Blog archive

Cows!

15th November 2010

Our cows have arrived! We picked up our two beautiful red dexters from Denise and Mike Hasshill on Sunday and they are settling in really well now! We are working hard to get them used to us, taking out fresh hay and some sugar beet regularly. It will take a little time for them to adjust to their new home as they aren't really used to children and lots of noise; which there is plenty of here at Gilbury!

They are called Sicilienne and Georgette (both types of silk) which are the pedigree names they came with, but I expect they'll get shortened to Scilly and Georgie or something similar.

Georgette is 6 months old; one week older than Patrick! And we will be keeping her to breed from when she is old enough (next Autumn). Sicilienne is 2 ½ years old, Gorgette was her first calf and she is in calf again; her due date is 3^rd June 2011.

Peggy and her piglets are outside now, loving the fresh ground for rooting around in. Doris and her piglets will move outside at the start of next week, once the two female porkers have gone to slaughter.

 

Slaughtered and Butchered

5th November 2010

Our first piglets went to slaughter on Monday. It mostly went smoothly... Getting them in the trailer was fine; getting the trailer out of the field was harder! We got totally stuck in the mud. In the end we ran up to a neighbour, Sue, who has a significantly bigger tractor than ours, she kindly came and pulled us out! The rest of the journey went fine and the boys didn't seem stressed, more inquisitive really.

We picked up the 'pluck' (livers, tongue, heart etc) on Tuesday and had a mass pâté making session. We made a total of 9kg of pâté and it's absolutely delicious!

 

We then picked up the pork on Wednesday from Kittows, the butcher, and the sausages today. We are genuinely very pleased with the taste and quality of the pork... it is actually amazing, even if we do say so ourselves!

Most of the pork from these pigs was sold in advance but we have kept a few bits back for people to try. If you want to buy any chops, steaks, roasting joints or sausages then give us a call/text or email, or pop on up to the house, we're usually around.

Piglets are born!

14th October 2010

Having gone to bed last night with Peggy showing no sign of imminent farrowing we awoke this morning to see lots of tiny piglets sucking merrily from her! We have a camera rigged up in the farrowing pen, transmitting to a tv set in the kitchen, so it was when we turned it on this morning that we saw the little spotty babes. Peggy did a stellar job all on her own and is now the proud mum of 10 healthy little piglets (one was still born, which is very normal and we are impressed that she only lost one). She is doing really well now feeding her litter and making all the right grunting noises. She is also being very careful about not sitting on them but the next week or so is a very vulnerable time for such tiny piglets, so fingers crossed. Even better, we have 7 girls and 3 boys which is great; girls are more desirable as they can be taken on longer to get better sized bacon.

 

Doris is due to farrow 1 week from now, lets hope she does just as well. Aunty Mary didn't come fully into season so we were spared the A.I.-ing experience for now (though we'll have to do it in January anyway), so we'll be watching again in a week or so to figure out if she is in pig to the late Vinny or not.

 

Unfortunately, the cow we were buying has not taking to A.I. on a number of tries now and so it doesn't look like she will... a cow who can't carry a calf is no good to anyone so unless she is successful with a bull in the spring she'll be slaughtered for meat. In the meantime Denise and Mike Hasshill from the Dexter Society may have have a cow and calf suitable for us instead. Their cows are also fantastic and are docile and halter trained.

 

We are in our new kitchen!!! it is absolutely fantastic and Caitlin is loving the wood fired Rayburn... she has taken to baking cakes and bread and cooking up all sorts of casseroles and stews, much to Rob's enjoyment! We are saving pictures of the house until it's finished, but here are some more piglet ones instead :)

Goodbye Vinny

30th September 2010

It is with great sadness that we tell you Vinny, our handsome boar, was put down on Wednesday morning. On Monday evening Rob returned to the house and said Vinny was limping slightly and looked a little off colour. Tuesday morning Caitlin called the vet out and Vinny was struggling to get up. The vet suspected that he had developed an abscess on his spine; pigs are very prone to abscesses in their lungs, and they can be caused by even mild worm infestations, which Vinny had been previously treated for, they can then spread and cause secondary abscesses. He recommended that we have him put down. By Wednesday morning, when the slaughter-man arrived, poor Vinny couldn't get up. We gave him some apples and he was shot in his house and died instantly. The whole process was thankfully less traumatic as we had expected and the slaughter-man was highly skilled and very sensitive to the situation.

We have had Vinny autopsied and unfortunately it was somewhat inconclusive!!! The vet was wrong about the abscesses... and the previous treatment for worms! Having spent the morning on the phone to the vet and agreeing to send off some tissue samples to be tested for viruses and bacterial infections we have largely lost faith in veterinary medicine. The gaps in knowledge about animal health is shocking. The answers to almost all my questions was "we don't know", questions such as: if it's viral could the gilts he has served and lived with contracted it, what is the likely source of infection ie environmental or pig to pig contact, if the tissue tests are clear could there be a genetic cause and could that be hereditary we will be farrowing his off spring soon? Basically they say not to worry, not to change anything as our welfare standards are excellent and to hope none of the others show similar symptoms... very helpful! It's not just the vets fault though, most farmers are not willing to pay for post mortems and tissue analysis and so vets are not able to further their learning. But then the vet who carried out the post mortem hadn't even bothered to take the tools to open his head and look at the brain, which considering the paralysis symptoms was pretty neglectful. There is a general attitude of 'where there is livestock there is dead stock'... you're just aiming for more live than dead! Anyway, rant over; as you can tell we are somewhat frustrated.

