Tonight there is a full moon; outside the air is calm and the last blackbirds have gone to bed.
The two dogs I have staying this week are sleeping - an elderly Lurcher of 14 and a German Pointer of 9, Penny and Smudge.
Angus, my wee Scottish Terrier, has had all his last jabs and checks and tomorrow night will be on the eurotunnel back to England.
My favourite Son and Heir (being the only S&H) is inconviently flying into Stansted tomorrow afternoon - and then having to make his way to Gatwick where GW will collect him.
Tomorrow night I will have the Husband, the Boy, the Dog and the Two Visitors here.
The Scot is smelly.
The road to the cottage
Showing posts with label Scottish terriers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Scottish terriers. Show all posts
Thursday, 14 July 2011
Wednesday, 29 June 2011
Thinking of you!
A message to my wee black Scottish bestest friend who is stuck in Brussels at the moment waiting for his Mum to get over to bring him home. Miss you, Angus!
Taken in Brussels when Angus was in Sapper mode. He will have serious competition from the bantams though!
Thursday, 9 June 2011
Country Life
A knock at the door.
'You missing any bantams?'
'Yes, actually, the four of them - the fox got in whilst we were away and that was the end of my Girls'.
'I've got one in my summer house if you'd like to come and collect her'.
Rush down the lane and there in the summerhouse is my Darling Grace - after her miraculous escape she has now become Amazing Grace.
We were away for a few days and the Meerkat Boy moved in tohave a break from his father to look after the Girls ... he was sleeping in the spare room at the front of the house and the Girls are in the garden at the back of the house which our bedroom overlooks. So when the f***ing fox chewed its way through the wire, the Meerkat Boy slept on ... so George, Bessie and Felicity are now in bantam heaven. The Meerkat Boy was devastated - you look after someone's animals and they die ...
Rang Mr. Bantam who told us that bantams/chickens get lonely and pine away if they are by themselves - or if we didn't want more Bantams the trick was to put a mirror in the garden and con Grace into thinking she wasn't alone. As Grace had proved herself to be a most smart Bantam, I didn't think she would be taken in by a mirror trick for too long, so three replacement Girls were purchased. They don't have names - I hate to say that we can't tell the difference between them and perhaps it would be tempting fate to give them names, so now it is just Grace and the Girls.
We now have a fox trap in the garden - so far we have caught three magpies (possibly the same one) and yesterday three of the Girls strolled in and the door shut. No fox. After capturing the magpies, we rang round to see if any of the gamekeepers wanted one - apparently they are put in a Larson trap to attract other magpies and the gamekeepers then blast them to smithereens. Anyway no-one wanted one so we were advised to hit it over the head and be done with it. Both of us cringed at the idea so the magpies live to fly another day! Waiting for another rabbit to be delivered to use as bait - if not I will have to go and get some dog food.
We have an allottment in the village about three minutes from the house - all planted and growing and this is definitely how I like gardening. I have been waiting for it to rain so that I can plant some things here at the house, but apart from a bit of drizzle we have had no rain for months. The one advantage is that we don't have to mow the lawn, as there is none left to mow.
Tomorrow we are off to the Royal Cornwall Show to see what goodies are on offer in that far away place on the road to America, and probably go and stroke a few pigs as one does.
My beloved wee Scottish gentleman in his black coat will be here within about 10 days, so I must go and make a Welcome Home banner.
'You missing any bantams?'
'Yes, actually, the four of them - the fox got in whilst we were away and that was the end of my Girls'.
'I've got one in my summer house if you'd like to come and collect her'.
Rush down the lane and there in the summerhouse is my Darling Grace - after her miraculous escape she has now become Amazing Grace.
We were away for a few days and the Meerkat Boy moved in to
Rang Mr. Bantam who told us that bantams/chickens get lonely and pine away if they are by themselves - or if we didn't want more Bantams the trick was to put a mirror in the garden and con Grace into thinking she wasn't alone. As Grace had proved herself to be a most smart Bantam, I didn't think she would be taken in by a mirror trick for too long, so three replacement Girls were purchased. They don't have names - I hate to say that we can't tell the difference between them and perhaps it would be tempting fate to give them names, so now it is just Grace and the Girls.
