May 2011

May 29, 2011: Cows and Calves and Miracles

This morning there are four miracles in the dying grass. They are very small and the colour of caramel, and they have eyes as dark as nights and bright as stars and deep as seas. Their cloven hooves are small enough to fit in the palm of my hand. They are newborn, purebred, Jersey calves.

It started with young Not A Boy. The story behind her name is that, three or four years ago, a cow named Nune had a calf and the workers thought it was a heifer, but when we went to look, it was not a girl. He was named Not A Girl and it was natural that Nune's next calf, which really was a heifer, would be called Not A Boy.

Fast forward two years and find a dainty little heifer preparing to have her first calf. She was on the brink of calving, and had been for the past three weeks. Eventually, the vet told us to induce her to calve with a shot of cortisone and some penicillin. Extremely dangerous in horses, inducing a calving is quite safe in cows. Come lunchtime and Not A Boy was down and obviously getting ready to calve. Half an hour past. An hour. An hour and a half. I pulled off my jersey, soaped up my arm and went inside, shivering in the nippy winter air. Immediately, I had hold of a hoof, and another hoof, and a muzzle. Yes! The calf was presented correctly, all seemed well - oh my goodness, here's another hoof. And another hoof. And another muzzle. I groped for the first muzzle. Yup, it was still there. Increasingly bewildered, I explored. I had four hooves and two muzzles; at one point I had a finger in each mouth. One small tongue twitched under my thumb. One of them was still alive, at any rate.

I pulled my arm out and sat back. "Mother darling, she's having twins, I have four hooves and two heads and they're all mixed up."

Mom called Brett, who knows about calvings because he milks Frieslands in the same way as we know about milk fever because we milk Jerseys. He told me what I already knew I had to do: push one back and pull the other one out. Easier said than done. I'd just shoved calf number two back in and laid hold of calf number one, when Not A Boy gave an explosive push and calf number two came surging back at me. Perhaps if my arms were longer or I was stronger I'd have managed. Either way, in half an hour, I was getting nowhere and poor Not A Boy was getting exhausted. Mom asked Brett to come and help and graciously he agreed to come.

We left Not A Boy in peace while we waited for Brett to come and went to look at Cleopatra, who had two front hooves sticking out at the back. All looked well but she'd had front hooves sticking out for the past half hour. Once again I soaped up, sprawled on my belly and went inside. Two front hooves and a neck bent back. Okay, not a catastrophe and she wasn't pushing like Not A Boy so I shoved the calf back in, stuck a finger around the lower jaw and pulled the head forward. The problem now was that the head and legs were next to each other and not on top of one another as they should be, so the calf simply couldn't fit through Cleopatra's pelvis. My arms were half paralysed by now and I just couldn't wrestle that head into place, so we left Cleo for Brett as well.

Our knight came thundering up on his mighty charger, AKA big old grey bakkie. He went into Cleo and within three minutes had a live and healthy bullcalf squirming on the grass while I gawped. The little guy instantly opened a minute mouth and bellowed. "What took you so long?" he seemed to be asking. Cleo stood up easily and began to lick him clean. He was named Conundrum, which suits him.

Off we trooped to Not A Boy, who was still patiently trying to push her babies out. It took Brett a little longer this time, and he had to use ropes and a calving machine, but it took less than twenty minutes. I knelt by Not A Boy and watched and waited. One calf had been alive when I was in there, but I thought the other was dead, and there was a good chance that they'd both be stillborn. So I thought a prayer and watched with faith as a big, live bullcalf was delivered, followed by a smaller, and equally alive heifer. God is indeed great and He does listen, even if it is to a girl's prayer on a windy winter day about two little unborn calves. Brett had to turn the heifer upside down and shake her for a bit before she breathed, but she was alive and well.

And now it was beautiful and Not A Boy was on her feet, bewildered and delighted with two little wet new calves falling around her feet. Her rough tongue rasped the life into them as they thrashed with legs that looked too thin to belong to what would, one day, be cattle. We were all grinning; me exhausted, Brett filthy and panting, Tannie Hennah amazed, Mom thankful. They were so beautiful and so complete. Nine months ago they had been nothing; and even a day ago they'd just been a massive bulge in Not A Boy's belly. Now they were real creatures, alive and kicking, bright and beautiful. We watched, utterly entranced, as the bullcalf staggered to his feet and wobbled there, swaying, legs straddled, triumphant. He stayed there for just a few moments before his slender legs collapsed and he sat down again, half on top of his sister. We named them Nasty (the bull) and Nice (the heifer). And they lived! They came from nothing, perfectly made; hand-crafted with love. The miracle is too great for me to wrap my head around. I couldn't resist it; I knelt down beside them and hugged their tiny wet necks and they squirmed and they lived!

