Cooling down

At least here they are just chasing each other
around. It will do some of them some good and
a good work out to warm themselves up.

We had a heavy frost this morning and several, large flocks of geese were making a determined headway southwards. Yes! Winter is creeping up. Not quite here yet, but you can hear its whisper in the cold northerly breeze, or the crunch of the ice underfoot on a frosty morning. Today was one of those glorious late autumn days, crisp in the morning and bright sunshine all day. The boys came out fighting, only Turbjørn didn't join in at all. Something was in the air as they are not normally like that. The younger boys usually get a bit argumentative in the evenings, but never in the mornings. The nip in the air didn't leave all day, but at least it was better than the damp, wet days, which we've had a few too many of just lately.

The physio came out to see Turbjørn this last week.
He had a painful spot on his neck, not just the 
stiffness he normally has these days. She gave him
some laser heat treatment on it and Ian is giving
him regular treatments with the heat pad again. Mind
you, he's not that bad as he's still sitting outside when
it rains. He was so wet one morning that Ian couldn't
use the heat pad - he would have sizzled.

Oh oh! This is looking serious

Sunday morning I cut down the shrivelled remains of the Jerusalem artichokes and started the process of digging up the tubers - at least enough to clear some ground for Ian to dump the alpaca manure and expand the bed widthways. The rain set in for the afternoon, but fortunately I had some proofreading to occupy my time. I also dug up the dahlias that I raised from seed this year. The tubers are drying off in the little greenhouse ready to be taken back to the apartment. I also cleared and mulched another bed and so now nearly all the beds are settled down for their winter sleep. 

Not just the odd flock of geese this time. Lots
of flocks have been flying over. Winter won't 
be long now, so they say!

Wish vegetable gardening was this easy. Just
put the animals out on the grass and let them
eat it down. Not much mowing goes on these
days.

I need to work on the garden for next year, as it has started to get out of hand and take too long to deal with. I'm thinking of a very low maintenance to no veg gardening next year to give me time to get the flower and herb garden sorted and make the veg beds more manageable. It doesn't mean we will have nothing to eat from the garden, there are plenty of herbs. 

There are some gardeners on our land who we 
do not appreciate. The moles have been
working overtime. They are all round the
greenhouse and have even been digging up in our
new greenhouse now. They are in various places
in the fields. They also dug up the ditch and
blocked it so Ian has taken up the small bridges
and has re-dug it. So far they haven't been back-
close but not back yet! 

Such a glorious golden autumn

There are also plenty of wild edible weeds that we eat a lot of in spring and I can sort of cultivate them too. Nettles are really nutritious and if we cut them back they can be harvested later too. I've already put some potatoes in to see if they will be okay over winter. I know I've tried it before and it didn't work but then again the winter was hard that year. We seem to have lots of potatoes that grow up anyway where I haven't planted them and they are cheap to replace, so no big worries. 

...panning round a bit more

Such a profusion of colours, all bathed in a 
golden light

I might also buy some plants instead of trying to raise them myself and put some seeds in that can overwinter. I tried it before with parsnips and that worked really well. Those sorts of veg don't seem to need a lot of work and so can just sort themselves out with a bit of mulching later on. . Once I have the garden under control I could then think about late summer and autumn vegetables as they seem to be doing okay. The garlic is already in too. It is easy to put that kind of thing in after the potatoes have been removed (I say removed rather than dug up as I don't use a spade - no need and a lot fewer losses from spade or fork damage). After the potatoes the bed is clear and just needs a quick raking over and then mulching. 

Then we had the damp squib of a day which
drained the colour and makes the photos look
like a slightly faded one from the 70s. Karla 
and Lolly were wet through this week, but
none the worse for it.

Generally they get on, but sometimes little Lolly
pushes Karla to her limit. Karla is smaller in
height but much stronger than Lolly. But 
Lolly can outrun all the girls I think with her
long legs and boundless energy.

Another aspect I really need to sort out is compost. We have plenty of manure and that, but not a convenient place to compost it all. I need the compost for starting seeds and it seems daft to buy it in when we have so much stuff that could be composted. I could do with doing some hot composting to get rid of weed seeds and then bagging it up, but I just don't seem to get organised enough for the beginning of the year. April and May is just such a busy time, both for the academic and agricultural year, that trying to fit in finding compost, raising seeds, finding sticks for beans and so on, all gets too much. Starting earlier isn't an option either in our short season, as the ground can still be frozen in March and we still risk hard frosts and snow. 

Like miniature stained glass windows.

Looking gorgeous there Mr. P

Ian will have to get cracking with wood chopping, as now we have finally got the wood to the apartment and down in the cellar there, ready for our return in winter. I say we. We both stacked the horse box and Ian did one run to the apartment on his own. I had work to do and there was rain forecast which makes getting the horse box on and off the land tricky, so he made a start. We both went another morning to finish it off. We made it before it rained anyway. It would have been done earlier but we had a problem with a delivery of flour. I get my organic flour online and it was too heavy to use the post box and it had to be sent by courier. Well there are problems with our address since the administrative changes as there are now two places in our larger municipality with the same name and the courier got the wrong one. I always wince when people swear in my language. I'm not the swearing sort and so this just kind of compounds it. I did feel sorry for him though as I know they are on a tight schedule. 

