Time out

It's been over a week since I've had time to play blogger rather than farmer, trainer, or consultant. I've been shooting about like a mad ferret and the lead up to Christmas looks as if nothing's gonna change soon. I'm already planning a New Year's resolution; do more of the stuff I love, less of the stuff I don't, and tighten my belt.
So, although wearing slatey grey eyebags that would only lighten with copious applications of sleep, I kept an appointment made months ago to get up and go fairly early this morning with a friend off to the Devon and Cornwall Waterfowl Show at the Royal Cornwall Showground.
I had my eye on getting some more Black Indian Runner ducks to join Beany and co, so slid along the for sale section, clocked a nice young pair, shoved over to the Treasurer's desk, paid over my beer vouchers and clicked a sold label onto the cage so that I could go and admire the show birds at leisure.
Many shows auction their birds, so you have to wait hours if the pens you are keen on have high numbers, and you have no idea how optimistic the bidding will be. I much preferred this civilised approach - each pen had a clear price tag, and if there was no sold label, you sauntered apparently casually, but actually at top speed, to put down your dosh and the deal is done. No argy bargy, no haggling, no competition. Lovely.
The long lines of runner ducks of every colour on show had me enthralled (only the white runners are on show in this photo). Unlike the other ducks of a more squat stature in square cages, runners are given tall pens to accommodate their naturally vertical stance. They stand in lines like soldiers on parade. It's a good thing they weren't all for sale or I'd have come home with armfuls of the beauties.
I iffed and butted over two pens of Silver Appleyard ducks for a friend, but closer inspection revealed imperfections that I wouldn't have been happy with, so I resisted. I chortled over the Sebastopol geese - a lovely example in the photo above - with their crazy ringleted feathers, the Shirley Temple of the waterfowl world.
The only problem was that the huge cattle barn the event was held in was freezing. It was colder inside than out - we shivered as we walked into the shed and my feet were numb in ten minutes. There were very few people there; much more body heat was needed to create a comforting guff. But I'm back in the warm now, and my two new black beauties are on straw, with feed and water, and getting over the trauma of the journey and their new home.

Dressed to impress

On Tuesday, Hatherleigh had its live poultry auction for those happy to dispatch and prepare their own Christmas turkey, goose or duck. But for those of a more squeamish nature, today was the oven ready auction, all dressed not to kill but to impress. Rows and rows of trestle tables were covered in birds, from an 11 kilo organic goose (that's over 24 lbs in old money) to cockerels with no obvious provenance, there was something for every taste and purse. Each bird was auctioned individually, and I suspect some would be going home with turkeys too big for their ovens. Many of the birds still had their feet and heads, even if the innards had been removed, and some had brown labels tied to their legs declaring from which local farm they originated. I was particularly enchanted by the geese whose heads were wrapped in Christmas paper; it stopped you from looking it in the eye until you got it on the chopping board.
I wasn't buying - one thing I'm not short of is home-reared goose - but I couldn't resist taking a moment out of veg shopping to see the scale of the thing. The photo shows but a smidgen of what was on offer.

Guinea Foul

Spent lunchtime at a dispersal sale of a herd of organic pedigree Red Ruby Devons. They were being sold from the Fishleigh Estate where the much debated Springwatch is held. It's all part of my bovine acclimatisation process - cow speak being so very different from the more familiar pig and sheep lingo. I now know that a heifer becomes a cow on the birth of her second calf, that a steer is a castrated male, and a bullock still has his bits. I think.
I was supremely impressed by the auctioneer. Extremely knowledgeable about cattle, the breed, and the provenance of the specific animals and most of the purchasers, he positively hummed with the required wisdom. His introduction showed that he had been preparing for this event, and there were all his peers watching him perform, determining whether they would sell their stock through him at some future point.
The estate stockman brought each lot into the ring, some individually, others with a calf at foot, adding a few words of insider wisdom for the occasional animal. It must be heartbreaking for him to bring to sale a herd he has cared for and developed.
We stood on trailers, six deep, hopping from one foot to t'other to glimpse between bunched shoulders the particulars of each animal - its confirmation, the clearness of its eye, it's breeding potential. I couldn't see why one cow went for over £1600 when another the same age went under the hammer for less than £500. Perhaps her teats were compromised - I couldn't tell from where I stood.
The auctioneer was miked and clear-voiced, the bidders discreetly nodding their catalogues or touching the brims of their caps. I didn't take a photo - I was worried it would be mistaken for a bid. I couldn't stay long, but I swallowed the essence.
Events like this are supremely English. There is a shorthand, a modus operandi, a complete sense of familiarity for those in the club, and an utter confusion for those unacquainted. And a key part of this mystique is that of course the lots were sold in guineas.
What's that all about? You bid, say, a thousand of these babies and have to part with £1050 (and possibly a buyers premium depending on the auction). Where else outside the auction house does a non existent coin of the realm become the accepted currency? Why not shekels or zlotys, or to keep with the English theme, groats?
I like the idea of paying with gold ingots, topped up from leather bagged gold dust to reach the required weight. It goes with my idea of Wild West ranchers, and that's not too far a leap from West Country farmers; one of the chaps there WAS wearing a leather cowboy hat.

