And Danny looked on...

"For this you give me extra carrots and corn?" "What are these guys?" "Why are they in my home pen?" Poor Danny the Donkey. He looked on inquisitively, and slightly confused, as the two New Romantic weaners took over what had been his home for the past few months. OK. He now has a lovely green paddock looking out over the sheep fields and some farm buildings and one of the main entrance roads. But, hang on, does that make up for losing The Winter Quarters???? I think he was prepared to suspend judgement. Certainly the little guys were slightly overwhelmed by their new home: after a quick scoot round they settled to rootling close to Danny - I reckon they'd have been more than happy to share his pen with him..... bet it won't be too long before they've made a good fist of rootling under that gate to get next door. Which we mentioned to Porig, their temporary Mum cum keeper - who said, since they'd been born on her birthday, she'd take special care of them.... and fix any troublesome exit points....... Note the 'troublesome'. Maybe the New Romantics will not find themselves too confined.... Anyway, this weekend is Grand Spring Opening at Elsham Hall Country Park (the New Romantics' summer home) so the Curly Coats are going to have lots of visitors to pet and pamper them. And their departure from Rectory Reserve marks the beginning of our own Migratory Season as our young charges go off to various summer quarters to "Wow" their public...............

Look what the cat brought in.......

Waifa has turned into an excellent mouser - most days either we or the dogs wander round the house (both inside and out) collecting the victims of her exploits.

Last Friday though she really surpassed herself.

In the early afternoon The Big Boss and I were packing and labelling products for market the following day: suddenly the oddest knocking and banging noises started up in the Dining Room. We've had some chaps here for a few days installing solar panels on the roof so my first thought was that one of them was still working away somewhere - although I was certain they'd all finished a couple of hours previously.

It didn't take long to locate the source of the disruption.

As I walked into the Dining Room Waifa erupted from behind the door and flung a baby rabbit down in front of the fire.

"Here's what I brought you for dinner" I think she said .........................

Best not ask "What next"!

Here, there and everywhere

The nicest time of all to be a piglet is between the ages of 2 to 3 weeks - all the 'bits' work sufficiently well to get away from Mum for increasingly long spells - - and 7 weeks when it's time to be weaned.

During this period all the Big Adventures and Explorations take place. The piglets also get to

know the other members of the herd and the extent of their 'world' at RectoryReserve. The fearless little creatures can be seen rushing everywhere like The White Rabbit; now here, now there.

Down by the pond one moment and up in one of the stables the next: in the orchard and then

suddenly round the horse's feet.

Sometimes they rush (piglets rarely stroll, they just seem to want to get to the next place as quickly as possible) around a corner, come face to face with one of us, screech to a halt and then,

like a wave retreating from the shore, flip over and rush back the other way!

Sometimes we have a little panic if one of them gets into a 'difficult position' (in the photo above for instance you can just see one in the background in Mangal & Ginger's pen - he couldn't remember how he got in and got in a bit of a tizzy so we had to go in and rescue him --- not a good idea with The Big Boar in Residence).

Mostly though we never cease to be charmed and amazed by their antics. Just yesterday Precious was trying to sleep in the sun and her young horde decided to use her as a climbing frame; over her back and down her snout and round the other way. She never batted an eyelid!

Gunner, on the other hand, clearly thinks his out-of-shooting-season 'job' is to round them up

when they stray too far and then return them to Mum.

They appear endlessly fascinated by him, sniffing and nuzzling enquiringly: he has a wonderful "I think I'll just pretend I'm a statue" demeanour whenever they become enquisitive! And when they get bored and scamper off he's instantly up and after them again!

Suddenly though they all get tired, rush back quickly to their pen (Precious always sniffs them in one by one!), have a drink on mum and then collapse in a heap and go to sleep....... till it's time for the next Big Adventure.

Ten is the number

It must have been the effect of the 'SuperMoon' being 30% closer to the earth than normal because on Saturday morning when Delila came out for her breakfast some of her little ones were already playing outside the ark - at not yet three days old......

They soon scampered back in again when they heard me though so I followed and managed to count them before they all piled up on top of each other again.....

Definitely 10 - Delila's favourite number. That makes three tens in a row: the 10 Delinquants this time last year, followed by the 10 Little B's in September and now The 10 Clarissas ("What a Thought" said The Boss when I wrote it up on the Family Tree Board.) That's what we've dubbed the litter for now: we thought to name them after the chefs on the programme - but we don't yet know who they all are! So in the meantime, The Clarissas will remind us of their provenance.....

Clever Delila....

"My! My! My! Delila

Our pigs have always been stars. Since Ginger's first litter were born back in November 2007 the paparazzi have beat a path to our arks but Delila truly stole the show last Wednesday evening.
The Big Boss and I had settled down to a relaxing hour or so of TV after dinner but were disrupted by the loud noises come from the woods outside the front of the house:

"What the Hell's going on out there?" I said after a bout of very loud banging.....

Slowly the pieces started to fall into place.

Delila had been a little late out for her tea that afternoon: enough for me to think her 'time' was almost nigh: her food bowl had 'disappeared' and when I looked inside her ark the straw was all piled up on one side..... housework had clearly been done....no sign of the bowl though......Whilst she was eating I collected an armful of sticks and branches and threw them into her pen thinking she could soon be needing them.....

