WINTER

The trees are mostly bare and so it all looks a bit wintery out there - not as bad as last year when we'd already had a foot of snow by now - but we have had slightly more seasonal weather this week. I hope we get some snow for Christmas - but not too much!

The pacas managed to dry out today and are looking reasonably clean but a bit dishevelled - not surprising given the amount of rain we've had. Yesterday morning they were almost crispy, they'd had a soaking the night before and then the temperature must have plummeted overnight - the gates were frozen shut in the morning and all the raindrops everywhere were solid, as were the outside of the pacas fleeces - shows how well insulated they are.

We had a very large group of students from South Downs college come to learn about alpacas as part of their animal care course - thankfully we were all in our heated lecture room for most of their visit, and then  a shivery 10 minutes meeting the alpacas in the field before going back in their mini-buses.

Tomorrow we give the second dose of the season of AD&E and will handle the weanlings a bit, they've settled really well and are enjoying the hard feed with extra goodies - carrots and micronised peas with Readigrass - yum.