Bogged down

The basics of life can be quite demanding at times. The very helpful Mr Cream Teas (aka the Environmental Health Officer) tells me that what is required are three women's loos, one unisex loo and a urinal. This clutch of temporary smelly habitats will satisfy the council for the charity (&) sheep shearing marathon and fun day I am helping to plan. What with the cream teas, hog and lamb roasts and alcohol on offer, plus the physical jiggling created by the pony rides, bucking bronco and bouncy castle, adequate facilities will be required.
Discussing bogs can be a bit of a downer when folks want to concentrate on how donations and fun quotient can be maximised. Then there is the formality of the Temporary Event Notice and contacting the police, getting insurance and all that jazz.
There will be lots of helpers. The local Young Farmers will be clearing out our friend's huge sheep shed so that all jollities will continue whether it continues to pour with rain or not; a local rugger team will be putting their muscular thighs and other bits to good use in one way or another; local companies are being asked to donate items for auction, and people will be flogging entry tickets and asking for sponsorship over the next few weeks leading up to The Big Day. There is a clay pigeon shoot to be coordinated and a marquee to be erected. The shearer is busy shearing across Devon and will be well warmed up by then. He is not in the first flush of youth, and has two artificial hips and a metal plate holding his thigh together. He aims to de-fleece 500 sheep in 24 hours, whilst all around him merriment and good humoured daftness urge him on.
Even with allowed breaks I suspect he will have a posture like Prince Charles at the stroke of midnight.

Going, going.......gone

Devon is full of auctions. In a random week you could pit your wits and auction technique against the pros and hustlers for: antique furniture; crap furniture; granite adornments of massive tonnage; farm implements; cattle, sheep, lambs and other livestock; horses; jewellery; arts and crafts of all kinds; houses, farms, clumps of woodland; miscellaneous objects of every kind; and poultry and poultry paraphenalia.
You may not think that bidding for a clutch of laying eggs, a group of sorry-for-themselves goslings, or a pair of majestic Silver Appleyard ducks is much of a thrill, but you would be wrong. First there is the viewing. You push your way past the hordes of folk eyeing up the cages of squawking birds. You see a mother hen with a half dozen chicks, one perched on her back as she struts and clucks, checking all are present and correct. There are examples that just about pass the vet's muster, that you would not risk introducing to your own flock; runny nose, dull eyes, feathers lacklustre, scaly legged or just sitting dejected in a corner. You spot a fabulous cockerel - black, polished, mature, shiny-eyed, probably done his bit for the breeder and now surplus to requirements. You don't need a cockerel, but he looks at you and you decide to take him if he's going at the right price. Then there are the examples you are really keen on: the trio of Khaki Campbells, just coming up to laying age; the Cayugas, with their effervescent plumage or a set of fine comical Indian Runner Ducks that should have their own primetime cartoon show.
You decide to bid. You get your auction number from the tiny booth, and even though you've only bid twice before, they know who you are and you don't need to repeat your address. The auctioneer and his sidekick push the wheeled auctioneer's stand into position. His hand does a quick check for auction notes, handkerchief and the two guinea pigs sewn together that sit on his head and impersonate a toupee. People cluster round the cages of birds they want to bid for, the numbers of the lots scrawled on the back of their auction number. They then try to act nonchalant, and mostly fail. The auctioneer's patter clatters on, barely intelligible; you have to deliberately tune in to his wavelength and it's a lost cause if you were intending to bid on the first few lots.
Your first lot comes up, you are now tuned in, you wait til the bidding slows and raise your hand quietly. You win or you lose. Sometimes there are no or few rival bids and you get your desire for pennies; you see something others don't, or they see something you can't. At other times a simple lot goes for bigger bucks than you can fathom. Concentration is total, even though you may be about to part with nothing more than a blue beer voucher. It's over quickly, but the initial adrenalin rush is as great for a duck as for a house, although the buzz lasts for a great deal longer if property or a new throughbred showjumper is the outcome. Done. Dusted. You do not control the pace of purchase.
When you emerge from the auction shed you feel the same as when you come out of the cinema and it's still daylight; disoriented, unreal, but with an experience and a story whirling in your head. The difference is that you may well have a trio of ducks in a container in your hands. You smile at them and take them home.