Shropshire Farming Talk with Laura Yates
In between long days digging early potatoes, cutting oil seed rape, wheat and oats, and manning chicken sheds while the Romanian poultry man is visiting family back home, my other half Tom has been verifiably ‘flat out’ so far this August.
So, understandably he hasn’t been able to spare much time to help me rear a bouncy litter of six pedigree cocker spaniel puppies!
One happy accident caused my lovable dog, Lennie, getting a little too loving with the other resident cocker on the farm, Ruby. You could say an accident waiting to happen.
I had zero experience of dog breeding; we’ve always (wisely) had a pack of male dogs at Manor Farm – from gundogs to sheepdogs to guard dogs. So Tom warned me not to get too carried away with the excitement.
His dog Ruby had had one litter before, during lockdown. A much more lucrative litter than this one!
Tom shuddered recalling the trauma of the first pup getting stuck during whelping. On a flying emergency trip to the vets, Ruby popped the pup out in the back of his truck on the A49.
But I was unphased – having been in that situation many times before with a ewe needing a caesarean!
How different can it be to lambing, I thought. On midwife duty once again, the birth this time was very smooth thankfully.
A good mother with plentiful milk, Ruby surpassed any ewe I’ve seen by singlehandedly rearing a clutch of six strong pups. A superb mix of golden, like dad, and jet black, like mum.
The hard work for us really started at weaning time.
At nine weeks now, this lot have already been showing their gundog traits, darting from one edge of my flowerbeds to the other, nose to the ground, with a trail of carnage left behind.
Nevertheless, it’s been difficult to say goodbye to these beauties, as their new owners have successively arrived to pick them up from the farm this week.
It’s been a joy to hear they are having just as much fun with their new families.
One interesting chap came from Telford way, looking for a new working dog to join him on his syndicate shoot at Shawbury. Also keen on rabbiting, he had a pet hawk and ferrets at home too. At one point they had a litter of 15 kits! I think we got off lightly with just six.
The marketing experience took me back to pedigree tup selling days with my dad and grandpa – taking pride in showing pedigree animals you’ve worked hard to rear.
Ironically one of the cocker pups did go off to a home in Builth Wells, where we had many a day out in the school holidays to the Royal Welsh Showground for the NSA ram sales.
We were usually buying a new tup for the flock on this annual trip. As kids, our main job was to collect some luck money!
by Laura Yates
