“Now, let’s go and see what these animals are up to over here shall we” those were the words I used before escorting our latest group of visitors over to see the Llamas, as part of our guided animal tours. That all sounds fine, but when you walk round the corner and find that your Llamas are otherwise engaged in activities unsuitable for viewing ahead of the watershed, it does put you in a bit of an awkward situation. Oh dear, I had to think quickly on my feet. “I don’t think the Llamas are very hungry today, so we won’t be able to feed them, momentarily pausing to explain a little about them, just in double quick time, ahead of swiftly moving on to visit the next animals. Judging by the reaction of many of the parents and grandparents, they definitely saw the funny side of the situation and were able to deal with any awkward questions the youngsters were throwing their way.

We have had a very proud week this week, as Wendy and her team in the Teashop have been shortlisted for the ‘Best local Menu Cafe/Tea Room’ in the Beverley Food Festival & East Riding of Yorkshire Food Awards 2016. It makes it all the more exciting as we have only been open for 8 weeks. It’s great to see all their hard word and countless hours of research, looking for local producers, get recognised too. We’ll just have to wait and see how things turn out on the big night, won’t we!

Talking of research, I was involved in some research of my own this week. It was evening time and time to bring the ponies in for the night. For some reason Maisie and Lucy, were not in any mood to be playing ball and clearly wanted to stay out longer as they were just ignoring me. That’s when I had a thought. Maybe, if I changed my accent and called them in their native tongue, it might help. So, that’s just what I did and instead of calling in my normal, bit of everything accent, with them being from Scotland, I put a heavy scottish accent on and do you know, they trotted over immediately. I thought, let’s give it a go elsewhere, so as I passed the other fields with the ponies, I called to both the Highland Cattle and the Shetland sheep and it definately had very positive results in both cases. I will have to undertake more robust research, but it is looking very promising.

I ask myself, why would anyone choose to steal one of the signs from outside our gate? Nobody would get much for it’s scrap metal value and would be no use to them unless they had a business involving a ‘Ginger Cow’ and required visitors to take the next right turn. If I stood and thought about it long enough, I would get wound up, so I won’t and just move on with life, without my sign!

This week, whilst checking Jeremy, who definitely looks to be on the mend, after his close call with  flies last week, and the rest of the sheep, we had a bit of an incident. Conner, one of our more recent team members was carrying the feed bucket out of the field when Kehna jumped up for a closer look inside it and somehow got the handle stuck around her neck. In a flash she was off, running around the field with the feed bucket attached and Conner in hot pursuit. I’m sure he’ll keep tighter hold next time!