A soggy Brencis

Mr. Tellus with a few glistening jewels

I heard last week that the paper that seems to have gone on for ever has finally been accepted. I sighed a huge sigh of relief but then got a message that they would like a summary of the paper for policymakers and the general public. Oh boy! Just condense 18 months of work into 1000 words please! Don't use anything too technical! Okay but it's one of the most technical papers I've ever written.... so....anyway it's done and sent off to my colleagues to comment on. Work seemed to be piling up this last week but at least I've managed to clear some backlogs in the last two days and can now get back on with the more routine side of things - whatever that is. 

A two-tone George

Golden morning rain with Freddie and Jakobs

A rainbow in our forest

The other end of the rainbow on the hill

Two-tone George on a frosty morning

Josefs and Freddie fighting

Still at it

Josefs taking a breather

Morning jog

Father and son wrestling now.

Now it's Freddie and George's turn. But don't
worry, Ian calmed them down after a while and
no one was hurt.

Ice on the car

A disagreement this time between Freddie and 
Jakobs.

Writing and raining

Just awwww!

Writing is going well for me at the moment. I've recently had two more articles published in Dispatches Europe, this time encouraging people to travel slowly through Latvia and visit places outside of Riga. I also encouraged people to visit our own farm of course, nothing like doing a bit of self-promotion while I'm at it. Having said that, it is not something that comes easily to me, but I recognise that if we want people to visit, then we have to take what opportunities come our way.

Herkules gets fed up of the heat and the flies. He's probably
enjoyed the rain just lately.

It was a relief to hear that a paper for an academic journal that I have co-authored was accepted the week before. I am not the main author on that one, I just added a section and polished the English before the second review. I haven't actually taken a look at the last revision as I haven't had time really. Although I now have three full published papers which kind of qualifies me to get my PhD, they are not the main bulk of my work.  I am still waiting to hear the results from that particular paper, but since I only submitted it on the 17th June it is not surprising. I hope to hear soon though. Apparently the turn around is very quick. Then I can get my thesis sorted. Now that will be good.

The baby swallows, still hanging around

There have also been three papers submitted for the EU project I'm involved in. I am only named as first author on one of them and co-author on another. Being first author makes a difference, it basically means I have put the most work in to it, after that it just means I contributed. Anyway all three got rejected. The editor though requested we have a Skype call with someone to help us with the content so they could be resubmitted, as they like the idea of the project. That at least is promising. During the Skype call we found out that the one I had mainly written was basically okay but the others needed re-wording to get accepted.

This bug was rather reluctant to
give up it's hold on the
meadowsweet flowers but I had
plans for these in a dessert, so he
had to go. There have been some
amazing bugs just lately.

We found out today what the minor the changes that were needed were but they are so minor that we should be able to sort it out by tomorrow. It takes a little bit of time to coordinate with my colleagues since we are not in the same office and in this case relying on emails but we get things done. Still it is progress. Published papers can be very important for academics and some places demand many publications to keep your job. Fortunately that is not the case for me and the job I'm doing, but having publications is still helpful for the future.

Our view for our evening meal

Of course, being summer, my time is not taken up just with writing it is also usually tied up with working on our land collecting hay, doing something with the alpacas or chickens or the gardening. So we are quite relieved that the drought is mainly over. We've had a reasonable amount of rain, but still not as much as elsewhere. It seems Riga is flooded in places, so we are grateful that it wasn't that bad for us. We have had enough to give the plants a good soak, but not enough to create a mudbath. Still it has rained most days this week, so I haven't done that much in the way of outside activities. I did get the chance to do some weeding and finally stake up some peas because I can get the sticks in the ground. I also started some seeds off in the greenhouse so that I can get some of the quick growing plants in for salads and some perennial plants for next year. It is much easier when I can get water without a great palaver.

After the rain 

We've actually been able to harvest rainwater to water plants and stock up on our own water supply. The ponds are still too low to water the greenhouse though. I have been taking the water first from a reserve we pumped from the only reasonably full pond earlier in the season and then I have been getting the water from the collapsed greenhouse. It was covered in black plastic and just happens to make a good rainwater catcher. Now there's an idea.

Still a very pregnant alpaca

We are still waiting for Chanel to have her baby. There have been odd days when she's looked uncomfortable but most of the time she looks rather too relaxed. We had hoped that she would have given birth before we start on the process of getting the other girls pregnant for next year's babies. Instead we just had to get on and hope she doesn't go into labour while Ian was supervising the mating process. We have never mated five girls in the same period before and it takes some planning. Not all of them can be mated to the same stud. Ian made a gate to separate the alpaca house into two so we can use two studs at a time and keep the girls separated to some extent.

Just how though can she bend round that far whilst pregnant?

Mr. P with a faraway look in his eyes.

