# rachels.haven's Journal



## rachels.haven

Hi out there! Normally I don't really care to share much and would much rather hear about others' adventures, but I'm having a lapse of normal judgement, so I think I'm going to start my thread. I've kept yard birds of various forms for a long time, but just started keeping rabbits, and when writing up pedigrees you need a rabbitry name, so this year when I decided to start breeding rabbits in earnest we became Firebird Gardens. We are very much not a farm, unfortunately. We live in a suburb of Detroit, on an acre that I've filled with fruit trees and vines and bushes and a large, fenced in vegetable garden, and every year the lady muscovy stuff our yard with more ducklings than I want to count. I typically put male ducklings in the freezer by 16 weeks and the female ducklings get sold to others who have had losses the previous winter or who are just getting started. The beef duck is great, but I really love my drake Elvis, and Cocoa is not so bad a character, just a little chubby and lazy. The girls are pinchy and huffy and all obsessed with eggs to the point of having little personality, so they typically don't get names, but I definitely know who they are. This year I kept 5 females back. Two are solid chocolate to go with my drake Cocoa, and two are cream pied, one is lavender pied. Elvis carries dilute genes, so his ducklings wind up fun and surprising colors.

We also breed red English Orpington chickens. They are currently mostly preoccupied laying eggs and fighting with the pilgrim geese through the fence, so there's not much to talk about them right now. They're a great meat and egg breed for this far north, although I admit, I always make sure they have at least 10 hours of light and food and water always in the shed so they stay fat and lay all year after molt. This is my first year lighting the shed. For the last few years the hens got skinny in the winter, so I'd worm them and just pray they'd make it. This year I decided to try lengthening the days with a single puck LED so they'd have more time to eat and drink, and lo and behold, my birds stayed nice and fat, and after molt, they resumed laying at a decent rate. We also have a 4 gallon horizontal chicken nipple bucket with an aquarium heater in it so they never go without clean water, ducks or no ducks. That whole setup is sitting in a stainless steel stock feed pan, so said ducks don't turn my shed into a slop house and frostbite heaven when they get bored.

My mini rexes came into the picture two years ago when I decided I wanted something that actually let me hold it. And I'm allergic to cats, and minorly allergic to dogs, so something else was going to have to fill the void. I got a broken black doe with fantastic fur quality from my Mom, turned her into a sort of house pet (I despise frozen water bottle and crock season that much). Later I bred her to one of my mom's very nice bucks, and got the black doe (we call her Apple) I currently have. Much later I got a very nice breeding pair of red mini rexes from my Mother, who needed the cage space.

At the moment, both of my does live indoors. Kits raised inside with my two preschoolers running around wind up pretty much bombproof and are very handleable for showing (how do you not constantly hold baby rabbits that live in the house?) so the does will probably stay in for now, at least until the weather warms.

My bucks, I'm not sure what I will do with them. Right now they are in due to winter, but I'd like to have an outdoor setup later, at least in the garage. Probably going to build a cage rack and tuck it away back with the rest of my animal stuff. My red buck, who the kids have named Benjamin Buck Bunny (oops, didn't name him fast enough) will not potty train, so he's going back to a wire cage, which I don't normally like looking at in my house, but this is an exception in the name of sanitation. He's sweet and loves the kids and to be handled, but potties absolutely everywhere in his cage EXCEPT for his litter box no matter where you move it, so in the name of sanitation, I think he needs to be housed like a proper rabbit, not whatever it is I've turned the females into. My other buck is a tiny black otter (Beaman Buck Bunny, also lost that naming war) and he does potty train, but does not enjoy people. Both bucks are upstairs in my front room due to some husband related de-contstruction that was going on last night in my basement where I was housing them for the winter away from the does. We have bunnies due the first few days of February, and man, I've missed that. I grew up with parents breeding meat rabbits, so there were always babies around (and they just in the last 8 years or so switched to mini rex). My kids are terrified of bald baby bunnies because they're not cute like ducklings or chicks when they "hatch". The kids also think rabbits lay eggs, and for now I think I'll leave it that way.

We have geese too. They are pilgrims, and I might be selling them when I get to the end of my patience with them if my mom doesn't want them. This fighting with all other birds thing is really not fun for them. They deserve to be walking the yard, picking at what's left of our grass, and instead the breeding season has rendered them pen birds. This is our first year with them, and normally the yard is fairly peaceful right now, but the geese want to fight through the fence and the chickens are loving it ALL DAY LONG (what's the deal with those dense, crotchety, war-mongering, ridiculously fluffy hens?!). Honestly, if the chickens weren't the ones making the eggs my family prefers I'd probably just have my muscovy duckers and I definitely wouldn't have the geese.

I'm thinking of adding a pair of dairy goats to our mix. Our township allows it, I can build a decent sized shed for them, and I've got plenty of time to care for them every day, but I've got an entire fence line of 30 foot trees to clear all by myself so I can replace the old field fencing and put up a goat pen to keep the goats out of my fruit trees. The husband is not yet on board with the goats, so hiring to do the clearing is not in the budget. Last year I did about 20 feet of it, which came out to be about a dozen large sumac trees to burn (yes, I CAN do it!). This year I might get a chainsaw, but for now I'm using a bow saw and a hatchet.  Unfortunately we only burned 2/3 of the wood before the snow came and now we have one of our hundreds of groundhogs living under the pile. I'm probably going to enlarge our burn pit and just move the pile into it and burn it one of these days when I get a chance. I wish I could clear faster, but I can't take down trees with kids in the yard, so last fall I used their TV time to do trees every day, and I'd do one or two per day, saw them up into light enough pieces, and drag them back to the pile for stacking. The kids are no longer into TV, so we'll see what happens this year. I might have to be a weekend warrior and make DH watch them. Maybe I'll negotiate for some budget and get some help. It won't be cheap, is the main problem. It's hard work, the property is very long, and felling trees makes lots and lots of burn wood. I'm definitely rounding up what I've already done because those trees are trying to return with a vengeance, as sumac trees tend to do.

Well, that's that right now. I'll get pictures of everything later. My two year old broke the camera as his major accomplishment this week and we're not smart phone users, so I either get to use my kindle's camera, which comes out grainy, or maybe try to turn my laptop webcam into a camera somehow, which I'm less optimistic about. I think I'll just get a new camera...but that takes time, and I just used up all of my "I feel like being on the computer" time for today already.

So hi out there, if anyone reads this! And sorry for the lack of photos.


----------



## Latestarter

Well, seems like you lead a pretty busy life! Thanks for sharing  I'm on board to follow your journey, or ranting, or just sharing what's going on. Good luck with the Feb bunnies.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you 
I know it's not BYC, but here's a picture of my favorite rooster I had laying around. I might make him my profile pic for a while until the new camera comes.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

He's beautiful - and welcome from TX!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. He's currently getting beat up by his brooder mate over the hens, but he's eventually going to get it all to himself. 

Here's a very dignified picture of my red mini Rex buck who just goes to mush when handled and therefore will not pose. HE'S now my avatar.



He's really very cute and petite looking normally when he's not limp.


But he's only willing to do that running around, and that's no good. I'm working on it. The kids let him out here. Rabbits with unpredictable restroom habits are not normally allowed to do this.


----------



## Sara Ranch

It's not easy getting started!  

I'm with you - I am not much for sharing personal stuffs online, but I have found this site to be very comfortable.

Lol - and girl, welcome to the club (we are the only two members right now) that cut the wood by hand with a handsaw!

Baby steps.  Keep plugging away at your goals.  You'll get there.


----------



## Latestarter

Not envious of either of you ladies having to use a hand saw of any sort for land clearing. You know you can get a chain saw pretty cheaply, right? Doesn't need to be a logger's version... just a smaller yard work model will probably do. There are also better electric versions today with more powerful batteries for light work. Handsome roo, and nice looking bunny.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! No, price isn't an issue. I'm just paranoid of it bouncing back or getting dropped...or breaking it via pinching or something. Honestly I probably just need someone to show me how to use a chainsaw the right way and make sure I'm doing it right, just once and I'd be fine. It's significantly harder to cut your hand off with a bow saw and a little hatchet, at least in my mind. My husband is not the outdoors working type so he doesn't know how to use one either, so I don't really have anyone that can teach me (DH does outdoors work and has even built a really nice 8x10 shed, but it's all been learned in the last 4 years since we acquired a house and it hasn't been without injuries and stupid mistakes). I was taught lots of house, yard, and basic homestead maintenance, but the parents adhered to the old mindset of the boys getting to use the power tools, the girls not so I do not know today. Husband's even teaching me to use his table saw that he learned how to use last year (lol). And in my parents' defense, DH's parents taught him no outdoors or manual labor skills.
I will probably set about learning the ins and outs of a chain saw this year in the spring. It's too much work to do with the hand tools alone. Youtube is good, and the internet can help.


----------



## Latestarter

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=how+to+use+a+chainsaw+    You can DO IT!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! YouTube is great. Its how DH learned to build this and he's a programmer by day.



Here are the young lady muscovies before they get all egg obsessed. The older one is already nesting.


----------



## rachels.haven

Elvis looks like a gator in this one. He's really a nice, gorgeous guy, but he's trying to dance with me here. I'm his buddy until nail or wing trimming day. Then I am shunned  . This is our third year with him, and Cocoa's second.


----------



## Latestarter

For a first attempt at construction, your DH did a really good job! Looks great! Thanks for the pics.  Kinda funny how our animals love us right up until we try to do something to benefit them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, last night we tried to let the bucks out, one at a time to be handled and work on posing and to "run around and play" as my four year old put it. Lol, bucks do not run around. Just run back and forth around the other's cage, trying to terminate each other through the wire. Silly boys. As soon as the basement is done being cleaned out, back into the hole they will go! At least until spring, then they'll go out on the cage rack.

I'm so glad the does think about stuff besides covering other rabbits and fighting...like digging, nesting, and eating. I might get some pictures of the does later. They're still nesting robots right now, but one of them is starting to take breaks for pictures now and again. Kindling date should be this weekend sometime. Then they'll be all about food, food, food and probably more digging.

Also processed my extra cockerel. After butcher and cleaning I was left with a 5 pound 8 oz carcass at 10 months. Not bad for a heritage type breed. All done with all foreseeable butchering until the muscovy ducklings that haven't even been set are 16 weeks old, unless we have rabbit culls or if there are any pugnacious cockerels in the three accidental hatches we had late this fall. Still not out of muscovy from the fall, which is good, because we have at least about 6 months to go before the freezer starts getting filled again.


----------



## rachels.haven

This Sunday brought us the kindling. My black doe, Arkansas Black (AKA: Apple) had 4 kits, 3 peanuts and 1 normal sized kit. 2 of the peanuts already passed on, trampled at birth because she's a first timer, but they would have died anyway.  One peanut still hanging in there for now. Apparently Apple is a true dwarf. Funny.
Rhubarb, my red doe had 5 healthy, normal kits. I am pretty sure Rhubarb is a false dwarf, but honestly, that's not so bad. She's still right around what a mini rex doe should weigh. If she ever throws a peanut, then I'm wrong about her big ugly status. We'll see.

Pictures as soon as I get around to it. The does are back to their normal selves and everyone but the bucks are chilling again-and the bucks want those does and nothing else. NOPE. Kind of want them back in the basement at least, then for it to warm enough for me to be able to take care of them outside without dead ice fingers. Basement isn't cleaned out yet though, and it's still so winter.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yesterday eyes opened. Learning to work with the new camera still. 

Here's Apple's one baby. Rhubarb rejected one of her crazy kits so I rolled it in Apple's litter box and dabbed it, Apple's nose, and the other kit with vanilla, and slipped it in and it's doing much better now. That's why we have red and black in the nest box in one pic.


----------



## rachels.haven

The picture with my hand around the kit's shoulders is to show how round the kit was. The bulge you see is just it's belly. It was a singleton for a good long time before I added the little red. Single babies get FAT. Also, does in Apple's line really like nursing their babies, multiple times a day, almost every time you turn around.


----------



## rachels.haven

Very tired Rhubarb (I accidentally used flash, so she got red eye, she does not really have red eyes). She has four kits since I subtracted the one she didn't like when it started getting skinny and gave it to Apple. She's kind of a temperamental doe, right at the limit of what I want to put up with, but in her defense, the first thing her babies did when I went in to inspect for deads after birth was jump up and bite me. I've never been bit by an hours old kit before, much less a whole nest of them. My mom, also a rabbit breeder, calls them "vigorous". They are a lot more normal now that their eyes opened last night, although now they are starting the "chasing mom all around the cage" thing already, and Rhubarb gets kind of feisty with them, and even feistier with me when I try to put them back. Wonder how the next few weeks are going to go for them. We might be doing an early weaning if any bunnies start getting beat up.


----------



## rachels.haven

This is the baby in Apple's nest box. I tried to get some pictures later of Rhubarb's nest, but the camera got an attitude, so I had to stop and tinker with it.

Camera shy.


 

Stretch + baby feet.


----------



## rachels.haven

He's not quite as fat as I'd like, but he's squeaking by. He's also helping Apple's baby avoid single-baby-rabbit-looks-like-a-hippo syndrome. Yes, that is so a thing. 

I might have more pictures on my blog, I don't remember, but I don't have time to sort through re-post them all here either way, so I guess you can look if you want. My hands have been causing me pain when I use the computer or really do anything, but I got the important ones here!


----------



## BoboFarm

Oh my goodness! Too cute!


----------



## Queen Mum

Your journal is great reading!


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, thanks. Here's a picture I wanted to get earlier. Here is a nest box full of baby ginger buns.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Last year I did about 20 feet of it, which came out to be about a dozen large sumac trees to burn


Not poison sumac I hope!

Yeah, just get a smaller size chain saw and get it done. You could hack up one of those trees in 10 minutes.



rachels.haven said:


> I know it's not BYC, but here's a picture of my favorite rooster I had laying around.


I figure anything that sounds like a herd is a herd. And when my 17 hens come running, they sound like a herd. More so than the 2 alpacas. But people here on BYH are very accommodating.

@Pastor Dave raises rabbits you might find some of his journal interesting.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, no, not poison sumac, I'd probably know that by now, I've done so much with these trees.

These are just giant weedy sumacs that can grow over my height in one year while sending up clones of themselves via rhizomes in rivers from themselves. I hate them. If I round the small ones up, they die in chains and then I get these white mushrooms all along where the rhizome grows that I have to keep my chickens away from because for some reason they like to take bites out of the caps, and then the eaters get kidney failure symptoms and die. They're probably not a kid safe fungus either (when those mushrooms come out, birds stay in pens, kids stay inside until I get rid of the mushrooms so everyone's safe). Definitely more information than you need to know, but this is a big reason why I really need to get the trees gone. They also try to take over the yard and they're about 20-30 feet tall (probably at about 6-7 years) and the trees are BRITTLE to boot. Kind of dangerous. It's possible the trees are meant to be shorter, but we live in a swamp with a high water table and it encourages certain trees to grow very, very fast with bad structural integrity-weak wood, often diseased from water and pests or both. We've already put down $5K getting bigger trees of a different species removed that grew that way as a result of our swamp last year. (They almost killed me a few times dropping huge, insect infested, waterlogged, packing foam textured still living branches at random following storms, VERY SCARY.)

Supposedly goats like sumac leaves and wild grapes, and wild raspberries, and buckthorn vines. That's basically what plants I need to remove all over my acre. I probably need an army of flying goats that won't touch mushrooms to conqure it all...and a chainsaw. Lol.

I like rabbit pictures better in the winter though. Too cold for me to do stuff.


----------



## rachels.haven

Kids and husband sick today, but here's a quick tree line pic. I wouldn't be surprised if the trees were only 20ft after looking up sumacs in my area on wikipedia. Some of these trees are problematic looking and might require experienced help.

 Neighbor truck for scale I guess?


----------



## Latestarter

Ummm maybe my eyes are old and not calibrated but those are 40-45 footers...


----------



## rachels.haven

I like it better when they're shorter. I've already taken out half a dozen, so they're not too bad. The fun part is how if you cut them right, they fall exactly the way you want them to (although you shouldn't count on it).

It's possible they're something called "stinking sumac" or "tree of heaven" which would be ironic but I'd rather not. _Ailanthus altissima_ are very invasive and get up to 70 feet tall. They'd fit right in with all the other invasives I've found in this yard but I really, really don't want them to eventually be 70 feet tall brittle, randomly dying, nasty looking, droopy, weed trees, so if anyone asks, they're 20 feet. 

Actually reading the stinking sumac page on wikipedia sounds right on. Oh dear, we might need a tree service and a lot of round up after that. Oh man, I'm probably going to war with a tree someone made wikipedia say was nicknamed "tree of h311". This might be fun.

I'm sure it was right at home with "one of the world's worst... ornamental trees that does not deserve to be planted anywhere" that cost us so much last summer. This spring needs to hurry up so I can work outside again and get moving.


----------



## Bruce

I am actually guessing more like 60'. I figure about 15' of the truck is showing and used that. But we can go with Rachel's 20 number (just happens to be in meters).  

You can tie a rope up in the tree and tension it the direction you want it to fall to be more sure it goes where you want. Wouldn't want it to land on the fenced area. But depending on what is within the fall area, you might want a tree service since they will take it down from the top rather than dropping it all at once from the bottom. BUT if there is nothing for them to hit, they are pretty small in diameter, something you should be able to easily drop with a 16" bar chainsaw.

BTW, your new rabbit looks like a plushy


----------



## Baymule

Pretty rabbits! Welcome to the forum from Texas!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! They feel like them too. I'm so shocked I was able to wind up with them, they're so nice.
We will probably do just that with the trees, especially the ones near my garden and bird pen and bird shed, and the couple that lean towards the neighbor's truck (...so, all of them, I guess). Normally I just cut a wedge in the direction I want it to fall and cut through from the back and the thing falls and I cut it up. I'd like some tension applied too as extra insurance. Alternately, I may work on my argument for another huge expense and not do anything. We'll see. 

And thanks for the welcome. It's nice to be here.


----------



## Pastor Dave

Welcome from the Hoosier State! 
My mom is from Pontiac. She married a Hoosier farmer. There are lots of good rabbiteers on here, but glad to bounce ideas too. I know @misfitmorgan is up in Michigan, but don't think she has buns.


----------



## misfitmorgan

We had rabbits but just meat rabbits. We did buy papered california's, a pair but they never bred so off they went. I really like lionhead the best and mini lop or champagne d'argent. I also had a pet flemish giant who was steel grey and papered but she died of old age.


----------



## rachels.haven

That counts to me.

So I don't know who this person is, but has anyone seen the youtube channel "blue cactus dairy goats"? I can't vouch for the rightness or wrongness of the information because it's the internet and all and I know enough to know I know nothing, but I've been impressed with the clarity of demonstration videos. It's been fun to watch.


----------



## Pastor Dave

Not something I have seen, but not looking for goat info right now. Tagged a few to ask.
@Goat Whisperer 
@babsbag 
@CntryBoy777 
@Bruce 
@Farmer Connie
@farmerjan 
@Southern by choice


----------



## babsbag

I have not heard for them but will have to check it out.


----------



## farmerjan

I am not a goat owner, but do farm sitting for friends that have boer meat goats.  Getting ready for their kidding now.  We have White Texas Dall sheep and beef cattle and I have several dairy cross cows that I use for nurse cows and raise baby calves.
We are lambing and doing our spring calving group of cows now.


----------



## Bruce

Don't tag ME for goats @Pastor Dave !! The closest I've ever been to a goat was feeding treats to 3 of them daily for 2 weeks. They lived with the alpacas we were given. This occurred back in Sept 2016 when the people were vacationing in Florida looking for areas they would want to move to the next spring. We got the alpacas in October '16.


----------



## CntryBoy777

I've never seen or heard about them, and seeing as all I have is a phone...I don't go to youtube very much...so, I really can't say anything one way or the other....


----------



## Goat Whisperer

It seems rather popular on the interwebs but I don’t watch them. Never needed too  Glad you are learning from the videos


----------



## misfitmorgan

I don't recall ever watching that particular youtuber but we have watched about everything on goats on youtube over the years so it's likely we have seen it.


----------



## rachels.haven

Nest boxes out today. Might be early, not sure, but at least one of them was too stinky to keep in, plus they were hopping in and out to to use it as a bathroom at will. This is where raising rabbits in the house gets potentially high maintenance. It's potty training time. Let's see how fast we can get those little stinkers stinking in the poo boxes.Or maybe the weather will warm up and everyone winds up back on racks. That would also be great.

So the thaw has occurred here. Our two sump pumps have been running about every five minutes, so after I was sure they had a chance to flush out I put one of the discharge pipes in the kiddie pool that my kids didn't ruin this fall and yesterday let the ducks and chickens out for some bathing. Today I let the geese out and so far no one has gotten decapitated, so maybe the geese feel like getting along now...at this second.


----------



## rachels.haven

Believe it or not the water comes out of the house clear. The constant replenishing of the pool keeps it not coffee colored. Eventually the husband will go put a longer pipe on it and drain it somewhere else and I will make the pool follow it, of course. The neighbor's yard has half flooded. Next the rear left portion of ours will flood too, and then there is no need for kiddie pools until summer, unless of course we get really dry weather, which we probably won't, or if the county comes through and fixes our ditches, which is about as likely as our various local governments not being too corrupt and/or incompetent to be able to afford it. But that's another story.

Those muscovy need to start reproducing so they can stay on top of our mosquito population that is so coming. I've had a nest of just a few eggs under a duck for about two and a half weeks, so I think we've got about another two and a half to go.


----------



## Latestarter

Great use of water that otherwise would have gone to waste. I'm sure the waterfowl are quite happy with the arrangement.


----------



## misfitmorgan

That's a genius idea!!

I filled up a large pan for our ducks last night....they made a mess but they seemed very happy.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ducks are like balls of poop and mud rolled up in feathers-and are both oh so cute (and yummy, which is a terrible thing to add, but that's life). They like it messy


----------



## rachels.haven

Not much going on lately. Kicked the bucks out of the house into the garage where they were originally planned to go. Chicks hatched. Broodies brooding. Gander figured out how to gander. Baby rabbits growing. I got put on meds for bad circulation, so now cold isn't so painful and my joints aren't angry. It's going to rain over here very soon. But hey, people like pictures, so here are pictures! Some are repetitive. Still haven't gotten good pictures of the does and the black otter kit. My camera decided on it's own to video from that point on, though so none of them turned out. Annoying, but whatever. My kids are being crazy, so no time to think about that atm.


----------



## rachels.haven

More pics, I guess. As soon as the blood work comes back from the joint doctor, we'll start thinking about goats. Just have to make sure my bad circulation and a touch of tendinitis from neglect is just bad circulation and a touch of tendinitis. Fairly confident.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



There, now you've got a fairly accurate idea of what's going on around here... 
...Besides, I guess our bicycle adventures. Living on an acre in the city has it's advantages. As soon as all the bikes are up and running again we'll go back to our fair weather pattern of almost never using the car. Feed store runs are the deal breaker typically. One simply can not put 300+ lbs of poultry and rabbit feed, potty pellets, and bedding a bike trailer and bike 28 miles home without the bike trailer giving out, lol. The distance would be fine, but the trailers' limits are not up to it. Last sunday, the first one that it was warm enough, we tried to bike to church, but one of my bike's tires wasn't adjusted right, and the other one (the 30 year old "new" racing bike) had a flat tire on it's probably 30 year old tubes. Probably should have replaced the tubes earlier, but with bikes sometimes you don't have to.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh! Forgot to mention. This week I sprayed a skunk. The little bold (stupid) critter decided to come in the coop at about 10 am, while I was standing in front of it, looking for a little chick and duckling balut/meat/eggs. So I maced him/her. After another few attempts to come in and more macing, he loped away and I watched him until he loped himself right out of the yard. After I cayenned heavily around the shed and other places it could he hanging out so it would be less likely to come back. NO FREE LUNCHES.

A couple years back I lost a dozen home hatched ducklings to one of them. Now I'm smarter. We have a lot of skunks (and possums and groundhogs) here-much more than when I lived on the edge of a rural Iowa town, oddly enough. If I were a gun person, I would trap and shoot them, but for now we're going to have to stick with mace or a hose and "shooting" from far away.

THERE, now we're caught up.


----------



## Latestarter

Thanks for the pics! Hope the med issues are what you're expecting and not serious. You are one busy person.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> One simply can not put 300+ lbs of poultry and rabbit feed, potty pellets, and bedding a bike trailer and bike 28 miles home without the bike trailer giving out, lol. The distance would be fine, but the trailers' limits are not up to it.


I would think the motor's leg would not be up to dragging that much weight 28 miles!

Sure glad it was you spraying the skunk and not the other way around.

Those bunnies sure are cute and what's better than a hen with chicks?


----------



## misfitmorgan

rachels.haven said:


> View attachment 44567 Broodies brooding.



This needs to be submitted for POW

It is the busy time of year, all the animals look really good!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! That means a lot. We were lucky and survived the winter well this year, I think.
That particular broody has chicks hatching as of this morning.  She's a very happy broody.
My last chicken that likes to brood is watching the chicks jealously. I think I might put some golf balls out and see if she will sit.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, it's been a while. The doctor thinks I've got either rheumatoid arthritis or lupus, so started some meds. I gave away my dilute muscovy girls, because next year I'll likely wind up hatching more, and I don't quite want a muscovy-pallosa this year while I'm figuring out my meds and exactly what I've got. I'm probably going to ease up or just quit breeding rabbits, since they're not essential and one of my kids is starting to show signs of being allergic. We're still doing goats this year, because I'm not ready to give up yet. Dear Husband started work on the goat house last weekend. There's also a 50% chance we'll be moving in the next few months, but we're probably going to keep all the beasts we have at the time since they are what I do all day when children fighting, trying to injur themselves, or rejecting all food and then fighting gets to me. At least the beasts eat what I feed them and have basic self-preservation instincts.

Last night I started worming/de-miting my birds, since as soon as the "warm" weather hit I found some mites on some of the hens. I also found a hen that appears to have dry fowl pox symptoms, so everyone 8 weeks and older are getting the vaccine that arrived from jeffers today, tonight and no selling birds this spring-maybe in the fall. We also have 6 new baby muscovy-was 7, but one appeared to be defective and survived three days and died (normal, I guess). All six were pinioned last night so all keepers can be kept in pens and away from hunting vermin during the fall and winter as around here escapees tend to get eaten (that's how extra females sell so well, unfortunately). Also I live by the interstate and two busy roads so human/bird road safety is a concern in the (24/7 multi lane traffic on all three roads). I usually pinion because duck rodeo to clip feathers is just a pain (sometimes literally if you mess up and the claws get you), and if done early enough, ducklings don't bleed because almost all blood supply is going to the body and legs for following mom. Yesterday is 4 days. I consider 10 days too late. Four days appeared to be the perfect time. Last year I did a week, and most of them bled a drop or two, which I do not like. So in the future it will always be 4 days, I guess. Should always be less traumatic than just being held.

Ducklings are so cute, but no pictures today though. It's too windy and cold.


----------



## Pastor Dave

rachels.haven said:


> Well, it's been a while. The doctor thinks I've got either rheumatoid arthritis or lupus, so started some meds.
> 
> we're probably going to keep all the beasts we have at the time since they are what I do all day when children fighting, trying to injur themselves, or rejecting all food and then fighting gets to me. At least the beasts eat what I feed them and have basic self-preservation instincts.
> 
> 
> Sorry to hear this. Praying it isn't as serious as they suspect and ypu will receive healing!
> 
> Sounds like child rearing in Michigan in the big city is abt the same as Indiana in the sticks.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, you've got boys too?

And thanks. I'd love it to all be nothing, or for it to all be manageable and/or for it not to cause any more trouble. I've got things to do, of course. I will always be grateful for all the prayers I can get going in that direction.


----------



## Latestarter

Sorry to hear about the health issues... neither is a good condition to have to deal with. Hope the 50/50 potential move is by choice rather than a forced event. Not easy with a bunch of animals to deal with for sure. Kids can be a challenge and it's good that you have the animals as an "out" when you need to de-stress rather than de-head.


----------



## rachels.haven

If it happens, it will be a husband changing to another part of the company kind of move. Mildly stressful, but not as stressful as it could be. I'm grateful for that.


----------



## Bruce

Let us know on the health thing . DW has had RA for maybe 15 years, she is now 56. She was on Enbrel for most of that time, just switched to Humira. Without a doubt she is walking and functional because of those drugs. But you need insurance, without it Enbrel is about $33K a year, Humira $29K.


----------



## Pastor Dave

Not that I like wbat you said Bruce, but I can imagine the pharmacy costs, and your encouragement to Rachel is from experience.

Yes Ma'am, Rachel. Jill and I have an 8 yr old son and almost 5 yr old son. Mortal enemies one minute, and best friends the next. The 4 yr old wears the same size shirt and waist of pants, but a head shorter. Gonna be a Hoss.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, insurance is something we'd probably need for the rest of our lives, even before my health things came up. Husband has late stage glaucoma and wants to keep the remaining 40% of his vision. I guess I'll need it to keep my immune system from eating my body. If you just looked at our medical bills you'd never know we were young people. Funny. Those meds you mentioned are OUTRAGEOUSLY expensive. Hope we're never unemployed because that would be terrifying for both of us.


----------



## Latestarter

Oh... being unemployed is no problem at all for medical issues... obamacare fixed all of that so that everyone can get medical care and medications virtually free of charge. If you can't, it's probably because you have some income and insurance. If you don't have income or insurance, then you're gonna owe the govt a fine (tax) for not buying their policy.


----------



## Bruce

The requirement/fine for not having insurance no longer exists.


----------



## Latestarter

The govt/VA sent me my "insurance coverage" notification and proof to "retain for my records" for 2017 tax season...


----------



## Bruce

The new tax law pushed through at the very end of last year so no one would be able to plan ahead takes effect for the 2018 tax year. You would still need to keep all tax records for the prior 5 (or is it 7??) years in case you get audited for one of those years.


----------



## rachels.haven

Not much more going on now. I had to de-rabbit due to my immune issues. Even outdoors they were problematic for me. A bit of a bummer, but my mother got to sell them. Plus, she was short on does before, and now she has some nice ones. Lots of musocvy duckings growing into juevie ducks. Not so many chicks. We had a five day power outage starting with an ice storm on hatch day because our power and infrastructure is done by Detroit's energy company and they're over extended at all times and they don't maintain anything other than the minimum so power goes out at the drop of a hat like just a little ice storm. I'm a little annoyed. I'm a little annoyed every time it does this (and it does this multiple times a year), although this time it was above freezing during the day and we had a place to go that wasn't freezing, and we drained and turned off our plumbing just in case. Nothing burst, so it could be worse, I guess.

My amazing husband built a goat shed...and the children claimed it. I guess we'll be building another one behind it. The kids want their's painted orange. Lol. Not happening. I'm thinking blue like the house, or dark green.

On Saturday I cleared a whole bunch of trees of heaven unintentionally. I meant to only cut down three that were in the way while DH was working on the shed, but they were all connected with buckthorn vines all the way up so three, which I could have handled, became five then became twelve so we didn't have any already cut trees partially suspended above the ground and waiting like traps. Unfortunately when I was done making the trees lay down my joints were done for the day (and the next day), so processing the trees is waiting for this Saturday.

Then DH took a look at one of the shorter trees (still two or three times taller than him), grabbed one of the more robust vines, and pulled the tree half way over. I'm starting to wonder if there may be a better way to do this for the shorter trees. I forget that for all their height, these trees really have no root system apart from the rhizome they clone themselves with. Plus, if we pull them, there are no stumps. I think later this week DH going to go pull more of them down. Right now it's a little humid and hot for him to do it after riding 16 miles to work, then 16 home on his bike like he likes to, and I don't want him to get tired and make stupid mistakes. That's what saturdays are for. We'll be back out there in a few days, cutting and pulling and processing and burning.

On a different note, does anyone know if Wintercreeper is okay for goats? So far I've found mixed opinions. I've found documentation of people using goats to control it, but other species in the genus are toxic, so I'm not sure what to decide. I have a bunch to roundup if it's bad. I know kids shouldn't eat it in quantity, but it's kind of tough and brushy so I'm not sure why they would.

Pictures later. My acre is a mess right now because of me and quite frankly I am embarrassed.


----------



## RollingAcres

Hello @rachels.haven! I just started reading your journal and your pictures are very nice!
We currently have 2 hens and 2 cows. I'm thinking about adding a couple of ducks but maybe not this year.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, if you want meat, muscovy are my favorite so far. Pekins grow faster (twice as fast in fact), but muscovy is like beef and they don't get as messy, reproduce better, eat less, are quieter, and have more personality in the breeders. For just eggs, Metzer's hybrids can't be beat or khaki campbells like I have now lay much better than any of my chickens and for some reason they go broody for me and reproduce just fine. Most of the hatcheries just drop ship Metzer's birds, so that's the main reason I mention them.

 I love my ducks, and definitely endorse your plan. The only drawback is the sloppy factor. Also that for the mallard types you basically only need one drake for between 6 and 12 ducks unless you wind up with a really low key guy.
But overall, they're nice, intelligent, sloppy, hedonistic birds that are beautiful and just fun to watch.


----------



## RollingAcres

I think I'd want them for eggs. I don't want a drake because I don't plan on having ducklings (although they are so cute!) so not point having one.
We have room to add on and can have more animals but everything comes down to the mighty dollar. With DH not having a job right now, we have to focus on what we have now.


----------



## Bruce

Tree of Heaven (Ailanthus altissima) is known by a number of names - stinking sumac, Chinese sumac, varnishtree and stinktree.

Seems to be something you WANT to get rid of.

https://www.nature.org/ourinitiativ...ndiana/journeywithnature/tree-of-heaven-1.xml


----------



## rachels.haven

You totally don't want this to grow anywhere near your property-or any of your neighbors' properties for miles. It's really kind of evil. Round up works on it when it's short enough to spray, but the rhizomes cause poisonous mushrooms to come up for a few years after. I do not like them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Since I guess we got them Saturday it's official by now. Last week I spent all my "spare" time building a goat fence around a mini-shed my husband built, gathering supplies and ordering stuff, then on Saturday we went and picked up a 2 year old, ADGA registered nigerian dwarf doe in milk and a doeling. Now I just need to get over this annoying cold and send in the transfer/registration papers, contemplate becoming a member of ADGA, and take pictures to show on here. I tried to go out and get some just now, but my 3 year old commandeered the camera, so now I have a lot of artsy pictures of sun lit leaves and trees silhouetted against the sky and his brother and maybe one of the garage door...but no goats. Probably why 3 year old photographers aren't the norm. 

The doe in milk still doesn't love being milked by me, but my husband put together a milk stand out of scrap wood on Sunday (goat was over full) and with the help of milk stand ties on her feet I got her emptied. I don't think I'm hurting her, but she really loves to kick and stand in buckets if allowed. At one point she was behaving so badly that I just put an empty bucket in front of her and milked onto the ground and she got everything but her udder in it (handy). That's why we use ties/hobbles and revised the hand piece a little. She's giving about 2 cups a day, but that varies because I think the doeling, even though it's not hers and is between 8 and 10 weeks, is being allowed to nurse. I'll accept that for now I guess. They don't eat as much as I thought they would, and that worries me. Their pen is mostly brush so I guess they're probably eating that, but I expected them to eat more alfalfa pellets, alfalfa hay, and grain and they don't eat much of any of that. Maybe the TSC compressed bales are not to their liking. My rabbits never liked them. We'll see. I'm anxiously waiting for my hay guy to make some delicious smelling first cutting hay, but it's raining almost every day to every other day lately, so I'm going to have to be patient. Third cutting is my favorite, but I'll get that in the fall. I'd take about 40 bales of that just to lay in if I had another excuse.

Honestly, I was expecting goatier milk. My husband loves the milk, but I kind of like it slightly...mustier? Maybe with more character? The milk that we do get mostly just tastes like ice cream. Darn...ice cream milk. Who could complain about that? DH's already joked about needing more milk and therefore more milking does. I think I'd like more experience before we get any more, maybe even just breed these and retain the doelings. Things are awfully simple with just the two. I'd rather things grow slowly...Kind of like the speed I get pictures up here...


----------



## Latestarter

Congrats on your new additions. I'm glad that your DH loves the milk. I'm actually kind of surprised to hear you (or anyone) say they "prefer" "goatier" milk...   I mean that just does not compute for me... All I ever hear is complaints when it doesn't taste the same as cow's milk... I too love the smell of fresh cut/baled quality hay  Have patience with your doe... she'll settle down with time and practice. My daily milker has 2 years experience and still sometimes kicks crap in the bucket or dumps the milk... It happens... I've milked her out on the ground due to that happening as well. And she's a full sized Lamancha...


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! and oh goodness, and that would be a big kick comparatively (Lamancha's are one of the more pretty looking goats, IMO though-something about those eyes).

In regards to the flavor, I wish people wouldn't assume it would taste like cows milk. It's not cow milk. At least the stuff my goat makes even has a different mouth feel than cow's milk. Unfortunately one of my boys will drink the carton flavored $5/quart store goat milk stuff but doesn't like the nigerian milk we're getting straight. I like the carton stuff too, so I understand where he's coming from, but not enough to pass on the fresh stuff. The other flavors in the milk are kind of fun. They're not necessary, but fun.

And you're right. My doe is getting better I think. This evening I loosened the ties so she had more slack and her feet stayed planted, didn't pull tight, and she didn't mess with the bucket. That's a little victory, but it makes me happy.

Thanks again.


----------



## Bruce

It would be interesting to know what breed of goat is producing the stuff you get at the store. Though it may not matter, might just be the added flavor your son likes. Guess you need to started "flavoring" the milk from your goat.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## Mike CHS

Your animals are cuties


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, thanks.


----------



## Latestarter

Quite the difference between outside, and inside the pen. Goats (and sheep) are great little greenery removers...


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep, they're working on it. Once the pen stuff gets stripped down and if we haven't gotten it cleared yet, I've got my eye on the area in front of the pen as a temporary run expansion. More T posts and fencing! But behind the pen is where I really want to expand into for a permanent pen. It's wooded to the point I could hide my HOUSE (and a good chunk of the front yard) back there. I'm not sure what my little goats can do back there considering how high they'd have to stack goats up on eachother to reach the majority of the foliage, but they will at least have shade and can feel free to strip bark off trees to girdle and kill as many as possible. We've also been throwing brush into the pen to have it professionally stripped already.

Meanwhile I'm shocked at how little grain and hay these guys have been eating. I thought their sweet goat food would never loose it's appeal and would be like candy, and alfalfa pellets and hay always smell so rich I want to eat them but I guess they're getting enough browse they're satisfied. My chickens and ducks are more expensive to feed on a daily basis so far. Makes me want...more goats . Maybe fewer chickens.


----------



## Latestarter

goat math?   I've taken to going to smaller trees and bending them over so the canopy is down near the ground within easy reach of the goats. I basically get trampled with goats trying to get as much as they can and trying to beat each other out to the best bites...


----------



## rachels.haven

Last hatch of the season under way (last, that is, if I have anything to say about it of course). Chicken and duck addition is now over, onto subtraction in the name of (short) family vacations and winter stable numbers. For the rest of the year it's time to fight broodies of various species. And find a hay source. And maybe put up a bigger, stronger permanent goat pen around the temporary one


 (and maybe join ADGA and do my goats' paperwork, and maybe get the older doe bred in the fall, and whatever else comes our way). Lots of stuff.




3 khakis in the incubator (muscovy/chicken incubated, incubator hatched), lots of muscovy in the nest. Unfortunately we had a run of rats come through. It used to be 14 khaki eggs, but the rats got to most of them. We'll see how many muscovy eggs made it because I failed to count when removing the khakis. I believe the rats are all dead now. Instead a groundhog decided to take up residence this morning  Gotta love the suburbs. No weapons. No one kills pests. They just dump them around.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's the main garden over at our "Firebird Gardens", weeded and cleared and mulched every winter courtesy of the Firebirds when I open the partition between pens (after shutting off the perennial herb gardens on each side). Everything's been growing kind of slow this year with the crazy temperatures, but it's finally growing.

  We've also got strawberries going, with goose berries and raspberries warming up. If we stay here a few more years we'll have what feels like a dozen other things bearing, but right now they're just barely not stick trees.


----------



## rachels.haven

My goat shed has almost totally disappeared. You can just see the roof on the right. I'm not sure if I want to allow it to be eaten by vines so no one knows we've got "suburban" goats on our acre or to expand the pen and beg the goats to get to work. They prefer alfalfa and their pen is starting to grow back. We may lay off the alfalfa pellets (but not hay, I guess) for a little while to encourage them to eat what's in their pen so I can justify giving them more space.


 See that mountain of vegetation behind and over their goat coop? (for reference, that roof peeking out is 5 feet high) The buckthorn and trees of heaven are starting to consume the goat house and fence too. I'm worried that it will happen to everything and the understory browse will die and it takes a very short amount of time for things to grow taller than me-months, in fact. I think I have a new weekend project in the form of putting up a new temporary fence. If they can eat enough of that so we can see the groundhog pits and branches that we've got to move, we can mow at least most of that. Right now it appears they do not care for buckthorn, wild grape, catalpa (not a problem tree, but it's in their pen), winter creeper, and trees of heaven. Only alfalfa, black walnut, and wild raspberries.



 



 

 
More goat pictures. I'm trying to figure out how to take pictures of my short, camera adverse goats. Eating all the black walnut branches they can.


----------



## Bruce

Buckthorn is a nasty invasive. I'd cut that stuff out as soon as you can before it gets even bigger and harder to remove.


----------



## rachels.haven

Tell me about it.


----------



## rachels.haven

Just found a new friend.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celastrus_orbiculatus

This is getting kind of annoying. Basically if it's an invasive in north america, most often from asia, we've probably got it in our tiny patch of heaven. Need more goats!...Or giraffes more likely.


----------



## rachels.haven

I believe my garden soil has too much nitrogen. Remember the last pic? Well, everything has a whole lot of greens and not much else. I got a few peas, but the weather has been too hot for them to be happy. Now I have a jungle of leaves and volunteer sunflowers.


----------



## rachels.haven

Actually, got a couple zucchini and cherry tomatoes today, but it's still kind of unsettling. No bean flowers, zuchs seem to dislike how much water we're getting this year and are mostly rotting on the plant before reaching size. Hot, hot hot and wet. Early season fast crops did provide a few dinners though. I forgot those. Things are going okay, the weather is just weird.

I added a goat. Meet Ava. Now I can take one of my goats somewhere without leaving one at home alone. Now that our "herd" is complete it's time to send in their registrations/transfer forms.






 

 


Happy Summer!


----------



## rachels.haven

Went out to a hay farmer's house and checked out some drying cut hay in the field. I think we're getting this year's hay delivery this week or next-3 small round bales. Now I need some pallets and to clean a spot out in my "empty" garage. It's funny how open space seems to creates stuff to fill it. The hay is good, thank goodness. I've been feeding them TSC alfalfa bales (not good hay, IMO and pricy to boot) and alfalfa pellets...and of course every day I bring them a whole bunch of buckthorn and crab apple saplings, a pile of grape vines, some honey suckle, and/or some wild rose bushes if I'm brave enough to cut and collect them and that's after I take out yesterdays stripped trees and sticks. We're just about out of excess wild black raspberries. I'm so relieved to have GOOD hay coming! It's been so hot and dry here, relatively speaking. My goats might be fat anyway. Eventually my tsc bales ran out (pulled all over the goat coop floor) so I decided to give my local feed store another fair shake. I should not have. I paid $7 for a 30lbs bale of what could very well be last year's first cutting and it shows. No smell, very little green, BIG COARSE yellow seedy stems like straw, mildly dusty. Not cool. Using for straw in chicken nest boxes. The goats would not touch it. I did not want to be stuck with that hay and thank goodness I won't be.

I think it's time to add some genetic diversity to my chicken flock. As soon as I know my first son is starting school in the fall I'm going to order some buff orpingtons from MMH and breed back to red in coloration and heavier build, because red IS best (and fat, they have to be fat) and have them delivered the first week of school.

Butchered 3 muscovy drakes on Saturday, and skinned this time because plucking ducks is not fun at the moment. I put 3lbs, 8 oz breast jerky into the dehydrator and there's a big bowl of wings, legs, necks, and organs needing to be taken out of the brine and frozen. Those were the first drakes of the season because I managed to sell the earlier ones. I hope the skinned meat is still as nice as the plucked meat. I'm looking forward to butchering all the cockerels from this year. THOSE are easy to pluck, even dry. For some reason it looks like we're mainly getting drakes and cockerels this year, which is great for meat purposes, not so great on the chicken breeding front. Just a little odd. I currently have 2 young female muscovy out of about 24 ducklings, and NO pullets. We have about a dozen little roosters running around. Really odd.

Oh well, things are still pretty good all in all.


----------



## Bruce

Does that mean you have a dozen future dinners running around?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes. If I can wait until they're 9-10 months old they're about 5 lbs and very tender and flavorful-more than turkey. A hatchery orp cross went after the food bucket yesterday (and then my boots), so he's not going to be waiting that long or get that big, but the pure bred ones should stay docile enough. It's just odd to have no pullet chicks at all. It's a bit of a reminder that the 50/50 odds of getting a pulllet/cockerel are PER EGG, not per straight run batch, I guess.

I still have 2 ready to butcher drakes running around to do and 11 more ducklings hatched this week that will be processed as thanksgiving or christmas birds. I wonder if the pattern will hold out and they will be almost all male too?


----------



## Baymule

Two years ago I ordered 50 Delaware chicks, straight run. I got 11 pullets. 11. We butchered ALL the roosters, meanest darn chickens I ever had. I was going to butcher the Delaware hens this fall, but they killed my favorite EE hen, so I killed every one of the mean witches and they are now packed in jars. They made some nice broth too. I'll never ever have Delawares again. I now have 10 Australorp pullets and 2 roos, one of which is challenging me, he will go to freezer camp soon. I have 14 EE hens, 1 rooster, and one crippled EE rooster that I just let loose in the yard. I have 4 other yard hens that just do what they want. I have some Muscovy ducks too, but have had no luck with them reproducing. I think I only have them to keep the rat snakes fed. So we just got 6 guinea chicks. Supposedly they will keep snakes away. We'll see.

It sucks about your RA or possible lupus. What do you do to fight that? Besides pharmaceuticals is there a diet that you can follow to reduce inflammation? My sister has polymyositis and because it is a rare disease, had a hard time finding a doctor to treat her. 

Your tree of heaven sounds like our Chinese tallow trees. A terrible, useless weed clothed in a tree trunk.  Curses on the idiot that brought them to this country.

Your goats are cuties, have you made kefir or cheese? A fellow BYH'er that lives a short distance from me makes kefir and it is delicious. @Devonviolet also makes cheese and that also is yummy. We have bought both kefir and cheese from her, a tall glass of cold kefir, crackers and cheese, that's a meal!


----------



## rachels.haven

Trouble with muscovy reproducing?! It has to be the snakes! Each of my girls would want 24-22 ducklings each batch,and 3-4 batches a year. They only don't make that many because I replace about half of the nest with golf balls every time and limit them to 2 or 3 batches. I hope those snakes get guinead soon! My muscovy have eaten all but one of our snakes, but they were only garter snakes.

For my mysterious autoimmune issue I'm just on a low dose of hydroxichlorquinine which makes me malaria proof as a side effect. They're waiting to see if it brings down the antibodies that mean my body's attacking itself down. No change in symptoms except that it's warm so the cold can't bother me so that med is probably a dead end. I still don't test positive for rh, and no lupus rash, so no definitive diagnosis, and no more aggressive treatment. But I'm getting by even if my muscles don't want to move when I'm cold and after a while of that my joints hurt. Go figure. I get along mostly fine in the summer, spring, and fall. It's just winter and using hedge sheers or weed wacking that gets me.

The only diet I'm on is now is a gluten free one because I can't digest wheat anymore. It's stupid. I've never been able to handle it well, so I got genetically screened for celiac as a kid (not that) but now it's very dramatic. Basically if I want to live with less pain and be able to keep food and water in, no wheat (or barley or oats to a lesser extent). Doctor did not seem concerned last time I mentioned this, but next time I go I will be more assertive to find out if it's related especially as my winter torture begins again. Oddly enough I've been loosing weight and being less endlessly thirsty and puffy since becoming gluten free. And the kicker is that I've been eating more instead of less because I'm not constantly sick. 

No kifer or cheese yet. My goat in milk is still only making 2/3 cup to one cup per milking and it gets consumed fast. I'm really not sure why production is so low. She's starting to get fat and all and her eyelids are a good color, so not enough resources shouldn't be the issue. She's a two year old first freshener, and may just be a low producer, but she's patient with my kids and she'll be staying. Cheese and yogurt and other things are for next year when the other does get bred and freshen. Then maybe we'll get 3 cups per milking, lol. I'm looking forward to having more milk.

That's good to know about the Delaware hens. I considered them once. We have eaten hens for similar offenses. I have the worst luck with rhode island hens. If I get them I wind up with injured hens, picking injuries, and once a dead rooster while I was watching. I also culled some australorps from meyer hatchery because they wouldn't stop laying 3+ immature eggs per day until they all began prolapsing one by one. So I processed all the ones left because it appeared it was all I could do. They even laid multiple per day if I kept them caged in the dark.

Thanks for stopping by. I'm so glad we don't have chinese tallow trees here. They sound A LOT like trees of heaven. I bet they'd get along great (I wonder which invasive would win).


----------



## rachels.haven

Goats eating their daily shrubery.






Ava trying to eat the camera strap.




Olivia trying to eat the camera strap in an attempt to not be out done.




Angel not falling for the camera strap trick.




There, now I don't feel like a picture slacker.


----------



## greybeard

rachels.haven said:


> Ava trying to eat the camera strap.


According to to box and instructions that came with my Cannon camera, that is not a strap. It is a (free) "Anti-theft Device."

(not joking...that's what they called it..."Free Anti-Theft Device included!"  )


----------



## rachels.haven

Ah. I see. That must be why she's trying to steal it. 

I confess, I never read the manual. Also, I always thought they included that so you wouldn't drop the camera. Pretty sure would be thieves can figure out how to get something off your wrist.


----------



## rachels.haven

Start of fall pictures. Ava's breeder has a couple of bucks that these girls are going to meet as soon as I catch them in heat.





Herd queen on pesky teen violence.




Livie on the stand getting her breakfast.




Ava getting her own shot trying to eat the "anti-theft device", as usual.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, it looks like my son gets in on the attachments. Oops. A boy and his goaties.


----------



## Latestarter

Handsome young man you've got there!   Love kids with animals!


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh no. I went to go get a buck rag from Ava's breeder and met the bucks. Yes, they were dirty and greasy, but to me they did not stink. They just smelled kind of like goat milk and goat cheese from the store. Kind of like how the does smell kind of like tide. Not that I'd eat a buck on a cracker or wash my clothes with doe essence.


Now I want a couple of really nice bucks...and maybe a few more does to justify their existence.

This will probably not happen for a while. My 3 year old did not want to be anywhere near me and my husband and five year old told me I reeked after I got back in the car. I think we'd need more acreage out of respect for my boys before I got any goat boys so the bucks can be far away from them because bucks apparently stink. I'd probably do what I do now and take care of the bucks with the chickens early in the morning, then shower, and do the children and does so no one would have to smell anyone else.

*lotsa dreams*


----------



## rachels.haven

As a side note, I have been asked never to keep these in the house again because they REALLY stink. Oily, poopy, kinda like vomity, stink that comes to you through your nose and your mouth, and I change them daily. So yes, I will not keep them in the house, basement, bathroom, kids room...
I agree with him. Plus, the kids are always feeding them people food. And eventually they will jump out of the bucket to get said food from said kids and then they will quap, quap, quap all over the floor in pursuit of food. I've only been doing this 4 years now, so I know he's right. Rat proof garage brooder it is then, just as soon as I get in a trip to the hardware store for little nuts, bolts and washers to bolt the hardware cloth to the bucket lids of my two brooder buckets. Just in time too. A fat, over weight fox came and cleaned out a bunch of orps. I opted to part ways with the remaining orps, so I have mcmurray ameraucanas and true blues coming the 22nd and we'll start over with something a little less curious, fearless, and calm...and I guess ultimately less meaty, but I guess that's what I've got muscovy for.


----------



## rachels.haven

Those are layer duck mutts, in my house.
Speaking of Muscovy:
I also picked up a lavender muscovy Old Drake. I named him Samson. I discovered the next day after pickup that he's missing an eye. Fitting, I guess. A blue muscovy Old Duck came with him. I'm a happy goose-duck breeder. Cocoa, my chocolate drake (profile picture) should probably be culled or sold to someone who feeds less. He's fatter than last year and developed angel wing. I like the size, he's truly magnificent at over 15 lbs, and his ducklings grow super fast, but I don't like the tendency towards obesity and the angel wing. His replacement would be a black Young Drake from this year's early february/april batch that is recessive for chocolate and may carry a gene for lavender dillution (Out of my pet Elvis, who I lost to hardware disease this spring). I could cross him to his two partial pied sisters, or to Samson's hypothetical offspring year after next. I don't want to keep the partial pied girls because this year I'm taking out the pied and going for solids-or at least I think I am.

I could also keep Cocoa until after Spiteful sets her first nest in February so I could get a Spiteful/Cocoa baby (Spiteful is unrelated to Cocoa and despite her nastiness, is one of my foundation females because of her early and long yearly duration of lay), but I'm continuing to tell myself I do not need more great, big, hulking drakes. It's cute how they hang out in a big, useless group though. I could also just keep Cocoa forever until he falls over dead of a fat induced heart attack, but line breeding to him would not be responsible. Assuming that he never gets too fat to breed. He's already not the ladies choice, probably because of his weight vs. theirs.


Samson and the unnamed Old Duck. I might just call her Blue. I might not. We'll see how she acts later and I'll let her name come from that. I dig Samson's sweet headgear.


----------



## Devonviolet

rachels.haven said:


> He's fatter than last year and developed angel wing. I like the size, he's truly magnificent at over 15 lbs, and his ducklings grow super fast, but I don't like the tendency towards obesity and the angel wing.


Pretty ducks!  I love your Lavender Muscovies!  We have Lavender & White Muscovies.


 

Here's a fun one of one of the hens bathing. 


 

We had a chicken set on some Pekin eggs two years ago.  One of them developed Angel Wing.  When I looked it up, people were saying to bind the wing to the body, to flatten it out.  That didn’t work.  Then, I learned that it was caused by a vitamin B deficiency. So, we started adding Nutritional Yeast to the feed and haven’t had a problem since. Although, the angel wing on our Pekin hen never went away.  That didn’t stop her from laying eggs though.


----------



## Devonviolet

BTW, we kept our first batch of chicks in the spare bedroom, because we didn't have any where else to put them when we first moved here. NEVER AGAIN!

They created a huge amount of dust. And stink???  OMG!  It was awful!  Once we built the barn, we started putting them out there. Now the barn gets dusty & stinks. But that is just fine!


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmmm...sounds like I need a barn!

Maybe if I bring this up with the husband he'll make it a priority next time we decide to change locations.

I love those muscovy. You've got consistency going on! That's really appealing. And they're a cute color combo too.


----------



## rachels.haven

I guess I could vitamin B him up next molt. He's kind of a free-range guy, so I'm not sure it will work, but B is water soluble, so even if anyone eats too much of it, no problem.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I think we'd need more acreage out of respect for my boys before I got any goat boys so the bucks can be far away from them because bucks apparently stink.


And put the boys (the goat boys!) in the direction that is generally down wind from the house and get a REALLY big fan to set outside the house when the wind shifts.


----------



## Bruce

Devonviolet said:


> They created a huge amount of dust. And stink??? OMG! It was awful!


I really do not understand this. I've read it on BYC a hundred times but I've now had 4 shipments of chicks and while the last 3 were broody hen or Mama Heating Pad brooder (last 2) after a few days indoors the first 12 were in a bathroom for nearly a month and no one in the house ever mentioned stink or dust.


----------



## Devonviolet

Bruce said:


> I really do not understand this. . . . the first 12 were in a bathroom for nearly a month and no one in the house ever mentioned stink or dust.


You had a lot fewer birds, than we did. Ours would not have fit in a bathtub. But since we don’t have a bathtub, it’s a moot issue. Having a lot of birds, we put tarps down, on the floor and then put wood chips down. In the end, that is what caused the dust.  Also, more birds produe more poop, which is difficult to keep clean. That is what caused the stink.


----------



## Devonviolet

rachels.haven said:


> I guess I could vitamin B him up next molt. He's kind of a free-range guy, so I'm not sure it will work, but B is water soluble, so even if anyone eats too much of it, no problem.


I doubt giving him vitamin B would help at this point, as it did not help our little girl.  I believe the out turned wing is caused by a malformation of the bone in the wing. Therefore, it is important to give thevitamin B from the beginning when they are small.
I personally believe that it is important to add nutrients in the form of food, whenever possible.  That is why we bought bulk nutritional yeast, and add it to their fermented feed daily.


----------



## rachels.haven

Alright. The puzzling thing was that I got him as an adult over a year old. He didn't have angel wing then. He molted last year and it showed up, then again this year. So this came up after maturation. I'd never heard of that happening before. 

I kind of wonder if I injured him during an incident where I had to handle him last time and caused some kind of damage to the joint. I had to pick him up, but he was so fat he almost got dropped (as in there were no "handlebars" to wing him by, because his shoulders had disappeared under fat as he moved, which I did not expect) and beat me with his wings as he panicked trying not to fall and something popped and at least blood feathers in his wing burst and got blood everywhere. If that's the case, I'd be happy to just keep him. He's really, really fat, unlike everyone else, but he is happy, and I do still occasionally get ducklings from him when there are multiple drakes, but only occasionally. I wish I knew if it was an injury vs. angel wing, but I feel like that would require an X-ray.


----------



## Bruce

Devonviolet said:


> You had a lot fewer birds, than we did. Ours would not have fit in a bathtub. But since we don’t have a bathtub, it’s a moot issue. Having a lot of birds, we put tarps down, on the floor and then put wood chips down. In the end, that is what caused the dust.  Also, more birds produce more poop, which is difficult to keep clean. That is what caused the stink.


Ah, I see then. Yes with a few birds I was changing out the paper towels at least once a day.


----------



## rachels.haven

Paper towels? You are brave. Give me a good, highly absorbant bag of equine pellet bedding or at least a big bale of wood shavings and I can do ducklings inside for 2 weeks (and I'm still changing it daily). I do not think I could handle paper towels even in the beginning for a day or two. I need that pine smell. 

My ducks are in the garage now because I failed to buy the equine bedding last feed shop run. The ducklings miss the chaos and handouts, but everyone's noses feel better.


----------



## Bruce

Chicks aren't nearly so messy as ducklings (or so I hear).


----------



## rachels.haven

That does make a big difference. Ducklings and goslings are almost intolerable. Chicks are just tolerable enough to make the world smelly and dusty.

BUT I may revise my thinking in a few weeks when I remember with the box of chicks that's coming my way. They'll be inside for a few days at least before I split them into my two brooders and brood them in the garage. They are SEXED, so I will hopefully only get the 3 cockerels I asked for.

I think I'm ready to begin my excess drake and drakeling-butcher-a-thon so the feed bill doesn't make me faint. It's time to stuff the freezer starting this saturday and going until I run out of drake-lets. This is the side of muscovy that isn't as light hearted, but is still fun in an artsy kind of way-once birds are done in, of course. The doing in is no fun. The making pretty roasting and soup birds is satisfying. Less feed bill is also good.


----------



## Devonviolet

rachels.haven said:


> I wish I knew if it was an injury vs. angel wing, but I feel like that would require an X-ray.


That sounds more like an injury, rather than angel wing.


----------



## rachels.haven

I want it to be just an injury. I also don't want angel winged ducklings. Maybe I'll get him restrained and look him over. Not sure I want the husband's help here because I'm worried he'll get clawed, but maybe I'll have him sit on Cocoa, or maybe I'll try to stuff Cocoa in a pillow case or feed sack and tie it and make a wing hole and then have DH hold the bag. Maybe this weekend.


----------



## rachels.haven

S'doribook Olivia was bred by Mustang Meadows J Wrangler.

S'doribook Angel was bred by Mustang Meadows KR Tahoe.

Avalon has still not had a strong enough heat and started flagging and getting intoxicated on the buck rag yet, but she will also be bred by Tahoe too.

Mustang Meadows T Durango is coming home with me because I've decided we're keeping a buck or two now. Although he's still cat sized, so he will have to spend this year growing, not breeding any ladies.

I'd like to get him a usable companion buck out of the Zanzabee or Swallow Hill Nigerians herds. We had a confusing misunderstanding with the Zanzabee lady a year or two ago when first looking into goats, so it will probably be the Swallow Hill herd that we get our buck a companion buck from if I do not retain one from Olivia. I like the Swallow Hill Nigerians builds on average better anyway. That breeder likes big teats on her does. I have small hands, so milking tiny teats is not a big deal, but I'd love a full hand workout instead of just two or three fingers. BUT you can't milk a buck (but you can spread good genes the farthest that way).

I may also retain a few does. Haven't told the husband yet. Already starting work on enlarging the penned area and splitting it. And building a buck house. This time I don't want to let the husband do it.

Funny story, yesterday I took my Angel to be bred. The kids couldn't get sitter and we have a car, so no crate could come, so I just put my favorite goat up by my feet. She enjoyed the car ride. She also peed my bare foot on the way back as a thank you for such a bucking good time. She wanted every buck on the premises when we arrived.

Cocoa got bought with full disclosure as well as a bunch of drakes. I didn't ask, but I think they wanted meat. So Samson will be my drake this year. I'll be keeping Pepper, the blue duck, and maybe Spiteful over the winter. Spiteful is a nasty broody so she may get souped rather than give me more bloody bruises. I'd rather have a bunch of Peppers. That means this year's ducklings will be black, split to lavender. Year after will be lavender.

And the chicks, I forgot the chicks. My mcmurray chicks came. They are all Ameraukindas that lay all blue and Whiting True Blues. 3 cockerels, the rest pullets. I pinioned all for safety reasons. Lost one when I switched feeds (should have transitioned slower, I guess). One chick has a sexing injury and just constantly dribbles poo and came in with what looked like a prolapsed vent. I'll probably have to cull him, but I called the hatchery and they credited me a fair bit. They're doing fine beyond that.

I'll do a better entry with with pictures later. Company's over.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's the new buck. He's in with the bred does for the next little while until my parents help me set up a buckling pen and I get him a friend. He's not very bucky. Right now the girls think he's a cute punching bag, but everyone does cuddle together at night, so them being together does serve a purpose.

I do still have one unbred doe, but the breeder doesn't think he's going to be able to breed her-he's the smallest, least mature, and least bucky one there, so I think I agree. All the other bucks were interested in the doe I brought for breeding at the time I picked him up. He just wanted his neck scratched and to be picked up. I should have enough time to get him an apron, but if he does breed my last doe it's fine. I just wouldn't mind if they waited until his registration papers come back so a service memo won't have to be done. Otherwise Avalon will be bred to his father, if she ever goes into heat for long enough to get her to the buck. Having a cute little buck rag running around might help me figure out her heats.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's some bred doe...or at least everyone but the white one on the top is bred. I'm a little concerned about Avalon. She acts so bucky sometimes I'm worried her hormones are off. She's also the tallest, so if the buckling tries to breed her he's going to have to back her up to something first. Despite my concerns, she'll probably eventually cycle and be bred next cycle (probably by the mature buck). I'm probably just being a worry wort.

The does are jealous that the buckling gets carried around and not them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's a buckling pic. This one makes him look really big. In reality he's barely taller than the red bucket behind him. This picture also reminds me that I want to tarp off more of the front of the "doe patio" for more of a wind break. It's cold and windy here now. A project which calls for MOAR TARPS and ROPE-two of my favorite things.


----------



## Bruce

He is pretty darn cute!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks!


----------



## rachels.haven

When to the rheumatologist today. My joint issue symptoms and blood work seem to only be pointing to lupus, not rheumatoid arthritis. On top of that, I'm off all medications, I got told I no longer need to be seen regularly-just if I have problems-and other than tendinitis when I do work when it's cold, I have no problems, so I'm free. Yay!


----------



## Bruce

No treatment options for Lupus?


----------



## Mike CHS

Free is good.  Congratulations!


----------



## rachels.haven

Things are quiet, so no.
I don't handle the meds well, so the benefits don't out way the risks until I'm in actual pain or being damaged in some way. Plus, my immune system does not appear to be attacking itself at the moment. I think I had a bad run of time for a while, and it's ending. I'm a little uneasy about going without bloodwork. Sure be nice to see things coming and all.
Not everything is normal with the current blood work, like I still have a positive double strand dna test, but at the last blood draw everything else was oddly normal so I'm getting a break. I don't get it entirely, but for now I'm getting left alone.

I'm suspicious that last flare up may have been build up from being severely sleep deprived for 4 years straight while I dealt with the behavior issues of my eldest. I'm hoping that as long as I don't have to deal with anything of that magnitude again for a while maybe I'll be okay.


----------



## Bruce

That sort of stress can trigger/exacerbate autoimmune diseases. Hopefully the lower stress will suppress the Lupus.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachel,

Just found and read through your journal and am now a follower.  I like the humor you have displayed in your journal.  And your positive attitude toward your illness shows you have what it takes.  I do hope your illness can become more manageable.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. I'm doing my best. And I have a very supportive husband to boot. Having a spouse with a good attitude helps my efforts to do or be anything go a lot farther.