Unfortunately, Aunty Mary has come back into season today and without Vinny here to serve her we have no choice but to have a go at artificial insemination (A.I.). Three bottles of prize winning pig semen is in the post to us now and tomorrow we will be having a go! Luckily we have retired pig farmers for neighbours, Steve and Val. Val has A.I.'d thousands of pigs over the years and has kindly agreed to come and show us how to do it... wish us luck!

On a more positive note, it is only a matter of days now until Peggy is going to farrow (lots of little Vinnys!). She is 'bagging up', which means her belly has dropped and she is showing signs of imminent farrowing... we are very excited and will let you all know as soon as we have some news.

Here is a picture of Vinny enjoying his wallow, his life may have been short but it was certainly sweet...

Finding time!

17th September 2010

Wow... two kids, a smallholding and massive extension project... doesn't leave much time for blogging! But at last I have a few minutes spare to update you all about the goings on here at Gilbury.

The piglets are growing and enjoying lots of windfall apples. We have booked the slaughter date for 1^st November for the 4 boars. Peggy and Doris are getting close to their farrowing dates and will soon be moved into their new accommodation which Rob and Mat (who has been on a woodwork course) have built. Actually they have just altered the front of the out houses to make them suitable and they have done an excellent job if it! The wood they used was all stuff saved from the old extension when it was demolished so it hardly cost us anything (which pleases Caitlin immensely!)

At last we had a great hatching success... with a broody rather than the incubator. Our Indian Game hen went broody and was sat on 4 eggs so we decided to just leave her be and didn't expect too much; Large fowl Indian Game hens are not supposed to be great broodies as they are pretty heavy and can be quite clumsy with the eggs, also Indian game generally have a fairly low hatch rate. Out of 4 eggs... we had 4 hatch! We were thrilled and she is doing a great job as a mother hen now. I tried to get a photo for you but like I said she really is a good mother and along with the cockerel being fairly fierce anyway I just couldn't get a good picture... sorry, you'll have to have a couple of piglet pictures instead!

 

 

We won't be selling hatching eggs now until spring as the hens just aren't laying well enough to collect them fresh for hatching but hopefully by the spring we will have lots of great hens laying fertile eggs for Indian Game, Light Sussex, Araucanna, French Copper Black Marran and Indian Game cross Light Sussex. The Araucana chicks are growing well now and will be going outside soon.

It's looking like October now for our cow to arrive as she didn't get 'in calf' (pregnant) at her last season so we are waiting now to hear if she will be this time. Hopefully we'll have more luck with the pigs... Vinny has been enjoying the company of Aunty Mary for the last few weeks!

 

The scaffolding is down on the house now and the retaining wall is rendered and looking good; railings will be fitted next week. The lawn has been re-landscaped and is ready for seeding so outside there has been lots of progress... inside less so!!! In fact nothing has happened for the last 7 working days and very little for the last month or so... I'm not really sure why and am trying not to think too much about it; hopefully not too much longer!

The weather is getting much colder now and having got through all of last winter without heating we were thrilled to press a button this morning and turn the heating on for the first time. The wood burning Rayburn is installed in the new kitchen just waiting to be used and we received a large delivery of well seasoned wood this afternoon. Rob is out in the dark now shifting it all to the wood store. Now all we need is the kitchen to be usable so we can light it... some doors and windows would be useful!

Life in Fast Forward

23rd August 2010

Apologies for the long delay since the last blog, life seems to have switched into fast forward mode!

Although there haven't been any dramatic developments here at Gilbury there have been lots of little events; We have sold our first weaners, bought some Araucana chicks, a Light Sussex Cockerel and a Copper Black Marran Cockerel. We are very pleased with all our new chickens and have high hopes for our breeding next year as we are starting with good stock. Rob is currently working on their new pens and housing.

Our first piglets went calmly and uneventfully to their new hope in Devon and it is only a short 12 weeks until all the males go off to slaughter and we have lots of delicious Gloucester Old Spot Pork for sale. An exciting development in the piggy world is the award of 'Traditional Speciality Guaranteed ' (TSG) status to pedigree Gloucester Old Spot pork. Gilbury Farm will be applying for our meat to be able to use the label, which offers a guarantee to customers that the meat is not only pedigree GOS meat but that it has been farmed in a traditional manor with welfare of the animals at the very heart of production. In order to qualify we need to meet certain standards with regards to both welfare and pedigree records and identification, both of which we currently practice anyway. For further information please see the GOS Breeders Club website.

Within the house, the boys are both doing well, growing rapidly and amazing us daily with the wonderful way they are developing and changing. Alfie is now in 'big boy pants' and is becoming an excellent farmer and Patrick is constantly smiling and gurgling. The extension is coming along... S.L.O.W.L.Y.!!!!! we should have been in months ago but alas we are still weeks away! Supposedly the stairs will be going in this week and the kitchen next week but we'll have to see it before we believe it!

Here is a picture of farmer Alfie filling up the pigs water:

 

 

Plans...

14th July 2010

As many of you know we have been trying to buy some land near Lostwithiel in order to keep a herd of Dexter cattle. We had found an absolutely ideal plot and have been negotiating with the sellers for the last few months; sadly this week we discovered we have been gazumped by some mad character who thinks he'll be able to develop it. He won't of course as it is agricultural land in the middle of nowhere, and the agent doesn't think the sale will happen but now the sellers reckon they can achieve development prices which we simply can't compete with. Very frustrating! But never mind, we shall keep our eyes peeled for other plots and in the meantime have altered our plans for the land we do have...

