03/12/2014

Fog

Most of November was looking like this:

or like this:

We had some minutes of sun in between two banks of grey clouds though. I liked this a lot:

Spider silk glistening in the sun. never seen that much spider silk before. Busy spiders. Saw this on a walk with the dogs up the hill in front of the property.

Rudi (terrier) got a new grey sweater for Christmas. He’s already wearing it and scares the sheep. Sheep are confused by and afraid of new colours. They don’t change their colour and expect everybody else to be like them.

22/11/2014

Feeding season has begun

Winter has arrived in Normandy. We already had two nights with only 2 chilly °C (35.6 °F). The sheep are complaining about the lack of fruits.

-“Where have all the chestnuts gone? Long time passing.” -“Fat sheep ate them every one. When will they ever be full?”

And then they walk into the sunset.

I filled the tube feeder for the birds with sunflower seeds and hung up fat balls. The weather is rather bad, grey and gloomy, sometimes even raining and thus I can’t take good photographs at the moment.

Poecile palustris or Poecile montana (marsh tit or willow tit) and Parus major (great tit).

Three Chloris chloris (greenfinch).

I bought 5 steres of wood and feed the wood stove. The house has no insulation and no other means of heating.

28/10/2014

Careful, Bach

This sheep warns Bach, the Bernese Mountain Dog. Sheep stomp their feet to tell the rest of the world to leave them alone. If a sheep looks at you and stomps its feet, it will jump with its head into your belly.

Bach knows the sheep well and he didn’t come near this one.

These sheep pretend to be harmless. They look as if they couldn’t hurt a fly.

Photographs are my own, stored on Flickr.

16/10/2014

Winter is coming

And even the sheep catch a cold.

Poor Brad had a cold and stayed 5 days in the barn. The vet visited us, a very nice young woman. She gave Brad 3 injections and he took it like a ram. Then I gave him every day an antibiotics injection. Brad felt better after one night and it was so boring in the stable. We played who eats the chess tokens first. Brad always won.

After his release from the barn, he followed me everywhere. Even in the house. And other sheep followed him. Kleines for example likes to come in the house anyway.

On the picture Kleines and Brad come OUT of my sleeping room. Needless to say, that my sleeping room doesn’t belong to me alone. The dogs and at least one cat sleep there too. That’s why Bach is a bit worried. “Will those sheep sleep here as well?” Don’t worry Bach.

I gave them some sweet chestnuts to bribe them.

Sweet chestnuts are the best. (sheep proverb)

I’m the author of the photographs, they are available under a Creative Commons licence on Flickr.

06/10/2013

The animals of my new neighbours

Deutsche Version hier.

I got new neighbours. And they have lots of cute animals. Their animals move too much and too fast for my camera, especially if I’m too stupid to use the sport-scenery-preset.

They got a goat and her little daughter. The goat is complaining the whole time, if a human is around. It wants food. Clever goat. There’s no way to stop it. She climbs on people to reach the food.

The goat of my neighbours. Own photo on Flickr, licence: CC by-SA/ Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported

They got three horses. A miniature horse of the size of a dog, The Irish cob Aquarelle and Quitty, a paint horse. All the horses are very friendly. Quitty likes to eat. Good that she and the goat don’t get the same food.

Quitty. Own photo on Flickr, licence: CC by-SA/ Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported

Like I already said in Moon over the pasturage, they got a cat that got hit by a car in the first week after they moved here. They got four cats. Two hairless cats, one is a Sphynx. And I got to admit, I’ve learned something. I always thought it’s terrible to have hairless cats. But their cats were so cute and nice to me. Sitting on my shoulder and purring in my ear. That really changed my mind. I still wouldn’t want to have a hairless cat, but it’s really not the fault of the cats. They are just as cute as cats with hair. Took no photographs inside the house and can’t show those hairless cats.

The poor cat, that has lost its tail. Own photo on Flickr, licence: CC by-SA/ Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported

Apart of chickens, horses, goats, cats, and a rabbit, they got sheep. The sheep are rather new members of the “zoo”. I will get the cute ram in November and he is supposed to get in close contact with my ladies. For Christmas my neighbours want to eat him.

Wtf? They want to eat me for Christmas? Are they crazy or what? Own photo on Flickr, licence: CC by-SA/ Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported

“We’re so small, cute and harmless.” Own photo on Flickr, licence: CC by-SA/ Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported

“Hey little girl, do you like to dance with me?” Own photo on Flickr, licence: CC by-SA/ Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported

Guardians of the property are three dogs of very different size. A Leonberger by name of Vulcain, some kind of spaniel called Forever and a Beauceron puppy by name of Isak. I don’t have any photos of Isak yet. He’s very cute, gives kisses and eats hairs.

Vulcain the Leonberger, he’s ten years old and a really lovely dog. Own photo on Flickr, licence: CC by-SA/ Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported

Vulcain and the little Forever play with each others. They are very good friends. Own photo on Flickr, licence: CC by-SA/ Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported