Such times!

I know people are meant to stay home Chanel, but really you
can go out into the paddock. 

I wonder what we will make of these times in 10, 20, 30 years? Will it just be a distant memory like the 2008 economic crash? Mind you that was an event that happened at a slower rater than the few months it has taken to descend into chaos across Europe with the Covid19 virus. Yet it doesn't feel like chaos out on our land, well not yet anyway. It has been a rollercoaster of a week though and I know that I'm not the only one. It is times like these that make it hard to be away from family, but then again, even if we were closer, the need for self-isolation would still make it difficult to gather everyone around.

It's no good hiding at the back Mari, get out into the sunshine

Coltsfoot: an old remedy for coughs

One of the reasons for the rollercoaster of a ride, besides wondering about family is that I hadn't heard anything about my PhD pre-defence (like mock exams for PhD students) until this week. For this I have to do a presentation with an Estonian opponent who will look through my work, critique it and ask me awkward questions in preparation for the final defence. This is supposed to be face to face with my supervisors present, but of course that is not possible now, because one of them is in the UK, one in Estonia and I'm in Latvia and none of us can cross borders. So it looks like we will now be doing this online, but I only found out on Friday. I got an urgent text and email from one of my supervisors to ask me to complete my thesis and send it to him to pass onto the opponent. And the defence? April 7th, so not long either.

The boys still enjoy a Christmas tree

Mr. Tellus had a sore eye again this week. He does seem to
get regular problems with them. I made up a slightly salty
thyme and hyssop tea and wiped it with that and he seems
better today.

So as far as possible we've stayed away from people so we aren't responsible for bringing a disease from Riga to our village and trying to stay healthy at the same time. Of course we have been to the supermarket on a regular basis, mainly because our neighbour is still not in milk production mode yet and therefore we still need to buy regular supermarket milk. Supplies are a bit lower in our little village shops, but there are stocks of most things, just maybe not every brand they normally have and a few spaces in between but at least it hasn't been as ridiculous as elsewhere.

Freddie getting his vitamins

Before Ian got ill he was preparing the area for the base of
the new greenhouse

Our panic buys from last week of a tent and greenhouse arrived, thankfully. Ian also got sorted out with supplies so that we...errr I mean he can get going on that. At least he will be when he has completely recovered from a stomach bug. Fortunately it wasn't the dreaded disease. All I can say is it is a good job we have toilet paper though. We had decided to go and stay in the caravan but that was nearly reversed so that we could take advantage of the better facilities at the apartment. In the end, we weathered the problem and Ian is feeling much better now. This is not the time to be ill though for sure.

George soaking up the sun and thinking about fresh grass. It's
growing, although the heavy frosts of the last two nights will
not have helped

Aggie

Despite being closed to visitors, we have still had a few people turn up, only they weren't coming to see the alpacas exactly. The first group, three young men, came around 7 in the evening. One of them swore when I asked if they spoke English, so he got a reprimand. I don't like swearing at the best of times and I most certainly do not like someone using English swear words when they don't speak much English. He did apologise though. I must still have the withering look that was perfected over 20 years of doing children's work. It was not used all the time, but was effective when needed. Anyway, apparently they just wanted some diesel because their car had run out about a1km away. It was better for us to deal with it than let our neighbours run the risk of meeting young men who should have been at home.

Lady V reaching for the tastiest morsel of grass at the back
of the feeder

So hard to tell Chanel and Ilvija apart now

Our next visitors were neighbours and members of our local hunting organisation. We did get a phone call to see if we were in isolation and we were careful to make sure we were close enough to talk but not too close. There was no shaking hands and after signing the papers to renew our hunting contract with the organisation and taking receipt of our cans of moose meat we washed our hands. It is a good job that it is the soap that is the most important part of hand washing because our water is very cold at the moment. It might be beautiful and bright during the day but we have seen some of the coldest nights this winter, only it is supposed to be spring now.

Antonia sunbathing. Looks like she is
sporting a rather unusual hat though

Sofie in all her fluffy glory. In reality she is a felted ball of
fluff here.

Sofie decided to pay us a visit too. She's been at our neighbours most of the winter but made regular visits back. This time though she didn't seem so well. I had to get some worming tablets as she has obviously been making a big dent in the mouse population judging by her fat belly and the tapeworms she's managed to pick up in the process. She is usually a very skinny cat. She is also not a practical cat for a farmyard. She's a great mouser but her fur mats up so badly, very quickly. This time I think she could hardly move her neck. It took me ages with much patient cutting away of great wadges of felted fur. I've given her a day off before I start on the ones down her side.

