It was early June, Spring had finally sprung and the sheep were getting a bit hot so we decided to have a go at sheep-shearing ourselves. The cost of some electric shearers was similar to one year's visit from a professional sheep shearer so we thought we would save some money and release our inner stylist! The clippers duly arrived so we were armed and dangerous and off we set.
At first it was tough going - the first sheep (the Ram who is twitchy at the best of times and also huge) took around 30minutes but it got easier. In this photo you can see the bottle of iodine in Bee's hand ready to treat any cuts - of which there were a fair few - on the first few sheep. Last year, the professional shearer nicked the sheep plenty of times so we didn't feel too bad about it.
The sheep have ticklish hind quarters so they squirmed a lot and it was nerve racking being so close to the carotid artery!
It was back-breaking work and we only had 7 adult sheep to shear (the lambs were left un-sheared). Our hands were lovely and moisturised with all the lanolin. We used the wool to mulch around the fruit trees and asparagus bed as it wasn't quite spinning grade especially as the fleeces were a little incomplete because of our poor technique.
The sheep also got a pedicure as their hooves had grown considerably with the wet weather. We couldn't post a photo of the shorn sheep; they begged us not to as their street-cred was at stake, but imagine a sponge having a fight with a razor blade and you can visualise the outcome. We look forward to honing our shearing skills next summer.
Another first this summer was making hay. The last two years a neighbour came to cut and bale it but we saw an opportunity to make and sell small bales for people who weren't equipped to handle large commercial round bales. Al had spent the spring collecting rusty old machinery and resurrecting it for a total cost of around €300 for the 4 tools needed (mower, hay bob, windrower and baler). At the start of June we had a week of good weather forecast so we decided to have a go at the first hectare (out of 4 in total) to test out all the equipment. All worked fine except the tractor had a clutch problem so after the first hectare and before the weather improved again Al changed the clutch on the tractor.
It was cut;
spun several times over the course of a few days;
then racked into windrows ready for the baler;
We borrowed the baler in exchange for getting it working again. We learned lots about the workings of a baler and we can regulate the length and density and thus weight of the bales to allow one person to lift them. They weighed 19-23kg. It was a great workout loading them onto a trailer and hoisting them up into the barn hay loft! We made 450 bales, most of which we sold. The rest will feed our sheep and donkeys over the winter.
A huge thank you to the Dutch and St Gervais guests who arrived just in time for the hard graft !
We were thirsty after making all that hay so we combed the river and canal banks for elderflowers and made several batches of elderflower cordial and champagne. There is no photographic evidence of the champagne as it was consumed so rapidly!
We also road-tested the solar oven we had made in the spring. It took 2 hours to bake a loaf of bread but it is very useful to sterilise the preserving jars. It didn't go above 150 deg C but will certainly save heating up the nice cool kitchen when it's 35 deg C outside!
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Last but not least we managed to get the glass panels into the mill room floor. They had been glaring at us for seven months since delivery, waiting to be installed. It seemed slightly galling chopping holes into the floor we had constructed in December. We hadn't tiled the floor section for the panels as we intended to tile around the glass panels once they were fitted.
There is a 3 metre drop to the old mill wheel and water below.
We painted the new timbers of the new floor black for effect.
Phew, the panels fit and we can stand on them.....
They're in and we have now tiled around them. We can also admire them at night with the halogen lamp we installed. Now we just need to finish tiling the rest of the ground floor and clean up the mud and silt from around the workings so there is something other than mud to admire...........
