigree Berkshire
Boar and Sow go off to a breeder down in Cornwall. We decided that
the pigs, aside from being extremely expensive to feed post
pandemic, are a lot of work especially in the winter and was the one
thing we needed to be able to pick and choose when we reared them.
So, having had the final 3 weaners reach a very decent weight in
October, we had our last lot of home bred, home reared Berkshire
Pork go in the freezer (and once again, to faithful followers of our
meat). From now on we will continue with Berkshires, but will buy in
2 or 3 weaners around February time each year and finish them during
the summer.
Another big change is certainly a money saving one and that is that
due to the reduced number of sheep, we no longer needed to rent the
additional grazing land from our friend 2 miles up the road. Every
year for the past 11 years, weve taken a fab crop of haylage from
one of those rented fields, which has fed all our animals throughout
the winter, as is the case at present.
With luck we'll have enough in our stack from this year to last next winter too and by then, we'll be able to manage by haylaging one of our own fields here at home.
The weather was a mixture of a long, hot dry spell followed by a
long wet spell, and now followed by the usual very bizarre weather
we are all beginning to get used to. Endless storms, high winds, a
LOT of rain and just a bit of MUD ! However, no where near as much
mud now that the pigs have gone.
The Swallows came in April as they do every year, and we had numerous nests and fledglings throughout the season.
Until it was time for them to leave.
We must not forget our wonderful, energetic, messy, always on the go collies, Pip, Tig and Dash!
The honeysuckle always puts on a show
Mandy is always baking!
Hot Cross Buns
Chocolate Brownies
So, having made a lot of adjustments, we managed to have a whole
weeks holiday AWAY at the end of June in 2023 and did one of the
things we'd longed to do; we hired a narrowboat on the Shropshire
Union Canal.
We took Tig and Dash the two girl dogs, whilst Pip stayed home and was looked after by our lovely friend Anna, who came for a 'holiday' here in Wales as well as looking after the house and Pip. Our great friend Cindy, who looks after all the animals morning and evening whilst we're away at Dog Agility weekends, took on the entire week of livestock keeping and so we were able to relax and thoroughly enjoy our well earned break, knowing everything back at the ranch was in very good hands.
Grazing has been good this year
... and it was not until the end of November that we brought in our first bale of haylage.
With 2024 just a couple of days away, we are planning our calendars
for the year and have already booked another Canal holiday, this
time on the fabulous Llangollen Canal as well as lots of Agility
competitions throughout the summer. Kidding will commence end of Feb
and if all goes according to plan, some new Berkshire weaners will
appear somewhere around Feb/March time too.
Also, the polytunnel still stands and we continue with the veg
growing albeit not very well and so hopefully we might have a bit
more time to do a better job of it in 2024.
For now that's about it. Happy New Year one and all and will
endeavour to update a little more often from now on.
Mandy
|
Click on year to see News for that year  |
