Stuff happens

A stork on top of the chicks' ark

I really don’t want any more weeks like this last week. There were some good points, like my youngest has settled in well to his new job, which is a great relief and we are very grateful to good neighbours, but some stuff we could really do without. We are a bit fed up with aspects of life at the moment. Don’t get me wrong, we wouldn’t swap what we are doing or where we are living, but such is life, things go wrong from time to time.

Agnese looking super cute

Agnese is still having feeding problems and we are now feeding on a regular schedule, approximately every two hours during the day. She usually tries to feed off her mum whenever we (well Ian usually) go up with her milk and we then have to wait until she is done. We would rather she got all her milk from her mum, but that doesn’t look promising, at least she is getting some. This is now a three month job and our next piece of research will be finding out about when exactly and how to wean her off the milk. One of the biggest problems is having to travel up to our friend’s farm which is 20 minutes away to get some goats milk every other day. We also brought our fridge out from our spare apartment to keep the milk in. Makes life a lot easier.

Snowdrop. She is doing fine after losing the baby, but
she still needs shearing

That trip up to our friend’s one morning coincided with our remaining pregnant alpaca, Snowdrop giving birth. Unfortunately the baby was dead when Ian found it. He was gutted. He said he wanted to be an alpaca breeder, not an alpaca undertaker. Our friend who helped with milking Veronica, came around to help out, as we were worried about the placenta, as that took a while for it to be delivered. I am beginning to wonder if he dreads our phone calls. He thought the baby had probably been breech, as the umbilical cord was ripped quite short and with the blood down the back of Snowdrop, it obviously hadn’t been as clean a birth as the previous alpaca babies. Ian felt really bad, because if he had been there early, like he usually is, there is a chance that he could have helped with the birth and saved the baby. Well maybe and we will never know if that was the case or not. I was meant to be at home that day, but decided my place was with my husband who needed some support and besides it would have been difficult to think straight to work with that news. We named the little one Snowflake, although we didn't think of it at the time, it seems so fitting for one whose life was so fleeting. Why Snowflake? Daughter of Snowdrop!

The fridge now resides in the barn,
where it stays relatively cool

That was the worse catastrophe of the week, but not the only one. The first one happened earlier on when our dear water company, without warning cut off the water supply to our side of the village, so that one of our neighbours could undertake work to his house he is building. When the water was turned back on, it caused the filter to blow in the apartment above our other flat and water started to cascade down. The neighbours at that apartment block saw the problem, as the water was pouring down on the outside of the window. One of them phoned a neighbour to the place where we live, who phoned another neighbour who he thought had our number and she phoned me to tell us the problem (are you still following?). Another neighbour knew someone who had the phone number for our friend who gives us the goats milk and he phoned her and she phoned Ian. Another of our younger neighbours used facebook to contact my young helper who has helped me in years past and made friends with the younger neighbours up there, who then messaged me, but I only found that one out later. One of our neighbours also turned off the electric from the box outside the door, for which we are rather grateful as the water was pouring in through light connections. It might have been a disaster, but at least with concerned neighbours we got to know about it pretty quickly.

Full of the joys of spring

What is it though about alpaca babies and flooding in our other apartment?  For those who remember in early February when we lost the first alpaca baby, born on the coldest day of the year, it was followed by a radiator burst at our other apartment. Our upstairs neighbour came down to look at the most recent damage that had been caused by water cascading down from his apartment and he looked very dejected. He asked us how much it was going to cost and to include the work, his shoulders almost slumping with every sentence. We know they don’t have much and yet they would feel bad if they didn’t contribute something. This is the third time their plumbing has caused a flood in our apartment. Our floors and ceiling are beginning to show signs of the repeated flooding. We are not sure we really want to replace floors and things though if there is a chance of it happening again. We have the dehumidifier on now, working away to pull as much water out of the fabric of the building as possible, then we will see what damage there really is.

Shorn Veronica, letting Agnese feed

All these unexpected problems has meant that I haven’t been able to weed the garden outside our apartments and so that is pretty bad and getting worse. I spent one day trying to find the carrots in amongst some self-seeded chamomile, not an easy task with both having feathery leaves. It doesn’t look like all the seeds have germinated either, or the seed planter gadget I used wasn’t set up right, both possibilities and so there are gaps in the carrot rows. I will give them a couple of days and if no joy will fill in the gaps with more seeds. The sweetcorn hadn’t germinated well either and that could be a seed problem or the cold spell we had. I had one bed covered with fleece and more seeds have germinated in that one, but it still isn’t good. I have already put some more seed in on the off chance there is enough time - in a good year there will be. I still have fodder beet to find yet and then start on the potatoes. At least with those I should be able to straw them up, which will stop some of the weeds from coming through.

