Unexpected Delivery.

Our female rabbit is a temperamental doe, she has been so since we got her, she calmed down a little last year after becoming a mum but soon regained her spirit, we had put her to Bobby our buck a few weeks ago but she appeared to be having none of it, and in fact attacked him, she had had one false pregnancy earlier in the year although there was no chance that she could have been in kitten  so imagine our surprise yesterday to find a seething mass  of fur in her sleeping quarters,

we have no idea how many kittens she has, we know that some of them are big for new-borns' as she had been given no additional bedding, after all, we were sure she was not pregnant so we will have to wait and see, she is very protective and growls if we go near and we don't fancy being attacked by a mad rabbit.

We lost two of our Muscovy ducklings to ravens, they had got separated from mum so we only have two left, I have eggs waiting to go in the incubator later this week when our last hatch of La Bresse are due, we have also bought nine Aylesbury X Chiltern ducklings so we should have enough meat for the coming year.

I am hopeful of having a fruit crop this year, the Blackcurrant bushes have a lot of berries, there's  even a few set gooseberries, the apples seem to have set, but nothing on the pears or plums, maybe next year. The veg garden is looking good and the summer flowers are now coming into their own,

at last we have a rose out, I have never known them so late.

The bees are now very busy, they love the foxgloves and the poppy's.

I noticed today that our large Beech tree has beech masts this year, a sign maybe that we are having quite a good summer as this is the first year since our move that we have seen them or maybe the conditions have been just right for them this year.

Kitten shows no sign of calming down despite the discipline that the other cats are now dishing out, he has now been named Sparkey, as he is like a fireworks display with large explosions of teeth claws and energy, he is very entertaining, but we keep him separate from Tess, I'm not too sure that she would accept being attacked by this little ginger fire ball.