Saturday, May 16, 2009

Back home and home alone

Have to admit that it’s good to be home although it’s been an interesting week. There’s some sort of unwritten law that says that when you visit the UK, you have to come back with a cold.
Not normally a problem, but now is not the best time to get in off an international flight via Hong Kong sniffing and coughing. My week as a bio-hazard has been a different experience, but at least I now have a certificate that says I’m not going to spread swine flu around Australia...

It’s amazing just how much the land can change in such a short time; I was only away for just over a week. When I left, the weather had started to change, it was beginning to feel distinctly autumnal and there had been some rain but the paddocks were still dustbowls and what grass there was was mostly brown. Now, after nearly two weeks of light rain, you’d hardly recognise it as the same place.

Suddenly, everything is green again

So this weekend I’m home alone holding the fort while the rest of the family takes the core show team (Drifter, Puck, Gypsy, Lulu and Chorus Girl) down to the Stawell Show in Victoria. Hopefully they’ll bring photos back for a blog update on Monday. We have wonderful neighbours who are always happy to look after the menagerie if we go away, but as we have one cria having a supplementary bottle three times a day and another getting over a case of staggers who is still having B1 drenches, it’s a bit too much to ask, so someone had to stay and, as stereotypical pathetic self-pitying male with a cold, I was the obvious volunteer.

Yes, that is milk all over her nose

We still haven't decided what to call our latest arrival, a light fawn girl by Windsong Valley Wilde Star out of an Auzengate mother, but she's a pretty little thing.

And, I know this is daft, but I'd swear the mum, who isn't producing quite enough milk, looks quite hurt when she takes her bottle...

3 comments:

  1. Geena used to be like then when I first started trying to feed her little boy Gaussian. She soon decided she didn't mind when she saw the fight he put up!

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  2. Glad you got home safe. What a cute cria. Trouble with supplementation in lactation is of course it drops mum's supply! This is seen often in the human sphere. Supply and demand and all that... I guess you could gradually reduce the bottles to get cria back to mum so she can work up the supply. Reassuringly most mammals produce exactly what's needed by their baby, given the suckling time for that to happen. Good luck!

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  3. I bet you are glad to be back home in Australia....without the 'swine-flu' !
    Hope all goes well with your showing days.

    Nice to see that your little girl is feeeling better and enjoying her feeds....crias are always a worry when they are so small and its important to get them the best start possible.
    Hope your British Flu....dosen't hang about too long ..Jayne

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