 

Firstly, a cow... we have been to see a pregnant heifer, owned by Trevor and Irene Pooley of the Chytrene Herd, which we are buying. Hopefully we will be bringing her home in early August after the statutory TB tests and various paperwork are complete. We are particularly keen to buy from this lovely couple as all their cows are halter trained and are very placid and friendly; they are also excellent pedigrees and their herd has won lots of awards. We had a lovely day when we visited them and Alfie was able to stroke a calf and bottle feed a lamb. So we are now in the process of getting everything ready here, topping and harrowing the field and clearing out her winter accommodation. We met them again at the Liskeard show at the weekend and here is a picture of Trevor showing one of his cows:

And Pirate Alfie at the Liskeard show having had his face painted for the first time!

Secondly, the pigs... Peggy and Doris are pregnant!!! They will be due to farrow in mid October, so don't forget to get your orders in early. The piglets are doing really well and will be being weaned in just two weeks. Aunty Mary has settled in really well now and is super friendly and 'chatty'. We are going to focus on the quality of our pedigree breeding with the pigs and hope to show some next year at the Royal Cornwall Show, which will be very exciting and fun.

Thirdly, the chickens... having learned a lot of lessons over the last year with our chicken flocks we have decided to change our direction slightly and focus on just a few specific breeds: Light Sussex, Indian Game, French Copper Black Maran, and Araucanas. We have reduced our flock right down and 'removed' the bad purchases and unhealthy birds and are now going to build back up while choosing our birds carefully and using reputable breeders. When we have the flock to the level and quality we want we will breed carefully so we can maintain a 'closed flock' for as long as possible. We are also going to focus on careful breeding of these so that we can show our birds at local and national shows. Unfortunately, we had one excellent breed standard Copper Black, out of a number of young pullets we bought, who was got by the fox a few nights ago. I also hope to sell trios of hens, to people wanting chickens for their garden, consisting of 1 Light Sussex (which lay a lovely pale egg), 1 Copper Black (which lay a dark, chocolate colour egg) and 1 Araucana (which lay a vibrant blue egg).

We have also bought some beautiful Silver Sebright bantams to breed, just for fun really. Sebrights are notoriously hard to breed from as they have a lot of infertility problems, the hens don't lay well and the chicks are prone to dying. With an average hatch rate of just 10% we'll be really please if we manage to get a couple of chicks a year! But they are charming, characterful bird with an interesting history and loyal following.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Highs and Lows

28th June 2010

This time of year life is springing into action and we have seen lots of new life here at Gilbury. However, the introduction of new life into the world does not always go smoothly. Lets focus on the success first...

Our new sow and piglets have arrived and they are growing rapidly. Having got to know the Sow we have decided to change her name to Aunty Mary as she reminds us of Caitlin's Irish Great Aunt who had a matriarchal role in the family and of whom we were very fond. Our other gilt, Peggy was named after her sister but as Mary was one of the (many) names on our list of girls names for the baby we held off using it for a pig until Patrick turned out to be a boy! We think those of you who knew Mary Menz will agree there is a great likeness when you visit. Anyway, she is settling in really well and is super friendly and placid. The Piglets are having great fun running riot in the pen we made for them and are turning it over at a great rate!

We are pretty confident that both Peggy and Doris are pregnant as Vinny has been a busy boy! We'll have to wait another couple of weeks to be sure but we're hopeful for our next farrowing in mid October.

Our swallow chicks have now fledged and we are hoping to catch the next clutch of eggs being laid and brooded on camera before long. We will upload some footage of them growing as soon as possible (we're a little behind due to our own offspring's feeding schedule, 2 hourly day and night!). It has been so wonderful to be able to watch the wild swallow chicks growing so fast and then step out of our door to see them learning to fly and catch insects. Alfie now thinks that TV is just of birds being fed!

On the down side, we have been having a disastrous time with our hatchings. After our bad hatching in the incubator which left us with just one (possibly brain damaged) chick we held great hopes for the first broody of the season. It was one of the Buff Orpingtons and it was her first attempt at brooding. She at well and seemed to be doing well but them she broke an egg and the rest got covered in yolk and muck; later candling revealed that many of them died at this point. Of the 3 that got to hatching point only 1 hatched successfully and unfortunately it discovered a tiny crack under the run and got out, only to be eaten by the other hens while the mother looked on trapped in the broody coup. Very upsetting, but a major lesson learned! We now have another broody on eggs but are not optimistic as she doesn't seem to be sitting well and is getting up and leaving them too often.

Hopefully we'll have more luck with chick over the summer, but in the mean time we have our hands full with the piglets, children and extension!

Patrick Jack Dean

5th June 2010

We are delighted to announce the safe arrival of the newest member of the Dean family... Patrick Jack Dean. On Sunday 30^th May 2010 He was born at home in the living room in Gilbury in a birth pool following a fairly short and natural labour without complications, weight 7lbs 3oz. The time was 11.30 at night and Alfie was sleeping soundly upstairs. We finally got to bed at 2am that night and have struggled to catch up with our sleep since! It also just so happened that Caitlin's brother, Patrick, was staying with us at the time and we would both like to say thank you to him for all his help that day and evening... between him and Alfie they did a great job pumping up the birth pool and picking wild flowers to decorate the room.

