Last week a couple of our guests had a red letter day, float fishing with a variety of baits on the lake. They caught an abundance of carp, 150 in total with the biggest weighing just over 10lb. The favourite bait at the moment seems to be sweetcorn! 

This year Mornacott teamed up with Portledge Estate and co-hosted the Exmoor Keepers Challenge. Charles our Estate Manager and Toby our Head Keeper competed in a number of events which included rifle and clay shooting and Exmoor’s version of the Highland Games. The day concluded with a quiz focussing on gamekeeping topics. Once again, our team emerged victorious and will be going for their hat-trick next year which has never been achieved before. 

We’re always delighted to see evidence of the increasing Owl population at Mornacott and spotting two Tawny Owl chicks was certainly one of the highlights of the week. We have a number of owl “boxes” which provide an ideal nesting habitat for these wonderful birds and sightings of Barn Owls as well as their Tawny cousins are not uncommon. We were particularly privileged to spot a rare Short Eared Owl on a night safari last week.

With the lambing season well under way, guests staying in our cottages over Easter were not only able to enjoy the super weather we've been having but also fed our orphan lambs. With several hungry lambs which require feeding four times a day, the help was gratefully received by our stockman Charlie and his wife Megan.

With the arrival of our first calf at Mornacott, we know that Spring is finally here. To aid the first calving of our Red Ruby heifers, we put them to a smaller Aberdeen Angus bull. Born at 5.00am, this Devon cross Aberdeen Angus was the first of what will be many more early mornings and through the night deliveries for our stockman Charlie.  

Owen the red deer pricket that has been such a regular attender on shoot days at Mornacott chose last Tuesday as his day off. It's often difficult to find beaters at the end of a long season and Owen's absence was particularly irritating as the team from Fieldsports TV had turned up especially with the intention of filming his antics. They did however manage to get some good footage of the shooting which can be seen here.

See it on YouTube here