September days

All the lambs are sold now bar a few stragglers who will go later in the autumn.  The place looks quite empty without them.

We managed to have a last picnic down by the Boathouse earlier in the month.  It was warm and very still, and the sunset was magical.

Still lots of greenery in the Keder.  I have harvested masses of tomatoes, which I 'sun-dried' using a low oven, and put in olive oil.  They are delicious and I suspect won't last long! 

We have had some rain recently.  (possibly an understatement!)  Farmer said there was 3 inches over one weekend, and this makes keeping the track in as good as a condition as we want it to be in, quite hard.  You fill the potholes, and no sooner than it has rained that hard again, and the potholes are back.   It is quite a back breaking job as you can imagine. 

We had an invasion of caterpillars.  Coco sat patiently while I photographed them.   They are Buff-tip moth caterpillars, and will overwinter in the undergrowth under the Hazel and Birch trees they have almost stripped bare!  We will definitely be looking out for lots of moths next year.

Allsorts of weather.  Allsorts of seas.  

And sunsets. 

In the middle of the month we took off to the other end of the country, taking Daughter down to the art school of her choice.  We had a bit of an Indian summer down there too, which was lovely.  We came home to this beautiful sunset on Tuesday! 

Jamie's cows are enjoying the mild autumn days.  They are doing a good job of munching down the Black Park and the Haunn field.

Seed collecting for Kew Gardens... Mull Native Woodlands Group are collecting seed for a project at Kew Gardens to create a tree and shrub tree seed bank.   A determined group of collectors came over yesterday afternoon and we endeavoured to collect Hazel, Alder and Honeysuckle.  There are strict guidelines as to how to go about this and how to record what you collect and where you collect it from.  

We had A, the MNWG chair, keeping us right.   We found a good amount of Honeysuckle, though a lot of seed had already been taken by birds, or fallen off in the wind, or dried up.    We didn't find as many Hazel nuts as we had hoped, but presume the wind will have played a part in scattering them far and wide.  Kew don't want seed that has fallen on the ground, but when we found nuts on the ground we kept them separate to use for the MNWG tree nursery. 

Making silage while the sun shines

The rust on the blades wears off when the mower goes mowing.  Yesterday Farmer mowed our field and the field at Calgary and a field over near Salen.

Farmer 'rowed up' the Calgary field once he had done ours this morning ready for the baler. 

Patches of heather slowly fading now, but the bog is still vital in colour.

The other Farmer appears with an enormous baler and makes 75 bales. His machine makes a heavier denser bale than ours (used to) so this is probably equivalent to about 100 bales, meaning we have nearly 200 days worth of silage/food in the winter store now. Excellent work Farmer!  Here is the baler finishing the last bales.  

A Red Admiral, newly emerged I think, as its wings look so fresh but crumpled.  It sat for such a long time in the one place.

On the school run, the campers at Calgary were getting ready to party by the sounds of things! A huge party, with gazebos, and loo tents, and jet skis.  

Back home a party of a more sedate kind as the hens huddle waiting to get out of their run.  They are still laying really well. 17 eggs today!

Sunlight this evening on the buoys hanging on the gate post.

Light pouring in through the garden shed windows.

All we need now is dry weather for the wrapping.

85% moon rising over Shian this evening.

I could hardly ask the guests to move their cars...

Farmer putting everything away for the night.

And a sunset to delight.