Once again air pressure is rising! Mid-week, another trip to Devon began in very wet weather, clearing when I arrived at Taunton.

Finally I arrived at Chuggaton Farm to be greeted by some sunshine. What a contrast!

The return journey two days later was just as odd. I left the farm in warm sunshine to arrive home in a deluge once again, which added on to the rest of the week’s rainfall gave us a total of 42.5mm.

While in Devon I did all the usual things grannies do, especially lots and lots of cooking.

I love baking so it was no hardship to spend much of my time in the kitchen making pies, biscuits and cakes, then putting a dinner on the table mid-day, filling in the rest of the time ferrying my grandchildren to bus stops, walking the dog and doing some stable work.

Many of Adele and Steve’s cows are still giving birth to their calves, so Adele is still very busy feeding them morning and evening. An anxious time is looming however, as they have a TB test scheduled for the first week of November, something all farmers dread.

Here on Manor Farm the crops continue to become well established, although at the beginning of the week Richard and Ian were a little worried by some bare patches appearing in a new grass ley.

The rape being grown by a neighbouring farmer also looks very well.

Ryan and Richard have been spreading more slurry, while they can, using the new tanker.

At the start of the week barns were prepared to bring more of our cattle under cover for the winter.

The ground was becoming wetter, so mid-week all of the milking cows were brought in.

The dry cows are now in straw-bedded yards, the milking cows that have all given birth since calving began at the end of August are in one section of our large cubicle barn and those now coming to the end of their lactation are kept in another area.

This is mainly done for ease of management, enabling the groups to be fed appropriate feed rations. The only cattle still outside are the older heifers, now in a drier field, where they can be fed extra food. They will hopefully be able to remain in the field for another month.

On Stowell Farm a small group of ewes have been artificially inseminated to bring new blood into the flock.

All the other ewes , including the shearlings (first-time ewe lambs) have been colour coded into their family groups and most of the week was taken up moving these groups to fields where they will spend the winter. A ram has been turned out with each group, so the sheep are now spread over a large number of fields.

The sheep will have to be checked every day but they should all have enough food to last for some time, which means they will not have to be moved into fresh fields.

The price for store lambs is good at the moment, so Kevin and Mark decided to take 100 to Frome Market.

Earlier this week Richard told me to go to the new grass ley next to the farm buildings.

When I arrived I saw something I had never seen before, 16 buzzards!

Richard told me that he has had up to 20 following the plough and Ian phoned to say he had seen 19. They ranged in colour from dark brown or grey through to very pale grey or almost white. Buzzards make what I think is an almost ethereal mewing sound, totally opposite to the spine-chilling call made by ravens, which seem to be on the increase.

Small mammals are buzzards’ favourite food, especially rabbits, which have greatly increased in numbers over the summer. Why these birds gathered together in our field I was not sure, but it was a great sight!