The following morning Alfie woke up bright and early (6.30!!) and was thrilled to find his baby brother asleep next to mum and dad. He is besotted with him and just wants to hold him and kiss him all the time. There has been surprisingly little jealousy and Alfie is incredibly gentle with Patrick!

Sorry we don't have time to write more, but as you can imagine, life is somewhat hectic now!

 

Piglets and Chicks

24th May 2010

There has been lots of new life arriving over the last week. Our new Gloucester Old Spot gilt, Annie, has had her first litter of piglets. So far 9 have survived but in the same way we don't count our chicks until they hatch, we won't count our piglets until they are a week or so old! Annie is doing well but giving birth came as a bit of a shock to her and she is being quite protective of the piglets now, so we've not been able to sex them yet either. However, we are able to see that they are in fact extremely cute! And many of them have very good spot conformation. We have already booked a couple to be sold as weaners, a couple of 'farrow to fork' and we will be keeping some for ourselves, so if you are interested in buying some weaners or one as a Farrow to Fork (they'll be ready just before Christmas) then you need to let us know ASAP, as it'll be first come first served.

Our Indian Game chicks in the incubator hatched this week also. It was fascinating and very stressful being able to watch the chicks emerge from their shells, however, we did find the process a little disheartening as it all seemed so unnatural. To not have a 'mum' to welcome the chicks into the world and encourage them to hatch and them feed seemed a little sad and it was luck no-one was around to hear us both trying to make encouraging clucking sounds to the tiny little chicks (Caitlin's pregnant hormones added a certain amount of both stress and comedy to the situation!). They are doing fine though and Alfie is delighted with them.

We used the incubator because we didn't have any broody hens but luckily one of the Buff Orpingtons has gone broody and we have put a clutch of eggs under her now so we should have some more chicks in a couple of weeks. Here she is sitting tight on her nest:

There is no news yet of our own baby, but we're optimistic that it won't be long now. The house is progressing slightly more rapidly now; the roof is pretty much on and the internal walls are going up this week. Here is a picture of Alfie helping Rob to mow the lawns:

Spring is in the air

12th May 2010

There has been far more progress over the last few weeks here at Gilbury. The timber frame is up and the roof is being laid with the slates that came off the old extension. Electrics are being fitted and most exciting... WE HAVE HEATING! Yippie! And just in time for the baby, Phew! We have had a practice run with the birth pool and can't wait for our new arrival any day now.

The Swallows are also eagerly anticipating their new arrivals as they have now laid some eggs and are sitting tight on them. We'll be adding some new footage of the swallow nest in the next few days and they should be hatching in about 17-19 days time.

 

Our eggs in our new incubator are due to hatch in one week and we'll try to get some early snaps or even video footage of them hatching (rather depends on whether we have a human baby by then!). From candling the eggs we are confident that a number of the Indian Game eggs are fertile, as many as 7 out of 8, but sadly none of the Indian Game X Light Sussex are... it seems our cockerel, the one we swapped for the aggressive one, is not managing to do the business. This can be a common problem with Indian Games due to their short stance and heavy set, they are also notoriously infertile! So we're looking for a new cockerel and in the meantime are going to swap the one from the Indian Game breeding trio, once we have filled the current order for hatching eggs.

We have bought yet more Light Sussex chicks from a lovely couple we met through the Dexter Cattle field advisors. Dave and Carol have a smallholding up on the moor and keep Dexters and a variety of chickens as well as making a variety of Willow crafts and running courses. The chicks we bought from them are fantastic, being the healthiest and best breed quality we have seen in some time; We're confident they will make excellent layers and breeders in a few months time. In the meantime, our current layers are laying well and we are now doing regular deliveries around Lostwithiel. If you would like to place an order with us please contact us via email, phone or text.

 

Having cleared the field of brambles and blackthorn rob is now ploughing it in strips and then letting the pigs on the ploughed areas to eat up the roots. Here is Rob with his plough:

The wild garlic is out in force and we have a few good recipes for what to do with it on our wildlife recipe page. Rob and Mat made the flat bread this week and cooked it on a piece of slate on a fire in the field. It was absolutely delicious!

 

Timber Frame and Website!

26th April 2010

At long last we have a timber frame (well part of it anyway). It should have gone up in about five days but we're so far on day six and only about 1/4 of the way into it! Hopefully this week will see quicker progress... I say hopefully looking at my watch at 11am on Monday morning with no sign of any timber frame workmen!

As you can all see we have launched our fab new website! Many thanks to Paul from revival design and Mat and Kat of Iteracy for their excellent work. Please don't forget to subscribe to this blog in order to receive an update alert (the previous ones were just group emails). We would also really appreciate people letting us know if they are interested in buying our pork in the next year or so, so that we can plan our herd expansion effectively.

 

We have started to expand our laying flock further in preparation for obtaining our egg producers/packagers numbers later this year. Last week we bought 10 young Light Sussex hens who we a currently keeping separate from the main flock while they grow a little more and we can worm them, check they are healthy and so on for biosecurity purposes. It would be an expensive mistake to introduce disease into our Rare Breed laying flock! We also bought some Buff Orpington Hens and a Cockerel which we will keep for breeding. They are currently on the Rare Breed list as 'at risk' and they are a lovely friendly chicken which makes a very good free range garden pet.

