Eight Acres

When I first came to Australia seven years ago I had never heard of a kelpie, and since then I'm pretty much continuously lived with one or both of the only kelpies I know.  Chime was the first kelpie I met, she belongs to a friend that I lived with them I first came to Australia, and she now lives with us while my friend is overseas.  Cheryl is Pete's dog, she puts up with me, but given the choice she always goes with Pete.  We try to take the dogs with us where-ever we go, they are part of our family and they are allowed inside and sleep next to our bed (this may change when we have a nice house! I am forever sweeping up dog hair!). Kelpies are a uniquely Australian breed.  The details of the origins of this breed are very vague, apparently the original "kelpie" was a black working bitch, named after the celtic kelpie , and bred from a collie and maybe a dingo, her pups started to be known as good workers, and people were asking for kelpie's pups (more on ...

Each morning and afternoon we walk around our property with white buckets of animal feed.  Some animals are happy to eat their own feed, but others wonder what is in the other buckets, this can make life difficult when walking past Bella with a bucket of chicken food! The Chickens We have been very lazy and feeding the chickens the cheapest layer pellets.  I suspect that is part of the reason why we are getting so few eggs.  I read the back of the feed sack the other day and noticed "animal protein" in the ingredients, followed by the big bold instructions that I shouldn't feed the pellets to any other livestock.  It occurred to me that this warning is most likely due to whole "mad cow disease" scare and the regulations that were introduced to prevent offal (particularly brains) being fed to livestock of the same breed, so I assume that the chicken pellets contain scraps from the meat works and that's why I shouldn't feed it to any other animals.  I h...

My former flatmate has asked us to look after her kelpie , Chime, while she's overseas with her partner for several months.  Of course we couldn't say "no" when we have so much space for her to play!  I lived with both of them for about 3 years, so I'm quite attached to Chime and hate the thought of her in a small city block when she could be living here.  Chime is 10 years old, and Cheryl is 8, so they have similar energy levels, although they both act like puppies at times!  I hope they will enjoy each other's company, at the moment they are just getting used to each other, which is hard for both of them as they are both only children! Seeing double?  Cheryl and Chime sit obediently for treats.