Come on Amanda, you also can at least go out in the paddock

I think our kombucha tea should be ready
by now. Surprisingly refreshing

As I said, it all feels very weird for so much chaos going on in the world and yet all is calm and peaceful on our land, well kind of. Hearing the cockerels crowing is normal in the countryside and we tune out the noise they make. Even from day one of sleeping in the caravan with the cockerels just outside they haven't really disturbed us that much. However, the cranes are definitely back and oh boy are they loud. The noise they make rings clear across the valley.

Tubjørn and Brencis making sure they are more than 2m apart

That's right girls. When outside remember the social distancing
rules.

I was playing about with making felted balls. These didn't
turn out quite right but thought they would make some fun
little guys.

So which tomatoes were the first to make an appearance? The
ones labelled "mystery" of course. Typical!

We are not likely to run out of eggs. Our hens
have started producing again. Not brilliantly
but enough for what we need. 

Been and gone

Someone has enjoyed rolling in the snow. Chanel is still
struggling with some skin issues though and it has flared up
again this week.

Winter has been back to visit again, but it can't quite make up its mind whether the season has finished for the year or not. The swans, the cranes and the geese seem to think that winter should have gone,, as they have been arriving back, but winter keeps checking back in. So some days it is white and sometimes it is that after winter brown, complete with mud. So in the spirit of the coming spring season we've been checking the websites for a new greenhouse.

I'm turning into my grandads, yes both of them! One used to
have an allotment and the other used to grow succulents and
cacti. These cups were too cute not to use and I thought they
made great places to grow something small, like these cacti.
I finally got them potted up this week

The view from the oak tree hill

Our large greenhouse needs some serious repairs, so we are looking to get a smaller one that we can work with this summer. I still have a backlog of tomatoes in jars and such like to see us through into next year, so shouldn't be too bad. It also means we can re-think the greenhouse space as a workshop cum events space. We will still have growing spaces, for that greenhouse ambiance, but the main part will be for ......... well whatever we decide to do.

I love the colours of spring starting to show through its
wintry dusting

The new smaller greenhouse will be put in the space where
the chickens were last year and extend past it. It will be
3x8m, so still a good size but not as big as the one we use now
which is 6x18m

The range of options for greenhouses though is mind-boggling. We decided on going for the maximum we can have without planning permission, which coincidentally fits well in a space we have. It means losing a couple of outside growing beds but they were only short beds anyway. It will also be well manured as it is where the chickens were last year. In addition to extra growing space while the greenhouse undergoes repairs we would need somewhere to store the feed for the alpacas but we have enough wood to build something, so that is a good start. That is as far as we got this week, as I'm still ploughing through the websites looking for the best option for us.

To keep the alpaca houses dry, Ian has put in a drain that he
empties. Unfortunately the water used to run into it, so Ian
made this elegant covering for it, l I jest, but it's functional at
least. The only problem is that now the water comes up from
underneath to fill the hole. The water table is so high.

Vanessa always looks toothy

On Thursday it will be the 12 anniversary of our arrival in Latvia. We won't be able to celebrate at the hotel where we first stayed for a week while our stuff was in transit from America, as it has suddenly closed. It has been struggling for a while and this lack of winter hasn't helped. Our area used to be a popular skiing destination, but it isn't possible to ski without snow and definitely not in this horrible wet stuff we have been getting this week. We had one week where it looked promising with a reasonable depth of the right kind of snow, but that was very early in the season and nothing much since then. As I mentioned before the lack of snow also meant the Schools Winter Olympics was cancelled and so that was another nail in the coffin for the hotel. Our problem of nowhere to celebrate is a minor inconvenience compared to the loss of another 32 jobs, in an area that has struggled with providing decent jobs anyway.

Meanwhile Silly Silla is sat outside in the rain and the snow.
Just why?

Oh is it snowing again?

The loss of the hotel has knock on effects for our village as it also means there are less and less opportunities for people to stay and something we have to consider for our felting course. Of course I now need to get on with the advertising for that, so people have a chance to book accommodation. It was something I was working on, but now it is a more urgent task. I don't think it will be possible to organise cabins before then, as that requires more cash than we have at the moment. Still it might figure in our reckoning on what we need in the future. We certainly cannot rely on there being a hotel for guests now.

When I saw the snow covered ice on the pond, it reminded me
of the painting, The Scream!

When Ian looks at it, he sees Australia.

Vanessa and Antonia are sensibly inside

Ian had some help at the weekend. One of our young neighbours wanted something to do, so Ian agreed to let him help on our land as long as he was up by 7:30am, as that is when Ian sets off. I was impressed, as he was up and ready. He helped Ian by shifting logs and branches so they are ready to pick up when the weather improves enough to drive a tractor on the land (which looks like it might be a while yet). He won't be helping with the animals though, at least not yet. He wasn't sure about the alpacas at all, in fact he was so unsure he was a few metres away from the fence, not even up close to the fence. It looks like he might need a bit of time to gain confidence around them. Oh well! At least he got done what needed to be done.

