Inside the Polytunnel

It's up. All 3.5x 3 meters of it. The first polytunnel I bought owed me nothing when it disintegrated, four years after purchase. The second, some might recall, headed off over the barns in big kite mode during the first of last year's storms. This one is the best one yet and, for less than £70, should last me a good while. It's anchored well this time and the entrance isn't aimed at the prevailing wind! It won't take long to fill up.

Before I'd bought the new structure, and before 'Lambing Live' went terribly wrong, my friend and I went pre-season plant hunting. I sow most of my plants from seed but filling the sitting room with all the pots didn't seem such a great idea. Up and out before the centres opened, my friend and I were on a mission. We are shameless as we head for the skanky aisles.. the little sections at the back or around a corner, where the plants are seriously reduced.

I picked up a few garden plants and a small selection of tomatoes, peppers, aubergine and courgettes. The most I paid was 50p for a pot, regular price.. £1.50- £4 each. Some, I argued at the till, would be unlikely to survive so paid zero. I know I can start seeding now and the plants will catch up but these will advance the season. Nurturing them on the window sills, they have strengthened and grown. Every last plant is healthy and some of the tomatoes have been flowering for the past week.

Now transferred into the polytunnel and after a couple of days of hard slog, they're in the company of many pots, seemingly full of bare soil. A few days and they will be green... I hope. Jack frost, please be lenient. I've had enough misfortune in the past few days.

I've been missing again. In short... hellish!

My ewe, Hermione, is no longer. Still paralysed, I'd turned her over to ensure she didn't block her circulation and gone to fill a bottle to top up the little milk she had for the lambs. In the short time I was gone she must have wriggled and rolled backwards onto her little ewe lamb. I was gutted to find the lifeless form at her side. She continued to feed her remaining lamb and was in perfectly good health other than she could barely move an inch without assistance. I had to turn her and put food and water to her mouth every couple of hours. I had to make a decision. With no sign of the paralysis being anything other than permanent, it was cruel to keep her alive. Such a shame but it couldn't be helped.

Rocky, had a hard start but is a fighter, is doing well without Mum. He lives on the paddock with the others but has a hole which he bolts through when he sees me. The other ewes are looking out for him but won't feed him so I'm the milk provider. On this side of the fence he plays with Cocoa and Maera, on the other the lambs. Strange creature... he doesn't quite know if he's a sheep or a dog.