The rams have been busy! Harold has served all his quota of 11 ewes and all now have yellow marks on their rear from his yellow raddle crayon. I have now changed it to orange and we wait to see if any ewes come back in season. Henry is sporting a red raddle and is presently with his 11 crossbred ewes some od whom have not yet been served, he gets his crayon changed to green at the end of the week.
Finally young Hedgehunter my ram lamb who was supposed to have 2 ewes this year found himself put in with 11 pedigree ewes all of whom are related to Harold and for whom a new ram would have been purchased had it not been for the recent movement restrictions.........Henry will be coming along later just in case the youngster was not up to the job!!
Our move to Cornwall is now not happening as we have been gazumped by another buyer..........this practice should be banned! Also the estate agent dealing with the matter would not either let us know there had been another offer nor once we found out let us up our offer!!!
So Somerset it is for the moment!

Next week we have a visit from Muddy Matches and a TV company following my wool from the sheep to the knitting needles................I will tell all after the event!

We went to Cornwall the other day to have a look around........we will be moving to Camelford (hopefully, fingers crossed, by the end of the year). Whilst we were there we had a visit to the Eden project, amazing metal statues in the temperate dome pictured here.

The Rams have gone in with the groups of ewes sporting their raddle harnesses......Harold has yellow, Henry red and Hedgehunter, my ram lamb has none as he is too small but is running with a group of ewes that Henry will go to in November. If he does serve any it will be a bonus as he is a very good looking lad!
We still have 20 butchers lams to go before we move, most will go to the Queens Arms in the next village called Pitminster.......so if you want to eat fantastic lamb in a lovely pub you know where to go!

Well things have been a bit frantic here! trying to keep the house tidy for the continual troop of prospective purchasers has been a challenge. It is also our busiest time sheepwise with lambs going to the abattoir weekly to supply the demand from the pub and private customers. We have also been supplying Abraham Natural products
Prices for those selling commercially have been terrible due to the fact that we are banned from exporting foot and mouth susceptible animals ...........some have had to sell prime lambs for £10!!!
Saying that I sold some breeding ewes in the first market for ages today and got £10 per animal for the Shetland ewes!!! Others made between £30 and £42 which was about 25-30% less than they should!
There was a general air of resignation about the market as I spoke to friends and contacts, with feed prices increasing daily no one can afford to hang on to sheep until better prices come along.

On a more positive note (well I know its all been sounding depressing recently!) I thought I would post some pictures of Otterford lakes
This is the lost gardens of Helligan all over again, the picture of the gate in the trees being where there is an amazing walled garden hidden in the trees. There are 2 lakes, an old coach house that is pictured and the position of the house is still littered with bits of old gutter and rubble in the brambles! Its a wonderful place for a walk and very eerie too!