 

It turns out our incubator was faulty! We've now lost our second batch of eggs to it, which sadly included some eggs from the Orpingtons which were fertilized by the Splash Orpington cockerel that they were with before they arrived. We are now returning the Incubator and awaiting delivery of a new 'fully automated' one. Hopefully we'll have more success with this one!

 

The count down is on for the baby's arrival now and this weekend we did lots of preparation with help from Helen and Roy; cleaning and tidying, getting the birth pool out of the attic, fixing the cot, washing nappies and so on... it's getting close now and Caitlin is very excited about not feeling sick soon! Worryingly, Alfie is still set on the baby being called Tractor!

 

 

Slow Progress

14th April 2010

Well, we have been waiting to post an update with pictures of the timber frame going up, but, alas, it is still not here. It was supposed to arrive two weeks ago, then last Tuesday, then last Thursday, when they informed us someone at the factory had had an accident and it would be this Monday... Monday came and went and they didn't show up, and their phones were off!!! We spent a stressful Monday night wondering if they had gone bust and done a runner with our money. Then Tuesday morning we managed to get through to them (Rob was about to get in the car and drive to the factory!) It is now booked to start next Monday, but we're not holding our breath! The timescale is so far behind now that it doesn't really matter anymore, the baby will just have to be born on a building site!

 

In the meantime, the retaining wall around the new patio area has been built and today the cement lorry reversed into it, but not until after the cement which was poured between the two layers of wall cause the front to collapse anyway!!! At least that is not something we have to pay for...

(It's not meant to be curved!)

 

It seems everything is a bit tough this week; we are having trouble with another of our cockerels at the moment and we had a go at candling the eggs in the incubator and we don't think most of them are fertile. We suspect the problem was in the first couple of days when the temperature in the dining room fluctuated so vastly that the underside of the eggs cooled down too much at night. It's all a learning curve though and next time we'll know to insulate underneath the incubator.

 

On the plus side, the sun is shining and we've had the first couple of barbeque's of the season. Our new website is nearly ready and looks FAB! so we'll hopefully be launching it in the next couple of weeks! And here is a cute picture of Alfie and his friend Isaac in their Derby County kits:

 

Foundations and Birthdays

29th March 2010

Well the foundations for the extension have gone down this last week and the timber frame should be going up next Monday. Yippie! Unfortunately, we are still way behind schedule and are unlikely to have a kitchen or new bathroom until at least mid July (baby is due early June!), but at least the weather is warming up so we may be able to use the sitting room soon, and it’ll all be worth it in the end… or at least that is what we are telling ourselves on a daily basis!

We are a little behind with the blog at the moment as Caitlin has been pretty sick for the last couple of weeks, so we have lots to fill you in on… 2 weeks ago the Vernons, Deans and Yevtushenkos congregated at Gilbury to celebrate Steve’s 60^th birthday. The team from Trewithen Restaurant catered for us here at Gilbury with a spectacular 7 course extravaganza (very impressive in our basic temporary kitchen!). The evening was enjoyed by all and the dinning room at Gilbury really came into it’s own!

Steve stayed until Wednesday and so during the following week Rob and he were able to crack on with the field clearance, doing what they both love… having bonfires! Having cleared up most of the strimmed brambles we’ll be able to get the pigs on there soon to plough up and munch all the roots.

Our little boy, Alfie, turned 2 last Friday and received a balance bike (without pedals) from us and various accessories (helmet, trailer, attachable satchel) from relatives. He adores it although needs to grow another inch or so to use it more effectively! Here he is on his new bike, heading out the door! and the pig birthday cake that his Grannie kindly made:

 

Our incubator finally turned up this week (cutting it fine to get the chicks outside before the baby turns up). And we now have 13 eggs warming nicely. Usually we prefer to hatch eggs under a broody hen (not least because we don’t have to remember to turn them 5 times a day!) but this year the new chickens are a bit too young, so we are not expecting them to go broody for quite some time. The incubator should give us a more reliable stream of chickens for the table. If any of you are interested in purchasing a chicken (oven ready of course) please contact us for further details. These chicks won’t be ready for slaughter until the end of August, but with limited numbers (after we’ve kept some for ourselves), pre-booking would be advisable. It also helps us to plan how many more we produce over the Summer.

     

And finally, we are in the process of writing pages for our website which is being built at the moment and intend to put lots of yummy recipes on there. If any of you have any tried and tested recipes you can recommend for either beef, lamb, poultry or pork then please email me with them, we would really appreciate your input.

Our email for chicken enquiries or recipe suggestions is hello@gilburyfarm.co.uk

VINNY HAS ARRIVED

14th March 2010

Shortly after writing our last entry we received an email to say that the young boar we were hoping to buy had made a full recovery and we could have him on Friday if we still wanted him… we did and he has now arrived! After a few name suggestions on our Facebook page Rob decided that he suited the name Vinny so that’s what we settled on. The first day didn’t go too well… Vinny is not electric fence trained (it hadn’t really occurred to us that he might not be… doh!) and so our 3 stands of wire didn’t stand a chance of keeping him in. Pigs tend to have a few scuffles when first introduced, to establish authority and so on, and with Peggy and Doris being a bit older Vinny didn’t fancy hanging around on the inside of the fencing to be bullied by a couple of girls. We spent the rest of the day trying to get him back in but to no avail and so we opened the fencing up in the hope that they would at least let him sleep in the house with them… they didn’t! We went out late that night and eventually found him huddled in amongst the raspberry canes. He had no intension of trying to get in the house so we covered him over with a thick layer of straw and left him there for the night, poor boy!

