It’s as though the weather suddenly realised it was winter and decided to make up for lost time. We may have had the start of spring over a fortnight ago, the pond may be full of frogspawn, the daffodils may be pointing skywards and we may have blossom on our trees... BUT today the temperature plummeted, the winds rose and the rain and sleet came down, and tomorrow is set to be worse.
So, as the photo shows, the cows are back in their pad!! We have now laid down some ground cover matting and added (to date) a total of 8 cubic meters of woodchip and it all looks rather impressive. The cows are under strict instructions not to drop any hay or kick out any straw from the field shelters and if they have to poo, no ‘loose stuff’ and all in one place please!!!!!!! But back to reality: as we have mentioned before the wind AND wet are not a great combination for livestock. Whilst the 4-acre field has great hedges, the wind direction is varying a lot now from north west to south south west and the more southerly it gets, the less protection the cows have. Plus with it being so much colder (and sleet can be very cold), we felt the lack of a field shelter was an issue.
It took us a while to get them to go across the line where the electric line had been but once over they fair galloped. They ended up overtaking us in fact as their hay trolley was hard work to tow, particularly over the soggy bits!!!
The weather is showing no signs of letting up and from previous wet periods we know that we need at least two drying days for every one wet day in order for us to feel the land is drying off...
And to think we may have lambs in just over a week