As I sat on the cottage verandah, a place I love to sit and reflect occasionally if we don’t have any guests, I realised I will have been at Glenlyon nine years this month.
Where has all the time gone? My mind flipped through memories, interestingly, in chronological order. Some bad – such as the early times here and the drought, and some good – friends and family coming to stay, Tom and Lottie renovating the cottage, the sight of frolicking spring lambs in the early morn, beautiful sunrises and sunsets, campfires and kayaking, swans and pelicans, finches and parrots, and the odd kingfisher.
It is only the end of July but the sun has a fierce heat in it, and even though I am in the shade that sun is burning straight through the tin roof. The trees have come out in all their floral finery and the birds are singing at the top of their voices, the guinea fowl are chattering away and the odd sheep is bleating.
I think the soil must be starting to warm up a bit and I mentally add to my to do list seed planting in the mini hothouse on the verandah. I told someone yesterday that I am determined to plant some Atlantic giant cattle pumpkins this year. A ten minute snooze on the comfy verandah completes my trip down memory lane and as I awaken from my slumber I guiltily think I had better get back and do some work.
The lack of rain is worrying me. The last drought is still very fresh in the back of my mind and, having failed to sell sheep before the price drop, I am paying the price now. I have been spending money hand over fist feeding the critters. Between nine head of cattle and 150 sheep, they have munched through six tonnes of grain and countless large bales of hay.
I sold the remaining Dorpers to a friend recently. In preparation, I had put them in the five acre paddock behind the house last time Richie was home. Early on the morning of the day the buyer was due to arrive I was able to get a few through the gate into the yards thanks to a Babydoll ewe I put in with them. The ewe had taught them to come up for feed every morning so I opened the gate and let them in. The only problem was that the ewes and lambs wouldn’t come in with them, as well as some others further down towards the back of the paddock.
Enter Crystal, with whom I didn’t have much confidence. The ewe and lambs were nearby so first, ever so gently and with way more patience than me she pushed them back and forwards past the gate until they eventually gave up and went in. I was elated. Crystal just looked at me as if to say, “You humans are so stupid, I know what I am doing, it’s you that doesn’t. Just let me do my bloody job!”
This gave me the confidence to walk down to the end of the five acres, encouraging Crystal to find the sheep hidden by long grass and bring them towards me as I walked back up to the gate. Getting them through the gate was trickier as the ones already inside would dearly have loved to go back out but I stood inside the gate and eventually we got them all in!
I went out for a kayak a few weeks ago and was delighted to see that the pelicans had arrived. Furthermore, I was really excited when I got within three metres of them. If only I had a camera with me! It was a beautiful day out on the water and there were plenty of swans around.
The first day of spring was picture-perfect and I was supposed to be finishing this article but Richie was home and announced he needed to take a trip to Tenterfield to pick up his engine lifter that had been sitting at the haulage depot for a few months. I love Tenterfield so I didn’t take much convincing to go for a drive on a such a beautiful day.
All went well until we arrived home at lunchtime and Richie decided to back the ute into the arbour beside the house for some reason only known to himself. We were chatting along quite animatedly about the amount of grain the sheep where consuming until a loud crash silenced us both. I am still not sure exactly what happened but the end result was that the whole arbour including six large posts, the attached wisteria vine, and the lovely horseshoe horse that Lottie made all came crashing down, hitting the water pipe which immediately burst making a glorious fountain of water in the air!
A large fat ewe had dropped dead, cause unknown. I had checked the gums and it wasn’t the usual ‘barber’s pole’ infection. I was in a hurry to go to work, so I just hooked her up behind the quad and dragged her into the gully. All was good until yesterday evening, when Dora came into the house stinking worse than a tribe of dead rats in the roof. I locked her out of the house but she knew it was bedtime and shortly after I heard a loud bang and Dora had somehow got inside.
She was straight up on the bed. Since the smell was only on her breath and she hadn’t rolled in anything I said, “Okay, you just have to stay down the end of the bed.” Dear Richie walked into the bedroom a short time later and said, “No way – outside Dora!” Now, a little bit of discord has been going on between Richie and Dora ever since she snuck her way into the house and, worse, the bedroom after she ripped herself open a while ago.
Dear Richie, is of the opinion no dog belongs in the house. Dora is of the opinion that she needs to look after me while Richie is away. As well as this, Dora is very bonded with me and sees me as the Pack Leader with Dora close behind and Richie a distant third. “Out,” Dear Richie says to Dora. No response. “Out, Dora,” again, only louder this time. Still no response. I thought perhaps I had better keep the peace, so I hopped out of bed and said, “Time to go out Dora.” She glared at Dear Richie but hoped off the bed and went outside.
The next morning on our way into Tenterfield I mentioned to Dear Richie that someone had commented that working dogs with Dora’s ability level were worth $1500 – $2000 these days. Dear Richie’s face lit up and he said quite seriously, “Wow that’s great. I think you should sell Dora. She’s no good – always being naughty chasing things and killing chooks.” It was not true – Dora only kills the odd Guinea Fowl. I looked at him to see if he was joking but apparently not.
A couple of weeks ago two ten year-old girls that were staying came rushing up to the house with Dora saying that she had attacked a lamb. I replied I was very surprised that Dora would do that and said I would go down and have a look. Richie was with me and put his two cents worth in claiming that Dora had tried to bite the lamb he had with him on the quad bike the other day. Now, I think I know Dora better than anyone and quite frankly, I didn’t believe either of them!
Dora thinks all the animals are her friends and she has had every opportunity to bite or attack during training as well as with all the sheep around the house. Needless to say, I went down to check the lamb which by then was grazing with its mother and it didn’t have a mark on it. I suspect Dora would have just wanted to check out the lamb and ditto with the lamb on the bike.
In the past week I have had one goat abandon a kid which was a couple of days old, and one goat that left behind a week-old kid. I had to orphan the first, not being able to find it’s mother but the second I was able to reunite the next day. Anyways, I was able to use Dora to catch the first one for me, gently circling it until slow old me was able to catch it. The second kid was more tricky as it was about a week old, and required both Dora and Crystal to help me catch it – Dora circling slightly wider and Crystal in closer laying in front of it giving it the eye until I caught it.
Dear Richie found a snakeskin up the paddock the other day, well over six feet long. He brought it into the house to show everyone, as you do, and laid it out on the floor to measure it. Dora just happened to wander in and immediately the hackles on the back of her neck stood up and she started growling. I was surprised. I couldn’t smell the skin as it was dried but Dora most definitely recognised it for what it was! Dora is forever pouncing on lizards in the garden, or trying to at least, but the one time I witnessed her coming across a snake she just growled and backed right away. How amazing that dogs know the difference! Wait, what did I say earlier about humans being the dumb ones?
Until next month, lots of love, Judy