We now have a fox trap in the garden - so far we have caught three magpies (possibly the same one) and yesterday three of the Girls strolled in and the door shut. No fox. After capturing the magpies, we rang round to see if any of the gamekeepers wanted one - apparently they are put in a Larson trap to attract other magpies and the gamekeepers then blast them to smithereens. Anyway no-one wanted one so we were advised to hit it over the head and be done with it. Both of us cringed at the idea so the magpies live to fly another day! Waiting for another rabbit to be delivered to use as bait - if not I will have to go and get some dog food.
We have an allottment in the village about three minutes from the house - all planted and growing and this is definitely how I like gardening. I have been waiting for it to rain so that I can plant some things here at the house, but apart from a bit of drizzle we have had no rain for months. The one advantage is that we don't have to mow the lawn, as there is none left to mow.
Tomorrow we are off to the Royal Cornwall Show to see what goodies are on offer in that far away place on the road to America, and probably go and stroke a few pigs as one does.
My beloved wee Scottish gentleman in his black coat will be here within about 10 days, so I must go and make a Welcome Home banner.
Friday, 8 April 2011
The Girls are here
Actually the Girls have been here for a month now but as usual the time passes and I don't put up a post.
A quick google search for 'Bantams Dorset' lead us to the Mr. Bantam of the area - he has been raising Bantams for 15 years and has 3 or 4 varieties, which gallop around in his garden and dig their way to Australia. We could have had 'posh' show Bantams or ones that didn't quite make the grade. As neither GW or myself see ouselves as Bantam Fanciers or whatever they are called we plumped for the rejects - after all the eggs are the same.
Mr. Bantam chose three Buff Pekins and a Buff Pekin x Wyandotte, all of whom looked perfect as far as we could see, and so off home we go, me with a cardboard box on my knees. GW had been building a run for them (lots of drawing up of plans, trips into Bridport to purchase things, and quite a lot of thinking) so when we got home, in they went along with food and water and we sat down to think of names.
The first one was named Felicity as we got them on the Ste. Felicie (my children often named their pets after the Saints Day on which they arrived, and being half Frog ...); number 2 was named Grace as she is as courageous as Grace Darling; number 3 who is the Pekin x and totally neurotic and horribly bossy was named George after George in the Famous Five and number 4, bless her, is Bessie named after Billie Bunter's sister, as she is rather F.A.T. and tends to waddle.
As George is such a bad influence, I decided to keep them in the pen for the first few days as I could see she would organise the Great Escape. There was much pacing and sulking. But it allowed us time to train them to the sound of food being rattled around in the tin which meant back to HQ. The first sortie was courageous Grace and chunky Bessie and deemed a success so the following day all four were let loose.
I no longer have a worm, a bug, or a grub in the garden. We are now on the front line of the Somme battlefields. My vegetable patch is as cleansed as can be - fortunately nothing is yet planted. I have to go and buy 50 feet of chicken wire in order to ban them from that area as time is racing on and things need to go into the ground for human consumption later in the year. Fortunately the back garden is above the house so I can fence off access to the front of the house and the Great Escape - also when Angus arrives after his quarantine we will hopefully manage to keep Girls v. Scottish Terrier seperate ... in a running battle the Girls will not win!
The Girls are each laying their egg a day and mighty fine eggs they are too - none of this supermarket rubbish. You have to use 2 Bantam's eggs to one chicken egg but they are rich, a deep yellow, full of taste and apparently lower in cholesterol than a hen's egg. And much less white, which suites me.
At the moment they are shut in as a) they normally lay in the afternoon but if they can lay in a Secret Place somewhere in the garden they prefer it and b) George has been totally over the top this morning with Teach Yourself to Fly lessons into the hedge - much flapping of wings and irate shouting from one of the wrens.
Are we attached to these small and charming beasties? Yes. Obsessed? Well almost. Does GW spend half his day talking to them in Bantam Speak? Yes. Are we sad? Definitely. I might even post a picture of them later.