This morning early, my old show heifer, Leri, had her third calf. A heifer, beautiful and dainty. Lady Lize. Now there are four and they're all beautiful, and the world is made out of miracles; my horse is surviving the most feared disease in Africa; a tiny heifer had live twins; my father returned safely from a police shoot-out that killed three men and wounded another; when I ride out on Arwen and she goes ballistic an angel sits behind me and holds me tight; and the world is beautiful and we live and breathe and think, and there are cows and calves and horses and family, and GOD LIVES and He is with us.

The sun rose this morning. Is that not enough? Is that not enough for us to know that God is there and He is great? Yes, it is. But He gives us so much more. He listens to the prayers of sinners and answers them. He made Life. Oh, but this world is beautiful. There is death and pain and fear. But there is so much more. Oh, but this world is beautiful.

I am here on the farm whose soil runs in my blood, I am here with my beloved family and my friend Skye and God. That alone is enough to make me cry Hallelujah. It has been a hard time, but what have we to fear or to dread? If God is for us, who can be against us?

We live! Skye is surviving AHS! My dad came home safe!

Thank you, Sir!

Leri and Lize

Cleo and Conundrum

Not A Boy and her calves

Nice

Nasty

May 26, 2011: It is Very Very Very Cold

Mom going on morning walkabout

... and the horses adore it, but I definitely don't. We haven't had frost for three weeks or so, but an ice cold south wind came roaring up straight out of Antarctica. Siobhan and the foals are frisky and being silly and skittish; if the weather calms down a bit and I ride Arwen, I can't imagine how silly and skittish she'll be then.

Skye is feeling all right, ate a trifle slower than normal this morning, but to be fair it was half past five AM and the wind was blowing like mad and she kept raising her head to check that nothing was eating me, I was shivering so violently against her shoulder. The colour is coming back nicely into her gums. Her temperature remains normal, in the 36 - 36.5 degrees area. A bit low, but normal for winter. I'm a bit worried about her condition, she was a bit on the lean side to begin with and then she got sick and lost a bit of weight. She's not ribby, but when I run my hand along her side I can clearly feel her ribs. She's not thin, but I am so fussy about my horses' condition and I would definitely like a bit more padding on her for this time of year. Well, as soon as she is completely healthy the foals must be weaned, that will already help; she's getting 2kg of feed per day, split into three feeds; she's on a vitamin and mineral supplement; she has a salt block and a phosphate lick; and she has free access to the most excellent teff hay I have ever seen. The horses love teff. They like the eragrostis but they simply can't get enough teff. Unfortunately it's almost twice as expensive as the eragrostis.

Artificially inseminating a Friesland aptly named Glorious was rather a nightmare; my fingers were numb, though my left hand was delightfully warm. However Glory was as cool as a cucumber (figuratively speaking) and didn't worry at all even though I had to do her twice because I made a really really brainless beginner's error.

The winter is definitely settling happily in. The birds are gathering in huge flocks, announcing their seasonal trek with the soft hiss of their wings on the icy breeze. The calves and horses look like woolly mammoths; this year, even Siobhan was beaten regarding the length of her coat - Dancer looks and feels like a huge furry black teddy bear. Achilles's coat is short and shiny, as ever, I always worry that he'll freeze with that fine coat, but perhaps the black colour sucks up the sunlight. Day-old Blessing, the daughter of Bashful (who has a bit of beef blood in her), is making a lot of noise; when the wind isn't howling like a banshee, she fills in the gap with her incessant bellowing. Blessing was actually one of a twin, but her beautiful brother was unfortunately stillborn. Twins usually have a low chance of survival, so we were very pleased about Blessing, hence the name.

The poplar trees are crying their leaves like tears in a crackling ocre rain. The workers have barely raked them into heaps when Cyclone comes hurtling out of the house, ears flapping, plopping ponderously along on huge puppy paws, and crashes straight into them, spraying leaves everywhere and howling with delight. It's pitch dark when I go out to feed the horses in the mornings, and twilight at half past five in the afternoon when they get their supper. The sunrises are glorious, coming late, blazing like brands as if to make up for it. Some days ago the clouds swirled into flame-like shapes, making the koppie look like it was belching rosy fire.

