A ground frost is forecast for us tonight, and after the amount of rain we have received in the last week, we are quite relieved for a dry night ahead. The brook is up but has yet to break its banks. However, the ground water levels are now very high, meaning the ‘ponds’ in the fields are starting to fill once more. Drainage for the ‘ponds’ along field 8, which runs alongside the drive, is proving tricky. Work we wanted to get done in summer was hampered by mechanical issues. We hope now that we will be able to get on with this project soon. Another wet autumn/winter/spring will start to properly impact not only the amount of grazing pasture we lose, but also the goodness in that grass. Sitting under flood water for any length of time is not good.

Bunds are being dug around the barn, and gully’s dug along the bridle path to ensure rainfall can stay out, or get away, but this last rain showed the need for gutter clearing and fixing too. In terms of autumn jobs, the hedgecutters have been, and the fields are looking very tidy for their overwintering. In between the rain we were also able to get onto the farm for spraying the 500. Now though, the land is too wet, and Tim has to pick his route with the tractor carefully.

The cattle have been busy. Six calves have now arrived, two stillborn, three heifers and one bull. The mothers of the stillborn are being supported homoeopathically, one needed the vet’s support. Three of the calves are bonny, but one is perhaps not quite as sturdy as first thought. We are keeping a close eye. These calves are all from our new bull, so we are closely monitoring the calves to confirm the good genes we hope he has. The New Forest Eye cases have slowed, and with a ground frost, perhaps we can hope that’s the end of the cases this year. All of the vets are baffled by why our cows have suffered so much with the flies this year. No other local farm has had as many cases as us. Our thinking hats are well and truly on.

The sheep are doing well. The lambs are making good weights, the ewes we won’t breed from this year have gone to market. The new ram has settled in well with his compatriot. The new Shetland ewes and ram have all settled in well too.

The big winds last week brought down an Ash tree in field 12. A loss for the hedgerow, but a gain for the Shetlands who have had a wonderful time stripping the branches they can reach! Willow cut down from around the polytunnel were passed onto the Young Stock, who were very joyous in their munching too! The Barn Owl was spotted on the field 8 fence one evening last week, a Kingfisher joined Alice in the veg garden, and although we haven’t yet heard the migrating geese, we did enjoy a swan overhead the other day.

With that, a question from Boots: Migrating geese fly in a V formation to save energy, and the V can appear longer on one side why? Because there are more geese on one side of course! There is a technical answer we are sure, but this one made us laugh and groan in equal measure!

To Autumn by John Keats

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For summer has o’er-brimm’d their clammy cells.

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep,
Drows’d with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.

Where are the songs of spring? Ay, Where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

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