One of our concerns is Mr. P maybe passing on some genes for rapid teeth growth and a possible asthmatic tendency with dusty hay. Not ideal for an alpaca. They are cute babies that he produces but not much good if they are then going to be a health liability. We are giving him a try again to see what happens next year. Meanwhile we decided to give Tellus another go. He's starting to get old, but then he gave us one very good baby in terms of fleece, George, a very, very sweet natured but not good fleece, Freddie and a reasonable fleece but rather large alpaca, Brencis. All of them are lovely natured, so we'll see what happens there.

The sweetest natured alpaca of them all I think. Only his
fleece is not very fine at all. He does produce a lot, so it is
a shame that his isn't fine too.

Brencis having a good scratch.

We've also tried Brencis now he's old enough with one of the girls, which has been interesting. Poor guy, it is his first time and he doesn't quite know what to do. He has needed some coaching by Ian to at least get on the right way around. He was fine the first time but must have got over excited the second time around. We have had to stagger the mating, as there is not enough room or appropriate accommodation to have three stud males. We also need to know who is mated when so that we know when to expect the babies next year, hence Ian has to supervise. Some of the girls have been rather resistant and we even considered trying Tellus instead of Mr. P with Vanessa, as she is a feisty lady like her Mum, Veronica. The reason we didn't is that we realised they both had the same father and so too close a relation.

Veronica might be old and a bit unsteady on her legs at time
but she is still feisty

Don't let this sweet, innocent face fool you.
She wasn't so innocent looking as she was
spitting at Mr. P.

Is it safe to come out?

Female alpacas will sit down if they are receptive and being around others that are mating helps them to ovulate and therefore be more receptive. This is the reason for having so many of them in the alpaca house at the same time. It's all a bit mind boggling really. We are hoping that Vanessa will respond to the mating going on behind the gate before bringing down Mr. P because otherwise he is just getting absolutely covered in spit. We are not sure she likes him really. Vanessa is on the older side and because we can't mate her with Tellus or Brencis because they are too close a relation, and George is too young, we are kind of stuck with persevering with Mr. P.

Amanda is such a cutie

Our boys can be very relaxed and calm

Normally our boys are fairly chilled. About dusk there maybe a bit of a fracas but rarely anything serious. However, the other day there was quite a to-do. I can't remember who was chasing who but they all seemed to be at it and this was before any of them had been to see the girls. Eventually Ian had to separate Mr. P. off to cool down as he was the one that seemed to be the main instigator. He seems to be picking on George at the moment and it seems to either set the others off trying to stop him or off on their own disagreement with another alpaca. There are probably hierarchy issues as the young ones grow up. Still, most of the time they are calm, so we just wait and see.

I love how Herkules, our deaf old man is still the boss and
will sort out the youngsters

Even Turbjørn tries to keep order, despite being the grumpiest
alpaca we have. No one, but no one invades Mr, Turbjørn's space

Jakobs is too young for faraway looks in his eyes. 

It was our time for a flat tyre or at least a soft tyre this week. One of our friends has had to repair three tyres on two cars due to the state of the roads and our visitor last week had a flat tyre. The washboard dirt roads are not good on cars. It's a good job our village has a tyre repair place, so not too big a job to deal with. It just meant it was one of those weeks when we were backwards and forwards to the village. I went back one day and realised I'd forgotten the key to the apartment and so had to drive all the way back to get it. There are traffic lights in our village because they are doing some major renovations on the main road and since the traffic lights take a long time to change and were on red when I got to the junction, I turned in the opposite direction and did the shopping first before heading back for the key.

Jakobs  does take after his Mum, Mari though. She's the one in
the foreground with Aggie behind.

Munching away on the hill

There are not many Brits in Latvia, around 400 I think, not too sure of the exact number, so it is almost inevitable that we will know a fair proportion of them or at least know about them. One guy we had met a while ago after I found out via a blog he had written that he lived in a town that wasn't very far from where I grew up. I even worked on the edge of the town where he used to live when I was a teenager working for my parents before going to uni. His son and grandkids were visiting and so he decided to come and visit us again. Funnily enough one of our previous visitors recommended our place when our friend posted a message in a Latvian expat site to ask for ideas for places for his grandchildren to visit. It is nice that someone recommended us. The weather could have been better but at least the rain held off and wasn't nearly as bad as forecast, well not over us it wasn't. It was amazing to find out his son and grandchildren live quite near to one of the places where we had the best holiday ever. One that nearly ended in disaster but made good by the open hearts and generosity of strangers, but maybe that's a tale for another time.

I know Aggie isn't pregnant but it is still unreal to be able to
scratch your nose with your toes.

We got the results back on the alpaca fleeces. We are a bit puzzled with some of them. Not sure if it is a problem with the testing or our sampling. It turns out that Turbjørn's fleece has got a whole lot finer, but we didn't think it was by that much. Also a sample we took from a young alpaca to be tested because we wondered how fine her's was, didn't turn out to be as fine as I thought it was. We shall have to compare them with next year and see what they show then.