Tannie Hennah has fixed up the garden; with the addition of a few frost-resistant flowers it looks lovely. There are turnips ready to be harvested. Dad is going to make a Broth. Most people would call it a strew rather than a broth but it is guaranteed to cure colds. Better than antibiotics, that broth. Tastes better, too.

I rode Arwen yesterday, worked on jumping a bit, and Rain kindly took pictures of us. Arwen is very good with bringing her head in at the walk, but not at the trot - we had to work on that yesterday. At the canter she doesn't bring her head in at all. Not yet, anyway. But after half an hour Arwen was looking much better at the trot.

Yes, the saddle is too far forward, but it slips forward, even the new one, on Arwen. Jumping-wise she is doing better, not refusing so much, though she is very lazy. She still doesn't jump far enough, her hind hooves clearing the jump by sheer luck. I'm amazed she even got over the jump in the picture below. No wonder she looks so unhappy, that must have been a nasty landing. Even when I make the jumps wider she still just scrapes over them. And I know she can jump far because when I started jumping with her she used to take off a whole stride before the jump and jump about twice as far as the jump was high.

I also rode Siobhan on Tuesday and she was tolerable, we didn't canter but there was no bucking and only a few spooks. I had her trotting a figure-of-eight very nicely at one point before she lost concentration. Her attention span is improving but still very short.

The foals are both being a bit bratty, though Dancer is worse than Thunder. When Thunder gets stressed he starts prancing and panting and tries to go around or through me to get back to his mother. (Thankfully no rearing, chopping, or biting as yet). Dancer is the one who has the terrific tantrums - rearing, biting, kicking, trying to run away and so on. When they're closer to their mothers, they have charming manners, walking nicely next to me on a loose lead, perfect with grooming and having the hooves picked up. It's when they're far away from their mothers (ESPECIALLY out of sight) when they get naughty. I'm hoping it's a problem that will improve when they're weaned; for now I persist and try to teach them better manners away from their moms. The mares frankly couldn't care less and seem quite relieved to have a break from their big babies.

Thunder started his troubles yesterday. He had a Bad Day yesterday. Well, perhaps it was because I had to wake him up from a nap before working him...

The lying down and pretending to be dead took some getting used to on my part, especially when they were little! Dancer has such an innocent little face. She looks positively angelic. Hah.

Cyclone also has a brand-new collar. It's reflective, which is why it looks like she's wearing a string of diamonds around her neck. She has had three puppy classes, and so far she can sit, down, and sit-stay very well. Whenever she's hungry, she runs after me and sits whenever I stop. She stays well too, I can move back three or four paces and she'll sit dead still. Also, she comes instantly when she's called, which is most important to me.

Writing-wise, I am very stuck with the New Shiny, still looking for a way to slow it down without bogging it down, just for a chapter or so. I'm in chapter five and chapter six has to give them a bit of a breather, allow me to drop a few hints, and let the foal - Sherwyn - grow up a bit. Perhaps I should throw the prince off his horse Razo and make him break something, that ought to slow them down a bit. Sparrowhawk's second draft is suddenly doing great, though I think there are still lots and lots of holes in it. I'm almost halfway through and the current word count has been cut from 160 000 words to 146 000 words. Not good enough, but it's going somewhere at least. It was double the size it should be.

Now I must get back to work. My poor little freezing fingers.

May 24, 2011: Oh, Siobhan...

I swear, I could pull my hair out over that horse sometimes. There was a little filly who was just a trifle silly, and had a star in the middle of her forehead. And when she was good, she was absolutely stunning, but when she was bad there's a worse word than "horrid"...

She's been having such a good run lately. She was steadily improving with every session. Then when I rode her on Saturday, she was okayish, had a bit of a bad hair day, threw a few bucks. The saddle was loose and sat on her neck, and I ended up on the ground (it was almost just a normal dismount, a bit like falling off elegantly). On Sunday at my lesson, sheesh, she was quite dreadful. The girth was pulled as tight as it goes without hurting her, and she was all right, cantering fine, behaving herself, then there were fireworks and I really did fall off this time. I plodded gloomily along on Arwen while Kevin rode her and wow, did she buck, she almost got him off on two occasions and that's saying something. He made a makeshift bucking strap out of one of her reins and did she buck then! That was just crazy, it was all I could do to keep Arwen away from the flying hooves.

Kevin's told me to keep to walking and trotting this week, until he can bring a real bucking strap and we can work her properly. I am despondent, because this is horribly reminiscent of what Achilles did and I had so many struggles with myself regarding Achilles.