Have a good weekend all of you and I hope your weather is as good as it is here in fabulous West Dorset. GW is on his way home from Brussels and tomorrow I will get him to the garden centre and purchase chicken wire and plants, then the National. Sunday we may go racing, the last pub quiz before the summer season (don't want the holidaymakers spoiling our fun!) and then it is Pig Black Monday. Well actually it will be a Black Sunday for the pigs but on Monday we get together to chop the porkers into bits. Great discussions in the pub the other week as to who wanted a pig and I think that so far there will be 12 people wanting a pig each. Endless discussions on what one can do with bits of pig and I keep throwing a fly in the ointment as having been previously married to a Frog Chef whose motto was 'if it moves, eat it' and follower of the belief that everything in a pig is edible apart from the oink, I asked whether we would have the blood to make Black Pudding, why don't we get the trotters, ears and tail make for a great soup, I want to make saucisson and not sausages, cheeks of pig are wonderful - and I think I will soon be barred from the boozer!
A quick google search for 'Bantams Dorset' lead us to the Mr. Bantam of the area - he has been raising Bantams for 15 years and has 3 or 4 varieties, which gallop around in his garden and dig their way to Australia. We could have had 'posh' show Bantams or ones that didn't quite make the grade. As neither GW or myself see ouselves as Bantam Fanciers or whatever they are called we plumped for the rejects - after all the eggs are the same.
Mr. Bantam chose three Buff Pekins and a Buff Pekin x Wyandotte, all of whom looked perfect as far as we could see, and so off home we go, me with a cardboard box on my knees. GW had been building a run for them (lots of drawing up of plans, trips into Bridport to purchase things, and quite a lot of thinking) so when we got home, in they went along with food and water and we sat down to think of names.
The first one was named Felicity as we got them on the Ste. Felicie (my children often named their pets after the Saints Day on which they arrived, and being half Frog ...); number 2 was named Grace as she is as courageous as Grace Darling; number 3 who is the Pekin x and totally neurotic and horribly bossy was named George after George in the Famous Five and number 4, bless her, is Bessie named after Billie Bunter's sister, as she is rather F.A.T. and tends to waddle.
As George is such a bad influence, I decided to keep them in the pen for the first few days as I could see she would organise the Great Escape. There was much pacing and sulking. But it allowed us time to train them to the sound of food being rattled around in the tin which meant back to HQ. The first sortie was courageous Grace and chunky Bessie and deemed a success so the following day all four were let loose.
I no longer have a worm, a bug, or a grub in the garden. We are now on the front line of the Somme battlefields. My vegetable patch is as cleansed as can be - fortunately nothing is yet planted. I have to go and buy 50 feet of chicken wire in order to ban them from that area as time is racing on and things need to go into the ground for human consumption later in the year. Fortunately the back garden is above the house so I can fence off access to the front of the house and the Great Escape - also when Angus arrives after his quarantine we will hopefully manage to keep Girls v. Scottish Terrier seperate ... in a running battle the Girls will not win!
The Girls are each laying their egg a day and mighty fine eggs they are too - none of this supermarket rubbish. You have to use 2 Bantam's eggs to one chicken egg but they are rich, a deep yellow, full of taste and apparently lower in cholesterol than a hen's egg. And much less white, which suites me.
At the moment they are shut in as a) they normally lay in the afternoon but if they can lay in a Secret Place somewhere in the garden they prefer it and b) George has been totally over the top this morning with Teach Yourself to Fly lessons into the hedge - much flapping of wings and irate shouting from one of the wrens.
Are we attached to these small and charming beasties? Yes. Obsessed? Well almost. Does GW spend half his day talking to them in Bantam Speak? Yes. Are we sad? Definitely. I might even post a picture of them later.
Have a good weekend all of you and I hope your weather is as good as it is here in fabulous West Dorset. GW is on his way home from Brussels and tomorrow I will get him to the garden centre and purchase chicken wire and plants, then the National. Sunday we may go racing, the last pub quiz before the summer season (don't want the holidaymakers spoiling our fun!) and then it is Pig Black Monday. Well actually it will be a Black Sunday for the pigs but on Monday we get together to chop the porkers into bits. Great discussions in the pub the other week as to who wanted a pig and I think that so far there will be 12 people wanting a pig each. Endless discussions on what one can do with bits of pig and I keep throwing a fly in the ointment as having been previously married to a Frog Chef whose motto was 'if it moves, eat it' and follower of the belief that everything in a pig is edible apart from the oink, I asked whether we would have the blood to make Black Pudding, why don't we get the trotters, ears and tail make for a great soup, I want to make saucisson and not sausages, cheeks of pig are wonderful - and I think I will soon be barred from the boozer!
Sunday, 21 November 2010
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)