----------



## Baymule

I am glad for you that the lupus has calmed down and that you are doing well. I pray that it stays away.  Nothing like goat therapy to make you feel better!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachel, I meant to ask you yesterday: you titled your journal "Firdbird Gardens Journal".  Did you intend to say "Firebird Gardens Journal"?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, I did. I had originally called my backyard exploits on facebook Firebird Gardens, after my muscovies. I'm going to stop doing muscovy (too much duck butchery over the last several years for me), so I guess I can change the title of my thread.
I will still keep my chickens and until I decide otherwise my normal egg ducks will stay too, but none of them will be my "firebirds".  Goats have actually proven easier and more rewarding, so I may focus on them instead and eventually use my herd name to title this thread after my username.

Regardless, this whole mess is still just Rachel's Haven, and that's my user name so that part stays.

I think I understood what you asked. Feel free to rephrase and ask again if I misunderstood. I'm a little distracted right now at the moment.


----------



## rachels.haven

We have more changes coming our way. We're still planning on relocating and the husband is starting to scope out and apply for jobs. June, I think is our target date. Tennessee is one possibility, Arkansas is another, Pittsburgh doesn't look like they want any more senior level programmers at their office. They want them in Seattle. We're avoiding selling our souls and moving to silicon valley or it's look alikes like the plague. So far 5 acres minimum is a requirement, barn a plus, dwarf goat quality fences would probably convince me. We also need at least one extra bedroom and bathroom. Means I might get a house over 850 sq feet, which would be nice especially when kids go bouncing off the walls when it's raining or winter outside.
Went to visit my parents in TN near to an amazon office that's being built. DH rode is bike to the potential office, found the Natches Trace Trail, Got up to 41 mph on his road bike...he'd like to work there, and me too, obviously. My mother's neighbor/friend passed away this year and she'd like us to live on his 6 acres next door. It's fenced on at least two sides and he used to farm hay. Fairly flat, which is good in the hills. Funny idea.
Not sure what I'd prefer. Mom or my young adult siblings could milk goats if we ever went on vacation to visit...them?...that way (or DH's family, I guess). House and "yard" would fit the bill in everything but bathroom number and the fact the office is still under construction (lol). We'll see what happens. Enough about that, I guess. We're trying to avoid working for walmart, even if the pay would be competitive and I've lived near the HQ before. Not sure what will happen.

We want to move for space purposes, because traffic has become over the top here in the last year or so, increasing heavy drug issues in the area that an acre isn't large enough to hide us from and lastly because we just feel like it's time. Husband is also interested in exploring more work options within his field. He's become one of the "old timers" in his office after almost 5 years. Not sure how that reflects on his company. I guess programmers change jobs a lot. I think sometimes it's how they get raises when they work for the giant companies like google and amazon.

Before vacation I came to my senses and decided to give my muscovy breeders to a friend of mine. She's always wanted ducks like them, and she takes good pictures and puts them on social media. No more butchering muscovy. Small ducks only, if possible. I might eventually go down to just savage chickens birdwise, since they make the eggs we eat best (although it is molt now). Just not having a muscovy army to deal with in June will be a huge help. I'd like this spring to be the spring (and summer) of the goats and getting chicken eggs and avoiding making more ducks.

Going to get some more stock panels delivered hopefully next week and finish my buck pen. Then I'd like to hurry up and build a shelter in it. I'd like the pen and shelter to be ready BEFORE I actually have to split up tiny Durango from the girls around kidding time moving or not (he'll get a friend too, I'm working on that). 
I'm going to tack some more stock panels on the order so I can enlarge the doe pen around an area so holed up by groundhogs that it can not be mowed and as a result is wild. They'll have fun in the sand when it dries out this spring after they're done eating all the invasives. I would take pictures, but it is cold and wet today. I do not like cold and wet. It makes it hard to put up stock panels. Anyway, that's it for now. Almost time to go walk and get DS#1 from the bus stop.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachel,

Good to have your update after your absence.  Do you and your DH have a time line for moving?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep, probably in June, when my son's out of kindergarten for the year. We're kind of excited.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> My mother's neighbor/friend passed away this year and she'd like us to live on his 6 acres next door. It's fenced on at least two sides and he used to farm hay. Fairly flat, which is good in the hills. Funny idea.


How is the house; price, size and condition? You can always add on to get the extra bathroom. But, will it still be for sale in June?
How well to you and DH get along with Mom?


----------



## rachels.haven

The house isn't for sale yet. The sons had a lot of rental properties, but don't want one on 6 acres. When they get to it they will sell it. It's 1,647 sq ft. We could add onto it later, the only concern is if the septic system is big enough for a family (and I hope to have our family grow plus, teen agers can use a lot of water), but if it came to it we could ask about it's capacity. Davidson county can be weird about letting you build onto your house or septic system though, we have been warned...although I'm not sure what the person warning was trying to do and if it was...a good idea or not.

There's also two properties down the road in Cheatham county being sold by two separate friends of my mom that are dividing their acreage as they age or as their children have health problems and need their care. We'd still be "neighbors" separated by a few miles, and the one property would be 18 acres with a house, the other I don't remember. It has a house. My mom is also personal friends with a person who is a real estate agent in the area, so if Amazon would just hurry up build that office building we could move into a place with lots of connections. I spent part of my childhood in the Nashville area, another part in Arkansas where we'd be moving if that is what we wind up with, and yet another in Iowa (no leads in Iowa though), and many of my mothers friends in the south stayed put.

Everyone gets along fine in my family, which may be a little odd for some to hear. We're good at coexisting while giving each other space. The only slight concern is my mother's goose army. I gave my mother geese earlier, so she went out and made a child and husband unfriendly goose army. The existing fence between properties does a good job of keeping the properties separate though. If we decided to go that route.


----------



## rachels.haven

In regards to the next door house condition, it is sound, but likely needs redoing, but it's "zestimate" maximum is within what we can afford without lasting debt so we have a little flexibility (I figure we'd probably have to "update" every house no matter where we go because we are carpet haters).

Personally, I'd go more for the property down the street, but 5 acres of old hay field next door to my parents 3 acres is appealing (yeah, 5, not 6, but that's okay with me, I remembered it wrong).


----------



## Baymule

Oooooohhh…..moving adventures!


----------



## Bruce

Sounds like you have plenty of options down that way!


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep. We've also thought about Google in Madison Wisconsin, but that's cold! It also doesn't quite feel right.


----------



## Latestarter

Seems I recall driving past a very large Amazon (or was it Google) place here north of Dallas on the way to the airport... Must have been amazon as I just looked and it seems google is also considering building a center down here.


----------



## rachels.haven

We also considered Texas. I think my husband said there was something in Huston that was an option. We consider it unlikely though because the property values in the area for property that meets our requirements was a little high. But my brother in law's mother would like us to move there, because she and her ranch are in the area, or at least more in the area than she is now. Michigan and Texas are a little far away. Also, better weather. It's still an option. I'd like it. We'd just have to look harder for homes.

I'm not 100% sure but my "brown" buckling seems to be getting some black on him. I coppered him a few weeks ago...we'll see I guess. I was suspicious a little because he started black and turned a beautiful red brown and was browner at each visit, but if he just stays the color he is I'd be happy. If he turns black again I'm not sure I'd mind either.

My last open doe still hasn't gone into heat again. We took her to the breeder when I thought she was in heat last and she climbed a wall to get away from him and no breeding occurred. He wasn't super interested either. We separated them to prevent injury. She's also not interested in the little buck at all, and he's not been interested in her in the slightest (not that he could reach, she's kind of a tall nigerian and he's kind of a small buckling). There's a slight chance she got bred while I was on vacation, but my gut says that's unlikely. I'm starting to wonder if she cycled at all and just acts bucky when the other girls are in heat. They're not cycling anymore so there's no more blubbering, moaning, going to war with, or riding the other ladies and she's just her typical nutty self. Maybe she'll go into heat and get bred someday. We will have old enough bucks on hand eventually, so as long as she cycles ONCE then she will get bred.

This Saturday I'm ordering more stock panels to enlarge the does' pen, get more invasives cleared, and build a buck pen and shelter. I'll take pictures as I do that-gray skied, dark, dead foliage pictures, but the goats will be cute.


----------



## greybeard

If you like high prices, high temperatures, high crime rates, high humidity, and high water, high quantities of biting/stinging insects, high property taxes, high auto insurance rates, high numbers of auto accidents and gridlocked roads, and comparatively high local sales taxes (2% on top of the 6.2% state sales tax) then Houston should be high on your list.

"Among the 10 states with the lowest per capita property taxes, a majority are in the South, where sales taxes are a more prominent source of state revenue. Texas is a notable outlier, relying heavily on property taxes while not levying state individual or corporate income taxes".


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, kind of figured that. I'd rather go to Huston than Seattle though. It's amazon, so there's a huge pull to get strong programmers to go there so they can be squeezed dry. We're not going to do that. We did that the first two summers we were married and it was terrible (for me, DH was fine). We'll see what happens. I won't know for certain until a little closer to the end of the school year when my husband can start applying for team changes. He's talking to people, but June is a few months off, so it's all putting out feelers and hearing the stuff off the grape vine.
It's really compelling to want to move sooner though when your kindergartner's school sends home a paper informing all parents of their policy on what they're going to do with children that come in high.  Parents smoke in their cars before school with the kids in their seats and windows up (can't damage their house with smell), then drive, yes drive, to school and dump the kids at the pickup line (people drive high a lot). Poor kids never stand a chance and have no choice. Unfortunately high children (and adults) at things like the library or in parking lots are not uncommon here already. I about started crying. It's really heart-wrenching to see it happen with he pre-k library storytime group. I'm not sure I'd have the heart to send a student home early like that so they can be exposed to more smoke. I'd at least want to give them the school day away from home anyway, but I understand the behavior aspect. I wish Michigan wouldn't keep throwing kids under the bus like this.

But anyway, we're going to be okay. Moving was over-due. We've kind of stayed longer than we're comfortable. We just have to find a slightly bigger home with slightly more space that we can pay off quickly and an open position. We moved here in the first place to buy an inexpensive home that we could pay off in 2 years right out of grad school. We've done that, we're now financially stable to buy a very nice home with cash somewhere else. The school is actually pretty nice too, IMO. But I think it's time to go due to running out of space, local drug issues (and not just pot), and DH wanting a team change.

As of this vacation I think DH is secretly hoping for Tennessee. Reaching 41mph on your bike on a bike trail there can do that to you, I guess. Hurry up winter!


----------



## greybeard

rachels.haven said:


> Reaching 41mph on your bike on a bike trail there can do that to you,


People ave different priorities I suppose, and I can understand shooting for the mythical 88 mph in a thunderstorm, but what if he had only reached 39.5 mph?
How fast I could go on a bike (or on/in anything else) has never played in to what location I chose to move to.
 Tenn sounds like your dream destination and you should plan accordingly.


----------



## rachels.haven

That would be very nice. We'll have to wait and see though. The office is still under construction. I'm not sure how long it will be or if it will be ready in a reasonable time frame at all.

The drawback to nashville is that they don't always have nice schools. I'd take it if I had to though. I'm not sure how much it matters for elementary school yet, and I'm not sure if the rumors are true or "true".

I'm not going to put all my eggs (of hope) in one basket yet even though I do want to go live there. I think we'll wind up where we need to be. 
(I do have my minimum requirements so I can take comfort in that, gotta have my goat friendly, kid friendly property)


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> a paper informing all parents of their policy on what they're going to do with children that come in high.


They should not be doing anything with the children, they should be turning the parents in to the cops.


----------



## Mike CHS

I agree to that!


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes. They should be. I hope future policy and laws shape up in a way that better protects children.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, now I'm starting to wonder if my buckling isn't turning black again, just dark, dark brown. This is a fun guessing game. Not sure how much it actually matters.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, now we know where we're going.

When the Nashville people failed to respond to inquiry, the husband decided to look and see if there were any rural offices anywhere within the company and see if there were any job openings that he could transfer over to fill. He found only one office that was originally a startup that Amazon bought and it had one opening. The manager was eager for him to apply.
Today he got the job.
I guess we're moving to rural Massachusetts. Which by the numbers is apparently just as cold as here. *excuse me, I must go    in private*


The DH is excited to work on their side project. The schools will be better than here. Workplace is bikable supposedly and only a few miles from good properties for sale (very $$$,$$$ properties  ). Houses are bigger and properties often include barns.
The biggest upside is that the office is only an hour's drive from Rosasharn farm and I still need a second buckling so I can separate my guy before kidding. I think I might be able to find a buckling with a good milking pedigree there.

Unfortunately, I believe we're are supposed to be there in February, not June, but I'll know more about that later after the details get worked out and become official.

So I guess we have big changes ahead in the very near future.

Life doesn't go on hold while we're waiting on details though, and now one of my does, Angel, is acting a little off. She tends to reject her grain just as part of her character, but lately she's been rejecting it, seeming a little sluggish, and has lost just a little condition-she's less fat now (still fat with no feelable ribs, but less cushion). She never bounced back activity and eyelid color-wise after the last worming like the others did, so I ordered some safeguard to use instead of ivermectin, which is what we have been using, and I wormed her today and started her on some red cell, pro-bios, and fortified vitamin B complex gel because I caught her staring into the sky watching after nothing briefly while I was trying to grain her (I also have the injectable form and will probably use that tomorrow). And I have a vet's number if that starts up again or if I don't see improvement soon or if anything else concerning pops up. The funny thing was, I've been watching her color every day, and it seemed to be improving. It's like she faded and lost progress over night. But I guess that's the way it goes. I'm checking her. I can get in touch with a vet when I need to. She's still eating and going to the restroom, just not grain and her behavior is not quite pronounced enough I could actually show it to anyone. She's just anemic with no grain appetite at this point. But I'm watching. I'll be keeping her on the red cell for the next week, I think and maybe the vitamin B too and I'll reworm her in 10 days.

It shouldn't surprise me though. Our pen is small, it's been raining constantly and things are WET, and Angel always seems to need a little extra help and pampering to recover (I did get all the supplies to cattle panel off the rest of the overgrown portion and give them a huge pen and a buck pen, but now we're moving apparently and the panels and posts will be needed elsewhere soon).

Ooo. My time's up. While I've been distracted the 3 year old has helped himself to the big bag of chocolate chips in the freezer and drawn himself a new pair or two of eyebrows. And it's almost time to get his brother off the bus. Gotta go! No more writing.


----------



## RollingAcres

Congrats to your DH for getting the new job! MA is just as cold as Michigan!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachel,

Congratulations on your DH getting the job in Massachusetts!  You won't be too awfully far from Miss @RollingAcres and Mr. @Bruce.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## RollingAcres

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Miss Rachel,
> 
> Congratulations on your DH getting the job in Massachusetts!  You won't be too awfully far from Miss @RollingAcres and Mr. @Bruce.
> 
> Senile Texas Aggie



STA you're right! We'll all be cold together. 
She'd be closer to me than to @Bruce . He's WAY up there in VT.


----------



## WolfeMomma

ooo yay someone else up here in the cold! we are in Maine


----------



## Latestarter

Ma is not a large state, neither are any of the (true) New England states except Maine. You can drive through a portion of all 6 of them in a day, and stop to eat meals along the way in different states. One nice thing is that being closer to the coast, you'll have access to really good (cold ocean) seafood. I do miss that a bit being "inland". Weather wise, it will most likely be similar to what you experience now. Pay should be better, but prices much higher, and a lot more taxes there. Congrats on having a direction and idea as to where you'll be this time next year! I expect you'll love the countryside and scenery, as well as the non flat ground.   Hope you find a nice place to buy and live.


----------



## Bruce

RollingAcres said:


> STA you're right! We'll all be cold together.
> She'd be closer to me than to @Bruce . He's WAY up there in VT.


True, I am assuming Western MA if there is open land. Likely not a long way from you. So Rachel, what is the general location in MA? I drive to Northampton twice a year, 200 miles one way.



rachels.haven said:


> I guess we're moving to rural Massachusetts. Which by the numbers is apparently just as cold as here. *excuse me, I must go  in private*


Not quite the temperature and longer growing season you were hoping for. 



rachels.haven said:


> Workplace is bikable supposedly and only a few miles from good properties for sale (very $$$,$$$ properties  )


And $$$ taxes. (as I see LS mentioned).


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks all,
Yes, taxes. Especially property taxes. They are technically lower than the Detroit area, but because of higher property values they work out to be higher per household. And we'll all be cold together, yes. In our own homes with the heat turned up and a blanket and a book at the end of the day hopefully. I'm still into winter hibernation, obviously. I just have to keep my beasties happy and my kids from going insane.
Seafood sounds like it could be enjoyable. I'm excited that it will actually be MORE sunny there than here.

DH won't be working there, but the central office that I know I'm for sure supposed to talk about is Marlborough. DH's office will be somewhere approximately north of that, maybe a little bit east or west. It may still be in gentleman farmer territory, but it looks about as rural as we'd be Tennessee from google maps and by the numbers. We're going out between Christmas and New Years to house and area hunt.

Crossing my fingers for a barn and a coop, 5-10 acres, and a house that doesn't make everyone sick every time it rains, and a good place to raise my crazy kids.


----------



## Bruce

Much too close to Boston to find anything "affordable".


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep. That's the way I'd put it. BUT if half of the household works for amazon that likes to locate in the middle of big seething cities, and the other half grew up on the edge of a small town in the rural farmland wilderness and would really like to stay there, that's what we wind up with. We can afford it, it's just really not fun affording it. Really, really not fun-not that we're into economic hardship territory yet, thanks to savings and high pay we were hoping to put into a very early "retirement" but will now go into down payment and a good chunk of the actual death loan.

We're just happy it's not Virginia. Looking at those houses was really painful.

For perspective, our current house and acre cost us $34,000. Our next home will cost a lot more than that. This house was kind of for saving up, and now it's worth a little bit more. We know there's going to be a bit of sticker shock going into this next home.


----------



## Latestarter

Actually, right on the border as I recall, though it's been a decade or two... Used to be if you were outside 495, you were in the country. You will be close to Worcester (SW) though, which is a pretty big place, and not exactly high society...   In addition, you'll be right along the Mass turnpike; I-90 (just south of Marlboro), so you won't want to live in that direction. The traffic will be horrendous,as well as all the other negatives with living like a sardine.

If the hubbster is a caring guy regarding your likes and needs, if you look west/NW of rt I-190 you'll only be ~15 miles as the crow flies from downtown cityville, but will be in legit country. Even if you move almost due north up toward Littleton and then west toward Ayer, Groton, Lunenburg etc. you can have the best of both worlds. Easy commute for him as right near major highways, but still country living for you. Really pretty country up around Ayer.


----------



## Bruce

My guess is anything in that area of MA is going to cost well north of 10X your current place. Oh, and you want some acreage?


----------



## Latestarter

Well, I wasn't commenting on the price(s)... just the location.


----------



## rachels.haven

Alright, thanks. I'll look those areas up/keep them in mind as we find places to look at. So far we've gotten as far as Bolton, Stow, Lancaster, and I think Clinton scoping for houses. I really want to actually get out there and see what there is to see. Right now we're going off of maps, population densities, and goat/rooster/zoning laws as well as acreages available within our price range. Lots of Zillow and Google Maps hunting going on right now.


----------



## Bruce

And I wasn't commenting about the locations you mentioned, just prices anywhere that close to Boston


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Lots of Zillow and Google Maps hunting going on right now.


LS is good at that. He was real thorough when looking to move from CO.


----------



## Bruce

Maybe you can get a foreclosure.


----------



## Mike CHS

Bruce said:


> Maybe you can get a foreclosure.



That's what we did .  We are only an hour out of Nashville and got our place for the value of the land only.  That being said we put a chunk of change into our place after we got it.


----------



## RollingAcres

Bruce said:


> Maybe you can get a foreclosure.



That might take longer than normal until closing and if things need to be fixed up then even longer. Would they want to wait?


----------



## Bruce

Have you LOOKED at the prices in that area? They would want to wait if they could get a better price on a place that meets their needs/wants.


----------



## rachels.haven

Looking at prices isn't exactly an inspiring experience. We can afford it, but it doesn't mean we want to. They don't call them savings because you want to spend them, I guess. As far as foreclosures go, this time I think we're going to try something a little more nice. We still want to able to pay it off in five years, but this round we will actually take out a mortgage.

That being said, we do not need a three car garage, a pool, and vaulted ceilings, nor do we want them.

Lately it feels like God is kicking us out of our house. We've flooded this winter for the first time in years. Normally this time of year we're dry. Everything is wet. We get water proofed the first week of January. Unfortunately the person heading off the waterproofing project demolded first and scheduled the waterproofing later in Jaunary, which means the mold has grown back with a vengeance and now the house is uninhabitable and we've all developed coughs and congestion worse than we've ever had before from the house. So now we're staying in a friend's basement until we leave this weekend for house hunting. After waterproofing we will demold again.

Things aren't too great right now, but I guess they could be worse.

I've already de-chickened and de-ducked to a friend (keeping my goats) so as soon as we have a home that isn't trying to kill us to go to we will do what's necessary and just move. Company pays for most moving expenses, from what I understand. I kind of want my life back together. It would be nice if we hurried up and found a house. February 4th is DH's startup date, and while he can work remote a little bit, he may run out of new thing he can do remotely. We have already found several that meet our criteria and are "affordable".

I will be more optimistic once I'm out of town, house hunting, and maybe not coughing. And maybe re-chickened and the goats safely in my barn and everything buttoned up for the rest of the winter.


----------



## Bruce

I hope you find a good property quickly. Sometimes things just fall into place.

Sorry about the flooding, last thing you need when you are wanting to sell and move.


----------



## RollingAcres

I hope you find something soon.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachel,

We all hope your trip goes well.  Please keep us all posted.  And pictures are NICE!


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, I've been feeling guilty about the lack of pictures so I found the camera in the house and moved it to the car. It's waiting to do something.
I was tempted to take a picture of my buckling today. He's doubled in size but I had my hands full keeping the 3 year old human animal out of the house while I was goating. Trip pictures would be fun to put up.

I'm really enjoying reading other people's journals and threads right now. It's nice to read about life in general going on. I'm glad there's life beyond mold.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

And we are enjoying reading about your adventures as well.

Also, since you and your husband will be looking for houses in MA, you may want to read my post to @CntryBoy777's journal about a buyer's representation agreement with a real estate agent.  It may help you avoid paying too much.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## greybeard

rachels.haven said:


> They are technically lower than the Detroit area,


I didn't realize there was any inhabited property left in Detroit...


----------



## Latestarter

Of course there is/are GB... mostly by wild and feral animals...


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, silly @greybeard . Its actually getting more crowded very fast. We get caught in stop and go traffic on a regular basis now. Do not drive between 3 and 7:30 anymore. Grocery shopping is becoming very difficult with the fast population growth, especially the weeks in the month before Christmas. Four years ago it was almost vacant including around the holiday. Going back to being busy city area.


----------



## Bruce

Grocery stores are usually pretty quiet around 3 AM


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachel,

Did you and your family have a white Christmas?  If so, did you take any pictures?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Hi again! We had some snow on Christmas, but nothing accumulated. It was still quite nice though to be with family with the kids all peacefully playing and happy. 
House hunting isn't going the greatest. Today we saw a 18th century farm house with a 17th century mother in law's quarter with a dairy barn they were trying to turn into more house in Harvard. It seemed a little much and was in town.

We also saw a house of Boxford that needs it's septic replaced asap as they'd just had some sort of septic explosion downstairs and it still reeked, but somehow is still listed as "move in ready". We saw a house in sudbury with a boiler exploding water all over the basement. Looked like a boat inside, complete with water. Lovely kitchen. Saw a large purple house in Marlborough that appeared to have had some bad amoteuring and was huge and needed more work. Also a shed is not a barn.
Then we saw a normal, non defective, huge house in Northborough with 5 acres of hilly land and no outbuildings. House looks good for family, not so good for fencing or sheds. That was the best one today. Nothing on the list for tomorrow, but we are still looking.

Also took Hubby to a piano shop to have a chat with the spouse of the owner and give them DH's number in case they get anything interesting in since DH has opted to stop killing his 100 year old converted player and leave it behind. It made him happy, and now the shop owner will keep an eye out for us.

Taking care of DH's loves are a lot easier than taking care of my own. Still trying. I might wind up with goats in calf huts in my front yard in a dumb colored rural McMansionish thing, but I'm still looking and praying.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I might wind up with goats in calf huts in my front yard in a dumb colored rural McMansionish thing, but I'm still looking and praying.


Geez I hope not. From what you have said a McMansion would make you anything but happy. Keep looking, there are good houses out there!


----------



## rachels.haven

thanks. We will. I'd settle for a bigish, somewhat ugly house if it was good for all of us and the animals at this point (I think we're traumatizing our poor realtor, as she's a family friend). It's kind of a bad time to be house hunting. It would be a little embarrassing, owning a big house and showing my parents but if that's what I have to do to get space near to DH's work, on 5 acres or more, and with at least two bathrooms and three bedrooms that's what we'll do. It has to not be flooded, especially not recently with sewage.

 This emoji is from my five year old, who is in love with moving emojis. It in this instance pertains to nothing above, though it seems to fit in quite well with today's events. Kind of looks like our poor realtors face in a few of those houses.


----------



## Bruce

Must be interesting to be a realtor and walk into a house for the first time not knowing if you are going to find a gem or sewage.


----------



## rachels.haven

We saw two more houses since I wrote last. One had a huge gas leak, so we didn't get to look it over much (poor real estate agent didn't want to get exploded or something and I din't either). The other we put an offer in on because the house was nice enough for DH AND habitable, had a small barn with a hay loft, and flat enough to use and wasn't out of our preferred price zone. Offer was countered but not by much, so we gave them it and it was accepted this morning. Sellers want to close asap (buying a house elsewhere) which is good for us so closing date will be as soon as the mortgage people allow-I believe in the second or third week of January is what they said last night.

 I will get a picture of at least the barn and yard (tiny) and part of the property (big, wooded). It's on almost 7 acres and zoned agricultural residential so I can do as I please. Lots of horses everywhere and conservation land next lot over. The only neighbor I can see has an alpaca. Good sign I guess.
 High taxes but good schools and roads and libraries. 20-something miles from DH's work, which is a bummer, but there's a good chance he won't even have a shower there so biking to work would not have been a good option anyway, or so he says. Biking to groceries or to lake/river beaches and trails are more likely. 
Next time I get out there I'll take pictures. I originally intended to, but so few of the houses we went to go see were actually "fun" or safe to be in, so I got distracted and forgot.


----------



## Mike CHS

Congratulations and I hope things go well and quickly for you.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> One had a huge gas leak, so we didn't get to look it over much (poor real estate agent didn't want to get exploded or something and I din't either).


It is amazing someone would even put that on the market, talk about a liability nightmare!

Glad you found a place that fits your needs.


----------



## greybeard

rachels.haven said:


> Lol, silly @greybeard . Its actually getting more crowded very fast. We get caught in stop and go traffic on a regular basis now. Do not drive between 3 and 7:30 anymore. Grocery shopping is becoming very difficult with the fast population growth, especially the weeks in the month before Christmas. Four years ago it was almost vacant including around the holiday. Going back to being busy city area.


When I was a teenager, Detroit was the 4 or 5th largest & fastest growing city in the USA. Population was right at 2 million (*1,849,568)*. Today, it is (wiki) 23rd largest city with a 2017 population of  673,104. It hasn't been a 'top 10' US city in 18 years.


----------



## Bruce

That is a lot of serious decline.


----------



## Latestarter

Congrats on finding an acceptable place for both of your needs.  Looking fwd to some pics when you get the chance. Hope the move goes smoothly and you're able to get all settled in. You will actually have time to maybe prep for some garden space as well as the animals that you want/need.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! Yes, I REALLY want my life back together soon. Being molded out of my home and moving has really disordered my quiet little orderly universe and I'm ready to be finished with that now. 

Detroit may never re-become what it once was-walking around the down town and going into some of the buildings you can see how grand it was-but the suburbs are growing to carry that weight. If the suburbs would quit bloating and city people actually worked to fill the city back in it would probably come close. But I think the whole area is going to be okay. It's really congested because the suburbs are built ONLY for cars and not that many cars, but people are getting by. Brutal traffic though. The Boston area is better based on what I've seen. In Woburn at the moment.


----------



## greybeard

growing suburbia contributed greatly to Detroit's historic decline but that was not the only factor.


----------



## Bruce

In some cases people get sick of the commute from "outside" and see that there are a lot of nice older homes in the city for a reasonable price and move "inside".


----------



## rachels.haven

Last night, late at night I realized that even though I didn't take pictures I could probably pull pics from the add and put them up, at least for a little while. So here we go. The house is a little large, but the market was fairly limited. I think the kids will like it on rainy days at least.

So here's the barn.




And here's the hay loft. The barn is visible from the master bedroom.




And since this is "backyard" herds, here's the backyard. The acreage goes on to the left side and above the house. It includes a creek.



Anyway, I think this is okay. The website wants you to "share" the pictures, so here's a share.

Can't wait to get back to home so I can be with my goats and prep things for moving. I'm already looking forward to giving everyone a brush down, hoof trim, and a fresh bed to lay on at night.

I also need to remove the inner cattle panel shell of their pen so the panels can come with me with the other panels that are laying on my driveway and the extra posts in the garage. That may or may not involve patching up some welded wire so it can contain them and last the lag time between the movers taking the panels and us taking up the goats. Not that they want to be anywhere except for inside their shed right now.

I'm not sure what kind is available still, but since we moved to gentleman farmers' horse country it appears there is still horse hay available for sale at various local feed stores. That's VERY nice, whether or not I'm taking my round bales.


----------



## RollingAcres

Love that barn! I could just live in the barn instead of the house. lol


----------



## greybeard

rachels.haven said:


> I'm not sure what kind is available still, but since we moved to gentleman farmers' horse country it appears there is still horse hay available for sale at various local feed stores


Buy it, and load it all on a trailer and bring it down here. You can name your own price. In regular years, horse hay was going for over $10 bale...about 45# bales. This year, hard to say, since there isn't any to be had here.


----------



## rachels.haven

I know! It would mean less vacuuming for sure!!! (*grumble, grumble, unnecessary grumble*) Plus, when the kids trash rooms and dishes get dirty while you're not looking or not home, where the animals live always looks SO tidy and low maintenance.

I feel really blessed the way things are working out. We don't really have a home to sleep in right now until things are waterproofed and de-molded.  And next month we're moving into THAT. So we just have a month at worst to crash at the SIL's house, maybe less if we can get the mold people back out sooner and/or closing sooner.

Btw, I'm SO bringing my round bales. They are part of the stuff in the garage in my book, and there are only two of them and they are "small". It's nice hay. But it's a nice feeling knowing that if I run out it will not just be tsc whatever they've got compressed bales until first cutting time.


----------



## Mike CHS

I'm so happy for you that things are working out this well.  Your future home and farm looks awesome!


----------



## Latestarter

Have to agree with others... take your hay with you! Aside from the fact that you'll have less to worry about, most goats don't like complete change all at once. This way you can gradually introduce "local" hay from your new place/area so they can adjust.

That's a beautiful property you're purchasing! I too love that barn!  Your goats will be in heaven with all those trees/leaves and undergrowth to eat. Aside from a full perimeter fence, I'd probably consider just doing movable internal electric net fencing to move them around to different areas of the property. That way they don't "kill" any one area and stuff has time to regenerate.

Hope the old home remediation goes quickly and smoothly and that your move is uneventful.


----------



## rachels.haven

Closing/move in day is Feb 1st. We're heading out on Tuesday or Wednesday with Ava, Rango, Angel, and Livy in plastic dog crates on a tarp in a mini van (testing the goats' okayness with the crates was fun-wound up with 2 boys, a buckling, and a doe locked in one). My oranda goldfish will be joining us in a 5 gallon bucket with a lid and a sponge filter with a 10 gallon temporary tank for our arrival.

The goat vet came out to take blood for testing and do exams and tattoo recording for scrapie.

The moving company is coming to pack up the house on DH's work's bill. They are bringing the hay, cattle panels, and t-posts. I'm stressing. No, I don't have to drive, pack, or load, but that won't stop the stressing. SOMETHING has to cause complications.

This weekend we got 6" of snow over 24 hours and the lazy county/towns refused to plow more than once (at the beginning, of course) so things kind of shut down and there were lots of accidents because suburban detroiters can't be bothered to slow down and tone down the road aggression even temporarily. We spent the day throwing everything out-I mean organizing closets so we did not make it to TSC in New Hudson due to bad conditions and worse drivers, so I still need to go and will probably go tonight. I need more alfalfa pellets and a compressed bale to use for the trip over and until the moving van comes. Also getting pine potty pellets and possibly course flake to use in the crates. Also picking up extra pro-bios tubes.

My journal will not be fun to read from this point on until we get moved in and at least semi settled. Now that that disclaimer's issued, I feel free to complain about -5 temperatures. Check.

Worry, worry, worry, worry, gotta go bathe the kids! The more temperamental of the two is off for MLK day, so things are not quiet or slow atm. Lots of savage yelling fast boy-children. The three year old is not bored with his brother around though. *insert recording of manic child laughter and the sound of disaster here*

Anyone know anything about preventing lyme disease in goats? Apparent New England is a hot spot and that would be a fun and distracting topic to worry-I mean learn-about. Wish there was a human vaccine.

There. All done journalling for now.  Hopefully I'll see you all on the other side of the move.


----------



## RollingAcres

Best of luck with the move and hope everything goes smoothly!


----------



## promiseacres

RollingAcres said:


> Best of luck with the move and hope everything goes smoothly!


X2 sounds like an endeavor


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> There. All done journalling for now. Hopefully I'll see you all on the other side of the move.


Yep, lots to stress over there. It is hard enough with just a couple of people. It will be fine. Welcome to the neighborhood (relatively speaking).


----------



## Latestarter

Many of have gone through it before to some degree or another. I sure hope all the worry is for naught. Have a safe and endurable transit to your new home.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Had to go out of town for a bit and have just now caught up.

I hope your trip goes well and that you won't have to deal with bad weather.  Moving can be a hassle, but your family is starting a new adventure.  I hope you come to love your new place.  Refresh my Senile Texas Aggie memory -- is your new home in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, or am I WAY off base?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Bruce

Mass, so no you aren't off base!


----------



## RollingAcres

rachels.haven said:


> Closing/move in day is Feb 1st. We're heading out on Tuesday or Wednesday with Ava, Rango, Angel, and Livy in plastic dog crates on a tarp in a mini van (testing the goats' okayness with the crates was fun-wound up with 2 boys, a buckling, and a doe locked in one). My oranda goldfish will be joining us in a 5 gallon bucket with a lid and a sponge filter with a 10 gallon temporary tank for our arrival.


Getting closer to Feb 1st! Be safe!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. Lots of hectic-ness going on. We got here and closed today. I am plunging into the no functional phone or internet rift and I will be back later next week if I can't catch some internet next time I go into town earlier than that. See you all later.

The house and barn are great. 
At closing the home owner informed me we do have bears and that I should always take my bird feeders down on time because bears have stolen his and broken down the posts they were on as they were dragged off. So I guess I'll be doing a google search on the nuances of keeping chickens and stock around bears. I might need to trade my skunk spraying-pepper spray for bear spray and another air horn. But I do like air horns, so that may not be a problem.

PS: Now I own a snow blower and TWO chain saws and a bunch of cool big yard toys toys. Original owners left us all the house/yard maintenance stuff as they were moving to an apartment. I also have enough extension cords and shop lights to make a girl very happy...although the barn has power and lights so I'm not sure what's wrong with me. 

Pictures will come, but life is crazy right now, as to be expected, so I'm a little busy living it rather than documenting it.

Anyway, after tonight I will probably be gone for the next few days to a week. We'll see though. Maybe things will go quicker than I think.


----------



## Latestarter

Congrats and welcome "home!"


----------



## rachels.haven

Smooth as it can go with these dear little animals in tow...and the goats! (fall/summer picture)





Before we left the top kid made me a new flock of chickens and a coop because I let myself be slightly down for a few minutes too long.




I rather like them, even if now they're preserved in only pictures.

So I lied, I forgot and did have some pictures I could put up. Of course, I'm on at 6 am before we leave the house we're staying at with the internet, but hey, here's something to look at. Journals are better on here with lots of pictures.


----------



## Latestarter

Those are two very happy looking kids! Can only imagine how much fun they're going to have living on a "farm"! Oh my!


----------



## Bruce

Congrats Rachel, things will smooth out after the move.


----------



## rachels.haven

I think things are settled down enough to post.
Well, the fish made it back in their own tank on untreated well water like fish should be. Fish are also awful to take pictures of. I'll spare everyone the rest of the blurry fish pictures. They're fat and white with double tails and red wens and never sit still unless I grab them and hold them still...and they're alive and that's good enough.  Just pretend I gave you a good picture.  (ETA: and I only grab them to move them occasionally, otherwise they wouldn't let me)




And here are the goats and they are so much better at sitting still than the fish. The barn has two lean-to areas but is really more set up as a lawn equipment barn, so I've had to "fix" it. The bucks have a side and the does have a side. After the cold the ground is too frozen to pound posts so I've had to staple my cattle panels to the barn itself to give them outside area. I've also fence stapled cattle panels to the inside to make two stalls and put a pallet up in front of the stairs so I don't have goats racing up and down the stairs and using the hay loft for post digested hay. Everyone's happy except for the buckling, Mr. Rango who is off on his own on the other side of the barn and has a new buckling buddy coming to live with him this weekend. He's particularly unhappy because Avalon went into heat and he wants to try to pester her. There's so little space currently I was concerned for his well being so he's on his own. He usually gets butted around the pen for paying too much attention to anyone then has to be alone for the rest of the few days or everyone pounds him. He is not an effective breeder yet-those two does keep cycling and no one takes him seriously. He will have to survive until Saturday. The does seem more relaxed with him out of their way so I think it's for the best.

Angel, the black and tan doe, is due at the end of March to Rango's father.


----------



## RollingAcres

Happy for you guys!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> and put a pallet up in front of the stairs so I don't have goats racing up and down the stairs and using the hay loft for post digested hay.


Ah come on, they would have such fun!!!!

Nice barn! Glad everyone made the trip in good shape. Well the animals at least, how did the humans do? Still a bit stressed out?


----------



## rachels.haven

Us adults are a little stressed still. The kids did great. The goats will recover-I think one needs a worming as she's a little pale. The adults have no desire to be in the car behind the wheel for more than a few minutes ever again. We opted to round the lake coming out here instead of going through PA and the Poconos because we always wind up in blizzards in the mountains when we head that way. Well, we got caught in a blizzard in sub zero weather, in the dark, minus the mountains as we headed towards Buffalo. Between the heavy road salt making road lines non-existent and the heavy snow on the road making the road go away our nerves for driving are shot. Other than that we're doing fine.
I'm quiet mainly because I'm madly unpacking. Our movers "unpacked" us by dumping out a lot of the boxes on the floor in random rooms of their choice. Some boxes they were nice enough to leave boxed. Stuff is broken, spilled, messy, and I'm cleaning it up. Not thrilled by the moving company the relocators picked for us, but as long as they stay away from us now I'm okay with it.

The dust from my other house makes me ill-I'm more sensitive to mold than most, but I'm powering through it slowly. 

As soon as I'm done here I will probably go back to unpacking some more. It's really weird to have so little stuff and try spreading it out over so much house. I clocked 7 and a quarter miles mostly indoors yesterday on my pedometer because I was curious (and putting it away anyway). My four little goats are just happy in their barn, filling up on alfalfa pellets, avoiding eating that yucky, bland EXPENSIVE $10/bale grass hay from agway, and Rango's waiting on his friend to come and be his companion while he tries to entice does to pay attention to him.

I really wish hay prices weren't so high here. Locally alfalfa hay is about (gag) $18.50/50lbs. Most of the hay is grass. There's a guy a few towns over who trucks it in from upstate NY that I've been talking to that is selling it for $9/bale, which is a bit more normal. When he gets a moment I'm going to get a lot from him and fill my barn with enough to last until 2nd cutting time. Apparently this is horse country and horses eat grass hay, and the alfalfa didn't go well to boot-or so they tell me. We'll see what next year brings. Generic pelleted alfalfa at tsc is $15/50lbs, back in Detroit it was $12. I'd expect hay to be more expensive here than there, but not by that much. Maybe a similar price increase ratio? Plain grass hay around Detroit by the square bale was $5-$6/bale. Here it's $10. That seems high.

But that's enough of that. Things seem to be going better around here. DH is getting used to the driving. I haven't had a car much during the day so I haven't been. There will be some learning to do there. I'm amazed by how not drafty this house is and how warm 68 degrees really is. Last house had over a 10 degree temp difference from the thermostat by the exterior walls and upstairs. This house is way bigger but does it's job heating and staying heated better-and the bills are about the same $$ wise, which is ridiculous.

Not that much more to write. I'd like my house in order and my barn full of hay. I need to keep moving and make it all that way.


----------



## Bruce

Serious drought in the NE last summer, only one cutting of hay. Maybe the rain will be better this year and the price will come down?



rachels.haven said:


> Between the heavy road salt making road lines non-existent and the heavy snow on the road making the road go away our nerves for driving are shot.


Been there, done that .... got the stress. Nothing so fun as driving in a snowstorm in the dark to tense up every muscle in your body.



rachels.haven said:


> Some boxes they were nice enough to leave boxed. Stuff is broken, spilled, messy, and I'm cleaning it up.


They are financially responsible for anything they broke. Sorry they didn't do a proper job. Definitely would have been easier for you if they had marked the boxes by room and put them in those rooms unopened. Now you have a mess to figure out rather than going through things on your schedule


----------



## RollingAcres

Bruce said:


> Been there, done that .... got the stress. Nothing so fun as driving in a snowstorm in the dark to tense up every muscle in your body.


Totally agree!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachel,

Is that a picture of uour barn at your new place?  If so, it really looks nice.  I hope you get to feeling better and that your family is happy at your new home.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, and thank you. I think things are going to be great. I'm almost through the worst of it and very glad we don't have much stuff.


----------



## greybeard

rachels.haven said:


> Yes, and thank you. I think things are going to be great. I'm almost through the worst of it and very glad we don't have much stuff.


Don't worry...time will cure that "not much stuff'' problem.
I'm told inanimate objects can't reproduce, clone or even hybridize but I don't believe it.


----------



## rachels.haven

You're probably right. I'm hoping not, but you probably are, lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

Rango got his friend today. I have to send in the registration papers still, but here is Rosasharn MM Mili's Buckeye, aka Ronan. Rango seems very happy to not be stuck with those mean old does and have someone to fight over the bucket with.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here are the does, trying to break out of their pen as usual. It's windy and cold today, and all they do is hide all day when it's windy, so they're shut in the barn when it's windy, so I shut them in instead. We're working on getting wood to frame stalls so I don't have to keep jumping in windows and over the pallet to feed and water my goaties. All the wires they can reach in their pen have had the breaker flipped so they're off, btw. I don't trust them. They can't quite reach the bucket outlet.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's all the yard stuff I have to move out of my animal space. My animal stuff is already starting to take over as I use it.



 

And here's the loft that I want to stuff with hay. Working on a delivery. Would love to find a hay guy with a hay lift.



 
Loft door open. Sure hope this loft is functional.


 


Frozen pond I got to walk around on. I feel like this is more of a drainage pond. We also have a creek. Right now it's kind of big and full of now frozen snow, and I didn't want to slide down the hill, so I didn't photograph it.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Loft door open. Sure hope this loft is functional.


Looks like it should be. How high off the ground is the floor of the loft? If you don't have delivery with a lift, I wonder if you could make a sliding beam with a pulley system that could extend out when the door is open.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm not sure how high it is (DH owes me a new tape measure after he used it for an unfortunate unapproved plumbing use right before the move, so we'll get one). I do know that if you fell out of it it might kill you-so for now it's just very high. I'll look that up and see if we can build it, if not now, then eventually. That sounds like a good idea. I want to USE the hay loft.


----------



## Bruce

You could buy a hay elevator, maybe you can find a cheap used one.


----------



## rachels.haven

I may eventually. For now I'm probably going to have the hay put where the lawn stuff is and I'll lug them upstairs one at a time over the course of a few weeks. It might be a fun challenge to help keep the winter blues away-but then again framing and putting up real stalls for the goats would also do the job. We'll be okay. I just really want that hay stash put away so I can relax and feel prepared on that point.

8-12 inches of snow coming on Tuesday, but I'm not worried about the actual snow. It's going to be above freezing after that point for a good long time and DH can work from home when necessary especially during the actual storm and until it's cleared.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> 8-12 inches of snow coming on Tuesday, but I'm not worried about the actual snow. It's going to be above freezing after that point for a good long time and DH can work from home when necessary especially during the actual storm and until it's cleared.


----------



## RollingAcres

9-12" of snow coming for Tuesday over here as well. So the commute home will be a mess. Glad your DH can work from home. I don't have that luxury.


----------



## Bruce

I DO!!!!!!  ('cause I'm retired)
Still have to get up way too early so DD2 and DW can go to work. Kinda hard to be a lift attendant or a postal clerk from home.


----------



## RollingAcres

Bruce said:


> I DO!!!!!!  ('cause I'm retired)
> Still have to get up way too early so DD2 and DW can go to work. Kinda hard to be a lift attendant or a postal clerk from home.


Get up early clear the driveway then take a nap after DW and DD2 go to work.


----------



## Bruce

Yeah but I still have to get up, dress for the weather and go out! I'd rather wait until it is done snowing.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachel,

How are things going with you.  Haven't heard from you since last Tuesday.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Pretty good. Unfortunately I've been doing that unpacking and organizing thing post moving adults are stuck doing every spare moment I've got-although I have been on reading others's journals. Not much to report on my herd's front, but I'll give you what I've got going on at the moment.

I suspect Angel is pregnant with only one kid. March 28 is her day 145, so I've picked up a CDT vaccine to use at the appropriate time. She is small, but definitely pregnant.

I attempted to breed my other two does to Millies Buckeye, now aka Ronan, but they both appeared to go into a second stronger heat 6 days later, so I'm not sure if it took. If they are open I may let them stay open until fall so next year everyone kids together. 

We have a large number of Coyotes in the woods around Groton. The scream and howl A LOT. I've opted to continue locking in the goats for the night. Also armies of turkeys and some deer.

Getting ready to materials for my chicken shed and run and for framing stalls for the goats-WITH GATES. I'm getting tired of crawling through the barn windows and going over cattle panels. I don't have a truck, so I'm going to try to order and ship my stuff from either Lowes or Home Depot all at once. We've done this before and liked it. It's much less hassle than trying to buy and load it all, and after cost of renting a vehicle and multiple trips are factored in it just about makes sense.

On the hay front, I went to a place called Low Places Ranch and looked at their 2nd cut alfalfa hay and their orchard alfalfa hay. Both hays are very green. The alfalfa looks a little on the stemmy side, the OA is very soft, not much alfalfa though. I'm waiting for a nutritional analysis on both before setting up a delivery. They may have the equipment to put it up in my loft so I don't have to put what's on the ground floor up there and work around oodles of hay. They're a big hay place out here.

Also trying to decide if feeding 15% alfalfa pellets from tsc ($15/50lbs) with cheaper grass hay ($10/50lbs) and grain will cover all nutritional bases and be more economical than buying alfalfa hay at $18/50lbs in February during a bad alfalfa year to feed with the grain. I'm also trying to find a long term haysource in the area that delivers, so a little extra expense if it means I have a stable source of good hay in the long run is worth it. Not totally sure what I'm doing yet. Definitely waiting on nutritional analysis. I'm not sure I'd want to depend on pellets so heavily forever. 

Today I didn't do much of consequence other than feeding and watering the goats. Ate something I was allergic to yesterday (on purpose because it couldn't be that bad, right? and that was dumb), so I've been hanging out in the house watching kids today, trying to stay comfortable. Muscles and tendons have been sore. Eventually I got sick of laying around and decided to go chip all the ice off the front walk. It's clean now. Very long front walkway. Not sure why anyone would put that in. Decided not to play with the "new" snow blower that came with the house and clear off the driveway in case my angry muscles decided they didn't like the abuse I've already given them. I've overdone it before and wound up senseless in agony for days and I can't do that right now (DH doesn't really want to work from home until work is boring again). So far I'm fine. Did laundry (how do kids make so much?!). Waiting for my body to stop being angry at me for my dietary indiscretion. Could be worse, I guess. 

Up until I got notification of a reply on my journal I was sitting on the couch alone learning about soap making while the boys had male bonding time with DH over smash brothers or something. Now they're down and monkeying around so I guess I'd better go brush their teeth. They should be tired from sledding all day.

Sorry I don't have more to say. Winter is so slow and quiet right now. I am stuck thinking about hay, baby goats, and soap. And bedtime.

Please pardon any typos. I'm out of time for editing.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I'm getting tired of crawling through the barn windows and going over cattle panels.


Oh come on, where is your sense of adventure? 
Hope your body perks back up soon.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, my sense of adventure doesn't want to fall on it's face.
And thanks! Feeling a little better already.
I'm hoping to show hay in my barn for my next post. I want my own hay stash! (I mean, what if the local feed store ran out?! We'd have a goat mutiny on our hands! Alfalfa pellets and grain ONLY? No way. They've got to have their hay.)


----------



## Bruce

And you KNOW that if you don't have yours in for the season the providers WILL run out right when you need it.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachel,

Haven't heard from you in awhile so wondering how things are with you and your family.


----------



## rachels.haven

We're doing okay. I've been giving the goats free choice alfalfa pellets and free choice hay from the local feed store. The hay is dusty and smells like weeds, but the goats aren't eating (or wasting) much of it anyway. Everyone is doing okay, and Angel is due to kid March 28th. Last night it looks like we got about 10+ inches of snow in addition to the thick layer that was already there, so I guess it's not spring yet.

DH and I did this last night.


----------



## rachels.haven

We decided the cattle panel stalls had to go and the does got their pen put up first. The door hinges come on Wednesday and the pallet goes. We're not letting the barn be a tool shed any longer. Does approve. Sorry about the glowing eyes. For some reason Angel's eyes ALWAYS glow in flashlights or camera flash or headlights etc. even if the other goats' eyes don't. The funny thing is she's the least devious one. She's sweet and extremely obedient (except for on the milk stand). It's not an indication of her being evil, lol. It just looks awful.


----------



## Bruce

NICE! 

10" of snow! Way down there, wow. We got about 1" last night.


----------



## rachels.haven

lol, I was hoping for more like one (minimum was 4 though). Want to trade?


----------



## Bruce

Nah, I'm hoping I don't have to buy rims and snows for the new car until next fall. Don't need ANY more snow!


----------



## RollingAcres

We got about 2" of snow last night. I'll take that over 10" of snow! I am DONE with winter, Spring can come anytime now please.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hay delivery is coming tomorrow. It's second cutting grass mix from a farmers exchange 25 minutes from here. No analysis, but I bought a bale earlier and it smells good enough to eat and has alfalfa and clover in it too. The goats, well, they will eat it, but they would rather bellyache for alfalfa pellets. 

I finished the barn renovation. Not sure if I posted about that earlier or not. I used my drafting class skills to draw up a plan that would have gotten me flunked out, but did the job, used to to order wood and materials from Home Depot, paid the extra $80 so we didn't have to buy a truck or shop with tiny...helpers...running around causing chaos, and the bulk of the delivery came the next day with hardware coming the day or so after that. I only botched up the hinges, which we could fix at our local Ace. DH and I put up the doe's stall (I think I posted about that), and we finished up the other side of the barn last week. With some of the extra wood and the welded wire I keep around I built hay feeders for everyone, so no more buying hay bags for them to destroy, so I think our barn renovation is done for now. ONTO THE CHICKEN SHED, I guess...and coveredrun, because I think we have nesting redtails in the yard behind us. It also appears they use(d) the barn as their relief station in previous years. I'd like to discourage because they're large hawks but mainly because it's disgusting down the back barn wall. Maybe us running around the yard all the time will help.

I got photos of the barn, but it looks like I took them on my phone and not on the camera, so I guess I'll post them later. Whoops.

I also got a batch of barred rocks from McMurray on Friday (this is Sunday) with a couple whiting blues and greens thrown in for the kids since blue and green are their favorite colors and I didn't want to order them a bunch (25!) of "grandma chickens", aka milli fleur d'uccle bantams. My mother loves them, but they look like predator snacks to me and they always seem a few crayons short of a box. I'm looking forward to when we can de-food waste our garbage again. Before I had it so everything edible when to the birds. Still a bit small at this point, IMO.


----------



## rachels.haven

Found some pics of our backyard. Guess I'll put them here, since the oldest son and DH are playing video call with the phones and I can't upload barn pics right now.


----------



## rachels.haven

Now the youngest kid wants turkeys and a deer farm more than ever. The farmers exchange visits we did didn't help. They had royal palms running around all over the parking lot. All that turkeyness inspired him.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lots of turkey pics. There are armies of turkeys and they're not super shy.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh rats. Didn't mean to get that smiley potato pic in there. Like the world needs one more picture of them. I took that picture because I thought they looked creepy. Apparently DH never had them before and I saw them in the store, so I got them and made them. They are potatoes breaded in potato. And not meant for BYH.


----------



## rachels.haven

Retook the barn pics since DH still has my phone.



Here's Durango, happy in his stall, going on 9 months old now, believe it or not. He's cute alright, and very little, which might be good, and has some dairy and show lines behind him. He also still begs to be carried around. He's buckish at this point. He's the smallest of triplet bucks and his dad was small too, so I expect him to stay short. He's also the hardest goat to photograph without getting headless goat pics and/or only half his body in the frame.


 

And here's Buckeye chewing his cud in the most unflattering way possible, waiting for dinner. He does hold still just only in bad positions.


 

Standing still.


 

Angel hits day 145 on the 28th. I'm betting she's having one because she's not a boat at this point. She is over the top grouchy at the other goats though. I bet they can't wait for her to go to the kidding stall.


 

Tried the bucks with flash on while Angel was getting her grain. They were not terribly amused.

 



Darn headless goats.


 

Anyway, there are some pics for the journal this week to get you all caught up. Hurry up spring!


----------



## Bruce

That barn work looks real good, makes everything easier for you. 



rachels.haven said:


> because I think we have nesting redtails in the yard behind us.


Don't need that!



rachels.haven said:


> Oh rats. Didn't mean to get that smiley potato pic in there. Like the world needs one more picture of them. I took that picture because I thought they looked creepy. Apparently DH never had them before and I saw them in the store, so I got them and made them. They are potatoes breaded in potato. And not meant for BYH.


We like to see lots of different things. Never heard of breading a potato with more potato, what's the point?


----------



## rachels.haven

The hay is here, and I've put half of it away already. I didn't want the man from the Farmers Exchange to get stuck in the mud by the pond and barn so I had him put it in the garage. Taking a break now.

In regards to the smile potatoes: I think breading them in potato flour makes them crispy and forms a skin so when they pre-fry them the moisture stays in every time and there is a lower incidence of dry ones. I'm sure somehow it makes them cheaper too. I really like the way they taste and their texture as I ate them as a kid in Iowa growing up. Tastes like childhood. They were really popular in school lunches. I think the holes make them fry faster as well, a bit like a White Castle slider patty. I was just happy about it because I haven't been able to handle wheat for a while now, and I bought them for the boys and DH thinking I couldn't eat them, then as I was reading the bag for directions I noticed they were gluten free and threw my own little party for something I don't have to give up. And I had smile potatoes for dinner too. 

This hay looks nice. I've been using it for the last few weeks already, just bought one bale at a time. The delivery guy told me to watch out for bad bales, as they've had a few borderline ones, and to listen to my goats if they won't eat it and I can call in and they'll credit me for the bad ones no questions asked. They have goats too. He also says they are down to 300 bales and will get another load, from a farmer in Vermont this time, and he likes that guys hay better than this last batch. This batch has been fine so far though, but I will be on the lookout for bad bales.

I've got to go now. I need to move that hay before DH comes home and discovers half a hay wall in his parking spot in the garage.  (How on EARTH did that get there?!) I woke up thinking of building a pulley system for the loft door in the barn this morning, believe it or not. I think I just might.


----------



## Bruce

I like your hay guy, sounds like a straight up person. 
Hmmm, I think I suggested a pulley hay lift, maybe I just thought about it.  If DH wants to park his car inside, he'll help move the hay to the loft 



rachels.haven said:


> Tastes like childhood.


----------



## rachels.haven

I knew someone suggested it. Good idea then, Bruce. 

We're going to finish moving the hay tonight. We've only got 6 bales left, then the three heavy shavings bales he brought. Just took another break to make and eat tacos. Kids are being silly nincompoops and refusing to eat composite food again, but I expected that. They have quesadillas in hiding for when they try the food I made for dinner-which are also composite foods, but cheese doesn't count when you're 4 and 5, I guess.

It's a good feeling to have the next few months hay bought and here. Counting down till my first kidding now.


----------



## Bruce

Kids can get weird with food. Kinda hard at their age to say "eat this or get yourself something else" because the something else might not be acceptable to you. There there is the "Eat this or eat nothing" method, some kids are mules and will eat nothing just to spite you (they think).


----------



## CntryBoy777

I sure have been around a few....in the recent past, as a matter of fact.....


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, yep. My kids try to eat nothing to spite you, then get moody and hangry, unmanageable, and feral...like little Sasquatch. I'm told that someday they will grow up and have to feed themselves the majority of the time and may even grow a sense of self-preservation. My plan is to make sure they survive until then. I love those crazy kids.


----------



## rachels.haven

CntryBoy777 said:


> I sure have been around a few....in the recent past, as a matter of fact.....




So I take it your kids are in bed then?


----------



## Bruce

No, he and his wife were living with daughter and grandchildren while they looked for a house in FL. Found one and moved in a couple of weeks ago. Been a long while since @CntryBoy777 had little ones underfoot.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Naw........I have 4 daughters that all have their own....we just stayed with DD4....and she has a 8 & 2 yrolds, we just moved to our new "place".....and are back to being us....well, as best we can do with our stuff 800mi away in storage....but, will be going and getting them next wk.....


----------



## rachels.haven

Sorry, clearly I should be reading your journal too.  Wow, that's rough! I hope by this time in two weeks you are being even more like you. Moving's no fun until it's over. Good luck!


----------



## rachels.haven

Hay, hay, hay!



 


30 bales of hay! That will last us a while.

As a side note, one of the cockerels in my chick bin is making himself out to be a cull for freezer camp. He's three inches tall, covered in fluff, and chest bumping and biting my hand whenever I go in to feed or change water. Sheesh, what an attitude! I'm also suspicious I'm hearing crowing squeaks already. He'll be tasty if he lasts that long.

I'm enjoying my barred rocks auto sexing ability, btw. Other than Mr. Aggressive Chick, I can already pick out the two other males. If their temperaments are decent these will be fun to breed.


----------



## Bruce

Curious since I don't think BR's are autosexing. Maybe it is a BR cross?


----------



## rachels.haven

Sorry, on my phone so this might be short.
The males have 2 barring genes, so as chicks they are lighter, have yellow legs and a less defined head spot. The barring gene is attached to one of the sex chromosomes, and in chickens the females are the heterozygous sex (unlike humans where the male sex is) so the pullets can only have one barring gene and and the black base color is less broken up by it therefore they are overall darker, blacker legs, fewer bars on adult feathers, more defined head spot, etc. I think I've heard that breaks down sometimes with the more show or heritage lines, but these are just from McMurray so the chance of being correct on sex by color is pretty decent. I should do pictures and show you, come to think of it. I'll do that tomorrow, although Google may beat me to it for you. Right now I'm in town for a quick errand so it will have to wait.
Lol, short.


----------



## rachels.haven

I like the feet the best example-wise because shading doesn't always show up right. Here's a male


----------



## rachels.haven

Different male


 
Female


 
Another female


 
Head spot/shading male


 

Female


 

And chicks vary, so there will be the occasional nonconformer, but that's usually the way it goes. _Usually._


----------



## Bruce

Interesting, I guess I got a non conformer. Here are my 2 BR girls at 1 week 
 
As you can see, the one on the right has a huge white spot on her head, the one on the left has almost no white. They do both have black on their legs and toes though. No idea which is Arcadia and which is Vienna but they have both been laying for months so I'm 99% sure they are girls


----------



## rachels.haven

I bet the legs are more reliable. On day one all my chicks spots looked the same. Later the males seemed to lighten, but it could just be I could tell them apart then, but the legs seemed to stay consistent. Where'd they come from? Also, I'm suspicious if you took chicks from one line and mixed them in with chicks from another line or hatchery you'd wind up with a bunch of mostly unsexable chicks because they need to be compared to chicks of the same line. It's kind of all about comparison, and that's not the best kind of autosexing. But it sort of "works"...most of the time. I'll take a slightly greater than 50%change of sexing them correctly myself over not knowing.

Well, today Angel did not want to jump on the milk stand for her grain. It was too high this late in pregnancy for her, so she only got what she could reach from the ground. Then she did not want to go into the doe stall where I let her go during the day after spending the night in the kidding stall with free choice, no competition, alfalfa pellets. Then she didn't want me to leave her in the doe stall and cried and cried her mournful "maa" for about 20 minutes after I left (she can see me through the windows of the house and KNOWS I'm there). Then around lunch time I decided to see if the does wanted to go out to "roam". The two young does took off like shots, expressed disdain for the mud, were led through the mud where they quickly ate a few mouthfuls of dry leaves off dry ground, then hoofed it to the barn where they refused to come out...probably because the ground was wet or they were overwhelmed. Angel walked. She can not go fast. I'm thinking of letting her stay in the kidding stall if she's inclined on her own-but that's 6 days! She's not happy to be in with the lunatics though. I may try to get her to hold off a few more days, then let her have some peace and quiet.


----------



## Bruce

My original 12 came from Ideal in 2012, still have 1 BA, 1 Faverolles, 1 Ancona and 1 EE. All the rest came from Meyer. I have no idea about their breeding or if they care if their BRs are autosexing, they have vent sexers so maybe all the non straight run birds go by them. I do believe that their BA line is muddled. The 2 I got in 2015 do not have slate legs and pink soles, they are black with yellow soles. My bet is someone sometime decided they needed to get some size in their line and threw in some Black Jersey Giants.


----------



## rachels.haven

d'oh! I wonder if your BR's had a little muddling in their genes too. Hatcheries usually just vent sex unless they specifically breed for sex-linkage, so they may not care. And hybrid vigor is good, hatcheries and keepers like that, and technically birds are pure bred native on appearance, but it can cause little off things to pop up. I wish they'd just cross strains within the breed. Lots of hatcheries keep australorps, and breeders too. Go figure, I guess though.

Mine may have muttage in them too for all I know. All I know for sure is that they have the textbook sex-linked characteristics and it's working for now.


----------



## Bruce

Who knows, some time I may be down your way and can see your critters  Though mostly I have my twice a year trip to Northampton and that isn't very close to you.


----------



## rachels.haven

Fun idea. Maybe by then if it ever happens the ground will have thawed and I'll have pens up. Maybe we can have you over for dinner or lunch or something similar. We're not really close to much of anything, though, just as a heads up. Not exactly rural, but kind of out there probably due to slow roads.


----------



## rachels.haven

It's Sunday and today Angel has refused to leave the kidding stall for a walk. Eventually, I just left the stall door open and walked out of the barn and very, very slowly she walked out, watched my husband and I talking for about 10 minutes then lumbered back to her stall. Her wide load has stared to settle downward in her body too, so she's starting to look a little more hollow. She is willing to stand, stretch, yawn, wait for you to bring her food, and slowly take a few steps to the other side of the stall to the hay, pellets, and water. I'm sure she has a ways to go, but I'm starting to wonder if she is going to stay pregnant until Thursday. I did manage to find her ligaments today-soft and gummy feeling, but definitely there. I couldn't find them at all earlier. Now they're clearer. Her rump seems to have changed angles as well. I'm sure it will get more pronounced as the week wears on for her.

A neighbor came over today to try to drum up some babysitting for her daughter and bring a treat and say hi. They seem nice. They also let us know that each of them and their horses also got Lyme disease when they moved here and they advised us to get our yard and into our woods sprayed. And that they already found a tick on them from their yard today. Yay. I guess we'll be spraying too. I really don't need Lyme disease on top of my other health issue and my kids DEFINITELY don't need it (DH either, can't forget him).

Got a family history insight on my health issue recently, but don't want to go into great detail here. I'll just say that my grandmother (you know, the one that doesn't like my mother and her kids, I'm sure everyone has one of those) and three of her daughters have it, and my sister just got the diagnosis and it runs in families. And it's an autoimmune thing. And it's hard to catch. And it's often misdiagnosed and the symptoms are almost every single one of my symptoms to a T. If it is what I have, and they can catch it this time, I might be able to live pain and damage free for the rest of my life. My rheumatologist only called what I had non-steroidal rheumatoid arthritis because she couldn't figure out what it was and put me on meds "to see if it would control it" and it would take a few months for the drugs to have an effect (we specifically asked her about this, she was dodgy). I'm a little disappointed in her. Telling her it didn't help for months was disregarded, and eventually I told her I refused to take it anymore and nothing changed except the meds side effects going away. Then we moved. Yee hah! Obviously I'm praying and asking family and friends for extra prayers and thoughts. I feel like catching this thing before it seriously alters your life and body takes quite a bit of luck and/or blessings. My sister's doing better though. Maybe it will be okay for me too. I really hope so, at least. 