Right now, though, Achilles is being as good as, if not gold, then at least silver. He is not at all lazy anymore when I lunge him and I've been lunging him over trotting poles to make him think; first I put them faaar apart to make him stretch and he took that in his stride, but when I put them closer together to make him shorten his steps he didn't like it at all. Eventually he realised that life was much easier if he listened to me and trotted over them perfectly. Smart boy. I have a nasty suspicion, though, that someone has been chasing or hitting him a lot  - he was so nervous about the whip yesterday that eventually I chucked it over the side of the lunge ring and went on without it. Normally it's very difficult to get him to move without waving the whip around. I don't think I made him scared of the whip; I gave him a smack with it last week when he tried to kick me, but after the session as always I rubbed him with the whip and he didn't mind, now if I even bring it near him he starts rolling his eyes and raising his head. It's quite possible that one of the workers has been chasing him because he bothers the cows when they get fed. In any case, he was very good and I am impressed with him.

I'm also impressed with Arwen and so, drum roll, is Kevin. This is amazing because Kevin is virtually unimpressable (is that a word?). She is bringing her head in beautifully (at the walk, that is), cantering nice and slowly, and jumping well. She's also doing the lessons by herself because Skye can't be ridden yet. She bucked with one of them week before last but the girl stayed on so no harm done. Today she was good and didn't do anything stupid and even put up with teaching one of the boys to post, which must be so awkward on the poor old horse. Yes, she tests them a bit, trying to wander off in her own direction, but they'll have to learn to put up with that because I don't have any ploddy old schoolmasters to put them on. Skye is very good but unfortunately listens to crazy daredevil boys when they want to go cantering off. Luckily she has a smooth canter and said boy stayed on top for long enough for me to shriek "WHOA!" and Skye to drop to a walk and regard me angelically while her rider got his stirrup back. Arwen is coping, though I think I'll teach them to lunge next week and give the poor mare a break. Arwen is now jumping four tyres high and three tyres wide, which I am impressed with. Oh, and Kevin said that I was doing a good job and Arwen looked nice under saddle. This is the Kevin equivalent of leaping up and down and cheering so I am most pleased.

Doesn't she look fabulous? (Yes, I know my hands are too low and my shoulders are forward!)

Dancer is being quite a bit of a pain. She gets very jumpy away from her mom, which she never used to. I suspect that she is testing me because unlike Thunder, who never shows any aggression to anyone, when she gets scared she gets up on her back legs and waves her hooves around, lashes out with her hindlegs, tries to chop with her forelegs, etc. Most irritatingly, she barges into me and tries to push me around. Unfortunately when more or less 200kg Dancer pushes 50kg me, I stay pushed. I can fix it, she's not as bad as Siobhan was and not as old as Siobhan was, it's just annoying. In sharp contrast Thunder is being such a darling. A while ago it was Dancer who was being the good one, but I think Thunder has a nicer temperament than she does. Dancer is VERY smart and learns extremely fast, but what I love about Thunder is just that he adores people and is so gentle. He has never, ever kicked/bitten/chopped/reared with malicious intent. (When he was much littler, as in three or four days old, he kicked out when his hindlegs were touched, but it was more a reflex action than an attempt to hurt us; and he likes to nibble clothes/fingers but never to actually bite). He is such a darling. His mother's son, obviously.

Speaking of which Skye is feeling great, the wind was blowing this afternoon, making the horses frisky, and she was running and playing with them, happy as a bird. Siobhan can buck, Achilles can bolt, Dancer can chop, Arwen can spook and Thunder can nibble all they want, Skye is getting better and it's simply FABULOUS. God is glorious. Life is good.

May 21, 2011: NAMPO, horses, etc., etc.

I had written a lovely blog on the 18th but it went away. I don't know where it went, it just got uppity and went. Sorry to any readers if such creatures indeed exist.

First of all, go and check out our new NAMPO Page (you see it there on the side?). I designed it, which is why the horses are at the top. NAMPO was perfectly glorious yesterday and we all had an absolute ball. We even got to see Sympa de Bellevue, the magnificent Percheron stallion, in the flesh and the picture does not do him justice - he's this enormous dappled-grey mountain of muscles with two ears and huge dark eyes on top.

So, today I managed to get some horse work done. First of all Skye got thoroughly groomed and given a carrot. (If she doesn't get brushed before I ride, she sulks and bites the poor horse I was riding.) A few days ago she developed three or four very strange mysterious lumps on her skin, along her belly and flanks. One of them was quite humungous, about 10cm in length, raised one or two centimetres off the skin and about 5cm in width. Thankfully they seem to be disappearing. No one had a clue what they were, but Skye didn't mind them at all.

