Every week at Olive Tree Farm has it’s ups and downs…. and this week was no exception. The weather here has been shocking for the past couple of weeks. We have had hurricane force 1 winds which damaged an awful lot and we are still repairing and suffering as a result. 3 of the animal pens were badly damaged and had the asphalt and boarding ripped off by the force of the wind. We also lost a whole section of asphalt off part of the roof of the house. It had all been recently renewed, all we needed to do was get the cement and tiles over the top of it, but just hadn’t quite got there. The result was finding it all ripped about 20 metres away from the house.
Whilst we were busy trying to secure the animals, the wind dropped, and the rain came. Bearing in mind the roof of the house was partly open to the elements now, the rain slowly but surely worked its way along the lintels and into 3 rooms which normally are the best rooms in the house. It was a night of searching for drips and finding pans and bowls to collect the rainwater. It was even dripping on the beds and on the main sofa in the lounge. It was a couple of long nights for all the family. Unfortunately you cannot do anything when it is still breezy and wet. We have to wait until the surface of the roof is dry enough to be able to get the new asphalt on and use the heat burner to melt it down.
During all this, we had a brooding box full of 16 chicks, and an incubator almost ready to hatch 2 goose eggs…. We have 2 girls to get to school and back, and a farm area thick with mud which we have to walk through to get to the animal pens to feed them and clean them out. As you can imagine it was a depressing few days.
But, as usual, there are always some good things that happen and can often outweigh the frustrations. The goose eggs did hatch. We are now the proud owners of 2 little goslings and the children adore them. We are going to make sure we all spend lots of time with them so they become friendly pets. We do not yet know whether they are male or female, but one does look bigger and the smaller one has a more rounded head……continued below photo gallery…….
With regard to the reference in the title of this post of ducks, we were contacted via our Face Book page by a lady that we have met a few times at the markets. She had been given two despatched ducks by a Spanish neighbour, and although as a young girl she was brought up on a farm, bless her, she just couldn’t bring herself to pluck and clean them. When she asked if we would like them, we jumped at the chance. Just three and a half hours later, we had 2 birds all prepared and ready for the oven. One is safely in the freezer, and the other is sat in the fridge ready for cooking for supper tonight.
So there we are, another hectic week almost gone. In the time we managed to get between everything else, we have been busy making lots of goodies for the market which we go to on a Saturday, so we just need to get everything priced and boxed and then we are just about ready for the weekend!
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