Estelle being followed by Agnese

At least we did get some things accomplished this week. I have got some of the cabbages that were in trays planted out, some peas tied up and we also managed to shear two of the girls one day. They are a bit more feisty than the boys and shearing was more difficult, as the cutting comb was obviously not working as well. It looks like we need a new base comb every other animal, especially with those who have the thicker fleece like Tellus and Estelle. It also needs a new top comb with every animal. At least we know where to get them sharpened now. Ian went off today to buy some more combs so that we can finish of the last lady of the herd and have some spares for next week. Ian also planted up some quinoa, amaranth, sunflowers and squashes. We still have some more space to plant up, but that will be with squashes that have self-seeded in the greenhouse and some that have been sown in trays. We are getting there, slower than we would like, but hopefully something will grow.

Tellus in the ladies house

Talking of Tellus and Estelle, we started the process of mating them. We were getting a bit worried after a few hours, they seemed to be behaving like a couple of shy teenagers. They even greeted each other by sniffing noses, which surprised me, as I thought that alpacas just spat at each other if they got too close. Anyway we left them together and eventually they seemed to get the hang of what to do. The males though make a very surprising noise, apparently called “ogling,” it certainly sounded very bizarre. We have to wait though to see if Estelle is pregnant, chances are that she is not this time around. How will we know? When Estelle starts spitting at Tellus to make him go away. We know that Veronica is not ready to be mated yet, she was already spitting in Tellus’ direction, as soon as he looked at her, even though they were separated by a fence.  We still have to decide if we go ahead with mating her again, but since Snowdrop lost her baby, we think we probably will.

The gaffa taped up window

Other snippets from life on the farm is that we have had the first strawberries of the year. I put some plants in the greenhouse and they turned early. They were rather nice, even if there was only four of them. Our chickens have also been plotting their escapes this week. One lot got out of their ark when the door didn’t close properly. Probably because it had just been moved and the frame must have got a bit twisted. The other escapees were the two cockerels we have in the horse box, where they are waiting either to replace the free range cockerel if he doesn’t book his ideas up and stop wandering so much (he has calmed down a lot since we sent the other hens away to a new home, so I think he’s safe), or they will be for the pot, when we find some spare time to do the deed. However, they somehow managed to fly through the clear plastic in the horse box fabric top. It was obviously a bit brittle. At least they were all easy enough to catch, even if the cockerels took a little more persuasion. Chickens are quite easy to persuade to enter something when grain is on offer. As for the plastic window, that has now been criss-crossed with gaffa tape to make sure we do not have a repeat tomorrow morning.

Maybe a bit hard to see, but the black blob is the dead
mole. There is an arc of disturbed ground and that is
the path the beetles took the mole.

The strange thing is that we are usually greeted by cats on arrival to the land, but this morning it was by the two errant cockerels and no cats. This is partly because Sofie has gone on one of her walkabouts again and Bella, we discovered, had managed to get locked into the caravan overnight. Our cats though are usually proving their worth as we see lots of small gifts left lying around, usually voles that are so destructive to trees and vegetables. The strange thing is though that these gifts frequently disappear and we have now discovered this is due to Burying beetles. They literally dig underneath the dead animal and it gradually disappears into the ground, it is very bizarre to watch. We did wonder who the clean up crew were. The beetles did attempt to take on a whole mole, but the ground where it was was too hard, so they then proceeded to move it about 30cms away. Unfortunately for them, I think it was too old by then and flies had found it. Still deep respect for the wee beasties.

Video of Agnese. The end could do with editing

but I'm sorry, no time 

Frustrations galore

Well sorry for the delay and it is good to see that blogger seems to be behaving itself this morning.

Several incidents just lately have had us and our friends asking "What does it mean to be an adult? "What  difference does it make to how someone should act?" and "How can we encourage folks to grow up?" It is hard when dealing with people from dysfunctional families or embroiled in relationships with those from dysfunctional families. Many people here in Latvia have an alcoholic in their family or amongst their close friends and encouraging responsible behaviour in that environment can be tough sometimes . It is always heart breaking to say "Enough's enough! You've gone too far!" Tough, but necessary sometimes. It has been a steep learning curve for all involved to realise that allowing behaviour to slide is not always in some folk's best interests. Yes there is unconditional love, but love also looks for the best for the person and sometimes that is far from comfortable. Well hopefully we have all learnt something in these processes that we can use to help others where necessary. Rapper/actor  Ashley Walters came from such a dysfunctional family as his dad went to prison 17 times and left Ashley an angry young man. After a spell in prison he came out to see his young son and realised where his mistakes were leading and said in a BBC interview  "I don't see any point in that. If I have already had the bad experience, I should be able to steer him away from that. That's the whole point in being a Dad and being an adult." Well said I think and I hope that many won't get to that stage before they realise their mistakes. Before you get the wrong impression though there are lots of very responsible folks here despite the difficulties, some holding down 2 or even 3 jobs just to make ends meet or working away from family just to make sure there is some income coming in, bringing with it a new set of problems, life is sure not easy for some. 

It hasn't been all angst this week though, how can you when Spring is on its way? It is not a pretty time of the year really, with the snow melting leaving soggy messes everywhere but there is a sense of urgency and a softness in the air that suggests just a little longer and things will be different. Magpies are zooming backwards and forwards making nests (I didn't realise how widespread those birds are until we have moved around and I can confirm they are in Denmark, America and Latvia as well as England), other birds are singing their hearts out and of course the storks are back. Ian was literally just telling me that the storks were back as the first sightings had been made in Latvia according to our Swedish friend, when on cue, one flies past our house. How's that for timing? A stork flies for 35 days from its winter nesting ground and times his arrival with our discussion about storks! Amazing coincidence! We have also spotted a couple of butterflies which is odd as there are only snowdrops flowering at the moment, goodness only knows what they will be feeding on.

The melting snow of course brings flooding because the ground is still frozen and the water has nowhere to go, so it tries to head for the rivers. The rivers in turn are still solid chunks of ice as well and so the water backs up. I didn't realise how thick the ice was until the nearby river started breaking up and there were chunks of ice over 30 cm thick protruding upwards in places. In Jelgava they have already had floods and so the army have been sent in to break up the ice on the Daugava river with explosives so that the water can drain away and it certainly needed some hefty explosives to break it up.

As to be expected, our land is rather soggy, and once again it is deserving of its nickname, the Everglades. And guess what with all this soggy mess we are still waiting for our polytunnel to be completed! We were told last week that the wood would be ready to finish the frame and they would start on Monday, which we were led to believe  meant last Monday but no. No one thought to ring to say what was happening and poor Ian is getting a bit fed up chasing folks around (do they want a job or not?).  Anyway someone did turn up this Monday to have a look, only a week late, and there is a real problem with the amount of water that is literally pouring through the channels that Ian has dug, but heh! that is not our problem we did suggest it be done sooner while the ground was still frozen, so they will need to be creative to get it finished and not covered in mud.

I said the ground was frozen still and so I watched in amazement as a lorry went by with a pipe laying machine on the back. It is quite amazing they are starting back to work now on laying water pipes because the frozen ground is like concrete and I know the pipes have to be laid below the permafrost layer, but they have to get to it first. It will be like digging through a metre thick concrete slab. Incredible! Rather them than me! Having said that the moles seem to have managed all right to dig through the frozen ground, judging by the number of mole hills up the garden - maybe that is what they use, an army of moles?

It is amazing how travelling about makes you think about your own heritage more and also the heritage of others (or maybe it's just me) so it was interesting to read on the Timber Butte blog about Tri Robinson and his heritage as an American, and descendant of pioneers. I have to say American's often have a greater knowledge of their own heritage than those of us from Europe but I guess it is all that moving about that makes you search for your roots. Seeing just a little of the vastness that is America in our two years of living there helped me to understand some of the American culture, to think that today's folks are the descendants of those who had to keep going to reach a place to settle, who had to lose things along the way that weighed them down, who had to be fixed on the goal or perish. All this makes sense of sense of thinking they know best, the determination to carry on in the face of opposition, and the courage to get up even after a fall. Those characteristics are admirable sometimes but they do have a flip side which is not so good but understanding where it comes from has meant I am more tolerant when I meet it - well sometimes and no doubt I have my own cultural foibles that are hard to understood by the good folks here.

So what about my heritage? My grandparents are all from different towns of England which is unusual for my grandparents era as people were not so mobile then. My Grandfather though on my mother's side wanted to start a new life in Australia but my Nan would not move away. So my heritage is one of those who wanted to go and those who wanted to stay, those with a sense of adventure which was never fulfilled and those too frightened to step out. It is odd that our daughter, her great-granddaughter has finally made it there to Australia. It sort of echoes how Abraham's father set out to go to Canaan but never made it, he settled for the comfort of Haran instead (Genesis11:31) and it was Abraham who made it to Canaan after a little encouragement to get up and go from God. Of course if my Grandparents had moved I wouldn't be here writing this blog or having these adventures as my parents would not have met. Sobering thought! But what is more sobering to me is the fact that Terah never made it to his destination, he settled too soon. I never want to be someone who settles for less than the goal of God's life for me, I never want to settle too soon. That does not mean it is time to leave Latvia, there are other goals to pursue than just places to go to but I just don't want to settle down yet, I haven't finished my journey through life yet, God has a purpose and a plan for me and I don't want to settle for anything less. That helps to spur me on with my studies despite the set back I had this last week. Up to now on my new course I had been getting distinctions but for the assignment for this new unit, one I thought I should have had no problem with I got what they called a marginal fail (not sure what that means yet) and I felt rather down about it, I suppose it knocked me off my pedestal a bit. It is a set back but not I presume an insurmountable one and so I shall determine to carry on and reach my goal. At least for now I have two weeks off my studies so I can relax and rest my brain.

You can see a big difference between this week's photos and last week's.
Photo 1 our rustic workshop still under construction, but the banks of snow at the side of the path are fast disappearing
Photo 2 but the snow is still deep in places, Ian had to take a photo first before he would help me out.
Photo 3 Ian digging drainage channels in the polytunnel
Photo 4 The polytunnel - not a pretty sight
Photo 5 The destructive effects of the melting snow on a road. The land to the left up to 3/4 of the way up the hill is ours too, and used to be a ski hill.
Photo 6 The children's playground and if you look back you can see how the snow was pretty much up to the swings and the top of the bin.
Photo 7 Our reappearing garden.