I rode Arwen next. She was pretty good, not as lazy as last time. She brings her head in very nicely at the walk and yesterday we actually managed a trot with her head in, which I was pleased about. We did a bit of jumping today; Arwen has a habit of not jumping very far, her hind hooves clearing the jump by mere millimetres (according to Kevin that is) and so we worked on jumping further and making her stretch a bit. After warming up over two small jumps I set up a jump that was about two tyres wide (my jumps are made of car tyres) and three tyres high at its highest. To my shock she actually flung herself at all the jumps and had a ball; last time it was all I could do to stay on through her refusals. Then I gave her a real challenge, four tyres high and also two or three tyres wide. She jumped it, but she had to stretch herself over it, so we only jumped it once or twice before calling it a day. We worked in-hand a bit too, getting her ready for the Nooitgedacht shows - next year, when she's been evaluated - and she was pretty good. She's excellent when she's concentrating but when she loses focus it's pathetic.

I also managed to get a nice picture of Arwen looking pretty, which is very hard because in pictures she always looks like a mule. Smile for the camera, Miss A...

Siobhan was next to be ridden. Kevin lent me his training saddle and as long as the girth is tight it doesn't shimmy up her neck, but it's basically a wooden frame with stirrups and a girth attached so it's a bit hard on the bum. Trust me, when she bucks and I bounce, it is NOT pleasant. Farmers are good at improvising and fixing things, usually with the aid of a pair of pliers, a length of baling twine and a bit of old wire. The saddle is comfortable for Siobhan because she has a numnah, so, I reasoned, why shouldn't a numnah work for me too?

Yes, I know it looks most peculiar, but it works really well, and luckily hardly anyone sees me ride so I won't get too many tasteless jokes about soft backsides and the human needing a numnah more than the horse. My horses are used to me doing odd things to them so Siobhan thinks it's perfectly normal.

Thunder was last to be worked. He's outgrown his foal halter and is now wearing Siobhan's halter. Note to self: Buy halters for the foals before they're weaned. I led him all around the perimeter of their paddock; Skye was stuffing her face with hay and couldn't be less bothered, and Thunder was a bit nervous but didn't have any panic attacks or rearing tantrums. Then I led him out past the oldest Frieslands and up the passage, where the tractor was busy unloading calf feed. Thunder took one look at the tractor and decided that it was a Monster and we had better Run, so he shot off down the passage and stood quivering by the gate. I fetched him and led him back up, he stuck to me like Velcro as if he thought I'd protect him. At length we reached the tractor and I put one hand on it to show him that it wasn't scary. He was still looking very scared so I led him around and around it for a while. It wasn't moving, but it was switched on and making a dreadful racket. He reared and tried to run off and dragged me along for a few steps, but after a while I had a brainwave; the tractor had some calf feed stuck to the wheels. A bit of calf feed wouldn't hurt him, even though the vet in me cringed at the hygiene, so I mopped up the dirtiest feed to expose some clean stuff. He was still sticking to me like Velcro and I let him sniff the feed. He was delighted and tucked in. After a few mouthfuls I led him away and around the tractor; he had a few spooks, so I brought him back to the wheel, let him eat a bit, took him away again... Okay, so it's not a method you'd find in a book and if Kevin saw us he'd laugh his socks off but it worked so I'm not complaining. Thunder is no longer afraid of tractors, he just licks the wheels with a hopeful air.

He's becoming a handsome little boy. At almost seven months old, he's almost as tall as Siobhanny and turning a nice deep colour like his mom.

The foals seriously need to be weaned. I want to wean them as soon as Skye has a clean bill of health again, my poor mares are going to be as thin as toast racks. In readiness for this we moved Achilles out of the implement camp and into the lactating cows' camp. I expected a lot of running around and neighing on his part as he's now alone except for some cows, but he is actually perfectly happy and seems to like that camp better than his old one. This means that poor old Benji is all on his own but he couldn't care less. More for Me, he says, poking his nose in the teff bale. Soon he'll have two young friends and then he will be grumpy, I think the foals will annoy him immensely.

