Moorlands

Last month my friend Janet and I planned to visit the Canberra Quilters show.  I left home a day early and was lucky enough to spend it at Janet and Vinces' farm, Moorlands, at Dalton.

The farm is 2 700 acres and has about 1300 sheep, this year with about 2000 lambs.  So many have twins, some have triplets and one even had quads!!  I asked Vince why there were so many multiple births this year, and he said he'd like to put it down to good planning, good pasture management and good stock, but looking around, he said, seems everyone else in the neighbourhood has achieved the same thing!!  LOL!!

This year is the first time in 10 (?) years that the region has received 'average' rainfall.  The pastures looked lush and green.

Janet and Vince have mostly Texel sheep, who have very characterful faces and are the best 'eating' sheep.  Woolworths wont buy anything that has Texel in it's pedigree, because the meat is darker - and since they are all about 'the look' they only buy the lightest red meat-ed sheep - if you're buying your meat at a supermarket, time to make a change in favour of taste!!

Moorlands is a bio-dyamic farm, and markets it's fantastically flavoursome lamb directly.  Check it out at:

www.moorlandslamb.com.au

I had a lovely time checking out all the mothers and babies, the Plymouth Rock chicks I hatched for Janet have grown up, one boy, one girl, the dogs and 'interesting' stuff on the farm.  A great day out :)

More Modern Game chooks

These are some of our Modern Game chooks,

Ginger Pile coloured girls (Iced) Vovo and Ginger (Nut)

Our darling Black Tailed Wheaton girl Poppy - very hard to take a pic of her because she is always right in your face!!  Loves being picked up.

And the enormously handsome Hugo - Silver Birchen.

Ziki and her little brood

Ziki is doing very well with her little brood of  3 chicks, 2 are Australorp x and 1 is Barnie x.  I think there are 2 pullets and a roo, but time will tell.  Zik is getting used to motherhood!!

The Garden

Here are a few shots of the garden last month, including the new water pots - my water lilies saved from the pond infill!  And our alarm clocks here - a pair of v noisy kookaburras!

Modern Game Bantams

These are some of our Modern Game Bantams, they are such personable little birds.
Daisy - a silver birchen - has 6 chickens at the moment.  To keep them safe the family is in a big rabbit hutch up near the house.  Unlike the silkie mums who are very protective of their babies and not keen on sharing them at all, Daisy's little mob have learnt from their mum that 'people are good'.  The chickens are nearly a fortnight old now, and this morning they not only came racing towards me for to get brekky treats - rice and corn - but the literally jumped into my hand as I lowered the spoon into the cage!!

Daisy hatched eggs from several chooks, including Poppy, Vovo and Hetty, seen here with Florenzo (purchased as Florence, but gave the game away by starting to crow!!)

In the garden this week - the 'black' anemones are flowering and just look spanking gorgeous.

Cleaning up the pots I disturbed a moth - very attractive fellow, see:

Peanut and Kiwi

Coco is a Silver Pencilled Wyandotte x Silkie, she's gorgeous, and she knows it!!  She's head chook!!

Here a couple shots of my darling partridge silikes Peanut and Kiwi (my fav), they are bearded silkies, good layers and in their second season.  I have had quite a lot of babies (incubator) from these girls.  Peanut is broody now, sitting on 7 eggs and we are looking forward to hatching day.

Dash

This is Dash, she belongs to my friend Gayle.  A gorgeous little dog, and expert mouse-er!!  I plan to us these pics for a textile art 'pet' challenge, if I ever get my Mac back!!

What a view

Went to visit Karen and Peter on the weekend, this is the view from their lounge room window - brill or what!!

 

New Bird sighting

This morning on the walk I was startled by a crashing in the undergrowth, a large-ish chestnut coloured bird had landed on a branch near the path.  It seemed completely unperturbed, and stayed put as I walked past!

Have now identified it as a Brown Cuckoo Dove, a new bird for my 'list'.