Not for the squeamish

Pictures

Mutton on the menu

Well we finally got around to killing 2 of our ewes today. We chose No19 and No 55 because they were the wildest ones who always hung back when I fed them every day. They are the most difficult sheep to yard and given that we do need to get the sheep in for a check regularly, it was fair enough that we should cull out those ewes that were least cooperative.
The starter plan was to get all the sheep up to the yard and then pop the 2 chosen ones in the race. It all started off well as they were the only 2 that headed up to the race. the other 4 stayed in a tight flock under the totara tree. So mike and I steered them up the hill very gently towards the race. Our race is set at quite an obtuse angle that apparently does not encourage entry and the 2 girls decided to make a break for it after all.
Plan 2 was to drop them in the field. Using the bins to read the ear tags and with Mike using the .22, the ewes were shot cleanly in the head from 20 feet away whilst they stood next to their mates.
The living sheep only ran off when we started to approach the carcases. Their throats were cut to drain the blood and we left them for a bit.
The next job was to gut them. The boys took a keen interest in this, especially Stuart, who did his best to identify the internal organs. We found that each ewe had 8 teeth the 4th pair of which were fairly small relative to the others.
We kept the heart and lungs for school dissections and the liver and kidneys for our own consumption.
We took the carcases up to the garden to be skinned. This was quite fiddly and time consuming but working as a team we got the job done - just like Bob the Builder!
We had thought about butchering ourselves, but decided to use a professional for this first time.
Stuart and eric have commandeered the fleeces and Stuart has been trying to spin some of the wool.
Tea was liver and fried bread - very tasty. We have asked the butcher to turn the rest into roasts, chops, mince and sausages.

The other pictures are of a trip Eric and I took last week to the gumfields above Ahipara. They used to dig up Kauri gum here many years ago, now it is a vast expanse of low growing bush and scrub.

My family and other animals

Some of us are coming out of illness, Chan and nyself, while Stuart is going down with the lurgey. All 3 boys took part in their school's cross country races yesterday which took place at Pukepoto School. They are all a bit achy today.

Not a lot of news this week. The chickens have started to lay much better and we are getting more eggs now than we have had since the Autumn. That gives us something to barter with. Our neighbour gave us a long roll of instant fencing that was surplus to her needs and so we installed it as the veggy garden fence last weekend. I also started to dig a drainage ditch along the edge of the wire. The plan is that each veggy bed will be raised and the water will drain down into the stream. I might be able to use the same channels to irrigate in the summer if I can rig a pipe up from the water trough to the garden.

The pictures are of assorted animals and eric. The centipede was about 6 inches long and was found by Mike in a manuka stump. They have a nasty nip apparently, but I did not try it out.

London Visit.

During the next few weeks i shall start to add photo's of our journey to the UK.
As well as meeting up with lovely family and friends ,we also had a small cahnce to visit some great places.
Here follows some photo's of Eric's trip to the big smoke. The smoke was this time caused by the heat as well as fumes.
As you can see the weather was great and so were the views.
Visit to London courtesy of Grandad Ely.

It is still raining and now we are ill!

Well we could be in Lancashire the way the weather has been this week. Cold winds and heavy showers. Last w/e there was so much rain that the river that flows past the start of Church road ad risen by 6 metres. I did wonder if it would go over the top before I got back from school. Fortunately it did not. In fact the council are pleased that the drains coped with such a lot of rain as they have been removing silt and obstructions over the past year and this was the first dbig test of how well they had done their work.
The dampness took its toll and whilst the rest of the family soldiered on, I took thursday and Friday off work. It was very quiet and restful being at home with just the animals for company all day. I am over the worst of it and hope to get back to things on Monday.
Other news: Eric has started working out 3x a week at a local gym. Chantelle is going as well, so they are spending quite a bit of time inspecting muscles in front of the mirror for early signs of swelling. Myself I don't see what's wrong with taking an axe to the pampas when you want an upper body workout, but I guess it is not the same.
There are some signs of spring in the air. The nights are slowly but surely getting shorter. Being a nerd through and through I have marked the outline of Kaitaia Heights onto our kitchen window and I am marking the position of the setting sun every week. it is good to see it heading back towards Ahipara and getting later by a few minutes each night. Early on in the week I was able to go down to the dam and cut scrub for an hour in the light after work. The chucks have started laying again, production began within 2 days of my increasing their rations and giving them layers mash.
Pictures may follow when I take some.

Its raining

The forecast was for a weekend of rain and so far that is what we have got. Hence the logburner picture.
We have spent the week recovering from journeys. Chantelle was back at school on Monday, but were both under par with a bout of the virus that is doing the rounds.

The sheep is called Independence which is not a very appropriate name for a wether who jumped 2 fences to get back to his girls rather than go off a solo journey back to the farm on which he was born. The 2 most awkward ewes got a week's reprieve because the homekill butcher we were going to use is busy today.

Meanwhile we are feeding increased rations to the hens as we havent had a single egg for a fortnight and no more than 1 a day for the last 4 months. i am starting to wonder if they have either a) all gone on strike b) are not getting enough food or c) are actually all cocks in disguise.