We also put our littlest Frieslands through the crush today. They got names beginning with O, which was hard, but we made it without naming anyone Octopus. One of the heifers has a perfect black eyepatch. We already have a Little Pirate, so she was christened One Eye II (we had a cow named One Eye but she had two eyes). She was followed by One Ear, who has an abscess on her ear, and One Lump, who has an abscess on her chin. (Both abscesses are healing). The others are named Oprah, One and Only, Oh Cute, Onyx, Oh So Pretty, Oortjies, Oliander, Olivia, Oulik, Oops, Olga, Orthodox, Orca, Omo II, Obstinate Blaze, and Other Winegum (because she looks exactly like an older heifer named Winegum).

Writing-wise things are doing okay, I found a big hole in Sparrowhawk and I think I have found something to full the hole up with, but it involved me leaving a lot of TKs. What's a TK, I hear you ask. It's a writer's trick I picked up on Magical Words. When you find a problem in your manuscript but decide to fix it in a later draft, you write [TK Flavian should lose the fight here], so that when you use the search function on your computer you type in TK and find all your notes. Why TK? Think of any English word in which those two letters are together. There aren't any that I know of.

The as-yet-unnamed New Shiny is doing quite well, though I have come to a place where I need something to chuck in and flesh out the next chapter, so that I can give the characters and the reader a bit of a break from all the fast-paced action. However I don't want to just fatten it up with bucketloads of nothing, I'll never do that again seeing as I did it in Sparrowhawk and now still have 30 000 words of nothing to cut off at the very least. Tricky. I need to find a new plot thread to start here.

To wrap up, here are a few photos of horse herd life on Hydeaway Farm.

Skye and Siobhan

Skye and Siobhan

Dancer and Siobhan

Skye and Siobhan

May 16, 2011: Frieslands, Frieslands Everywhere

Today began with a most glorious sunrise that was full of cobblestones and pink lightning.

Skye ate her feed very well. She spent most of the morning grazing, giving Siobhan flat ears when the filly tried to eat HER grass, and contentedly grooming with Arwen and Siobhan. The foals really have to be weaned, Dancer is Siobhan's size.

There has been a slight change of the arrangements. Previously, Benjamin the donkey walked with the cows and had apparently decided that he was a cow. Since he hurt his hoof, he's staying with Achilles and to my amazement Achilles loves him. When Benji is with Achilles, the stallion stays in his camp. Therefore Benjamin has simply got to stay with Achilles because on bad days Achilles escapes three or four times a day and once or twice in the night as well. To be truthful the camp isn't the most secure place in the world but a rampant stallion is truly uncontainable. They're a somewhat unlikely couple.

Okay, a very unlikely couple. Now you're eyeing the fence and saying "Of course he escapes with fences like that..." That is a particularly dreadful section of fence but it's the best I can do at the moment, when he's gelded and settled he can go and live with the mares who have nice safe electric fences.

I was going to school Arwen, brush Skye, work with Thunder and ride Achilles, which is normally very doable, but today was just ballistic. With two workers AWOL and the Frieslands' owner, Brett, coming to drop off some and collect some, there wasn't much time. Mom promptly gave me off from school and put me on calf breakfast duty. We have a nasty diarrhea epidemic going through our young calves again; we've already lost one (RIP, Abigail). We think it's Salmonella and dosed them with activated charcoal to get rid of the toxins. So far we seem to be curing most of them, but diarrhea is a horrible thing with little calves, and the ones who are getting it are seriously little - six or seven days old.

First to be fed were Miss Josephine and Bandana; Miss Josy is a spunky, playful girl and Bandana keeps her feet on the ground. Lucky and Hex, two bullcalves, are being weaned. Lucky has a cough, but in a big three-month-old like him it's nothing to panic about. The shed calves are the sick ones - Bramble and Hawthorne seem to be recovering, as are Baie Groot and Mighty Man. Beverly is catching it now, as well as the Green Knight. Shield seems to be dodging it this far. Bandit, Scimitar, Trouble, Bedlam, and Nightingayle have dodged it, I think. At the moment we're fighting to get Mother's Day and Prairie through it, but both are strong little heifers.

Last of all were the old parlour calves, who are doing very well; Mathysie, Bandoned, Tempest and Croccie have just been weaned. Leodogran is also being weaned but he is such a runty little guy. (Ironically he was named after a great king. The name is longer than the calf). Breggie is one-quarter Hereford and turning a very odd colour:

... and all the calves except my heifer Florette seem quite repulsed. Nanaimo, Sweetie Pie, Banjo, Biggles, Pumpkin, Parsley's Brother, Other Brother, and Splash are all doing brilliantly.

After feeding the calves it was time to move the Frieslands. Brett was going to take 17 of his big ladies back home and brought us 20 little babies. We had to move lots of the groups before we had the to-be-loaded Frieslands in the right place and a camp open for the littlest babies.

