With the show season cancelled everything has moved online and Brackenbrae Ragnald has done very well in his first big show. We were all chuffed when he made the shortlist of ten out of forty-three entries in the Cleveland Bay class of the Virtual Windsor Horse Show in May. He was the only one of the ten shown in hand. We are so proud that he was awarded Second place to the Queen's horse.

It was interesting hearing the Judge's (Mr Nigel Hollings) comments which we wouldn't normally hear; "I really liked this horse, he has lovely limb on him, he's got the scope, you can see how strong he is behind. Yes he really caught my eye as soon as I opened the photograph he was always on my mind"

Congratulations to Rags and Helen. We told Skysail about her son's success but she wasn't impressed enough to lift her head from the grass.

More good news about another of Skysail's sons - at Stormcloud's new home three of his mares have been scanned in foal already so he seems to have settled well at Braithwaite Stud.

Rags winning photo taken after winning at N. Yorks Show last year

Brackenbrae Coruscation has had her first foal this week, a healthy colt. After a lot of debate (and a gender reassessment) we have decided to call him Brackenbrae Bright Spark (Sparky). Cori has taken well to motherhood after the initial surprise.

After months of rain we have had some dry weather and the grass is starting to grow. Our first lambs of the season have left the nursery and found the field. Most of the horses are now staying out all night, just the youngsters and the mares still requiring feeding and staying in overnight until there is more grass.

There was the usual ten minutes of excitement and mayhem after these lambs first entered the field before they re-found their mothers and siblings and settled down to investigate this new world of grass.

One of our preparations for lambing is vaccinating the ewes, which we did a few weeks ago. Also included were Nicola's four ewes and five alpacas living up the glen from us. A first for us, the alpacas are great fun and such characters.

Last year we sold some gimmers to Newparks Farm, Muiravonside Park and later in the year Kembla Fearghas got promoted from our number two ram to Newparks Zwartbles ram. He immediately took himself to the top of the pecking order over the other rams already there and is completely established and happy there. We await news of their first crop of lambs due soon.

Kembla Fearghas at Newparks this month

The Hebridean boys might have horns to be proud of but Fearghas rules by force of personality.

To cap off a miserably wet winter we have had the highest water levels in the river for several years, bursting it's banks below the house and running down the field. The horses are still getting out turn about every second day, apart from King William the stallion who gets out most days, although he very often looks like he would rather not. The sheep and cattle are coping, which is more than can be said of the fields, which are completely saturated.

Last weekend...............now back to this

The weather has been "a bit on the wet side" recently but thankfully not as bad as some other areas. We are getting at least some of the horses out each day although they do come back in "barkit" as we say around here. So each evening is spent cleaning off the mud.

We started Brackenbrae Ultimate (Tim) on the next stage of his education this weekend when we walked him out on long lines. He reacted like he usually does, with interest in the new approach but with no drama. He has a real gem of a personality.

The foals have not had much work recently with bad weather and abscesses but we got both out this weekend. Bumblebees on strings was the general description of their behaviour which is to be expected as they have been indoors for so long

TIM GETS HIS FIRST EXPERIENCE OF LONG LINES

TACKING UP FOR THE OUTING

CRYSTAL AND SOLSTICE GET OUT FOR A WALK

TIM GETTING THE HANG OF LONG LINING