double laced barnevelder chickens

We have wanted barnevelder chickens for some time now and have been looking around for point of lay pullets but we would have to drive some distance to pick them up so we have decided to hatch our own! 

As it is a bit of an experiment, we have just bought a cheap incubator, hopefully it will work well enough! We found some lovely people who have sold and mailed some barnevelder eggs to us. Due to some misdirected mail we ended up reordering another batch thinking the first was well and truly lost, however, as soon as we did that the original batch turned up! So the first batch went in the incubator today and we should receive the second batch in a day or two. 

Barnevelders are gorgeous dual purpose chickens and the eggs we received in the mail were certainly very attractive eggs. I wonder if the chickens themselves will actually turn out to be good eating too?

Tux has a bit too much fun...

Well, its never dull here at adagio alpacas! I looked out the window yesterday to see the sisters Ebony and Silhouette cuddled up together whilst Ebony let Tux have his way with her!

Tux looking wistfully at his girls and the steers are curious

Alpacas are very sweet when mating, the male often crooning to the female. Tux was no exception. Alpacas have very close family and friendship bonds within the herd and Ebony is obviously very close to Tux. Female alpacas are at their happiest when they are pregnant and get quite grumpy when they aren't! They are all a bit devastated that Tux has been separated. I have no idea how but somehow last night he managed to get back into the paddock with the girls! They have all been mooning about since I separated him a second time this morning.

We don't intend to bread with Tux much to our disappointment his fleece was not fine enough however cute he may be! I was planning on separating him out and arranging the castration for next week but obviously I was a week too slow! So the castration has been arranged for tomorrow... He can be back with his girls in a few days once he has healed.

Tux feeling sorry for himself

It is unlikely that anything will come of the mating, I double checked my quick reference guide, a wonderful resource from the Australian Alpaca Association, "Managing Alpacas in Australia" and it indicates that generally males become fertile between the ages of 18mths to 3 years. However I guess we will find out for sure in May/June next year!

The neighbour's lambs only just born

To complicate matters further, our bore pump has had to be removed to be fixed as the iron in the water has completely corroded out the pump, we were lucky it was still working at all! So whilst the boy slept today I had to find 4 lengths of hoses and associated connectors to be able to fill the steers' water back up! Not an easy task with our organisation system... or lack thereof! Luckily we are on town water as well as having a bore so I had another option!

In good news whilst I was sorting out the alternative water supply I looked across and one of my neighbour's sheep had had lambs! They were so new that they still had all the birth fluid on them. Very cute! The boy and I will have to wander down so he can look at them later. Unfortunately the only camera I had on me was the phone but the lambs were very cute!




Hopefully thats all the drama here for a while!

Autumn colours

It's really starting to look like autumn here. I love the colours and this tree in our backyard is simply stunning.