The sun is rising further round and the days lengthen. It will
soon be time to move out to the caravan again.

Mr. P. was the first to alarm us.

It isn't just the weather that has been on and off this week, my plans too have been on and off too. There is a seminar that I wanted to attend up in Tartu tomorrow morning, but it is only 90 minutes long and takes me a day to travel up and I could just would have just about been able get back after the seminar by bus and train. I was humming and hahhing over it, when two of our alpacas were sick on consecutive days. First Mr. P was ill. Ian rang me to ask if I was doing anything and if not would I come out and take a look at Mr. P. Typically of course, by the time I had got out there, he was improved, but still a concern.

Josefs is such a cutie, even if he does carry around a light
snack to keep him going

Herkules at his usual spot by the feeder. It is hard to believe
that he has lost so much weight over winter and yet he eats
well and normally is quite healthy looking these days, at
least for a nearly 16 year old alpaca.

On Saturday, Ian walked through the door and asked if tea was ready. Well it was, so we sat down to eat, but he explained that Herk was now sick and wouldn't get up to eat that evening. So as soon as we ate, we trekked back out to the land. This time there was no improvement. Herk was still sat on the floor and wouldn't get up when we tried to move him. Brencis then decided that something was wrong and maybe we needed protecting- oh that alpaca! I'm sure his heart is in the right place, but being so big he creates us real problems. Brencis tried to sit on Herk, which as you can imagine is not what we really wanted. We managed to get Brencis off and shunted him through to the other side of the alpaca house and shut the gate.

Josefs is very submissive to Brencis, but Brencis is not so
keen on the adulation

Turbjørn kept Herkules company in the night when he was
sick. Not that Turbjørn had any choice in the matter, but
at least we could trust him not to sit on Herkules

Now as you are probably aware, animals and children are never ill at convenient times, and that day was such a case. We tried to get hold of our vet, but she wasn't responding. We tried other options, but didn't get anywhere. Our vet eventually text us back, but she was in a theatre in Riga, so wasn't much help. Our neighbour also eventually got our messages and phoned back, they had been watching tv at the back of the house and so didn't hear me knocking. I went to pick our neighbour up and her son, she used to be a vet and works with cows and her son could translate. By the time we arrived, Herk was at least up and about and Ian had managed to swap Brencis and Herk around so that Herk was in a safer place, but still with Turbjørn for company.

Ilvija has been rolling in the snow like her mum

Mari looking happy with herself

After examining Herk, our neighbour decided he seemed cold compared to the others and his stomach seemed to be slow. He also seemed a bit gassy, so maybe that was part of the pain. We wondered if he and Mr. P. had found something in the hay that had given them some mild poisoning. It seemed to fit with the symptoms we could find in the alpaca book. She gave us some peppermint, wormwood and valerian drops, that is good for the stomach. Valerian is also a calming herb. Herk wasn't so sure about the drops on his food at first, but he ate it. We had to give him some more later and he seemed a bit more keen. The next morning he was very keen on the food. Phew! Emergency over. It is a good job we ate when Ian came back home as it was after 10pm before we got to our apartment that night.

Our winter wonderland.

The signs of spring are still there though

The following day I went out with Ian and we had a slow day pottering about and discussing greenhouses, as I mentioned earlier. We even opened the greenhouse door to enjoy the view outside, as the sun was out. It was still too cold to sit outside with a hot cup of coffee as there was a chill wind blowing, but Ian has managed a few times just lately - he's made of sterner stuff these days. It used to be him that felt the cold, now it is me.

A walk in the forest. Our forest will look
a bit different this next year as one of
our neighbours will be doing some more
cutting. Sigh!

A moody sky

Someone's sunbathing in the snow.

Started off well

Mari looks like she has been styling her eyebrows

It was a sorting out kind of week. I had a Skype conversation with my supervisors one evening where I got some solid advice and promise of help that will hopefully push me forward to finishing off a paper and a big step forward to finishing off the PhD. I will be so happy when I get that sorted out.

A rolling alpaca having a dust bath. Vanessa's group are
enjoying the bank that Ian created. Not sure we are ever going
to get grass to grow on the bank.

Trying to regain some composure after the inelegant roll

I was using google docs for working on the paper and it wasn't working so well for me. I needed to amend the references in it and it isn't so easy, so I decided to download it to my computer to work on it using Word, as I have an automatic reference app for that. The plan was then to upload it to the cloud for my colleagues to comment on. Only the plug in for the type of reference I had to use wasn't working and so I had to deal with that first. It seems that nothing is straightforward at the minute. You want to do that? Then download this app then you need this plug in! Now you need to do this, then learn how to use the thing. Then overcome this little glitch and it feels like yet another week has gone and it still isn't finished. Not really this time, but that's what it feels like sometimes. Probably just showing my age.

