Monday 12 March 2012
The downside of having animals and birds is that on occasion the inevitable happens and they die. We lost Ruby yesterday. She had been ill about a month ago but had recovered well and was very cheerful in the lovely spring sunshine that we have been having. But about four days ago she slipped back again, and on Sunday morning she quietly died. We are pretty sure that it was heart failure, she was coming up for 12 years old which is very old for a Burrowing Owl, considering their lifespan in the wild is probably not much more than two to three years, but that aside, what a gap she leaves, we will miss her enormously and her aviaries stands silent. I will even miss the huge holes she dug all over the floor of it.
We also lost another owl yesterday, but that was in the mislaid sense. Darcy Spice decided that he was going to misbehave, he has not liked the field since we cut down the trees at the bottom so that we can let them regrow and then have a nicely laid hedge. So yesterday he flew up into one of the beech trees by the upper pond – and stayed there – for about five hours!!! He is back now, although I have no idea how, I went out well after dark and nearly got him back, but he moved to the little wood, and so I got up at 5.30am to go and see if he felt like coming down and blow me there was a note from Simon on the gate, he was back, now that was cheering to get up for! Of course the dogs were delighted to see me that early as it meant they got fed early!
The field is full of wild daffodils and they are all coming out now, the weeping willows by the large pond are showing green and there is a faint green tinge to many of the trees and hedges now, which is wonderful to see.
The puppies are demolishing my log basket, they are at the teeth onto anything stage, although they did try chewing the big metal statue of the eagle that is residing in my hall at the moment and that slowed them down a bit.
I watched the early news this morning and they were talking about the new legislation on housing for hens, it was made illegal to keep hens in tiny cages at the beginning of this year. The cages are now much larger and supposedly better for the hens, it was an EU Directive, and guess what – the UK put it into place immediately and 13 countries, which is one under half of all the countries in the EU, have not!!! Well there is a surprise!! In fact I am surprised that 14 actually have, and I am not sure I even believe it. But it does go to show just how completely out of touch the European Parliament is with the countries that it supposedly represents. Did they really think that most of the countries were going to comply!! Are they nuts? Most could not afford it, and most could not care less! Our Government should immediately implement a ban on the import of eggs from any country known not to comply, otherwise not only will they have cost our farmers a fortune in having to comply, but they will put them out of business because those not complying will be charging less. The sooner we leave the EU the better!!
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2 comments:
Mima for Prime Minister that's what I say - you talk such sense!!!
Sorry to hear about Ruby,she's been a star over the years.
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