Victoria returns to The Black Banana

 Four days or so after weaning, the Sow comes back in season and is ready to entertain the boar. Victoria's little 'Alberts' were successfully (for us, if not them!) weaned on Wednesday so we decided to move her back to The Black Banana on Friday to give them a few days to reacquaint themselves before he starts leaping all over her.

First though we had to move Merkel the Ferkel, aka Mrs Merkel, away from Banana to her farrowing pen as she is due shortly before Easter. Her new pen had a bespoke house in it - new and unused - but it wasn't built with her in mind and we felt it might be a little small to share with piglets. So a bigger house had to be moved first.
 Gunner and The Big Boss supervised operations  and in no time at all - thanks to John and his Manitou - a had-been-redundant ark was soon in place and furnished with plenty of fluffy straw to welcome Mrs Merkel.

Pigs are funny things. She's been happily mucking about with Banana these past few months but when the gate was opened and a feed bowl rattled under her snout she was away without a backward glance.  I don't think he

 noticed her leave either - too busy with the little bit of feed Linda had put down to distract him. Mrs Merkel didn't exactly hop onto the trailer but it was not a very long job to persuade her up the unfamiliar ramp. Transportation to her new premises took all of two minutes - hardly time to empty her bowl really - but when we let down the ramp she happily trotted out and ran the 20 or so metres to her new pen. And kept on running... round and round, up and down, inspecting the new neighbours and admiring the view.  She's seen nothing but mud and trees for a few months so it must have been a real treat to feel firm grass

 under her trotters.
Then she settled down to the serious business of eating.
Saturday morning we could see her from our bedroom window (a first) happily mooching about in the early morning light - rootling here and there, pursued by a little flock of birds doubtless after any little morsel she might have overlooked. As if!

Having successfuly moved Mrs Merkel we turned our attention to the Beuatiful Blonde Victoria. She's been cooped up in the stalls since

before Christmas so she was not unhappy to leave. Again, it took a little coaxing to get her up the ramp onto the trailer but at the other end she trotted off and positively charged up the path to her old pen....... and kept on charging....and then floundering as she sank in the mud! We let out a collective "Ohhh" as her beautiful blonde coat became offset by black mud. She didn't seem to care at all. She galumphed round the whole pen. We opened the gate separating her from Banana and in no time he was all over her: "So very pleased to have you back again" I believe he was saying - or was it something a little more earthy!  In no time at all she was a piebald piggie but she didn't seem to care. They clearly recognised each other and soon settled down together ..... Saturday morning they came running out of their ark like they'd never been parted......... and by this (Sunday) morning they were running rings roud each other as he was gamely trying to leap on her back....... won't be long before she's in the family way again......

"Hang on - this isn't what we meant.."

"OK, the joke's over; you can open the gates up now.
We'd quite like to get out on the other side and
run around the place a bit; we've had a rest and it'd be good to play with our mates and see some of the others...."

"Hey, anybody out there? You listening to us? We're shouting as loud as we can....  COULD YOU OPEN UP PLEASE???  There's nothing to do in here and we're not hungry cos we haven't been anywhere to work up an appetite....."

"It's no good mate; they don't seem to understand what we're saying. Much as I like you, brother, your conversation's gettin' just a tad repetitive and I could do with a different point of view. Wonder what happened to Mum .... haven't heard her little grunts for a while now...... where d'you think she's gone.... P'raps if they let us out of here we could go find her.... I almost miss her..."
"HELLO! Anybody listening out there, we want to go visit our mum now. How loud do we have to shout? P'raps you could at least send in reinforcements ..... those other chaps keep runnin' past; why won't someone open up so they can get in or, better still, we can get out.
This really isn't what we meant ..... not what we meant at all................"

"That's odd"

 "Hmmmmmmph.  Look at this will you?"
"Oh. Well, I don't know. What's it mean?"
"Well: it's a bit odd isn't it? I could've sworn the Big Boar said this was a special new housing for us littl'uns - you  know, when life with mum and all her nagging get too boring."
"Then what's those chaps doing in there? And just look at it - they've got loads of fluffy clean straw - ...."
"Yes; and look here - they've got their own food

buckets - this one still has some snacky bits stuck on the bottom - look, look .....Oh!  Whoops, all gone now..."
"I don't care about food just now.... I just want to know what we're s'posed to do. I mean, I was just getting used to the idea we could get away to a place of our own from time to time  and now it looks like these chaps have taken over - and how'd they get in there anyhow?"
"I don't know - I never saw them running around the place. Perhaps they flew here?"
"Tell you what.......Let's go back home and have a little chat with um - perhaps she'll know something......"

In search of the new youth hostel....

"They were talking about making us a new youth hostel.....
Well... we better have a little trottle around and see what we can find..."

"There's a brick place up there... d'you s'pose that's what they meant?"
"Nah... c'mon.... that doesn't look at all like a youth hostel........."

"What about this then?"
"Let me see ... move over...... Nah, that can't be it - got no hole for trotting in and out......"

"Hmmm..... come over here and have a sniff .... this seems much more like it... got a big hole to go in and out and some of  those gappy things mum has in her house......"

"Yep; you know what... it's pretty interesting in there....I think I found something to nibble on the ground too .... what d'you think the others'll make of it?"

"Dunno.  Let's go and check it out with mum and then tell the others to come round and have a look.... there's plenty of room for us all .... we could have a party and make real pigs of ourselves........."

