Aug 12th, 2014

Author: donich_admin

Of Mice and Sheep

The sheep are back in the field below our house – literally hundreds of them down to be sheared. I keep imagining waking up one morning and seeing them all in our garden. Actually I think they might do some good at the moment – everything is so overgrown that they could do a bit of good trimming things down….

R saw the deer (two does and a fawn) in the back garden again today as well so we have ruminants to both front and rear at the moment. Also a potential source of ticks to both sides – although we are hoping these will shortly be disappearing for the year….

On the small rodent front, Schrodi is averaging about three a day at the moment. R says that this would have made him a valuable cat in the Middle Ages because his catch rate is high. My response was that cats were valued for their ability to reduce the mouse population of a human dwelling – not increase it by bringing live rodents in and then losing interest in them once they have escaped behind the cooker. Tora doesn’t catch as many and tends to kill his – so at least he is not making the problem any worse (though eating just the heads and leaving the bodies in the hall where you can stand on them in the dark is not an endearing trait).