BUT that's enough of that (way too much in fact). We're just waiting for baby goats here!


----------



## Bruce

You are close to Boston. Must be some good RA doctors around. Much as I'm sure you don't want whatever this is, at least you can attack it better than guess work, trial and error.

DW has RA, has had it pushing 20 years. She was on Enbrel a year after it was approved, switched to Humira about a year ago. I expect without those she would have been in a wheelchair long ago. How is DH's medical insurance?


----------



## rachels.haven

It's "good" insurance. I need to get tested for this family thing first before going on with the RA thing. I'd also rather be absolutely miserable and immobile before going back and risking going on the hydroxychloroquine or something similar again, plus the symptoms I had didn't quite match up with RA, I didn't feel settled on the matter, and the meds didn't change anything after 9 months (if memory serves). Still painful, but now with drug side effects. This other thing may result in an appointment with an endocrinologist. If I have it, all my symptoms will be explained, will be treated, and RA will officially be a misdiagnosis.
I'm living on ibuprofen right now and having trouble with the other symptoms getting worse, so solving this mystery soon would be enough of a relief to make me cry. In the meantime the chickens and goats will get fed, and the kids will be clean and fed and the one put on the bus, and the house will still be cleaned, even if I have to stay on acetaminophen and ibuprofen to be able to move.


----------



## Bruce




----------



## rachels.haven

Got a hay analysis done on the hay I bought so I could get a rough idea of what I would need to feed for a ration. Looks like I'll need to keep feeding a little alfalfa pellets to keep calcium and phosphorus in balance, but I was surprised at the protein. It's 13.9%. I thought grass hay was always under 12%, more like 10% or less. The grass should be awesome with alfalfa pellets.

Waiting on Angel to kid. She's poofy, ligs almost gone, udder filled but not hard, and keeps moving her kids around and grunting. I can still find a ligament on one side if I have her stand a certain way. She smells strongly like the does do when they go into heat-reminds me of tide laundry detergent and the smell is kind of clingy and it seems to be making the bucks go crazy in their stall next door. I'm glad she's in her own pen or Ava or the bucks would probably be riding her sluggish self and Angel is a lap goat, not a party goat. She wouldn't want that. She just wants to sit around, chew cud, be given cheerios, and be uncomfy. I shaved her udder and rear zone today too. That was something else she didn't want, btw. Took a lot of cheerios to come back from that one.


----------



## Bruce

Hey, at least she can be bribed


----------



## rachels.haven

This morning Angel kidded three black bucks. 

The first is undersized and lacks teeth, which I find odd. Nothing's erupted yet. Both others had sharp teeth already. He was dried completely but got chilled anyway, so he had to come in for a while and I gave him some colostrum a few times today. Angel is ignoring him, so he might be a bottle baby if he lives. I'm worried about him. He still hasn't pooped and it's 6pm and he was born around 7am. The plumbing might not be right.

The second was huge and is hard to deliver. I had to help. He's doing fine.

The third was DOA and appeared to have passed a day or two ago. It wasn't stinky yet, but it hadn't just died that morning. 

Angel is doing great. Everything happened that needed to happen. I collected and froze some colostrum for emergencies and for the weak one after the healthy buck ate.

I'll put pictures up later. It's a little hectic now. I wasn't around the house all morning so now I have to make up for it so I'm kind of busy. Plus now kids are out playing in the nice weather in the mud, so as soon as they come in there will be even more to do.


----------



## RollingAcres

Congrats on the bucklings!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you!
We lost the tiny buckling last night. It did get cold. I think something was off about him. He was nursing and he got quite round, but nothing ever came out the other side. I don't think there was much I could have done in the long run to make him work. Yeah, I could have taken him in over night and his mom would have taken him back (she was still guarding him this morning too, that was sad), but he probably would have just died in here, maybe a few hours later. The remaining one is doing great-very robust, active and happy.

Saturday evening the buck's fence lost enough fence staples a panel fell off-I think as the barn wood warms up the staples fall out since they're not really fence pushers. So the bucks ran away-one ran away to the barn to raid the milk stand, and the other ran away to the doe pen to pee on his face. Not sure how long they did this, but my son spotted them, so I shook a cheerios can and they booked it back to their pen for the promised treat, which I gave them. Conditioning is great.

Buckeye's behavior when loose makes me think my two does are still open. They were enjoying the show a little too much. I'll probably try again this late fall if they are. I wouldn't mind a warmer kidding season. Fall kids would have been nice, but everyone is healthy and alive so I'm happy.

I'm thinking warm thoughts so the ground thaws around the pens. I have to go pound some posts in and put up my more permanent barn pens! Those staples are not staying in even in places they don't get stress-I probably should have gotten bigger ones, but they were supposed to be temporary and held when it was frozen at least. 

I'm also excited for the future. If I can learn how to stretch and put up 2x4 woven wire in a solid enough way to hold in 50 lbs goats long term I've got a lot of wooded pasture land to fence in for grazing and brush management-a goat's favorite thing to do. Less purchased food, happier goats, should be a win-win as long as the tick thing works out okay.


----------



## rachels.haven

I got my home depot order earlier last week. Today I am starting building the chicken coop, starting with a perfectly square and level 8x8 platform. Gotta get my barred rocks and the Whitings out of my house. I think it's warm enough for my muscles to not cause me grief. I will be satisfied today if I get the platform leveled and square and overjoyed if I get the two plywoods put on to make it a floor. I will still be happy if I do none of this. 
Here's one buckling picture.


----------



## rachels.haven

Looks like I'd better locate tarps before putting the plywood on the floor platform. It's square and level. Might stop there for today.


----------



## rachels.haven

Project report. Yesterday I was feeling good and things got out of control so BAM, goat pens appeared. Now I'm locking the goats out of their stalls for the day to keep the bedding clean. They have lean-to s after all.


----------



## rachels.haven

When I can close my hands again I will run "goat baby saver" around the doe pen so Angel can come out.
And here is the chicken shed progress. No more barred rocks, btw. As four inch chicks the kids had become terrified of them, so I decided to just stick to Easter eggers for now. Fewer eggs, but maybe we'll all get bit fewer times.


----------



## rachels.haven

After the coop and pen are done I have plans to begin fencing some of our woods for goat consumption. That is a little ways off though. It will take a lot of work to do that too. The ground here is definitely not sandy loam.

Btw, @Bruce if you did ever want to come for a visit and needed to stay the night we'd probably want you to wait for us to put up a guest bed first. Right now it's just a room that we haven't gotten to yet. In-laws don't seem to mind, but it's a little embarrassing. We've got this big house, but very little furniture still. Eventually we'll figure out shopping here, but right now we are hiding behind denial and just letting the kids run in the open space. The guest bed is near the top if not the top of the list though.


----------



## Bruce

Spend the money on the animals! Guests can sleep on the hay bales  

Or do like @B&B Happy goats did, air bed. They used it for themselves before they got their bed. After them living there 2 years, I was overnight guest #1 , their air bed is quite comfy. Pack it away when you don't have guests and let the children have fun in the open space. 

Interesting about the Barred Rocks. I've not ever had a mean chick and I've had 12 different breeds. Now as adults some are more aggressive than others, but never toward people.


----------



## rachels.haven

Heheheheh. YES. An excuse to buy more hay.

Or an air mattress, but I like hay better.

We will get something. The in laws are coming back in May. At this point that's all I've got planned that would require a bed, so I've got two weeks to figure something out.


----------



## rachels.haven

I might be getting another buckling. This guy's mom produces over 1000lbs per lactation and so does his paternal grandmother. I hate spending so much on an animal, but I really wanted one out of this breeding, and there it is, and we can do it, so I guess we will. I have a deposit down on him and we're working out a pickup day.

On a positive note, I think Avalon, who I am trying to turn into a FF so I can see her udder, which is supposed to be nice, is solidly bred to Ronan aka Buckeye. If she doesn't take I'm not sure what to think. They had a pretty wild party day.

Olivia, my other FF hopeful, is either bred to Ronan and a month pregnant, or has gotten away with going through her whole heat screaming/bugling with her bum against the wall for 4 days straight AGAIN (she was loud this "heat" but that was while Ava was in heat and Ronan was in there, since they tend to cycle together and there was a buck in her pen and that always makes her bugle and freak out). While I was watching last couple cycles, Ronan just looked freaked out at the incredibly loud, unfriendly, never receptive doe in the corner that was making the whole barn a nervous wreck and did not make any attempt to breed her the whole 4 days BUT I penned them together anyway, and I wasn't watching the whole time so maybe, MAYBE he plucked up the nerve and got lucky. If she is not bred by November, which would mean we've been trying to breed her for over a year, she may have to be sold to a companion/pet home. She doesn't have blue eyes, but she is quite pretty and flashy with her black tights and black and white spots, and has become affectionate to me and the boys despite being a nervous goat. She could be somebody's pet. I guess if she cycles again, I could try penning her with Durango, but he's 8 months old and under 40 lbs still, and while he has great genetics, he's not very wide, and I'm not sure I want a herd of miniature nigerians, so I was planning on just watching and waiting to see how he grew up instead of using him as a buckling. He's so tiny feminine looking I'm not sure if he'll make my cut or not. He might be good at refining corse does or bringing down a herds average height though. I like his personality, so I'll keep him around for now.

Angel and Junior are doing great. The kids decided to name Junior "Sir Finnegan", so I guess I should start calling him that. I ran chicken wire around the big doe pen I set up and turned Angel and "Finnegan" out in it and let Mom hash it out with Ava and Olivia and things are going great. Nobody beats up Finnegan. And Finnegan definitely knows he's a buck.

Oh, and get this, Finnegan's apparently POLLED. So I guess Angel is too, despite being disbudded (the buck I used from Ava's breeder certainly wasn't). So I guess in the next month or so I'll be selling a polled, black buckling. He's developing great. He's got nice long, straight legs, and his rear legs seem to have a nice spread, and if he had an udder there'd be a good place for it. His back is VERY straight. If he weren't related to my herd while I'm starting I'd consider keeping him, but I'd rather have unrelated bucks that can cover all the does if needed. Also, Angel's udder is not my favorite. She does have a nice rump angle, straight, strong, more correct legs than an average nigerian here, and she's nicely wide. And she's not pot bellied with a swayback-which actually a lot of middle of the road nigerians are around here oddly enough. So someone could probably use a "Sir Finnegan" in their buck pen. The hard part will be getting good pictures.

Getting a quart of milk per day now from Angel at morning milking. I think she enjoys getting a break at night from her buckish buckling so she can sleep. Plus, he's not far away. She can still see him. He's just in a crate in the same stall.


----------



## rachels.haven

CAncel on the polled. All it took was for me to say that and the horns that had been under skin for the past FOREVER-the skin came off in my hand today and there were horn buds. Weird. But that's life.


----------



## rachels.haven

Disbudded the delightful Sir Finnegan who was too big and wide for the standard issue disbudding box. That was the difficult thing. Next time, EARLIER.

So earlier I'd ordered an iron but got the pygmy tip. That was dumb. By the time I realized it wouldn't work Finnegan was a few days old. Then the breeder down the street said he was polled so I quit worrying. So last Friday I ordered the portasol dehorner, clipped his incredibly fast growing buds down to the cup size and did it. It's a more expensive iron, more for cows, and especially $$ to rush it (because I was dumb), but it worked really well and fast. I do not like searing off goat buds and horns, but I feel like it could have been worse. Hopefully I did well enough there will not be scurs. Now to cancel the rhinehart coming from Jeffers. I like counts of 3-5 that come with the butane portasol one better than having to burn for longer anyway, so I think it's worth a phone call.
My poor baby goat has a shaved head top and disbudding injuries now, but he's officially hornless. Turning the worry on that subject down.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yesterday I noticed something was wrong with Ronan aka Buckeye's male bits. His sheath had dark crusting on it and his poor wizzer seemed stuck out. Put him on the milk stand today and took pictures (gosh, the things I do for my goats) and put them on a FB goat tips group fearing the worst. One of the admins came on and told me it looks like he bit himself while performing a self service...Well, if that's the case I'm glad I didn't go running straight to the vet. 

I brought home another buckling on Sunday. I really like his breeding and right now he's a sweet little 8 week old guy. I'm sure eventually he will grow up and be just like the others. Regardless, now I feel like I've got enough genetic variation to say I'm done collecting bucks. Now those young does just have to prove they've settled. This year is supposed to be Ronan's year to get the ladies. Oops, Ronan. Looks like we're missing this cycle. I exposed them last time, but one enjoys spending her whole heat backed up against a wall screaming if I put a buck in the pen so she never gets bred and the bucks avoid her because she makes them nervous and the other young doe parties it up, gets all the attention but never settles. Aw well, maybe in the fall. My buck of choice can just live with them for a few months. Maybe it'll work.

Got to see the prettiest, most awe inspiring buck on Sunday while at Mr. Little Guy's breeder. He was huge and way overheight for a ND, but he was amazing. He's the sire of my little buckling, so my guy might wind up big too, but if he is half as beautiful as his dad I will be lucky.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

You had me laughing out loud reading your post, silly goat bit his own wizzer  sounds like something that  would happen here


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, maybe our goats would be great friends... but not friends I'd want to watch the reunion of. The does would be rough and a touch insane and the bucks would thoroughly enjoy being obscene. (Sure glad animals aren't people.)
But still, I can't even be mad at the little guy. He's so sad. He just is what he is.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Lol, maybe our goats would be great friends... but not friends I'd want to watch the reunion of. The does would be rough and a touch insane and the bucks would thoroughly enjoy being obscene. (Sure glad animals aren't people.)
> But still, I can't even be mad at the little guy. He's so sad. He just is what he is.



Poor little guy, lol
I think that their are people that act like animals...that's  why we have jails for them


----------



## rachels.haven

Going to vaccinate Sir Finnegan the buckling for CDT today.

I'm also going to be starting our food forest here again. I want to get it back to what I had growing on before I moved. I impulse bought a two seedless concords, another grape of a green table variety (Himrod, I think), a chicago hardy fig, some strawberry roots-one white, one ozark beauty and a blueberry that I regret getting as I found it out it was a low or mid bush instead of high bush. I want them big here to maybe help them with deer survival. I got the blueberry and fig from TSC while my angel husband with infinite patience tried entertain the kids and survive the "I want model farm animals" whining and stop boys from bouncing around the store. 
Home depot got me on the grapes and strawberries. I want to go back to HD for better blueberries from them, but then I have to brave the Daniel Webster Highway madness and I'm not doing that alone. DH needs to return a box of shingles...maybe I will get more blueberries then.  Wish I had that mini van we're supposed to buy, then I'd buy big apple trees...but both Mark and I are putting off car shopping. 

Our Redford/Detroit house sold last week. Cost us $20,000 to convince the city to let us sell it. We weren't in it for 30 days so they had to do a "safety inspection" before it could be sold which meant they got to ding us for anything they didn't like that our move in inspector approved 5 years ago. Nothing was really unsafe. An unpainted shed and ventilation in my chicken shed is very dangerous. They also wanted all my bird fencing out before I could sell it and the list went on and on like that. And steps redone, and plumbing redone, and about a dozen other non-dangerous mostly aesthetic things. Meanwhile our buyers just sat there with money in hand for an extra month and a half while the city made us pay them more and more and more to reinspect so they could fail us and ad to the list. AND the buyers had a dozen ducks they needed to put SOMEWHERE and the city wouldn't let them do it until the house passed and was safe (to look at I guess?), so now they have to put the fencing and the little shed BACK UP that we left in the garage for them. Next time we move DH says he's getting "legal insurance" from his company. 

Now that I'm out of there I can say it. 

Redford Township in Michigan sucks.

They are incredibly corrupt and have major drug problems. Nice schools. Bad govt. Still not sure what our taxes pay for either as they didn't plow or repair roads or ditches and the library was sad. Cops were okay-a little deadbeat, but okay. Not going to shoot people up, and cared about kids and people. Seemed to turn a blind eye to drug and alcohol issues.

Okay, rant over. I will avoid living in places like that again. Now I live in kind of a snobby over the top place. Kids with horses everywhere. Hope it's better here. Slightly uncomfy considering I grew up empty fridge poor for a lot of it and definitely not on horseback, but could be worse. Hope my kids turn out okay. 

The six Whiting chicks are in their new coop. It looks like 4 of the pullets are cockerels and 2 are actually pullets. Maybe I'm wrong, but I'll probably be calling them later for credits. I've got another order of just their ameraukindas coming-1 cockerel, 14 pullets. Let's see if they can do that breed better. We have a serious tick problem so I need those birds. Now I know why the neighbor girl, her parents, and all their horses got lyme when they moved in. Yesterday I picked a basket of morels from a mowed, very short part of our yard and the basket was full of nasty, creepy, wavy armed tiny deer ticks. I've found ticks of various species crawling up my white house walls in random places. HURRYUPandGROWCHICKENS. I'm beginning to reach the "BURNEMWITHFIRE" stage of being grossed out on those ticks. Would rather not get Lyme too.

The chicken coop is nice though. The 8x8 coop has a poly wall floor, painted walls, lights, and an extension cord and power strip. I also put a mineral feeder on the wall, one of my horizontal nipple waterer buckets inside on blocks, and a hook for the feeder. I've learned a few things from my last coop. Now I just have to put in a locking chicken door and the perches...and a run up-not that we want to use it. Those chickens need to go on a tick heavy diet. DH will stop by Lowes on his way home from work to pick up 2 2x4x8's for perches and a jig saw to install a bird door on monday probably (HD is in Nashua unfortunately, Lowe's is by work, we prefer HD). The roof is going on (for a guy with limited sight, DH has become a very good roofer-that I don't want on roofs because of the height, but he didn't want anything but a real shingle roof, so I stopped arguing and let him put a house quality roof on my chicken coop. Could be worse, right?). I really want to paint and trim the outside soon, but that will probably have to wait for next Saturday. Nearest paint store closes at 6 and we only have one car between us and at 6 it's being driven home from a secret not so secret office location nearby. After the perches go in and they start using them I will probably start letting those birds go out.

Maybe I can talk DH into letting me roof too-although he likes to own parts of projects and neither of us are good at sharing work, so maybe not. There are also only 4 more rows left on an 8x8 building, lol. I will at least paint and maybe trim.

Well, my keyboard is failing so I'm going to stop here. Spacebar is starting to give out so I'm done here until I decide to brave the heavy handed typing frustration next. I'm going to have to switch to my account on my husband's home programming computer soon, I think. This poor chromebook's been dropped and typed on too much.

BFN.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Hope my kids turn out okay.


They will, if you keep their heads on straight 

You can roof the next outbuilding.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Just caught back up.  Noticed you haven't posted in awhile.  Hope everything's OK.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes! Everything's just settled into a routine and hasn't changed much. 
Finnegan and Patrick the bucklings have begun weaning.The biggest thing that's come up is with Finnegan. He's my doe in milk's actual baby, but she's decided he's done nursing at 7 weeks, even if I put her on the stand, so he's become a bottle baby for the next few weeks and all bucks are now in the buck pen, which is good because Finnegan is very bucky now.

Trying to convince my oldest son that we don't need a doeling that will get "as big as a horse" and we definitely don't need an actual horse. The neighbor girl rode her horse down our driveway a few times and now my son has horse envy. Not happening.

I kicked the Whiting chicks out of my house into their mostly finished, but unpainted coop earlier. I've been letting them "out" of the coop during the day. They refused to go out for about 2 weeks. Now I take away the food and by the time they get hungry at around noon they go out and start hunting. Now the space under the coop and within about a 6 foot radius is tick free, lol. Nothing else is though adn ticks are kind of a big deal Yesterday between the 4 of us humans there were 11 ticks dealt with. It's 10 o'clock and I've already flushed one. Deer ticks. 

Even though they're not helping much the whiting rooster is doing his job chasing the hens to cover when the bluejays start getting upset about hawks. So they may live. And they've figured out the nipple/button waterer (and are afraid of open water sources now...i'm not sure what to think of these chicken chickens any more).

I also got an order of 12 ameraukindas and 4 not brahma but cochin chicks last friday from Mcmurray to help with the tick problem as soon as they're grown enough to make it back to the coop at night.

I'm trying to find a source for fencing here. It's time to fence some acreage. I've heard rumor that TSC does not to premium delivery here, which means they won't deliver my oversized rolls of fencing or t-posts or cattle panels and leave them by the side of my driveway. We're hunting for a mini van to tote my kids and goats in, but cattle panels won't fit in that, and I'd prefer to use those.

(worry section, skip this if you're a reasonable creature with less worries about the unknown than myself)
I'm also worried the state won't let me put up livestock fencing without paying a lot in applications for exceptions et c. and still may not even let me do anything. Our property has a creek and a pond in it and the town makes you file permits for doing any work within 150 feet of any water, and the state within 50 feet. Right now the water is high everywhere so nothing is far away from anything. My barn pens where the goats are living now are small, but probably do not comply due to where the barn is set, and at the moment the whole barn that the last occupants built is not far enough from the water either...I need to get to the bottom of this. The barn had permits pulled when it was built so it has permission to exist, so I shouldn't worry about the structure, just the pens. Worried someone will come out and tell me to take down my barn pens and say no to any pens anywhere else on our land. Probably going to talk to the city ag commissioner. I'm hoping things will work out. It's not like I'm setting up pig or cow pens, so maybe it will be fine. The woods really need cleaning out. The invasive asian bittersweet is a plague here and the other invasives have taken over-invasives that my goats like to eat. Maybe I'll get lucky and be allowed to put up my fences. Goats are even supposed to like eating even knotweed, which apparently they hate here (which strikes me as odd because the bittersweet is killing massive amounts of very old forests the landscaping bushes are apparently more of a concern?). We don't have that here for some reason, but we do have barberry, multiflora rose, bittersweet, and japanese honeysuckle like crazy. I'd love to open that salad bar to my crew. The non invasives here are mostly giant trees and ferns that the goats do not care for. I think it could work and I could get the brush cleared out so we can walk through the woods without showering in ticks but still have a forest. it just needs to be fenced.

IN SUMMARY, everything is normal and my fencing project is about to begin one way or another. 

Oh, and I should get more pictures. Pictures are what BYH lives on, right?


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I've heard rumor that TSC does not to premium delivery here


TSC here doesn't deliver at all.

Regarding the fencing. You will check of course but I would think the setbacks would be related to the normal channel, not flood stage. AND more than likely they would RATHER you fence the animals out of the creek so they won't be walking and pooping in it.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh rats! Well, home depot sells woven wire horse fencing and delivers. They're my backup plan. I guess it's time to learn to stretch fence. If I wait a few more years for us to pay off this house I could just hire someone to do it, but that's a lot of tick toleration and goats in barn pens. The horse fencing will keep in chickens too so I could trap them in there for the day if I wanted to instead of having them de-tick under their shed over and over again.

I bet that's true and I'm willing to bet they'll work with me to help me make them happy and not just say no. It's not Michigan and the state seems to want to encourage ag here even if it is just gentleman farms like mine. That's a good idea too. I probably will be fencing goats out of the creek, probably x number of feet to each side of normal channel. I hadn't thought about that and haven't devised a way to allow them to jump across without that one crazy one everyone has in their herd figuring out how to swim under any fencing onto freedom and danger (creek is not deep, the goats are short) so that's probably the way to go.

Thanks!


----------



## greybeard

rachels.haven said:


> Trying to convince my oldest son that we don't need a doeling that will get "as big as a horse" and we definitely don't need an actual horse. The neighbor girl rode her horse down our driveway a few times and now my son has horse envy. Not happening.



Are you sure it's the horse that stirred his interest..or perhaps the rider?


----------



## rachels.haven

The neighbor is 14 and my son is 5, but I guess you never know. Maybe we'll have to see. Could be amusing. 

However I'm relatively sure it was the horse. He seemed pretty smitten with that tall, blond, palomino with long legs and velvety lips, and it was in very good condition, and very large for the rider. It was so big you could hardly see the little girl. Biggest golden goat he's ever seen. Bet he could picture himself up there, just like her (and hopefully not WITH her).

I had to tell him on Sunday that five is a little young for a horse and that he needs to get a job first (and a couple feet taller, and maybe double or triple in weight at least, but don't tell him that), then again on Monday, and again today. Lessons aren't out of the question at some point. It looks like there are plenty of people advertising within a 15 minute radius. But I'd like him to weight more than a sack of feed first-maybe a sack and a half. Curious to see if this fascination lasts. Hope it's not girls already, lol.


----------



## Bruce

Maybe he likes older women  He COULD start with a pony you know  

You can go look through my journal, starting on page 3, for fencing. I was fencing in an acre and got lots of helpful advice from others here. It takes some effort but isn't really all that technically difficult (unless you have ledge and a lot of rocks).


----------



## rachels.haven

I have rocks.  (pretending I don't) Probably going to be adding to the rock walls here and there, and pounding and pounding and pounding to get posts in through rocks and around rocks again (mostly around). But I will do it-just slowly. No ledge thankfully (we looked at houses with ledges and canyons and avoided them). I guess I'll be going through your journal then. Thanks!


----------



## rachels.haven

As a side note, anyone know how to get rid of coyotes? Not even sure if it's legal to kill stock killing things here (other goat lady with a gun down the street says we are, BUT...). We were in and out of the house this afternoon and it came out of the woods, i'm assuming several times during the brief "in" periods, in broad daylight and killed and carried off 4 of 6 chickens and terrorized the goats. I saw it as it carried off the 4th chickens and chased it into the woods with a 2x4. It was way bigger and broader than the ones I remember when I lived in the south, and way bolder and slower but definitely a coyote-just a little larger than the size of a labrador, which is NOT what I remember. Apparently they've been killing people's dog childs in the cities/areas around ours so it was only a matter of time, I guess. The goats are not happy and fretting and stuck in the barn. I'm down with a cold and not sure what to do anymore, but having a plan always makes me feel better.

Also, 
why was that thing so HUGE?


----------



## CntryBoy777

As far up as ya are in New England there could be Canadian wolves coming down....probably being drawn to the deer as they birth and the easy young.....I don't know it as fact, but there has been talk about coyote/dog crosses, or hybrids, out there, so may be something along those lines.....also, if ya have a Lowe's....they carry cattle panels, and they deliver free within 50miles.....
....got the TSC paper today and they have the panels on sale for $20 ea.....maybe ya can get someone to haul it for ya, cheap....teens will do it for $$....even if they have to use Grandpa's truck and trailer to do it with...."they are helping a friend Move some stuff".....


----------



## Bruce

Check with the authorities on shooting the coyotes. Or just SSS. I can't imagine predators being so bold as to walk into an area with people present. We hear them at night, I've never seen one. My chickens are locked up at night. I guess the 2 alpacas are safe inside the fenced area but I suppose if a pack of coyotes were really hungry they'd go after a 150 pound alpaca.


----------



## CntryBoy777

They will "call" others in for the hunt , to help out....


----------



## rachels.haven

Wow, I forgot about Lowes. That was a good idea. Although I don't think they carry or deliver them here-which strikes me as odd if TSC doesn't deliver either. And I guess I could ask on FB livestock forms about someone hauling panels for me-a little later though. I'm a little sick. We've got some kind of virus going through the house.

In regards to the coyotes. I popped into our city FB chatter page and warned the neighbors not to let their cats and dogs out. Neighbors pointed out that most "coyotes" here are either coy-dogs or coy-wolves and they are bold. They have out competed and interbred with coyotes to the point they aren't coyotes anymore. So I feel less crazy. They really are different around here, and I'm not just some crazy city kid. In Arkansas and Tennessee 20 years ago coyotes were coyotes. They aren't big and ate cats and sometimes small dogs, farmer's calves as they were born. Here, they are large and unafraid and willing to take on large dogs for a free lunch fairly often. Someone's pit got messed up a few towns over last year. I may have to go buy and learn how to use a gun (I'm very good with bb guns, me and the brothers used to shoot pine cones out of trees for fun,but that's different animal so I'm going to have to put some thought into the matter). I may also want to hasten my fencing project and invest in a pair of guard dogs or ldg. Anne Peterson, the Rosasharn Farm owner, breeds them. I got to meet them and I got a good impression of her stock-they were very large stoic attention sucking marshmallow dogs, but there are other options, I'm sure. I'm a little leary of them though because her fencing was 6 ft tall and had hotwire-not for the little goats or sheep or her horse or pigs, but to keep the dogs in. So they may not be such a good option if I don't want to build a fort knox.

That needs to wait for now though. I need to milk goats and get the oldest kid ready for school, and off to school, then me off to the urgent care to make sure this isn't something serious. Gotta keep moving before this cold or whatever it is decides I have to stop.

Thanks guys!


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Hope you feel better!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachel,

Maybe this is something you should consider:


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> And I guess I could ask on FB livestock forms about someone hauling panels for me-a little later though.


Do you have roof racks for your car? I got 2 12' 2x4s and notched them so they could be fastened down tight to the racks. 16' cattle panels overhang an acceptable 2' on each end. I wouldn't necessarily want to carry a lot of them at once or on the interstate but it works well for the 6 mile trip home from TSC. Good way to get home a 12' gate or 2 as well.


----------



## rachels.haven

I love coyote hunting videos. Thank you @Senile_Texas_Aggie . Apparently I'm allowed to do that on my own property-trapping and poisoning too.

@Bruce you drive a prius, right? That's impressive. I will have to remember that that is possible. We're trying to get a good mini van to tote my goats and kids in (and hay, you can fit 12 bales in a mini van, according to my mother). They often come with racks.  and i can drive slow down the wooded country roads.

Just got back from the dr's. I've got a raging, obvious case of strep throat (phew, I was worried about lyme). I got the feeling I should get my youngest son seen at the same time and turns out despite acting fairly normally and insisting he's not sick he had a fever of 101.something and strep throat. The older kid had puffy lymph nodes this morning, so I'm going to assume we'll be going back to the Dr.'s tomorrow if not tonight to get him an Rx of amoxicillin too. DH is also coming down with throat pain, so he can go and drive the older kid. Younger kid and I might hitch a ride (or drive if necessary) and hang out. We haven't had a good, pass it all around illness for a while I guess and we're due for it, lol. Party time...in our own beds, on tylenol and ibuprofen and antibiotics.

Then I will get back to my fencing plans and how to deal with Mr. Big and Tall Coyote.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sarcastic part of me wants to point out that the younger kid will not be driving, despite my lack of clarity, no matter how necessary it may seem. He's 4 and can't see out the windshield and push the pedals at the same time. He's tried.


----------



## Bruce

That is why the boys have to work together. One pushes the pedals, the other steers!

As much fun as strep throat is NOT, I'm really glad it is that and not Lyme Disease. 



rachels.haven said:


> @Bruce you drive a prius, right? That's impressive.


Yeah but I have to get new pads for the new Prius. Different generation (I skipped Gen III) so different roof shape. On one trip I had a 12' pipe gate & 6 cattle panels on the roof, 13 6"x8' posts inside and a 330' roll of fence on the cargo tray. That was in the '09 Prius. I'd probably not be able to get quite as many posts inside the '18.


----------



## CntryBoy777

I have used minivans for years and love the versatility of them and comfort.....I've had town & country, grand caravan...both are chrysler products.....be sure ya get at least a 6cy engine, especially if ya are planning on hauling stuff in it....there are sliding doors on both sides and the rear seat pops in & out for more storage....here is a pic of us bringing the goats home in the caravan....yes, that is a kiddie pool...that turned into a duck pool....

 ....we only have had used ones, because if ya use it, it is gonna get scratched, torn, or gauged....so no need for a new one....we had a chevy astro van too.....I liked it because it had swinging doors...but, not as easy an access as with the others and we had teens at home when we began getting them....they are very comfortable and have driven many long miles in them....sorry to run on and on...but, just wanted to share my experience with them....sure hope ya get to feeling better....seasonal issues are irritating to deal with.....


----------



## greybeard

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Miss Rachel,
> 
> Maybe this is something you should consider:


That particular FLIR and same zoom optics will cost only $2100 + tax and shipping from Amazon..OOPS!! Sorry I was looking at the wrong one. the one in the video is only 
Price: $7,499.00 & FREE Shipping
https://www.amazon.com/Trijicon-Electro-Optics-Hunter-Mark-35mm/dp/B06XH11RGF


----------



## rachels.haven

Luckily I don't think I'd need a special scope. I just have to let out the chickens and sit by the window in the house waiting, during the day of course...and fire a gun from in the house, through the window, which is probably not what DH would like, but hey, I'd get my coyote.  That's all that counts, right? It would probably come if I were on the porch too, so I guess I could always move the party outside.

And yes @CntryBoy777 , that is exactly why I want a mini van. You can haul hay in the rain too. My parents haul feed and plants in theirs. DH can also use it to get to work when it's going to snow. Our car can't handle more than about 4" before slipping around like a toy and him driving that little car to work on ice worries me. Mini vans do slightly better. We could have really, really used it last time we went camping, however. We had room for everything, the hyundai sonata was all filled up to the brim with all our stuff and bikes, then we realized we didn't pack a cooler of food. So we decided, "who needs food? we can get it on the way", and left for michigan/ohio's irish hills anyway (we're very stubborn, slightly dumb people apparently). Turns out the town near the campsite was not that towny. There was only a golf course. No other grocery stores or restaurants. The golf course food was good, but there's a limit on how much pizza and wings you should stuff into a kid. We didn't know it, but the weather was planning on turning terrible, so I see our packing up and leaving then as a wonderful blessing. So we gave up due to lack of food and went to a larger small town about an hour away and checked into a hotel and bought food at a grocery store (in a torrential downpour). I'm so glad we left home without food that time because that evening and into the night it rained so much that it flooded and they closed most of the roads until the water went down and I'm not sure what would have happened to us if we'd stayed at the campsite in the tent in that very heavy rain and wind by low area by the lake. I think our bad planning and irresponsible actions paid off that time, but next time I'd like to have the option to give up on camping properly, without being starved out.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Sometimes watching or checking the weather forecast for an unfamiliar area can save a tough experience like that....


----------



## rachels.haven

I think we did before we left, believe it or not. Nobody expected it to rain like that. But we didn't exactly have smart phones at that point, so "before we left" may have been a day or so before and forecasts change.


----------



## CntryBoy777

I've known people that traveled to Florida for vacation and never check....when they arrived they found out that they were preparing for a hurricane....right where they thought they were gonna be on the beach.........while they traveled down they thought it was great....hardly any traffic on their side of the road....but it was bumper to bumper as far as the eye could see on the otherside.....they were sooo thankful they weren't caught in all that traffic....and didn't realize they were rushing to be the back of the line....


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> and fire a gun from in the house, through the window, which is probably not what DH would like, but hey, I'd get my coyote.


Remember to open the window and take out the screen! The window sill will make a great stable platform for shooting.


----------



## greybeard

rachels.haven said:


> Luckily I don't think I'd need a special scope. I just have to let out the chickens and sit by the window in the house waiting, during the day of course...and fire a gun from in the house, through the window, which is probably not what DH would like, but hey, I'd get my coyote.  That's all that counts, right? It would probably come if I were on the porch too, so I guess I could always move the party outside.



Why limit yourself to daylight?

I have several of these, just to keep from having to switch them around and resighting them in on to different weapons. I have one on a 20ga Mossberg, one on my .270 Weatherby and one on my SKS.




On the accessory rail, mount a cheap red dot:
$12 at academy.





A different kind of clamp, but it looks a lot like this on my 20 ga:




I have less than $100 each in all 3 of mine and I've killed a lot of beaver with the same setup.


----------



## rachels.haven

This forum is bad for me. I like it. But it's not the only bad influence in my life.

My mom thought the hurricanes in St. Pete were the best time for skateboarding with a bedsheet with her brothers. She would probably check the weather and head down there anyway if she hadn't been living there in the first place. But that lady is tough. And a little crazy. She's been waging war with raccoons down in tennessee in the dark with my little brother. When she sends me texts with play by play texts telling me how she killed a racoon carrying off a bantam hen while she was "yelling like warf" and her racoon scores vs her bird hit points it reminds me that I will never be as slightly crazy as my mom. But she's also always smiling, cheerful, and quiet spoken with lovely curly red hair. And she's gone back to work as a plant stocking contractor for the premium hardware plants which has certain perks, so while she's running around the backyard in the dark shooting up raccoons with my mellow littlest brother, she's surrounded by blooming hibiscus, jasmine, pomegranate other tropical novelties they sell for summer display that came out of cracked pots that were destined for the dumpster because they weren't up to par. If I were her I'd probably already have a coyote tail up on my coop. But I'm not her, so I'm not gunning down murderous raccoons all night in Tennessee. Nothing gets her darling baby goose dragons and muscovy without getting a "bullet surprise". Maybe someday I'll get to be slightly crazy like her. 

Her journal would be fun.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> This forum is bad for me. I like it. But it's not the only bad influence in my life.
> 
> My mom thought the hurricanes in St. Pete were the best time for skateboarding with a bedsheet with her brothers. She would probably check the weather and head down there anyway if she hadn't been living there in the first place. But that lady is tough. And a little crazy. She's been waging war with raccoons down in tennessee in the dark with my little brother. When she sends me texts with play by play texts telling me how she killed a racoon carrying off a bantam hen while she was "yelling like warf" and her racoon scores vs her bird hit points it reminds me that I will never be as slightly crazy as my mom. But she's also always smiling, cheerful, and quiet spoken with lovely curly red hair. And she's gone back to work as a plant stocking contractor for the premium hardware plants which has certain perks, so while she's running around the backyard in the dark shooting up raccoons with my mellow littlest brother, she's surrounded by blooming hibiscus, jasmine, pomegranate other tropical novelties they sell for summer display that came out of cracked pots that were destined for the dumpster because they weren't up to par. If I were her I'd probably already have a coyote tail up on my coop. But I'm not her, so I'm not gunning down murderous raccoons all night in Tennessee. Nothing gets her darling baby goose dragons and muscovy without getting a "bullet surprise". Maybe someday I'll get to be slightly crazy like her.
> 
> Her journal would be fun.



Lol, I don't  know your age, but i am going to be 67 this month.....there does come a time ....when you look in the mirror.......or do something .....and you realise, ...OMG I'M  JUST LIKE my mother....... my moment was in my late 50's....
Your mother sounds like alot of fun !  Suck it up and shoot that coyote and send your mom the tail....bet she would be proud of you


----------



## Bruce

She sounds alright to me!  If she has so many coons that she has to hunt them every night, so be it! She'd be welcome at my house. I have no idea how often coons wander through. The last one I saw had gotten itself trapped in the HavaHart I has set out for woodchucks. Bet I wouldn't have caught it if I was TRYING to catch a coon! That was one POed coon but having seen what a prior coon did to my hen (the day before I saw it in the coop going after another hen that was recuperating in the broody buster) and eventually escorted out to the woods, I didn't feel at all bad about having this one join it.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Sounds like she'd fit right in....maybe ya can talk her into joining....that way, we can enjoy her stories, too!!....


----------



## Mike CHS

rachels.haven said:


> T
> 
> Her journal would be fun.



I imagine she has some tales to tell.


----------



## rachels.haven

I bet she does. I'm not sure she'd want to sit still and write them though. She's always up to something in her "spare" time. The coons are so many in number because they live right outside of Nashville, where it becomes/used to be more rural. In the spring and part of the fall, if I remember right (might have been early winter) they go to war. I think my parents both hate and love it.

Afraid the reason I haven't shot the coyote yet is because I haven't bought a gun.  DH hates guns. However this time he says I'm justified doing whatever I want here and he'll support me. He feels like this is an appropriate use for a gun, but I know nothing about them, he knows nothing about them (alright, maybe we both know a little, but it feels like nothing), so I'm waiting until my voice comes back and I'm calling the mother to get her recommendations and where she got hers, which is funny, because when I was living at home she was against them. She may also recommend some traps. I know they like their traps baited with marshmallows. Not sure how coyotes feel about marshmallows. I'd probably use chicken from the freezer or organ meat. I just have to be patient and get my voice and throat back. I mean, I could text, but on this I'd want to talk and that's still painful.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

There are a lot of gun experts on this forum, like Mr. @greybeard, @Mike CHS, and others.  (Apologies to those where are gun experts and I didn't mention you.)  But even a 22 rifle will take care of the coyote, and it won't kick back like some other, more powerful guns.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Not much has changed since last posting. It's getting warmer. The three remaining teen aged chickens and baby chicks are staying in the coop until I get a run finished. Someone brought me a litter of 7 leghorn chicks from lab chickens that were hatched for the classroom. Pathogen free apparently. I like leghorns fine. The baby ticks are coming out and man, do they bite fast! One of the giant maple trees beside the chicken coop fell partway over earlier. Careful examination revealed massive root rot of all but surface roots. Now all other trees in immediate vicinity are suspect and I'll probably be avoiding woods in the wind. The trees on lower ground part of our property are struggling and trees are always seem to be randomly falling in storms and wind, but I thought those were on high enough ground. One pine is big enough to squish the house from where it's standing and it's kind of leaning, but I'm hoping it kind of won't. I'm not too worried about it. Maybe I should be, but the tree's been there a long time and the wind tries to blow the other way. It's also probably leaning to get out of the other trees' shade. But maybe we'll get an arborist to come out and give it a look and cut down the other tree since the other tree is a bit of a hazard complete with at least one big hanging bough caught up in neighboring tree waiting to fall. These trees are not Trees of Heaven and are far too large for me to mess with without experienced supervision/direction.

Not much to talk about on the beast front so I resort to trees. Here are some pics. Coop hasn't painted outside yet still-oops.





Before in winter



Top of giant pine in question. Hoping if it falls house will mostly get hit with brushy part and not cause major structural damage. With giant gas grill in foreground that I have no idea how to operate, of course.




Found some bad hay this weekend. Smells like silage or old beer. I think it will be mulch. Because it didn't smell moldy I tried to feed it and the does threw all over the place and didn't eat any so everyone had skinny stomachs this morning and the bucks scarfed it down because they're not picky and they all wound up bloated. Yay mulch! I might call in and see if they'll make good on the "watch out for questionable bales" thing. Might not. I'm kind of tired.

DH dove off his bike memorial day. He went too far to one side of the road while a car was passing and slid off the pavement and road bike tires being road bike tires and all his bike stopped in the gravel and dirt and rocks and he didn't. He was going 27mph apparently and was enjoying himself too much. The lady in the house where he crashed in front of drove him and his mangled bike home. It's still mangled on the porch. He hasn't been up to fixing it yet. Lots of advil, aleve, and tylenol. He did not tuck and roll by any stretch of the imagination (can that even be done on a road bike?) and took the impact head and shoulder first and got road rash down his whole side to boot. Bike clothes kept the stones out of his skin. No breaks according to the doctor-just a massively bruised collar bone, neck pain, and everything hurt for a long time. He's starting to be able to be off the painkillers for parts of the day. Needs a new helmet. He crashes like this every few years, usually his bad eyesight can be just a bit to blame, sometimes mechanical failure, sometimes user error. But he's on the mend now, thank goodness-we even got a short, downpour soaked hike in yesterday, and I see that as a good sign. I would not mind if he tried a more "all terrain" bike. A gravel bike or hybrid might be fun, right?

The accident wouldn't have been as big of a deal if he and everyone on his team weren't being made to stay very late at work trying to prepare something to help make their non-programming upper level person look good and justify his existence. His healthy team mates from lowest engineer to manager are very worn down and I wouldn't be surprised if some of them started leaving soon. Working 8 or 9 am to 10+ at night for no real reason is too long, especially if they want to retain anyone with talent who knows better than to accept that kind of treatment. That whole thing's been hard on Mark on the pain management and rest point front. So I've been pulling double duty on the kids and house front to try to make things easier, and I'm ready to get back to normal, maybe sleep for a year. Too bad kids aren't as easy as goats, and keeping a house isn't like mucking a barn. The older kid especially does not cope with things being out of wack well and makes life for everyone at home miserable-but I'm not sure he can help it at this age-not an excuse for him, but I'm not ready to hold grudges yet either.

I'll write more later. Hopefully next week will be less tired. As part of my general fatigue and resulting bad judgment I am making ribs in the oven for dinner (which at this point means it's just in the oven covered on a rack). Sides will just be nuked veggies and mashed potatoes. It fixes nothing and I really don't like pork, but the rub and slowly cooking meat sure does make the house smell good. Maybe I'll snag a meat scented nap. This smell should be made into a candle or air freshener.


----------



## Bruce

That tree is a widow(er) maker. I think you would be best off having a tree service check it out, take it down and any other trees that are suspect. Not cheap of course.

Sorry about DH's director. I've worked for people like that, nothing good to say about them. That guy is stressing not only the workers but all their families as well. Hopefully they will get his project done soon and back to normal work.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

So glad to see a new post from you!  Sorry to hear about your poor DH and his accident.  Hope he fully recovers soon.  And sorry about his having to work long hours as well.  It sure makes for a tiring life for him and you!

Mr. @Bruce is right -- something needs to be done about the tree.  You may be able to get the tree to come down completely by yourself, but that would probably be dangerous for you.  So Mr. Bruce's advice about calling an arborist is probably a good thing to do.  That way, he/she can advise you about the other trees as well.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

No worries. I'm not touching that tree if I can help it. I am definitely intimidated by it, in a good way. That's no tree of heaven. It's much, much taller and bigger around. As soon as I can I'll get an arborist out.
In the meantime, on windy days like today I'm avoiding going near trees and keeping the kids back. Just today as I was heading to the bus stop to get son #1, one of the large trees in the pond snapped with a loud noise and fell into the water and I was walking right across the drive from it (although it only would have hurt someone if they were swimming in the stagnant drainage pond). The woods are hazardous, I guess.


----------



## Bruce

Wow, sounds like you have a lot of "sick" trees. They shouldn't be breaking over without some serious wind.


----------



## rachels.haven

I think they're water logged, but I'm not sure if we have serious wind or not. I think today's gusts were supposed to be between 10-20 mph with a max of 25. It does make things interesting though.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's for mentioned tree top now in pond


 Sick
again. Same thing. Apparently need different antibiotics. To console and distract myself I began work on the chicken run.  Probably wasn't the best thing to do in long run (run is quite long though). Also still sick son and I will try to go in tonight. Phone byh-ing is tricky. So. Tiny.


----------



## Bruce

I used my phone when I was in MS/FL for a week. I don't know how people manage to one finger type in a forum. At least the word guesser was pretty good though for the life of me I don't know why it thought I wanted to type 'hygienist' with great frequency.

So sorry you are sick again! I hope what they give you this time will knock it out for good.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, hygienist. I love autocorrect.


----------



## Bruce

Especially since I don't think I ever WANTED to type hygienist when it kept making that suggestion


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I really hope you get to feeling better, along with anyone else who may be sick.

Is your DH still having to work overtime?  I hope he gets to slow down soon.  Long work days make for time off days where all he will want to do is rest.

How big and how deep is your pond?  I didn't even know (or at least remember) that you had a pond.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hi @Senile_Texas_Aggie ,
Thanks for asking. Yes, the antibiotics are doing their thing. I'm hoping they knock it out for real this time. Today I feel better and have my voice back and last night I didn't keep myself awake with my own snoring so it's PROGRESS.

DH is still having work issues. Long hours are annoying. Things are not terrible though, I keep telling myself. He could have another job very quickly if he wanted to. At this point he is staying because he wants to and isn't terribly emotionally invested anymore, which I am hoping will ward off burnout. It looks like a lot of his team mates are burnt out and want to quit now though, which might make things interesting. Maybe things will change if they can't keep enough tallent?

I do have a pond. It's by the driveway. I think it's more of a drainage pond. It fills when it rains and the water level slowly drops as it rains less and less often. I still have trouble thinking of it as mine. I also have a creek BUT the town wants permits pulled and $$$ if you do anything within 125-150 feet of any water (including the pond), and the state says 50 feet and has its own $$$ that you have to pay and permits to apply for, so the area around the water and the water is kind of not mine. I think you can get waived fees if it's ag related so I may not be as limited as I think, but I will have to check when the time comes. I'm not sure how deep the pond is. I think there will be a time it is empty and I will be able to know. I think it's probably not deeper than 4 feet at the deepest, but would like to confirm that.

We did go see a bigger pond today to look for fishing in the area. Unfortunately I think it was a little marshy for shore fishing, so we're either going to get a canoe with an attach-it-to-the-new-van apparatus, or going to have to scope out another pond. There are plenty of them around here so I'm not too down. The hike was fun.

I hunted for hay on craigslist yesterday. Going to go see some 1st cutting hay from a farmer in Lunenburg. Looking for a local supplier that isn't a third party hay selling feed store (nice store owners, but hay can vary in quality and is a little higher in price, so I'm curious what's around). Hay should be cut and baled over the weekend if the weather holds. I love hay hunting. First cutting will not be perfect for the goats, but might be a nice fresh treat and then I can stay in touch for second cutting later.

Btw, I'm seeing little udders on my two younger does that I bred earlier this year. I'm excited.  Its either August or September.


----------



## rachels.haven

Not much new to report this week. 

I got some hay from a dairy farm nearby earlier and it looks nice, and meant to get an analysis out so I could decide if I want to fill up on more but I ran out of checks (which is probably good, because they have our old address on them). I don't think they take cash. The goats are crazy about the hay, and I'd like to get some hay from one of their cuttings BEFORE they put manure on the field this year. It's been 6-8 months since last application so I think the hay is safe enough to feed.

Looked at a 3/4 lamancha, 1/4 saanen FF up for sale in milk with a butter udder and I was interested enough to pull a blood sample and send it off for testing. Owner has an old attitude towards CAE, so even though she says she thinks her goats are clean I'm not super hopeful. Pen was a bit of a mire and at least one goat not up for sale seemed to have respiratory issues, so if even one goat has CAE I feel like this one is definitely going to have issues too. But now I know I feel like I can handle a slightly larger breed goat. The check for the blood test was the last one in the book.

Someone's been getting into my barn and moving stuff and feeding my littlest buckling herdsire that I bought earlier so that he's as round as a basket ball by the time I come in to milk. Last night I locked as much of the barn as I could (I don't have the hardware to lock windows yet) and this morning he had a normal hay belly. I think I need to hurry up and lock those windows. I can not say this did not make me want to get a dog to sleep in and guard the barn and a game cam. Locks are the first step in my opinion.

Angel's baby, Woodland Haven Sir Finnegan, sold on Saturday. He's off to be a herdsire for someone looking to start with registered goats from unregistered. Angel's udder leaves a little to be desired-it's a little meaty and could use slightly better attachment in the back (and bigger teats)-but she still beats 95% of the CL does I see listed, plus Finnegan's dad had very strong good udder and teat genetics so Finnegan will probably be a good herdsire for them especially if their herd is full of Craigslist does. He's got a lot of improvements to offer there.

Despite being bred, I don't think Olivia took. Avalon did though. She's due Sept 6th-my oldest's birthday. Both sons are hoping for does to spoil and call their very owns. Avalon single handedly tore up the guard I put up and ate the magnolia in their pen, so I'm hoping that if she ate someone's baby girl's tree that she'll have all does.  Wishful thinking is fun.

I got my last order of chicks for this year. I have about 40 chicks to grow out and pick my favorites of, then sell the rest. 6-10 out of all the batches together will be roosters. I really want a good couple of roosters to help the hens survive and not hunt partially blind husbands or kids (I know what to do with those). Growing out and culling down/selling is exciting for me. I get to pick what future chicks will look like by picking the parents.

It is time to start pounding posts and digging in the rocky soil for my front yard pen-one post at a time. I have a van now, so I CAN haul rolls of fencing and t-posts home.

That's all I can get out of this week's happenings. We're making ice cream tonight out of goat milk and cream I skimmed. I guess there's never "not much going on".


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Someone's been getting into my barn and moving stuff and feeding my littlest buckling herdsire that I bought earlier so that he's as round as a basket ball by the time I come in to milk.


That is beyond bizarre.


----------



## rachels.haven

It definitely feels weird. It's not a petting zoo, and I always wonder if someone's still there and I can't relax in the morning until I go check. I suspect it might be the girl up the hill with the horses and/or her friend. I'm not sure why whoever it is thinks they have an open invite to feed my animals whatever they want-and come in the barn and move hay and stuff. Bucks have specific dietary needs too, and I'm not sure if Nutrena Nature-Country Whatever is balanced enough for for bucks' Calcium vs phosphurus needs so I'd really rather all of them not have it.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

Sold Angel's buckling, Finnegan last week-forgot about that, I think, because it was such a low key affair and he really didn't cause any trouble in the first place.

The Lamancha I looked at came back disease free. I'd been wanting to try a standard goat for hand exercise and lower milk fat in the milk to mix with the nigerian milk and she fit the bill, so I decided to just jump. So far I've learned not to milk barefoot in the barn and get stepped on. I've also learned what "the will to milk" is and that Angel sure doesn't have it. Saffron wants to be milked, and wants to do what I ask. That's weird. She also milks down to nothing and has no meatiness to her udder and big teats whatsoever, which I've never experienced before. She was being dried up back home, so she's only making about two quarts of milk now and has a dog damaged teat, but I appreciate the milk, which tastes like cow milk and not half and half, and the teat, while crooked is still milkable despite the scar tissue.

On Friday I plotted out half a 100x100 foot pen in the wooded part of the front yard. I was going to fence it next year, but I realized that the bucks' current pen is under a pair of giant choke cherry trees which will be shedding leaves all fall trying to kill them, and fence will still be expensive next year, but I'll have the added the cost of feeding them just on hay instead of brush all summer and fall lumped into it, so I took a deep breath, found a cattle man with a long trailer to hire, and picked up as many cattle panels as I could stomach buying(I did the math and rolled fence wasn't much cheaper and a lot more hard work and time). The posts and material to attach fence are being fed-exed here today and tomorrow, because for some reason with HD, orders over $50 ship free, saving me the trouble of hauling two kids to the store to pick out t-posts while they try to run away and hijack a forklift to take home or something 

So now I've got a project, a new, second goat to milk, and am getting just enough now that if we adults go light on milk we can skip buying milk at the grocery store. Grocery store milk has been tasting off lately. Not sure what the deal with that is, but I'll be glad when it's not in the fridge anymore. Looking forward to having the next doe(s?) freshen and having even more milk so I can start having enough to make yogurt without hording milk for a few days.

And the inlaws are having a full scale reunion here next week, so I guess I'll also have an excuse to duck out during the lulls and get some post-pounding, ear-protection-wearing, I-can't-hear-you, me-time in. The kids will probably be busy fight-I mean playing-with the cousins their age that are coming up to stay, so it should all work out.


----------



## rachels.haven

Big pen is now 2/5's done-two sides out of five. I'm so glad it's summer and not winter when my tendons are so cold they don't slide, the muscles don't heal or seem to get circulation, and I'm a giant charlie horse from the eyes down. Not sure I could have moved 2 cattle panels without causing myself pain for days much less move 30 twice in one day, pound endless posts and tie the panels on without much issue. Summer is great! I'm excited to get the rest of the pen up and the goats browsing like they're supposed to be.

I have had an appointment with a rheumatologist scheduled for July 26th that I've been avoiding thinking about that I'll be getting a second opinion/re-evaluation of my last "diagnosis" at. But I'd rather continue not thinking about that. 
I have a new rule. If they're not 100% sure what I have, I'm not taking drugs for it. Looking back I realize that last time was bad-the side effects from the drugs I took for 6-9 months on the basis of "take this and see if it does something" which randomly became a diagnosis some time between appointments with no change in symptoms during course of treatment and no blood work done during the entire time to check up on the numbers until I said NO MORE either-that doesn't check out. I'm just not doing that again. I would literally rather burn in cold heck all winter with a body temperature of 96 degrees or lower in the house like I usually do every year than do that again with the meds and side effects and no benefit. So I guess that's what I'll assume the worst case scenario will be if they can't figure something definite out-and just keep hoping I'll randomly get a clean bill of health and never have to deal with it again. Maybe since the appointment will be in the summer I won't be feeling so cold blooded.
Gotta go. It's evening/dinner time. And like I said, I'm going to avoid thinking about it, right? Lol.


----------



## SA Farm

That’s no good. I’d refuse to take meds too without being sure they’re actually going to help! 
Hopefully your appointment goes well and you can get a proper diagnosis and treatment.


----------



## rachels.haven

Progress on grazing pen has been completely stopped. Have had to have bad (extended family) house guests for the past week so I've been either cleaning up after them so my house does not become a human feces stained wreck more than they've already made it, watching/moderating their nasty bully kid, taking care of their toddler, or trying to patch up my own kids' hurt feelings while not strangling anyone. They leave sunday morning, so 2 more days. Then I will clean my house again, make sure my kids are operating in a relaxed, stable way again, and go back to pounding posts the next morning.

On the positive side, this week has taught me that I really love my own kids. They're actually pretty well behaved at home and fairly well behaved in public. They are also very polite, full of empathy towards other people and animals, and self aware by comparison to the kids I've had dumped on me, which should not be taken for granted I've now learned. 

Today I will move the cattle panels I haven't put up yet so no bozos park on them. They are resting on the side of the driveway and have already had some close calls. Destroying them with their stupid car would be the last straw. Wow, I didn't realize I could feel this way about "guests".


----------



## SA Farm

Sounds like you’ve got your hands even fuller than usual 
I can’t stand bad houseguests...but then I’m a bit of a recluse on a good day, so my tolerance level is super low.

Hopefully everyone survives the next few days so you can get your household back in order. You got this


----------



## Bruce

Should have given bully kid the post pounder and a post and told him/her to go work on the fence 
Sorry you had to put up with all that, maybe next time they come (DH's family??) they should be given a few affordable local hotels to choose from.


----------



## CntryBoy777

It probably isn't "appropriate" for me to reply fully, but....use this as a "teaching moment" for the children....yours....I've had others "shove their rules" to me when I show up at their place, so, when they show up at mine..."I shove mine"....but, I'm the ogre...I fully agree with @Bruce and if ya have the $$...offer to assist in paying for the room....not really close by either....


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I like Mr. @Bruce's suggestion about letting him pound in some T-posts and attach the cattle panels.  In fact, you could have the entire extended family out there putting up the fence.  By the time they left, they would be glad to get away!  Maybe they'd be reluctant to come back for another visit so soon.


----------



## Bruce

Yeah and if they DO talk about coming back after all that labor, make sure they know what you have in store to keep them busy the next time!


----------



## rachels.haven

I wish I could have her pound posts, but these are inside people, plus the kid is six-and high maintenance, bossy, without empathy to others, and more than a little spoiled. I hope she grows it later.

Today things got a little better. Yesterday I told DH I was going to take the kids and go live in the barn or a hotel until they left. Today DH had his (direct relation in offending party) clean the house with us. Another family member came over to help. There are still feces stains and they are still here, but some of the mess has been undone. It took a long time. I'm sure I'm a bad guy when the two family members are alone, but offending relation has been offloading their kids on me from dawn until afternoon, and then again during the "tiring" parts of the day, and I've been cleaning up after all of them non stop in all my "spare time", and I'm done so I don't care what they think.

My oldest son has finally snapped and has begun laying into the bully brat hard and relentlessly (and truthfully), chewing her out for everything she does until my husband or I call him off because we don't want to hear that coming out of his mouth (even though we're all thinking it, and he's right). I'm not telling him he is wrong. I just don't want him thinking that being too mean is okay. They are not getting along anymore for some reason, lol. I guess she can't get along with kids who have a spine. He has not punched her yet, which I am proud of.

My youngest son is taking things the hardest, but today after the bully brat had been particularly mean and exclusive to him I took him aside and let him "drive" my mini van up and backing down the driveway (coasting, basically just moving the car from one parking spot to the next) on my lap with him at the wheel and me at the pedals to prove that he could still do big things and he wasn't a baby that would never grow up no matter what any nasty someone told him. I wanted to do it with him on the lawn mower first, but the one we're using that came with the house is not a simple machine and I don't know how to start it, so the van had to due. He was in a happy daze for the rest of the day. May not have been the best, most responsible parenting thing to do, but I think it was the highlight of his week. I also laid out the rules for kids driving anything and taught him about drivers licenses, and told him about the lawn mower and how Daddy should take him on it. I think that's his next goal. I'll make sure to keep that car locked and the keys out of sight and reach just in case. DH is supposed to start teaching his kids how to mow the lawn so they can do it for him soon, right? (though probably not at 4)

My parents inlaws are most likely going to be moving to Nashua next spring, 15 minutes away. In regards to us hosting any guests at any future reunions-No! we won't be. The parents in law can keep their kids with them. They will be close enough and will probably have the space. And if not, there are hotels. I don't need my home wrecked. Kind of a shame. My parents in laws are easy house guests and I like having them around. Too bad all their kids aren't that way too (DH is easy to live with, not the kind of person that women would consider in need of "changing").

Anyway, I've probably said too much and will be editing this tomorrow, but that's the honest long and short of it.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Glad ya got some "action" out of them and ya certainly are "wiser" now....this will pass and things will get back to "normal" for ya.....


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! Me too. Today's the last full day! Then it's big clean up time.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I hope she grows it later.


[out of it]
I wouldn't hold my breath, not unless the parental units take an active part. Kid probably needs serious counseling. So do the parents if they allow such behavior.



rachels.haven said:


> but offending relation has been offloading their kids on me from dawn until afternoon, and then again during the "tiring" parts of the day, and I've been cleaning up after all of them non stop in all my "spare time", and I'm done so I don't care what they think.


Who the H3LL does that????? Frankly from your story I think even I, the most conflict avoiding person around, would have moved to the barn with the kids and told DH you'll come back when the "family" is gone, the sooner the better, and the house professionally cleaned ... at their expense if there is any way to pry the money out of them.



rachels.haven said:


> DH is supposed to start teaching his kids how to mow the lawn so they can do it for him soon, right? (though probably not at 4)


Yeah, 4 is too young. But eventually.



rachels.haven said:


> Anyway, I've probably said too much and will be editing this tomorrow, but that's the honest long and short of it.


Well lucky me, I got to read the original. I hope DH's other siblings and their families are normal and reasonable people


----------



## rachels.haven

I think the parents of this family didn't adjust well to becoming parents and haven't totally shifted their way of thinking away from it being just about them towards taking care of their whole "gang" (yet?). They seem to love to make other people take care of their children (always for free, usually with little notice, for long periods of time). They used to live near us. I'd forgotten how bad they were, and the kid have gotten worse. I wanted to be hospitable to my family, silly me. I'll be smarter next time. Tomorrow early morning they will be off (I'm trying to to tell any specific stories, can you tell?). Then I clean!

On a side note, I got the stuff together to do my own goat fecals, so next time I get real spare time I'll go play with that. I've got a couple of pale-ish goats. I have to figure out what wormers work here, because something's needed. I also need to find a reference chart potential worm types that can show up in goat fecals because the fiasco farm pictures page isn't loading for me. I did a fecal last night on one of the pale goats and it looks like he's got a decent number of coccidia (those are easy), infestations of small balls with squiggles inside, larger balls with squiggles inside, ovals with squiggles inside of two different sizes, small dark footballs with polar caps, and a few larger worm eggs. The goat is on coccidia prevention after coming down with coccidia so i expected to see some, and I just wormed him with something I had around. I'll do another fecal again in a week. I'd love to get an id those worms for curiosity's sake and to make sure I'm treating right. I wish I had a good chart or book. 

Typing during the gathering, so not sure how coherent this has been. I need a chance to edit the last few days. Maybe tomorrow.


----------



## Bruce

I bet if you posted pictures of those fecals @Goat Whisperer and/or @Southern by choice could ID the parasites. They've been doing their own fecals for a long time. 

Regarding the family, I guess everyone has been letting themselves be taken advantage of by the people who produced those children, trying to be nice because that is how people get along. Time to draw the line, tell them to grow up and be responsible for their spawn. Enough is too much at this point.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

What Mr. @Bruce said!


----------



## rachels.haven

Phew, life is stable and reasonably clean again. I'd love for the next post to be about the goats going out in the brush for the day.


----------



## Bruce

OK, post that! 
Glad the relatives have left and you can have your life back.


----------



## Genipher

rachels.haven said:


> I think the parents of this family didn't adjust well to becoming parents and haven't totally shifted their way of thinking away from it being just about them towards taking care of their whole "gang" (yet?). They seem to love to make other people take care of their children (always for free, usually with little notice, for long periods of time). They used to live near us. I'd forgotten how bad they were, and the kid have gotten worse. I wanted to be hospitable to my family, silly me. I'll be smarter next time. Tomorrow early morning they will be off (I'm trying to to tell any specific stories, can you tell?). Then I clean!
> 
> On a side note, I got the stuff together to do my own goat fecals, so next time I get real spare time I'll go play with that. I've got a couple of pale-ish goats. I have to figure out what wormers work here, because something's needed. I also need to find a reference chart potential worm types that can show up in goat fecals because the fiasco farm pictures page isn't loading for me. I did a fecal last night on one of the pale goats and it looks like he's got a decent number of coccidia (those are easy), infestations of small balls with squiggles inside, larger balls with squiggles inside, ovals with squiggles inside of two different sizes, small dark footballs with polar caps, and a few larger worm eggs. The goat is on coccidia prevention after coming down with coccidia so i expected to see some, and I just wormed him with something I had around. I'll do another fecal again in a week. I'd love to get an id those worms for curiosity's sake and to make sure I'm treating right. I wish I had a good chart or book.
> 
> Typing during the gathering, so not sure how coherent this has been. I need a chance to edit the last few days. Maybe tomorrow.



