Oh my goodness...what an epic, mammoth task we had today (Tuesday)! This morning we started to hear that people we were relying on to help this afternoon wouldn't be coming (eek!)...leaving 5 of us to work on bringing in all the remaining bales - and 2 of us were up most of the night unable to breathe because we're allergic to the hay dust, so were not on top form! Ringing around didn't get us too far until thankfully Catherine and Victoria kindly agreed to make the journey down from Exmoor...and then amazingly Rachel and Faie agreed to come back for a second day and bring Oliver with them.
It was too hot again to lift bales during the day but by the evening it was cool enough to work. Roger rescued us yet again, bringing his "flat 8" loader to pick up the bales in the field allowing us to use all our "man" power on the stacking...we thought we'd done quite well yesterday but the baler was still going when we took the finishing photos. We've now found out that the total number of bales was 1,040 which is a record for the number to come off this field! This evening we stacked...and stacked...and stacked...and stacked some more...so we now have 2 huge hay stacks, piled to the roof of the barn. I think if we didn't have the loader there we'd have needed a week to get it all collected and stacked!
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| Roy and Stella |
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| Getting higher |
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| The "flat 8" carrying more than 8 as it's loaded on top too! |
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| Bales being dropped onto the stack. |
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| Snack time! |
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| Starting on the second stack |
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| Brief rest waiting between loads - feeling a bit wilted now! |
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| Archie and Peter |
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Pam picked sweet peas from the garden to say thank you...
like a medal ceremony with flowers! |
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| A full pen stacked to the roof! |
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| A bit of room left on the main stack but not a lot! |
Immense thank you to everyone who has given up their time and energy for the ponies today - we do appreciate it
so much. Thank you to Roger, Roy, Angela (who came from up from Cornwall), Faie, Rachel, Oliver, Archie, Peter, Pete, Stella, Catherine and Victoria. Margaret, Pam, Ted and Jenny assisted with extra snacks for everyone. Ted and Jenny amazingly donate the hay to People4ponies which is such an invaluable help! We can't say thank you enough to everyone!
The hedgehog babies are still with us. We haven't seen Mum today - she was there last night. The babies are still all very healthy looking! We hope Mum's been in to see them when we weren't looking but have left some food out for them just in case!
Comments:
Cilla said...
Moving over 1000 bales is a tremendous achievement - even with some mechanical help, all the bales will have had to be hand manoeuvred to their final positions in the stack. I am so sorry that we couldn't help you. Utmost respect to those that did!
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