Nosy was wondering if the new camp was going to be as fun as her old one; she used to be among the youngest, until the new ones arrived. We call her Nosy because her nose is half pink, half black and very cute.

Splash watched the proceedings with great interest. She is such a pretty little girl.

Wollies, one of the big Frieslands, was such a pain to load, she had to be more or less manually pushed onto the trailer, but seemed quite calm once she was there with her buddies. And after only half an hour or so everyone was loaded and heading off. I was relieved because the infamous Skrikkerig had loaded beautifully, despite snorting like a mustang as she approached the trailer and rolling her eyes madly to show us the whites. And off they went.

It's sad to see them go, but we are watching Brett VERY closely. He daren't give "our" heifers anything but the best care! :)

Spending the afternoon in town meant that there was no riding done today. I'm very frustrated about that and not very nicely inclined towards the AWOL workers at the moment. Ah well, tomorrow is another day. At least Skye looks happy, which is the main thing. And now Dad is yelling "Do ya luv me?" which is the latest addition to the Dictionary of Hydeaway Slang and, like most of Dad's additions, means "Please make me coffee," so I'd better run.

May 15, 2011: African Horse Sickness. Need I say more?

I was just beginning to think that the midges were all dead when Skye got African horse sickness. The signs were classic. First came a slight swelling of the hollows above her eyes. The next day she was running a mild fever: 38.9 degrees Celsius.

That was two weeks ago. I will tell the whole story in detail later on. The long and short of it is, so far, by God's grace, with a lot of prayer, Skye is getting better. She eats. She drinks. She neighs impatiently at me at the very top of her voice when she thinks I'm not coming fast enough with her feed (which is always; Secreteriat would not be able to come fast enough with Skye's feed). Her temperature remains normal, her coat remains shiny, and she's lost very little weight. Even the sore and swollen neck she had from all the injections has gone back to normal. She's still a bit pale in the mucous membranes, but I think it's just that her system is still returning to normal. God willing, she's getting well again.

My equids have been going through a bit of a bad patch lately. Benjamin, the donkey, who seems to be my responsibility because he doesn't have paws, feet, or cloven hooves, got a wire in his hoof. The resulting hole got infected and Benjamin doesn't like his feet being picked up. The solution? A lunge rein, tied securely but comfortably around his neck, then run around the pastern of the inflicted hind hoof, then back to the neck, pulled on, and voila, his leg was tied up and I could treat it and he couldn't do a thing about it. Thankfully Benji has recovered and is now living a life of luxury, his sole purpose being to keep Achilles sane. Said stallion is doing quite well, though I think he had mites or something because he came over all itchy; the vet prescribed some injectable parasite-killing stuff and the problem seems to have gone - whether it was the pesticide or the frost, I don't know. I lunged him a few days ago, and though he had a few madly bucking fits I was quite expecting it because he's doing no work, he's young, and he's very full of himself. However, he wasn't half as lazy as normal, so that was positive. His manners are improving too - no more nipping or biting, either humans, brushes, or saddles.

Arwen is suddenly doing well; after a long struggle trying to get her to bring her head in Kevin put side reins on her and the transformation was quite amazing. She now brings her head in quite well at the walk; she can do it at the working trot but any faster than that and it's lost. She was most responsive when I rode her on Thursday, really rather a joy. On Saturday I took her out and though Arwen really detests going out, with a recent schooling session under her belt she was relatively sane - only one bucking fit and a handful of spooks.

Siobhanny is doing fantastic! We're now cantering quite happily in the arena since we leant Kevin's training saddle. It's not the most comfortable thing to sit on but it stays in the same place and that's quite a bonus, with Siobhanny. Today, I rode her out in the company of Kevin and Arwen and she was quite brilliant. We rode through all the terrifying places inhabited by horse-gulping monsters, like the forest and the old borehole pumphouse. No spooks whatsoever from Siobhan. There were only a few bad moments when Arwen and her rider disappeared and Siobhan panicked but she calmed down after a few minutes and a small rear. We had a nice calm controlled canter through the forest, which was brilliant - with Achilles's bucking in the back of my head it's very nice to have backed a young horse and not be terrified of getting launched into the air at every canter attempt. I think she quite enjoyed the ride after a while.

The foals are HUGE!

Yes, at the age of six months, this really is Thunder. He's starting to get handsome, apart from the poor furry ears. He looks a bit like his mommy.