We'd just got on to The Great British Food Revival when it all went quiet outside. The TV crew had been here, back in October or November last year, filming with Clarissa Dickson Wright so we were hopeful of catching sight of our pigs on the programme. And suddenly there we were in the woods talking to Clarissa about our curly coats. "Come and meet Delila" I said to her after we'd spent some moments talking with the Maiden Aunts in the background. Delila was rootling contentedly in her pen next door.

"Oh Look, now there's a magnificent pig!" Exclaimed Clarissa. "My! My! My Delila: look at the size of her!" At the sound of her name Delila - as if on cue - stopped her rootling, lifted her head and looked Clarissa straight in the eye.

At about the same time as that very scene was being enacted on national TV Delila was giving birth to her litter of little squiglets.When Pilot, Gunner and I took our habitual late night stroll up the drive I could just about distinguish the sound of gruntles coming from her ark. I wasn't absolutely sure though. I mean - having piglets on cue with one's appearance on National TV was a little too much of a coincidence wasn't it?

As we got back to the house though there was an unmistakeable "Squeaeeeakk": " That's it" I thought to myself.

"Definitely new piglets" I said to The Boss when I got up to bed - and we both settled down contentedly for the night.

"Bit of a Prima Donna, that sow, don't you think?" he muttered before falling asleep.

Next morning whilst Delila was distracted by her breakfast I peered inside the ark and there they were: 8 or 9 or 10 wriggly pigglies. Difficult to tell exact numbers because they keep wriggling and piling up on each other like worms...................

The Boss promptly sent Clarissa a postcard of one of our sows with her newborns: told her on hearing Clarissa call her name, Delila promptly gave birth ---

"Wanted to be done and dusted before the Paparazzi turned up." I said.

....

The programme airs on www/bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/GreatBritishFoodRevival till next Wednesday : minutes 49-52 are the relevant ones.........................

"Where can we find enough food to feed all these people" (God News Bible : John 6)

The parable of the Loaves and the Fishes is familiar to most - how the 5000 were fed with just five loaves and two fish; enough being left over to fill 12 baskets.

A similar tale is told in the Ancient Lore of the Swine except that, being 'of the earth', the story told for generations around wallow and sleeping hollows features loaves and roots.

Which may go a little way to explaining the curious sight of piles of these foodstuffs around RectoryReserve over the past few weeks.

The constant increases in feed prices had been causing the Big Boss's brow to furrow more than normally:

"For everyone to have even a little, it would take more than 200 silver coins" (ib.) he had been heard muttering to Mangal over the fence one evening.

And then he had a flash of brilliance (sometimes also known as Common Sense) --- or maybe Mangal muttered something earthy back. Whichever..... within a matter of days a way of lessening the burden on The Big Purse was established. Henceforth, the Porcine Herd shall dine on the fruits of the earth - sourced from a nearby organic farm. Sometimes Parsnips, sometimes potatoes and, in their season, fresh brassicas will replace up to 50% of their proprietory feed.

Mangal and The Boss know a thing or two for all the herd are most satisfied with this arrangement, roots being just the thing pigs most love rootling for.

Morphic resonance then kicked in: a friendly farmer from the village delivered a large load of sugar beet. How these were relished! And then again: Plum the Keeper rang The Big Boss 'out of the blue' one afternoon:-

"Could you use a few loaves of Bread d'ye think?"

It transpired that one of Gunner's putative wives' owners, who works for a well respected local bakery, was (thanks to a cancelled contract) looking for a 'home' for 600 redundant loaves........

Now, if there is one thing Pigs truly relish it is Bread. Harking back to The Ancient Lore of the Swine...... "Happy the Pig who finds bread before his snout...........". Happy pigs indeed.

The sun has got his hat on.............

" Hip Hip Hip Hooray"

The Bestest Gundog in the world is 4 years old today.....

So we took him on A Great Big Birthday Adventure.....

to see the sea, which he's never seen before.

A whole different environment for a working dog
And he loved it straightaway................

Especially when he realised there were seabirds ...

Which he could chase and chase and chase....

all the way out to sea

And he leapt and dived over the waves in sheer glee
And then charged all the way back to tell me

What great fun it all was ... and then went back again for more!

So I took him up on the shore and he realised that was better still.

Not least because there were more seabirds to flush off the tide-ridden sands

He charged hither and thither and to and fro with gay abandon sniffing the flotsam and jetsam in his path..... just too, too many smells and objects to check out!

And then I took him still further up the shore and showed him the dunes -

And off he charged following his nose once more.... till, a few moments later, up flew a woodcock, weaving and diving and darting away from danger.

What joy! Thought the dog....... here too....

I never thought to see the secretive and solitary game bird in this place... it was doubtless just as surprised to be flushed out so far from its customary woodland habitat....

Such a big new world to explore.... I think The Dog would have gladly stayed all day.... but we had deeds to do ... and he was tiring....

Back home and he happily fell asleep in front of the fire to dry off - and dream.

Another time when the sun has got his hat on we'll go back to play again.......