BBBRRRrrrrrrr it's cold out here

Freachan & Cullan above Creag Mhor

Wee Wendy & Tougs

Cullan & Creag Mhor in the snow

Freachan washing Sandy & Craigy

BBBRRRrrrrrrrr it is cold out here, I don't know about you lot but my thermals have had some use this month, I know they are passion killers, but i would rather that than be vain and freeze to death.

Well we have had snow at last here, it had to come at some point as we have had very little up to now.

Freachan thinks it's great he loves it so much out doors, to him it is just a big playground of fun.

Cullan being older and wiser looks at him like he should grow up but more that he is cracked, alas poor Cullan he forgets he was exactly the same when he was little too.

Well we have been waiting for Beauty to have her baby she was due on the 28th Jan.

We sorted the cattle out this morning fed them and put them out for a drink, we kept Beauty in because we did not want her going away and having the calf on the sly, then decide not come back home with it, they do that hide them from you so you spend hours looking for them, it was to cold to be having a calf outside anyway.

My hubby checked her bones this morning and said they had moved her udder was solid too, so in she stayed.

Pal and Wee Wendy are still in, as Wee Wendy is a bit small to be out in the cold snow, we don't want her to go down with pneumonia.

So we cleaned the byres ready for the cattle coming back in later.

I was filling the feed buckets ready to go in the stalls for the evening, I went into the shed where Beauty was tied in the stall, with two buckets in my hands, I looked down and there was a head and two feet sticking out, by the time I put the two buckets in the adjacent stalls and turned around the calf had popped out behind mum.

It is a little girl jet black like her full sister Gemma, a quick learner too just like her sister, straight to the teat no messing.

We put them in the calving pen together so mum could give her a good lick to dry her off and bond properly.

They will stay in there until the calf is steady on her feet and knows who her mother is.

Calves sometimes can be a little fly too, they go down the line behind the cows and check to see if they can steal milk from someone else, they usually get a firm kick from the none to keen cow.

But new Born's have a stupid sense when they are born, and will go in to any stall to get a drink from an unsuspecting cow, it's not the calves fault it's just one teat look much like another, but they learn quickly after a few short sharp kicks.

Tougs our other calf is doing well too, he has started demanding his food, and will push you about if you do not give him anything before you feed everyone else, as you go in and out of the shed with hay he tries to catch you with his head.

Freachen our Jack Russell has opened a beauty salon of his own in the ram shed.

He has taken to sitting in between the two Ram pens on the hay, the Rams have learned that if they put their head up to the pen gates Freachen will give them a wash every morning, ears, nose and eyes, boy don't they look clean when he has finished.

Know there is a race for the first wash, Sandy demands he gets washed first by charging at the pen and just stopping short so Freachan pays attention to him, Craigy just stands up on the pen wall to dominate the space, so poor Freachan is stuck in between the two Rams not knowing who to do first.

It usually works out without to much of a to-do.