Well Hello There!

It is now 6th November and it is snowing/sleeting/and raining in no particular order. "Nesh" as we used to say, so miserable in fact that I can't find anything I would rather be doing outside so I guess I will have to sit down and do this Blog! I see its been 9 weeks since I last posted though quite frankly I don't know where the time went.
First of all we bundled the kids off back to University, then we were busy making a 3rd cut of hay. Next we bought in another two flocks, one of 39 head the other one 3 head. The large group were Dorset and Dorset cross and the 3 amigos as we call them were Coopworths, a Romney Leicester cross which makes a lovely ewe and I just wish we had 300 instead of 3.
This Thanksgiving we flew to Kingston Ontario to see our youngest two at University, my first time there and with the Fall colours it was a great trip. Kingston is an interesting historic place with a vibrant down town and if you ever go there visit "The Sleepless Goat" cafe, my wife says their 7 layer chocolate cake is heaven!! We did a tour on a boat through the Thousand Islands which was a riot of Fall colours and is the best way to see them and oh yeah we saw the kids!
We have also completed a Farm Environmental Plan and passed with flying colours so in due course we will be given a sign for our farm gate to say that we are doing it right. Personally I am not sure what all the fuss is about as we have always farmed this way, only now it is called sustainable and green, putting us on the map. I'm not to sure if it puts us on the extra profit map yet, time will tell. Next week the same fellow is coming to do a Bio-Diversity plan on the farm, but with all the worms, bugs, birds and four legged wildlife we have around along with lots of weeds and trees as well as a river with salmon in it, I'm hoping to get another colourful sign.
More recently we sorted the flock into breeding groups and put the rams into their respective groups. This should give us lambs starting around 1st April when Spring should start to be waking up in this valley.
Rosa our dog has been growing like a weed though not without problems. The Dorset flock we brought in do not like her and run when she gets near, so Rosa runs after them to say Hi and it never ends. We hoped the ewe's would settle, no luck, and scolding Rosa was difficult as I am not there all day watching. So I found a nice length of chain for her, attached around her neck it drags along the ground to her back feet. Its not very heavy so it doesn't hurt her but when she runs she treads on the chain and stumbles, after an afternoon of getting used to it the excess running has stopped and the Dorset ewes are much calmer and happy grazing. Rosa can still run to great me but can't turn corners while on the run or else she does a lip stand. I will leave this on for a couple of weeks and then remove it, this should be long enough to break the pattern and then we will see if she has learnt to behave.