Housing matters

It's mid-February and time to start thinking about weaning the last two litters born at New Year.  Just one small problem: Victoria and Truffle farrowed in the buildings we normally wean the little ones to. So, where to next?
We toyed with the idea of giving up one of the stables to pigs but that didn't seem a good idea - once pigs are in, experience has shown, they are likely to stay in; if not the same pigs all the time. I couldn't really see Rocco happily going back into his stable if it had been loaned out to the porcine herd for a spell!
So here's the new weaning barn: it's the old Coach Shed complete with brick floor and hurricane lamp alcove. I'm hoping these traditional features outlast the pigs' stay! Actually, it's rather nice to see it like this - for all the time we've been here it has been used as spare materials storage - posts, wire, ladders etc.etc. plus a load of rubbish that was never going to be useful! Thanks to the pigs, therefore, we at last had an excuse to have a good sort out! Who says they don't have their uses!

Another Season gone by

We started our fifth season of bush-beating in the middle of October 2012. It's fair to say we were a little bit anxious about how much work we'd be getting involved in. Our 'main' shoot in the local village (which folded at the end of last season) left us with a gap of some 30 days to fill. Throughout the past four seasons we'd been able to count on going there at least 2 days a week from late September/early October onwards. With 'our' other shoots only staging 6 or so events a season we were going to have difficulty matching, never mind exceeding, the 46 days we notched up last season.

Through putting the word about a bit during the summer we picked up two other regular fortnightly shoots and, as the season wore on, were invited to work on a further two. That gave us a total of 7 different locations - each with its peculiar 'culture' and terrain. In addition we were invited to beat for a shoot that holds just one event a year! 
Bush-beaters are a pretty whacky lot. Mostly men (on most of the above shoots I am the only female!) with an average age of 60 we turn out for 9 am every shoot morning regardless of weather and proceed to spend the next 6 to 7 hours trudging up hill and down dale, through plough, bracken, kale, bramble, bog and wood, over stubble and grassland  with our sticks & flags (usually half a plastic animal feed sack nailed to a hazel or blackthorn stick)  "tap, tap tapping" on wood "beat,beat bashing" on bush and "flagging up"  all with the purpose of pushing game forwards and upwards for the waiting guns. Most shoots will cover 5-7 drives each day, between which there is much banter, joviality, storytelling and, often, colourful language. Nor is it a day out for the fashion conscious: the main requirements of clothing are that they be water, wind and briar proof! Those of us with dogs (75% spaniels, 25% labradors) tend to be a little more reserved than those without - working a dog effectively demands 100% attention on that dog - any lapse and the wily chap will be off doing his or her own thing. Nothing spoils a shooting day as effectively as an uncontrolled or unruly dog in the beating line and most such creatures are tolerated for their connections rather than their contribution to a successful day.

However, I digress...
This season was going swimmingly: the Bestest Gundog and I were quickly into the swing of things on our regular shoots and settled seamlessly into the 'new' ones..... He was a little keen to get on with the job and obviously (!) knew a lot more than his handler concerning the whereabouts of birds. In a perfect world I'd have wished for him to stay a little closer but past experience is a hard lesson to disregard! His occasional transgressions were overlooked in light of his overall work standard. The greatest compliment was being invited to work on a shoot which, until this season, has refused our help because they "don't have dogs in the line"!

Then the dog limped to a halt. Our 15th day was memorable for a number of reasons: it was the Keeper's Day; he forgot his radios so had little, if any, control; several 'new' beaters joined the line and a number of them were extremely rowdy ('red indians' someone, who heard them in a nearby village, called them); a number of wrong instructions were given by and to various people on a number of occasions so birds were flushed all over the place and not nececessarily over the Guns; yours truly picked up the prevailing tummy bug and the Dog picked up a nail-bed infection. At the end of that day he was just a bit lame; the next day he was seriously limping and the following day, having stayed away from 'work', he was unable to put the foot on the ground. A course of anitbiotics and anti-inflammatories helped and 10 days later he seemed OK, although the nail was glaringly red, so I made the mistake of taking him to work. He enthusiatically set off in the morning but winced when he jumped out of the car after lunch break: there was no way he was going to work that afternoon with only three good paws. The next day he was fine so, reluctant to let him be thought a 'wimp', we set off a couple of days later to the Shoot I mentioned which till now has not wanted dogs in the line - and that was his last day. His nail came off completely leaving the quick exposed. Another longer course of antibiotics, anti-inflammatories and lead-only exercise followed with the toe bleeding every time it was stubbed on the slighted thing.

 It was most distressing. The Dog took to howling when I went off to "work" without him and I was doing the job with 50% normal enthusiasm. "Bet you're missing your dog?" or "Not the same without the dog is it?" colleagues kept saying. Quite!
I shall add "the least enjoyable season" to the list of other headlines for 2012 ("wettest", "dullest" etc). Our stats for our five seasons so far are:
Season 1   Total: 34 days  Dog 26.5 (several weeks lost owing to having tail amputated)
Season 2   Total: 39 days  Dog 39 days
Season 3   Total: 36 days  Dog 33 days
Season 4   Total: 47 days  Dog 46 days
Season 5   Total: 31 days  Dog 16.5 days
To end on a positive note: two of our 'new' shoots this season have invited us to join their team on a regular basis next season - and one of them is the one that "doesn't have dogs in the line". Well done that Dog - he won them over in just one day!