What kind of microscope do you use (recommend). I need to get one and learn how to run fecals...


----------



## rachels.haven

10x, 40x, 100x. Funny thing, I had to return mine and I guess I'll be going up a price bracket. I got it out to use it the second time and turns out the right-left, front-back knobs were glued on with something that didn't hold past one use. I'll post on here if I find one that works. This was the one that DIDN'T work. I do not recommend it for durability sake, but it did let me see worm eggs very well. It also had batteries that charged via a cord and then I could do it anywhere if I wanted, so in theory this was a cool one. Just not a long lasting one.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BEK1WZW/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Today I need to saw through a fallen, rotted tree, pound a post, and tie the posts on that panel on and I can add does. I haven't put up a buck divider yet, but I think I need some brush clearing before I do that. It gets a little thick with asian bittersweet in there and I think I'll avoid swimming through it with cattle panels, hoping I don't pull any branches down on myself in the process if I can help it. Done that enough now. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel now. If the area gets cleared enough and I think it's flat enough (and at a time I can afford it) I may someday put in real wood posts at least on corers and replace the panels with no climb horse fence and move the cattle panels to a new location for clearing and evaluation. But that's a someday project.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm adding new pens to the list of things my does find cruel. After they belly ached for what felt like an hour, trying to squeeze out so they could run back to their own pen and beloved milk stand they had to pass on the way they stopped giving me the what-for and started eating. I let them eat for like an hour and a half before I switched them for the bucks. The bucks were happy. They'll be going back to their pen soon. Starting work on the buck divider tonight. I'll get pictures too.


----------



## rachels.haven

I've let progress on the buck divider in the pen stall out. The horseflies and deer flies are so thick the goats don't want to leave the hiding places in their barn pens. I spoke with the neighbor up the hill and she says their horses are struggling too. They will not leave the stalls. It's so bad WE don't want to go outside either. Eventually I'm spraying the goats with a low dilution of permethrin and forcing them out, but I'm not in a super hurry. The bottle says 1:100 is for normal levels of infestation and I found this works for ticks as long as I spray between toes and their ears but didn't work for these flies. 1 to I think 64 was for flies on animals according to the bottle-that didn't work for flies either. So I've stepped it up in my quart spray bottle a few CC's at a time until it DID work. Yesterday I think I got it right. They were not screaming in the pens in the evening, just hiding.

That being said I only have 5 posts to pound, 2 panels to tie on, and a log that looks like a pen escape ramp to freedom to remove. 

I've also let the pen settle to "when it's convenient" status because of the preparation involved to prevent me from getting ticks, flies, and mosquitoes. I have to take off all my clothes including my socks (keeping underclothing, so far that hasn't been an issue) and spray myself with 25% deet everywhere INCLUDING feet and toes. Then I have to take my clothes outside and spray my shirt, pants and inside the garments by the edges, socks included. Then I have to let that "dry". Then I have to put my crispy, sicky clothes on and spray my hair and neck and put bug spray in and on and around my ears. Some days I have to rub it in my face, but I avoid that because it's not super effective. So basically I'm disgusting BEFORE I go out, then I go work until I'm soaked in sweat and tired of being dive bombed by nasty flies trying their luck. We had a spray can of permethrin to treat clothes, but whatever dilution it was it let the ticks in at reduced but still existent numbers and did not repel flies. But the pen is so close to being done. I just have to dedicate half the day to working on the pen and showering again and need to wait until the kids are peacefully in "let's pretend land" with legos or fort building or stuffed animals.

I'm also letting it stall because I've got what I think is a weasel to destroy somehow. Over the last 3 days I've lost at least 5, maybe more birds and to see new piles of feathers and have the chickens cowering under the coop, and to have them discovering and snacking on pieces of their friends (they are chickens), then midway through the day a new pile of feathers appeared where something had come in and snagged a chicken from under the coop and dug a little hole and pulled it under the fence to eat and I couldn't do anything about it because the birds won't be caught and put away until dark. AND it was a bad kid behavior day, so while I was coming out to watch for and scare off bad things I was leaking barefoot, semi dressed tantruming children out into the mosquito, tick, fly infested yard while I went to go see if any new feather piles appeared. "I" sure made a lot of noise to repel things. At least the coop itself is tight. I tried to make sure of it. So the chickens should be safe when locked up. 
Bedtime fixes the kids, btw, but I couldn't move bedtime up to 3 or 4 pm without risking "morning" coming around 4 am, so I had a tense afternoon/evening with animals dying and kids being nagging fighting terrors. But that's parenting. Everykid stayed safe, clean, and fed but they were not happy, quiet, non-violent, or dressed. I didn't even let them destroy each other like they wanted. I'm so glad little kids are little.

BUT today will be a better day. I've got a havahart weasel trap coming. I may put out my larger trap too even though it's pretty clear whatever it is is very small. The bait will be chicken and I will not "haveahart". Things are going to die. I have also put up jar fly traps, but discovered too late that they don't work on biting flies, so I ordered one of a different kind, another jar one that focuses on horse and deer flies, and also the stuff to make a hanging, sticky black painted cardboard trap in case that helps. Some of the reviews stated that the biting fly traps worked really well but they seemed to attract more flies into the area as they were killing them so the jars will be hung on the edges of our "yard" near but not too near to our main activity zone. If the one works I will get more.

It's also going to rain today and with rain comes wind and I don't want to be in the woods when that comes though.

Sorry about the lack of pictures to show you. The flies make taking pictures kind of risky business. There are some fun things to photograph stacking up though. There's a random big pit in the middle of the new goat pens that I had to work around. The pond has shrunk an incredible amount. There are asian bittersweet vines of epic proportions that are kind of cool that the goats will enjoy girdling. And then there's the pen and the goats themselves. I'm holding off on the chickens. They are so pretty, but are being destroyed right and left like a bad dream so best not to bring them into memory yet. If they fail, maybe I'll just clean the coop and do quail that never come out so we can have eggs-but quail are slightly creepy to me, so I'd like to avoid it. Something about their oversized mouths that you can't see how large they are until they open them and their face splits open almost to their eyeballs (presumably so the tiny little  birds can eat big bugs, nothing ACTUALLY nefarious), how dumb they are, how blank their little eyes are, and just the fact that I plain old fashion like chickens better. The chicken thing has got me kind of down and worried today, and I will be down and worried until this issue is resolved.


----------



## rachels.haven

On a lighter note, this morning it was brought up that a mob of wild turkeys had come through and eaten all of the ripening and unripe blueberries and picked off the leaves, so the boys (4 and 5) started to discuss turkey hunting. According to my oldest the way you go turkey hunting is to get a weapon, find a turkey, and slice it in half. 
 Someone is so not going hunting. What a mess!


----------



## Bruce

Wow, lots of "don't like button" in that!!
Small hole, yes probably a weasel. Hard to keep those out since they are so small. I'm not even sure if an electronet would stop it. I had 4 week old chicks walk right through. The lowest line on the ground is not hot, neither are the verticals. 

And the ticks!!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Sorry you got so much critter and biting  flies  issues....it does bring back memories of living  in Massachusetts,  ...it will get better for you.....fall is amazing


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks fo the hope. That's good to know. I think if the flies let up it will go back to being paradise for the goats. Permethrin in a high enough concentration does seem to be keeping the ticks and mosquitos off them. That actually makes me really happy! The flies are nasty, but I'm not seeing flies on them today either after spraying yesterday, so maybe, just maybe they will de-traumatize and want to go off to the big pen.

Hay hunting this year is going well. I've got two hay farmers I've gotten nice first from and one has some second out already. It's extremely rich looking-not leafy, but like lawn clippings. The nicer one is $8/bale for second, $7 for first, which isn't quite the price I want, but if that's how it goes here I'll do it. The other is $5 for first and a 40 minute drive, with second coming out in a few weeks. I'm hoping that has nice second too.

Just had something odd happen while I was out today. Patrick, my smallest buck got his collar caught in the side handle hooks of the bucks' fortiflex flat back bucket and almost strangled himself trying to get out. I know collars are a hazard, but the hooks on those buckets are kind of confusing. Why don't they close the loops?






Anyhow, my chickens are locked down, no goats have collars right now, Patrick got carried around by me and the boys until he felt better and started chewing on things like a normal goat and everything is okay right now-other than the kids wanting a bath because now they smell like a buck. They are just starting to figure out that if you play with a buck, you get the stink, even if the little stinkling is still in his cute, gazing into your eyes with love and putting his head on your shoulder phase.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachel,

Regarding the black flies, have you considered wearing some netting?  GP Outdoors, who is in central Ontario, has been wearing recently in his videos (see starting about 1:55 into the video):





Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

THAT is a good idea. I've been especially worried about DH mowing. He doesn't mow much because the soil is so nutritionally empty and rocky, but that time is coming back up again and he can't see the flies to fight them off so he just gets bit a lot. We're all going to look like bee keepers, I guess.


----------



## CntryBoy777

About the bucket....we had a doe get stuck between the handle and bucket....I ripped every handle off and put theor feed bkt on the fence with the good thick bungee straps with "S" hooks.....course, we only had 3 goats, but they do make feeders that will hang on fence or wood.......


----------



## rachels.haven

Dangerous buckets. I guess I'll need to implement another system.

I figured out what's killing the chickens and it isn't a weasel, thank goodness. It's a hawk carrying birds off. He took two more today and the second I caught him in the act, chased him off, and took my headless, plucked bird back. time to put up some yarn over the run in the am and later a net over the top of the run.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Something that ya may like, the orange construction fencing, sold on rolls at HD or Lowes.....if ya build a frame from some schd 40 pvc ya can make a "T" on the ends of whaever length ya have the base.....then stretch the fence from end to end and set it wbere ya need it....all raptors see orange and won't get tangled in a net....also, if it is hawks, most prefer to have an angle to dive from.....the height can vary, so ya don't have to bend over or duck....just a thought, anyway....


----------



## rachels.haven

Spent all day yesterday shoring up a third of the chicken run and covering it.

Today it looks like my little razorblade cooper's hawk friend walked or hopped around on top of the cover until he found a place that could be made into a gap and went in and killed at least 4 of my smaller chickens and bashed out the way he came with the defeathered carcasses-no feathered drag trails in the dust, no holes under the abbreviated pen fence, the piles of feathers were under a new hole in the snow fence that is the run's ceiling. I guess I need to completely sew it together instead of tying it every 6-12 inches.

Wish I had a hawk zapper. Nasty, nasty, despicable little bird. We are totally overrun with rabbits and chipmunks and it chooses to test my chicken run and eat my chickens.

I wonder if there's a point I should give up and quickly sell what's left at a super cheap price to get them away from the nasty bird?


----------



## Mike CHS

I have no idea how I would deal with what you have going on.


----------



## CntryBoy777

I certainly know what I would do.....but, it depends how far away your neighbors are.....sss....


----------



## rachels.haven

I might use aviary netting and leave town for the day and hope he tangles and dies while I'm out.
In the meantime, tomorrow I will be sewing the snow fence with baling twine.


----------



## Baymule

What kind of run do you have? Can you post pictures? At our old house I had a pretty good coop and run. We moved 4 years ago and I have had a series of craptastic coops. It is on my radar to build another coop similar to what I had, but bigger and a longer coop. I'll modify the coop with a double 2x6 header in the center of the "roof" to better support it and cover the top with corrugated tin to keep the run dry. You have a snow load to deal with and I don't. A double 2x6 header run from front to back on the hoop run would provide better support for your run, maybe a post in the middle to further hold it up. 

Here's pictures of what I used to have.




 



 

I would suggest a similar covered run for you to keep the pesky hawk out. If you will notice in the lower right corner of the picture above, I skirted the run and coop with wire laid on the ground, hog ringed to the bottom. That was to keep varmits from digging in. 

This is one of my coops now, it will become part of the run for the new coop I will build. It is only 2 cow panels. I want to add 2 more for a bigger run.


----------



## rachels.haven

That may be where we are headed. I will get pictures when I go out in a few minutes. My run cover is NOT as nice as yours. It is spur of the moment, ugly, and was just supposed to be temporarily functional until the chickens got out of the less bright 12-16 week juvenile stage. Yours looks bear proof.


----------



## rachels.haven

This is the gist of what I put over the run. I closed yesterday's gaps and some potential gaps. My run is a cage now. Picture is pre-gap closing. I've never had to deal with a hawk this relentless.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Sorry you are having so many critter issues  .......we have several huge oak trees in cow neighbors field, two of them are homes of hawks. While my other neighbors have seen them fly off with baby chicks and other aged chickens , (and a newborn goat, so I am told) .......
I  have purchased two cheap plastic owls  that heads move in the breeze.... And used fast grip to attach them to posts facing the chicken area. They don't  deter the racoons or crows, but have not had any hawks since they have been up.....? ? ? ?


----------



## Baymule

We have some rolls of that same plastic mesh. We gave a roll to a friend to put over his run. 

The cow panel run is the best I ever built. Add a few strands of hot wire and your run/coop would be bear proof. Nothing but a hot, HOT wire will keep a bear away. For added security for feed storage (for you, I don't have bears) build a 2=chamber coop with feed storage in the first chamber, put feed in metal trash cans. Wrap in hot wire.


----------



## rachels.haven

I could try owls. 
I will keep the bear proofing in the back of my mind if we start having on site appearances. So far I protect the chickens  from bears by keeping the feed in the barn in feed cans.  I should be bringing feeders out of the coop at night, but have been slacking because some of the birds are still young. 2 of the 6 ground level windows in the barn have bear bars. Considering finding a source for more. If bears go after my birds or barn Fish and Wildlife will dispose of them supposedly- not that it resurrects dead birds or goats or destroyed feed and property.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I am about to show my ignorance (if you read me journal, you will learn that I do that quite often), but have you considered getting black Austrolorp (sp?) chickens.  YouTube channel Red Tool House had a video that talked about those:





OK, all of you chicken experts out there can start to beat me with a wet noodle for being so dumb! 

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks for the suggestion. Maybe I'll try that if I have the opportunity to buy some adult australorps. Worst case scenario is that I get to have a few extra black birds to protect, and Australorps are usually pretty chill birds.

I bet having working roosters would help too. The hawk is small and roosters either hide their hens or go duke it out.


----------



## rachels.haven

No losses so far today. That's a big deal. I've lost a lot of chickens this week-more than I care to admit. The hawk is sitting in tree above covered run, screaming and screaming like a cartoon character, like he has nothing better to do. So weird. Now, the chickens are in a tiny cage, but it looks like nothing will eat them for now-assuming I follow the rules of chicken keeping of course, and don't let the sheets of snow fencing untie and fall away from each other. Maybe I'll try covering more of the run later this week. I may need to use the cheaper aviary netting though. That green stuff is pricey.


----------



## Bruce

I wonder if you could use the thicker deer netting (as opposed to the really thin bird netting), probably cheaper than full on aviary netting. It is amazing that the hawk managed to find its way back out, but you've got that entrance locked down now.

I read the YouTube comments for the video, some posted that they were losing black chickens to hawks. That brought up a comment from the video owner asking if they had crows around. Theory being that if the hawks already know that crows, and potentially other black birds of that size, are enemies that will fight, they leave them alone. In the absence of such an education, the hawks don't fear black birds about the size of a crow.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, I wonder how it would go for us? Our crows have some interesting behavior involving hawks. Not sure it's the right kind, but it's interesting.
We have a pair of crows around. At the beginning of the year they'd chase the birds of prey around. Then when they had chicks to feed they stopped and I thought they'd moved on for a while. Then I noticed they were back and following the hawk around. It got to the point I could find our hawks by spotting the big pair of crows but they weren't attacking him. I couldn't figure out what they were doing. Then I started seeing the crows eating stuff in the yard, with the hawk off to one side on the ground, with no food. I think they use the small hawk for fresh kills. I don't feel bad for the hawk. It is a nasty bird.

The crows are gone now though. Too bad I don't want a big black mean rooster. He's probably do the trick and give the hawk a complex and a chicken aversion. I guess the mean ones are usually free, right? So if I did get desperate, it would cost me a road trip (and maybe sacrificed biosecurity, but that's another story). No adult australorp hens yet. I'll be keeping my eyes open. Fall is a good time to pick up molters.


----------



## Bruce

Probably a stupid idea but I wonder if one could find plastic crows somewhere and place them around the chicken yard. Of course the hawks would likely figure out they weren't a threat fairly soon.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Bruce said:


> Probably a stupid idea but I wonder if one could find plastic crows somewhere and place them around the chicken yard. Of course the hawks would likely figure out they weren't a threat fairly soon.



I have TONS of crows...real ones, ya all can have them !


----------



## rachels.haven

Funny. I was whimsically thinking about robo drone crows.


----------



## rachels.haven

But real crows are cheaper.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

So do we!  No charge!


----------



## rachels.haven

Grab a crow, stick a "to" address label and a bunch of stamps, stuff crow in mailbox and I'm sure carrier will deliver. Will take as many as can be sent, lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

No casualties again. I sprayed the goats with permethrin and stuck them out in the pens to go eat until it rained hard. Then we had a "running of the goats" to get bucks and does in from the rain. Everyone is fat, happy, and fast motion chewing cud.
I did have to worm today as a follow up from my last worming 10 days ago-everyone had gotten paler than I realized so I went in and did it, and usually when I use Eprinex if I don't follow up they wind up wormy again in a couple weeks. New microscope is coming. New browsing pens will help. Why eat grass when you can eat forests? They will be fine now.

Learned the right way to use safegaurd recently, which HAS worked for me the one time I've used it, despite not using it right, but next time they need it I will use it right and see what happens. Chickens need some of it too. A few are showing signs of gape worm, so if they can hold out I will treat at next coop shoveling. The pen and grass in general is so slug and snail infested I knew that was coming. Kneeling on a giant lunker slug in the dark is gross, btw, and I do it a lot. Helping me wash my pants more, I guess. No barefoot over there (plus, the ticks...). I am so glad I don't want to eat those.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Sounds to me that ya need a few ducks...2-3....khaki campbells can take care of those slugs, snails, and ticks for ya if they area is large more would be better....they are a great companion animal for the goats....they even chase, catch, and eat biting flies.....the slugs and snails are carriers of parasites that will affect the goats.....they are really easy keepers, after the brooding stage....not a heavy pellet or grain feeder, if forage is available they will find what they need.....


----------



## B&B Happy goats

What @CntryBoy777  said,..... he talked me into getting some, not only do they do everything  that he said they would....eat bugs etc. .....they are way too funny to watch with themselfs and the goats and fluffy butt chicks....now that they are settled they eat with the goats and come to greet me when I go out to the goat yard they definitely  are the funniest  duck I have ever watched ! And their eggs taste great


----------



## CntryBoy777

Ya can't watch them for long, before they will put a smile on your face.....they will put on a "show" in a pool, too....they love the rainstorms and have a blast on those days....watching them thru a window is very entertaining.....


----------



## B&B Happy goats

They quack me up...


----------



## rachels.haven

They sure are. I know, I used to breed ducks. Apparently I was too good at keeping them alive. We'd go from 4 to 60 in a matter of a few months then back down again as I sold them and butchered them and tried to fight the growing population. Husband has said no ducks here. No khaki's, no muscovy, no pekins, no other breeds, and no geese. He's not usually that adamant about what I do, but he is this time, and I can respect this one thing. Plus, I like everything about them but the eggs and poop-and that's a lot of eggs and a lot of poop. 

However, they'd also work wonders on the japanese beetle, tick, and horse/deer fly population. And not many hawks will pick on a 15 lbs drake. I am VERY partial to muscovy. I like my drakes, and the more carnuckles the better (provided the eyes are clear, it's cruel otherwise). And they are quiet.

I'd like to focus on chickens, goats, and gardening living here if possible. If I have to I could switch chickens out with coturnix quail if I can not keep chickens safe enough, but I would rather not. I dislike them.

And that's the only thing my husband has put his foot down on in 7 years of marriage. No duckers.

QUACK-quack-quackquackquack.


----------



## CntryBoy777

I learned alot with ours....we had 10 hens and 2 drakes....6 KC and 6 Rouens.....we had a bit more than 2 acres fenced for them to free range on and they shared it with the goats....we closed them up at night, because of predators.....but they were out everyday.....I have penned them and they are messy, but out in the fields it is instant fertilizer......tho, I surely don't want ya to get in a disagreement with DH.....it ain't worth it....what about guineas?....


----------



## Bruce

Is the "no ducks" because he fears another population explosion? Maybe you could get a few females OR males. Seems like you need something to control the parasite carrying mollusks. And the ticks seem to be horrendous there.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

We have only three females, they are with the goats, so not a poopin issue here ....


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> Learned the right way to use safegaurd recently



Huh?  I thought that you would just wash and lather and rinse just like any other deodorant soap.

Regarding the ducks, I can't advise, but it sounds like the others may be onto something if DH is simply concerned about the population explosion.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

My husband does not like duck poop, and poop soup, and the fact we have to be back slightly before dark to herd them in and lock them up or ducks die and I stress out. The chickens-we just shut the door-no onry spaghetti ducks if the sacred routine is not followed. We may even make a small fort knox run at some point so lessen the pressure around lockup with our chickens. He also does not like duck eggs (but does like the muscovy beef and moist, fatty khaki and pekin meat). The noise is also a factor with the non-muscovy ducks. Ducks also eat A LOT if you let them. That's pricey here.
The population would probably not explode here. Too many coyotes.

DH actually expressed interest in getting Guineas. It is I who does not want them. The guineas I've met seem hard to care for. They seem wild and not so bright and LOUD, which would be a bad combo here. But maybe some spring we'll try.

Safeguard is a goat wormer. I didn't know you're supposed to use it at least 3 days in a row. I wound up with two unexpired bottles of it somehow, so next time they are wormy, I'm going to use that.

You guys got me thinking-muscovy would be great here, but a promise is a promise. DH will not come home to a trio of muscovies-and two hens that are rearing to find 21 eggs each to sit on and turn them into 19-21 babies each, then rinse and repeat in 2 months. Maybe someday I'll try saxonies. They seem pretty. I also love khakis and the layer hybrids dehybridize into fun colors. Geese would help with the hawks, but would not be husband and child or landscaping compatible (or chicken).
Dreams are fun though.

I ordered some bare bones cheese making equipment last night in a moment of bad judgement. I guess I'm going to play with that. There's a fun dream. I also have a spare fridge to see if I can get to run at 50 degrees for a cheese aging space (extra fridge came with house, we have only been using the freezer portion except for the occasional soda hiding/chilling and soap making).

I also have strep throat again-a light case this time, not an "I'm dying" case like the last time two times. I must really have no immunity to it in this area. Previous to the last few months I think it's been about 15 years since my last case. MOAR DRUGS FOR ME. I'm just an antibiotic junkie now apparently. Glad I don't feel too sick this time. There's laundry to do (um, or neglect) and stalls to shovel, not to mention kids to referee for.

Now that that hawk can't get in life is pretty nice.
AND the three original chickens I ordered back in March are nearing lay. Excited for their first blue or green egg.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Hope you have a fast recovery with the strep....the laundry can wait, go relax ...


----------



## Bruce

Well we tried! I gather DH doesn't go out into the slug and tick world. Given the prevalence of Lyme Disease, I think I'd try most anything to keep them at bay.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> And that's the only thing my husband has put his foot down on in 7 years of marriage. No duckers.
> 
> QUACK-quack-quackquackquack.



what about guineas?


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm afraid they won't last here, but we may try them eventually. We may also someday reduck. We're just trying to enjoy being duck free for now. Right now I can't even let the chickens free range without them being killed. Not sure ducks would be able to do proper "work" under confinement for their own protection. My concerns are the same for guineas. 

I've considered a LDG to help on the hawk/coyte/weasel/fisher/bear/potential unverified mountain lions front, which would let de-bugging animals like chickens, ducks, and guineas work uneaten. I'm willing to bet just having a big dog walking or laying around the yard will make attacking things wary, but I can't afford to put up a perimeter fence, so I'm going to guess they're a bad idea. I've only got the 100 foot pen, the barn pens, and the chicken pen enclosed, and I get the impression that putting in real posts here is going to take heavy machinery, experience, and probably a tractor. I'd probably find someone who does it for a living here and hire out, but not right now. Maybe when the house is paid off in a few years. Then I'll REALLY never want to move again.

So yeah, that's why I'm okay with no ducks or guineas. The ducks can't roam, we can't keep protection for them at this point, so no ducks.


----------



## CntryBoy777

How many sides of your place is vulnerable for attack?....a fence is just a "barrier" of protection.....the number of sides that are vulnerable would need to be reinforced for the amount of pressure that it will likely face....if birds are to be protected from ground and air....then make extra sure that there aren't any trees in their pen, yard area....this helps to eliminate "routes" that can be travelled to gain access....coons and possums will climb one tree and take the "squirrel hiway" to get to their "goal"....an added level of protection would be electric wires that can really help....even the electronet can be an answer for ya....ya may want to check it out.... @Mike CHS uses it quite a bit with his sheep....and it could protect the birds too......


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Whatever happened to the tree whose top got broken out, that you mentioned in this post? https://www.backyardherds.com/threads/rachels-havens-journal.37330/page-34#post-611004
Also, have you gotten out the tree limb from your pond?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Nope, haven't gotten the tree top out of the pond. Law says we're supposed to leave the pond alone. Nobody's going to enforce the law (I think?), but treetop is not hurting anything so I'm leaving it. The pond is also coming and going. It was dry for about a week, then it rained for two days and has water in it again. Tree it fell off of is "headless".

Partially knocked over tree is still there. I've been ignoring and avoiding it, letting it get pushed down in priority after sickness came in, then family, and now something else. After we get a certain "mice in the walls baking" issue I haven't mentioned resolved priority will go back to finding someone to take care of that tree. It shouldn't be too expensive. They just have to knock it over. It does not need to be cleaned up or ground down unless they want the wood.

The tree leaning towards the house may just be leaning out of shade and not going to fall. It is a pine. The ones that have been suffering are the deciduous guys, so I'm hoping all will be fine but when we get an arborist out here I will ask their opinion. It's also the tree the hawk perches in and screams at the chicken run from.


----------



## rachels.haven

@CntryBoy777 
I was thinking of the fence keeping the LGD in. Not sure I need one.

The chickens are temporarily protected from everything but underground and through the netting attacks. I may do something more permanent and attractive later. I wouldn't keep ducks with chickens though. I did that before and it resulted in having to worm a lot or have thin, bony birds. The ducks would need their own place.

For the ducks to do their best work I'd probably want them on and around the pond and in the trees and brush free ranging. We are not ready for that, but someday we might be. The goats are working on it.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> and probably a tractor


Rachel, that is how you justify buying a tractor!!!



rachels.haven said:


> "mice in the walls baking"


Oh, what are they baking? And is it any good?


----------



## rachels.haven

COOKIES.
Oh, I wish, I wish that was true.

Anyway, DH was walking around in the woods and where my goats have been working last night and let me know that if I wanted to I should feel free to go build another 100' pen somewhere on the property next year to clean out. The fact he could walk around in there at all is the amazing thing. It was completely bittersweeted over but the goats have been working. I brought up that as soon as we got the house paid off I should just get all of it fenced to run the goats on and clean out all of it. He didn't seem to want to wait another 4 or so years. I'd rather kill the debt on our over-priced house, but clearing brush is part of lyme disease prevention, so we'll negotiate over the next few months. If I win, I just build another square 96' or whatever cattle panel pen next year. If he wins, I also win, and I get the property fenced in.

Wiping out debt is the key to financial stability (which I don't really need to say), and when you're boring, low expense people with middle to highish income it's within our grasp if we budget and stay boring, but lyme disease prevention is a serious health thing, with potential irreversible effects and fencing in our property would make it easier to keep the kids and animals safe in general.

Anyway, that was exciting. I did a good job!

BUT I still don't want to go out and take pictures because of the hordes of deer and horse flies waiting to bomb everything in swarms. One of these days I will go shower myself and my clothing in bug spray and just do it.

I did take this picture this morning, for there are no flies inside. We boring people living in the tick infested woods like to play a game. It's called, put your dirty pants on the white tile of the bathroom overnight and see what crawls out by the next morning. We find a lot of ticks. This is from DH's pants. He found two more walking around on himself before bed after his walk in the woods. You just don't do that here without copious, deep woods, high deet bug spray. Pretty sure this is just a dog tick.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Fence the place in, get several kakhi campbell ducks and let the ducks and goats go earn their keep.....pretty soon your ticks, flies and othe pests that have taken over will be without a home ..........and the fencing will add to your property value


----------



## CntryBoy777

It doesn't have to be a "winner take all" situation....why not extend the time a yr or 2 and meet in the "middle" for ya both?....if ya plan on staying there, then relax a bit and enjoy what ya got already....ya will appreciate it later....something that will help with the ticks is sevin dust....get and old athletic sock and put the powder inside the sock....tie the end of the sock in a loop-thru knot....go out into the infested area and put it on the ground and kick it around....or wear gloves and hold the knot and shake it around....low, around the ground....it needs to be dry for application, ticks overwinter in soil, they will stay in the dirt and then climb the plants to "catch a ride"....if they are in trees they will let go and fall on ya, too....I have dealt with some heavily infested situations, so I sure hope ya can get a hold of that there....I hate ticks!!!.....also, some rubbing alcohol in a pint jar makes an instant death to a tick dropped into it.....


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I'd rather kill the debt on our over-priced house, but clearing brush is part of lyme disease prevention, so we'll negotiate over the next few months.


I understand that but given you are talking only about 4 years to pay it off, I would prioritize the tick reduction if not removal. I've heard too much bad about Lyme disease even when it is caught early. Fencing won't set back paying the house off too much.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

To help with the flies, consider buying the protective netting that GP Outdoors in Ontario wears:




In the comments section he called them "big shirts".  He said that he got them at Home Hardware for about $22 CD.  I don't know if that is a Canadian store or if they are also in the New England area.  He said "_They have worked great so far - black flies, deer flies and mosquitoes all kept at bay. The only drawback is it gets hot in there!_"  So maybe you can get a few of those and then go out and put up the fencing for the goats, or put out the Sevin dust that Mr. @CntryBoy777 recommended.  Please continue to keep us all informed of your progress, and don't forget -- we like pictures!

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Bruce

It is a Canadian chain. Don't know it they ship outside Canada or not.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

After my post I read another comment where he called them bug shirts.  I searched on Amazon and there were several, with most under $20: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=bug+shirts&ref=nb_sb_noss_2.  I bet Miss Rachel could get one at a sporting goods store there.


----------



## Mike CHS

I don't know if you have the kind of tick that carries Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever but a friend of ours has been in quarantine at the hospital for the last 10 days with it.  Her immune system is so compromised they are afraid someone may come and pass a virus to her.


----------



## rachels.haven

I like the fly shirts. I'm adding one to my list. I'm also testing out fly traps and baits. Some of them are supposed to do deer flies. And I'd forgotten about Sevin's dust. I may have to do that. RMSF is rare here, but we have tons of dog ticks (gross thought), so I'm not willing to believe we don't have some ticks with it somewhere on the property.

We will eventually get the place fenced in. 6 years was the original mortgage paying off timing. We've already dumped the last house's selling money into things and taken off a few years. By the end of next year we should be half done going the rate we are at last check. We may or may not wait for that to put up fencing. Whatever we do, I will work on keeping bug spray on that man. I don't want HIM to be the one that gets some tick borne illness.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I don't want HIM to be the one that gets some tick borne illness.


Oh HECK no, then he'd be the stay at home parent while you go to work.



Mike CHS said:


> I don't know if you have the kind of tick that carries Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever but a friend of ours has been in quarantine at the hospital for the last 10 days with it.  Her immune system is so compromised they are afraid someone may come and pass a virus to her.


 Oh my, I hope she recovers that sounds awful.



rachels.haven said:


> deer flies


Nasty little assassins that carry daggers! They put quite a cut on you.


----------



## rachels.haven

Dog ticks carry Rocky mountain spotted fever, unfortunately, btw.


----------



## rachels.haven

Went to new rheumatologist. She's running labs but doubts I have rheumatoid arthritis or lupus and is leaning toward fibromyalgia. We'll see. No drugs for me today.


----------



## Bruce

Can't like that too much Rachel. I don't think they have found any medical help for fibromyalgia.


----------



## rachels.haven

It would be okay with me. Seems like pain is my lot. It would be nice if it wouldn't be pain as my body tries to destroy itself. Winter will probably always be painful and incapacitating. RH meds certainly didn't help while I could take them. I guess I'm semi-hoping for the long term lesser of two evils maybe? And a break from people trying to push drugs on me that turn up obscure side effects when I take them.

Edited because I can't spell and give directions at the same time.


----------



## rachels.haven

The coyote is back. The neighbor warned me about one lone male loafing around in her front yard again, and upon inspection, something has been pulling on my wire run by the gate. I'm crossing my fingers it moves on to easier prey soon and doesn't find or make a way to get in and wipe everything out or get a goat when it hunts during the day.

We just got our first eggs friday, btw. The kids say they are green. All I see is gray but I've got a touch of color blindness in the green spectrum, so they may well be green. I will post a photo from my phone.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## CntryBoy777

Hope ya can get the "drop" on that coyote....they can be a real problem.....congrats on the eggs!!.........the bottom one has a tinge of green to it, but unless it is the flash covering up the color the top one looks off white or grayish to me....


----------



## Baymule

Nice eggs, they are greenish. I hate ticks!


----------



## Baymule

Nice eggs, they are greenish. I hate ticks!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

That coyote needs some lead in his butt ! Congradulations  on the eggs, I can't  tell what color  they are but if the kids say they are green...then they are green by golly


----------



## rachels.haven

lol, whiting true grays. Sold by McMurray hatchery.
Not nearly as catchy.
They are nice hybrids-friendly, not aggressive, and laying at 19 weeks. Who doesn't want some nice gray eggs in their egg carton?
I am glad my kids see green...or at least think they are seeing green.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> lol, whiting true grays. Sold by McMurray hatchery.
> Not nearly as catchy.
> They are nice hybrids-friendly, not aggressive, and laying at 19 weeks. Who doesn't want some nice gray eggs in their egg carton?
> I am glad my kids see green...or at least think they are seeing green.



Works for me, lol...your children sound like great kids


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> All I see is gray but I've got a touch of color blindness



They look light gray to both my wife and me.  I, too, have more than a touch of color blindness, too.

Speaking of your kids, have you posted pictures of you and your family before?  If not, maybe that would be a good thing to do.  After all, we folks on BYH love pictures! 

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, nope. No one knows what we look like. Although I did get the kids in here, but they look different now. I guess I could work on that.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Lol, nope. No one knows what we look like. Although I did get the kids in here, but they look different now. I guess I could work on that.



If I was younger and had children, I wouldn't  even consider putting their pictures on the internet...far too many strange people  these day's. ..not meaning BYH folks, but those who lurk and troll the internet seeking their next victim. ....
Nope, momma you keep your babies  safe


----------



## Bruce

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Speaking of your kids, have you posted pictures of you and your family before? If not, maybe that would be a good thing to do. After all, we folks on BYH love pictures!


Don't let STA fool you, the only picture we have seen of him was altered to put @Mike CHS's arm in front of his face (Mike's image was stolen from a picture posted by someone else)


----------



## rachels.haven

I could probably find something appropriate.


----------



## rachels.haven

Does anyone know if Great Pyrenees make good LGDs?
In response for a post I put on a local group on FB looking for ideas to deal with predators, someone is offering me their fixed female 2.5 year old Great Pyrenees LGD because they have three right now and would rather just have their two male Meremmas. They keep their dogs in with their goats in their quarter acre pen and they say she stays with the goats with one of the Meremmas and the other male patrols the fenceline.
I may just thank them and pass this by. I'm not sure. I'm also not sure I'm going to win the predator war here.
She's not a baby, and she's used to staying in a pen the size I have now, and apparently she likes to stay with the animals to guard.

My concerns are previous training, roaming, and if this is a situation I want to get myself into and master at all, if I have a choice.

On the same post I also got FB chewed out at by a recent college graduate "biologists", younger than I am, that knows all and supposedly works at an exotic animal rescue over the fact that I'd consider ever killing predators at all. Yay, facebook! I can definitely afford to just 6-8' fence with electric at the top my entire 6.whatever acres right now and keep my chicken in what she called "a cube". All 35 or whatever of them, so her beloved nigerian dwarf-sized coyotes can roam, poo, and kill on whatever is not fenced in on my property whenever they want, assuming they can't find a way in at all. That's exactly why I moved to a place with space. Also not sure the coyotes would just blindly accept her idea of a fence. I think they'd test it and dig under because, you know, they don't have anything better to do and it's their day job.

I'm still in my late 20's, but I'm beginning to realize that young people are terrifying and rude (then she got in a fight with someone who basically agreed with her on everything but the finite details because she was rude to them, which I admit, was satisfying in a not very mature way on my part, and I didn't have to say anything).

Back to being dormant on FB! (or at least as dormant as possible) Not sure I'd mind if PETA comes through and shuts down all the interesting groups anymore. Maybe people would learn how to be polite as they learn to reconnect.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

If you have a fenced in large area for the GP , go for it....on a 30 day trial .agreement with current owner (if they won't agree to that, then perhaps the dog has issues)...they will wander till they are sure where their home is (Mel sure did) ......but once bonded with you, you will have 24 hour protection and unconditional  love.., 
And these young kids, ....they are clueless  about life, the universe and everything else....totally self focused brats !
Good luck on the decision  making with the dog


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Does anyone know if Great Pyrenees make good LGDs?


That is what they have been bred for, for hundreds and hundreds of years. Yes they make excellent LGD's, it is in their DNA. They DO need good fencing to keep them in, 4' with hot wire along the top is minimum. And you might need a low wire as well if the dog is a digger. It is said that if they can see it, they think they own it and are supposed to guard it. And the farther they go the larger "their" area  I would give serious consideration to fencing a larger area as time and money allow.

They will keep predators out, primarily by barking their deep "I'm here, I'm big, stay away" bark. A GP doing a LGD job will likely be up at night, out with its charges and sleep during the day. But they sleep light, they may be laying in the field looking dead to the world but their ears are still on alert. 0 to 60 in seconds. 

They are also loving dogs and need loving on by their people. I second @B&B Happy goats suggestion that you get a 30 day trial and the current owners will take her back if necessary.

Your FB experience, yet another reason I'm not sorry I never got "into" that.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Please go meet this girl GP, then make your decision.....Mel is keeping the racoons away, hawks and crows...I have seen him give "his bark" to a pit bull pack across the field from us and they turned and went the other way...people respect their size, your children will have a grand friend and your home and animals will be safe..
We just have a 4 foot no climb fence, Mel stays inside our property, although he can go over the fence, he stays on our property.....sure is worth meeting her, espically at her age, spayed and goat friendly !
I feel completely  safe at night here , even with knowing the meth heads are out and about, and looking for homes to break into...they won't  come close to our place due to our LGD


----------



## rachels.haven

I wonder if having a dog in the barn would make it so I didn't have to lock the door every night. It still only takes a few days of me not padlocking up for things to start getting moved around again, flakes one type of hay winding up in the wrong feeders, or the door latched funny (and we still haven't gotten a game cam, but I still think I know who it is). I wouldn't get a dog just for that, but it would be a nice side benefit. It would make things feel a little less creepy too.

I still have to ask DH about the dog. Not sure what he'd think even about "just" meeting her. Our fences are just cattle panel and no electric. Not sure I want to do anymore fence work for the next few months.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> I wonder if having a dog in the barn would make it so I didn't have to lock the door every night. It still only takes a few days of me not padlocking up for things to start getting moved around again, flakes one type of hay winding up in the wrong feeders, or the door latched funny (and we still haven't gotten a game cam, but I still think I know who it is). I wouldn't get a dog just for that, but it would be a nice side benefit. It would make things feel a little less creepy too.
> 
> I still have to ask DH about the dog. Not sure what he'd think even about "just" meeting her. Our fences are just cattle panel and no electric. Not sure I want to do anymore fence work for the next few months.



I don't  have electric on mine, and I promise you....nobody will come in your barn if you have a GP in there or in your fenced area, lol.....I have seen grown men get back into their trucks when they see Mel....their size is very impressive !  They don't  eat alot either...Mel weighs 135 lbs and eats the same if not less than our 85 lb. English/american bulldog.

Added note....if you decide not to get the dog, Amazon has fake security cameras that are awesome, we have four up and people actually have started driving the speed limit past our place now


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I can't add anything about the GP that others haven't already.  Their suggestion to do a 30 day trial sounds like a great idea.  If you have read Miss @B&B Happy goats's journal, you will see just how much she loves Mel!  I have a feeling that you will love this GP.

As for Facebook and other Internet forums, anonymity(*) makes folks be nasty at times when if they were talking to someone in person, they would not be as nasty.  It's a shame that some folks are that way, but it's true.  I got off Facebook after a brief sojourn there because I found it so boring.  But the nastiness is also a good reason.

Senile Texas Aggie

(*) The anonymity is to other folks.  Our identity -- our opinions, likes, dislikes, etc., is sold to whomever is willing to pay the price.  That is one of the biggest ways that Facebook and other such sites make their money.


----------



## Bruce

Electric is cheap and easy, you don't need a huge charger for the area you are likely to cover even if you do expand in the future. The cattle panels are fine though in the long run an expensive way to fence for larger areas. 

Definitely talk it over with DH, a 2.5 Y/O livestock trained GP is a valuable animal. Are they offering her free or do they have a price?


----------



## rachels.haven

For a price. Not sure I'd take a free dog without being nervous.

Cattle panels are expensive, but they go up and down rocky hills easier...or at least what I tell myself. I'm not afraid of the fence rolls but the serious posts are not something I can put in by myself. I'd need to hire out to someone with real machines. 

As a side note, here's a patch of grass I " killed" off for my garden, then scraped off because my timing was wrong. What, can't see it? It's that really lush green bit that's taller than everything else.





And here is a mulched fig getting established. "Mulch" is already creating more grass, I'm realizing. Poo.

 

Now I need to go make dinner to feed my little wolves and figure out how to bring this dog up with Mark. The question is, will it make farming and my life eventually easier, or harder? Not sure how we could know until after the fact.


----------



## Bruce

Assuming, unlike my DW, everyone in the family can sleep through the normal warning off barks, my bet is life will be easier. You won't be worrying about those predators any more. Most with LGDs say they sleep better at night knowing the dog(s) are on duty and can tell the warning bark from the "I need back up" bark in their sleep. What price is the dog (if it isn't too rude to ask).

I would disagree totally with the idea that cattle panels are easier on up and down land. They don't flex up and down so unless you plan to trench the high spots, you are going to potentially have some big gaps under them. And a fox can dance right through them with inches to spare. So can the chickens. They are nice in that you can do corners without the need for braced posts though. 

Now about those "serious posts". How rocky/ledgy is your property? You don't NEED a machine to dig a post hole (other than a manual post hole digger). Once the holes are dug, putting together an H brace or corner brace is really quite simple.


----------



## rachels.haven

The ground was rocky enough to bend (or split the top of) a lot of T posts when I pounded them in and I had to move where I put some posts all together when there were surface rocks that I could not dig out. We have rock walls all over the property, so things did get rock picked once long ago, but it probably needs to be done again. The dirt also has a lot of gravel according to the tours of the soil enjoyed while I dug holes for the fig, a couple of blueberries, and three grapes. I think once the posts are in they will be solidly in for a long time. Soil also drains very well. My blueberries, grapes, and figs will be happy with that, and the posts may not rot out as quickly.

I'll try to go out and take pictures of areas where I can't picture stretched fencing working tomorrow. Next year I may get someone out to do the posts and just try stretching some fence.

Husband has kindly asked me to hold off on the dog and not do things while I'm afraid. He'd also accept it if he came home to the dog being here as long as she was on my plate and not his, so to speak which is how our relationship works. But I'll hold off. Although if I lose a goat to a coyote or another thing he may come home to one.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

So sorry, ...you may be missing out on the love of your life dog 
The fake cameras have blinking lights to "show" they are on ...and are two in a package, and four were under $40.00 ....sure makes someone think twice about tresspassing  ....


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, sometimes the best things in life come suddenly...although my husband doesn't want 135 pounds of dog coming home suddenly if he has a choice.
We'll get a LGD eventually, I think. I'm just hoping we don't lose anything before then. Or if we get a puppy, I hope it doesn't escape and get eaten. The purpose of the post I put up on FB was info gathering, and minus the rude lady, it did let me gather info. It sounds like at least a 3 acre pen is preferable, but someone can and DOES keep LGD's and goats in a quarter acre pen without a problem and he did not mention electric-THREE OF THEM. A quarter acre seems like plenty of space for the goats right now. They do not like to roam much. They like to eat and lay down (and in the evenings when it's cool they like to butt heads and dance  ). The next quarter acre can be for extra insurance for the dog if that's what we wind up fencing next.

...although yeah, I'll be pretty frustrated in his direction if I turn this down and a goat gets killed, or say a bear breaks into my coop or barn and starts injuring and destroying things because there's no barking deterrent. I still have this haunting feeling that the only way we're going to keep the coyotes, and bears (who crushed a bunch of bird feeders for the last guy here and compelled him to put up bear bars on some windows of the barn), and bobcats, and hawks, and fishers and weasels and mink and foxes away from us and our stock is with a dog, especially since we're not gun people and I don't have time to hunt. That dog may not have been the right dog at the right time, but I think we have an outside working dog in our future for my peace of mind. I'd like my other half to be okay with it first though. It makes things easier when said disagreed about animal causes trouble during the adjustment period, which I feel like is unavoidable to some degree with just about every animal you get. Plus, I like DH.


----------



## Bruce

The "other half" does have to be in agreement. Don't know if another already trained dog will come along again in the future.



rachels.haven said:


> We have rock walls all over the property, so things did get rock picked once long ago, but it probably needs to be done again.


That does make it a lot harder, guess you are similar to here. New rocks "grow" every year. Most likely they are slowly pushed up in the annual freeze thaw cycles. 

I had to move some T-posts from their planned location due to rocks, not too big a deal with stretched fencing since the distance between posts isn't hard and fast. And, sadly, I had to dig 3 new holes for a H brace and gate strike post (6") after I had two dug and on the 3rd hit a rock 2' down so big I could not dig out by hand. I have a tractor with a backhoe now and if I had had it then, I might have been able to dig the rock out. And I have a corner post that I had to use cement with because I hit ledge 2.5' down. No moving "just a bit" to get around that! And it has floating braces instead of being H braced, no way to get the other posts in. Quite disappointing because I wanted to put a gate in that area. Would have been convenient for getting out to the field. Similar problem up near the barn where I wanted to put a gate. Nope, ledge and water 1 to 1.5' down.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Seriously  I am not trying to be pushing  you at all, but the offer of a LGD that is trained and with animals currently is a gift that may  never come your way again.......ever.... And training a puppy to do its job takes several years to train,  feed, house break , bond with...... to be capable  of taking care of the problems you are currently having now. The solution is almost in your hands......it has been offered.......JUMP on it ... 

I didn't  have much of a animal predator  problem as I had a human criminal problem, Mel is a LGD, but was raised a bit more as a companion dog  than a full LGD......I pitty the idiot that would try to tresspass here, or the predator  that goes after my goats...Mel makes us feel safer than any gun that we have in our home.....the trip to Texas was a small price to pay for such a great creature...If I had known that any animal could do as much for us as Mel has, I would drive ANYWHERE in the USA to go get him.
I promise I won't  post any thing else about getting that dog, just felt that I really needed to let you both know what a life changer getting  this breed of magnificent  creature has made for our little place and our personal safety   Barbara and Leon.....and....


----------



## rachels.haven

Ouch @Bruce , my arms ache for you. I don't think our properties are so different geologically speaking. Mines just covered in trees, which is nice for goats. I've realized that I will either need heavy equipment or will need to do things very slowly and work HARD and be flexible.

I'll keep talking to DH about the dog. I'm personally worried that we won't be able to contain her while she adjusts to thinking this property is hers and she'll get killed.

 My husband on the other hand...at one point we had a mini poodle for 18 months that we wound up with who was obviously a puppy mill dog and totally vicious and neurotic with very disturbing quirks-ate dirt until she got very ill on a regular basis unless I prevented it by keeping her on pavement, peed and pooed only in her water dishes, every single one, attacked stairs like a demon, randomly attacked people, 4 luxating patellas, had a crooked back, and drew blood regularly on a daily basis until she went after one of my 4 month old human babies immobile on the ground and I got rid of her. He is afraid of another Melody, especially a big one. I used to obedience train dogs for the local country animal shelter as a kid and loved it, but this dog was like nothing I'd ever dealt with before and didn't seem to have all the lights on in the attic, so I could dismiss it as a bad individual with bad breeding but that was my husband's only close experience with dogs period and that is why he is reluctant say yes. So I have a lot to talk through with him. And it might take losing a goat or having the barn or chicken coop smashed in. I just hope it's not one of my favorite goats.


----------



## Bruce

IMHO, the little ones are more likely to be neurotic, call it the small dog syndrome. I agree with @B&B Happy goats's post, almost wrote the same thing earlier. Finding a trained LGD is GOLD. Finding one TWICE? I don't think the odds are good.

We all believe DH to be a smart man and will understand that not all dogs are created equal. You should go meet this dog and see its personality. A well adjusted LGD will accept whoever their owner brings to them but it is unwise for an unknown person to approach them without the owner present. They are working dogs and protecting their property is their job. A Great Pyrenees is the polar opposite of an 8 pound nutjob. In my experience, which is limited, they move slowly and calmly unless they sense danger, then they are a rocket. Their bark is the first line of defense, pity the fool (of any species) that comes ahead anyway.

BTW, Mel's real full name is Mellow, named him that since he was such a mellow puppy.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Bruce said:


> IMHO, the little ones are more likely to be neurotic, call it the small dog syndrome. I agree with @B&B Happy goats's post, almost wrote the same thing earlier. Finding a trained LGD is GOLD. Finding one TWICE? I don't think the odds are good.
> 
> We all believe DH to be a smart man and will understand that not all dogs are created equal. You should go meet this dog and see its personality. A well adjusted LGD will accept whoever their owner brings to them but it is unwise for an unknown person to approach them without the owner present. They are working dogs and protecting their property is their job. A Great Pyrenees is the polar opposite of an 8 pound nutjob. In my experience, which is limited, they move slowly and calmly unless they sense danger, then they are a rocket. Their bark is the first line of defense, pity the fool (of any species) that comes ahead anyway.
> 
> BTW, Mel's real full name is Mellow, named him that since he was such a mellow puppy.


----------



## animalmom

You know, if this wasn't such a serious topic... livestock guardian dog and all I'd wag my finger at the two of you as being pushers, not just enablers.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

animalmom said:


> You know, if this wasn't such a serious topic... livestock guardian dog and all I'd wag my finger at the two of you as being pushers, not just enablers.


I understand, you are correct and I feel guilty.....but what a awesome  chance ...... sorry.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

On the topic of fencing, have you ever used a tamping tool?  I had never heard of such a tool until my brother-in-law visited and help me put up the fence at the front entrance.  It really helped loosen up the soil for the post hole digger.  Here is an example at Home Depot:
https://www.homedepot.com/p/Husky-69-in-Post-Hole-Digger-and-Tamping-Bar-34219/204168182

While it won't do anything for ledge or very large rocks, it can help dig out the smaller ones and make it a lot easier to use a post hole digger.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Bruce

@CntryBoy777 has one of those. It would have been helpful when I was fencing. For tamping I used a 2x4. For trying to dig out rocks I used a number of things but non were as long as that so less leverage.



animalmom said:


> You know, if this wasn't such a serious topic... livestock guardian dog and all I'd wag my finger at the two of you as being pushers, not just enablers.


Maybe it's because I had one for 3 weeks and had to return him. If there weren't the sleep ( or not sleep I guess) issue, I'd let Rachel pass this dog up ... but not until I got the contact information  I guess one can't really appreciate these animals until they have one.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

A few things I forgot to mention in my previous post.  One, either Miss @Ridgetop or Miss @babsbag used a walk behind machine (seems like it was a Bobcat) that had a post hole digger attachment.  (Maybe one of them will comment here.)  Perhaps you could rent such a tool.

Also, Stoney Ridge Farmer on YouTube had several videos of installing fence.  He went with steel posts and wire.  The reason for using steel posts that is the steel is a lot stronger and will last a lot longer than wood posts.  You can see one of his videos here:





Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh! Apparently I have a tamping tool in the barn. Didn't know what it was called, but I did figure it was for breaking rocks. Thought it was called a breaker bar. Previous occupant left all his yard equipment here. Still don't know what all of it is.

That is some lovely power equipment. Not sure it would fit through the trees here, but if I had the opportunity to rent it at the right time I would jump on it and try. I will keep my ears and eyes open.

Personally, I love pounded posts. When I was growing up in Iowa, I'm not sure if it was a myth or not, but people would say if you didn't pound in the post it would heave up. As a result, everything was pounded BUT the prairie has very few rocks. Living outside of Detroit I got to see a lot of heaved dug in (sometimes cemented) posts dug in 2.5-3 feet, and according to code. Nothing was allowed to be pounded as per goofy code. But again, different places, not here. Digging may work better here, not sure if cement will. I also like pounded posts because pounding posts makes me happy. I just have to wear ear protection here and be ready to hit them 25-30 times straight through sub-surface rock piles unlike by Detroit where it would take 5-8 strikes to get it in through sand, which would also dampen the sound. And the posts would not bend or have their heads split, even a little bit. Hitting a piece of metal until it goes several feet into the ground is something I find stress relieving.


----------



## CntryBoy777

If ya use a Tpost driver to drive posts it will be very difficult to split the post....they slide over the top of the post and the handles are on the opposite end, so ya can get momentum and gravity will add to your strength.....much safer and easier than hammering it in.....the tamp rod will bust things up, but most are like 16lbs and can both help and hurt ya....if ya have to raise it often it will wear ya down a bit.....but it really helps to cut thru thick roots or rock......


----------



## rachels.haven

That's what I use. I haven't tried wood posts, but this time I split the top of a few t posts. I really don't want to check and see how many. I think next time, I may see what I can do with the tamping/breaker bar when I start encountering resistance instead of just banging and banging. I'm not sure a wood post will go in.

DH said I can look into the girl Great Pyrenees. LGD's also tend to turn up on our local Craigslist quite often. There's a male GP up right now for annoying a neighbor with barking. There are also working lines maremma puppies available, and I've seen a couple other breeds. I'm going to get more info and proceed with caution. May still pass up this one if it doesn't feel right.


----------



## B&B Happy goats




----------



## Bruce

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> The reason for using steel posts that is the steel is a lot stronger and will last a lot longer than wood posts.


Yeah and the speciality machine to drive those posts is likely $$$$. Gonna cost him a fortune I think given he's only just started and has a mile of fence up. Plus you have to know how to weld since the braces are welded to the posts.



rachels.haven said:


> Still don't know what all of it is.


Line it up, take pictures, post pictures! We'd love to see if we know what it is.



rachels.haven said:


> May still pass up this one if it doesn't feel right.


We didn't say that because it goes without saying! Never go against your gut with an animal. Just like when you have a LGD you don't go against ITS gut with strangers. Somehow they smell bad intentions.

With the dog on CL, you'ld have to find out when the dog is barking. It is the annoying "any time anyone or anything walks by" barking or is it barking at night. The latter means the dog is doing his job which is what kept DW up. The former is a PITA dog you don't want. Merlin never once barked at people or cars going up the road. He would go to the fence and follow them, just in case, but never made a sound. In fact I don't think I heard him bark once during the day. And is the CL dog a working dog or a yard dog? One of the huge plusses with the female in question is that she is a working dog.


----------



## rachels.haven

BTW, I may later paint the split t-post tops, btw, but not today. I've had a sleep deprived week so my brain is foggy.

Wow, I didn't think about posting pictures of the mysterious lawn stuff here. I'll do that. That might make it so I can get rid of things I don't think we'll use or that I don't want to store, and use the stuff I can.

The CL dog's ad says he's a working dog. I'll get more info there too.


----------



## Bruce

Find out what kind of animals they have and what kind of work.  

I forgot to mention that I have crack off part of a T post here and there as well. Sometimes you can work it down between unseen rocks and sometimes there is no way around other than digging it out .... if you can.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Bruce said:


> Yeah and the speciality machine to drive those posts is likely $$$$. Gonna cost him a fortune I think given he's only just started and has a mile of fence up. Plus you have to know how to weld since the braces are welded to the posts.
> 
> 
> Line it up, take pictures, post pictures! We'd love to see if we know what it is.
> 
> 
> We didn't say that because it goes without saying! Never go against your gut with an animal. Just like when you have a LGD you don't go against ITS gut with strangers. Somehow they smell bad intentions.
> 
> With the dog on CL, you'ld have to find out when the dog is barking. It is the annoying "any time anyone or anything walks by" barking or is it barking at night. The latter means the dog is doing his job which is what kept DW up. The former is a PITA dog you don't want. Merlin never once barked at people or cars going up the road. He would go to the fence and follow them, just in case, but never made a sound. In fact I don't think I heard him bark once during the day. And is the CL dog a working dog or a yard dog? One of the huge plusses with the female in question is that she is a working dog.



Your last line is so true..."One of the huge plusses with the female in question is that she is a working dog" .........


----------



## Baymule

Here is Trip, our male GP, eating supper with Carson, our black Lab/Great Dane. Our 2 year old grand daughter decided that it was a good time for some Trip loving. he totally quit eating and adored his little human.







Here he is watching a new lamb getting his first milk. The lamb was born under Trip's watchful eye.


----------



## Baymule

If we didn't have our dogs, we would have no sheep. I 100% agree that you need a dog. Don't let the heartbreak of dead livestock be the catalyst that gets you shopping for a dog. Better yet, get two dogs.


----------



## rachels.haven

Wow, Trip looks like a beautiful soul and a good farm hand. I will check these dogs out and try. A 30 day trial sounds best for all parties involved.

Here's the male's ad.
https://worcester.craigslist.org/grd/d/ware-livestock-guardian-dog/6943527388.html

The female is being sold by a man in Marion, Massachusetts.

Btw: heard from my rheumatologist and got blood work back. She sticks with her previous assertion that the other doctor may have jumped the gun to medicate me for lupus/rheumatoid arthritis and she still suspects fibromyalgia. Tests were still negative for both (my previous diagnosis was for nonseroidal rh/lupus, so no change there). Crp marker was slightly elevated, but not a concern to this doctor, which I seem to remember from before. We will meet again in January for a report on symptoms and winter bloodwork. No medicines needed at this point. And that's a relief. I'm hoping to try more otc's this winter. I just recently "discovered" Aleve, right at the end of winter/spring and it did help. Silly me should have tried it earlier.

I did come back anemic, so I guess it's time to get my drenching gun and do a worming, lol.


----------



## Baymule

I looked at the ad, he sounds like a good dog.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I


rachels.haven said:


> Wow, Trip looks like a beautiful soul and a good farm hand. I will check these dogs out and try. A 30 day trial sounds best for all parties involved.
> 
> Here's the male's ad.
> https://worcester.craigslist.org/grd/d/ware-livestock-guardian-dog/6943527388.html
> 
> The female is being sold by a man in Marion, Massachusetts.
> 
> Btw: heard from my rheumatologist and got blood work back. She sticks with her previous assertion that the other doctor may have jumped the gun to medicate me for lupus/rheumatoid arthritis and she still suspects fibromyalgia. Tests were still negative for both (my previous diagnosis was for nonseroidal rh/lupus, so no change there). Crp marker was slightly elevated, but not a concern to this doctor, which I seem to remember from before. We will meet again in January for a report on symptoms and winter bloodwork. No medicines needed at this point. And that's a relief. I'm hoping to try more otc's this winter. I just recently "discovered" Aleve, right at the end of winter/spring and it did help. Silly me should have tried it earlier.



Congradulations  on your new doctor not pushing pills at you !  Aleve is pretty good stuff, I have good results from using  that and pure CBD oil....
I read the ad on the male dog, sounds like a good boy, .....I just personally got a gut feeling on the female, can't  explain  why......but I am so happy that you are looking into these dogs, raising a puppy may sound like fun, but to get it to the point of working is a alot of constant work. They are a special breed of creature (I don't  like to insult them and call them a dog...there is a huge diffrence between the two)  I am so happy you are willing to explore the GP as a solution to you predators,  barn intruder and family friend and protector.  I hope you feel a instant  connection with one as I did with  Mel....


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Baymule said:


> If we didn't have our dogs, we would have no sheep. I 100% agree that you need a dog. Don't let the heartbreak of dead livestock be the catalyst that gets you shopping for a dog. Better yet, get two dogs.



Those  pictures you shared are the perfect example of the heart and brains that these creature's  exhibit  constantly. ...I can't  imagine life without one  since  meeting Mel


----------



## babsbag

Bruce said:


> @CntryBoy777 has one of those. It would have been helpful when I was fencing. For tamping I used a 2x4. For trying to dig out rocks I used a number of things but non were as long as that so less leverage.
> 
> 
> Maybe it's because I had one for 3 weeks and had to return him. If there weren't the sleep ( or not sleep I guess) issue, I'd let Rachel pass this dog up ... but not until I got the contact information  I guess one can't really appreciate these animals until they have one.



I could never have goats if I didn't have my LGDs. Actually I would never go outside of my house at night if I didn't have my LGDs. I can't tell you how much they changed my life.


----------



## babsbag

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> A few things I forgot to mention in my previous post.  One, either Miss @Ridgetop or Miss @babsbag used a walk behind machine (seems like it was a Bobcat) that had a post hole digger attachment.  (Maybe one of them will comment here.)  Perhaps you could rent such a tool.
> 
> Also, Stoney Ridge Farmer on YouTube had several videos of installing fence.  He went with steel posts and wire.  The reason for using steel posts that is the steel is a lot stronger and will last a lot longer than wood posts.  You can see one of his videos here:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Senile Texas Aggie



I have a walk behind Bobcat with a post hole digger attachment. I also have a post hole digger on my John Deere. Don't waste your time on a three point hitch attachment, the Bobcat with down pressure will dig a hole anywhere, I love that thing.  And because I am incredibly spoiled and my motto is work smarter not harder I also have a pneumatic t-post driver. Granted you need an air compressor to run it and therefore power but I have a small generator that fits in my bobcat bucket quite nicely and I take it and the compressor where ever I need to go. I will drive a few without it, but for a big job it is priceless. CA has no summer rain and I grow rocks here so good tools are important.


----------



## babsbag

As far as the dogs, make sure that they are people friendly and have been handled.So many are raised without human interaction and that is very hard with an adult dog. I had a barker...he barked at the sun, the moon, the stars, the flowers, the leaves, the flies...you get the picture. The three I have now, and the one I recently rehomed, only bark when there is a threat, or the neighbor is driving down our road...they all hate him. It is nice to know that when my dogs bark I need to listen. But a constantly barking dog is enough to make a person crazy. If you decide to get a puppy there is an awesome Facebook group for training. They train differently than any other thing I have ever read but if I ever have another puppy I will use their methods.


----------



## rachels.haven

Which FB group if you don't mind me asking? Not planning on a puppy, but I can always lurk.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Which FB group if you don't mind me asking? Not planning on a puppy, but I can always lurk.


You beat me to it! LOL Even though I have 2 LGD's, I am still a beginner. I have found that you have to sift through the nonsense to find the wisdom, on most information that you find. I learned tons right here on BYH, we have some very wise people here!


----------



## babsbag

rachels.haven said:


> Which FB group if you don't mind me asking? Not planning on a puppy, but I can always lurk.


https://www.facebook.com/groups/1828786214072789/?ref=bookmarks

She believes in bringing a puppy inside for training and socialization and when it is outside it is tethered near the stock when it is alone. Set the pup up for complete success.  And like raising children, she does not go with this idea that you never correct them, she believes in appropriate "escalation and beat the crap out of them (not really)" when needed.   It is a no fuss, no drama group. Good information and good ideas that I will try if I ever have a new puppy.


----------



## Baymule

I did not tether Trip, I penned him next to the sheep. It worked. Since Paris was fully grown, 4 or 5 years old, she only wanted to attack them, so in the backyard she went. We built a small pen to wean the lambs in, in HER back yard. Over time she accepted them as HERS and protected them. We let them out in small increments of time, with us being out there with her, and she guarded them. On that correction thing, I caught her chasing them and went ballistic on her. I yelled, screamed, chased, cornered her up and yelled some more. Never did that again. Make the first mistake one to remember.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hey, I just joined that group this morning! Well, I guess it's time to get reading.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I did come back anemic, so I guess it's time to get my drenching gun and do a worming, lol



I'm glad to see you plan to make time to improve your health 



Baymule said:


> I looked at the ad, he sounds like a good dog.


I agree. Working dog and a fair price. Owner wants him to stay a working dog, that shows he cares about the dog. Would need to make sure the barking is working barks not incessant. Sounds like you have an unusual situation, two likely good dogs to choose from. OH how I wish I could take one.  If you do get one of these, you can get a GP pup later, the older dog will teach the younger and in ways that you, a simple human, can not.


