what's new in the sheep shed this week?

We had all the lambing ewes scanned a couple of weeks ago. This tells us how many lambs they are having and helps us to feed them appropriately. Those having triplets need to be fed well through the last couple of months before lambing, those having twins need some extra feed gradually increasing towards their expected lambing date, but those having singles do not really need any extra as the lamb can get too big and then lambing is difficult.
We have seven expecting triplets and we put these plus some older ewes in the back field after the scanning as there was quite a lot of fresh grass on it. They were also enjoying the ivy that we cut off the wall for them (see pic). This soon changed after all the rain and by the beginning of this week we had to bring them into a shed. They now have a lovely dry straw bed but can still stand out in the rain in the yard if they really want to!

Location, location, location

We are so lucky to live where we do - we just wish we had more time than we do to enjoy the beautiful place we live in.
For those of you who do not know us, we live in the heart of the Northern Lake District, just outside Keswick. Cherry Bank Bed and Breakfast, Dancing Gate Farm and the self-catering unit, Dancing Gate House all nestle together in the foothills of Dodd Wood with the mighty Skiddaw Range further behind. The views from here are breathtaking (see left), even for those who have lived in the area all their lives. We look across towards Grizedale Pike, with Winlatter Forest and, at times of higher water, the edges of Bassenthwaite Lake further to our right. To the left, we look up Newlands and Borrowdale Valley - Sca Fell can be seen in the very distance, Catbells in the foreground. To the far left we can see Walla Crag, and further round still, the Helvellyn Range. Completing the panarama is Latrigg Fell - an extremely popular walk and many people's starting point for Skiddaw.

Sheep - how it all started

In the dark days of 2001, when the countryside was virtually closed down due to the foot and mouth outbreak, we had a flock of Herdwick ewes from a Borrowdale farm wintering at ours and as they could not return home due to the restrictions they all had to lamb here at Dancing Gate. This was a steep learning curve for me as we had not had sheep since I was a little girl and Dad put me in charge of them. Things mostly went okay, but by the time lambing was over we had four pets - either due to their mum dying or rejecting them. April, Pepsi and Toffee were all texel x herdwick and Sooty was a pure herdwick. As they were all girls and everyone had got so fond of them there was no question of sending them to market and so as things got more back to normal in the autumn a search was on for a suitable tup to borrow. Neighbours along the road let us borrow theirs when they had finished using him and so 'Sue's Flock' began. In May 2002 April and Toffee had a ewe lamb each and Pepsi had twin ewe lambs. Today, there are about 75 ewes, lambing each Spring.

Introducing us all!

Hi everyone - my name is Sue and I run Cherry Bank Bed and Breakfast, with a little help (or not!) from the rest of the family, hubby Kev who is a Senior Forester with The National Trust, design-student daughter Rach and police student son Matty. We have three delightful dogs who you will get to know and love - cocker spaniels Lottie and Jasper, and Westie Hamish; Tiggy the tabby cat; an aviary full of colourful budgies; five horses - the one and only Bucks Fizz with whom we have travelled all over the UK with success at the highest level, including two appearances at The Horse of the Year Show, Sonny - my wannabe eventer who had much success as a four year old but who has been thwarted by the weather ever since with many events cancelled, Buster - the new kid on the block, sweet but slightly thoughtless at times, Roscoe - our lovely coloured boy whose best-loved passion is gymkhana games and Jaffa - my retired eventer on whom I had much fun and success almost twenty years ago.
Just over a year ago, Kev and I took over the farm next door, Dancing Gate, which had belonged to my parents when they were alive. We have been busy renovating the farmhouse for the last year and hope to have it ready for self-catering letting by Easter. We have kept four cows, three of these are beautiful red Salers and we have one Aberdeen Angus cross. We hope to buy more Salers cows this summer. We also have a sheep flock - we have several different breeds as we are quite fond of rare breeds. About half of our ewes are texel or charollais cross, but we also have two South Down ewes, two Ryeland/South Down cross ewes, six herdwick ewes, sixteen shetland ewes and a Suffolk cross ewe. The two tups are friendly boys - Merlin is a Dutch Texel and Charlie is a Beltex/Charollais cross.
Kev also has a collection of Vintage Tractors which he has spent many hours working on and which he occasionally uses on the farm instead of the more modern tractors we have nowadays.