And this is seven-month-old Dancer, who is almost as tall as Siobhan:

Training-wise they're doing quite well. Both are walking very nicely on the halter, staying next to me, etc. Both have no problem with being touched or having their hooves picked up. Now I'm working on leading them away from their mothers, which they REALLY don't like. Thunder is turning out to be the easier pupil; he learns slower, and he does have his Moments, but he's never, ever been aggressive and even when he catches a panic he'll try to bolt off, I'll pull him back, and he'll stand quite quietly next to me, shivering a bit. He never tries to chop, kick, rear, bite, etc. I'm even starting to break him of his habit of chewing things. Dancer is becoming the tough cookie. She's Siobhan all over again. The difference is that by the time I picked up a problem Siobhan was eighteen months old; Dancer was four months old when I first thought, "Wow, this is Siobhan the second." When she starts getting bored or out of her comfort zone, she'll try to give me a chop with her foreleg. I don't like it at all and it earns her a smack. But when she panics, she goes up on her hindlegs - just like Siobhan. She also has a nasty habit of lashing out with her hindlegs. Oh, and she'll rear, then spin around and try to intimidate me, which is not pleasant at all especially because standing right in front of her nose puts me in the perfect place to have my head whacked by a flying forefoot. But if, a year ago, I could get rid of Siobhan's bad habits, I can get rid of Dancer's. We'll get there. The foals need to be weaned; the poor mares have both lost some condition. They're not skinny, but especially Skye after her illness is a bit on the thin side for my liking.

Speaking of which before Skye got sick we had a fabulous jumping session and Rain took pictures.

The rider has improved but there is still a lot of room for more improvement... The horse looks great, look at those pricked ears! I love to see a horse having fun at a job. I so hope that my beautiful Skye will get well again. Mom and Dad think she will, the vet thinks she will, Kevin thinks she will. So. Hopefully it's just a matter of TLC and patience, taking her temperature every day, brushing her every day, putting stuff on her neck for the swelling, giving her a supplement called Trident Fortitude to build her up. (I thought she'd turn up her nose at the Fortitude, it's the first time I've ever fed a supplement, but she adores it). She has been an absolute angel throughout her illness, she never, ever protested at her injections even though she had at least one - often two and sometimes three - every day for ten days. She stood still with her eyes open when I put ointment in her eyes for the swelling. She kept eating no matter how sick she felt. She has shown a fighting spirit and I'm so glad that she's feeling better. She feels fine in herself, neighing and eating and walking around, coming at a trot when I call her for feeding time (though most of the time she's at the gate already and waiting impatiently). She is very jealous of Arwen, who gets ridden a lot now, and gave poor little Missy a huge big bite in the backside to show her just what she thought of her rider being stolen. I am very happy that she's feeling well enough to want to be ridden again. I check on her at night again now, and she is a beautiful creature, luminescent as a halo in the moonlight, grazing happily, or perhaps eating hay or dozing on her feet. By God's unlimited grace, she is getting well again. Now I pray that she'll make a full recovery and not have a relapse or a secondary infection.

Writing-wise, I'm plodding along in the second draft of Sparrowhawk. I seem to have gotten a bit stuck. I think it's a matter of knowing what to do and not having the guts to do it. Or being too lazy. In true writer jargon it's lnown as the I-Don't-Wannas which is a good description. In equally true writer jargon is the solution: BIC. Butt In Chair. Go to www.magicalwords.net - you'll never find another goldmine of information such as this. I have also finally got a new first-draft novel in the making. It hasn't got a name yet, but it's super cool and I like it. Moonrise at Midnight has been renovated and started over again and so far I think I've grasped the nettle of it at last. Right now I want to keep going on Sparrowhawk, the new Moonrise at Midnight (currently known as Unicorn Summer), and the New Shiny (Song of Fire), but I also want to write a short story to the absolute best of my ability and try to get published with that. I have a few first-draft short stories sitting in the computer, and I think I might pull some of them out and look at them; in the back of my head I'm thinking along the lines of Before the Legend (what really happened between Sir Kay's foster brother and the greatest legend of all time?) and The King who Bowed to a Mare (a fairytale that I have my doubts about but that has quite a wonderful message). Plus there's another short halfway through its first draft, inspired by a beautiful song called Die Siener, that could turn into a beautiful story with lots of work. I adore Before the Legend especially, but it's very, very short and there's not much conflict and it doesn't make any sense unless you have a vague knowledge of the story of King Arthur.

And this is a wonderful sight: A miracle horse eating happily, healthy foals grazing contentedly, a beautiful sunset - all testimony to the greatness of our single living God.