----------



## babsbag

Baymule said:


> I did not tether Trip, I penned him next to the sheep. It worked. Since Paris was fully grown, 4 or 5 years old, she only wanted to attack them, so in the backyard she went. We built a small pen to wean the lambs in, in HER back yard. Over time she accepted them as HERS and protected them. We let them out in small increments of time, with us being out there with her, and she guarded them. On that correction thing, I caught her chasing them and went ballistic on her. I yelled, screamed, chased, cornered her up and yelled some more. Never did that again. Make the first mistake one to remember.



That is what the moderator of the group says to do as far as corrections...make the first one one to remember.  I remember reading about Paris when she was new to you and your patience paid off. She is a lucky girl to have landed in your life.

I have never tethered a dog either but I also had a pen right next to the goats for them to stay in. But I could see where tethering in a chicken yard might be a good idea for poultry training. I also believe that the group suggests tethering in the house next to your bed at night to aid in housebreaking. I honestly haven't read all of the files since I don't have an untrained LGD at the moment. (Thank God for that).  Alondra is doing great at her new home, no chasing chickens and no chasing cats. Just goes to show that an old dog can learn new tricks. Alondra just turned 3 years old last week.  I miss that girl...a lot.  I didn't realize how much I was going to miss her until it was too late. But she's happy so that is what really matters.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> OH how I wish I could take one.



There seems to be a lot of ldg's and breeders up here (hmm, wonder why?). If you ever need to some to Massachusetts for a dog hunting trip, you should look us up. I'd have to see where we're at, but we might have an extra room with dorm grade bed available for a night or two while you hunted-or at least a meal (especially if we still haven't put functional locks on the spare room doors, which I've realized is a little ridiculous if your guests ever want to feel like they have privacy). BUT again, we're not close to anything, especially not highways. I think the big house people like it like that, but it does make any kind of visiting difficult.


----------



## rachels.haven

Starting to sound like a skipping record, but the hawk's back. I was milking and I heard the chickens upset. I assumed the run cover would protect them and briefly checked on them when I was done and saw nothing. Now I'm down to 31 chickens. I had 36 the night before. I started with 44 birds outside. I looked at the run and it looks like the hawk's been walking around on top pulling on the baling twine I used to tie it again, creating gaps and breaking twine, and I wouldn't believe it if I didn't see him doing it last time. He also hops under the shed and just grabs birds. out of the dark.

Husband told me one of his coworkers' wife starts out with a box of baby chicks every year, lets them free range, then they're down to zero by the end of the season. He thinks a lot of people do that, so the hawks are used to getting fed, like entitled domestic animals. I'm getting close to wanting to quit, but the birds are so, so beautiful. I really should sell them while they're not hawk food and save their lives. The roosters sound like flutes when they crow too-not annoying. The sound rolls down the hill of our front yard and gets absorbed in the trees. I want to keep them so bad.

We have a roll of deer netting to put over the run while we're at church. Then Mark suggested we build something. I hope the hawk gets stuck and dies while I'm gone.

Hardwick dog is pending to someone else and FB man is not answering further messages or comments, so I will assume he changed his mind. Guess I missed my chance.

If I had a chance I would keep a whiting true blue rooster(s) and an ameraucana rooster(s) and all the hens I've got left.

Well, happy sunday all!

Dog probably couldn't guard the chickens anyway. They are out of the goat pen.

On a happy note, Avalon's due kid on September 6th. Happy, happy, happy?


----------



## rachels.haven

I also found a hay man 15 minutes away who delivers and the hay is dry, the bales are heavy, and the grass is leafy and smells beautiful. And $7/nice 55 lbs bale is cheap for around here. 5 of his bales are in my barn now, waiting for their lineup to be fed.


----------



## Baymule

I hope you can secure your chickens from the hawk. Build a hoop run!


----------



## Bruce

I think you are going to need to wire the top over the run onto the sides with something thick enough the hawks can't bite through. Besides hawks, a coon could easily get through twine. Twine no good, thin wire, no good. Try some 14 gauge wire.

It's not brilliant to get new chicks every spring and end up with none in the fall, they won't ever get to the age of laying. Waste of time, money and the birds' lives. 

Sorry you've missed out on the dogs but glad you found good hay locally. And thanks for the offer but I'm not dog hunting, DW would not be happy if I brought home another LGD.


----------



## rachels.haven

My goodness.
The Great Pyrenees female is driving up on Friday. The man got back to me eventually. He's got a friend in Pepperell, and he's coming up for the weekend, so he'll just bring her. He's not asking much at all for her so I'm not sure what to expect, but he is okay with doing a 30 day trial period, so I'm less uneasy.

I kind of cut a door in the wall between the buck pen and the spare stall and switched the bucks and the does so the does could have a double wide stall with the option of closing a door between the two halves for kidding and spare stall usage, but I haven't put a door up, so I guess I'd better get on that. Unless I decide to keep her in the house at first. Not sure, we'll see how she handles crating at night.

The hawk has not been caught trotting around on the top of the run since I put up the bird netting, so I think he can see it. The problem is, I think we've got a mink or weasel killing and dragging off birds too, so I've set a trap baited with a little fresh salmon and I'm praying and crossing my fingers as I build a giant (but not giant enough) chicken cube.

My chicken saga has been really stupid. Just saying.

We are getting blue eggs now too, so my one adult whiting true blue is laying. They are all such beautiful birds, I wish they'd quit getting eaten.


----------



## rachels.haven

Also, this is what a gallon of milk looks like when I run out of fridge room. It's chevre and according to the critics, it's great. Too bad we can't sell cheese.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## B&B Happy goats

So happy you are doing the trial with the GP.....I know that's  a big step for you, you just got to talk to her like you would a friend, they are diffrent than a dog...once she gets comfortable, you will wonder how you managed without her congratulations  on trying her out.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

B&B Happy goats said:


> congratulations on trying her out.



Amen to that!  Is anyone in your household a light sleeper?  I hope not.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I never have liked a dog barking at night, ....drove me crazy. ....Now it is music to my ears, Mel has three barks, when he goes for the deep growl...I get up because I know something is outside....not that he can't  handle  it, I just am there for back up 
When he first arrived he barked alot to warn everything / body that he was the new guy claiming his territory,  ...now  it mostly to let a racoon or another dog know to move out of his territory .... By the way, his property consists  of every place he can see ...because HE is protecting everything. ... his animals and humans.
So barking is now a good thing, I sleep so much better with this amazing creature guarding us. 
When your girl arrives friday, start getting her poo and put it outside the chicken run..it will let the pesty predators  know the big girl is around !


----------



## Bruce

She may not, likely WILL not, accept being crated in the house at night. She's a working dog and most of the threats are at night, she'll want to be out with her charges.

When do I pick up the chevre?


----------



## rachels.haven

I'd give you a block.  Give me two day's notice-one to collect the milk, the next to let it get ready. So far it works great on salads.



  We're looking at the inside of the new tiny run. Tomorrow will be the day I finish the last wall and prepare the site. I need DH to help me move and hold the walls in place while I screw them together and add roof pieces, so maybe all the pieces will be in place after he gets home from work. The last day will be clothing the roof and adding a skirt...and probably a door. It's kind of open otherwise.

Need hinges and a lock or two. And also to clean the coop.

Time to cook dinner.


----------



## Baymule

When your new girl is barking at night, go outside and talk to her. That lets her know that you are backing her up. Don't yell or scold, praise her and tell her good dog. She will be in a new place, everything is strange and it will take her awhile to sort out what is a real threat and what isn't. 

Will she be close to the house? With the predators you have, you might not want to take a hike to the barn at night. LOL

If she is close to the house, before you go out, tap on the window. Now, when mine are barking and it is that "dog wants the last bark" kind of aimless barking, I just tap the window and they shut up. It took time to get there, but so worth it.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

You know your set up better than any of us do, can you make it so the GP goes freely from the goat yard into the barn at will...the gentleman that is bringing her to you will fill you in on her and see your set up, Im sure he will have some suggestions to help you make a easy transition to your place. I am so excited  to read how the whole thing goes....just remember, they do think on their own and you both need to learn to trust each other and bond.....and when she barks, and you can't  see what she is  seeing or hearing, tell her she is a good girl. Because she is doing her job.
Sure wish you had a camera to capture the look on you "barn visitor" face when he meets the GP face to face ....priceless !


----------



## rachels.haven

Yikes, I hope no one gets hurt! Dumb people don't always make the best decisions.




Baymule said:


> Will she be close to the house? With the predators you have, you might not want to take a hike to the barn at night. LOL



In this instance, I'm so glad the barn is close to the house. Normally it's annoying because the goats can see us and it sets them off whenever they want anything. This time I'll use the flood light on the barn and the one on the back of the house, and the wing lights, and with the dog I will be less afraid to go out.

So I've been assuming I should separate her from the goats at first to make sure she's trustworthy and not going to go after any goats or jump the fence in a panic to get back home. Is that what you all would do with her? I'm not sure I feel comfortable tethering a guarding breed that I do not know yet like the lady in that fb group suggests, especially not with the amount of things walking around here. She'd be bait. Would it be better to just let her in the barn pen and big, undivided stall with the goats after introductions? Even at night? Or should I stick with my plan to give her a stall that she can look over the wall of and be next to the goats at night in your opinion?


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> clothing the roof and adding a skirt



Huh?  Will it be a miniskirt, maxi skirt, or something in between?


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I do believe when they man comes to your place with the GP he will let you know what her habbits are and how you should approach  things with her...and where she should sleep


----------



## Bruce

When Merlin came he'd always been with sheep. The 2 alpacas eyed him from a distance. He smelled their poop pile and later when they were eating their evening pellets, smelled each of their butts. I guess that made the association for him. The geldings had originally lived down the street with 6 females and 3 goats. They also had a herding dog and a GP but those dogs never were in with the "livestock" so the boys didn't have any history with a guardian. But they weren't freaked out by Merlin and he never bothered them (though once he did ask them to play, they refused). 

This is Merlin with DD1 just after he came
 

I made him a room off the barn alley, complete with dog bed, food bowl and water dish. He decided the alpacas' water bucket was where he wanted to drink, he slept in the alley opposite the chickens stall coop and carried his food dish out back to eat. Talked to the lady I got him from, he was used to eating out of a bucket so I got some. Every day I'd put food in a bucket and he would carry it out back of the barn. The food dish is now used for summer water for the chickens out between the barns and the heated water dish is their winter water dish. Need a brand new never been used XL dog bed?

 

The gate in the distance keeps the alpacas in that end of the barn (they have a 24 hour door around the corner. There was originally chicken wire on the gate (like a 3' gate will keep a chicken in!) and the first night Merlin scaled it when he felt the need to go out. I took the chicken wire off so he could go through it instead. 

The point of all this is: You can set it up the way you THINK the dog will be comfortable and she will do what she wants. Just go with the flow.


----------



## rachels.haven

One week until we get our ldg and today I almost get in a kick boxing match with the coyote which is as tall as my waist and decided it would rather fight me than run away, and then when he did run away, he only sort of ran away until I went and got my airhorn and horned him out of sight. I've just about had it with him. I was outside working on the run and he decided to run he was going to have a little snack while I was out there. NO. Not sure what I'm going to do, but I need to do something. He's making the goats into spazzes and is going to bite someone. I hope we can last a week. Oh my goodness, this is getting dangerous.

On a side note, all but the run door, the skirt, and the top of the covered flight cage for the chickens is done. I can keep them contained tomorrow and they'll be safe if I put up a net and nothing digs in. I'm going to have to build another segment, shorter this time. 8x8 is too small, even with the under the coop space. *insert complaint about how expensive this is here* But husband wants me to not give up, so I've got the budget.

I guess no free ranging ever again, even with supervision for safety reasons.  Poor birds.


----------



## Bruce

I think a .38 or 9mm pistol carried at all times while outside is in order. 

Free ranging may be possible if the LGD works out. Some are attentive not only to ground predators but also avians.


----------



## Baymule

You need to shoot that coyote. He could snatch a small child.


----------



## CntryBoy777

When they lose their innate "fear of man"....they are very dangerous.....sss....and if nothing else, ya better "make a plan" and have something very handy and close by....to grab for a weapon.....don't just "swat at it"....it is a fight to the death....as far as that coyote is concerned....be very aware of your surroundings....they can travel in packs....be really careful...even a pump BB gun is better than nuthin'.....


----------



## farmerjan

Have you contacted the sheriff's dept or the local police, dog warden, maybe the extension service, or one of the Gov't  agencies that deal with farmers?  I am thinking that you are putting yourself in a dangerous position now that this animal is not afraid of you.  @CntryBoy777 @Baymule  are right.  This can be a situation where this animal can and will come after your kids if outside.  It needs to be eradicated.  Nowhere would I tolerate a wild animal being that bold.  I was born and raised in CT., I know about close proximity to houses and such.  But we still shot and killed smaller varmints like raccoons and such for lesser infractions.  Had a fox that I caught coming through in the middle of the day after my chickens.  Managed to shoot it after losing several.  Turns out it had mange.  Have killed some that have had rabies.

What will you do if it decides it is not afraid of you?  Or if it turns on you?  This is no longer about protecting some chickens.  I think that you need to make it known to some one in the animal control dept that there is this threat.  The dept of Game and Fisheries will often trap and dispose of animals that are nuisance.  I have family in NH and my brother has several tree farms in VT that he manages.  They talk about the problems with the coydogs and the different crosses now with the coywolves and the dog/wolf crosses.  They also do alot of damage to the wildlife and are on the radar of the dept of game people. 

On another front, I do not miss the terrible deer flies that are a part of the New England landscape.  We have a few here but not like up there.  They will literally eat you up in your area. 
Our chickens were always kept in runs, that had tops to keep the hawks and owls out. And they got locked in every night. Although it is illegal to shoot any bird of prey, there were a few that just disappeared from our area after repeatedly having them actually get into the runs and then in the coops after the birds.


----------



## rachels.haven

I have contacted fish and wildlife and animal control and am waiting for a call back.

Looking into getting a gun and will be picking up some fast acting agricultural rat poison for some rats or something.

I have warned neighbors via town Facebook page. Got several disconnected nature worshipers acting as you'd expect. A few neighbors have been having issues too about a mile off. And yes, he is human aggressive and not afraid. I'm hoping they can send someone efficient with experience to take care of this so I won't have to blunder my way through the learning curve of killing this very dangerous thing.
Sorry if I missed anything. I'm still out building the run. I will reread when I can finally rest for the day. Putting the door on. Next the roof and skirt.


----------



## farmerjan

DAMM all the nature worshippers, they need to get a lesson by an animal going after them to make them have any sense at all.  I don't want to kill all the wildlife.....he// I rescued 4 baby skunks and took them to our wildlife center when their momma got killed on the road....but there are times for real life to be considered.  Hope the dfg gets back to you soon.


----------



## Bruce

If you haven't been trained in whatever type of gun you will get, I suggest doing so. You want to be confident you can hit what you are aiming at.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sorry, this post is not an improvement on the last one.

Animal control will not help, they said, unless they can be called and they drive up and see him attacking someone or not acting "natural". My word is not good enough. They told me to call fish and wildlife on Monday-no one on call from them. Well, animal control may get their wish. The coyote is now hanging out outside our house, howling, sounding just WRONG-like a weird dog, and NOT like the other coyotes, who are not answering him. He's not leaving. I can't see him, but he's there. I'd only come in a few minutes before he made himself known. I guess no more after dark chores, and I'm becoming scared to go outside period, day or night. This thing is harassing us now. I wonder how this little adventure is going to end?

Hurry up Monday. Might be keeping the goats stalled tomorrow. 

I didn't get a gun today. Husband is still not comfortable with it. BUT I can't shoot what I can't see in the dark anyway, even if I was trained. The best I can do is make sure I do no more chores in the dark and the kids stay inside and be super careful while going out at all.

I did order a couple of my favorite vermin killing rodent poisons (we do have mice in the barn, after all), but now I'm starting to suspect rabies, so those aren't going to be super effective in the coyote if I used them on it. Plus, they too won't arrive until next week.

How the heck are animal control supposed to drive up and catch it attacking someone?


----------



## Bruce

That does seem weird. Maybe they have no trapping capability, only deal with loose dogs? Hopefully F&G will do something. I know that some official, I assume F&G, trapped 4 or 5 coyotes down in Charlotte a few years ago that were endangering a sheep herd. 

It is horrible to be trapped in your own house at night. No way you can only be out in daylight forever, winter is coming and with it a lot fewer hours of daylight.


----------



## rachels.haven

DH said he's okay with me keeping a pellet gun.

Would this one be appropriate? 

https://www.amazon.com/Gamo-Magnum-...22&qid=1565540247&s=gateway&sr=8-1&th=1&psc=1

It's no BB gun...I liked the BB gun we had as a kid, but it was mainly just good at shooting targets and pinecones out of pine trees. That's the extent of my expertise on this subject.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Looks good to me, but have never shot anything like that...I have shot 22cal pellet rifle, but they were just the ones from Walmart....barrel breaks and compresses air to shoot the pellet....some, like that...maybe use a CO2 cartridge....just find the range of it out and anything a 22cal will kill, the pellet will too...within its range....most are single shot, but some use a rotating plastic clip that will hold more....no kick or noise...other than the release of air....


----------



## Bruce

Hubby would prefer that you just piss off the coyote? 

To answer your question, IMO No.

I have the .17 version (Actually the Bone Collector Whisper) of that. Other than the first time (when I got lucky I guess) it has taken at least 4 shots to the head, aiming for the center of an X created by running a line from ear to opposite eye, presumably the best place) IN a Havahart trap for both a coon and several woodchucks. And I'm using heavy pellets for penetration. Clearly there is no loss of velocity at 3" or 4".
It is a single shot gun. After you piss off the coyote and open the breech to put in another pellet, you are going to be praying the coyote runs rather than going for your throat.


----------



## rachels.haven

I just got off the Fish and Wildlife call. They told me to get a shot gun, and until then get a lot of fist sized or bigger rocks. And that hazing a coyote is not making a lot of noise and chasing them off. It's maiming or killing them here. It's also legal to poison them, but trapping doesn't usually work.
She also recommended contacting the hunting club and having someone hunt on our land in season, or have a friend shoot the thing (did not clarify in season or not).

DH is calling the hunting club...maybe...since it's his hang up preventing me from taking care of this myself. I'm not super happy about the no gun road block, but I married him.

Just putting out poison will not just make everything all better, contrary to what is being thought by some parties here.

I'm mad, but I guess this is my mess to work through with my spouse. Problem is, if it's not taken care of the kids and I will probably be the ones paying the price and not him.


----------



## rachels.haven

...Time for a trip to Walmart or Cabellas or something.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> I just got off the Fish and Wildlife call. They told me to get a shot gun, and until then get a lot of fist sized or bigger rocks. And that hazing a coyote is not making a lot of noise and chasing them off. It's maiming or killing them here. It's also legal to poison them, but trapping doesn't usually work.
> She also recommended contacting the hunting club and having someone hunt on our land in season, or have a friend shoot the thing (did not clarify in season or not).
> 
> DH is calling the hunting club...maybe...since it's his hang up preventing me from taking care of this myself. I'm not super happy about the no gun road block, but I married him.
> 
> Just putting out poison will not just make everything all better, contrary to what is being thought by some parties here.
> 
> I'm mad, but I guess this is my mess to work through with my spouse. Problem is, if it's not taken care of the kids and I will probably be the ones paying the price and not him.



There comes a time when you just have to go into " mama bear" mode " , your children need to be protected first...above all others...
.I am the one at our home that steps up to the plate when trouble comes, and the gun is needed...Sometimes overies are better than testicals....get yourself a gun, no matter who objects !  You and your children are the ones that are there while he is pursuing  HIS career. ...
Take it from a ole gal  who has burned through several husbands....protect your children and yourself


----------



## CntryBoy777

I do know that in Mississippi it is open season on coyotes...especially in rural areas....sounds like the DH has never been around a truly "vicious" dog, coming at him...he'd change his mind real quick....


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, he is a city-suburb kid.

Coyotes or not, this place is still much better than where we were living. People and rats were the issue there.


----------



## Baymule

You need a firearm and lessons how to use it. A gun range would be a good place to go for lessons. Wear hearing protection!


----------



## farmerjan

If he is that opposed to a gun, yes, you married him and it is your situation to deal with.  So why is he opposed (slow to call) a professional that can come, dispose of it when he is most likely going to be at work anyway, and going this route to protect his family???? Maybe approach it like that?????  Not any different from calling a plumber to deal with a bad drain..... problem, call a professional, get it "fixed"..... done.  Yes we have guns, I carry a .22 rifle most times as there always seems to be something that needs to be taken care of when I don't have the gun.....so have just started carrying it.  One pasture where we rent, they have a garden and are in and out.  Keep trapping groundhogs and asking me to shoot them... Since they are in the barn too, I am happy to get rid of them.  Shot a skunk one time up there that was just not acting right.... and a fox after the chickens once.....coons, possums and occasionally a fox here, coyotes whenever I can......


----------



## rachels.haven

Yikes! Skunks can definitely be rabid.

DH said I could get one now. I just have to hide it. I'm not entirely sure why he so opposed to them. Yes, people can accidently blow people away, but if treated right a gun can be safer than the huge, professional grade, super sharp butcher knives I use to process things, and he doesn't have an issue with those. It could be political and prejudice and therefore his issues to work through. It's probably tied very much into anxiety over a new dangerous thing. He'll be alright. He also really does not want to call the hunting club (not totally sure why on that, he is okay with other people hunting and it would get him out of having a gun in the house).

Looks like I have to take a class before I can get the necessary license to even buy a firearm to use on my own property in this state. This is going to take a while to get done, especially if the class during the day when I am with the kids. I guess I'd better get on that, maybe call the police station again that won't help me with a coyote following me to my house in the dark because I have animals and the that means I forfeit their concern or help at all unless the animal is obviously rabid. Following me to my house door is apparently acting "natural" here. Plus they can't drive up and see it themselves.

My Dad suggested I go to wally world and get a Mossberg 500 shotgun. His has a place to have a gun lock on it, and in this state you have to store them in a locked container separate from the ammo on to of that so it would be fairly safe (two locks, no ammo and all). I, for one, think I'm going to have to go to a hunting/fishing store and not walmart because this is Massachusetts and not the south. If I can get over the hurtle of childcare while I take a class (hopefully a one day thing), I will probably go that route.

I'm just shocked that animal control wouldn't come out and take care of this coy-dog. If they came out and while coyote was there it would not run away and go after them too, and that's not natural. And it's more an adult and kid safety thing, and not a chicken safety thing. The chickens are "safe" living in a hardware cloth box now, and I can't ever let them out for me and my family's safety or this thing comes around to threaten us (which means he's sitting out there watching us for them, which makes me not want to go near the chickens). And not all the coyotes have issues that come through our land. Just this big one that's not going away and has no friends.


----------



## Baymule

I am glad that he finally agreed. When my kids were small, they shared a single shot Ithaca 22 rifle. My ex and I taught them gun safety with it and there was never an incident. At just a few years old, they both knew to NEVER touch a firearm unless one of us was with them.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Till you go get the gun, go get the bear pepper spray and a couple  (4) big baseball bats, set the bats where they are convient for you if needed outside and carry your cell phone and Pepperspray  and a bat with you ..."momma bear" , sorry all of this has become your responsibility. ..but I got faith in you that you will take care of it


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I'm not super happy about the no gun road block, but I married him.


I know that one, and actually likely begot the bigger problem ... DD1. The emotional vegetarian who thinks that animals have to live their lives too. Yeah well, I don't think domestic chickens in a fenced area is the natural food of coons and foxes. I scared up bunches of voles when I was out mowing. 

But to keep peace I don't have a gunpowder gun. And they don't know about the pellet rifle in the barn. At least I've not had your problem of a "too friendly" coyote. I suspect if I did I'd be saying "tough noogies, I'm not getting attacked by a coyote for your belief system".

Good luck. BTW, don't know about there but WallyWorld doesn't carry anything but pellet and BB guns here. I'd go to a gun/hunting store where they know their inventory and can tell you what the best option is for you and your specific situation and quarry. They might also know where you can get training if they don't have that themselves.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. I hope you never have to deal with a coyote issue like this either.

Believe it or not, Walmart in Iowa, Tennessee, and Arkansas always had real guns locked up for purchase when I was a kid and last time I went down south (not sure about Iowa, haven't been there in 7 years). Some politician here is trying to lobby for some office somewhere on the platform on getting rid of the guns in walmart, but I think they're already gone, which would be typical of politicians. I didn't see them when we were getting camping supplies earlier (that we will not be using until this is dealt with ironically enough).


----------



## CntryBoy777

They still sell them in Mississippi........there are some really good crossbows too....just sayin'........I don't know if ya never shot a rifle, gun, or pistol or not, but the big difference is the amount of recoil that is produced....a general "rule of thumb" is the larger the calibur of the weapon, the bigger the bang and recoil....I would go to a reputable dealer, many run pawn shops or shooting ranges...and talk to them about it...personally, I would go with a 22mag...if they have a range...ask to shoot it before ya buy it...they will supervise ya....a good pair of earplugs would be very wise....even a 410 shotgun will do major damage with the smallest number of shot ya can get there....automatic shotguns are better than pumps....imo....especially for a lesser experienced shooter....I believe that the 410gauge shotgun has slugs available, but it might be a state thing.....


----------



## Bruce

CntryBoy777 said:


> .there are some really good crossbows too


Oooh, silent and deadly!


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm very seriously considering it. I'm not allowed to use them to hunt (unless you're certain versions of permanently disabled with a doctor's note and govt approval) BUT this is very much not hunting. You are allowed to own them and no license is needed. I'm also not super fond of carrying a shooty thingy with a knife tip on the end, but it would keep my husband happy. I'd probably want a smallish one that could at least do damage point blank, but shooting coyotes off my deck if they decide to try going through wire to get to my chickens again would be another use. Coyote seriously damaged the chicken pen fence, I'm discovering as I take it down.


----------



## Bruce

At least with a crossbow, you know FOR SURE if there is a bolt in the "chamber" and whether or not it is cocked. I think hunting with them here is the same as there. 

I've never seen one in person but I suspect you would need a bit more time to go from "loaded" to "ready" with a crossbow.


----------



## CntryBoy777

The tension is placed on the string before the arrow is loaded and the pull of the trigger releases the tension....the time depends on how fast ya can tension the string and place another arrow before a 2nd shot can be taken....make sure ya have good tips on the arrows, but use the field tips for practice...they are cheaper and safer for that, but the "business arrows" will penetrate trees and other things....a galvanized bucket filled with sand will stop most any caliber of lead bullet, but an arrow will go thru it and if against a tree will stick in the tree....so, they are deadly.....many deer shot with bows are killed and the arrow goes through them, unless the tip hits bone....


----------



## rachels.haven

That's what my Dad said. A crossbow bolt with a hunting tip should go right through a coyote and kill it. He advised me to get a crossbow and hunting tips and practice, and start the firearm LTC process, then get a .410 mossberg 500 or a good .22 (his last one was no good, so he's asking around for both of us). I may have a gun in a month. Looks like this is going to be a long process.

Put as skirt on my chicken run. It had to be chicken wire, as we'd already bought Lowe's and Home Depot out of decent length hardware cloth. I do have enough hardware cloth for the top of the run, but not both.

My over large, aggressive coyote gave us a day's of break and was terrorizing people in their back yards in town about a mile away, and is now back. There is another goat breeder less than a mile from my house across the woods from me and he was going after her stock this morning. So early chores and constant checks out the window will be the theme of today. If he shows back up at her place she or her staff or boyfriend will shoot him, so he will either be dead or moved on from there very soon, and I'm hoping he doesn't come here next, but he probably will. I've also made a deal that if they come here and kill him I will pay them, since getting armed is going to take a while.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Good for you !  If you get enough  neighbors on the lookout for him, odds are someone will succeed.  Hope the gun process moves swiftly  for you


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I don't know about you, but I would be reluctant to depend on a crossbow to shoot a coyote.  Yes, if you hit the coyote with the arrow, you will definitely kill him.  If you miss, you probably won't get a second chance.  Were I facing a coyote, I would want a 22 rifle with hollow points or a 12 gauge shotgun with buckshot and slugs.  That way, if I miss with the first shot, I still have several shots available to make in quick succession.  But maybe the neighbors will take care of coyote for you and you would have to worry about it.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Baymule

That coyote is a bad character. Since he is being a pest in so many places, I wonder if you and the neighbors could band together, call local TV stations, complain about the danger he presents and shame the authorities into capturing or killing him? Squeaky wheel gets the grease.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sounds like a good idea to me. The nature worshippers get in the way here though, so I'm not sure how far it will go. Me warning my neighbors already got me threatening private messages as it is. "IF YOU SHOOT THAT COYOTE I will do blank blank blank to you". Great people live here, I tell you. No way am I feeding my kids (or even my goats and chickens) to that thing. A big dog would be extra nice now, I think. Something that takes trespassers seriously would be nice.

 I just set up my gun safety class for licensing and the guy said he just did a whole lot of Groton people and asked why I wanted my license and he told me that's why this big mess of people were getting their licensing too. Lotsa new people with guns here, I guess (good and bad?). Now both DH and I will be $190 poorer when this is done and that's BEFORE we buy a gun, but in about a month we'll be ready for this coyte...if he doesn't get shot first (and I really hope he does). 

Our Great Pyrenees is coming to town tomorrow. Wish us luck!


----------



## CntryBoy777

Tell that idiot to come on over and show ya how well their "method" works....when reality is "face to face" with em....those "tree hugging, save the animals" idiots talk big when they just send $$ to others to do what they have no clue about....ya just don't see too many trying to feed the polar bears, do ya?.....nope, just send the $$ and we will take care of them....suure babe!!....just hold your breath til it gets there......save the message....cause it is a threat made towards ya and it may come in handy for future events there...in case something stupid happens....


----------



## Bruce

They might change their tune when Fifi gets taken for a snack follow by their cat.



rachels.haven said:


> Our Great Pyrenees is coming to town tomorrow. Wish us luck!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Dog tommrow. 
Gun safety classes
Gun owner
Dead coyote ....sweet
"You've come a long way baby !"


----------



## Baymule

Practice SSS. Shoot. Shovel. Shutup. What coyote?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep. That's my new plan. I only mentioned it to others earlier because there are some nice neighbors with pets and small children that I don't have emails for. I also found a few more people who want this thing dead, and one of them is a lady who was in her back yard and got menaced while she was playing with her 10 month old so her DH is going to shoot it, and she asked me to let them know if I get it first so they can relax, and someone who offered to come over and shoot it for me. My goat neighbor wants to do it first, but it's nice to have a plan with a backup while I work on my own gun. I also got updates on when it moved out of the area and ran into people because of how large and identifiable it is. I got a full 24 hours+ off of worrying because it was harassing people in town before swinging back around last night (and the goats knew it wasn't here without FB, they were relaxed during that time and sure aren't now). Not going to do that again though probably. Pity.

Wish animal control would just shoot it. It's basically a large vicious dog. It sounds, acts, and even half looks like a dog. I'm flabbergasted it's allowed to run at large like this.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Just s s s then post here and we will celebrate  with you...
The animal rights people won't  shut up until it attacks a child ....oh then it will be a totally diffrent story !


----------



## rachels.haven

Based on what I've seen, I don't think our type of animal rights people here would change their tune for a child.  It's a jungle out there.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Yeh, and many are rallying behind a true "representative" of theirself and they all embrace his initials...BS....which also explains just "what" they "contain".....


----------



## rachels.haven

I think these are the kind of people who are incapable of truly liking another human being, and draw their feelings of self worth from telling other humans how awful they are and they sit in their unlit, unclimate controlled apartments or houses, and bemoan the fact they were born, and that their parents, friends, and neighbors were born, and that they can't push a button to undo their (and the rest of ours') existence, and be replaced by their weight in turtles and coyotes and if they weigh enough, bears. They are that kind of people. And if a child got injured or killed by wildlife they'd be like, "well we are encroaching on their territory" and walking away feeling all superior. That is what I believe I am dealing with and so far I have not been wrong. 

It's not everyone here, but I kind of wish this kind of people would go back to the city where they can be truly low impact to the environment and not in my hair. Or at least develop manners. Not everyone is full of that level of self, and own species loathing and wants to deal with their unpleasantness.


----------



## rachels.haven

Gosh, I'd really like to go back to not worrying about this coyote and watching my back and worrying about this subject in general. I'm starting to appreciate how pleasant my life was before. Guess I'd better do better to enjoy it next round.

I can focus on the fact Mr. Coyote has several bullseyes drawn on his head and if someone shoots him (even before I can get armed) or hurts him that maybe he'll go away (dead) or start avoiding town and people including us. We're only a mile out from the "thickly settled" signed neighborhoods, and two miles from town center, after all (although we back up to conservation woods, so I should still be very careful).


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Based on what I've seen, I don't think our type of animal rights people here would change their tune for a child.  It's a jungle out there.



And that proves my motto "you can't  fix stupid"....more sympathy  for a coyote than a child..?...sorry you are living amoung  the population of humaniods that couldn't  surive two weeks with no grocery stores open ...if these  people really want a cause to fight for and protect, .....how about protecting our freedom  against violence, .....hunger,....... poverty, ...I got to stop, ...I could  have a stroke thinking about those  fur protecting fidiots.
Have a wonderful  day Rachael,  and watch out for the big bad wolf / coyote  and it's  following of fools


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you, and you too. That's a good way to put it.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I was born   in Massachusetts, and stayed  until I was 15..., even then many people had the "superior '  I am educated, my family came over on the Mayflower,  staunch,  uppity, I have a cause attitude" ..... I can only imagine the influence  of "the city slickers" moving to the burbs and what you must be dealing with. Yes we have in fringed  into animal habitat. ..well guess what , the population has grown, human housing is required.....so to the PETA people I say ..."So this isn't  home sweet home...adjust" and quit overpopulating the planet and give your property  back to nature , if you care so flippin much ! 
This has been a senior citizen  statement, not the beliefs of all members of BYH, ...PETA take a bite out of my old hide , and chew on that !


----------



## Mike CHS

rachels.haven said:


> Based on what I've seen, I don't think our type of animal rights people here would change their tune for a child.  It's a jungle out there.



Those kind of people would wear out their welcome pretty fast in our part and most of Tennessee.  Of course that doesn't apply to the cities.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Mike CHS said:


> Those kind of people would wear out their welcome pretty fast in our part and most of Tennessee.  Of course that doesn't apply to the cities.


I know a few places up that way that would use em as "bait"....


----------



## B&B Happy goats

yepper,


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> Practice SSS. Shoot. Shovel. Shutup. What coyote?


Did someone say something about a coyote? 

Actually it is good there are several people ready to put that thing in the ground given a chance.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Dog, dog, we need pictures and story on how that went ...pleeeaseeeee


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm afraid you'll have to wait a few more hours. The man with the dog needed to delay until tomorrow morning. I'm okay with that.


----------



## Bruce

x100!!!!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

sooooo excited for you


----------



## Bruce

Hmmm we posted at the same time, I x100 the pictures, not the delay! We can do nothing but wait.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Bruce said:


> Hmmm we posted at the same time, I x100 the pictures, not the delay! We can do nothing but wait.



Great minds think alike


----------



## rachels.haven

Bailey is here. She's anxious, and tried to bounce my nuttiest goat once, but she's all settled now and gaurding the barn pen. The man who brought her seems to be downsizing his parents farm a bit, which explains why she was only $150. She's a big, quiet, gentle girl who always wants to come be with you. We walked the property together to get her acclimated. The man selling her says that they have her out without fences all the time and she does not roam and prefers to just sit and watch the land. I believe it.



  She WAS laying down in a hole she scratched, resting and watching, but of course she had to get up and come over.

The man's girlfriend from Pepperell, about 8 minutes from here says they used to have little, normal coyotes, but now there are only big ones and they get more aggressive and fearless as cooler weather comes in. And that if they are that aggressive now, that yes, it IS time for a dog NOW for both the kids and animals' sakes.

Tomorrow I'll but Bailey out in the browsing pen with the goats. Today will just be getting to know the goats and acclimating, I think. She was worried when her man left.


----------



## Bruce

SUPER LIKE!!!!!!!!!!

It will take a bit for her to figure out that you are her's now, not the man who brought her. But since she was on his parent's farm, she may not be overly attached to him. I bet she melds into the family quickly.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

As soon as you get a chance go have a talk with her, hold her face in your hands and tell her this is her new home, that we are going to work together....look her in the eyes when you talk with her...they truly  understand  much more than you think.  Tell her she needs to help you protect your animals, that your are her friend...give her a hug. It may take some talking to create that bond between you ,but it worked for Mel and I , and I know he was traumatized  by the loss of his best friend ........ we made it throgh the tough  part,
  Mel is my heart creature ........ I am so happy for you and your family


----------



## Baymule

Talking to her and loving her really does work, just like @B&B Happy goats said. There will be a period of adjustment, her world has just been turned upside down and she doesn't know why. She needs that reassurance now, she needs comfort. You are going to fall in love with this dog and it will be like no other dog you have ever had. 

My husband and Paris.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Baymule said:


> Talking to her and loving her really does work, just like @B&B Happy goats said. There will be a period of adjustment, her world has just been turned upside down and she doesn't know why. She needs that reassurance now, she needs comfort. You are going to fall in love with this dog and it will be like no other dog you have ever had.
> 
> My husband and Paris.
> View attachment 65262



The magic between these animals and their humans is like no other, pure devotion and love, understanding and a partnership, independent thinking and fiercely  protective


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw man, thunder.
I got her to eat a cup of food by pouring milk on it before the thunder filled typhoon let loose. I also cut off about a cat's worth of matting on her back. Lots more grooming and kid scissoring to do from her neglected coat. Poor girl though all of this just wanted to go hide in the loft until the thunder stopped, but I WASN'T in the loft so she tried to hide under the goats I was milking. That didn't work, so she wound up tied next to me, ignoring the rest of her food. Tomorrow will be a better day, I guess.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Poor darlin, she's really feeling lost and confused right now. Stupid thunderstorm didn't help any either.  But, she's seeking you out for comfort instead of bolting to the furthest corner of the place so I think that's a positive.

I agree - tomorrow will be a better day.


----------



## Baymule

Tomorrow, spend time with her and let her know that you are there for her.


----------



## rachels.haven

My husband also says he loves her quiet confident presence. I like her too. Love for me always comes a day or two in. Regardless, I think we've got a winner here.

Things are better in the barn now. Storm did not last as long as it was forecasted.


----------



## rachels.haven

Grooming progress. Looks like her undercoat didn't come out properly. Very patient doggo.



 



Do dogs like Batman hats? From yesterday.




If I cut the dreadlock solid mat off, I can comb the rest out, BUT the mats leave short spots behind. Lots of pink skin between hair, but noting red. I think she's going to be getting a lot more brushing from now on. Gotta go to church! And I stink like the barn, 3 rutty bucks, 4 does, and a big dirty dog.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

I think this is a very lucky dog to have landed with you!  I bet she'll be proving her worth and paying you back very soon!


----------



## Baymule

frustratedearthmother said:


> I think this is a very lucky dog to have landed with you!  I bet she'll be proving her worth and paying you back very soon!


X100!!!

Farm perfume.....

When she barks at night, you will learn the different barks. Sometimes mine just seem to be barking with no real purpose. I go out and talk to them, tell them good dog and let them know I am their back-up. This makes them happy and they usually settle down. It is important for them to know that they can depend on you.


----------



## rachels.haven

She has yet to bark, so when she does I will definitely investigate. Something will probably be wrong and she deserves backup.
Infact, come to think of it, if you didn't see her or the brushed out hair all over the barn yard you would not know we had a new dog at all.


----------



## rachels.haven

Trusting Bailey with the does tonight. Still haven't heard one bark, but she is out there watching. She's got the barn floods and wing lights on, and one of the house floods is on, and one of the little lights, and she's in the barn pen, watching and waiting outside.  Also put piles of her hair around the buck's pen. Now we look like a dog exploded outside (OH, THAT'S how people will know she's here! I get it now).

Today I let her out when I let the does out to go back to the barn and she decided she wanted to go where the kids are and made a beeline for the front porch, which of course let to pandemonium and confusion from the goats and she got slightly stubborn about not wanting to go to the barn, but I got her there (she tried to collar slip me, but I know that trick from my shelter days, so I use a mendota style lead on dogs I don't know well). Children are the most interesting animal for her too, I guess.

I also got her to eat two whole cups of food, cereal and milk style for dinner, so she's doing better than yesterday. She can't stop pacing to eat and only seems relaxed while guarding, so it took a long, long time to finish it all, but if she's willing to eat 2 cups food with milk on it, twice daily, I'm satisfied with that. Her last owner had her on the TSC retriever 27% blue bag stuff, so we got some and I'm feeding it now. She's not fat, but very well muscled and no big tummy under all that hair, so the food is working for her. No hot spots under those mats. Hope the 2 c's of milk don't make her fat.  I may switch to another brand because this food smells like dog poop before it goes in, but I figure I should hold off on changing as much as I can now. I'd really like her on something that doesn't smell like poop. 

More brushing and taking out the shed going on. If I can find a groomer that will just brush her out for me and can see her soonish, I'll bring her in (they usually do that before bathing anyway if I remember right, because water tightens existing knots). It is going to take hours. No baths though. She needs those oils. Otherwise I'll just keep working it out and if I don't have it in a week I may shave her whole rear end and under her ears (poor dog). Then, either way, when she's no longer in as embarrassing a shape I'd like to get her to the vet for a physical and her rabies shot is due in October, so I may see if I can get her boostered early so I can register her.

So yes, I think life is finally settling down. DH and I take a gun safety class tomorrow and the kids get sittered. One of my kids' guinea pigs died last week, probably from old age or heart issues, so we're on the hunt for another "my kid got bored with this" one from CraigsList or babies. Plenty of oops litters and actual breeders out there. No need for a $60 who knows where they came from or are they healthy pet store guinea pig. Our original pair was $1, and I'm fairly certain they were older than the owners were saying based on their leg and back arthritis and how much their toes were curled and hip prominence (despite being chunky)-all signs of great GP age. But that's what almost free gets you, and they were both sweet guinea pigs, and the remaining one will get friends back again soon and continue being pampered for the rest of her days.

Overall, I'm happy. I hope the doggo does well guarding tonight.


----------



## Bruce

Didn't take long for DH to take a liking to her 

I'm sure she is unsettled and you two will figure things out. I don't recall what all good advice you've been given so I apologize if this is a duplicate. She may CHOOSE to not eat for a day or two, then eat a lot the next day. For their size they don't eat a lot, maybe because they aren't run around, bouncy all day dogs. 

"Listen" to her, she will let you know what needs to be done. She will hear things you do not, smell things you do not. My guess is that with her in the yard, that coyote will be looking elsewhere for dinner. She will let you know if it comes by.

I am seriously happy for you!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

So happy your family is liking  the girl,. MEL doesn’t  eat much in the hot weather, they don't  eat as much as a regular dog.....soon you will realize  that she is a magnificent  creature and not "just a dog" . Currently we have two dogs , a foster dog that got thrown out of vehicle  and is recovering from surgery,  and a magnificent  creature named  Mel 
Wishing you a happy and safe evening, and no more pesty predators  around your property , you will learn to sleep better knowing you have your girl guarding your animals and family


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you both. Good job being enablers all those who enabled. I think that was the right choice.


----------



## Baymule

We use Victor dog food. Currently, the dogs are on a break, TSC dog food, Alpo I think. But before it gets cold, we will switch back to Victor. They stay healthy on it, PLUS the dog poop piles are MUCH smaller. The Cheap brands make big poop piles, not a problem when it is warm and the dung beetles break it up. But in the winter, who needs big poop piles? check for a distributer near you. 

https://victorpetfood.com/

We use different flavors LOL

https://victorpetfood.com/products/professional

https://victorpetfood.com/products/beef-meal-brown-rice-formula

https://victorpetfood.com/products/lamb-meal-brown-rice-formula

And because they are completely spoiled, when we take pigs or lambs to slaughter, I get the offal. I can it with rice, then my husband mixes it with the dog food. We have 3 big dogs and he splits a quart jar between the 3 of them. I also can chicken backs, necks, heart, gizzards and livers for the dogs.


----------



## Bruce

B&B Happy goats said:


> Currently we have two dogs


Um, last I knew you had THREE dogs?


----------



## rachels.haven

I like the looks of that food. I'll visit their dealers. One of them is next to a grocery store we use about half an hour away. A couple of the others are in Nashua, which is the big city we are basically a suburb of. Then a few of the others are in cities I hunt for hay in. I may be able to find it. I've got time though, especially if she's only eating 4 cups of food a day.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Bruce said:


> Um, last I knew you had THREE dogs?


Have a rescue that is staying here, she is six months old, was thrown out a vehicle.  Front leg was going to be removed due to injurey but vet did surgury to try and save it...then while in recovery at vets, a larger dog attacked her and took off part of her ear and pierced her head with teeth... (her name is NOT Lucky) ....so the woman who has a small rescue took this dog, .....she just had back surgery three weeks ago and had nowhere or anyone to help this girl recover or teach her how to do basic commands. .....so she is here now for two months only...ONLY..... ( the healing is not going well, and I think the leg needs to be removed, but I am not going to bother the woman who is recovering from surgery about it yet. The dog is not in pain, but the leg is more of a hindrance  than useful)


----------



## Bruce

Um, what happened to Missy and Sophie? Are they not dogs?


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Bruce said:


> Um, what happened to Missy and Sophie? Are they not dogs?


Missy and Sophie are still dogs and quite content, rescue dogs name is also Sophie and then there is magnificent  Mel.....Four   three dogs and a magnificent  creature named Mel .....not that I have any favorites ...


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, Mel is not a dog. He is just too perfect.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

How did your new dog do on her first night?


----------



## Bruce

B&B Happy goats said:


> Missy and Sophie are still dogs and quite content, rescue dogs name is also Sophie and then there is magnificent  Mel.....Four   three dogs and a magnificent  creature named Mel .....not that I have any favorites ...


OK, so when you say you have 2 dogs, you mean 2 that were "rescued"?
I'm sure Mel won't tell the others that you have a favorite


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Bruce said:


> OK, so when you say you have 2 dogs, you mean 2 that were "rescued"?
> I'm sure Mel won't tell the others that you have a favorite



Missy i bought as a puppy, Sophie was a CL rescue, Sophie #2 is a temporary rescue foster dog and  magnificent  Mel, ...my heart dog  ...not tha I have a favorite 
So technically,  I have two dogs and a magnificent  creature...three plus a foster rescue


----------



## rachels.haven

Bailey did good the first night on guard. The goats are mostly okay with her and seem to be getting attached, so I think they'll stay close to her.

Saturday, Bailey's first day here period was rough because of T-storms. Sunday (yesterday) I don't seem to remember any thunder so I left her out. Today and this evening we've had more typhoon-like storms here complete with thunder. Dog is back under the table pretending she's not there.

My standard goat, Saffron, still wants to kill the dog so I've had to call her off Bailey a few times. Thank goodness both dog and that particular goat are responsive to verbal reprimands. The goat rams the dog enough times and the dog tries to tell her to knock it off in dog, which is what the goat wants, which becomes war. I love Saffron, and she can be stupid but this is really dumb, uncharacteristic behavior. I'm suspicious this could be a sign the goat is going into heat. The two fights we've had have always been near the shared buck fence. Not sure though. The dog does not want to hurt her. She wants Saffron to stop smashing her at that moment. I think we'll have this resolved in a few days. Today was better than yesterday, and better than the day before when everyone just ran around in a blind panic while the dog laid there or lumbered around the edge of the pen. Saffron was raised with LGD s(and a LGD puppy was the one that ripped her udder and left her with a damaged teat, hmm...) but she was friends with the ones she was penned with at her other home.

 Saffron has also recently declared herself herd queen, but does not have the brains or disposition for it. Her violence might also have something to due with that (for instance, in order to control all the alfalfa pellets and get the most, she LAYS on the ground in front of the feeders so none of the nigerians can get any. Not very herd queeny and more lazy piggish. Herd queens would smash the other suckers away with relish, imo. She is also clingy to people and panics if routine is broken.) We will work this out either way.

Mr. Coyote has NOT come back and I feel safer even if I still haven't heard any barking. I also got my gun safety class done with DH. Now I get to go schedule an interview with the police for half an hour and get printed and background checked (and pay ANOTHER $100 for each of us). After getting that done in 2-4 weeks I can go buy a gun. Still going back and forth between a .22 american rimfire (Dad's suggestion for a .22) or a Mossberg 500 pump action shotgun in .410 (my dad's first recommendation, who says it will punch the right sized hole despite being smaller). I joked about getting both (way too expensive, especially after licensing costs) because they are two different tools that can serve different purposes.

We'll work everything out. Bottom line is, things are going well with the dog. She's fitting in great. I've just got to get my big, sweet oaf goat to improve her behavior towards her.

Btw, on a side note, we are not having a dry year at all. It's super humid, super hot (regularly in the 90's?), raining every day, maybe every other day, and my goats keep winding up pale, so I ordered some ingredients to mix to add herbal deworming into the picture, and I'm going to keep on with the conventional wormers and fecals (and I just ordered a new conventional wormer to use, as Ivermectin, Safeguard, and Eprinex all used correctly seem to just have rebounds after 3 weeks routinely, even after doing it then repeating 10 days later). I'm starting to feel like I'm in the south. I wonder if next year will be drier.


----------



## Baymule

B&B Happy goats said:


> Missy i bought as a puppy, Sophie was a CL rescue, Sophie #2 is a temporary rescue foster dog and  magnificent  Mel, ...my heart dog  ...not tha I have a favorite
> So technically,  I have two dogs and a magnificent  creature...three plus a foster rescue


This suspiciously sounds like chicken math....I have 10 laying hens, 1 rooster, 1 hen went broody and hatched 7 chicks. I have 26 eggs in the incubator that are hatching now. I have 50 meat CCX, but they don't count because I am going to slaughter them. Oh, I have 8 old layers, but they don't count because they don't lay any more. the chicks don't count because they aren't chickens yet, plus I plan on selling some...….


----------



## Baymule

It sounds like Bailey is going to work out well. Just her presence is deterring the coyote.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Bailey did good the first night on guard. The goats are mostly okay with her and seem to be getting attached, so I think they'll stay close to her.
> 
> Saturday, Bailey's first day here period was rough because of T-storms. Sunday (yesterday) I don't seem to remember any thunder so I left her out. Today and this evening we've had more typhoon-like storms here complete with thunder. Dog is back under the table pretending she's not there.
> 
> My standard goat, Saffron, still wants to kill the dog so I've had to call her off Bailey a few times. Thank goodness both dog and that particular goat are responsive to verbal reprimands. The goat rams the dog enough times and the dog tries to tell her to knock it off in dog, which is what the goat wants, which becomes war. I love Saffron, and she can be stupid but this is really dumb, uncharacteristic behavior. I'm suspicious this could be a sign the goat is going into heat. The two fights we've had have always been near the shared buck fence. Not sure though. The dog does not want to hurt her. She wants Saffron to stop smashing her at that moment. I think we'll have this resolved in a few days. Today was better than yesterday, and better than the day before when everyone just ran around in a blind panic while the dog laid there or lumbered around the edge of the pen. Saffron was raised with LGD s(and a LGD puppy was the one that ripped her udder and left her with a damaged teat, hmm...) but she was friends with the ones she was penned with at her other home.
> 
> Saffron has also recently declared herself herd queen, but does not have the brains or disposition for it. Her violence might also have something to due with that (for instance, in order to control all the alfalfa pellets and get the most, she LAYS on the ground in front of the feeders so none of the nigerians can get any. Not very herd queeny and more lazy piggish. Herd queens would smash the other suckers away with relish, imo. She is also clingy to people and panics if routine is broken.) We will work this out either way.
> 
> Mr. Coyote has NOT come back and I feel safer even if I still haven't heard any barking. I also got my gun safety class done with DH. Now I get to go schedule an interview with the police for half an hour and get printed and background checked (and pay ANOTHER $100 for each of us). After getting that done in 2-4 weeks I can go buy a gun. Still going back and forth between a .22 american rimfire (Dad's suggestion for a .22) or a Mossberg 500 pump action shotgun in .410 (my dad's first recommendation, who says it will punch the right sized hole despite being smaller). I joked about getting both (way too expensive, especially after licensing costs) because they are two different tools that can serve different purposes.
> 
> We'll work everything out. Bottom line is, things are going well with the dog. She's fitting in great. I've just got to get my big, sweet oaf goat to improve her behavior towards her.
> 
> Btw, on a side note, we are not having a dry year at all. It's super humid, super hot (regularly in the 90's?), raining every day, maybe every other day, and my goats keep winding up pale, so I ordered some ingredients to mix to add herbal deworming into the picture, and I'm going to keep on with the conventional wormers and fecals (and I just ordered a new conventional wormer to use, as Ivermectin, Safeguard, and Eprinex all used correctly seem to just have rebounds after 3 weeks routinely, even after doing it then repeating 10 days later). I'm starting to feel like I'm in the south. I wonder if next year will be drier.



At least your parasites will freeze off this winter... are you using the concentrated  garlic barrier ?  I have been giving it to my goats here in the land of never ending parasites,....several other BYH members also use it, ...I haven't  had any major worm problems this summer. Since I got  a more regular schedule  of use.


----------



## rachels.haven

It just might be.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Baymule said:


> This suspiciously sounds like chicken math....I have 10 laying hens, 1 rooster, 1 hen went broody and hatched 7 chicks. I have 26 eggs in the incubator that are hatching now. I have 50 meat CCX, but they don't count because I am going to slaughter them. Oh, I have 8 old layers, but they don't count because they don't lay any more. the chicks don't count because they aren't chickens yet, plus I plan on selling some...….



Now Bay,, my three critters and a TEMPORARY  foster dog...not chicken math !


----------



## Baymule

B&B Happy goats said:


> Now Bay,, my three critters and a TEMPORARY  foster dog...not chicken math !


And that is how it starts......all innocently.....a caring, (ahem) not-so-young-lady opens her heart and home to foster dogs.....and a few more.....then you see her on the news getting arresting for brandishing an unloaded 410 shotgun at those mean ol' SPCA people taking all her dogs away......


----------



## rachels.haven

Could you share about the garlic barrier? I've got garlic to put in my wormer mess, but more info would be great. Also any worming tips you know of would be welcome. Anything that would make the worming would "stick" better, especially with my rutty bucks. My does seem okay after our last round, but the poor boys can't seem to get it together. Makes worming very sticky.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Have you given the goats a copper bolus, espically the bucks ? (Also helps with parasites) 
The garlic barrier is super concentrated and can be bought online, given every week to start, then e/o week , then in winter monthly, from what I understand cuts down on worm load by creating a hostile enviorment for parasites to complete their cycle...
Do some reading on  mike CHS journal, read some online info...there have been studies done on it and it sure has some impressive supporters. If I can find the article I saved I will give you the name of it to read...got to grab some sleep right now but will look it up for you


----------



## rachels.haven

Alright, I'll go read up. I didn't realize that was a thing.

I'm supposed to go get some of this sleep thing too, but my kids won't sleep and there aren't enough hours in the day to boot and all, so sleep an extra few minutes for me, maybe mail it to me.


----------



## Baymule

http://www.garlicbarrier.com/  click on the sheep link

You can buy it on Amazon cheaper


----------



## Baymule

https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/1797/f4a7a5f3a284d8ece15e69ce1dc4a4a8aaf2.pdf

http://skylinesfarm.com/parasitecontrol.htm

http://www.mofga.org/Publications/The-Maine-Organic-Farmer-Gardener/Winter-2004-2005/Garlic-Juice

https://projects.sare.org/project-reports/os07-039/


----------



## rachels.haven

Wow! Very interesting. I need to stew about that for a few days, but it looks like it has potential. Read the website last night.

I'm probably going to be cutting Bailey's back end out of pictures for the next few months. I discovered last night after last post that the dog's tail is dread locked to the hair on the back of her legs. She'll be getting a rear and tail shave from me (if my clippers can get through it) and will not look great for a while. I'm just glad she could still poop. Last night I freed one leg before my clippers needed a break. The front half of her body is doing good.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

@Baymule,  thank you for posting those links , they were the ones I was going to put up for Rachel....now off to do the rabbits  ...it has been postponed  for so long due to the rain , that now I am dreading it


----------



## Baymule

Bailey is getting crutched! LOL Poor girl, she came to you just in time.


----------



## rachels.haven

@B&B Happy goats ,


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> @B&B Happy goats ,


Thank you, just got the rabbits done...really needed that hug ....here's  one for you


----------



## rachels.haven

I GOT THE DOG TO EAT!!! We'd been so worried because she'd been skimping so much.
So I went out and got a small brand of super premium holistic or whatever bag of dog food from a place that got a lot of turnover, and the bag was plastic, and after I bought it I smelled it and the food didn't smell like poop. I also bought a couple of cans of alpo wet dog food. She got excited as I ripped the bag open and I gave her a bunch in her dish then mixed in an alpo and SHE ATE IT...although DH sat and reclined himself on one of my feed pallets next to her and she had to choose between laying on his chest and finishing her food, so she took a break and did both and got alpo drool all over his face (DH likes dogs, even our first demon dog). Then we took her on a walk down the driveway and got her to poop, which we hadn't seen at all either, and that was a RELIEF. She also had more energy after. She'd been getting more lethargic lately. So I will probably be switching her to something else sooner rather than later. The new brand I bought may not be where I want to stay (never heard of it, and it was recalled end of last year for lethal level of vit D, just discovered) but she ate today. So I think she's officially stable now. Phew!

Back to grooming. Grooming being my biggest concern is great.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Grooming being my biggest concern is great.


Sure is!! It does take time to settle in to a new home. Sounds like she and DH are already BFFs though. Isn't he glad you got HIM a dog?


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> I GOT THE DOG TO EAT!!! We'd been so worried because she'd been skimping so much.
> So I went out and got a small brand of super premium holistic or whatever bag of dog food from a place that got a lot of turnover, and the bag was plastic, and after I bought it I smelled it and the food didn't smell like poop. I also bought a couple of cans of alpo wet dog food. She got excited as I ripped the bag open and I gave her a bunch in her dish then mixed in an alpo and SHE ATE IT...although DH sat and reclined himself on one of my feed pallets next to her and she had to choose between laying on his chest and finishing her food, so she took a break and did both and got alpo drool all over his face (DH likes dogs, even our first demon dog). Then we took her on a walk down the driveway and got her to poop, which we hadn't seen at all either, and that was a RELIEF. She also had more energy after. She'd been getting more lethargic lately. So I will probably be switching her to something else sooner rather than later. The new brand I bought may not be where I want to stay (never heard of it, and it was recalled end of last year for lethal level of vit D, just discovered) but she ate today. So I think she's officially stable now. Phew!
> 
> Back to grooming. Grooming being my biggest concern is great.



Congratulations  on a happy drool and poop !   I totally understand as I went through the same things when bringing Mel here, he does not  eat much in the summer when its really hot and some days he will skip a meal. You will know when she is pooping as its hard to miss those  big piles of recycled  food  we are feeding all three Diamond Natural lamb from TS.....they all do well on it, it's  $35  for 40 lb bag..
So happy your Bailey  is starting to feel at home


----------



## rachels.haven

I was considering Diamond, Fromm, Blue Seal, or Blue Buffalo (if I can stomach the price of that one). And yes, DH loves her, and she wants to be a family dog. The kids are hers, the husband is hers, and I am hers. She does not care about the guinea pig or chickens. They are beneath her notice at this point. And the goats are starting to be anxious when I take her out, which is too bad for them.

Btw, I checked the does eyelid color and all of them passed my exam, which makes me so happy, although my very preggo girl is close to what I'd worm for, so I will be redcelling her at a low dose for the last bit of pregnancy. I blame rut on the bucks needing worming. All they want to do is tell the girls how classy they are all day and hardly eat, so my plan is to worm, step up my feeding of them on the alfalfa and grain front, and redcell for a while until color is almost back. Good thing buck pee smell doesn't bother me. My poor family though.  I may wind up kicked out and sleeping with Bailey soon.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Pm me your address, and I will send you some goats milk buck soap...gets the stank off


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, I've got some, but thank you. It doesn't have coffee or anything special in it, but it does the trick thoroughly if I shower. I think the problem is that I get the funk in random places like my hair, or forehead/face, arms, and all over my clothes so I come in and bring a cloud with me. I think I need an exterior shower right by the door...or maybe a me sized car wash loaded with doe milk soap.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Aw, I've got some, but thank you. It doesn't have coffee or anything special in it, but it does the trick thoroughly if I shower. I think the problem is that I get the funk in random places like my hair, or forehead/face, arms, and all over my clothes so I come in and bring a cloud with me. I think I need an exterior shower right by the door...or maybe a me sized car wash loaded with doe milk soap.


when you build the car wash one...please send me the plans, that sure would be  helpful here with the dogs, Mel and us humans....espically  during rut


----------



## Baymule

My ram doesn’t pee on himself and he doesn’t stink. 

Congratulations on getting her to EAT and poop. She is figuring out that she has a family who loves her. I don’t know who I am the happiest for, family or Bailey.....BOTH!


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, I could go into business with my "automatic adult, dog, child, goat wash". I should just install the tunnel by the back door and no one can come in until clean.

Oh, and she barked today...at DH, to come and say goodbye before he left for work because he came to visit me out in the barn but almost left without saying anything to her. Not something I want to encourage, but it's good to know she was feeling secure and good enough to use her voice in general. I also took her on a walk before breakfast, which made her very happy. Then more thunderstorms moved into our area so I'm extra glad we got some happy in before she went back to pretending to be invisible. It sure is raining a lot here.


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> My ram doesn’t pee on himself and he doesn’t stink.


Is that an air of species superiority I smell?


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Bruce said:


> Is that an air of species superiority I smell?



No @Bruce, just a male who doesn't  wear  "cologne " for his dates there is no species superiorty on BYH


----------



## Bruce




----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> Is that an air of species superiority I smell?


You must be smelling something else, no stinky here!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Baymule said:


> You must be smelling something else, no stinky here!




LMAO ohhhh Bay , you make me need depends !


----------



## Baymule

Laughter is the best medicine. When you move, make sure it is close to another BYH member(s)!!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Baymule said:


> Laughter is the best medicine. When you move, make sure it is close to another BYH member(s)!!



It Sure is, and...lordy. ....  lordy you sure provide lots of it


----------



## rachels.haven

I don't mind if her ram doesn't stink. He wouldnt be very happy at my place. We don't have sheep or very much grass-just the cultivated stuff by the drive and in the front and back yard, and that stuff is wimpy unless it's had goat poop on it. It wouldn't survive much grazing. I don't think we could do sheep even if I wanted. 

Plus, I don't mind buck smell. A buck is a buck. That rutting smell comes with the territory, and so do showers apparently.


----------



## Bruce

Hmmm, maybe Rachel can make a fortune selling "buck cologne".

Bay, are you going to send B&B a lot of home listings? What about place? Have the kids got it sold? I know it has a very new goat mansion. And isn't too far from a couple of dandy BYH members. Plus, Mel might recognize the place.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Rachel, in a very odd way, I find buck smell to be kinda interesting, so does my neighbor ...it must be a pheromone  thing.    .....


----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> Hmmm, maybe Rachel can make a fortune selling "buck cologne".
> 
> Bay, are you going to send B&B a lot of home listings? What about place? Have the kids got it sold? I know it has a very new goat mansion. And isn't too far from a couple of dandy BYH members. Plus, Mel might recognize the place.


Have no idea about  place. For a little while, his kids posted here, but not anymore. 

I would love to have @B&B Happy goats for a neighbor!


----------



## rachels.haven

The kids' milk for lunch had quite the cream line. I'm amused. I'm also confused how my kids are thin and wiry when this is 90% of their fluid intake and drinking milk is one of their favorite things to do. I guess fat intake probably doesn't equate to weight gain when you're a human perpetual motion machine.


----------



## Bruce

25% cream! 

I think it is a misconception that eating fat causes fat.


----------



## Baymule

That is some yummy looking milk!


----------



## farmerjan

The fat globules in NON-homogenized milk are larger than when the milk is homogenized.  To homogenize, they are broken up into very small "pieces" in order to stay in suspension. The fat globules will pass through the walls of the intestines when homogenized into very small "pieces".  When the non-homogenized fat travels through the system, the body ( intestines) will take out all the good and some of the  fat actually will pass on through the intestines and exit the body in a more intact form so to speak.  There is more good nutrition in the fat ( Hence the popularity of the KETO DIETS)  and it does not cause the body to get fat.  It also has to do with the metabolism of kids too.... I mean hey, we just don't do all the "jumping wiggling etc. around" that kids do either. 

Look up the thread that @Mike CHS  started (?) about all the Keto foods/plan.... or maybe it was @Devonviolet ,  but several have been following it and lost weight and there is alot of "fat" in that diet.


----------



## Mike CHS

farmerjan said:


> Look up the thread that @Mike CHS  started (?) about all the Keto foods/plan.... or maybe it was @Devonviolet ,  but several have been following it and lost weight and there is alot of "fat" in that diet.



Search "low carb/keto diet" and there is some pretty good info.