The Girls are enjoying their new house but wouldn’t let poor Vinny in!

In the morning we had a new plan. Because we now have a second ark we set that one up with electric netting around instead of the 3 strand fencing. He won’t be able to just run through it and he would learn pretty quickly. The plan worked beautifully and once he was unable to escape the girls he had to face up to them. Within 10 minutes Doris was in love and by the evening Peggy had given in and snuggled up with him. Watching the social communication between them was hilarious, once Doris had decided she liked him she let him know by lifting his bum in the air with her snout!

Vinny is a handsome boy… a very good example of the Gloucester Old Spot breed.

So we now have 3 pigs, they are all super friendly with us and have settled in brilliantly. We’re glad they are keepers as we’re pretty attached already!

The Trouble with a Boar…

8th March 2010

Eggs

22nd February 2010

We had an exciting development this week… the sale of our first hatching eggs. We advertised on a couple of poultry forums that we now have Indian Game X Light Sussex hatching eggs and within 24hrs we’d had two enquiries. This is particularly exciting for us because we have always sold our eggs for £1 for 6 whereas the same eggs fetch £1 EACH for hatching! This means that one box of eggs pays for nearly a months supply of chicken food.

A valuable egg:

However, it is not all good news on the chicken front… the cockerel who is currently making our eggs so valuable has turned rather nasty. He is attacking Robs boots at every opportunity and obviously this means we can’t take Alfie into the run to collect eggs and pet the hens, which he loves (although it may mean that we have a slightly higher percentage of the eggs safely reaching the house). We initially thought this might be due to the new cockerel in the next field (the breeding trio) but having had some discussion on poultry forums it looks like it may be due to the springing of spring. We have had a few suggestions of ways to help from picking him up for cuddles to changing his surroundings entirely for a while. We’ll give them all a go, because he’s a valuable bird, but if the behaviour carries it’ll be a case of coq au vin!

His Cock-a-doodle-doo’s may be numbered!

In the house… we’re freezing! Our main source of heat, the wood burner in the kitchen has become blocked and unusable over the weekend. We have a chimney sweep booked for Friday but we’re waiting to hear back if someone can come sooner. On the plus side the chimney boring has pretty much fixed the fire in the sitting room, it still needs a bit of tweaking but at least it’s usable. We would need a whole forest of wood to keep it burning all day though so lighting it is more of a treat for the evening. It’s jumpers and duvets for us at the moment!

Recovery

18th February 2010

With Alfie on the mend Rob has had a far more productive week. Last weekend he built the new chicken house with help from Mat and the hens are delighted with their new quarters. We can start expanding our flock now that we have more accommodation for them and the chap we got the last ones from will have some more ready for us in about a month, including some ‘Splash Orpingtons’ which are a beautiful blue colour. Our Light Sussex (with Indian Game cockerel) are laying well now and we’ve started advertising their hatching eggs for sale at £6 for 6 plus P&P. So hopefully orders will start coming for them as peoples hens go broody in the spring and we’ll be hatching some ourselves when one of ours goes broody.

Rob went on a fruit tree pruning course with the national trust last week which he thoroughly enjoyed, so that is now an ‘extra branch’ to his general tree services on offer. He has a big tree job booked in for next week which is right in the centre of town so should be a good opportunity to spread word of mouth recommendations.

The field has been strimmed of all the bramble and we’re going to put the pigs on it when the new (portable) ark turns up so that they can dig up the roots and eat the cut bramble, I would think they’re a bit thorny for our pallets but pigs love them! Now Rob will be starting on the blackthorn and hedgeline clearance, ready for stock fencing.

On Wednesday we went to see a new born dexter calf and to learn about all the paper work for cattle keeping at the house of the field advisor who visited us a few weeks ago. They have been very helpful and are going to help us to source our cow when the time is right. They have also offered to come and teach us to ear tag and halter train our calf when it is born (which will hopefully be spring 2011) and generally be on hand for help with calving and so on. It’s lovely when you meet really nice helpful people!

ILLNESS

7th February 2010

It’s been a tough old week here at Gilbury! It started on Monday morning with Alfie waking up with his eyes stuck together… Conjunctivitis… (which also meant no nursery) and with Caitlin throwing up regularly again it meant Rob was unable to get much done. He did take a gunky eyed Alfie to buy a plough from an old farmer in Bodmin though and was so thrilled with it he drove around the field in a big circle to celebrate! Luckily Helen arrived that evening so Tuesday was a little more productive with a father and son effort at chopping some trees down from the driveway (now that we finally have permission from the council).

On Wednesday little Alfie started spewing and is still being sick now… on Sunday! Robs week has therefore largely consisted of emptying sick buckets from either Caitlin or Alfie and making trips back and forth to the doctors and the chemist. One trip to the doctors proved productive though… Caitlin went in for a sick note and conjunctivitis advice and, Cornwall being Cornwall, managed to leave with a fantasic arrangement to breed the doctors Buff Orpington cockerel with our Buff Orpington hen! On leaving the GP surgery the Practice Manager accosted us and we managed to get Rob his first independent tree job, climbing a couple of massive cypress trees to take out the dead wood, should be a nice little earner! It’s all very ‘small town’ stuff and we love it!

