May I be excused?
Jack spends his May bank holiday sharing an update from Hill Top Farm. It’s time to start planning for the show season but things don’t quite go as planned.
May the best sheep win
With showing season just around the corner, I suggested to Dad that it was about time to fetch the Welsh lambs and ewes into the field by the house to get on with some halter preparation. It takes weeks of training to get them ready for the show ring and I want to do our best.
Devil may care
The Welsh ewes and lambs were in the bottom field by the river. It’s a nice little spot with a bridge where Sal likes to play Pooh sticks. She’s not the only one. It’s a popular spot for walkers and there is a right of way that stretches along that boundary. We’ve seen many more walkers along the stretch of the river since the first lockdowns. If I lived on an estate, surrounded by other houses with a garden the size of a postage stamp, I could see the attraction in driving out to a spot like that for my daily exercise. Cars still park up there regularly and folks get out for a little wander. But, very occasionally, there is a walker who leaves the gate open and our sheep end up loose on the hill. As common land, it is vast and fence-less and a utopia for a Welsh ewe. Welsh ewes don’t need very much encouragement to escape through the tiniest gap in a fence. Leaving the gate open is an invitation hard to pass up, and they can cover miles in a day, with their four feet and endless determination.
To be fair to Dad, he has done his best to send them in the right direction. He’s put up signs. Several signs. He’s asked very nicely in a range of fonts and slogans. While nearly all walkers are very respectful, friendly people, there’s always one who can’t use the ‘perfectly good stile’, as Dad calls it. (Dad’s complaints are not only limited to a small number of walkers, but to delivery drivers too, but that’s for another blog.)
Anyway, to cut a long story short, as we headed to the bottom field to fetch the Welsh ewes, we found that the gate had been left open again. Cue Dad losing his sense of humour.
As luck may have it
There’s no easy or clever way of gathering stray sheep in from the hill. It has to be done the hard way. Mum, Sal and Tommy came to the rescue, along with Meg. Thank goodness for Meg. And Dad took the quad. With a lot of sweat and a little bit of noise we managed to gather them together in a group to head back for the gate. It can be a hit and miss, but thankfully one of the older ewes spotted the gate, recognised home, and made her way through. The rest? Well, they followed like sheep.
Jack – Farmer in Training
Jack was born to farm. He just loves helping out his dad, and his trusty dog Meg is never far away. Farming is in his blood and bones. He has his own small flock of sheep, a few hens and some calves. He has great plans to expand his own enterprise (though Dad says he has to learn to walk before he can learn to run). He may be little but his ambitions are huge.