----------



## rachels.haven

Wow. Bailey the dog weighs 122.5 pounds. Vet does not mind because of the amount she's eating daily-the dog is not over-eating. She also does not like vet visits and outweighed and outmaneuvered (and out leaned and out squished) the technicians so we'll be going back next week for blood draw because she did not let them at her veins today. They also split the shots into two visits for stress's sake and to upgrade her lyme vaccine to a better one since she started being defensive anyway. Silly dog could have gotten it over in one visit. Aw well.


----------



## Devonviolet

rachels.haven said:


> She also does not like vet visits and outweighed and outmaneuvered (and out leaned and out squished) the technicians . . .


   That is too funny!   Our 2 LGDs are the same way.  We have gone to the Vet since they were puppies, and it's never traumatic. But, they don't like being away from their goats. In fact they don't like it when I take their goats to the barn, for weighing or meds, etc. They start barking as I lead them away. 

Anyway, I was going to tell you that we take them in the bed of the truck and the Vet and Techs do their thing right in the back of the truck. I will say, we have a bed topper, which makes it so easy to keep them in the back of the truck.  We got it just for carrying animals back there. 




 

Those side windows are hinged at the top, so the window can be raised for easy access to animals in the bed of the truck. There are also sliding windows, with screen, so we can have airflow when we are transporting animals.


----------



## rachels.haven

Secretly, that and hay is why I got my mini van. I still need to devise a floor cover that isn't a tarp, maybe add bars in the back so the dog isn't sitting on the kids feet any time we take her anywhere. 

Unfortunately she would rather be bonded and supervising my kids than the goats, and she's been acting depressed in the pen as she adjusts, so long story long we've driven her to a few of the walking trails close by by minivan for family walks to perk her up in the goat run later in the day (also they were vet test runs/intentional conditioning), so she likes the car. She may be happier in the there to do blood.

I'm a little concerned about this vet because she didn't want to muzzle Ms. Bailey, and Bailey was trying to soft bite at them every time she got pricked by a needle and they were intimidated. I would have told her to knock it off, gotten the muzzle, and gotten on with it, but hey, I'm not a vet. I may buy a muzzle and do it myself if they will take the sample when I hand it to them. She does not pull that with me.

She also told me that if I couldn't get her to reach basic obedience goals that I should get her in a class. I only need her to come when called sometimes and maybe leave it (although we've already been working on leave it and it is going fine, she looks for permission before trying to eat anything she's in doubt about...except cashews for some reason, and I may use those as training treats since my kids like stashing them in the car and not eating them). I wonder if this vet understands she is a goat dog and a walk dog, not a house dog. 

Also, is it normal to have a vet want to know all the meds you ever use on your goats so if dog eats poop dog won't get poisoned? I'm actually not the slightest bit worried about that. That would be a lot of poop. I may attempt to accidentally forget about that vet request if it is unnecessary. The dog should be fine.

I'd like to keep going to this vet because they're an 8 minute drive down the hill, but man, I feel like this vet is a pet vet and is out of her depth and was rather pricey (which I would rather not get into).


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I don't  think she knows anything  about LGDS. .... follow your gut instincts  ....
 you are alot smarter than she is about your dog .......
our vet has never asked about goat meds..... or suggested any obedience  class


----------



## Baymule

Obedience class?  It's ok if she bonds to your family. Let her have house time with the family in the evenings, then back outside. She can handle both worlds. As I write this, our male, Trip is asleep on the floor. He relishes house time and will come to the door and "ask" to come in. Our female NEVER comes in and the few times I tried, she utterly freaked out. So there you have it, each dog is different. Your vet is missing the mark, you don't so much train the dog to you, as much as the dog trains you to her. Somewhere in there is a happy medium. 

keep her at work as much as possible, take her treats and spend time with her in her work space. Bring her in each evening for love and attention, nap, then put her back outside. That's what we do with Trip and it works for him. Since we raise feeder pigs, I get the soup bones  and give the dogs semi frozen "dog popcicles" on hot days. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, I was of the opinion she's pretty well behaved. 99% of the time she even asks before eating stuff on the floor when I do bring her in and walks on a loose lead. She doesn't come when called yet, but neither do the goats unless there's something in it for them. And no, she didn't let the vet draw blood and didn't tolerate being stuck 4+ times, but I wouldn't either and obedience classes aren't going to fix that. She wasn't even that feisty with them, but they got scared. She tolerates me clipping her nails and grooming her just fine as I listen to when she's getting stressed and she just accepts anything the kids have dished out so far, so I'm just going to roll my eyes at the obedience thing. I will work on her recall, but I don't mind her acting like a goat if she's in with the goats most of the time especially at this point. She's only been here a day over a week. Still feel like muzzling her and getting the blood draw over with in 2 minutes would have been kinder to her (and save me from laying down the law if she ever tries to pull that behavior here, but somehow I doubt she will).

Yesterday I didn't drive her to a park for a walk in the morning. The vet visit had left her with the runs for some reason and she wasn't acting like she felt good after the shots either, so we skipped it. She was very sad with very loud whines from the goat pen when we had to load up in the car without her and go to the grocery store. She expects to sit on her kids now at least once a day (just kidding, she lays by their feet, behind the front seat). Regardless, she did not go to Sams club and wally world for school supply shopping, although she would have made it more fun.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Please don't  let anyone try to muzzle her, first they are hard to fit a muzzle, 
secondly  your girl could feel their fear , and if I had a fearfull person trying to stick me, they would get more than a soft mouth on them.
It makes perfect sense  that Bailey felt sick after that trip and the chemicals they put  into her. ....
Mel doesn’t  Always come when he is called..unless it's  important, he knows by my tone of voice and they ARE independent  thinkers 
Sounds like you may want a vet that is familiar  with the breed, if Bailey has no problems with you grooming her and cutting  her nails than I would say you have gained  alot of trust from her in a short amount of time. Finding the right vet depends on where you live, we are in very rual farm country where LGD'S are as common as hunting dogs....... best of luck to you and  to Bailey.......and you too


----------



## rachels.haven

I did hate it how they kept poking her because THEY were uncertain and afraid. That was miserable for her. I think I can go ahead and start looking for another vet toward Townsend that is specifically used to LGD's, out where things are more going towards being rural without being isolated and remote yet. I have until wednesday when they scheduled another blood draw attempt. This vet's main virtue is a short car ride. So far we haven't taken her by car any farther than about 10 minutes, so they fit the bill. I guess I was taking for granted that they had decent animal handling skills. This dog likes EVERYONE (at first, I'm assuming?) including them until they made something painful take too long.


----------



## Baymule

Our Trip smiles at everyone. I swear, that dog smiles! He likes everybody. But—-when we took him to be neutered, the staff wouldn’t bring him out to us. They were scared of him. They said he tried to bite them. He was in a kennel with a sign in big letters. BITES! I don’t know what happened, but at least he can only loose his nuts once.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, plus can you blame him?

I mean, darn doctors and all.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, Bailey knows come now. She's quite smart. Not sure she'll come 100% of the time, but I'm sure she'll do good enough. She sure came from all over the yard and the pen tonight. I could probably teach her a lot of parlor tricks from my animal shelter training days, she's extremely biddable and excited to play any new fun game, but I don't think parlor tricks are necessary unless she'll enjoy it and one day I have time and some spare chicken or hotdog at the same time.

Yes, she is an independent thinker, but she lOOOOVES everything especially if it involves me, kids, and DH (and CHICKEN). We will be reviewing/reconditioning often. Daily preferably, since that's really the only command I care about at the moment.

More nails were clipped until she decided to try to swallow the clippers as they were troublesome (she didn't take them from me, she just engulfed them in her mouth to see what I'd do). I quit because I didn't want to cut her tongue or lips, and gave her a little scold. We'll have another session when she's calm and not all jazzed up from recalling from all over the yard. Nail clippers are not gummable.

Avalon the Nigerian is due September 6th. This doe I wouldn't mind building my herd on. She is overheight, but milks like a dream and is a people doe. She takes meds and shots like they are nothing. Prefreshening while she was over full to hardness and leaking milk all over the place down her legs I was milking her and she was making around 2 cups per milking (then her production slowed down, she stopped being so tight so I stopped and now it's colostrum again, thank goodness). Her dam peaks at half a gallon a day, so I am excited. I told her that if she has a bunch of does that she could take over the herd and potentially become herd queen. She has a butter udder and long, wide teets, so I'd love her daughters to stay. She closed her eyes and looked like she's got a plan. I wonder what she'll have?


----------



## B&B Happy goats

All doe 's just to make you happy ....so great to read Bailey  is enjoying herself, ...she sure has landed in a great home  ohh...., any trace of the coyote  ???​


----------



## Baymule

After you said how matted Bailey was, I got to looking at Paris. Her ruff on the back of her legs is matted.  I think I'm going to cut it. The hair must be 8 inches long.


----------



## CntryBoy777

So glad things are going really well for ya and the family with her and she is settling in so well.....hope ya can find a vet that understands LGDs.....


----------



## rachels.haven

@B&B Happy goats , still no sign of the coyote. He's been harassing the other goat owner across the woods from me. I think 122 pounds of dog might be a bit much for him. She did bark this morning. That would be the second time I've heard her voice, but it may have been at a car accident or the clean up crew out on the main road at about 5:30 am. We get a lot of accidents(people keep hitting giant trees on the side of our winding road that the people of our city are somehow smitten by and could never remove, therefore they keep hitting them, taking bumper chunks out of the trunks...sigh...*I will be nice*). By the time I got out she was laying down by the fence watching the woods towards the road and she came over to ask for approval like she does when she finds food in the house. I told her she was good.

Put shortly, It could have been a coyote, or it could have been an accident clean up crew. For the record, the goats WERE hiding in the barn.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> @B&B Happy goats , still no sign of the coyote. He's been harassing the other goat owner across the woods from me. I think 122 pounds of dog might be a bit much for him. She did bark this morning. That would be the second time I've heard her voice, but it may have been at a car accident or the clean up crew out on the main road at about 5:30 am. We get a lot of accidents(people keep hitting giant trees on the side of our winding road that the people of our city are somehow smitten by and could never remove, therefore they keep hitting them, taking bumper chunks out of the trunks...sigh...*I will be nice*). By the time I got out she was laying down by the fence watching the woods towards the road and she came over to ask for approval like she does when she finds food in the house. I told her she was good.
> 
> Put shortly, It could have been a coyote, or it could have been an accident clean up crew. For the record, the goats WERE hiding in the barn.



Awesome girl Bailey ....no matter what it was she was on alert and protecting her family ....sooooo happy she is working out for you


----------



## Baymule

Maybe it was the coyote, maybe not. Maybe an acorn fell, maybe a raccoon farted....whatever it was, IT HAS BEEN WARNED.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, you've been warned raccoon fart!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Not sure she'll come 100% of the time


Of course she won't because sometimes she'll know that what she is doing is more important than anything you might want her for. You will just need to figure out what that thing is that she is doing. She'll probably deserve some praise for sticking to her job and not coming.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, you wouldn't want to know the % of time my children or goats come when I call them. I think she can still be the star obedience being here if she makes it to 50% (or doesn't take off running in the opposite direction most of the time  ). The little things are nice.


----------



## rachels.haven

*Gulp* Our "huge" coyote (this time not my words) has been confirmed in the very close area for the last three days, killing off 2 neighbors' chickens, as fast as possible, in broad daylight. One has none left now, the other is getting harassed all times of day and will soon have none left. Thank you, Bailey, for barking just a little the other day and changing your sleeping spot to the edge of the fence, outside in the dew and cold. My chickens are still in their cube, but me and my kids (and goats) would still be in danger during the day when we're out around this thing that acts like a vicious dog.

We will be skipping walks off the property from now on, which will make her sad, but this is very serious and I need her on the job. Hopefully Bailey will be the last of it. I'm slightly worried about Bailey because even though she's a 120 lbs dog, this coyote is taller than her by a good bit. We're still working on our gun licenses, btw. Maybe she'll be alright if we are really attentive and back her up. Long gun licensing process. I will sleep better when this particular probably has been neutralized.


----------



## Baymule

If it makes you feel better, know that predators usually want easy meals. If they have to fight for something to eat, they could get injured and they don't go to the vet for stitches. A wound can mean death to them and they know it. Bailey's barking is telling the coyote that there will be a fight if it comes on her property. This is a bad coyote, unafraid of people and it could challenge her, so it is good that y'all are getting firearms and lessons on how to use them. 

When coyotes get too close here at night, we go outside, shout and fire into the ground. From howling, it goes silent. Coyotes here know what gun shots mean. A neighbor shot a hog last week, left it lay and waited the next night for coyotes to show up, he shot one of them too. Two pests gone!


----------



## frustratedearthmother

That's sooo big for a coyote - makes it even scarier!   The ones we have rarely get over 50 lbs.  Glad you've got Ms. Bailey on the job!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Gosh, I wish you had that darn gun ......or someone  who shoots that coyote  tonight......


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I will sleep better when this particular probably has been neutralized.


I just bet!!!! I hope it is smart enough to not come into Bailey's area. And I'm glad you are getting a real gun. A pellet gun would be worth about as much as a pea shooter on that coyote.


----------



## rachels.haven

How normal is it for the vet to want you to pill your dog with a sedative before going in a third time for an attempted blood draw? She gave me gabapentin.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> How normal is it for the vet to want you to pill your dog with a sedative before going in a third time for an attempted blood draw? She gave me gabapentin.



Not normal at all ! 
  They are fearful of her, .....and why are they wanting so much blood drawn ?  You are just taking her for normal stuff, not searching for a particular  disease.....
The second a vet wanted to sedate my dog...we would both be out the door finding a new vet....these people sound like they are ALL about the money and not about Bailey at all....run Rachael,  run


----------



## farmerjan

Find a different vet.  They are scared of her, she senses it and it just goes in circles from there.  Close by convenience is no excuse to take her to a vet that cannot handle her.  You need to not put the closeness  ahead of her welfare.  I am from up north, some of them are just out for the money and convenience of "little pets".  Cancel the vet appt., find another that has a large animal side to their practice.  You need someone who can and WILL treat all your livestock.  If she was a vicious guard/attack type dog with a known history of problems then m.a.y.b.e....... Mass is a crap state for alot of things, the gun laws being one of them and the unwillingness to "do" anything about that "coyote" which I think really is more a dog/wolf hybrid.... 

Get a different vet.


----------



## rachels.haven

Alrighty! Didn't think so. It didn't make me comfortable at all. If I can cut her nails front and back, shave her, clean her ears, and accidentally poke her in the eye with my finger this morning, they should be able to do a tiny blood draw for a heartworm snap test.

Plus, I need her working, not sedated. She keeps my kids safe.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Gotta love  that Bailey girl  , .....


----------



## Baymule

What @farmerjan said about a vet with a large animal practice. Some people have to load their LGDs in a trailer to take them to the vet. Sometimes our vet makes farm calls to treat the dogs. It doesn't sound like Bailey has a problem riding to the vet, being in the vet office, it's the vet and staff that she doesn't like. It's like being terrified of a skittish horse and trying to ride it -- recipe for disaster.


----------



## CntryBoy777

If there are any around ya with livestock...stop by and introduce yourself and ask what vet they use or recommend...and tell them why....most won't have any problem telling ya and sharing what it is they know about the ones in the area.....


----------



## rachels.haven

I contacted my horse neighbor. She says her equine vet will be coming out and can see dogs if they are part of a horse farm visit. It will be expensive, but I can probably walk Bailey up the hill and maybe the vet will not be afraid of a teeny tiny 120lbs marshmallow dog that is not a horse. I will be working on getting her seen elsewhere in the mean time if I can.

Yesterday after the vet tried to take her blood the second time and brought her back out after failing Ms. Bailey flipped on her back to me for a belly rub (her belly is pink with freckles and not much hair, btw). Yep, she is truly terrifying.  She definitely wanted her belly to bite that vet right there from across the room. That was when I got handed the bottle of pills and got a talk about how my dog was stressed out which didn't make a lot of sense, but hey, smile and nod, get out of there with the dog in one piece and decide my next step.

Anyway, thanks for the validation. Giving her pills tonight just didn't feel right.


----------



## Baymule

She took the dog out of your presence to draw blood? Is she so stupid that she doesn't realize that the owner is a calming influence and knows the dog better than she EVER will?


----------



## Mike CHS

I have never had a vet try to do anything with my dogs ever that I wasn't in the room.


----------



## farmerjan

Case closed..... if the neighbors horse vet can't see her or you can't get her to walk up there, at least talk to them and see if they have any other suggestions for a vet. Some horse vets aren't well schooled in FARM animals or the associated guardian animals. If the dog is not afraid to ride in a vehicle, just drive up there with her.  That way there is not stress of walking somewhere strange..... and if you are not comfortable, you can put the dog back in the car and go home. Simple.


----------



## farmerjan

I sincerely hope that you realize you have a priceless sweetheart of a dog.  She has been with you for what a week, 2 weeks?  And she is that loving towards you, and accepting of you to want her belly rubbed after being taken by a stranger into a room, without your comforting presence, stuck by idiots that are afraid of her, and she came out and just wanted some affection from you????  You have a priceless addition to your household/farm.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Oh geeze…   Would you be comfortable doing a blood draw yourself?  I'd be tempted to do it myself and hand it to the vet with a smirk on my face lol.  But, I'm evil that way... 

Really does sound like a new vet is in order.  And, for the record, I'd rather a vet suggest a muzzle than sedation.....geeze.  Nobody learns anything with sedation....sigh.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, me too. The muzzle would be for the vet, not the dog, and if it means they are quick and not dumb, weak, and scared about it it's better than drugs.

And thank you @farmerjan  . I need to not ruin her. She is perfect and I am so lucky to have her.

They took her away I know because there is a theory out there that the owner is the source of all the dog's negative behavior. Take the owner away and the behavior goes away too. But not with this dog. She's an independent thinker, like she's supposed to be and she's not making decisions based on me in that department. I feel like she's being very patient with them and "schooling" them. She feels like she's got this. I wish they could work with her better. She's not actually that difficult.

Tomorrow morning I will be making some phone calls. She'd be happy to walk up the BIG hill provided there's water at the top and I'm going too, but you never know, maybe there's a LGD experienced vet around here somewhere so I'm going to look on my own too.

Meanwhile, she's getting off leash privileges in the yard after being on the 6' leash, then 12'. She's also allowed in the house, but doesn't want to stay long even though her kids live in there. She mostly just visited to check under the table for stuff I didn't sweep up then went back out today. House is boring. She loves walking the yard with the kids and showering them with attention when they are outside though. My youngest can walk her on and off a leash and yesterday they went around finding stuff he could throw for her (leaves and sticks, I think) and she'd catch them and act like it was a big deal. It was cute. She does not care about sticks and leaves normally. She also guarded him from a cyclist that accidently knocked him over on a trail last week. I can't remember if I mentioned that. The cyclist didn't stop and was going very fast so the bike did not become dog food (telling her to stop worked, and being on leash is obviously helpful). She did what she was supposed to do guarding her charges, imo. I think she may be particularly attached to my 4 year old, but she takes good care of both kids on their outdoor excursions. They like to escape at meal times and feed her the food I cook that they don't like so I'm not totally surprised. "Too crispy" bacon can really encourage friendships, although I get the impression that if she wasn't already smitten by them the bacon wouldn't have been touched because she makes her own decisions and is very bright.

Yep, we'll take good care of this one. She's a good loving dog that has exceeding my expectations. There's a vet a little farther down the road that is supposed to have experience with large dogs and be very good and patient with them, including aggressive ones, so he shouldn't be afraid of my non-aggressive one that is making a fool out of my current one and he may be able to get that heartworm test done so I can get her on preventative just in time for fall and winter to kill off the mosquitoes. I'll call and feel it out today, and if they don't pass, I'll just keep working my way west into farmyier and farmyier territory. She got her rabies shot done at least.


----------



## Bruce

What they said! And Gabapentin? I was given that for nerve pain from shingles, I don't recall having any feelings of sedation. I'll try to remember to ask SuperChemicalGirl (from BYC) about that tonight at dinner. She lives on our way to New Brunswick.



rachels.haven said:


> She also guarded him from a cyclist that accidently knocked him over on a trail last week.


Perfect dog!



rachels.haven said:


> They took her away I know because there is a theory out there that the owner is the source of all the dog's negative behavior. Take the owner away and the behavior goes away too.


Which means all they see are "How is Mama's widdle precious baby this morning" dogs.


----------



## CntryBoy777

I'd pity any stranger that took Gabbie away from either of us into a room.....we were there when they were gonna do a blood draw and they were ready to pounce on her to hold her down to do it....I told them there's no need for that and I talked to her and rubbed her neck....she sat still and they got it without incident.....she doesn't cotton to being separated from us....


----------



## Bruce

Yep, protective dogs get stressed when they are away from their "protectees". How often do we hear that, like Bailey, they like to come in the house for a visit but want to be back outside with their charges at night? I can only imagine what is going through the dog's mind when the vet staff takes her away. Maybe she is afraid they are going to do something bad to their people and she isn't there to protect them.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I love reading the about realtionship that Bailey has formed with you and your family so quickly,.... you have a magnificent  creature , and she loves and trusts her new family


----------



## Bruce

According to my pharmacist friend, yes in doses high enough gabapentin has a sedative effect. She also said there are plenty of things she'd use before even considering gabapentin for that purpose. Lots of reasons, including but not limited to side effects and cost. I hope you can find a vet that understands LGDs.


----------



## rachels.haven

Good grief. I just looked it up too and I don't feel like that was an appropriate medication for this scenario at all.

So anyway, the undrugged dog spent the evening run around session playing "come" and running back and forth between me and DH for treats. I'm also almost done getting under matts and shaving her poor rump-no hot spots. I shocked us both in the process. Unpolarized plugs can apparently have one prong in and the other on the side, outside the cord if you plug them in in the dark barn so I got to yelp and she got to jump because she was touching me. Not the first time I've done something like that, but the first time another being had to deal with my bad luck with plugs too. I really don't like electricity and I have no idea why my wahl clippers aren't polarized.

So she comes when called mostly with enthusiasm until the treats and all the running around makes her thirsty, then she runs away to the barn for a big drink and a flop under her stall table deflated. We will be working on teaching her not to jump up at my husband when she gets excited to see him at the beginning. He's the only one she jumps on and punches. She goes nuts when he's around-she acts like a wiggly puppy for him. I think we'll do the 4 feet on the ground=treat thing since treats seem to be working so well, and I'll tell her to knock it off when she does it-that usually works for things too. Dh will also hold the leash on our next few walks since she seems to instantly respect whoever holds the leash. I'm also going to be helping DH learn to be assertive and confident with her on this because I'd like him to be able to keep her in check too.

So we're doing pretty good, and she's definitely not getting drugged. That bottle is going in the trash. What a weird choice on the vet's part.

6 days until Avalon's due date. Go Avalon!


----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> Which means all they see are "How is Mama's widdle precious baby this morning" dogs.


----------



## CntryBoy777

I have learned in my years, that if a large dog is excited, the best way to break the "jump up on ya" habit....bend over to them first and greet them down....it doesn't take long to correct and ya don't even have to scold them....just know they are excited and greet them on their level....Gabbie use to do that, but doesn't now....unless I pat my chest....but as soon as I walk in from being gone for a bit I have to greet her first as I come thru the door....then I can bring in bags from the truck unaccosted....


----------



## rachels.haven

We'll try that.

Took dog patrolling in the woods this morning. She does not like getting tied up with bittersweet. She does love harvesting burrs, swimming in the creek, and running all over with a mushy goofy smile on her panting face. She's not very clean anymore. Then I recalled her out of the woods for a treat, then I put her in the pen and she went for more water and to settle down in the giant mystery crater in the goat pen. She tried digging her own crater, but rocks big and small keep blocking her holes. Here's a pic from a front window. Dog is not really visible. She's a light colored line in the middle ground.


----------



## rachels.haven

Slightly better pic.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh! I forgot this picture. This is her "park?" face.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

She is so pretty!


----------



## Bruce

I am so happy for you that you got such a great dog!
(and jealous)


----------



## B&B Happy goats

She is beautiful , so happy you got her


----------



## Baymule

Happy! Happy! Happy!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

I am happy for you, too!    Dogs make such wonderful companions.  They offer so much love and ask for so little in return.


----------



## farmerjan

She is a very pretty dog.  You are fortunate to have her.  Any news on the "coyote" situation?


----------



## rachels.haven

The coyote hasn't been coming back around since Bailey has been here. The "local" coyotes are packing back up and starting to run around so I get the impression over the next few weeks he will either be packing up or run off. A bunch of people still want to shoot it. I spoke with my neighbor up the hill who runs a pick your own orchard and she says if it bothers us we should contact her and she'll put us in contact with a friend of hers who manages the local deer for some branch of the govt and he can come and "take care of it" for us. Not sure it will be back though. 

I haven't made our appointment to go down to the PD and complete our own licenses to carry application because last week I threw my efforts into getting the family as up to date as I could on medical stuff and getting people to appointments at the right time (and also restarting a kid at school, I guess). I'll do it this week.


----------



## rachels.haven

Avalon kidded early. TRIPLET DOES!!! All keepers (especially nice since I'm making cuts). One fawn with a white pol, one black with a white pol, and one white with fawn spots, and although they are all small, everyone is doing what they are supposed to be doing. I believe Ava is done. @B&B Happy goats called it. Ava wants to take over the herd. I can not believe it.

I walked in after getting back from the library with my youngest to find her pushing in the barn surrounded by her friends, so I shuffled them around, divided off the spare stall and added hay and water and alfalfa pellets, and she got back to work, had the three, then I had to wipe them and do a hasty assisted nurse and ran off to grab my kid from the honking bus at the stop, barely catching it, trailing my tantruming 4 year old behind me (no, I will not get your shoes that you lost "SOMEWHERE in the house or barn" while the bus driver lays on her horn at the stop a quarter mile's jog down the road) as my neighbor from the way back part of our driveway shows up in her car leaving and stops and watches the screaming tantrum part (I don't think she ever had kids, so I'm sure that looked great). But hey, triplet does, healthy favorite doe, crazy tantrumer is now safe in the house drinking juice to stabilize his mood before I stuff him with evening food to get ready to put him to bed, and the older kid is home safe and not being taken by the bus back to school and I'm only a bad mother based on what my neighbor saw, and just a reasonably bad mother based on what the bus driver saw. Hope I wasn't too covered in amniotic fluid and blood when the neighbor showed up, lol.

And tomorrow morning I finish my gun license application and get it in and get to wait for it to get back to me.

Oh! And we had a hay delivery brought in and I put it up in the loft, so I should be set for winter. I may still be buying hay as we need it as the season winds down until it's gone, but we're really only using a bale every week or two with the browsing they're doing in the pens I put up, so it shouldn't be much. 60+ bales of nice hay is an equally nice feeling.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

CONGRATS!   Three does is awesome!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Way to go AVA girl ...congratulations  Rachael   
Looking forwad to pictures....great news on the hay, .........sounds like you have had a very productive day !


----------



## CntryBoy777

Well, I tell ya....my mom was an absolutely horrid woman if ya think that was such a terrible thing...........and we sure didn't "complain" either.....I wouldn't be concerned....life is Full of "moments" with children and animals....and whoever gets to "witness" it....might not "look" next time if it were too "shocking"...........like all the others, can't wait for pics....and really Glad Bailey is watching over them too....


----------



## rachels.haven

Here are some "action shots". Table is not bowed, btw. I think it's a trick of the angle. Spent a good three minutes staring at it after looking at these, trying to see the bow in real life, not behind the camera. Just about drove me nuts. Pretty sure it's straight if I take the pic from straight on and level. I may move hay tomorrow regardless.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Ava looks quite pleased with herself ,........and the kids are adorable. Do you have any others that will be kidding soon ?


----------



## rachels.haven

I have my adult nurser that was supposed to be bred to kid on Friday too. I bred her, she seemed to finally stop cycling, but she has no bulge, is very slim and trim with a girlish figure, very little looseness around the rear end so I doubt it. BUT I'm keeping her off craigslist until day 150 just in case. I don't want a doe to have to adjust to a new home and being a mom at the same time. She doesn't take to change really well as it is.
Today she was getting butted around a little bit in the pen, so I wouldn't be surprised if she'll be going into heat soon.


----------



## rachels.haven

And yes, Ava is VERY proud of herself. She's taking over the herd and going to be trying for herd queen now.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Oh she' ll make to queen, "she who kids the most doe' wins " ...


----------



## Baymule

Congrats on the triplet does, getting your kid off the honking bus and dragging your 4 year old down the driveway while having a tantrum. A very special congrats on presenting your Bad Mom side to your neighbor while covered in goat birth juice. Way to go!


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, Olivia, that doe in question tried to climb through the fence to be bred by one of my bucks today, so no kids from her this week. She's now bred. Angel is also bred. Both are listed. I'm hoping that will help them go to better, milking homes, separately if possible. A toss up in the pecking order would probably change my adult nurser's habit. Angel claims Olivia as her daughter, which made Angel head doe before Saffron the standard came to town. Olivia has nursed for a very, very, very long time on Angel and tries to go for everyone else (cue the Saffron SMASH, but Avalon let her). Livy acts like a dam raised brat in the worst way, and a high pecking order one too. If they were split up, and Olivia fell to a low ranking doe, where she winds up without Angel around, I get the feeling that would nix the behavior and obviously the nursing. So listing it is. I'm telling myself this is for the best because all of Avalon's does are staying.

We finished our License to Carry applications. Now we get to wait 8-10 weeks according to the guy who did it. Then we can go pick them up. Nope, getting a gun takes a good long time here. Sure is good I've been able to go underground and find people who I can hire to shoot it if I had a real problem. Fish and Wildlife has disappointed me.

The lady who has an orchard up the hill has dozens of coyotes on site. She tells people to make noise as they walk around so they don't cause trouble for people. After talking to her, I'm pretty sure we're just getting the one rejected xL one that needs to die and her many acre property holds the rest. Also, I may look into getting Bailey a backup buddy so she or any goat doesn't get killed when they do pack up this (or next) winter. I probably already mentioned this, but now I'm serious.

It's also time to add another two segments onto the chicken's aviary run. I think I'll do it home depot delivery order this time because taking the kids and collecting materials was crazy. It may not cost too much and they will also deliver stuff that my HD is out of (because I bought all the hardware cloth and they have no PT 6' 2x4s).


----------



## rachels.haven

We also discovered that there are tax incentives for having permanent grazing pastures and selling $500 worth of farm stuff per year (after the first 3 years of doing it), so I may eventually get my perimeter fence and fenced in wooded goat pastures. Our taxes are ridiculously high currently-it's like paying rent. Plus, the more walkable and open our woods are, especially with my canine farm hands marking and guarding, the fewer coyotes we'll have coming through. And my kids will have a harder time getting lost or wandering off. 

And the goats will be able to eat more for free. That time is fast ending though. Our leaves have begun turning.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> Our leaves have begun turning.



  Here in western Arkansas, we have some leaves turning, but not from chill, but from heat and lack of rain!

Congratulations on the triplets.  That story of your goat birth, the bus driver, the neighbor, etc., was so funny!  I am glad you were able to laugh about it and shared it with us!

Sounds like you are getting your place together, what with your new dog, and updating your pens, and pasture.  I am happy for you! 

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Bruce

Congrats on the doelings. How is Bailey acting around the new kids?


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks @Senile_Texas_Aggie  and @Bruce . She wants to check them out and was getting nervous when they would cry for a while. For now she's fenced out with the rest of the does, and is sleeping against the shared wall with them. I think their intro is going to upset Avalon. She doesn't even want those babies leaving the stall.

Odd thing, despite Olivia wanting to climb in bed with my bucks this morning complete with being loud calling for them and them complying and having a happy, willing one day stand all day long, she almost seems to be a little softer in the ligament area tonight. I was having trouble finding them. But I'm not sure yet. If I touch her when she's not in the mood she tenses every muscle in her body and tries to tap dance away no matter where she's at and she was definitely not in the mood to be touched tonight so I guess we'll see. No udder filling whatsoever but where did her ligaments go? That does not make sense.


----------



## rachels.haven

No more babies, btw. The 11th is day 150, but I'm 99% sure she was just in heat.

Bailey has a vet as of Friday. I forgot to update. They are a husband and wife pair that used to breed rotties. They came out to the house, had a ten minute appointment in which she finished her shots, had a blood draw and a snap heartworm test, I got handed her HW preventative, paid the bill, and they said "see you next year". She's not aggressive, doesn't need drugs, and other than my house being messy because I didn't realized they'd come IN to see the outside dog, everything was fine. Done.

There were gunshots outside tonight. Considering how many of my neighbors want him dead, I wonder if the giant coyote is still alive now? The only thing that's in season right now is bears, and I'm not convinced there are more than a few of those.

Might have woken up very early and driven an hour and a half to check out this guy...


...and his brother...

...and his Komondor mom and Pyrenees dad and an adult puppy komondor male, all working to keep chickens, goats, and tiny alpacas safe in the big woods of New Hampshire (side note, we also went to the Franklin Pierce house museum in a whim before the morning was over because it was there).
One puppy we met wanted to go wander off. The other stayed with us and laid down. We decided the stayer is coming home with us in a few weeks to be trained when he's ready. The wanderer was prettier with an opal colored coat, but the other matches us and Bailey better. I'm very much looking forward to Mr. Puppy coming home and growing up here. I also discovered that my kids are afraid of puppies because they are not Bailey. A strange dog is a strange dog, I guess.

We also talked more about our plans to fence everything. Free ranging chickens and children would sure be nice.

DH is going out of town for a week in a business trip (not very happy about the workload his work piled on him last week "because" he was going out of town, as if it wasn't for them at their request). Since free ranging chickens isn't an option yet, I think I'll take this opportunity to put up another cube or two on my chicken run-half height this time. 8' walls are too hard to do much with, especially alone. 4' high should be better. They'd better not send him out of town too often or I might build a whole other coop next time.

AC season is officially over here, btw. The chill is back.


----------



## farmerjan

Wow, from never having an LGD, to getting an adult, to finding her a vet that sounds pretty decent, to taking on a second LGD all in the matter of ...what .... 2 months?????  Sounds like you are pretty sold on LGD's as part of the protection detail.... Hopefully the puppy will learn from Bailey for the protection end of it..... 

So glad that the vet (s) were so very matter of fact and got the whole thing done with no muss or fuss or problems.  I guess now you got an experience at the "other end of the spectrum"  with a "farm dog vet"... That's great.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. We really love the dog(s) as part of the farm and not just a house pet. Itjust  feels right. There's also something special about their temperament that I can't put my finger on. They contribute to the calm and not the insanity. Lots of learning going on still.

There is some method to our madness as well. We are trying to minimize the risk to our current dog. We spoke to a few different neighbors and I realized that if I'm going to live in "peace" with the wildlife that no one here wants to control, for the safety of me, my kids, and my animals I'd better get big dog friends. We still don't have a Barker. Our girl has only serious barked 2x to date. Her way to keep things safe at night, assuming they don't follow her in is to poke the goats with her nose until they are all in the barn and hides with them so I feel like she would benefit from a team mate. I also want to minimize the chance we DO have to use our gun. The local human wildlife may try to antagonize things. The sane locals that spend time outside really have to keep the measures they take to stay safe while outside hidden and keep them VERY quiet and two dogs might be a quieter, better way for us than shooting things off at 10 pm in the dark. I also really love how they watch for things even when I'm not able to (when not at the barn pen). If push came to shove, Bailey could defend them in the field. That all is a HUGE burden off my shoulders.

Getting stalked to my door in the dark and being howled at from right outside was a real turning point here. I guess we took our yard back. We're still expecting someone to get bit by a coyote in the next few years, but I don't want it to be one of us. So rabies shots to all the dogs and we'll keep working on the perimeter fence details!

Btw, if we wind up needing more than two dogs, we may move instead, because that's nuts. We're only two miles from "town center" and "thickly settled" zones.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

I am SO HAPPY for you and your family, Miss @rachels.haven!    Everything seems to be working out well.  Miss @B&B Happy goats's "mama bear" side coming out was a good thing -- it helped you to see you needed to do something, and by golly you did it!  With Bailey and soon the puppy coming, you should have plenty of four legged protection.  Now you should be able to sleep well at night!


----------



## Bruce

Now I'm extra jealous


----------



## rachels.haven

@Bruce I bet your family could handle a LDG if you could find one that never barks like ours. Apparently they exist. They do lots of peeing and pooing, which I guess works for repelling things because it seems to be working here.

Dog was looking depressed and we wanted to go walk a trail so we took her to "The (town where we live) Place", an off leash trail on forestry land open to the public that used to be a horse farm. I put on a long lead because I wanted my dog back when we were done. Bailey met lots of dogs and became undepressed fairly quickly. She also jumped in the nashua river and drank half of it while swimming around, then tried to catch up with a whippet mix puppy with the help of a rat/chihuahua terrier she met and hit it off with. They couldn't get him, and he literally kept running circles around them, so I guess they all enjoyed themselves. After all that she almost couldn't get in the car and was too tired to get out of the car when we got home, so I cut all her nails before dragging all 120 lbs of her out, and put her in the goat pen where she drank more water then deflated into the dirt for what will probably be a long power nap.

The walk only got hairy when a lady came down the trail with two off leash pit bulls that went after my kids (the kids jumped in the water and lady was able to grab her dogs before they jumped off the bank barking and snarling). I don't like pits. Bailey caused no issues, but I think she was well on the road to over doing it by the that happened so she didn't have much fire left to protect them. She doesn't appear to have a lot of endurance, but all in all that walk went really well.

My kids want to find a place without all the dogs to get in the water (although they said to go fishing, but I doubt that because I know them). It was nice and clear and there were plenty of visible panfish. My youngest said he saw a shark, but I doubt that too.

Good dog day. I have cute pictures of baby goats running their already crazy mom around, but those are on the phone and not this laptop. I think Avalon is losing her mind from the isolation and always looking for all three of her kids. I feel for you, Ava.

I also introduced the dog to the goat kids, but Bailey kept trying to herd them back to their mom, and their mom kept trying to get them away from Bailey and they weren't being cooperative to anyone for so for the sake of everyone's stress level we went ahead and took the dog for that walk.


----------



## Baymule

Bailey has made a huge difference for y'all. A new puppy too! I hope the puppy doesn't bark a lot. Our female GP was REAL barky but has finally settled down. She is 10 years old and finally shut up. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

If he follows Bailey's lead there may be no barking. I'd like a little though. It might keep the coyotes at bay without altercation when they start packing up on the hill and screaming at each other all night long. Mom and dad weren't barky though.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> @Bruce I bet your family could handle a LDG if you could find one that never barks like ours. Apparently they exist.


The problem is that you can't know if they are barkers or not. Even if they aren't barkers at one home, they may be at another.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ah, that does sound difficult. I'm sorry that went that way.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bailey was guarding in the pen towards the road again. She also keeps trying to make holes, but gives up at about this size. Darn rocks.





She might like cars too much now.



She was very pleased with herself here and attempted to sit on the seat.

She's had the runs since she got here and this morning I think I finally figured it out. When I alfalfa pellet the does, she claims one of the buckets and eats her fill first. Makes no sense considering her full dog dish is right there...I may stop the pellet feeding in the barn run, I guess.



On a different note, Avalon is looking very dairy lately. She's empty here. it has come to my attention that she is a self nurser, so teat tape might be in order when I separate for milk. Silly goat. She is still lovely to milk. We have begun training.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

She looks good!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> she is a self nurser



Please forgive my ignorance here, but what in the world is a self nurser?


----------



## rachels.haven

She doesn't like feeling full of milk, so she empties herself by drinking the milk. All she needs now are cookies to go with it.


----------



## farmerjan

Very bad habit for any lactating animal.  We will put an anti nurse nose ring in a cow that does it and if she continues... she will get sold.  Sorry, but I would not tolerate it.  I guess in goats, maybe it is not as important to get as much milk as we get from the cow???


----------



## Baymule

Now if you could just teach her to make ice cream and cheese.....

My female GP, Paris is location bound to the back yard. She loves HER yard. My attempts to move her have failed, so I connected the back yard to the side pasture and sheep barn/lot. I can open a gate from the barn to Pasture #1 and Paris can go from the back yard all the way to the front fence at the road. When we leave and come back, Paris is up at the road, watching. When we drive up to the gate, she trots to the barn, goes through the gate, down the side pasture, back to her yard. It's like she's saying, It's your turn. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

God dog, Paris! 

No, self nursing in goats is serious, but she's a FF, just getting used to being full. She's also a crazy goat that will do everything. I'm going to try to modify her behavior asap. Hot sauce and teat tape can be compelling I am told. Most of my ND have something nutty about them, and I can't sell them all because of their annoying quirk. Although some days I wish I only had a herd of lamanchas-mild mannered, calm, predictable and slow. Also less likely to be coyote bait and larger teats...hmm...

But the bucks are big. And everyone of them pees a lot more than a nigerian (not as much as a cow though). You also can't beat the rich ND milk for cheese and soap and yogurt, and drinking if you're in the mood for super creamy milk.

I want to see what I can do with her before I despair. I'd like to build my herd with her genes. Her udder, when it gets full is a dream to milk with perfectly long teats, good orifices, and great attachment. It empties fast too, and just feels plain nice. If I can't get a decent amount of milk for my family out of her I'll just let her doelings nurse until they are semi-weaned and she's mostly dry and refreshed and breed her back a little early to next year's buck (she also had a really easy pregnancy and delivery).

But teat tape and hot sauce is the plan for now. Burn that bridge when we come to it and all that.


----------



## Bruce

I guess that self nursing thing is kind of prevalent. I Googled teat tape and wow what a lot of hits.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep. Goats are food motivated crazy nuts who like to try and do everything just in case it's fun or yummy or rewarding in any way. Self sucking is right up their alley. Also, I'd imagine they don't like feeling like a near to bursting milk balloon, especially when they start up on the milk production. I've very slowly learned that you have to out patience and out consistency them and eventually they will shape up. If she will leave the tape alone it will be alright.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Goats are food motivated crazy nuts who like to try and do everything just in case it's fun or yummy or rewarding in any way.


Except, apparently, hay they have pulled out of the feeder and has hit the ground.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Now if you could just teach her to make ice cream and cheese.....
> 
> My female GP, Paris is location bound to the back yard. She loves HER yard. My attempts to move her have failed, so I connected the back yard to the side pasture and sheep barn/lot. I can open a gate from the barn to Pasture #1 and Paris can go from the back yard all the way to the front fence at the road. When we leave and come back, Paris is up at the road, watching. When we drive up to the gate, she trots to the barn, goes through the gate, down the side pasture, back to her yard. It's like she's saying, It's your turn. LOL



Come to think of it every time I lose track of our dog, she's never as far away as I think. She's usually sitting (quietly) in front of the garage, or up on the back deck (quietly), or in the garage, getting into something I may or may not have left down (also quietly). Maybe that's where we're headed. Maybe not. It's working for now.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Except, apparently, hay they have pulled out of the feeder and has hit the ground.



BUT @Bruce ! They have to get to the good stuff!!! The best stuff! You know, at the bottom of the bag, but not the dust. Then they get upset when the bag is empty or just full of dust.

And the ground hay is now dead to them because it wasn't the good stuff.


----------



## rachels.haven

Boy mauled by baby goats.






In your opinion, are these doelings about the right size to disbud? They're a week and a day old today, so I'm starting to think about it.


----------



## Bruce

Cute goat kids! 
Others will need to answer the question like @B&B Happy goats, @Goat Whisperer, @Southern by choice, @Devonviolet


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Don't forget Miss @babsbag!


----------



## frustratedearthmother

I try to disbud by 10 days.  If they are tiny baby does they might get an extra couple of days.  Some of those itty bitty ones you can't even feel the horn bud....but you don't want to wait too long.  It gets harder on everyone if you do.


----------



## rachels.haven

Good to know. I may do that too. The size of heads vs. the iron tip is worrisome and I can't feel buds yet.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

I'd check 'em every day...it's amazing how fast they can change.  You can shave their little heads and keep a close eye on 'em - but if not, it's easy enough to feel 'em.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Boy mauled by baby goats.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> In your opinion, are these doelings about the right size to disbud? They're a week and a day old today, so I'm starting to think about it.



That looks like one happy boy!


----------



## farmerjan

Cute....


----------



## Southern by choice

What @frustratedearthmother  said. Not sure what size tip you are using but if the tip is larger and buds real small then you may go around the outside of the entire bud and it has no effect.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

What's  the news on the wolf/ coyote / dog  monster ?


----------



## rachels.haven

No daytimes sightings yet, although last night I heard coyotes howling and the dog barking through my dreams. Someone nearby has been shooting at night a lot.

Disbudded doelings. 2 had round wedged buds coming up and one didn't, so two got white rings and decapped and the other got copper rings and if any new growth happens she will be redone. Aw man, I hate disbudding. I don't want pointy dairy horns. They aren't like meat horns. Avalon's breeder had a few horned goats and the horned goats would flip and throw babies and really beat on the unhorned ones and each other. So for the peace, NO HORNS. Also horned goats sell for almost nothing and any time I have to sell anything for chicken scratch I always wonder how things will go for them as "discount" animals.


----------



## rachels.haven

Holy cow! Chewy.com has Victor for around a dollar a pound.


----------



## rachels.haven

In regards to my window maker danger tree, we had a guy out to do a fencing estimate that was a logger by trade and he quoted the trees at $300 each and strongly suggested we get the health of the giant pine tree that is leaning towards our house evaluated. Last time we had trees taken out we were charged $1000 each and they were half the size or less, so $300 sounds great. Even if we don't get this guy to do a fence I may have him do some trees instead. The halfway down tree is going to go along with a few other dead or dying ones.


----------



## farmerjan

If he comes and does the trees, and does a decent job, then even if he is not the lowest bid on the fence, it might be smart to give him the business too.  Then he will be more likely to come back sooner and do other stuff for you even if he is busy....Maybe the pine just needs to come down on purpose, instead of coming down on its own in the wrong spot or direction.  Got 2 tall pines here that have about died, and I look for the owner to keep fiddling around until one bad storm/wind takes them down on the house because he is too tight to do anything PRO-active....


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> No daytimes sightings yet, although last night I heard coyotes howling and the dog barking through my dreams. Someone nearby has been shooting at night a lot.
> 
> Disbudded doelings. 2 had round wedged buds coming up and one didn't, so two got white rings and decapped and the other got copper rings and if any new growth happens she will be redone. Aw man, I hate disbudding. I don't want pointy dairy horns. They aren't like meat horns. Avalon's breeder had a few horned goats and the horned goats would flip and throw babies and really beat on the unhorned ones and each other. So for the peace, NO HORNS. Also horned goats sell for almost nothing and any time I have to sell anything for chicken scratch I always wonder how things will go for them as "discount" animals.



As for the selling of horned goats not bringing much, maybe try to time any sales just a bit before some of the ethnic holidays.  They always do better here if we sell sheep and goats a week or 2 ahead of an ethnic holiday.  There are quite a few and I would think that there that it might help the prices.


----------



## rachels.haven

I may consider that in the future. There's also a processor 10 minutes away from here. I'd like to buy a freezer and fill it. Too good of an opportunity to pass up. The dairy doelings I want to get right though. 

And yes, I think we'll go that way with the fencing guy. I'm slightly concern. At the end he kind of vaguely gave me the impression he doesn't know how to put up livestock fencing. He thought I meant I wanted him to run cattle panels around the whole place (we clarified that). So we will proceed with caution, but will definitely let him do what he does best and pay him what he asks for that. I can run cattle panels myself if I wanted to go that way.

Tomorrow I need to call the town conservation board and ask them what I'm allowed to fence in on my land so I can run my brush control dairy goats and what will be sacrificed to the rapidly growing asian bittersweet jungle in the name of wildlife conservation. If they don't let me fence, my bittersweet has already jumped the creek and is charting new territory on the way to their conservation land so I'm hoping, hoping, hoping they'll work with me. Wish me luck and eloquence and the ability to communicate clearly and that they'll be having a good day and will give me any paperwork I need to do to put up the fences to make our acreage work for us, help the dogs keep us safe, let the goats eat, with the added bonus of keeping our woods safer by preventing tree girdling and protecting their precious coyote breeding ground.


----------



## Baymule

You have to get permission to fence your land?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep. Because of the dry creek and pond.


----------



## Baymule

I hope you get permission to put up a fence.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. Me too.
Bailey was barking this morning. I didn't think much of it because I couldn't see anything. Suddenly there is bear poop by the chicken coop (I thought they were only supposed to do that in the woods?). This is my first time seeing it out of pictures. Bear poo is grosser than dog poop. Hurry up fence and working LGD's. I'd rather shovel after dogs than bears.

Also, fence guy said there are totally mountain lions here. He a population on his property about an hour from here. I hope they read the memo and respect mass state border and stay in Rindge, because fish and wildlife says they're not here, despite joggers "allegedly" seeing and taking pictures of them in town. I'd forgotten about them, so I guess I'm glad it's not giant cat poo I'm shoveling this morning. That stuff gives me asthma.


----------



## farmerjan

Bears are somewhat common here and they will tear into anything they want to get into if they smell something enticing.  A friend just recently had one tear into one of the premade coops, like you see at tractor supply, and tear the nest box part off that stuck out on the side.  The dog may not be a great deterrent to the mountain lions - that of course don't exist there - once it gets familiar with an area, it will learn to "work around it", but maybe you will get lucky. 

If he is not familiar with doing woven wire fencing, then do not have him do it.  It is an art to get it up and stretched tight and if someone doesn't know the how's of it, it will not keep the tension.  Find a farmer in the area, with the kind of fencing you are wanting,  and ask if they do their own or if they have a fencing person to suggest. Whether you put up standard woven wire - field fence - or do the smaller sized goat and sheep woven wire or even the no climb, it is still all woven wire and needs to be braced right in the corners, and stretched properly in order for it to last.
  I would not suggest the no climb in your case for the simple reason that if one of you were in the pasture and say a predator like a bear should get in there, you would want a chance to be able to climb the wire to get out.  Any fence like that will not stop a bear, or a cat, although it might slow a bear down for a minute for you to be able to get over it.  The no climb type, the openings are too small and there is no way a person, or a goat, can get their feet in it to get purchase to climb it.  There is no climb at one place we rent, they had for their horses.  It keeps the horses from being able to paw it and eventually "walk it down", or get their feet stuck in it,  but there is no way in or out but the gates for most anyone except the tallest most agile person that might be able to vault over it.


----------



## rachels.haven

Wow, that's good, good advice. Field fencing it is. I did not think about that.


----------



## Bruce

Consider the size of the holes in the fencing. Generic field fencing is 6" squares. From personal experience I can tell you that a fox can get through that and drag a full grown White Rock back out after dispatching it 100' inside the fence. I think the sheep and goat is 4" squares and SHOULD be fox safe. Not sure about coons though. Hopefully if you fence your property the bear will forage outside the fence. Remember hot wire is your friend and is cheap. 



rachels.haven said:


> I hope they read the memo and respect mass state border and stay in Rindge


I hope so too! DW's brother and his family live only about 15 miles from there in Brookline.


----------



## Baymule

I've had the field fencing, I grew to hate it. I now have the non climb and @farmerjan is 100% correct--you aren't going to climb it. I agree with @Bruce, for you, the sheep and goat wire with 4" holes is the way for you to go. 

No cougars there, huh? Then if you shoot one, it won't really be there and it certainly won't be dead! But don't SSS. It could be tagged and Fish and Game could show up looking for the cougar that isn't there. Take it down the road and drag it out in the woods,_ then_ do the_ shutup_ part of SSS. And don't tell us either.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, I hope it doesn't come to something like that.

I separated Avalon from her doelings last night and milked this morning and got right about 3 cups. That's about what Angel made at peak as a 2nd freshener. No self sucking took place last night either.

Looks like I may not be able to feed Bailey at night with Ava in there. She likes grain free super premium holistic dog food better than Bailey does, and definitely better than alfalfa pellets. I guess it's "better grain". Luckily that should be fixable. Yuck.


----------



## rachels.haven

At around 4 yesterday afternoon a neighbor went on the town FB page and said an XL, fearless coyote walked through their yard while they were out. 4:30-5am this morning it came over here and we woke up to Bailey's "I'M GOING TO KILL SOMETHING" bark. Everyone was either locked in the barn (bucks and avalon's kids) or in their barn pen (does and dog). Bailey was up on the fence, snapping, lunging and growling. I went out to do milking, put out her breakfast, and give her backup if necessary. She barked until 6, and a little longer with a different tone, then she went to sleep (no breakfast necessary). I'm starting to wonder what would happen if she was loose when that happened. I think she WOULD kill something.
Regardless, good dog today. Looks like she's doing her job fine. But the coyote is still alive.

How hard is fence stretching? I may see if I can just get the fence guy, or a fence guy to put in the necessary wood posts and let me do the rest as I'm able. I'd really like to let Bailey do what she is meant to do over a larger space. I think she is totally capable of making the property safe for us to walk on even at night and definitely able to guard more than just the barn pen.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Rachel,  it's  much easier and quicker just to hire the fencing job out...espically  with the nasty beast around. Then you can spend your time on other projects. When leon and I have done some of the fencing we use the 4x4 to pull , it's  a PITA job for one person. After the fence is up, you could do the hot wire on top yourself....
Sure do wish you didnt  have him right at your door step, that critter needs to get shot  and left out for the buzzards.


----------



## farmerjan

To do the fence right, you need to have the brace posts and the brace wire put on.  Then, if you are using high tensile fence, of any type, the actual proper way is to stretch from both ends to a middle point and tie the fence together in the middle.  Makes no sense to me in one way, but I have gone to fencing clinics and seen and learned the reasons for that. The biggest reason is to get the ends well wrapped around the brace sections at each end.  We don't do that normally..... but the fence needs to be stretched very tight, needs to be wrapped and secured at the end of the brace posts, then at the other end, you will be pulling with a tractor, and attaching it to the first brace post (which can put strain on it and actually loosen it)  while you then go past the corner(end) brace post , cut it off, then wrap and secure.  
If we didn't have the tractor, and the experience over the years, we would have someone else do it.  And actually have hired it out to get it done, up, finished and not have to fool with it.  If you don't get it stretched TIGHT, then it will quickly sag and get loose, and then it is more pain to deal with than not.  Most all woven wire fencing is high tensile that you buy.  It is because when stretched right, it has some spring in it and will outlast the older style fence.  It also will have more give if abranch falls on it whereas the old style would just get smushed. 
@B&B Happy goats , is right.  Get it done and go one to do something more productive with your time.  There is also alot of "little expenses" incurred and if this is the only fence, what will you do with all the tools and such that you need to get it done right.


----------



## Bruce

I stretched my fence with 2 come-alongs, one low, one high using fence stretcher "bars". I made from 2x4's with 5 lags, washers and nuts in each. The easiest way is if you have a gate in the fence run. You first wrap and fence staple the fence to the STURDY H-brace corner posts and attach the "bars" in the middle, it will pull a distance so don't put the bars too close together. Pull until it is TIGHT, the fence will lift up off the ground as you pull. Cut ONE wire, wrap and staple it to the gate post (which ALSO had to be an H-brace or floating brace support), then do another and another. The top and bottom wires are the hardest because they are a lower gauge (bigger diameter) and more stiff.

If you do want to try it yourself for whatever reason, check out some YouTube videos, they can be very informative and a video is worth a thousand words.


----------



## rachels.haven

Doesn't sound like something I should be learning now when I just need that fence asap. The main advantage of doing it myself besides cost is that I can start now, when the plan is to hire it out in the spring. It sounds like an easy, expensive, annoying to fix thing to mess up.


----------



## Bruce

No reason you can't get it done now, check with fencing contractors. They may not be all that busy right now. But DO make sure you hire someone who is knowledgeable about farm fencing, not just urban/suburban fences.


----------



## farmerjan

Agree w @Bruce that now might be a good time.  Many "seasonal type" businesses like fencing, will be winding down in colder areas.  Many do something else like snow removal or something in the areas of the country where it snows.  Here many of our lawn care guys will do snow removal, and other stuff in the winter, and we don't have near the "winter " that you do up there.  I would call around and either find a farmer in the area who has some fence similar and ask if they have a preferred fence person, check at a feed store/ag business. But yes, get someone who knows and understands woven wire/farm type fencing.  Here we have several in this area and the ones that are good will be booked up months in advance.  Then, sometimes they can fit in a small job inbetween.  

You really want to be able to feel somewhat safe with the coyote menace.... get the fence up.  

It sounds like the dog is really settling in and doing good for you.  I've said it before, but you are really fortunate.  You lucked out with her and it sounds like the longer she is there, the more you have learned to appreciate her and even though she can't really "know it",   I think she would tell you how much she appreciates you too.  Congrats to you and to her both!!!!


----------



## Baymule

When winter sets in, the coyote will become bolder. Food will be harder to find in the "wild". People and their animals will be easier targets.


----------



## Bruce

Good point Bay! And that b@stard is already very bold.

Jan, snow removal in Virginia? I thought y'all just let it melt.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

If you are unable to locate anyone to do it for you, then I think you should strongly consider doing it yourself.  You have proven yourself quite resourceful, and I believe you and your DH (when he can help) can do it.  Watch A LOT of YouTube videos of how to install woven wire fencing.  See if you can locate a rental place that will have a post hole digger, such as what Miss @babsbag has used.  There are a number of people on this forum who have installed fencing: Miss @babsbag of course, Mr. @Bruce, Mr. @Mike CHS, Miss @Baymule, Mr. @CntryBoy777, Miss @farmerjan, and I think Miss @Ridgetop, and maybe Miss @RollingAcres.  There are almost certainly others who know as well.  Either way, you will have that fence up to protect you, your family, and your animals from that nasty coyote and anything else that comes your way.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Baymule

This is my fencing thread. I got some things wrong and some things right. It was a good discussion, with added input from others much more practiced than I was. Read the whole thing before starting on a fence, so you get the benefit of correction and better ideas on the things that I didn't get so right. LOL I will say again that you should use the 4"x4" sheep and goat wire, just in case you get cornered up and need to get over that fence!

https://www.backyardherds.com/threads/non-climb-2-x4-horse-wire-fence.32922/


----------



## farmerjan

@Bruce, we get snow.  And sometimes we REALLY get snow.  The last 2 winters have been sparse, but we often get 4-8" snowfalls at a time.  My son was sent with VDOT, with the huge snowblower (that is on the front of the machine) to Hampton Roads for their nearly 24" + snowfall a year or 2 ago, and has been sent elsewhere several times for big snows.  One winter, the snow was so bad, and the winds had it drifting, they were getting roads open only to have them blow shut again in a few hours.  One place, he used the snowblower, opened up the road partway to a community that was totally closed in, got an elderly lady that was supposed to have dialysis, into the cab of the snowblower and took her out to where they could get an ambulance to take her to the hospital.  This is when they were supposed to get 2-4".  Along the coastal areas they are not equipped as well to handle big snows.  They do have some plows, but often it does melt fairly fast.  Here in the Shen Valley, between the Blue Ridge Mtns, and the Alleghaneys, we normally get 10-30 " in a winter.  About 15-20 yrs ago, we got 2 back to back storms that put down over 30" in 3 days.  We didn't have any 4 wd tractors then.  Took the one 2 wd tractor to break open the road, and I drove the 4x4 truck with hay on the bed right behind him, so he could get hay out to feed the cows.  It took 10-12 hours a couple days in a row just to get hay out.  We were supposed to get a small storm of 3-5 ".  When I moved down here in 1981, I think it was the next winter, we got 2 storms back to back.  Had over 4 ft on the roads, they didn't get to the back roads to plow for 4 days.  I rode my horse from the house out to the barn in the back where the cows and hogs were because the first 2 days I couldn't walk in it and this is when I had "healthy strong" legs.  Luckily my horse liked snow, and would come to a whistle,  so I would call her to the fence line behind the house,  ride her bareback out to the barn to feed and all.  They had to make do with the creek water and what I could carry to the hogs.  After a few days there was a path I could walk.  It was about 1/4 mile from the house to the barn out back.  

And no, this isn't one of those 5 miles up hill both ways in 2 ft of winter snow......stories.......


----------



## Bruce

I guess things are different in Alexandria where my sister in law lives. She says everything shuts down if they get an inch of snow and they wait for it to melt.


----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> I guess things are different in Alexandria where my sister in law lives. She says everything shuts down if they get an inch of snow and they wait for it to melt.


Sounds like Texas. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

and Tennessee. When my mom first moved to TN from OH over the winter she enjoyed going out when it was snowing and the whole no waits for anything part...except then things started closing down and all the recently turned out drivers had no snow driving skills at all. Can't win them all, I guess.


----------



## rachels.haven

And thank you for your confidence in me @Senile_Texas_Aggie . That made me smile.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, Bailey the wonder dog is afraid of whatever she's barking at. She started snarling and barking while I was milking at around 8 last night, so I stupidly decided to try to walk the barn pen perimeter with her and see if there was anything we could see. I went 16 feet before she was hiding behind my legs and I reconsidered. I took her with me to go get eggs and she was very, very uptight. I think she does need friends and a fence for them to patrol and feel secure in. She's a good dog, but apparently not stupidly courageous and I am the boss and the boss deals with the threats if she's taken outside of the pen at night. I don't think I'll do that to her again. The barn pen is nice and small and well lit and a nice defensible position on purpose (although it could be better, I wish it were ON a hill instead of at the base of one, and had no brush around it).

DH said go head with the fence. So I need the conservation people to get back to me. And i need to apply for a permit because I WILL be putting a fence within 150 feet of swamp and the creek (state rule is 50 feet, town is 150 and all are in town in Massachusetts). And I need a surveyer's sketch of our land with my fence on it. And there needs to be a public hearing. And it may not get approved. BUT I don't need to pay any fees because this is an agricultural project.

Very tempting to see if I can say nope to all that and try to do it without that nonsense because the penalty for violations is 1.5x the fee and my fee will be $0 and not $500 like some residential projects, but somehow I'm sure they'd find a way to punish me for using my land without consulting them (although they sure aren't answering email). I think I may head out to the road where we have phone reception and call the agricultural commission officer and see what he says. You can not have a farm without fences in this proximity to others (everyone has less than 10 acres, animals roam). And people here have fences near to water features. The question is, do they just have connections, a lot of $$$, or can I actually legally get this done? (Or maybe they don't legally get this done and just rack up an ag violation)

Then the property boundary and buried electric lines will need to be marked, then I'll actually need to find someone to do it, which I may be doing sooner than later.

I'm concerned I'm not going to get this done before the ground freezes making it impossible, but I can at least try. At least maybe I can fence in the half of the property on my side of the creek. But spring is a backup plan if I can't get our act together fast enough.


----------



## RollingAcres

@rachels.haven we rented a post hole digger from Home Depot and got our fencing done. Not the best job we had done but we had 2 days to get it done because the cows were being delivered that weekend.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I'm concerned I'm not going to get this done before the ground freezes making it impossible, but I can at least try. At least maybe I can fence in the half of the property on my side of the creek. But spring is a backup plan if I can't get our act together fast enough.


I was digging post holes with a manual post hole digger in December, you have time. I hope all the hoops line up fast. I would think they would PREFER you put up a fence to keep animals out of the water.


----------



## Baymule

That’s too many regulations!


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh yes.


----------



## CntryBoy777




----------



## farmerjan

As a former New England Yankee, I can tell you that Mass. has the WORST reputation.... for being a stupid state with stupid laws that are so anti-farmer..... known as the a$$hole of new england..... with the worst gun regulations too.  My family had property in Vt and we lived in Ct.... taking a rifle across Mass.  state lines was taking your life in your hands.... without all the "proper permits"..... to go hunting on family owned land in Vt..  To top it all off, Vermont has the least restrictive gun laws in the nation.  No permits required, carry open or concealed..... Yet the last time I researched it, Mass has had more gun violence than Vt..... Ya think someone would learn?????? 
If it wasn't so prohibitive, I think I would put up a TEMPORARY fence of fence panels and just not tell anyone. T-posts, panels that can be removed...... I would research the fence laws a bit more....Temporary fences.... I do know that under 6 feet tall, and not a spite fence, you do not need a permit according to the state laws....but then there are restrictions for towns/cities and/or counties like here. 
It does sound like you have done some serious research on it.... but have you looked at temporary designation?  Here temp fence also qualifies for tax exempt on some things.... I do know that here, there is not a "time factor" for "temporary fence"..


----------



## rachels.haven

It's for "disturbing" or "intruding" (can't remember which, may have been both) on any of your wetlands at all. Which is funny, because the guy who lived here last I believe was on the conservation board mowed up to the edge of the water and planted very invasive bamboo on it.

Town law
https://ecode360.com/9080946

Probably only part of state law. They tend to only give the public parts of their laws online even if it looks like the whole law, I've discovered. I read this a few months ago and need to reread, but can't at this moment.
https://www.mass.gov/regulations/310-CMR-1000-wetlands-protection-act-regulations

I'd be happy to fence the property in half and keep the goats and dog out of the creek-but not by leaving 150 feet on each side as the town is trying to make you do. That's ridiculous and it would turn into a predator super highway.

I guess I'll be reading and worrying still. I'll also contact the ag commission board and get to an area of service and call the conservation board. 

Mass does seem to be quite pro abandoned farm. That's what they've got the most of.


