Lifes just not busy enough so Mother Nature likes to chuck her oar in from time to time.

This week we have survived another seven nights of sleep deprivation as the Ryelands adopt the tactics used by the goats to gain attention, and as a result better terms and conditions by way of feed and housing, by pretending to be on the point of delivery for hours, sometimes days at a time.

Easter, a very substantial ewe, has taken the charade to new heights by threatening to give birth on the compost heap and refusing to get off it, thus allowing her very cold and very wet owner to seek shelter himself, unless a bucket of sheep nuts were produced. The game then became one of racing the fat sheep to the gate while she has her head in the bucket scoffing the treats and through to the goat house or stable destined to be her birthing bay.

This game was made much more exciting by never knowing the feed to distance ratio required and several times just before she was succesfully led to the shelter of the outbuildings the food ran out and sensing a trap she hightailed it away leaving me cursing all things sheep.

Matters were made much worse when torrential rain turned all the smallholding into a scale model of The Somme battlefield complete with craters of mud from which there is no escape.

Light relief was obtained this week by watching Apollo the Gypsy Cob sitting on the fence. Not suggesting an equine inability to make a decision, more a horse that has decided he has an itch in a sensitive spot and it has to be dealt with. Finding a 9 month old foal scratching his backside is initially amusing until the potential for disaster dawns and I dont just mean splinters. So far the fence holds, but for how long I wonder.

The Rotty was spayed this week, she is a gentle soul who wouldnt hurt a fly. As tall male vets are not in that category they dont count so she lunged at him with malice aforethought when he tried to take liberties with her stitches. Luckily no contact was made and she has gone back to being a calm couch potato.

This morning as we battled against the rain and mud all was well in our world and for once we were on time. Meg had other ideas and waited for the last moment to declare she was actually giving birth this time honest. The delivery went well, a bit of help was needed and soon a new lamb was living and breathing at Rock HQ, now named Midas. His birth is captured on video and you can watch it on www.talesfromtherock.com and Meg is the one who doesnt look like a darts player.

The prize for animals behaving badly this week goes to the pigs who got fed up with the rain and took shelter inside what we euphamistically refer to as "The Barn". This is a grand title for a shanty town type shack that is constructed primarily from corrugated tin, rotten wood and nine inch nails. This structure is held aloft by a huge oak beam. It has survived the ravages of time, the assault of wood worm but not the attention of Pixie and Patches the Berkshire pigs. These two have dug in, under and around the post and moved the internal wall over a foot to the left. Somehow the building managed not to fall in on itself and its repair is added to the massive and ever expanding jobs list.

Somehow I think repairing this will require something more than substantial than the ubiquitous bale twine that fixes most things on the smallholding.