Quite a lot happening

Well quite a lot has been happening over the past few days. On Thursdays we take our agility dogs training to a venue near Shaftesbury. It is an equestrian centre and we park in the car park and take our dogs about 50 yards away to the training area. Last Thursday we behaved as usual and I took my handbag down to the training area. At the end of the lesson I went to get my purse out to pay the trainer and could not find my handbag. I thought I must have left it in the dog van, but sadly it was not there. After extensive searching we came to the conclusion that it had been stolen. It contained all my credit and debit cards, £100 cash which I had just withdrawn as well as all my keys - to two vehicles, the farm gates, the house, the office, the post box and even the carry boy which is the pick up cover on the back of our 4 x 4. Worst of all my driving licence was in it with my name and address on it.

The rest of the day was taken up in reporting the incident to the police, phoning the insurance company to claim, cancelling bank cards, arranging for the locks to be changed on the vehicles, buying crook locks to secure the steering wheels on both vehicles until the locks are changed, and generally feeling really fed up about the whole affair. We have, however, moved on and have even received my new mobile phone (although they omitted the sim card) and some of the bank cards already.


On Sunday I had arranged for Colin Ottery (our shearer) to come and scan our pregnant females to make sure that they are pregnant. He found that most were pregnant, one was definitely not and five were inconclusive - probably because they were mated late last year. He is coming back in a month to re-scan and hopefully give us a definite answer so that we know whether we have to remate them.

Pregnant females are in general the most valuable stock as they command the highest price when selling them. Stud males also fetch a good price but non-breeding males have the lowest market value.

The good weather has enabled us to start catching up on paddock cleaning. One of our neighbours was worried that her young labrador bitch was not good with other dogs so she has been coming round to go for walks on the farm with our six dogs. Her dog is fine with them and is showing all the right reactions, which our neightbour had thought were problems.

As I have retired from dog training I did not want to be paid, but luckily her husband is a builder and he is going to pay for the lessons by giving us some advice on some small building projects around the farm. And joy oh joy - she has offered to help with the paddock cleaning a couple of times a week. This has helped us a lot as the wet weather has put us behind.

Todays picture is of Colin dressed for scanning. Although you cannot see it, he has a back pack containing a monitor and the ultrasound scanning equipment.