----------



## rachels.haven

I got Bailey her 8 week old puppy. LOOOONG ride to Deering NH. He vomited most of the ride home and was still vomiting for 3-4 hours after, so he's on a chicken and rice home diet to help him (raw food puke is terrible, I discovered, and I contacted his breeder who said add rice and do cooked chicken only, no veg). Bailey decided to help him feel better by taking all the treats and kibble she could get out of my son, chewing it once and dropping it on puppy's head as much as possible. He didn't eat it of course, but it seemed to make him happy, so now they are best friends. He growled a huge dog growl at her and refused to get out of the crate at first (so I dumped him out, because she was gleefully wiggle butting it and being very slow and gentle and slow wiggle butting dogs don't kill puppies, also, no sequestering yourself in a crate and defending it).  He and his siblings and mom were permanently in with ND's, so he did okay with the intro to my goats today. Only Ava with babies was really afraid of him. He tried to put Saffron at ease and I was there to intervene if she was a butt about it. She's ignoring him now. He's also been good with the rest of us and is a very placid pup all around-mostly just wants to sleep with chewing on the side. He's so little-only 14 lbs, so obviously he won't be working or being left unsupervised yet. The breeder seemed to think he'd do best if kept with Bailey in with the goats like they were at home. If the goats don't want to cream him and while they're not in the grazing pen that he can slip out of I think I'd be okay with that. She'll keep him safe and dote on him and make him mind his manners. She does not want to be separate from him anymore either. It was a cause for distressed when we tried to split them up and send her back to work and him for a nap when he was feeling particularly bad.

Small hitch occurred on #2 started getting hay fever and puffy eyes while cuddling and rubbing his face all over puppy. Either he's allergic to the puppy shampoo, or we won't be having house doggies. Son doesn't react to Bailey. Son also can't wrestle her though (*squish*). Puppy couldn't really wrestle either. He mostly just laid there, needing a nap and a few more vomits, I think.

So I guess we'll just take it easy then and help this sleepy, laid back Bailey style puppy grow up. Last I checked they were both laid out deflated on the barn floor side by side like a dog murder scene. Might get the vet out for a health check, I guess. He should be chicken proof too, apparently. We'll see.

No fence updates today. Too much driving.

We should have enough dogs now.


----------



## Baymule

I roared with laughter....DOG MURDER SCENE.....

Congrats on the new puppy, glad Bailey is over the moon about him. They sound like a happy family. What are you going to name him?


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I got Bailey her 8 week old puppy. LOOOONG ride to Deering NH.


Long more due to the vomit than the distance? I had to us Google to find out where Deering is. Of course no "big" roads between you and there on the "as the crow flies" route.


----------



## rachels.haven

It was long both because of the vomit and because no matter what Google maps says it always takes an hour and a half. A very, very, very pretty hour and a half. The leaves and landscape is amazing out there. I wish I'd taken DH...minus the vomit.

I think we are going to call him Badger, so now we have Bay and Badge.

Here's a blurry picture from far away this morning as I was taking son#1 to the bus stop. I didn't want to get closer and ruin the moment so I zoomed. Saffron wants to be milked.


----------



## Bruce

They are a happy dog family! Seems like you hit the jackpot with your LGD finds.


----------



## Baymule

Love the picture!


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, xxl kong and kong knockoffs are a hit here. MOAR FILLABLE RUBBER TUBE THINGIES. Goats can't eat the dog food out of them but the dogs like to. They also like to chuck them around and try to make food come out, and the more playing with those they do the less puppy messes with things he shouldn't. But with dogs you've got to expect some of that.  Auntie dog enjoys them too.

Bailey's also lost enough weight that she can run now (and today she ran off and didn't come back for 10 minutes, I think she went to go visit the neighbor's dog based on what i heard, no more off leash until fence) so we'll be going running in the AM's if I can swing it. I've also got a bike or two to run her by if it turns out she does have endurance. She looks like she's lost about 10+ lbs, but she could still stand to lose a little more because she's still fat and squishy especially...everywhere...and still slightly jelly bean shaped. Stairs are getting easier though.

Got in touch with the conservation officer and he wants to help me figure out the permit process. Giving him a copy of our property survey with fence on it. We can talk. Crossing creek and boarding wetland has to happen or perimeter fencing won't. He says he thinks we can get this done quick so the project can start. This may happen.

Ava's dying to get out in the cattle pen and ditch those doelings. I feel so bad for her. She throws her "no more udder bumpers" tantrums at the fence or stall door after about 10 minutes of being back in with her babies in the morning and then all day. Some-doe is going to be counting down until 8 weeks. I believe we just past 3. Not sure she's going to make it till then. She may quit letting them nurse. They ARE eating grain and hay now-not sure about the alfalfa pellets because they are bigger. They'll be fine once they get that figured out.

Going to cull my extra two roosters this weekend and it will be a relief. I always hope I'm making the best decision on this front when I do this. You can't change your mind once the bird is done. I should get rooster pics. They are pretty. One won't sit still. I'd cull just for calm temperament, but the lavender barred one with red and gold shoulders coming in is just too pretty to process.


----------



## Bruce

Good news with the conservation officer. Yes I can see there would be a requirement to fence the animals out of the wetland and the creek. Don't want domestic animal waste getting in those (wild animal waste is OK though ).

Time to start milking Ava for your own use!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Congratulations  on making a good connection  with the conservation  officer, hope he helps you through all the red tape so you are able to get your fencing soon , that sure would take some pressure off .....and ease your mind


----------



## Baymule

So you have Bailey on a doggie diet....I didn't know she was "curvy" LOL I hope you can make the fence happen!


----------



## rachels.haven

She was more in the lack of curves territory before. Now she's curvy with a little sagging in the belly region. I don't think she's ever going to be lean and mean. I don't think that would be ideal for her.
You know, I guess she was on a diet, but she mostly did that herself. I took her off the TSC Retriever 27 food and ended up putting her on Iams large breed, and we'll move her over to Victor's when the bag is done for simplicity's sake (also, Iams comes from WM . com and they keep shipping me expired bags and I hate that, Victor's is from Chewy and the bags are still young and price is the same). She eats 3-4 cups with raw egg or milk on it to repel goats and is done for the day even if I leave it. It's working. She's eating. She's in acceptable shape and is losing weight slowly.

And I don't have to handle dog food that smells like dog poop _before_ being run through the dog. That retriever food was gross.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

This is wonderful news about the conservation officer meeting with you and he being willing to help you get the fencing approved!  Did he give you a time estimate as to how long the approval should take?  I hope it is no more than a week, two at tops.  That way you can get started before the ground freezes, and hopefully get done before the snow starts piling up.  I wish we were closer -- I would offer to help.  Of course, you'd probably send me home after the third time you told me, "STA!  Use the other end of the hammer!"

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, I'm afraid if that were the case by the third time my boys would have the hammer and they'd be nailing or breaking everything in sight.  Might be safer for us to hire out, and keep the kids  away from the cool new toys and people to take them from.


----------



## rachels.haven

No more mile jogs with Bay for the foreseeable future. She has the will but not the endurance. She did it with me then after a drink she deflated in the trunk and went to sleep and I had to drag her out and to the barn pen where she passed out again. Poor dog. Her owner is a crazy lady. Pen guarding and patrolling for her it is.


----------



## Bruce

Maybe she should start on short runs and work her way up. No one in shape or out of shape starts with a full out 5K 



rachels.haven said:


> Lol, I'm afraid if that were the case by the third time my boys would have the hammer and they'd be nailing or breaking everything in sight.  Might be safer for us to hire out, and keep the kids  away from the cool new toys and people to take them from.


How are they going to learn if you don't show them how things are done? Of course "everything in sight" better be rocks or something if they are bent on destroying things.


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, I thought a mile on flat terrain was short!

Good sentiment, but my kids are more at a digging holes to china with spoons and butter knives stage or the learning not to color on themselves and the whole house with markers stage, and also the learning not to lie when the aim is not true and they pee on the toilet instead of in the toilet stage. Hammers come later for everyone's safety. Four and six are not a good point for them to have any tools (or scissors, please no scissors). I love them, but I have no illusions about them not being little chaos-ites. Maybe at 6 and 8.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Bruce said:


> How are they going to learn if you don't show them how things are done?



I think Miss Rachels.haven didn't want them to learn from me, holding the wrong end of the hammer! 

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## farmerjan

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> I think Miss Rachels.haven didn't want them to learn from me, holding the wrong end of the hammer!
> 
> Senile Texas Aggie


I love that you are so able and willing to laugh at yourself for some of the things you have "messed up" ???  Reminds me a little of @Latestarter.  Sure do miss his escapades, and his daily doings.


----------



## rachels.haven

Would holding the wrong end of the hammer be safer or more dangerous?


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Would holding the wrong end of the hammer be safer or more dangerous?


Dunno, but it sure wouldn't drive nails worth a durn.


----------



## CntryBoy777

There are only 2 ends to a hammer, and no matter the job or use of it....there is a right end and a wrong end....if ya are always holding the "wrong" end it will never be used for its designed purpose......


----------



## rachels.haven

Coyotes are gathering on the conservation land behind my 6.81 acres. Had to hurry and bring in the goats from browsing. Waiting on conservation guy to get back to me, waiting on LTC to come back still so we can skip down to Cabellas or Bass Pro if we need to, crossing my fingers those fat, surley, bold coyotes leave my goat pen alone and don't eat Bailey, the puppy, and the goats.

I'm sure we'll survive, but man, I hate that exposed feeling when you know the authorities won't help you because they blame all the trouble you having on stock no matter what, they won't let you defend yourself, and still not knowing for sure if they will let you fence your land to run your dog (and goats).

On the positive side, the bucks are locked in the stall, the does have a 115-120lbs dog guarding them, and conservation people haven't said no yet and I don't have to go outside in the dark with a pack of giant howling coyotes nearby.

And Saffron's brisket edema almost seems smaller and less saggy. She's been kneeing my hand off her when I try to mess with it, which is odd for her. So I am hopeful and doubt liver flukes or a heart condition if it's sensitive.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh, and I'm making cheese right now listening to the dog bark. I've left that out of my journal. Every few weeks I put up a couple of pounds of cheese in the extra fridge that was left with the house downstairs turned up to 55 degrees. It's pretty good cheese so far. Tonight I'm making jack and maybe ricotta from the whey.


----------



## Baymule

Homemade cheese!   I admire your abilities for using the milk to make nutritious good food for your family.

Coyotes-they can and will, kill and eat dogs. One night, over the TV noise and through the insulated house walls, I heard an unholy row outside. Our house sits over 100 feet from the county road, coyotes were killing a stray dog outside our front gate. The coyotes were snarling, the dog was screaming, then it all went quiet. When people toss their dogs out, they most often become a coyote meal. 

We even have neighbors that will call us to warn of coyotes. Our standard is to go to the front gate and fire shots in the ground. It goes quiet, coyotes get shot at enough around here that they know to run. 

Our dogs are on guard at night, their barks are music to my ears. I actually sleep better, hearing them bark and knowing that they are protecting our sheep.


----------



## rachels.haven

They do. People lose dogs here all the time, up to german shepherd sized, sometimes in groups. Often in fenced in backyards. And "lost dog" signs here are really "gone dog" signs. They don't come back. I'm sleeping with one ear open now, and I may have to bring the ax inside if our licenses don't come back soon. If I hear a dog fight, I'm not sure what I'll do but I'm telling myself it will be good. I'm just lucky we're not less 500 feet from the next dwelling. Then I would not be allowed to shoot a gun on my property when I can have one. Too bad if you're one of these people. Fitchburg is crowded.
https://boston.cbslocal.com/2019/09/21/wildlife-black-bear-shot-killed-fitchburg/

I just have to focus on the fact that we're okay now, we're doing okay, and things look hopeful as long as we can hold down the fort (literally?). This is kind of a goofy place to live, but we are here.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Sure hope you get your fence permit, ....gun permit , and gun soon....
get the fencing done ...and practice with the gun so you are comfortable.....
then I hope you will never have to use it  and just be able to feel safe at your new home


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! Me too. Right now my brain is too scrambled from staying up until 1:30 making cheese to think straight and deal with any of that properly (no kids awake that late).

Poor Saffron. Today she came into heat. And that goat has LEGS. Guess what nigerian bucks don't have? Legs. I let both mature bucks try and they exhausted themselves and just couldn't. They can't be left together because all 140-150 lbs of her gets frustrated then she tries to ride them and they are too small for that. So poor sweetheart, no babies for you. Next year might be better for her.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Got a bale of hay?  If you can hold her in front of it the guys can usually figure out how to take the next step!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> Saffron's brisket edema



Miss @rachels.haven,

Excuse my complete ignorance, but what is a brisket edema?

(Ignorant) Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Fluid in the area between the front legs under the skin. It's gone now, so now I don't have to worry. Somehow that goat got herself into trouble-stung, hit, or butted.

These three does are for sale a half an hour from me. I'm kind of interested in at least one. Does anyone know lamancha lines?

http://www.adgagenetics.org/GoatDetail.aspx?RegNumber=L001601762
http://www.adgagenetics.org/GoatDetail.aspx?RegNumber=L001947928
http://www.adgagenetics.org/GoatDetail.aspx?RegNumber=L001947898


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> These three does are for sale a half an hour from me. I'm kind of interested in at least one. Does anyone know lamancha lines?


@Goat Whisperer @Southern by choice


----------



## frustratedearthmother

rachels.haven said:


> It's gone now, so now I don't have to worry. Somehow that goat got herself into trouble-stung, hit, or butted.


Glad it's gone!


----------



## animalmom

The goats with Kastdemur's farm name should have great genetics.  Here is their website: https://kastdemurs.com and you can find pictures of the Kastdemur listed goats.  Great genetics, WOW udders and teats.  Go to the website, just make sure you have lots of tissue to wipe up your drool!


----------



## Southern by choice

The pedigrees looked very nice especially the Lil Orchard! However, and this is something all should keep in mind. Pedigree is only a factor.
Always LOOK at the actual goat for sale! Always find out the management requirements as well. 
There are goats LA'ing at 80 that produce 90's and goats that LA90 and produce 80... every  farm EVERY farm no how matter how big the name will have less than stellar animals. *Not all genetics line up either.* You can have goats from famous farm A and goats from famous farm B but they may not mix at all! 
Sounds like the goats would have been a good start.


----------



## Goat Whisperer

I'd take a look. The one doe (fallen angel ) is already a CH and has a good appraisal, don't like the tilted chest floor but she may be worth it anyway. I'd take a look and see if it's really tilted- ask who appraised her. She looks like a small doe, but appears that she has a great back and rump. For me personally, I like to see udder height a bit higher but she still earned an E in mammary so certainly no slouch. She may be a really nice doe for you to use. 

Blue heaven is the daughter of Fallen angel. Why are they selling dam and daughter? Are they culling these genetics from their herd? 
Fallen Angel has quite a few registered daughters, I'd ask if they have retained any for their own herd. If they have, look closely to see if they have a tilted chest floor. 


I'd take a look, if you like them bring them home.  

Welbian, little orchard, kastdemurs, shady lawn south fork are all well known herds. 
You just have to look at the individual animals and see if YOU like them.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Goat Whisperer said:


> look closely to see if they have a tilted chest floor.



I going to show my ignorance again, but what in the world is "a tilted chest floor"?


----------



## rachels.haven

They cut a lot of does this year. I'm not sure why they are selling. Fallen Angel is 7. Purple Summer has an orifice that is not plumb to the bottom of the teat. Blue Heaven was supposed to be a dry yearling this year but she jumped out and a neighbor caught her and accidently put her in the buck pen to contain her. She will need to be milked through till next year. That's what I know so far. I've been invited to come and see them on Tuesday this week. It's exciting.

I'm pretty sure a tilted chest floor is when the brisket area-the strip between their legs-is angled so their body line in the belly area doesn't seem to "flow" from the front to the back and make them look wide and deep. Instead they look tubular, with a broken belly line along the bottom when viewing from the side. Saffron, I'm pretty sure, has a slightly tilted chest floor (BUT good feet, good parasite resistance, silky butter udder, just long enough teats, and good attitude means I don't care). She may not though, I could be wrong. It seems to be becoming less prominent as she puts on weight and the longer she has been here. When she's thin everything stands out. I also feel like she's put on a little size too since she arrived so it may be that she's grown a bit and things really are changing. But I digress...

I've arranged a breeding for Saffron. It was my plan to get her a buckling and a doeling friend in 2020 to grow out and eventually breed. The breeder has a buck at one of her friend's nearby me earning his keep for the year at the friend's place since he was the main busy buck last year. They're all disease tested. My doe's disease tested. We will introduce buck and doe for a quick rendezvous. The breeder also suggested seeing if we can register Saffron as NOA while we're at it, preferably long before hand. Her ears are small enough. The breeder seems to think we can. I need some info from the lady I bought her from at least. If we can't, well, that's okay too. I like her the way she is.


----------



## Goat Whisperer

@Senile_Texas_Aggie the way I understand it is that if you are directly in front of the goat, and can easily see the pad formed then the chest is tilted- the chest floor is “sloped”. 

@rachels.haven 
I’m super excited for you. Looks like some nice does! Definitely get your doe NOAd, so worth it! Years ago, two long time successful Lamancha breeders encourage us to register our fist Lamancha as NOA. One of the best things we’ve ever done!


----------



## Pastor Dave

Do you need a permit for long guns too? Indiana is different than some states. Firearms on private property is allowed without permits. Permits are for carrying handguns here. Open carry or concealed. Long guns aren't given permits. I do live out of town, so handguns on my property or long guns are both permissible. A 12 guage shotgun with some .00 buckshot wouldn't travel as far, but would sure pack a punch to coyotes. It would kick good too, so there's that. Handguns are more for 2 legged vermin, but most will stop in their tracks as well when confronted with a shotgun or lever action, AR-15, etc. Just curious.


----------



## Bruce

Pastor Dave said:


> Open carry or concealed. Long guns aren't given permits. I do live out of town, so handguns on my property or long guns are both permissible.


How do you get the handgun onto your property if you don't have a permit to carry it?


----------



## rachels.haven

If it's an antique and not able to or intended to be fired supposedly you don't need a license for it. I don't trust the state not to somehow cause you grief anyway. 
Here's a website that sums things up. Not sure how credible they are. 
https://www.pewpewtactical.com/gun-laws-state/massachusetts-gun-laws/

 Our licenses are in today, btw. DH has the day off, so we're going to go get them.


----------



## Pastor Dave

Indiana follows Federal law about transporting firearms. As long as it's lawfully owned, firearm can be in vehicle secured and if ammunition is present, it has to be secured in a separate area of the vehicle until getting to ones temporary or otherwise permanent abode.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here it has to be in a locked case in the trunk, ammo separate.


----------



## rachels.haven

@Senile_Texas_Aggie 



I hate posting this, but this is Saffron's dirty little secret: a very tilted chest floor. She is also standing down hill and scrunching up, which makes it look worse. Her edema is totally down now, I think.


----------



## Baymule

We’ll, none of us are perfect. Neither are our animals, but we love them anyway.


----------



## Goat Whisperer

She doesn’t look tilted to me. 
She looks like she’s “slouching”. If she was holding her head alert I think it’d be level.
Is she taller at her hips than her withers?  

A tilted chest floor would be “tilted” in the opposite direction.


----------



## Goat Whisperer

If you stand in front of her, do you see her chest pad?


----------



## rachels.haven

Not sure. Maybe she just slouches a lot, lol. Me too. This is fairly normal, although she is standing on the "yelling stump". She's breaking the rules and not yelling though.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'll check in the hips vs withers, but I don't think so. She does arch her back a lot though. When she's feeling really good and calm she relaxes and walks around with it straight and she looks divine. I'm not sure what the deal is with that.


----------



## Goat Whisperer

I don't think she's tilted  

Looks like a sweet doe! You really should get her done NOA. Our first lamancha was unregistered, her whole rear end is a complete train wreck!!! But we use good bucks over her and her daughters are wonderful! I had initially underestimated RG's, but as we went further and further into goats we realized how valuable they are to our farm. We actually took that ol' train wreck our of retirement this year and bred her in hopes for a 2020 doeling!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

OK, I now know what a tilted chest floor is.  It turns out that I have one, because when you get to the floor of my chest, it tilts way out.  It's called my belly!

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

15 hay bales can fit into a minivan. If passenger seat is used the number is 16. Bought 21 more bales of hay. I feel secure enough now.

There's a place 5 minutes from me that sells hay for $10/bale for just grass hay. My hay guy charges less but is 15 minutes away in Littleton and the backup guy is 25 minutes away in Leominster. But if I had to, I could have more in an emergency with a short car ride, so I'm double set.


----------



## rachels.haven

That wasp nest went dormant all of a sudden so I kicked it down today and it was empty. But now we've got wasps coming in our bedroom by the dozen every day, so apparently they've decided to move in. Looks like I DO get to call pest control after all. I mean, they're not very aggressive, so I can catch them and put them outside, but eventually someone is going to step on one barefoot or accidently squish one and get stung so I guess I'll be taking care of that this week. So that's what I get for not dealing with that immediately and getting my goats stung, lol. Procrastination is still bad, I guess.

Here's a picture of Longvu WFRH Fallen Angel from the FB post listing her for sale with the doelings. I don't think you need an account to see it. No front view.
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=2797977576898332&set=p.2797977576898332&type=3&theater


----------



## Bruce

Do you want Fallen Angels at your house? Not a good example for the boys.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Bruce said:


> Do you want Fallen Angels at your house? Not a good example for the boys.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, she'd fit right in. Maybe she'd help them color on the walls and my car some more.


----------



## Goat Whisperer

I like her. You should bring her home.  

I forgot to ask, what are your goals for your herd?


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm interested. She's dry right now, so either her or her daughter. I'd consider both, but you know...
My goals for my herd are
1)decent parasite resistance (within reason) and general soundness
2)milkability-good, well attached, good textured, well teated udder (lol)
3)conformation good enough that I can have something to work with when/if I do start showing. Not to mention form following function.

Within the first two I'd like to select for the last one if that makes sense.

Temperament is a deal breaker too because obviously I have to work with them. Life is too short to volunteer to work with wild goats that think they are feral rhinoceros. I'm not sure it would ever be long enough for that.


----------



## Baymule

She's pretty. I'm no goatie, but I like her.


----------



## rachels.haven

Redid 2 of the 3 doelings disbudding. Each of them had one scab lifted up by a horn. This time should do it. I'll get this right eventually. The does took it very well this time.

Rescheduled the Longvu Lamanchas visit until Saturday because I didn't want to drive in the dark.

Going to go see this doe tomorrow during the day. I want to see how loud is "loud". Saffron is "loud" and bellows for all to hear when upset...maybe once a week. Mom milks a gallon and a half supposedly.




https://www.adgagenetics.org/GoatDetail.aspx?RegNumber=L002026044

I don't think lamanchas sell well here. If I play my cards right I might be able to pick up a couple of does to be our main milkers and a nice registered buckling in the spring. I was thinking of selling the nigerians in the spring BUT DH and DS's won't hear of it. So I guess we're doing both. Really nice dairy nigerians out of which I will sell anything I don't like milking and a few dairy lamanchas.


----------



## rachels.haven

As a side note, it looks like I'll be putting off milking Avalon. It worked for a while, it hasn't been for few days now. If I separate and milk she doesn't allow the fawn doeling to nurse. So I'll probably restart in a week or two for the sake of the kid. Then they can all wean.

Conservation guy got back to me yesterday evening with formal paperwork that I'll be doing with DH since I find that kind of stuff intimidating. The conservation guy's not totally sure what kind of approval I'll need. He thinks I'll either need to apply for an RDA, or an NOA. RDA's wait time is 1 month after paperwork is received and a $53 fee, and NOA is 2 months after that paperwork is received. I'm unclear on the fee. So we'll do the paperwork now but the fence project is probably a next year thing. That is considered "quick". Man, the hoops you have to jump through here to do stuff on your own land...


----------



## Bruce

What a PITA!!!


----------



## rachels.haven

yeah. Mass is kind of pro abandoned farm. The farms are abandoned and they want them to stay that way. Even our place used to be a farm. Now the govt kind of "owns" all the land (but you can pay plenty of taxes on it) and you have to do serious paperwork just to clear trees or apparently fence. We'll keep trying. DH is a stickler for accuracy and has better people skills than I do so maybe he'll use some of his magic on the paperwork. I'm lucky to have him.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's part of the orchard up the hill from us. It hasn't been abandoned and they are somehow allowed to use and be near water, and keep wild trees back, and disappear coyotes when needed. It's pretty land out here when you can see it.


----------



## Bruce

I think the issue of being near water is animals the go in it or the excess fertilizer that does. Less of a problem with an orchard. First the trees don't go in the water  and second, they aren't likely to be putting a lot of fertilizer out like one does with crops, especially heavy feeders like corn.


----------



## Baymule

I can't imagine having to fill out paperwork for permission to fence my own #%%&# property or clear trees.


----------



## rachels.haven

They didn't seem to care about animals near water. They cared about me modifying anything "within 100 feet of a buffer zone to a wetland" which kind of winds up being my whole property. Even the portions that never get swampy are considered by the town govt as "wetland". It's a little much.


----------



## Mike CHS

I know you are kind of stuck there but I couldn't live in a state like that.


----------



## farmerjan

Mass and Ct are 2 of the worst for the wetland designations.  My father used to do lake dredging, had a Bucyres Erie dragline and used to clean out ponds and such.  Did alot of work on the "fancy" golf courses and such.  I remember the paperwork he used to go through, the different town meetings and planning and zoning and all kinds of different "boards" to get the process done.  All the "know it all" book learned ones trying to tell him how to do it and then he would show them how they could not possibly do it their way, and all the reasons why it would not work.  Not an ounce of practical experience on most of those wetland boards.  It got worse and I think he was somewhat glad that it was retirement time as the rules and regs and the paperwork and the fees (all paid by the landowner he was representing)  were just way out of reason. 

Good luck to you getting through it with wetland designations. 

Any news lately on the coyote?


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh dear. And the board has to vote to approve my woven wire fence. Thanks for the luck. I may need it.

In regards to the coyote: Now we have lots and lots of coyotes. They've packed up and howl and howl and howl just out of sight, sometimes during the day. Bailey tells them off all night long a few nights every week. So we really need this fence both for the beasts and my kids being allowed to play outside. I also worry about the dogs getting enough exercise.

Odd thing, since the coyotes have come out I've started finding chewed up pink lawn flamingos, partially destroyed dog chew toys, garbage all over our place, and I know our dogs aren't doing it and nobody's dogs roams (lost dogs are gone dogs). So yes, fence, fence, fence


----------



## Baymule

Mike CHS said:


> I know you are kind of stuck there but I couldn't live in a state like that.


times about a million.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm a little upset, but trying to make the best of things. This is better than inner city or suburban PA or Nashville, as it turns out (my family keeps getting into drama and I prefer a no drama kind of life). Now that doesn't keep me from occasionally gazing longingly at NH or anywhere else where you are allowed to use your land, but you know.


----------



## rachels.haven

Anyway, that's not why I came on here. I just got back from driving to Derry and looking at that random doeling and she's nice, but I think her tail area looks pinched-she may have kidding issues later. BUT on the other hand she may grow out of it. So yes, lots to think about.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

New Hampshire has it's  issues too although it is  not as bad as Massachusetts  yet.....taxes  are high there also and they really are following right behind Mass. As far as the land use laws. 
So, are you passing on buying the new goat ?


----------



## rachels.haven

No, not passing yet. I needed to think about it after seeing her. I have one more lamancha appointment this week and I'll decide after then. I need to look into the rump issue and see if it's a thing before I commit. If I am getting into standards, I'd like them to be nice to keep things simple. They don't have to be show stars, but I'd like good functional conformation.


----------



## rachels.haven

I will probably pass on her though. Pics of her mom did not scream "dairy" to me and had small teats. Not the greatest rear attachment either.

On the other hand, doelings body was very deep and well built. Her back is very, very straight and she has a lovely uphill stance/build. Her hind legs are beautiful and she looks like a show goat. Nice feet.  Not sure she has the right blend of traits for here though. She has a scur but it is no big deal.

Still weighing what I saw against what I want to see.


----------



## Mike CHS

It's funny how there are so many differences in the regulation process. In the county I live in, the only thing the country gets involved in is septic tank locations.  When we were trying to locate our septic and leach field we went to the county and they pulled the info for ours.  It is literally a pencil sketch of the paddock the system is in and shows the line up from the house to a big tree at a drainage ditch.  We did make another friend in the process, the county rep is Terry Hatfield (our last name is McCoy so the usual conversation was started)


----------



## farmerjan

She should say " I'm just what you want"  so to speak.  If you are iffy, then she is not what you really want.  Keep looking til you see one that says to you, yes, I like her.  PERIOD.  You'll find one that hits you right, and then you won't be second guessing your choice.


----------



## Baymule

I hope you can get all the required paperwork done, permits issued, so you can fence your land.


----------



## Bruce

Mike CHS said:


> the county rep is was Terry Hatfield (our last name is McCoy so the usual conversation was started)



I'm glad the two of you managed to let bygones be bygones


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

What do you think would happen if, instead of asking permission, you asked forgiveness, i.e., put up the fence and then if someone complains, deal with it then?  Are the fines really high?  Could they make you take down the fence?  Not that I am encouraging you to break the law... 

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, I was just thinking about that this morning. DH, on the other hand, is considering hiring a lawyer to help with our proposal. I think my way is cheaper (this is a good indicator of our personalities, we clash on this kind of thing occasionally). I think me breaking the rules would give him the emotional version of an ulcer BUT the fee for disobeying the conservation board and acting like you own the land you pay taxes on is 2x the cost of filing on the town level, not sure about the state level. No professional fence installers will not do it for you without permits though, so I'd be on my own. I might still be able to do something.

Sooo...
I'm considering first finishing the chicken run I've been procrastinating on and replacing the cattle panels in the front yard with field fencing and a cattle panel gate then moving the panels to behind the chicken coop or somewhere similar for the goats to keep clearing so I'd have two big runs, does and bucks. It's also a less intimidating area for me to learn the ins and outs of woven wire. The way the rules are, I'm sure some part of that has to break a rule somewhere.

None of this is set in stone. DH likes following the rules, so I may not do anything, or who knows, maybe he'll come home to a roll of fencing unrolling itself down the driveway.

Two of my brothers are coming to visit, study, and escape the drama that is happening back with my family in Nashville. The brother 2 years to my junior is studying to pass a programming exam to get a job at Amazon too (probably in Nashville, but he does robotics and the A. Robotics is in Marlborough, so you never know). So I might have extra help while executing my crazy and potentially not allowed plan.

SPEAKING OF RULE BREAKING, I also might have a show lines silkie rooster living in my laundry room. Please do not tell DH. Rooster is too cute. (dirty laundry crows occasionally, right?) Rooster looks like someone crossed a tribble with a winkie, and the guy who bred him says his kids named him Baby Teddy. Not sure what I'm doing with him yet. I think I owe Mr.Teddy a trip to home depot for bantam coop materials.

...after I finish that other thing I'm building, of course.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Have you checked with any of the fence companies to see if they  can pull the permits ?
  You know how the contractors sometimes have a "good ole boy relationship" with the people that they have to go through to get the jobs done and inspected...


----------



## rachels.haven

I can check. Most people who do livestock fencing I've found so far are just people for hire. The fencing companies I've found mostly only advertise chain link or privacy fencing. That's a good idea though. I'll definitely check individually not just go off of ads.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> I can check. Most people who do livestock fencing I've found so far are just people for hire. The fencing companies I've found mostly only advertise chain link or privacy fencing. That's a good idea though. I'll definitely check individually not just go off of ads.




We have companies here (small private) that put up any type of fencing, and if you are required to get a permit ( within city limits) they will pull it for you. 
I am like you.as far as just do it ! ..... , but learned my lesson in south Florida lol.....went to replace ONE board on my privacy fence that had rotted....city came by and tagged me with a $250 "either pay the fine or get the permit for $250l ...I got the permit and fixed and replaced all that was needed.
Here where we are now.....no permits needed for much of anything , not the well, porches or fencing....but then again...I am in the middle of nowhere


----------



## rachels.haven

Cockerel pic



 

You gave me a good idea there. I'll make a list and call some contractors before stressing DH out.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Oh how I love those fluffy butts


----------



## rachels.haven

I think tomorrow I'm going to take pictures of everybody else. My barn is messy and needs a mucking but pictures are quick. Then I can get to mucking before bringing wood into the garage and sawing and screwing things together. I want to get the run frame put together and in place tomorrow. The hardware cloth can be the next day when I have my already ripped pants and shoes on (thanks to hardware cloth). I've been avoiding building it because no matter what I do it seems the hardware cloth always gets me somehow.

Also, I need bantam hens. Old ones, young ones doesn't matter-just a healthy one or two. You don't keep bantams for eggs, after all. (ETA, he may get blue egger, green egger, or leghorn hens instead)

If I get done early I will be hitting up one of the NH Home Depots for bantam coop materials. Maybe DH won't notice.


----------



## Baymule

Would putting up cow panels and T-posts be considered a fence? Just trying to help you out on breaking.....BENDING......the rules.


----------



## farmerjan

Baymule said:


> Would putting up cow panels and T-posts be considered a fence? Just trying to help you out on breaking.....BENDING......the rules.


That was my suggestion back awhile ago.  "Temporary fencing".... if someone complained, you could have it down before anyone could come back to check on it....


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> Would putting up cow panels and T-posts be considered a fence? Just trying to help you out on breaking.....BENDING......the rules.


I would say yes since the south line of my fence is exactly that (thanks to Farmerjan)


----------



## Baymule

Just don't go to the property line.....


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm technically not allowed to do anything at all except walk within 100 feet of the 100-200 foot buffer zone that the city declares. I'm a little peeved right now. The state says creeks get a buffer zone of 50f, but if the state has this high standard, Groton has to have the higher one! The guy does not care about my goats walking on it or pooping on it. He cares about the number of posts going up on my property, which I think is stupid because once they're up they're up and should be the only thing touching the ground. I'm suspicious the city uses this rule to control people and preserve the "quaint" lost in the woods look of our town while talking out of the other side of their mouth and saying they encourage and support farming.

I'll get this done. Or maybe we'll move because I don't want to feel like I need to sit on my porch all night and gun down every coyote I see. Sure be nice if I could have a border and a functioning "welcoming" committee to ward things off and only have to kill the stubborn things. Or DH might need to change jobs, who knows?

Today I cleaned stalls and coop and took no pictures. It's already getting dark.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sorry, guys, I'm upset lately. More demanding stuff from DH's job starting up again and the fence thing...and endless strep throat (I think we got the carrier treated this time). Moving here has been a bit of a stress marathon and it doesn't seem to want to let up yet.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

You have to be a " dumb follower" to live in Massachusetts. ...and it is quite clear that you are far from being dumb or a follower ..... I totally understand your fustrations


----------



## rachels.haven

I put a deposit on and on Monday somehow I'm bringing home Moon Mist LOG Purple Summer(...with 2 kids in tow, and no husband home, YIKES). I might kidnap DH in the morning for the trip so he can either be goat holder or driver. Yes, she has an orifice that doesn't point down, but she has great teats, great udder texture, good feet and legs, a lovely build, a great back and rump...she looks pretty close to perfect. I guess she could be deeper and longer but she looks nice and has a lovely temperament. She's also TINY. Saffron is a giant lamancha apparently. All the lamanchas were very short.

Blue Heaven had an udder texture that wasn't as fine and very small teats. She was built slightly nicer though. And Mr. Parker didn't seem to want to sell Angel, and I'm okay with that. It's tempting to bring home both yearlings, but I think I'd rather pick exactly what I want and focus on getting to know that goat. I'm also getting a standard goat milk stand. I'm sure it will fit Avalon and her babies too, but if not all I need to do is replace a hinge on my nigerian one and it works.

 I'm excited for full hand teats and a second sweet goat even if she is NOT another horse goat with long legs(btw, I think Saffron's hips might be ever so slightly higher than her shoulders now that it was mentioned, but we don't have much level ground to stand her on so I'm not 100% sure...plus it doesn't bother me).

MY Angel and Olivia went to their new home today. The young woman who bought her remarked how Angel's udder reminded her of one of her sheep's udders and she seemed to like that. She's also in 4 H and babies will be sold to other 4hers (both of those does were bred by a family for 4H). I hope they make her happy!

I might be allowing a local goat person to stud their tested does to one of my bucks too, so maybe I'll make a little hay money back.

That's it for today. Paper work tonight, I hope.


----------



## Baymule

I'm glad that you are getting the goat that you want. She sounds like just what you want.


----------



## Goat Whisperer

Exciting! 

I’m glad you were able to see them in person before putting a deposit down.
Especially with milking does. There is no “perfect” goat but finding one that fits your needs/wants is so important. I see some does appraise 92 EEEE but have the worst hand milking teats. That score doesn’t do much if you have to hand milk! 

Lamanchas can very a lot. They were originally a medium sized goat however some are breeding them to be Saanen sized. 
Some want then to be 250#+ giants, others want them to be a medium sized goat as they were intended to be. 

Certainly don’t discount your NOA doe! You can really do a lot with RG does.


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, Saffron makes me happy. I could never discount her. She's a very gentle goat that wants to do what you want. Plus the hips thing is very slight. I'd need to get a tape measure out to make sure that's what I'm seeing. I think if she were a buck she'd be a 250 lbs monster and I think slightly smaller than that might be better. What she does have going on is a long back (the longest I've seen but if she's uneasy or excited she "slouches" and seems to want to become a smaller goat), a great rump angle, nice feet, good production even after being dried off and brought back into milk with no kidding, and a well attached udder with a texture like a rubber glove. She's also putting on weight on Nigerian milking rations. I'm hoping that means that when her production ramps up I'll be able to keep her condition good. I'm really grateful to have her. She's got a place here as long as I judge it the best thing for her. Plus, I like a goat that can clear what I guess is 8 feet up by standing on her hind legs (I need a picture of this, not sure the scale will be obvious, but it's kind of fun). I should also compare both goats height on monday. It's interesting.

Yesterday someone was shooting it up on conservation land and I got to discover that Bailey is VERY gun shy, but that's okay. She still hates coyotes. I don't need her to guard us from men with guns or hunt with me (also coyotes SHOULD hate guns too, right?). Plus we still have Badger who is not afraid. We were walking on the first leg of our walk and the guns started going off and she looked at me for permission and I gave it for whatever she wanted then surprised me by turning tail and running back to the barn trailing Badger and me behind her. Badger guarded her outside the stall door all day and made sure those scary gunshots didn't get inside-or at least that's what it looked like. His legs are still too big for his body and he can just barely squeeze through a cattle panel without getting stuck so he's still "small" and not very intimidating. So fluffy and soft too...Mom dog was super silky and soft too. I feel like cording a komondor is a crime against softness now. But I know why it happens. That coat wants to tangle and mat (and cord).

 I've also started having him stay with the bucks in the stall at night, and both dogs in the buck barn pen during the day. They will be his goats to guard so I will not have to stall them at night (until we get the fence up, then Badger and Bailey can have free roaming privileges within the fence). Yes, they guard better in pairs, but the pens are only about 30 feet apart and small, and right now the situation needs it to be this way. He and the doelings have also started playing, and the does play like prey (who want to jump on puppies) and he plays like predator, and even though right now it's mutual it's a no-no, so I stopped it. After a loud night or two I think he likes the bucks. They are nicer than the does even in rut.

Yesterday got too busy for fence paperwork, so we'll try again tonight. Did chores, saw a goat, went to a kid b-day party, sold 2 goats, took DH to work because his bad director demanded EVERYONE work the weekend (and til midnight friday) because he wanted them to, got dinner on the way home and that took us up to dark and crash time. It was funny to see Dh's "secret" office location full of kids and family of engineers and programmers because their other halves and parents were being taken from them and they had nowhere better to go, and we just can't have that, now can we? Bad director did not work yesterday for some reason. Only...everyone else in the office. 

But yesterday was still fun. I guess I'd better get moving now. Sunday morning is always busy with chores, getting kids dressed for church, and church and DH does not seem to want to wake up so I may need to own this morning. We're going to be late.


----------



## Bruce

How did DH get home from work? I'm not liking "bad director". What's good for the worker is good for the slave driver.

I guess here is as good as anywhere since you have goats. Maybe other "goaties" can chime in. One of the YouTube channels I watch includes dairy goats, 2 are bucks kept in a separate enclosure. The bucks are apparently loud and he's asking his viewers if anyone has ideas as to why and how to quiet them. The does and 2 kids apparently aren't objectionably loud.


----------



## Baymule

Is your puppy a Kommodor or a Great Pyrenees? Somehow I missed it and thought he is a GP. Separating him and the does is a good idea, I caught my puppy playing with the slaughter lambs and now separate them at night so he doesn't develop bad habits.


----------



## rachels.haven

@Baymule he's an intentional cross of the two. Their unrelated male Komondor was still too young to breed. So pyr for steadiness and size and Komondor for athleticism.

@Bruce I drove him home after hanging out in the parking lot. The kids came in to contribute to the general ambiance and test what they are developing. I was not allowed farther than the lobby. Director is leaving supposedly in 3 weeks. I'm afraid he's trying to make the project that was on track to finish the end of this year finish before he leaves so he can decorate his resume further. The result is that talent is leaving and the quality is not what is should be. I'm also suspicious that his leaving may be a lie. But I kind of really don't like him, so I may be hopefully just biased against him and he'll go. DH says he's refusing to go in today. I hope his Jewish co worker didn't go in yesterday.

In regards to the bucks, mine are loud too. It may be that way because some does are unbred, or because they can see or smell  the does and they want to own them and keep them from the other bucks. Or they may just want to sing and tell the world the wonders of rut. I think my bucks are funny, but nobody cares about their opera here. Someone else may know more about silencing them. I'm really lucky I don't have to worry about that.


----------



## rachels.haven

Got my goat. Spending today house cleaning and collecting contractors names for the fence. Got told by other Ma residents that if I have to file paperwork to put up a fence I should move, lol. Just another quiet day.


----------



## Bruce

I guess they haven't wanted to put up a fence.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm willing to bet they probably did it on their own property without permission and lived in a place no one would care.


----------



## Pastor Dave

You go ahead and put one up. "None of us" care, and in fact "we" are into fencing and prefer you have one.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm pretty sure my salamander loving adult neighbor would report me for impeding wildlife. I've already had to tell her to ASK before walking all over my front yard in the dark looking for salamanders. But I guess I could be wrong. Not sure I want to risk it (although the violations fee is supposedly 2x the cost of filing, which would be 2x$53, compared to the cost of the fence or a lawyer that would be chicken scratch-or 14 going rate hay bales around here). 

(...Yikes, where am I living? as long as DH wants to stay and it's safe and good for the kids, I guess).


----------



## Bruce

So your neighbor would complain because she could no longer easily trespass on your property? No stock retaining/coyote excluding fence is going to slow a salamander even 1/2 second.


----------



## farmerjan

Me and the salamander hunting neighbor would have already "had it" .... I mean to maybe look in the back part of the property... but the front yard?  whenever she wanted?


----------



## rachels.haven

I was thinking about getting some geese before I got the dogs to help fix things up, but she apologized when I persuaded DH to express my feelings on the matter to her without me burning bridges with gasoline (DH can be my filter sometimes). I think she just wants her beloved wild animals to do whatever they want as much as the law allows, and to go where she wants to find them. 
It might keep big snapping turtles out, but that is for their own safety (and even then, it probably won't keep them out now that I think about it). BUT I don't want to get started on the turtle worship here and snappers. They're almost as beloved as salamanders and the majestic giant "healthy" coyote. But not bears. Everyone's afraid of bears (unless you feed accidently them, then you're a murderer of the "poor babies"). Not sure I really fit in here.


----------



## rachels.haven

This morning milking. A quart from Ava, over a quart from Summer, and a little under a quart from Saffron.


----------



## Pastor Dave

I am hoping when I get my mini or dwarf dairy does to be able to show similar pics one of these days


----------



## rachels.haven

I hope so too. Keep us posted?


----------



## rachels.haven

Actually, I've been the most happy with my standard goats. They're actually easier to handle and kinder on the fences. I'm down to one dwarf and her 3 doe offspring and my three bucks that I'm going to be sad to leave behind if I decide to stop NDing. I may keep the next breeding's offspring too, but anyone that doesn't milk like mom or isn't built at least as nice as mom goes. If you do go dwarf or mini, make sure the person breeding them pays attention to what you want. Otherwise you get pets that sort of make milk, but have blue eyes or are polled.


----------



## Baymule

You would fit in just fine in Texas. We would applaud you shooting the coyote. And you could build your fence! We also have plenty of wild hogs for your shooting pleasure. 

We have a purple paint to mark trees and posts with that means NO TRESPASSING. Saves a lot of money on signs and works even without fences. Maybe paint a purple line between you and salamander lady! LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, that's new to me. I wonder if the purple paint law is well known enough here to work. Someone sounded like they were in our woods shooting this morning. I should get the property marked and purple it in properly.


----------



## rachels.haven

And thank you! I'd probably like Texas. Maybe next move.


----------



## Mini Horses

rachels.haven said:


> If you do go dwarf or mini, make sure the person breeding them pays attention to what you want. Otherwise you get pets that sort of make milk, but have blue eyes or are polled.



I so agree.   Because they are smaller, many get them JUST for that and don't develop the milk production.   Personally, I like my full sized also.  I do have 3 mini Nubians that are nice girls. 2 will be FF this Spring, other 2nd time -- and I didn't milk her last yr.  Mine are Saanen and SaanenXNubian.  The milk is outstanding and plentiful.  I get an easy gal a day in 1 milking, after she had nursed twins for 4.5 months.   These gals easily give me 2 gal a day if I want to keep them at that.  It's more than I need but, for sales of a doe in milk, it's great.  OK, some don't want that much milk.  I never buy cheeses, yogurt, butter, cream, kefir, & make soaps...plus I feed the chickens, cats, share with friends,  etc.      I enjoy them...& drink about a qt a day.     Both types have their place in a family -- depends on needs/wants.


----------



## farmerjan

I would love to try some of the goat milk products you make, I am just so used to cow milk.  And honestly have had 2 not so great experiences with goat milk tasting "funny" and so now I am leery.  I would try some from someone who I "know" but refuse to buy and try any from a vendor at a farmers market.  Wish I was close to someone who liked to do the "making of the stuff", and I could do the " milking of the animals" and share some of the work.  There are negatives to being by yourself all the time. I am not a very good "marketeer" of products, and not even of the making of some of the stuff, I like being in the barn better.


----------



## Baymule

farmerjan said:


> I like being in the barn better.


I am sooooooo with you! My daughter told me that I would live in a barn as long as I got to go outside.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Hmm, that's new to me. I wonder if the purple paint law is well known enough here to work. Someone sounded like they were in our woods shooting this morning. I should get the property marked and purple it in properly.


If nothing else, get some wide yellow tape, like the crime scene kind and run it from tree to tree. Put up no trespassing signs.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> This morning milking. A quart from Ava, over a quart from Summer, and a little under a quart from Saffron.






rachels.haven said:


> Hmm, that's new to me. I wonder if the purple paint law is well known enough here to work. Someone sounded like they were in our woods shooting this morning. I should get the property marked and purple it in properly.


I've never heard of it. Here you have to post it with a new "form" every year since the year is on it. Every 400' and all corners. Frankly I'd put the signs a LOT closer. Really easy to walk 200' from a sign and never see it. For the 500' buffer safety zone the signs must be no more than 200' apart but posting it that way leaves the rest of the property open to the public.


----------



## Baymule

The purple paint might just be a Texas thing. A bucket of paint sure is cheaper than a bunch of no trespassing signs.


----------



## rachels.haven

...painting chalk outlines on ground in woods sounds like a fun idea too. I think I'll wait until after halloween though. I'd like to be taken seriously. Trace me some kids. But I may just stick to highly visible paint, maybe get the property marked officially while I'm at it. 

Oh, and @farmerjan , if the milk tastes funny whatever you do don't drink it. It will make you hate it. Goat milk should taste like just milk or half and half in the case of nigerians-unless they were fed something odd (nutrena textured feed or some weeds) or were drying up or producing colostrum...or I guess not handled properly or stored too long. Goat milk is fussy. But when it's good it's good.


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> The purple paint might just be a Texas thing. A bucket of paint sure is cheaper than a bunch of no trespassing signs.


That is for sure, plus we have to pay $5/year to officially post land. 

I have had goat milk from the health food store. It is from a dairy maybe 15 miles from me as the crow flies. I honestly couldn't tell the difference between it and cow's milk.
http://www.doesleap.com/index.htm


----------



## farmerjan

I think that the goats milk I had was "off flavored" from something they ate/were fed.  But it turned me "off" of goats milk.  I think I need to have some that I don't know is goats milk, good and cold and hopefully tasting just like cow milk. My jerseys have pretty high butterfat so am used to "creamy milk".


----------



## rachels.haven

It is possible you just don't like goat milk too. Jersey milk sounds wonderful. My youngest keeps telling me to get him a little cow because he wants cow milk, not goat milk and he doesn't like goat milk. He's 4 and he says there is _always_ a difference and so far we can't trick him (and no cow for 4 year olds, btw,plus we don't have grass). I'm willing to bet that some people really are able to tell the difference every time-super tasters or something along those lines.

This is going to sound funny, but after selling the two dwarfs even though I brought home a medium-large goat, I feel like our hay consumption has gone down sharply. We're not even completely emptying a hay bag per day anymore. How much did those little goats eat?


----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> That is for sure, plus we have to pay $5/year to officially post land.



PAY to post your OWN land?


----------



## farmerjan

@Baymule , I don't live in Mass, like @rachels.haven , but lived in Ct just below it and traveled through it to go to the property our family had in Vt as a kid.  Mass was one place you didn't want to stop in, and got through as quickly as possible and we are talking either interstate or back country roads.  The state had a reputation for being as unfriendly to "real country type" people as any around.  Most were ashamed to say it was a New England state.  NO JOKE.  Vermont was much more farmer friendly then, especially the more rural parts, NH and Maine were better.  Believe me, there are rules to follow the rules in Mass.

Now you all know one of the reasons for my move south.  Besides wanting more "growing season" weather, for farming. 

The saddest thing about Va now, is the influences from DC getting worse, and honestly, all the Yankees moving down and then wanting it to be just like where they came from in amenities;  and where they can spend their money made in the more affluent areas, and then tell the poorer locals what to do.  There are some really fighting to keep it an ag state because it is one of the biggest revenues here, but the sprawl, and the ones wanting these 20 acre mini-farms, that are really only tax write offs, are making it harder for us to farm it practically.  I am not against trying to improve the water, as an area that is in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, but some of the rules have bordered on ABSURD. 

My dad was in lake dredging in CT for over 40 years.  By the time he retired, there were more rules about wetlands than you can imagine.  If a place had water lay for a day after a "monsoon type rain" they were declaring it a wetlands.  I mean it was so far out in left field that you wouldn't believe it.  He spent as much time the last 10 years in meetings, applying for permits, sitting through meetings explaining the process, and then having to explain to all the DUMB, right out of school EXPERTS, Why it would not work what they wanted him to do.  This is someone that could take the bucket of the machine and grade the bank of a pond so that it could be just planted in grass..... He had a talent for what he did, and understood the land and the water possibilities and carrying capacity.
One thing that used to really frost his **** , was the ones that were trying to preserve areas that were more swamp than actual true wetlands.....then have them turn around and DECRY the mosquito problems and the diseases they carried.....Then want to go in and spray with chemicals to kill them.....which would kill the predators of the mosquitos....when in a true working wetland, the balance would keep alot of those populations in check.  You can't believe the "STUPID" that some of them would come up with.


----------



## farmerjan

And as a side note, those idiots were the ones making the rules from mostly an office and desk, and then would go out and buy "organic" because it was healthier.... and yet they were creating so much of the problems they were bytching about


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh dear, that sounds exactly what it's like here.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

I think we're going to have to name Avalon's fawn doeling something spicy. Today she threw a tantrum. I let them in to eat from mom after milking her and THERE WAS NO TEAT FOR HER...so she got mad. She SCREAMED and threw her head in the air with her little stinker nose all wrinkled up and looked down her face at everyone (nobody noticed). When that didn't work she screamed again and jumped into the air, headbutting nothing. She's the one Avalon doesn't favor, but I think she's spunky enough she's going to get enough. She's just like her naughty, spunky, tiny rhino of a mother.


----------



## Bruce

They sure look happy out there. 
Seems like that little one might be a sale girl rather than a keeper. Who needs a Drama Queen? And a loud one at that.


----------



## animalmom

Your pictures are delightful!  Fall is in the air.  Thanks for sharing.


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> PAY to post your OWN land?


I think that is only if you want it registered as being posted. Purple paint sure would be a much cheaper method than putting signs up all along the property line.


----------



## Baymule

I have a name for your spicy brat. Tobasco.


----------



## Baymule

Love the pictures, beautiful goats and beautiful scenery.


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, she's not so bad. She has a temper (but don't we all?). Plus, when any of the doelings can't get what they want or need they come to people and ask you for it. They've trained us. The other day the does were eating maple leaves and all the low leaves had been eaten so somehow I wound up lifting doelings into the tree so they could pick a leaf and then setting them back down so they could eat it while I lifted the other one. How can you say no to lined up doelings hopefully waiting for their turns? They're kind of brats because of us...and possibly Saffron who dotes on them and does everything but nurse them. 

There, I blame Saffron. Clearly it's all her fault, lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

Avalon has an aunt named Cayenne. That might fit. Not super feminine though, and right now those little petite things look feminine.


----------



## Baymule

My sheep are spoiled brats too. They speak, I get them what they want. Or I brush them, the ones that want to be brushed. I pull branches down so they can reach the leaves, shake the wild persimmon trees and have even picked up acorns for them. Aren't we happy goat/sheep servants? LOL


----------



## Pastor Dave

Your little guy in the green shirt looks a lot like my youngest from the back. Abt same size and hair color.


----------



## Pastor Dave




----------



## rachels.haven

Happy kids. I think they do sort of look similar. Gotta love dirty blond.


----------



## rachels.haven

Did actual paperwork myself today. Need to print it out somewhere because printer died and submit it with the fee so they can print it in the paper. Probably going to give it back and tell me it isn't enough paperwork, make me do more and send them more cash. Yay. Preparing my mind for that. Upon checking we only have about 120 ft of actual state designated "wetland" to put posts and wire through, and if they went and reviewed their classifications they probably wouldn't consider it a wetland (that, or they'd go out and seize everybody's yards and property in the name of "wetlands" they want to own). We checked other people's wetlands via satellite and it only includes their actual ponds, unlike on our property where it includes all the occasionally wet ground by the driveway where the driveway drains into when it rains. And we have no actual pond according to the official map. Fencing it would probably lead the salamander neighbor to take us to court though.


----------



## Bruce

The salamanders can get through the fence. You might even be doing them a favor, they can escape predators. Tell the neighbor. Good luck with the paperwork. The maps can be wrong, they have our house listed as being in a wetland. Um, no it has been here at least 160 years, unlikely they built it in a wetland. We DO have a natural wetland north of the pond about 150' though.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, you sure you're not under water there, @Bruce ? Do your slippers go *squish* when you step into them and out of bed in the morning?


----------



## Baymule

No pond on our place, sure would like one. Good luck on your paperwork, I hope it is accepted and you can get the permit for the fence. Your salamander lady sounds like a nice person, but a sandwich shy of a full picnic.


----------



## rachels.haven

Probably correct, but she gets by. This place has a protected temporary pond. If you someday wind up with a pond, I recommend making sure the pond stays all year round. Semi-dry ponds are yucky.


----------



## rachels.haven

So bears attack dogs? I was milking (yep, I milked late, darn kids), Bailey went and hid (and I didn't pay attention but she sure was) and I got to hear a bear roaring and a dog flipping out like his life depended on it and going back and forth. Wonder if the dog will make it. Retired and now alpaca-less neighbor tends to be high a lot, so their dog probably won't get much help.
And for some reason I didn't think black bears actually roared. Well, that sure teaches me.


----------



## Baymule

THAT had to be creepy to listen to! Poor dog.


----------



## farmerjan

Black bears are not normally aggressive, but if it is "having a bad hair day" so to speak, they can go off.  The bear might have a cub ( they stay with them normally for at least a year) and the bear might have seen the dog as a threat.  The bear could have an injury, the dog could have disturbed it while it was foraging, the dog may have just gone after it and then realized too late that this thing was bigger than he was..... 
There are a couple of bears here that we have seen, and one is big, 350 lbs by several estimates by several who have seen it.  Another that we think might be it's cub from 2 years ago when we saw a sow with a cub a few times around the area. They have been seen right up against several people's houses at bird feeders.  Tried to get in one friends smaller cabin on the property where she has her broom making machine and keeps her cat and bird food.... in metal cans. 
Don't know all the laws on them, but one farmer gets kill permits every year because these bears will tear into the silage piles they have in the concrete bunks covered in plastic so it ferments.  They are a PITA in many areas, can wipe out a half acre of corn and pile it in a big messy heap....


----------



## rachels.haven

I hope it's just a sow with cubs. There's a private school that's been having bear issues with them coming up to windows and trying to come in two miles away(and they had to put the kids on lockdown until it left) and one of my neighbors a few days later put up overnight security footage of a bear tearing up their kids' yard toys then coming up on their patio and trying to come in. Based on the reactions to these posts, I still think someone is feeding the "cute bears" and "sweet innocent babies" (none of the bears in either set of footage were immature). I'm allowed to shoot a bear as a farmer the same as I'm allowed to shoot a coyote, but I'd rather not. Plus, you're supposed to report and get a tag for what you shot and I'm SURE they will charge you the big bucks for the animal you didn't want to have any interaction with in the first place. Because our property is so stony and hard to dig holes on I'd pay if they disposed of whatever was shot in defence of my family and stock, but not out of the goodness of my heart as a donation for the help they never provided.  I doubt they'd dispose of anything for you. (Plus, I'm fairly sure shooting a bear requires bigger guns than I'd be comfortable learning and carrying around.)

I don't hear the dog yet this morning, but if he was in a pen and not tied out that night he may have made it (I hope). I'm not going to worry too much about that. It's the neighbor's dog. At least until they sold off their alpacas they seemed to be taking good care of things. They may also know more than little old me. If not, it's on them.

Btw, we've decided to find someone who can fence JUST the house and barn portion asap if possible, which should not require town paperwork. I may consider adding a little electric on one side at the top for bears so they don't damage it since they're so friendly here, but electric around kids, especially my kids who are very, very clever but not always very bright, sounds like a bad idea.


----------



## Baymule

Your kids will brighten up REAL FAST if they grab hold of a hot wire. A one time grab the hot wire versus a bear on the porch trying to get in sounds like a darn good idea to me. Tell the kids what it is, what it will do and if they grab it, laugh at them. I bet they won't do it again.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Lol, you sure you're not under water there, @Bruce ? Do your slippers go *squish* when you step into them and out of bed in the morning?


Quite sure and the only water we get in the basement is from rain. Need some work done on the foundation. The man made pond behind the barn is occasionally spring fed, the area just south of it is sometimes wet. Doesn't help that there is a ton of ledge and clay here, water doesn't perk through rock and clay.



rachels.haven said:


> Probably correct, but she gets by. This place has a protected temporary pond. If you someday wind up with a pond, I recommend making sure the pond stays all year round. Semi-dry ponds are yucky.


Yep, then there are vernal pools. SOMETIMES they dry up in the summer and sometimes they don't but they are important for certain amphibians. There are a couple out in the woods here. There is a property line marker right in the middle of one where the line takes a turn.



rachels.haven said:


> but electric around kids, especially my kids who are very, very clever but not always very bright, sounds like a bad idea.


Bay covered it. IF they are dumb enough to not trust you when you tell them it will HURT A LOT, it won't kill them but it will ensure they never do it on purpose again. It isn't a light socket tingle.

There was a report last week of a black bear in the Hundred Acre Woods. Town property about a mile north of here. I'm not putting out any bird seed!!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

My brother opened his door last week (NH) ...and a very large bear was standing on the deck facing him......be careful !


----------



## rachels.haven

I don't think the dog made it. Something non-coyote was yelping and screaming early this morning in the woods today. It stopped before I could consider going to investigate (I shouldn't have though, I had a kid in tow). We also haven't heard a peep from the direction of the neighbor's yard. Rough. 
Got in contact with a fencing guy from Townsend. He wants to come out Wednesday and we can go over phase 1 of fencing and see if we can get it in asap.


----------



## Baymule

I hope you get the fence up pronto!


----------



## Bruce

Do you have your gun yet?? I don't think I'd go out investigating with protection.


----------



## Bruce

B&B Happy goats said:


> My brother opened his door last week (NH) ...and a very large bear was standing on the deck facing him......be careful !


Did it say Trick or Treat?? You play him a trick or you'll be the treat.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Bruce said:


> Did it say Trick or Treat?? You play him a trick or you'll be the treat.


Scared the crap out of him and his wife...they are building a 8' stockade fence around their deck and putting up a locking gate...that was way to close for comfot for them...


----------



## Bruce

I hope by "Stockade" you mean like the old wooden forts. A bear can take down a normal "modern day"  stockade fence with one paw behind its back.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Bruce said:


> I hope by "Stockade" you mean like the old wooden forts. A bear can take down a normal "modern day"  stockade fence with one paw behind its back.



Of course, .....they are die hard Yankees  !!! 
Knowing my brother he will at least use 2"thick by 6" wide boards


----------



## Bruce

And 8x8 posts!


----------



## CntryBoy777

Getting some fence up will be Wonderful for ya and the animals.....bears are very unpredictable and ya can't outrun them....and they climb real well....so, I would certainly keep distance between me and them....a 410 pump with 0 buckshot, or slug will bring it down....or a larger cal pistol....just doesn't have the range, but if it is charging ya better have something to set it on its rear, or ya are risking enduring  the aftermath....


----------



## B&B Happy goats

CntryBoy777 said:


> Getting some fence up will be Wonderful for ya and the animals.....bears are very unpredictable and ya can't outrun them....and they climb real well....so, I would certainly keep distance between me and them....a 410 pump with 0 buckshot, or slug will bring it down....or a larger cal pistol....just doesn't have the range, but if it is charging ya better have something to set it on its rear, or ya are risking enduring  the aftermath....



They are almost in the White Mountians, bears are common for them...just not at the front door when opening it


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Yepper, @CntryBoy777  is right, getting some fence up will help you some with the bears...at least it may give you some time to get your gun loaded and give him a shot in the butt as a warning


----------



## Bruce

And maybe a detour if it is just ambling along following its nose.


----------



## rachels.haven

On a lighter note, last night was busy, but Saffron's papers got back, and last night I loaded her in the van and got her bred. I dropped the rear mini van seats, got a piece of polywall and cut it to fit, then lined the front and back of it with towels and put tarps in the middle for traction, and attached a light leash to the back of the middle van seats at the right length so no jumping over or turning around could occur, but plenty of sitting and standing up.
...and then I had to lift a large horny goat that wanted nothing more than to go back stand by the buck pen and start fights into the car instead. When I originally got her she weight taped in at 140...now she's taller and wider and some would say fat, so I'm a little afraid to measure again. It certainly made loading by my self interesting. BUT I WON, and she got to watch cars passing and TV on the van TV the whole way (a little over an hour).

Then she had a very respectful 15 minute date with Rustic Wood's Black Tie Affair, who she was much larger than, but happy to accommodate. After getting my children out of the trees where they'd flown off to with the resident children, home we went (they were looking for flying ants, and it was VERY important). Next season, we get our own buck or two I think. I've got a reservation for one from the lady who owns the buck who bred her this round, and I'd like to also get one at some point from the Longvu Lamancha family if they have one that would fit my requirements, but I'm willing to wait for both of those. I'd rather not do studding, even if all parties involved are disease tested. It's a bit of a hassle to drop everything and drive your doe to her beau's place on both ends.

Of course that's all assuming we don't all get eaten by bears, I guess, lol. That felt really bizarre and surreal. I've lived in a couple of rural places, but never had issues like this with wildlife. DH says it's because I was in farming areas where problem wildlife was shot on sight and here nobody does, which I don't see as sustainable here. This is not really a farming area. Somebody's going to get bit or mauled. They've already had to euthanize a bear in Fitchburg this year (my town's response:"POOR BABY, YOU BAD HUMANS, YOU SHOULDN'T EXIST", kind of sentiments) and every few years we have recorded coyote attacks on people. I guess we're staying though. I get the feeling I'm going to have to up the moxi and kill a bunch of stuff to make up for disconnected people and I'll probably take heat for that at some point on the community level. No silencers allowed, after all (and a bunch of super restrictive rules, some outright banning things that could bring my activities under the radar).


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> It's a bit of a hassle to drop everything and drive your doe to her beau's place on both ends.


That's why you want to have people come to YOU for the stud service your future boys will provide


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, that's an idea I hadn't considered yet. They might be able to pay for more hay that way. Something to think about. Thanks!


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, maybe not. Diseases.


----------



## rachels.haven

Badger doesn't appear to be able to be in with cycling does. He's, um, over attentive. I don't need any litters of Doats born. I guess he'll stay in with the bucks until he's castrated. He got 12 week shots today.

The fence guy came out today. Waiting on the rough estimate. I need to get the property lines and electric lines marked before we get the official estimate and deposit and schedule.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

DOATS...the perfect  pet 

 So happy the fence project is becoming  a reality for you


----------



## Baymule

Doats.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bailey, out standing in her field.