Kind of strange, the grass looks like the middle of summer
but the leaves have not come through yet.

Contemplating something or recuperating from gardening

I was sorting out the gardens over the Easter weekend. The potatoes are now in, well most of them. We appear to have eaten too many white potatoes and so need some more to finish off the last row. I also potted on cabbages, cauliflowers, lettuces, Chinese cabbage and chard. Unfortunately they seem to be growing rather slower than I hoped, because the nights have been so cool. At least they are still alive though. It was my birthday on the Monday and so it was nice to be doing the potting on and potato planting rather than computer work. I know how to enjoy myself.

The moon shines down too

Is it fleece or is Chanel beginning to show a bit of belly there.
Still a few months yet before she is due, but Ian has increased
her rations because the alpaca cria (baby) puts on most of
its growth in the last few months.

My daughter tried to send me a WhatsApp message for my birthday but unfortunately WhatsApp stopped working on my phone two days before my birthday and won't update. Sigh! The phone is working reasonably well and so it is annoying to need to change it for something like that. Still at least there are more options than WhatsApp to communicate with. Messenger fortunately was still working, so she resent the message that way and I also got a message from my youngest and a video from three of my grandchildren wishing me a happy birthday.

Sunbathing on the mound

A spring visitor. This one was hopping away from the pond,
so Ian caught it and put it in the pond as there are not many
frogs around at the moment. 

Spring is definitely in the air, despite the cool nights. As we are out in the caravan now, I am using the outside loo and so as I wander on down there, admiring the backdrop of the forest, the birds singing in the early morning, all is well with the world. The problem is that just as I am enjoying the atmosphere the stupid chickens started creating a fuss over nothing. We have two cockerels who freak out at a hen announcing she has laid an egg, or a passing butterfly or whatever it is that seems to freak them out on a frequent basis. The noise drowns out the more melodious warbles and trills of the woodland birds. The cockerels crowing in the background from time to time did amuse my work colleagues though one Skype meeting. Not your regular business meeting background noise. We moved the caravan out of the greenhouse this week and so we don't get woken up so easily with the sound of the cockerels crowing right outside the caravan window deenow either. Bliss!

A nice large nesting box and they have to practically sit on
each other to lay an egg

Probably the same deer we saw, although we are seeing a lot
of them this year. Normally in March we see them as they are
hunting for food under snow, but by now the grass is usually
appearing and they disappear deeper into the forest.

It is amazing to see the forest coming to life with the wood anemones bursting into bloom once again but we were even more amazed one lunchtime as we were sitting outside eating our sandwiches and enjoying the sunshine when Ian spotted a deer in the forest. We sat and watched her for a good 15 minutes or so as she searched for food. She seemed completely unaware that we were there. She also looked rather thin. This time of the year is hard on the wildlife as the vegetation recovers from the winter, but it is even harder this year due to the lack of rain. We have not had more than the merest hint of drizzle in the last week and it is getting critical.

Josefs looking very fluffy around the face

I've seen quite a few cranes this week. No not the big industrial ones but rather the large birds, I even spotted a group of them from a train window. It was more stunning to see two of them flying slowly over our land, they were so low. We also saw two swans flying over several times and I'm guessing they may have been whooper swans, definitely not mute swans as they were making a right racket. Some must have flown over on an early morning flight as we were in the caravan when we heard them loud and clear.

At 16 years old and she can still do yoga poses. Do be
careful Veronica!

We had English visitors to the farm this week. A couple and their daughter. Apparently it was their first trip out so far from the capital and the husband was a little unsure and wondered if they were lost. It is a lot of countryside with not many people around if you are not used to it. Fortunately they found us okay and we spent a good couple of hours chatting about life in Latvia and of course alpacas. We just had time to grab some lunch when we had a phone call from a Latvian couple who wanted to visit. I let Ian get on with it this time, as I had the garden to deal with and I had heard it all before already that day.

Out enjoying the sunshine and the breeze

I went to get my haircut this week. My hairdresser had just got back from Georgia and she gave me a gift of Georgian Svanetian salt. It was rather nice on some potatoes. Apparently it is produced up in the mountains and has eight hand ground ingredients in it, including marigold, which gives it a lovely golden colour. Very different anyway and a lovely gift.

Just trying to get that itch!

Ian often does a search for our farm on the internet to see if anything has been published recently and was rather bemused to see my article from Dispatches Europe translated into Russian. Unfortunately it was on a rather dubious news site, which I know has a rather loose connection to truthful reporting. So while it is nice to get free advertising, I would rather that be on a more reputable news outlet, but as I was told, that's the way the internet works.