Early Days
Our first blog is a little bit of a catch up!
The spring here has been kind so far, with early frosts in August causing the soil temperatures to be a little colder thus the flowers are coming on about 2-3 weeks later than normal.
The fertilizer has been spread.
The flowers are getting water Mr Blue sky’s up there waiting, and they know it’s a beautiful day! There is a song in that somewhere!
The flowers are an addition to our working farm, we commenced lambing on August 15th with the pure 250 Cheviots giving birth on the hills surrounding us.
In the first week of October the 150 Merino ewes started lambing they are very different in temperament to the Cheviot ewes much more secretive and a little easier to handle than the robust cheviots.
Stuarts mum has arrived with his sister Angela from Scotland to help with our Peony harvest.
They have both been making the container boxes that the flowers will travel around the world in.
A welcome addition to the 2016 team!!
De- lateralling of the Henry Sass, and Bowl of Cream are now due to be done. We are waiting to do this when it is a warm and dry day, Stuart will then apply a spray to protect and seal the wounds to keep the plants healthy.
Sammy Jo our daughter has arrived home after having just completed 4 years honours in Theatre and Classics at Victoria University in Wellington, another valued team member! Pretty good with the sheep too.
At last we only have 5 merino ewes to lamb! The flowers have moved and the Red Charm have started to pop open those beautiful Crimson petals. Some have been picked and are currently being stored in the Chiller. We are now awaiting our certification for export to the USA. Currently selling flowers locally.
Still three merino left to lamb!! These girls know how to hang on to their babies.
The Red Charm have steadily being coming into the picking stage with the splash of shiny merlot colour, and a slight movement (softness in the bud). Boxes have been flown to Auckland for the exporters.
They are pleased with our quality of Bloom!!!!
It is hard to imagine that as I pick these living blooms among the bumble bees and ladybirds, that it possible these could be making someone smile at the other side of the world in less than a couple of days.
We are today De Lateraling the Bowl of Cream, Bess our young Huntaway has decided to become a flower dog, she is recovering from a broken femur joint so this suits her just fine as part of recovery!
This variety has many off shoot side buds and some plants can have as many as 8 on one stem. It requires a little gentle breaking off, so as not to damage the stem. The main bud will then become stronger and larger.
The Henry Sass have all been done and boy are these stunners going to melt some folk’s hearts…. Or so I keep telling them.
Two new helpers today with the delatrling, Sammy Jo and her friend Christie, from ‘Kitchen Creations’ she makes fantastic products with our petals check out her facebook page for details.
Today is wet so we are heading off to town for some supplies, food for us and the dogs!
There are now only two merino left to lamb. Sadly this morning we found one ewe had had a dead lamb so she has now been put into the adoption pen reducing the pet lamb numbers to four!
The flowers are welcoming of the 7ml of fresh mountain rain, and hopefully will dry out when Mr Sunshine appears, then the picking will commence yet again.
A ray of sunshine two wee girls newly emigrated from Holland came with their Mum and Dad Andrew and Barbara Scales (South Island Peonies)
It was school pet day and they came to collect two merino X pets aptly named ‘Humphrey & Blackie???’