The chickens are all settling in well now and Caitlin has been talking to the local ‘Egg Marketing Inspector’ about what we need to do in order to sell our eggs through a shop. It doesn’t seem that complicated, just a couple of forms to fill in and inspections of our premises, plus some basic equipment for grading and stamping the eggs. It won’t be until the extension is finished as we don’t have anywhere to designate as the ‘packing area’ until then but I doubt the chickens will be laying much until then anyway as they’re only very young still. The exciting thing about this though is that it means we can extend our flock a little more too and get some other interesting rare breeds!

Roy also arrived on Wednesday and, with Helen looking after Alfie and Caitlin, the elder generation father and son made much progress with jobs around the house and garden. They picked up the new trailer and sorted out the hydraulics for it, added weights to the front of the tractor, sorted out the wood pile (Helen helped with that too, adding a certain neatness to the stacking!) and put up blinds in the house. However progress was somewhat hindered by poorly Alfie and his regular need for ‘Daddy cuddles’. It’s just been one of those weeks…

Many of you know already that we have set up a Facebook page called Gilbury Farm so if you are on Facebook be sure to add us to your pages, there are lots more pictures of the animals and house on there. We have also signed up to Twitter (also as Gilbury Farm) and we will try to tweet regularly about the day today happenings here.

Tractor, tractor!

27th January 2010

Well much to Alfie’s (and Rob’s) immense delight we have now got a fabulous tractor! It’s only a little compact, and with a cab on it it looks quite comedy, but should serve our purpose well. Its first job will be to plough and seed the field, we had a field advisor out today for advice on preparing the field for Dexter cows and it turns out we only need to plough half the field as most of it is perfect for Dexters as it is. We’re hoping to buy a second hand plough for it from a farmer in Bodmin and Rob can start the field prep next week. Then it will be used for digging trenches for water pipes and ramming in posts for stock fencing as well as general smallholding duties such as annual farrowing, stock moving and so on.

Our new laying chickens have now arrived also and Rob has finished off their living quarters. Most of them are quite young still and we’ll have a bit of work getting them friendly and tame to have around the garden but they all seem healthy (if a little tatty looking from their age and being a little weather beaten) and have settled in well. We should have lots of eggs to sell before long and if brooding under the Silkes (we ended up with 2 but one might be a cockerel) goes well then we might just have a few meat birds to sell too. The chicken in the middle of the picture is a Welsummer; we have 3 of those and they a very dark chocolaty coloured egg.

Chickens and Demolition

25th January 2010

It’s been another busy week at home, with great changes afoot! Monday saw the start of the demolition of the old extension, and by Saturday it was pretty much demolished. Internally was more of a dismantling as we are planning to reuse as much as possible in the new build. Many of you will be pleased to hear (and some of you less so) that the gravestones came up intact and can therefore go back down in the new utility room. The Rayburn is out now so we’ve lost our central heating, though luckily the weather has been pretty mild this week. Those of you planning to visit over the next few weeks would be well advised to pack some warm jumpers!

On the livestock front, the pigs have been settling in well, although we have had to have the vet out this week as they both developed a cough (bad news in pig keeping) and were off their food (even worse!). Pigs can get ill for a whole variety of reasons and their lungs are particularly vulnerable (due to being a bit small for their bulk). Parasites tend to effect their respiratory system and they are very prone to pneumonia and various respiratory infections. So the plan of action was to give them each a dose of wormer and a dose of antibiotic… that was the plan, Doris took her injections very well and barely flinched but Peggy (whose symptoms were slightly worse) was having none of it! The vet was a bit of a wet blanket about it and basically gave up, but she left the injection with us to try to give later when she was a little calmer. We tried a few times, but my god are they fast… and strong! In the end another vet came back out the next morning and after chasing her round the field a few times managed to give the much needed medicine. We should see improvement by tomorrow, so we’ll let you know.

New Chickens arrived at Gilbury on Monday. A cockerel and two beautiful hens, all Indian Game, which is an old Cornish breed considered ‘vulnerable of extinction’ at present, so we hope to do our bit to preserve the breed. The lad we got them from was very helpful and has lots of other traditional breeds which we want for laying and brooding, so today Rob is finishing off the new chicken shed and tomorrow he’s going to collect 9 more hens; 4 Light Sussex, 1 SilkieX (good for brooding), 1 Buff Orpington and 2 Welsummer. These hens will be free range around the garden and when the Light Sussex are old enough (they are all quite young at the moment) we will switch them with our old ones to breed with the cockerel to produce table birds.

We also had a scan of the baby on Wednesday and all appeared fine, so that was good news, though unfortunately this week also saw the return of Caitlin’s hyperemesis… with a vengence. Oh well… only four and a half months to go…

Pigs!

17th January 2010

It’s been an exciting weekend! After much reading, research and debate, we decided that rather then get weaners to fatten up for slaughter we would, instead, go ‘the whole hog’ and get a couple of gilts (females who have not yet bred) to breed ourselves! On Friday we contacted a farm we know nearby called Ballardsfield, who specialise in pedigree Gloucester Old Spots and they agreed to sell us a couple of gilts on the condition we could collect them before Monday. So it was all hands on deck as we needed to build the pig house, erect electric fencing, demolish a wall between the fields and source a stock trailer! With help from Mat and Kat the house was built and the wall demolished and we borrowed a trailer from a neighbour to transport them in. Keeping pigs for breeding is a whole different ball game from raising weaners and there is an awful lot of paper work that goes with having pedigree stock so while the others were slaving away in the rain, Caitlin sat in bed and read an entire book on traditional pig keeping, made lots of notes and sorted out a system for record keeping for the next few years.

