Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Posts slowing down

As harvest season is now well upon us and the Alpacas have settled in our number of posts have declined. Outside of breeding and our most recent birth the Alpacas have taken second fiddle to other activities. Most of our weekends and evenings has been harvesting and perserving fruits and vegatables. Peas, beans, snowpeas, currents, raspberries, blackberries, carrots, summer apples, zuchini, cucumbers have gone through major pickings and either been frozen, canned, jammed, juiced, pickled or in some cases sold. We also have added strawberries and peaches which we have bought in flats from farmers markets to be preserved for the winter. This will still continue for another month or two as beets, corn, broccoli, cauliflower, squash and pumpkins come ready and other items continue.

Non gardening tasks that need to be done before end of November include:

  • bucking and splitting another 4 - 6 cords or wood for winter
  • fixing the barn roof as there are a few small leaks,
  • building two more entrance ways,
  • aranging for water in the barn besides the hose from the house,
  • improving the door and gate system in the barn
  • getting the official website completed
  • buy a trailer to move the alpacas around (possibly saturday)
  • and if money permits, regravel the driveway which gets washed out in every big storm now.

I am sure that if I let Caroline at this list it would grow even longer. ; )

Nikki has her cria

Our final Cria of the season has been born. We have another male whom we have named Sweetnss. We wanted to use sweet in the name as his father is Sweet William in BC. Unlike the others, Sweetnss was born on a very rainy day in the barn but we were able to witness the entire event. This was fortunate as on of the legs was bent backwards so Caroline and our dairy farmer neighbour Bill, who happened to be over at the time were able to assist while I ran up to the house to put a call into the vet, just in case he was needed. Luckily he was not. Pictures to follow.