The cows and the king cups.

A lovely evening on Calgary beach on Friday night for Daughter and myself. Farmer was on his way back from Oban, and I saw him drive past as we enjoyed the evening sun.  He went straight home to move the cows who had been roaming around in small groups on the hill, while he was away (cat away, mice will play sort of thing) - they clearly could smell the grass on the in bye!

The other night, we walked up to the lochan so that Farmer could put some magic blue mastic round the pipe in the repaired dam.  It is slowly, slowly filling up. (Water went over Farmer's wellies!)  There was a mist rising off the water and secrets revealed when the levels were low are gradually being hidden again. You can see the spits of soil between the old peat cuttings.  In a day or so they will have covered over completely.

The cows are in the field between Haunn and the Point.  They have plenty of area to roam, and roughage to find.  Farmer was hoping to stop feeding them, but still the grass is slow to come. Usually by this time the fields would be ankle deep in grass, but not this year.  So tomorrow we are ordering more cattle food from Fort William.  Never before have we needed to buy feed in so late in the spring.

The calves all congregate in a 'nursery'.  There was one cow with them, and the others were spread out across the field.

Slowly the cows came up and had a look at us as well.

Looking past us for signs of the food.

Calling for her calf.

Here he is, at last. Our new bull.  You can see his heart shaped tattoo. Daughter wants to call him Cupid. Farmer refers to him as Hearty.

This cow is no 63. She is our oldest, born before January 1996.

The woodland area to the west of the Black Park is always of interest.  The willow is flowering now, and there are masses of king cup, as well as primrose and clumps of birds foot trefoil and the pale cuckoo flower.

The sea was flat calm this morning.

Wild garlic is beginning to flower.

The elm is looking so pretty.

Puffed ball in Scoma field.

Rum was looking beautiful this morning.

I am having trouble with broodies insisting on sharing a nesting box.

 The new mystery breed - those are certainly not Maran - are getting braver.

The lambs have their first try of the lamb bucket! It took a few days before they latched onto the idea of the milk coming from there and not from Farmer with a bottle.

Plans are afoot to get the in bye lambs in and through the fank.  It is too early to gather the hill, it is too far for the smaller lambs at their age to walk, but the in bye ewes are now in the hill park and Farmer will do them this week.  This is called the Marking.  It is when you know for certain how good or bad a lambing it has been.   We suspect that it will confirm it was not our best this year.

This young rowan was bird-seeded.  (electricity wires overhead!)

At this time of year it is so easy to see the new crop of natural regeneration - the freshness of the leaves on their tiny spindly shapes almost glow.

The islands this morning with some of the calves and the 'nanny' cow in the foreground.

And along Loch na Keal, the bluebells are vividly blue.

It is the Bank Holiday weekend.  There is a different atmosphere here this week, more families with children in the cottages, and a more summery feel suddenly.

Extra feeding

The weather has continued to be glorious, but every sunny day makes us a little more anxious about the ewes about to start lambing and whether they will have enough milk to support their lambs.

Lovely to be on Calgary beach though. Coco had her (first) birthday walk there on Wednesday!

Farmer's day are getting longer as he starts to feed the sheep along the coast and the sheep on the Sitheans.

This afternoon I went with him to give the cows the silage.  I walked home having taken some photographs.  I wish I had stayed with him because he had an amazing Goldie sighting on his way back to the cattle shed.   It swooped down just beside the tractor and took a live rabbit from only a few feet away.  It lifted up over the fence with its prey and dropped down reasonably close to start eating.  After a few minutes it took off again - disturbed by my walking towards it, unknowingly, with the dog. I was slow on the uptake with the camera, as it was amazing just to see it fairly close with the rabbit in its talons.  Prasad rushed to the scene and got some great pictures of it.

I was standing above the feeding site before Farmer appeared on the tractor with a new tractor assistant (see close up of tractor below). The cows hear the tractor and slowly start to stir in anticipation of a refill for the feed trailer.   In the foreground below you can see the 'calf creep'.

Earlier in the day, the hoggs went back to the hill. They have been on the inbye all winter, and now they are fully fledged back to life with the flock!   You can see here they are on the move, heading along the inbye/hill boundary fence.  Their ears also pricked up at the sound of the tractor!

At the weekend Farmer assembled the calf creep in order to introduce the calves to feed.  Some of the bolder ones as soon as the tractor appeared went into the creep and hovered about waiting to see if Farmer was going to give them anything.  We have ordered in an extra lorry load of hay because of the dry weather, as well as more bags of short ration.

We cut silage in September in order to protect ground nesting birds and to allow the wild flowers to set seed.  This does mean that the silage is not as good quality as silage cut earlier in the year when the sugars are higher.  With the change in weather conditions too, it can mean the silage is wet, here you can see the juice dripping out of the bale which Farmer has just unwrapped.  (he invariably gets splashed at this point in the face too).

There can be few such picturesque feed sites, with Rum in the distance. I hate to go on about it but you can see how parched the ground is. 

Wending his way back to the farm building.

Out and about - Loch na Keal with the Ross of Mull in the distance.

The last couple of days have been warmer and in hidden corners the primroses have finally started to appear.

I have been watching out for the Aurora again. No luck this week, twice I was in the car driving home, looking at a green glow, and getting back to find it had gone.  These were taken last night, and if you get a magnifying glass you will see the blurry shapes almost side by side of the Andromeda galaxy and Comet Pan Starrs.