On Sunday we set off to collect our new pigs. The couple we bought them from were lovely and took lots of time to answer all our questions on everything from disinfecting a sow before farrowing to the use of Aloe Vera for pigs! The journey went well and once they got out of the trailer, which they were reluctant to do, maneuvering them to their new home went surprisingly smoothly. We have named them Peggy and Doris. Peggy is the one with lots of spots and Doris is the plain one (she just has one spot in the middle of her back and one under her right ear!). They are really friendly and seem to have settled in instantly.

Looking to the week ahead, it’s going to be a busy one! Demolition of the old extension starts which means that we will loose our central heating this week, brrrrr! Luckily the weather down here has warmed up significantly. Also, tomorrow we are going to collect some new Indian Game chickens, a cockerel and two or three hens. We intend to breed from these too in order to preserve this old cornish breed, which is currently endangered. As many of you know we cross the Indian Game cockerels with Light Sussex hens to produce birds for the table (with great success so far, we ate one this week and it had loads of meat on it), so we feel it is important to help preserve the breed by keeping a few of the hens as well, we will probably sell the chicks on in breeding trios.

We shall post a picture of the new chickens tomorrow when they arrive.

The Story So Far…

10th January 2010

We bought Gilbury and the attached ‘Post Field’ last year from a lovely old couple called Eric and Jean Gadd, and we moved in on 3^rd March 2009. The house was in a rather distressed state and the gardens are somewhat overgrown, mainly with a vigorous and invasive bamboo species. After a big knees up for Rob’s 30^th, which allowed our friends to see it in it’s ‘then’ state, we set about tearing off wallpaper, only to find… more wallpaper… everywhere! There were at least two layers of wallpaper on all the walls and ceilings.

Now we had been hoping that we would be able to just patch up and redecorate, but alas no, all the outside walls needed replastering and it was cheaper to re-skim the internal walls (with lime) then to get a professional decorator to ‘make good’. One problem after another surfaced with the lime and we had a real fight on our hands to resist all the criticism of lime plaster, eco insulation, reclaimed timber, antique fixtures and fittings and so on, but we’re glad we did.

While all this was going on the three of us moved into a caravan outside the back door and lived in the ‘extension’ part of the house, which consisted of the kitchen and a loo. We showered at friends houses (thank you friends!) and Alfie bathed in the kitchen sink. It was fun for the summer but after four months of it, we were thoroughly relieved to move back in at the beginning of October, not least because by that point we had found out that Caitlin was pregnant and was throwing her guts up every 5 minutes or so! (Baby is due 6^th June)

Since then we have largely finished the ‘old part’ of the house and just before Christmas we got carpets and curtains in most rooms. There are still a few unfinished bits such as coving, refurbishing the sash windows and so on, but they can all wait a couple of years! The next phase is to demolish the extension and rebuild it bigger and better. This will give us a bigger farmhouse style kitchen, utility room/larder and boot room downstairs and two further bedrooms upstairs. We are aiming for the new build to consist of around 80% recycled materials and the remainder to be as low impact as possible. We’re also getting solar panels, a wood burning Rayburn and a bore hole to reduce our environmental impact and also our monthly bills! Work should be starting any day now, and we’ll keep you updated with progress pics etc.

Outside, progress is somewhat slower! As many of you know Rob has taken a year out of full time employment in order to set up the smallholding. So far he has done a stellar job stock fencing the Post Field and has taken out a couple of trees around the garden but work has been limited due mainly to Rob having to be fully time nurse and single dad to Caitlin and Alfie, respectively, but also to a lengthy legal process to purchase the field behind the house called Gilbury Field… We completed on 23^rd December and on 4^th January Rob started the massive job of clearing it with his new brushcutter. He was making excellent progress until the snow on 5^th January… which has rather slowed things up again mainly due to the nursery being closed and Alfie therefore being at home. Hopefully this week will see more progress and by the end of next week our new tractor will be arriving so that tree stump removal can start followed by ploughing, seeding and rolling in order to create a lovely pasture for the Dexter cattle we intend to get next year. That said, we have really enjoyed the snow!

In the meantime we are planning to extend our flock of chickens and this weekend we have been building nest boxes out of the old kitchen cupboards (pictures to be posted tomorrow) as we are converting the outside loo (long since redundant) into a new chicken house for about 10-15 hens. These will be our layers and brooders (producing chicks for the table) and will have free range of the garden. We are also getting a new Indian Game Cockrel and some Indian Game hens so that we can help to preserve this old and endangered species, and will brood these under the layers.

The Pig Cooperative is also about to restart in our field and this time we are going to be rearing some pedigree Gloucester Old Spots. We will be doing two out of the five ourselves this time in the hope that we can sell some of the meat from the second pig to family and friends… let us know early if you’re interested in having some.

All in all we are very excited about the developments here at Gilbury and are thoroughly enjoying the process of setting it all up and getting it going. This year should be a good one…

Welcome

10th January 2010

Welcome to Our new blog. This website is intended to keep our friends and family updated with the developments here at Guilbury as we extend and renovate the house and convert the overgrown fields and garden into a productive smallholding.  We’ll try to update it regularly and post pictures of the house, gardens, fields, livestock and of course our family as they progress and develop.  Please feel free to comment on the posts and pictures.  We hope you check in regularly and enjoy it!