Saturday 25th January 2025

Saturday 25^th January

SHE SAID:

We woke to another muggy day & fully overcast sky.

It was a sad day too, with Geoff finding the male sheep, which apparently was a ‘wether’ and not a ram, lying down in the field at the back & unable to get up. He was still breathing but obviously not well. (Kieran said it was old & it wasn’t in great condition when we arrived). Geoff rang around the neighbours, eventually going across the road, to Byron, who had a gun to put the poor animal down. It was quick & hopefully painless.

Later in the day another neighbour came with a Bobcat & dug a hole to bury him. Geoff was very grateful for the help of the friendly neighbours.

Another odd happening later in the evening, with a strong smell of burning, nor fire but electrical or rubber. Long story short, it turned out to be the next-door neighbour hooning around in a car sending all the acrid smell our way! 

Thankfully it was two short sessions & didn’t go through the night, though the smell lingered on for a while.

Death of the Wether

Motorbike Frogs in the pool again

HE SAID:

I had a busy morning. Firstly with the watering system pumps from the dam, as air must have got into a line and so the holding tank wasn't getting any water to water the gardens. As the holding tank had been emptied by the garden watering pump it was now running dry! Which is potentially very bad, as it can seize. Anyway, I managed to bleed the systems and get everything running well again, and I only got saturated the once. 

While moving between the dam and shed several times to troubleshoot the watering system I could only see 5 sheep; the old bugger was missing. After everything was fixed I had a short search for the sheep, finding him unable to stand, and seemingly distressed. He had absolutely no condition, was just skin and bone. It seemed obvious to me that he was kaput, but what to do about it? I rang a couple of the neighbours, but only got voicemail. Eventually Gary from up the road called me back and said that Byron, down the road, was an old sheep farmer and had a gun. So I wandered over to Byron's and he kindly agreed to come to the house and do the deed. Gary had offered to slit the sheep's throat, but I was keeping that as a last resort. Within half an hour Byron had come across, put the sheep down with his .22, and we were chatting away, when I realised that Varena and I had done a house-sit for one of his old neighbours from his farm near Nyabing a few years ago: Percy and Lesly Curnow, in Yabberup. Small world.

My next task was to cover the dead sheep and see if I could ask Darren, a neighbour, if he could use his bobcat to bury it. Darren wasn't answering his phone, but well after lunch called me back to say he could come over soon. He came over and made short work of digging the soil away down to the limestone, moving the sheep, then covering him over. All done. I am grateful that Kieran has nice neighbours.

The neighbours on our other side were drongos, doing burnouts after 10pm and smoking us out; it was a pain in the bum. And stinky. They then went out onto the nearby roads to do more fully sick donuts, but we could hear them, but not see or smell them this time. Once I will forgive. But if they do it again...