 

Dan, my four year old, caught him his first mouse today. Unfortunately it was inside, so I taught him how to make friends with it and let it go, emphasis on the last part. He thought it was a baby porcupine.


----------



## Bruce

I'm glad it WASN'T a porcupine!



Baymule said:


> Doats.


Would it be self guarding and produce milk too??


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Congratulations on progress on the fence project.

OK, my Texas Aggie I/Q is getting in the way: what the heck is "Doats"?    Based on Mr. Bruce's comment I guess it is a cross between a dog and a goat, but I thought Badger was a young buck?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep! Badger the dog + goat.


----------



## Mike CHS

You have some nice leaf colors going on there. Ours just turn brown and fall.


----------



## Baymule

We had some nice color last year, but this year we had summer clear up to October--and it was 80 degrees today. Poor trees don't know it is Fall.....


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks, I love the leaves here! Also the temp in the fall is perfect. Everyone's enjoying fall.

Yikes, still waiting on that estimate. I guess I'll get in touch myself and ask about it, but it looks like I may be getting flaked again, just like the last guy we had come out. Maybe I need to get serious about doing it myself.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Thanks, I love the leaves here! Also the temp in the fall is perfect. Everyone's enjoying fall.
> 
> Yikes, still waiting on that estimate. I guess I'll get in touch myself and ask about it, but it looks like I may be getting flaked again, just like the last guy we had come out. Maybe I need to get serious about doing it myself.



Be a PITA...call and get as many quotes as you can, someone's  bound to give you a good price and get the job done right


----------



## rachels.haven

5 batches of soap (and a text to the fence guy, which he replied to) I have burned out my stick blender and am out of lye and vanilla fragrance oil. Darn, I wanted to finish the apple and peppermint too before needing to replace equipment. Aw well, I guess it's time to clean up for the season.


----------



## Bruce

Soap might be a bit thick for a stick blender??


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

What is a stick blender?  What comes to my mind is a blender that blends sticks, but that probably isn't right. 

Also, any more news on the fence estimate?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Technical term is immersion blender. The soap may be too thick, but it stays thinner than a smoothie, so I'm not so sure. I did buy the cheapest one on Amazon. That's not always the best route.


----------



## Baymule

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Miss @rachels.haven,
> 
> What is a stick blender?  What comes to my mind is a blender that blends sticks, but that probably isn't right.
> 
> Also, any more news on the fence estimate?
> 
> Senile Texas Aggie


 Your very literal mind sure comes up with some very literal descriptions.  Don't ever change.  We love you just the way you are. A blender that blends sticks.....and THAT is how toothpicks are made!   and I am a smart a$$, just can't help myself, sure glad you still like me


----------



## rachels.haven

Moon Mist LOG Purple Summer went into heat today. She picked a favorite buck. Back to the barn pen she goes. Sorry, not sure mini lamanchas sell well here. A cross with Rosasharn MM Mili's Buckeye cross would be fabulous if they would find homes well though.  Very, very high quality, and milky. She really wants that disgusting, not too bright hunk too. Apparently she likes the pushy ones. I'd like her to put on more fat before she starts throwing her resources at kids as well. She's put on weight, but not enough for me to feel comfortable breeding her, IMO.


----------



## rachels.haven

Anyone have any good articles/know anything about putting up electric fence? I'm looking into electrifying the back part of our lot away from the yard after putting in the yard fence, a 96' ish square cattle panel buck pen in the back yard behind the chicken coop and making the front/side yard doe pen bigger next year (all this should keep the kids away from it, right?). You know, like permanent electric fence 101 with the context that it will be for goats and not horses or cows. It would be very interesting if I can do it myself without not having to drag cattle panels or heavy rolls of fencing through barberry patches and bittersweet curtains.


----------



## rachels.haven

I've found this.




__





						Buliding Electric Fence | Electric Fence Setup - Zareba
					

There are many factors to consider and steps to take when planning your electric fence system. Let us help you with our checklist, suggestions and tips.




					www.zarebasystems.com


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Anyone have any good articles/know anything about putting up electric fence? I'm looking into electrifying the back part of our lot away from the yard after putting in the yard fence, a 96' ish square cattle panel buck pen in the back yard behind the chicken coop and making the front/side yard doe pen bigger next year (all this should keep the kids away from it, right?). You know, like permanent electric fence 101 with the context that it will be for goats and not horses or cows. It would be very interesting if I can do it myself without not having to drag cattle panels or heavy rolls of fencing through barberry patches and bittersweet curtains.



We got a solar 10 mile charger from TS, pretty simple to put up..just get your grounding rods in the ground correctly and before the ground freezes up there. You can do this job Rachel !


----------



## Mike CHS

Premier1 has some good information sheets and there is a ton of info on youtube.  If you have a TSC near you they carry a free DVD put out by one of the charger makers.


----------



## Bruce

Electric is pretty easy, though you still need to brace the corners. If you have gates, make your life easier by running wire in conduit underground. That way even if you run a wire across the gate that you have to unhook to open the gate, the rest of the line is still hot.


----------



## rachels.haven

What gauge wire did you use @B&B Happy goats ? Or did you use one of the rope types? 
This might still be a next year project, but I need to start my research binge on it and collect as much info as possible between now and when I chose to start. You'd be surprised at what you learn if you study something for a month or two in as many places as possible.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> What gauge wire did you use @B&B Happy goats ? Or did you use one of the rope types?
> This might still be a next year project, but I need to start my research binge on it and collect as much info as possible between now and when I chose to start. You'd be surprised at what you learn if you study something for a month or two in as many places as possible.



I belive it was 14 guage wire, we also used three copper clad ground rods 8'each ,4'in the ground... we had the t posts already up and bought the plastic wire insulators  / holders for the wire....so easy to do that part. And our solar charger is awesome !


----------



## rachels.haven

@Bruce ,(or anyone) do you have any experience with these?


			https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/wedge-loc-corner-in-line-brace?cm_vc=-10005
		

Any chance they'd hold t posts pounded deep bearing non-high tensile electric wire that shouldn't be leaned on without delivering a surprise?


----------



## Bruce

Yes and I found them to be less than good. @Mike CHS has had better luck though. The brackets are soft aluminum, they bend, angle brace T post falls out. I had to wire my angle braces to the corner post. Fortunately only 1 corner where prior owners buried a lot of stone. Heck of a time getting the T posts in, wood posts would have been impossible. With that experience if I had my current "heavy equipment" back then I'd have dug out the rocks and put in a braced wood corner post.  I got my WedgeLocs when TSC was clearing out stock since they weren't going to be carrying them any more, interesting that they are again.


----------



## farmerjan

I know a dairy farmer that uses them and likes them, but another that said they aren't worth spit.....Somewhere I have seen a t-post corner brace system that wasn't the "aluminum" lighter ones but dang if I can remember where.  But yeah, go to TSC and see if they have the free  dvd to watch.  Also try going on the internet and maybe You Tube.?  There is Premier and Kencove companies,  that really are big in electric fencing, alot of the electric netting stuff.   Maybe I saw the t-post corner braces in one of them.  I will look at our local co-op when I am in there.  Usually you can put up t-posts well into the winter until the ground freezes real deep.  A few inches on top won't be too big a deal to pound through.  Just getting them started.


----------



## rachels.haven

Woah, BYH overhaul. Looks like the thing that killed BYC for several months. Not sure it really recovered. We may be fine though. BYH is more balanced and fun.

Fence guy got back to me. He came over this morning for the final plans and stuff and all our kids played with goats. Fencing will start next week on Wednesday or Thursday and take 8 days. We will be $5,000 poorer, but my dogs and kids will have an acre and a quarter fenced in, and apparently that's a very good price for the area. Dh's coworker is also putting up fencing and they talked number (the coworker's numbers are terrible).

So I'll have a fence and gates up when DH drags me to PA for Thanksgiving so the dogs can keep the beasts and animal caretakers safe.

I may or may not have also been advised to _not_ get permits for the rest of the property based on the city I live in and if necessary ask forgiveness and pay fees and not ask permission. Maybe. And to only call it temporary fencing for livestock.


Well, I think I need to go get some more hay today. Rustic Wood's Black Tie Affair (Buggy) is joining our farm. He's the buck that bred Saffron and I was impressed with his temperament, conformation, handleability, and size. His owner needs to move him on because how many does are related to him in her herd now. I also went and took a second look at that lamancha doeling I saw earlier and decided to take a chance on her. I spoke with another lamancha breeder and they thought her rump angle would correct as she grew more and her rump angle has indeed corrected quite a bit between visits. She's not going to grow very big over the winter or eat very much though. She's only 5 months old and still a size I can carry around. I guess lamanchas are slower growers. Nigerians at 5 months are more of a hand full.
Buggy is also being sold with a second doeling that the owner can't afford to keep and grow up with her price of alfalfa going up and she'll be coming up from Maryland with her around Christmas time. Buggy is up in New Hampshire breeding a friend of the owner's does and coming down on Sunday.

I think my lamancha herd may be done then. I would only consider a second, milky background buck if I am allowed to sell some nigerians, or if one becomes available out of a specific breeding or two in the spring I've got my eye on, but I'm in no hurry (and the two breedings will probably be all does, cause luck and all, lol). Mr. Buggy will have plenty of nigerian buck friends. Hope nobody minds that I only feed alfalfa as pellets. There's no baled alfalfa grown here that I know if. You have to pay $40/100 lbs + delivery for the shipped in stuff from out west.

So by Christmas we should be up to 4 lamancha does (2 of breeding size, 2 will be growouts IMO), 1 lamancha buck, maybe another buckling in the spring. We've got 3 nigerian bucks, and 4 nigerian does (Ava and her 3 babies). Lots a goats for our woods, I guess. Then we've got Bailey and Badger the stock and kid dogs, and the chickens (and fish and guinea pigs who are housepets).

I guess if I don't get hay today or next week I can just play it by ear and get the more expensive hay mid winter. It's not like it will just all go away, thank goodness. The horse people in the area would have serious issues if it did.

Fence, fence, fence.

Oh, and fence guy is also happy to take some of our problem trees with him because that's his home's heat source and he's got to keep his 3 little kids warm. Otherwise we'd have to pull a permit and wait for burn season and burn them ourselves...somewhere, and we lack a cleared area that we wouldn't mind destroying the already weak grass on.

This was a good week over all.


----------



## rachels.haven

PS: Beginning to realize we're probably just going to do both breeds of goats.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Not a darn thing wrong with that


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I am so glad you are finally getting your fence done!  Did the fencing guy actually suggest asking forgiveness instead of permission, or did he simply not say no when you suggested it?  Either way, I know this has got to be a relief for you.  Now you will have much better protection from the Wile E. Coyote that has been threatening your livestock and possibly your family! 

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Baymule

That’s great on getting a fence up and the non/maybe advice that you didn’t hear about no permit-ask forgiveness for the sorta kinda halfway temporary fence masquerading as a structure that obviously space aliens brought from another universe since you have no idea where it came from.


----------



## rachels.haven

YES. SPACE ALIENS.

The forgiveness route may or may not have been brought up specifically to answer your question, STA.


----------



## farmerjan

I remember suggesting "temporary fencing" ,  and am glad that it was something that the wind carried in like the sound of a train is more pronounced on the cloudy days when the "ceiling" is lower..... someone must've been talking about it somewhere else in the general NE states area.   SSS is still the quietest route to go for most anything....except for the removal of the eagle that was plaguing my free range layers several years back.   Granted your DH might balk at it being as upright as you say he is.....AAHHH   just do it.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> And to only call it temporary fencing for livestock.


All fencing is temporary!!!! Shorter or longer depending on how well it is done.
Seems a fair price to me given the cost of materials. I am ASSUMING it is woven wire of some sort?


----------



## rachels.haven

@Bruce Yes, woven wire field fencing, 47 inches for the dogs and kids.

and yes, @farmerjan  you did suggest temporary fencing, and bruce may have as well but I thought you meant short term temporary, not long term _temporary_. Apparently I was being a bit blonde at the time. Net fencing is in vogue in the goat world right now and that's not my cup of tea, nor do I think it would make sense in this application if using it was even possible, so i let the whole idea short out.

DH and I are still talking in short spurts between his constant working about what he'd be comfortable with me doing with our property across the swamp that comes off the driveway without permission. I may not say much more about that here. He's either working or asleep lately (and working nights and weekends for Mr. Pinhead director and Spineless, probably pinheaded boss) but we're getting by.   But that's not farm related. It's just annoying and makes things kind of bleak and tricky to communicate through.

Just got back late from grocery shopping, time to go milk.


----------



## Baymule

With a work schedule like that, don't bother the poor man with the details. Just tell him after it's done. LOL LOL


----------



## Bruce

If one wanted a pretty permanent but easy to call temporary (if the fence police come by) fence, @farmerjan's T-post and cattle panel fence is it. The posts don't take much time to put in and can be pulled in a few seconds with a post puller.  But that fence has limitations on predator protection, especially if your predators are fox, possum or coon.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, DH says cattle panels are temporary by him and that may or may not be the plan 

I mean, I can move them around. I may still try to go through the nonsense of applying for permanent fencing, but there may be nonsense ahead.


----------



## farmerjan

The cattle panels and t-posts are a good temp fence solution.  If you ever move, they can be taken down and moved and a new pen set up easily at a new place.  And steel isn't getting any cheaper, so are a pretty good investment to be able to take. I don't see any more predators through them than woven wire, like possums, fox and, coons....  holes are about the same a couple strands up on the "field fence"  and most will try to go under and they will go under anything they find a slight depression in the ground.  Unless you use something like the no climb horse type fence that is very closely spaced;  and expensive.....
I think that @Baymule  used them as she was trying to decide where - how  she wanted some fences and they are much more sturdy that just field fence to use to patch a hole or something just because of their rigidity.


----------



## Bruce

A fox can get through a 6" opening and drag a full grown White Rock through as well. And it can EASILY go through a cattle panel. Know that from personal experience as well. If a fox can get through something, a coon or possum can do so even easier. Sheep and goat is 4" and while the latter 2 can get through that, I do not believe a fox can.


----------



## rachels.haven

Fox and possum can't get through the dogs though, although the dogs would love it if they tried. My chickens will probably need to stay in their covered pen unless the hawk moves on. That sucker was just killing and killing and killing and hanging chickens around the property in trees everywhere, and THAT made me mad and he's still here and would love an opportunity to go back to killing and wasting my chickens.


----------



## Baymule

I have 4 of the 2"x4" horse panels, they are HEAVY and hard to deal with by oneself. I have lots of the cow panels and drag them all over the place. If I were to start over, I think I would go with the sheep and goat panels. I do lots of temporary fencing, lots, pens and whatever. 

As far as the hawk goes, sounds like he struck a Bonanza until you shut it down and your chickens are going to have to deal with lockdown. Our female GP, Paris, hates predatory birds, leaps in the air, teeth snapping and them. She also hates snakes, kills every one that she can. So Mr. Hawk hung your chickens up in trees like a personal pantry? That was adding insult to injury.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today something odd happened to Badger. I let him and Bailey out. With the neighbor dog gone Bailey no longer runs out of the yard to go conduct her shenanigans. Badger followed her and I went back into the barn to organize something or whatever it is I do when I'm not looking. I'm pretty sure she outran him as he did his usual "I'm going to pull your tail off" trick that he does when they go out to be a pill (he likes being "beat up" by her I guess), so she was running laps, he was in the side yard, probably watching. When I called him for treats he came, then she came for her treat a bit later, but instead of trying to get her treat and needing to be corrected as usual he started acting like one side of his body wouldn't move and he dragged himself over and couldn't stand up. I had him drag himself over to the barn so I could watch him. He wasn't acting in pain, just like it was really, really hard. He'd been running a few minutes ago, so I wasn't terribly worried so I put them both up in the doe pen instead of putting him in with the randy bucks (new buck included) and watched for a few minutes and it looked like he was still a little shakey in the back end, like one of his rear legs didn't want to work, but his front legs were working again. He wasn't faking, but over about ten minutes he went back to normal.

I wonder if he pulled a muscle. That sure was weird.

No chance of trauma with a vehicle, btw.


----------



## Baymule

A pinched nerve maybe?


----------



## rachels.haven

Hope so! He's a good goofy, fluffy guy.


----------



## rachels.haven

These aren't aluminum. Curious.








						LockJawz Corner Brace Kit
					

All New T-Post Corner Bracing system by LockJawz. No tools required and it fits all standard t-posts (1.25-1.33 lb)




					www.lockjawz.com


----------



## Bruce

That looks like it would work better than the ones I got since the posts don't have to be so carefully lined up. I think one reason I had a problem is because mine aren't (hard to put T posts in rocks) and the aluminum fittings twist. Not sure with this one just how you get the 1st posts from the corner PERFECTLY lined up distance wise though.

Tractor Time With Tim showed the LockJaws post insulators. Again they can be installed in any orientation on the post so if the post isn't dead on straight it doesn't matter.


----------



## Baymule

I bought the lockjawzs electric fence insulators. They fit a T-post, no matter what side it is on. I like them. That corner brace kits looks _TEMPORARY _to me!


----------



## rachels.haven

Ah. Well, it was just a thought.
My neighbor up the hill is going to split the cost of a uhaul rental with me and she's getting some corral panels for her horses and I'm going bring in more cattle panels to try to put up a big buck pen complete with buck hut behind the yard fence before the ground freezes. Yard fence got postponed until Friday. I'd like to start when they are finished, but I may start pounding before then.

Spoke with a different neighbor today-not the dog one. They warned me about rabies in the area (yay, adding that fun story to the one with the up the hill neighbor who got lyme). They've gotten treated due to a rabid bat incident. Price was more painful than the shots they said. Told me that our area was supposed to be where the high school was going to be built, but the salamander protectors/conservation commission put a stop to that. Our lands all used to be a farmhouse, which they bought run down and are slowly fixing, orchards, and farmland. Now the apple trees are ancient and dying and properties overgrown and wasted. They love the goat noise. I don't think they can hear the roosters or dogs. Said where my fence line plan looked good to them, but warned me that the random rock piles are bigger than they look, so it would pay to avoid them. The corner of my property near them used to be an ancient card road, and if you look you can still see the wagon ruts. They also said they'd take any rocks I cared to move over the property line to their yard. Also said our pond is shrinking and drying up more every year. Maybe the salamander police will ease up if the pond goes. The neighbors seem nice. It was nice to meet them.

This evening the coyotes were rallying. It sounded like children shrieking, and tunelessly singing, and screaming from everywhere in the woods. Really eerie. My kids were kept inside. All the goats were unusually quiet and hiding and Bailey was on guard. I left all the outside barn and side garage lights on so the whole world around the barn is lit up. So far all is well. I'm listening.


----------



## Baymule

I am glad that you met more neighbors and that they are not looney, but are nice people. Too bad you didn't know about the salamander conservation pond before you bought the property. Oh well, you can proceed with your "temporary" fence, at least the salamanders can go through the holes in the cow panels. 

Hope the coyotes stay away, hope the dogs keep them warned away. We are now dealing with a cougar in our neighborhood. It killed 5 goats a mile from us earlier this week. That lady used donkeys for pasture guards, just another reason to have DOGS and not donkeys. I know what the donkeys did, they ran in terror and were glad to outrun the durned goats, the cougar could have the goats! A neighbor whose place backs up to ours heard a cougar scream last night, right at dark, that's too close!


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh no, @Baymule ! That's terrible-poor goat neighbor!  I bet you're glad you've got your dogs.


----------



## rachels.haven

Planted paw paws, persimmons, and a mulberry today. Let the dogs run the yard like crazies until they started "helping" too much. Need some apples, I think, and a garden area.

Also discovered where they hid the links to my watched threads after the switch.


----------



## Baymule

We have Wild American Persimmons, a couple of mulberry trees that I guess birds planted. I have some Paw Paw seeds, I should plant them and see if they grow.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Ah. Well, it was just a thought.


Perhaps Bay bolded that one word not to suggest that it would be temporary due to quality but could easily be seen as temporary to a fence checker.



rachels.haven said:


> Price was more painful than the shots they said.


That is probably good as my understanding is that in the past that series of shots was horribly painful. Of course the alternative is a permanent home 6' under.



rachels.haven said:


> The corner of my property near them used to be an ancient card road, and if you look you can still see the wagon ruts.


That is pretty cool!


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, I'm potato level some days. Thanks Bruce.
Had a moment of clarity and realized we only need to get permission to do about 300 feet (and possibly 100 feet of buffer on each side courtesy of the town) of it. The rest they can have no say in supposedly.

Also found a rat in the barn. All the mice vanished. Time for the shock and snap traps. It is an open air building. I don't think he has much food besides hay, but shelter and coyote protection are probably enough to invite him.

And realized why we went from 8-10 eggs to 1 or 2, covered in egg. My hens have all gone egg eater. Set an egg on the floor and they all have a frenzy. Maybe I'll be testing free range inside our fence with them, testing out the dogs with them, and Mr. Silkie rooster and his girls-coming on the 12th-will be the only chickens we have. Luckily we don't eat many eggs (but a little sad because I like the blue ones, and they did become blue!).

I'm drying off Saffron. Her milk supply is plummeting. Looks like she took.

Anyway, got to get the kid ready for school.


----------



## Baymule

I hate egg eaters! A permanent coop is on my radar...….. when I get it built, a roll out nest box is going in it.









						New rollout nest design Picture heavy-edited 1/21
					

Many of you have gotten my plans for a 2 unit rollout nest box and I have talked with several others about how to modify the plan to make it even larger.  I have been using a box that has 6 nests and for the past year it has worked beautifully.  Recently I have noticed several birds trying to...




					www.backyardchickens.com
				




Yes, I did mean that the Lockjawz fence corner pieces were for your fly under the radar, flaunt the rules, temporary fence, not that the corner itself was temporary. LOL

Rats. I hate them. We have rat snakes that do a pretty good job on the rats and mice, until the dimwits go after the eggs. Oh well, when I build my permanent coop, it will be as snake proof as I can get it and wire skirted (laid flat on the ground) all the way around the coop and run.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep, potato level me. Oh that's funny. I should have realized that.

I considered roll out nest boxes, but several reviews of premade ones suggest the hens just learned to catch their eggs or stick their heads in the box. Mine would be that type. They are bored and active breeds. Chickens aren't meant to be in an aviary setup. I may try rollouts anyway next time I have $50 or enough time to build in the budget. Meanwhile I'm trying golf balls. But there were hens this morning with eggs half way out as they headed to the coop door this morning and I caught those eggs, so we got some today. I just have to work for them, I guess, lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

Gate posts are in. Fence guys decided to call it a day after that to let them set. It's also very windy and cold and almost looks like rain (although that's not what the forecast says).

Edited to add: And now the snow is flying.


----------



## Bruce

Sorry you have egg eaters, I guess I've been lucky. Even if an egg gets broken in the nest box they don't go for it. But they sure do if I throw it in the run. You likely need to make sure the dogs can't get to the eggs either since I gather they are often fond of fresh eggs.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks, I will. The dogs do like them, but Bailey gets the squirts if she gets too much protein for some reason, so I will work doubly hard to prevent egg eating from the dogs.


----------



## Baymule

How dare they! Cannibals! 
People are shocked to find out that chickens eat eggs. LOL Better not ever have a heart attack in a chicken coop.


----------



## rachels.haven

They _are_ little dinosaurs after all and egg eating isn't the worst of what they can do of course. It's just annoying to go from 8-10 clean ones to 1-2 dirty, sticky, only semi-usable ones per day unless I catch them out of the hens rears...because that's not going to happen very often.

Aw well, that's how the wind blows. Maybe free ranging will help (assuming they make it).


----------



## rachels.haven

Pulled hairs on the bucks. Ready to DNA them. Also bolused Mr. Buggy, the lamancha buck. He's supposed to be black but has gone all rusty around the snoot. And pedicured his back feet. His feet are nice. Front feet later.

I need to shower, mulch the newly planted asian persimmons, and go to tsc for alfalfa pellets.


----------



## Baymule

TSC, my favorite store!


----------



## rachels.haven

Just about half the t posts are in today. I started work on Mr. Baby Teddy's (or whatever his name was) hardware cloth box coop run. It's about to get really cold for the next few days, so I guess I'd better leave something half finished. Rediscovered that counting pieces of lumber in a plan in my head is hard. Need another trip to HD.

I'm pretty sure my egg eater is one of my two identical leghorns (I do only ever get one white egg per day). I was replacing roosts today and one of them came in trailed by a way too attentive EE, knocked over the very heavy nest box that I weighed down with a big rock inside, attacked all the golf balls for a good ten minutes scratching, pecking, and making a huge ruckus while I went and came for supplies and put up the roosts, then checked out all the other nest boxes and left. We got 9 clean eggs today because I'd been putting them in my pocket as they were laid in rapid succession so she got none. I think I need to blue kote one to tell them apart, and stew one pullet.

Anyway clouds bearing rain are looming. I took a break to make the kids lunch and it looks like I may be done now and the temperature is starting to drop.

Heated waterers and buckets ALL AROUND 

Mr. Buggy, the lamancha buck I bought, has a ridiculously small amount of hair. He had been spending the fall with a new goat owner, friend of his owner, to cover her grade does. I don't think he has had copper or replamin or a good high selenium mineral for a very long time and from what I understand this area needs it. No itching and flaking, so I doubt lice or mites. Maybe zinc, copper, or selenium in my very unexperienced opinion, and I will watch for signs of external parasites. Looks like I'm going to be riding a musky buck and shooting him up with vitamin gel in the stinky mouth weekly for the next month or two. He may be blanketed tonight.  His little rat tail might freeze off otherwise. He's been fine down to 18, but we're heading into the single fahrenheit digits for the next few days. I may grain him too, although on my feed regimen he already seems to be putting on weight and depth, which I find amusing as I haven't had him for that long. Hope he's an easy keeper in that regard.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> We got 9 clean eggs today because I'd been putting them in my pocket as they were laid in rapid succession so she got none. I think I need to blue kote one to tell them apart, and stew one pullet.


Guess I've been very lucky to not have had an egg eater. It does sound like a trip to the pot IS in order.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, egg eaters are awful. They teach each other and before you know it you are getting no eggs, still feeding out the same food, and have to start over. I've had and dealt with them before. I hate it when they crowd into the nest box and eat the egg AS it comes out of the hen laying, then chase the layer out to continue their feast and make a sticky, stinky mess of everything. That hen got the knife the day I caught her doing it. She was morbidly obese.

3 more eggs out of the nest box, still missing a white egg. Everyone popped an egg except for Ms. Egg eater, who may have eaten hers in the run. I need that bluekote.

It's a good day though. I have hope for the chickens. Maybe it's just that one hunting them down at this point.


----------



## Baymule

Delaware chickens were the worst I ever had. They not only ate the eggs as they were being laid, they sometimes started snacking on the hen herself, dragging her intestines out and killing her. I took a special kind of joy in killing every da**ed of them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Managing a gang of cannibals is fun, eh? Sometimes you can forget that they'd be happy to eat each other (and you). Other times it's soup time.

Forget the bluekote. Tonight I'm going to crate both leghorns and the one that lays an egg and eats it dies.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I like the way you think , and your problem solving is great !


----------



## Baymule

That will be one satisfying pot of soup!   Take THAT stupid chicken!


----------



## rachels.haven

It's kind of almost sad though. They're SO stupid they can't help themselves. They're like little computers with crappy programming, some crappier than others. However I don't feel too bad about eating the bad ones.

Crated both leghorns separately. By morning one had an unharmed egg and one had a messy cage. I released the egg one. The eggs in the coop have not been harmed so far. I'm waiting the whole day to make sure I've got my culprit. I'm willing to slowly work my way through the chickens and see who eats the eggs they lay to stop this where it's at and get this out of my flock rather than just cull them all. I think I may be about done though. Hopefully I caught it early enough.

I LIKE HAVING CHICKENS, DARN IT.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Forget the bluekote. Tonight I'm going to crate both leghorns and the one that lays an egg and eats it dies.


That does sound like the best plan, fast and very efficient.


----------



## rachels.haven

Too efficient. Didn't work. Back to the drawing board. Or maybe I'll crate someone else next night it's not too nnthe teens.


----------



## Baymule

It's hard to catch an egg eater, wish you luck with that.


----------



## Bruce




----------



## rachels.haven

Well, darn. I came home from grocery shopping to see Bailey holding Patrick the buck down while Badger was beating them up. I got MAD at them both and was not gentle when dragging them to the front grazing pen and taping a stick of shame to Badger's collar. Both of them are in the "dog house" and kicked out of the goat runs until further notice. After I cleaned off the bloodsickle, Patrick only has a 3/4 "long gash down his tail, skin only so I packed it with antibiotics and put him in a stall by himself. Poor Patrick, he submits to everything. I'm debating getting a vet to put in a stitch or two to keep it closed. I may try to wrap it, but it's so cold I'm kind of afraid to put extra pressure on such a small extremity. 

I'm not entirely sure why they did it, but but we have a doe in heat and last time we had a doe in heat, Badger did go crazy for goat backsides and Bailey held down his targets for him to chew on their rears (so I gave them both major tongue lashings and dragged Badger off to the buck run). It's possible he may be redirecting and if that's the case, he may also be about to lose his gear, young or not. Patrick is the kids' favorite (and EXPENSIVE). Plus, Patrick is probably my favorite nigerian buck too. I was mad enough I could have neutered Badger on the spot. He's lucky DS#2 was there. Dumb dogs. Patrick is basically his adult size too, so it's not like the dogs were going after kids.

The posts are in and the gates are almost all up. 

Tomorrow should be a better day.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

That's  not cool, bad doggies  ...... 🤔 can you put liquid bandage on it to at least seal the wound?  It sure would sting but it does stay on really well.
Great news about you almost having a completed fence, that sure will make things a little safer and easier for you, please post pictures when it's  done so we can celebrate  with you 🐏🐏🐏🐏


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh dear. Said doe in heat, Ava, broke into Patrick's stall and was there for an undetermined amount of time.  I'm pretty sure Patrick just had a better day.
I think I shall go to bed now before anything else happens and bring on that better day (just kidding, I'm a mom-no evenings or nights off!). So if she takes Mustang Meadows H Avalon is bred to Rosasharn WS Sir Patrick to kid on April 6th because Ava's crazy.

Ava should be fine though. Her doelings are almost weaned. She is rather fat because I haven't been milking her (she's bucky on the stand, just like her breeder said her mom was, and crazy horny, just like her sire was, for she was an "oops" as well). She was making a quart at morning milking as a FF when I was separating and milking, so the cross might be nice and milky.

Darn you Ava.


----------



## Bruce

Are you hand milking or machine? I follow Lumnah Acres YouTube channel and Al has a little electric pump machine, said the doe is a lot more calm on the milking stand with it than she was with hand milking. She looks calm to me.


----------



## rachels.haven

I hand milk. Avalon's teats and udder are amazing-near perfect. I get tired of being bitten while I milk her though. Soft, silky texture udder, teats almost as long as my thumb, she empties really quickly, but long, long goat neck armed with a head of teeth.


----------



## farmerjan

Head catch, stanchion type so she can't turn her head around......


----------



## rachels.haven

Good plan. I need to modify that milk stand anyway.


----------



## Bruce

Al has a stand and he ties the doe's left hind foot. Stand is against a wall with the headgate on the left and a grain bucket to give her a reason to jump up there. Willow is mostly quite calm while she is being milked with the machine, Al does some udder massaging during the process.


----------



## rachels.haven

I wish that would work. Actually, when I quit milking Ava, she had just about stopped kicking while milking. It's the biting that was the problem and her neck is quite long so she has quite a reach. I'll probably just add to the head stanchion so she can't reach and bring a spray bottle next season at first just in case she can. She needs to EAT not bite. That's why we don't milk alligators.


----------



## Baymule

BAD DOGS!! I would have been mad too. I caught my pup Sentry chasing the slaughter lambs one morning. I yelled and threw his stainless steel feed pan at him again and again, there was nowhere he could go to escape. Then, because he is a puppy and would get a stupid attack again, especially at night while I was asleep, I closed them up at night. They are gone now, I only put him in with the ewes and 1 month old lambs when i am around. I can put him with Ringo and his 2 ewes, they are not afraid of Sentry and will butt him. Sigh, it is a process, isn't it?


----------



## rachels.haven

YES! STABILITY IS PROGRESS...

...or at least that's what the hectic think.

He's going to be crated at night and locked out in the front browsing pen with a "freedom stick" on his collar to prevent him from squishing through the cattle panels so I don't have to stall him until the fence is finished (he could get eaten wandering, or hit). Let's see if toothpaste dog can not need the stick. Puppy stupids is a good term. He was quite submissive to the crazy lady that was rough on him this morning.

Fence up by the house to the left is up. I'm watching and might try putting some up myself sometime.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Fence up by the house to the left is up. I'm watching and might try putting some up myself sometime.


You can do it !! And watching it being done is a great way to learn.



rachels.haven said:


> That's why we don't milk alligators.


Not even with head gates?



Baymule said:


> Sigh, it is a process, isn't it?


Yep, but we know this isn't your first puppy rodeo.


----------



## rachels.haven

...hmm, puppy rodeo. I guess you could ride Badger. He's probably over 50 lbs.

I'm going to try it, I think. Our ground is frozen now, but somehow I'm going to try it.


----------



## Bruce

Frozen ground makes digging holes harder unless you have a powered post hole digger.


----------



## rachels.haven

You can say that again. Discovered that in February this year after we moved. Ground was "nope" frozen to like, 6 " when I tried pounding after moving. Not sure I can picture digging in that. We might get a run of warm weather before the end of...not winter.


----------



## Baymule

What about a pot of boiling water poured in the starter hole? Having never dealt with frozen ground, I have no idea how stupid that idea may be. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

No, too much thermal mass. The boiling water would freeze too at some point.  But you're on the right track. I believe steaming the ground would work (seen it).

Next week we're going to be heading back into the 40's with lows just below freezing for the foreseeable future. The ground might thaw during the day.


----------



## Bruce

I doubt your ground is frozen much yet, probably not even the top inch. You can dig through that. And if you are pounding T-posts, no problem with a slight "crust".


----------



## rachels.haven

I'll do that. Monday things start being warmer. We are coming out of a run where we didn't see the other side of freezing and today is a nice warm day. I'm anticipating my buck pen build and clearing more space.

OMgeeS! The fencing has almost made it all the way around. The gates aren't all done, but it's really happening!

They left the danger tree arched over the fence though. I'm a little unhappy about that, but if it falls down in the next year I'll have him fix it or do it myself. I guess his tree cutting contact didn't want to do it. Nobody's going to walk under that now at least.

I've got a vet coming out to look at Patrick, the chewed buckling's tail. One spot will not stay closed and isn't scabbing over. It concerns me.

If you remember my silkie rooster that I picked up I've got another update on him. I got him some chicks to grow out to be his flock and he adopted them. Here's Mr. "Baby Teddy", the Baby Daddy. They are HIS babies. Mr. BroodyMom.


----------



## rachels.haven

He feeds them so much if he eats even a 10th of the grain that hits his beak he's really going to pack on the pounds. Nice to have him happy finally though.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Gotta love a rooster that'll take over daddy duties!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Regarding the frozen ground, buying a tamping/digging rod may help you.  Here is one at Ace Hardware: https://www.acehardware.com/departments/lawn-and-garden/gardening-tools/digging-tools/74414

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Bruce

How big is the tree that is arching over the fence? 
Mr. BroodyMom's kids are going to take one look at Pops and KNOW they are adopted. I'm glad he's got a family now, chickens aren't meant to be alone. 
I hope Patrick's tail can get fixed up easily.


----------



## rachels.haven

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Miss @rachels.haven,
> 
> Regarding the frozen ground, buying a tamping/digging rod may help you.  Here is one at Ace Hardware: https://www.acehardware.com/departments/lawn-and-garden/gardening-tools/digging-tools/74414
> 
> Senile Texas Aggie



Ah, that's what that ice pick looking thing in the barn is. GOT IT 

and at Bruce, The tree is big enough that you can't hug around it by a long shot and very, very tall. I think the tree canopy averages about 60 feet according to DH's estimate. It's also hung up on a similarly large tree. At some point it will go slowly down, I think, not fast. I think it may be hard to get someone to deal with it. If it were me and I'd consider cutting the tree down it's leaning on-that guy is finished-but I'm not sure what kind of force will be released when THAT big tree snaps if you cut it. There's a lot of stored potential energy in that equation. If no one messes with it, neither tree will snap and eventually they will both pull out of the ground, onto that length of fence. Fence guy has a one year guarantee. Wonder if that applies?


----------



## rachels.haven

Some of the fallen trees in our woods that have fallen in the last 2-3 years are much taller than that one and 3-4 feet in diameter. Quite interesting to walk on. But the tall trees seem to be at the end of their life spans. When those fall by the time they hit the ground they have built up enough speed they shatter. It's quite interesting to see the aftermath after the storms we had. I should take pictures. This tree is hopefully not a 100 footer though.

Not sure why I'm taking DH's height estimate on that tree. Probably because I don't feel like measuring or getting the angle the trees at and calculating to solve for the missing side. It's VERY tall.

ETA after rereading this...our woods are a little dangerous, I guess.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> ETA after rereading this...our woods are a little dangerous, I guess.


Sure sounds so! Don't go out in the big wind storms. Now the question, if a massive tree falls in the woods and everyone is in the house, does it make a sound?  



rachels.haven said:


> If no one messes with it, neither tree will snap and eventually they will both pull out of the ground, onto that length of fence. Fence guy has a one year guarantee. Wonder if that applies?


I'm quite certain he is guaranteeing the work for quality work and materials, not "acts of god", but you knew that.

 One day a big wind and maybe a ton of snow is going to blow through and that tree is going to drop along with the one it is leaning on. I agree, don't touch it yourself. Too bad it wasn't taken down before the fence was put up. My guess is it really needs a professional service with big equipment to take it down from the top bit by bit. You can find YouTube videos which are quite impressive.


----------



## rachels.haven

YES trees falling make a sound (for tiny humans to hear). That question has always confused me. The sound is loud, and it reminds you that you are very, very tiny compare to the wind and the trees.

and yes, I figured it wouldn't really be covered. We'll be prepared to fix it.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

Pics from this morning. Some of that darned tree, some of my dogs eating...something, possibly bear poo again. Hopefully it was only racoon.  I accidently stepped in it, then they bolted it fast. Lovely, normal dogs.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Do you own the property on the other side of the fence by any chance...sure would be nice to get it cut past the fencline so it would fall on the other side...
We had some trees cut here, one was in a area that was impossible  to cut completly  down, so we had it topped down to a 40 ' tall "stump" , ... it looks much better since it now has little limbs that have leafs growing...


----------



## farmerjan

Wow, fence builders here would not have built the fence with a tree like that laying over.... Really, they would outright refuse knowing that it would be down before the next winter.  Most here are so busy, that they would say to call them when the tree is off the "fenceline" ;  then we'll fit you in.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


>


 OK, that thing is WAY past gonna fall "sometime", that is a widowmaker for sure. And too high on the other side of the fence to cut it off on that side without a lift of some sort.


----------



## Baymule

Yeah, that tree is going to fall someday. Hopefully it will be after your husband gets a promotion in another state and y'all move!


----------



## rachels.haven

Love it, @Baymule . That's the spirit!

Fence guy said he could find someone to remove it for easy money. My guess is that the someone said it was out of their league or flaked on him and he just carried on.

Yes, that's our property there too. I was going to put the buck run back there. There is a 12 foot gap I left for a cattle panel gate that could accommodate a lift too if a different angle approach was needed. As soon as I get done with this cold I should probably get on that tree for real (so much illness this year, at least it's not strep in the house for the 6th time).

We'll do our best to get it taken care of soon now to protect the fence.

Oh, and vet said Patrick's tail will heal, even the open looking spot, and only charged me half a farm call, so he's good.


----------



## farmerjan

Baymule said:


> Yeah, that tree is going to fall someday. Hopefully it will be after your husband gets a promotion in another state and y'all move!


@Baymule  always has the brightest way of looking at things


----------



## rachels.haven

It's especially funny because his office is in sorry shape and there may be big changes for it coming that may involve being moved or totally shut down is my guess. She unintentionally made light of an unstable situation I've been worrying about. Made the uncertainty funny. Maybe we'll miss the fence flattening and all.


----------



## farmerjan

You had hinted a couple of times that things were not what they should be at his job.  It has to be tough and stressful for him, and for you.  Are there other offices/headquarters for his company that you all could be transferred to?  Maybe you could be looking for a "better place" that would be more stable for a longer term?   Here's hoping that things will work out for the whole situation.


----------



## rachels.haven

There are a few. They are not close, and we have a desire to choose carefully after this to find another one like we had in Detroit that had a work environment that is easier to balance with family life (and his own personal life, but I will not get started on that). If the other offices here are like this one where 16-18 hour days and weekends for the big wig's whim is the normal which is already becoming burnout, I'd rather he preserve his mental health and soul and we go through the mess and stress of moving for a long term career continuation rather than a short term job.

Things will be okay in the end, I'm sure, just like with that tree. I put one of the pictures on our town page and I've got several recommendations and one guy with a tree company who personally wants to do it. I'm interested to see what they do. I'm sure it won't be free, but I've got a path now.


----------



## farmerjan

I think that the long term career and preserving his mental health and soul and your overall family life is more important.  Maybe you can find somewhere that is more "small farm friendly" too...


----------



## Bruce

I agree with @farmerjan, 16-18 hour days is nuts. No one can do that for long before their work quality suffers not to mention their mental, physical and family health.


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> There are a few. They are not close, and we have a desire to choose carefully after this to find another one like we had in Detroit that had a work environment that is easier to balance with family life (and his own personal life, but I will not get started on that). If the other offices here are like this one where 16-18 hour days and weekends for the big wig's whim is the normal which is already becoming burnout, I'd rather he preserve his mental health and soul and we go through the mess and stress of moving for a long term career continuation rather than a short term job.
> 
> Things will be okay in the end, I'm sure, just like with that tree. I put one of the pictures on our town page and I've got several recommendations and one guy with a tree company who personally wants to do it. I'm interested to see what they do. I'm sure it won't be free, but I've got a path now.


 
The guy with the tree company that wants to do it would be a good one if he is reasonable.  It will also be good advertisement for his company if they do it with no damage and problems.....


----------



## Baymule

A job that robs you of your life is dreaded drudgery. Poor man! Things will work out, they always do. Sometimes, when you are up to your A$$ in alligators, it’s hard to remember your object was to drain the swamp. 

Yeah, I do have a knack for finding the humor in almost any situation. Don’t ever take me with you to pick out a coffin for your beloved departed, I have some very dark humor. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

He wants to keep going until February when their thing should go from prep to launch mode into maintenance mode and he'll re-evaluate things. If he lasts that long is the * on all that. I'm worried, but it's up to him, I guess.

Not sure how you could go coffin shopping without dark humor. It's not exactly a trip to the grocery store.

No freezing rain occurred here last night or this morning.

Something amazing happened this morning. BADGER STAYED IN THE CATTLE PANEL PEN WITHOUT THE COLLAR STICK. Maybe it was just because there was a coyote howl a thon going on when I put him out, and maybe it will just be temporary, but I'll take it today. Maybe he's even finally big enough. Summer should be going into heat so today or tomorrow so the next few days it's especially important to keep Mr. Not Neutered separate from any chewy goats.

A tree guy is coming out today around 3.

Oh dear, my space bar is failing. I feel like I'm using an old typewriter, lol. Darn technology.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> He wants to keep going until February when their thing should go from prep to launch mode into maintenance mode and he'll re-evaluate things. If he lasts that long is the * on all that. I'm worried, but it's up to him, I guess.
> 
> Not sure how you could go coffin shopping without dark humor. It's not exactly a trip to the grocery store.
> 
> No freezing rain occurred here last night or this morning.
> 
> Something amazing happened this morning. BADGER STAYED IN THE CATTLE PANEL PEN WITHOUT THE COLLAR STICK. Maybe it was just because there was a coyote howl a thon going on when I put him out, and maybe it will just be temporary, but I'll take it today. Maybe he's even finally big enough. Summer should be going into heat so today or tomorrow so the next few days it's especially important to keep Mr. Not Neutered separate from any chewy goats.
> 
> A tree guy is coming out today around 3.
> 
> Oh dear, my space bar is failing. I feel like I'm using an old typewriter, lol. Darn technology.



Hurray  for BADGER .......I hope the tree guy is cheap and does a good job for you .


----------



## rachels.haven

I don't think I'm getting a quote from this tree guy. He said he'd send me one, but I made the mistake of asking if they could clip the fence back up after unscrewing the connectors on the metal post unclipping it from the t posts (which he offered to do). He acted somewhat dismissive and disinterested after that. Oh well, next lead. Serves me right.

I can clip the fence back up myself, and I want to get a stretcher and come along all my own, but I have to work around my kids. Just today as soon as the fence was done my plan was to pound the posts for the cattle panels and cover the gaps I requested and instead my older son came off the bus sick with a temperature of 104 so all I got done was about 15 minutes of work-pounding the 3 posts, cutting the required cattle panels down off the front, empty buck pen, and leaving the dogs in the rain while we rushed him to the doctor (dogs were only in a hurry to get dry until they decided they'd rather walk the yard than go in and eat, so I feel less bad).That kind of thing is why I asked. I can't really rely on myself. I'll not do that in the future and just rough it. It's not like my husband can help.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Sorry about your son being sick.....
Any tree guy should put your fence back up if he takes the darn thing down....if he is getting paid !


----------



## rachels.haven

That's the attitude I should have.

I just get kind of irked when people use passive aggressive communication in these kind of interactions. I wish they'd just say no. Otherwise it turns things into me trying to find and use the magical right groupings and sets of words to persuade them to do something or not be offended and get paid lots by me-while asking as little as possible from them or they never get back to me. It's driving me nuts. But I'll just keep trying.

My son should be fine, btw. We'll just be closely managing his fever reducer tonight and keep an eye on him tomorrow. Double checked his lungs, waited until the motrin and tylenol reduced his fever, breathing,and heart rate, did a flu test, and sent us home. Typical kid episode.


----------



## Baymule

It may be a typical kid episode, but it sure can scare you.


----------



## Bruce

If that fence is properly installed and tight, you can unclip from every T post and it will still be standing. Taking it off a corner H brace on one end will be hard to put back on since there won't be excess to pull on. 

The tree definitely should have been dropped before the fence was put up. Are you calling Craig's List "arborists" or a tree company? I really think you need someone with equipment that can get the saw up high enough to cut it off on the other side of the fence, then hold the part that is above the fence, cut that off on the "inside" of the fence far enough that when the trunk is dropped it will miss the fence (Or it can be held and cut).


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm calling licensed, insured tree companies. People are weird here. I wonder if it's because I'm not a community insider yet. I do know they pick and choose the jobs they want to do. I should not have to sell a job I'm paying for though?

The fence is not the greatest,there are some things I could have done better, but it will hold 2 big dogs and my kids. I will probably only hire this guy to do posts in the future, but I could not have done this all myself at this point. The positive side is that I can take it down myself. I'm pretty sure I can put it backup too. I'm just not sure when I can find the time especially if I'm catering to someone's unknown and unavailable schedule.

I may have the fence man come back to take down and replace the fence since our *verbal* agreement was that he would find someone to cut the tree down and he didn't (but verbal agreements mean nothing as we all know). He said he'd be willing to help if something happened to the fence during tree removal.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> I'm calling licensed, insured tree companies. People are weird here. I wonder if it's because I'm not a community insider yet. I do know they pick and choose the jobs they want to do. I should not have to sell a job I'm paying for though?
> 
> The fence is not the greatest,there are some things I could have done better, but it will hold 2 big dogs and my kids. I will probably only hire this guy to do posts in the future, but I could not have done this all myself at this point. The positive side is that I can take it down myself. I'm pretty sure I can put it backup too. I'm just not sure when I can find the time especially if I'm catering to someone's unknown and unavailable schedule.
> 
> I may have the fence man come back to take down and replace the fence since our *verbal* agreement was that he would find someone to cut the tree down and he didn't (but verbal agreements mean nothing as we all know). He said he'd be willing to help if something happened to the fence during tree removal.


You are dealing with the "yankee attitude" (I can say that because I am a yankee) ...you ARE dealing with not being a community "insider"....this is probably something you won't  want to do...but let them THINK they are smarter than you and ask them for their advice, (I know it would be hard for me to do, but it works)....let their snarky indiffrence work to your advantage..in the end you will out smart them and get the job done....


----------



## rachels.haven

Ooo. I have to be sneaky. Okay. I'll try that. Just no cutting the fence.


----------



## rachels.haven

Queen Bailey is enjoying her freedom by sleeping in the hayloft today. Badger can't (or doesn't want to try to) climb stairs so he's spending the day whining and crying and barking at the foot of the stairs. Tonight might be interesting. Bailey turns on then.


----------



## rachels.haven

Talked to my horse neighbor. She says we absolutely have cougars. The week we moved in she wanted to warn me that they had one hanging out in their front yard, but she didn't have my number. Big guarding dogs and a fence were a good choice. 

(and now I have 40 cattle panels to enlarge goat fields with)

Other tree guy that lives down the street came out. He says minimum would be $500 because it is a big, bad, risky tree. Yep, bad for you and me both. He'll email the official estimate to me tonight. That's a lot of hay money. He also has a Tyngsborough hay contact he says I should check out because it's $5-6/bale and his friend still has some for sale.

Darn tree. Maybe we'll clear our land someday and plant trees that won't grow up to be big and bad (I do have a couple hundred paw paw seeds in the fridge and I'm starting some hardy types of fig cuttings, and we have a family want list of fruit and nut trees to slowly obtain and find places for). No goats in the fruit trees though, thank you very much.

Fantasy though at this point. $500 is a lot


Moon Mist Log Purple Summer was bred to Rustic Wood's Black Tie Affair. That's the second adult lamancha doe. Now I'll just keep waiting on little Lacey (epimetheus lace) to grow. Not sure if she'll make this breeding season. She weight tapes out at 80+ lbs(pulled tight against her fluff) but she seems so small! With fluff not squished the tape says 95, but I doubt that. Plus, I don't think she's even cycled yet.


----------



## rachels.haven

thoughts and prayers for B&B Happy Goats tonight.


----------



## Baymule

Too bad it's so far away...… our friend comes over and cuts our dead trees. Over the fence? Just cut the darn thing above the fence and let it drop. No taking down the fence, what's wrong with those people? And you can't be "smarter" than they are, it rube them the wrong way that you are even there, breathing, much less telling the genius how to cut the tree. On bad leaning trees he ties a long rope up high on the tree, then we go around a tree in the direction we want it to go, then to the tractor bucket so we can back the tractor, keeping the rope tight and the tree falls where we want it. Simple, huh?


----------



## Bruce

Simple if you aren't going to take out your brand new fence in the process! I guess the question is: how much would it cost to drop the fence, cut the tree, put the fence back up? If less than $500, that is the way to go. Fences can be spliced, just a shame to do it when the fence is a week old.


----------



## rachels.haven

Cue Lacy going into heat. Mark it on the calendar, I've got a buck planned for her when she's big enough, but until then, NO BUCKS FOR YOU, LITTLE DOE. Good to know she's working.

On a side note, I put my least favorite Rosasharn buck up on CL for $500 earlier hoping to downsize just a little (bought him as a teen for $800). Someone replied to my email that "he could come and live here with me" because she couldn't afford to go to Rosasharn farm and get a buck herself and all I would get were replies from meat buyers and all I'd have to do is drop him off (two hours away) and no one pays attention to pedigrees and papers and lines and they know because they sell goats...Nope. The same lady also links to her goats for sale on all my FB advertisements in the comments. She breeds goats all year round in large quantities for color and flashiness and blue eyes as pets with pedigrees. I thought she'd go away if I ignored here, but it looks like I've got a live one here. (I may have to report her at some point on FB too, next time she piggy backs her ads on my posts, that should be fun)

I will either sit on my buck until he sells or eat him myself (?intact and in rut?), thank you very much, and not play into this rude lady's twisted goat mill game and let her have a free buck obviously. And if it will repel emails like that, I'll put his price back up to his buckling purchase price, thank you very much. No free goats. Infact, if you don't like to be annoyed, no "cheap" quality goats. Dang, I thought $500 was expensive enough to avoid that. That just blows my mind. Someone still had the gall to ask for free. Price going back up, I guess, and maybe avoid this clown. Apparently Anne Peterson has the right idea with her prices.

Who would ask for an expensive buck for free?

Rant concluded. So I guess I'm selling him for back up at $800.


----------



## rachels.haven

That didn't even make sense either. Who would buy a 50-65 pound intact male goat for meat for $500 when there are wethers more than twice that for $50-$100, maybe $150 on CL?


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Who would ask for an expensive buck for free?


There is always someone who wants a free lunch.


----------



## rachels.haven

But that's just embarrassing!


----------



## Bruce

Apparently not to her. She is either totally clueless or sees nothing wrong with taking advantage of people. I could forgive the first but suspect the second.


----------



## rachels.haven

That is why I like goats. Some days, only goats. Or dogs. Or chickens.


----------



## rachels.haven

Danger tree is finally down. Poplar wood smells. I put the fence back up. Made Chevre (started yesterday, finished today). My 4 year old got a butter knife stuck all the way in a pumpkin while I was putting up fence. It involved a tent stake mallet I thought I had taken away and hidden well enough. Thank you, my little raccoon son. Looks like I'm going to have to hack it apart to retrieve the utensil.

That is the extent of my remotely farm stuff today. Everything is good.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

How did you get the tree down?


----------



## rachels.haven

I rolled back the fence and paid the tree company that finally got me an estimate. Even so, it was kind of a scary job and required heavy equipment. I'm glad that's over.

Killed two rats (a shock trap and Badger) and buried the rat holes. So far no re-excavation has occurred and no further activity has been observed.

Speaking of Badger, he's been a giant mouth lately, just as the vet warned and today committed the giant no-no of bringing down my youngest and using him as a scratch and chew toy. So while my kids play, he will be tied out until he gets out of this giant mouth stage. Bailey seems very happy about this. Lately she's been hiding all day in the loft from him because he's been pestering her so much. Today she's shadowing everyone, especially the kids, and gently helping them play, unmolested. I think she's tired of getting her tail and ears and jowls chewed on. She does go to down on Badger and disciplines him occasionally. Badger listens to me to stop (and when she whales on him) and holds back while I'm there, but for no one else, and sometimes my kids have to play outside, so tied for now while the kids use the yard it is. He'll be loose when they're inside. That way, when they play they can still play with him and be able to get away from him. I'm glad he can't reach the goats.


----------



## Baymule

To be such intelligent dogs, sometimes they get an attack of stupid that just leaves you shaking your head. How old is Badger?


----------



## rachels.haven

He complained for the two hours my kids were digging holes with Bailey until he fell asleep, then I let him off and he's back to normal. I really like him, btw. He's a smart, smart dog. If I'm there, he behaves himself with the kids, but not if I'm out of sight. I think he'll grow out of it as I continue to be consistent. He's very responsive to treatless obedience if it's part of the routine (and oh so soft kinky fur!). He just loses it if I'm not there to enforce the rules and he outweighs the kids now so I'm still sticking to my tether rule until I can trust him on little tests. Any suggestions you have would be welcome.


 I might also use the tether to re-introduce him to ignoring chickens later. He was safe and ignored them as a baby, but I think he needs a refresher on chickens not being toys. Bailey actually did okay when I tested her earlier. I was surprised.


----------



## Baymule

It takes tons of patience, repetition, repetition, repetition and repetition. And one day......he "gets" it.


----------



## rachels.haven

I worked with Badger and chickens today, then cleaned the coop, doe stall, and spare stall so we had plenty of time together. Badger gave up trying to catch chickens and went back to ignoring them like he did when he was a puppy so the chickens spent the day free ranging. The hawk did hang around, but he left by mid afternoon. I'm not sure he's interested in chickens if there's a possibility of a dog retaliating. So today was good for the chickens and Badger. We'll see what tomorrow is like.

I will be cleaning the buck stall tomorrow and preparing for our annual "husband takes wife and kids to his parents' house filled with all his siblings and their loud kids with no quiet ever" trip on Wednesday. Dear Husband, I love you so much.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Lol, you are welcome to come here and hang out.. it's quiet. .....pretty darn quiet !


----------



## rachels.haven

Going to Florida would be fun. I think I'll have to stick to a closet for now though. I need to help drive to Pennsylvania.

You're probably sick of hearing it by now, but I hope you're recovering okay. Last eye surgery DH had sucked not to mince words, and it was a fairly minor one. I'd bring you dinner and do your chores if I could. Last thing you probably need is stuff to do for the next few days (until it starts to make you crazy, then nice, grounding worries are good).


----------



## rachels.haven

Dog pics. 






No more danger tree either.


----------



## Baymule

Badger training seems to be going well! Have a Happy Thanksgiving!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Going to Florida would be fun. I think I'll have to stick to a closet for now though. I need to help drive to Pennsylvania.
> 
> You're probably sick of hearing it by now, but I hope you're recovering okay. Last eye surgery DH had sucked not to mince words, and it was a fairly minor one. I'd bring you dinner and do your chores if I could. Last thing you probably need is stuff to do for the next few days (until it starts to make you crazy, then nice, grounding worries are good).


Oh, mine sucked the juice right outta my eyeball...no need to mince words with me , lol....there are worse surgeries to have, like my next one...total labodamy...should be a quick procedure ! 
First thing I did was to give Piper a bottle...and that was awesome, all the goats came up and diped their heads to my level and check out the eye bandage ....they were soooo sweet, and the cat and dogs were trying to babysit me...that did not  work well at all, lol...have a safe trip and try to enjoy the outlaws and their offspring.... we got em here too, but I have them trained to keep a safe distance from the me


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks, Baymule. Happy thanksgiving to you and yours too.

Aw, B&B happy goats, it sounds like you're in the right spot for the immediate future. Take care of yourself and happy Thanksgiving.


----------



## rachels.haven

Got our last hay delivery for the winter. A few bales split so they got mounded in a pile in the extra space in the loft, and now I am down two guard dogs who refuse to come off their hay nests. Clearly they are broody. I'd take pictures, but I am too sore to climb any more stairs. Before the split bales got mounded Bailey was obsessed with it and wouldn't pull her face out of it while I wheeled it out of the garage. I think she wants to change her name to (Queen) Bale-ley. It smells like candy, and it is her kingdom. Then Badger wised up and he got some kingdom too, much to her royal highness's annoyance.

The kids are also sore and the older one has already dropped for the night. DH came home late, so they spent an hour or two jumping around the bale stacks in the stuffed loft and hanging off the rafters while I moved hay from garage. Healthy little kids.

More chicken free ranging today. The rooster is going to get himself killed. He flew out of the yard on his own this evening and ran around the woods like a dummy, not able to figure out how to fly back into the fence(???), cocky as you please, until I herded his smug, hysterical self back through the gate. He can fly like a songbird, but doesn't seem to have the brains. We are drawing in more raptors than I realized we had, so the chance of him getting killed outside of the dogs' protection is fairly high. (One of these days I hope to write about the dogs terminating one of them. ) Also, coyotes are out as usual (but I'm not worried about it now, because we have our compound) and would probably love a rooster snack. Goofy rooster's going to make Mr. Baby Teddy the winkie silkie king of the chicken coop via taking himself out. Rooster politics are sure amusing. I don't even think the silkie could handle those fourteen(ish) feisty, flighty hens.

Tomorrow after the older kid comes home from a half day we leave for vacation. I'm almost ready. Life is good.


----------



## Baymule

Clip Mr. Smarty's flight feathers on one wing and see if that grounds him. 

Have a safe trip, come back home safe and sound. Enjoy family and have a good time.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

have fun


----------



## Bruce

B&B Happy goats said:


> Lol, you are welcome to come here and hang out.. it's quiet. .....pretty darn quiet !


Put your hearing aid back in!

I wonder if Bailey would respond well to a shock collar set to warning tone with the kid playtime with you out of sight in the house or elsewhere.


----------



## rachels.haven

If it were Bailey, she'd listen to verbal corrections. She's great. Badger the puppy is the kid eater. He's been a giant 45 lbs biting mouth lately(darn puppies) I'm hoping he'll grow out of it as we're consistent. If he doesn't soon, i may consider a shock collar for long distance corrections. That's a good idea. He'd like it better than the "cool down tether".


----------



## rachels.haven

Hello from vacation side. 10-17" snow predicted over the next 48 hours around our place and it's sleeting and coating the world in ice so it looks like this vacation is going long. We may try leaving tomorrow. I miss my beasts and routine. ALMOST DONE.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Safe travels....


----------



## Baymule

Be safe getting back home!


----------



## rachels.haven

Got back. The animals were fed and alive. The house is intact. The layers somehow got fed chick crumble the whole time, but that's okay, and the dogs were somehow given a whole 50 pound bag of dog food over the week we were gone when it normally lasts a month, but I guess people often put on a little extra weight over Thanksgiving, right? Why not dogs? (Bailey has indeed added some padding already somehow)

We got somewhere between 17 inches and two feet of snow. That's a lot of wet.

I think the fence installation season is over for me. Getting the panels here was the important part and that happened. I'm planning on testing out some woven wire when things thaw too. That's exciting.

For now it's just time to go into maintenance mode here and feed all the beasts.

I did adult doe feet today. The three kids and three bucks are next on my list. The bucks are always the best behaved, so I'll probably have them go last.


----------



## HomeOnTheRange

Welcome back!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Glad you made it home safely


----------



## Baymule

When we leave I am always glad to get back and go check on all the animals. Our neighbor that does chores when we are gone doesn't have a smart phone, I wish he did so he could send me pictures. When they are out of town, I can't send them pictures either.  LOL When I pet sit, I send pictures.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> and the dogs were somehow given a whole 50 pound bag of dog food over the week we were gone when it normally lasts a month


 And the dogs ate it all? Maybe the neighborhood squirrels got into the bowls when the dogs were done. LGDs, for their size, don't eat a whole lot. Puppies I guess would chow down more since they have growing to do. But growing too fast is a bad thing. Guess they'll be back to their usual ration now.

Sorry about all the snow. I guess that storm went south of us, we've gotten a couple of inches in the last day or so, another inch or today until tomorrow.


----------



## rachels.haven

Friday check in time.

THE CHICKENS ARE FREE RANGING (in snow). Good dogs. The silkie chicks are almost ready to go out to their coop with a heat lamp with Mr. Teddy. And I have egg customers.

Bailey is patrolling and racing around the yard at night barking things off. The giant coyote was back this week, but Bailey is out for his blood. He can howl AND bark like a dog and is VERY loud, btw. Much louder than my dogs. He's not real happy about not being allowed in sight. All the normal coyotes are gone again and someone is shooting it up on the conservation land. Hope they get a little coy-thing meat or fur or whatever.

I've weaned Ava's doelings. They'd made tooth ulcers in their mom's udder the shape of their mouths on one side while I was gone. Ava's being milked once a day and starting to go dry but has decided it's okay for me to milk her, probably because I'm not a toothy doeling. I believe she is indeed pregnant by Patrick. Her udder is so torn up and scabby, poor dear, but suddenly her stand manners are perfect, no hobbles required (although she did take a biting pot shot at me today on the way by, but whatever). Maybe next lactation won't be so bad.

Quick question: Does anyone know the length of a Nigerian's lactation? It doesn't seem like they want to make milk for very long.

My family still hates nigerian milk, btw. They can taste it even in small quantity mixed into our daily milk 😭 Too rich, too creamy, and too "not as good". Only lamancha milk is "high quality" enough without the nesquick. Ugh. Please explain this to me. I think it's great. I wish they would have come to this conclusion sooner, but I guess we didn't have lamanchas earlier.

Speaking of milk, I got the town's blessing to sell milk, and they are the authority apparently here. So I may test the dairy waters next spring. A lady in Pepperell sells it for $20/gallon (which is going grocery store price, I guess). It might be magic though...or organic or something, and I'm not going to do that right now, so I'll probably ask for a fair bit less. Maybe I can pay for hay this way and enjoy milking as much as I want?

Here's a goat count. It's a bunch of goats, but we're swinging it. Whatever I do next year tiny goat-wise, I think I'd like to close my herd for a few years and have no more new personalities staying on the scene unless they are born here.

Lamancha Bucks
Rustic Wood's Black Tie Affair (ate the metal straw off my feeding syringe while I was worming him yesterday like a champ, thanks buddy) 120 lbs
Lucky 4-Leaf Count Chocula (coming in two weeks)

Lamancha Does
Woodland Haven The Saffron 155 lbs (deep, wide, long legs, great feet, cute ears, wanna be lap goat that outweighs me and biggest little goat you've ever met)
Moon Mist LOG Purple Summer 122 lbs (a sweet doe with sausage teats and a soft, soft udder-she's golden)
Epimetheus Lace 80lbs (looks like a muppet with her scurs and how she "talks")
Kaos Farm RWP Uranium (coming in two weeks)


Nigerian Bucks
Mustang Meadows T Durango (my cute little one from a michigan diary lines with high production and big teats in his history, son of the best milking doe in his breeder's herd)
Rosasharn WS Sir Patrick*B (I love this one for his sweet attitude and dairy record)
Rosasharn MM Mili's Buckeye*B (amazing build, stunning feet and legs, good udder history with okay production history, but has a habit of hunting and biting butts if you haven't picked him up and carried him around the pen recently enough and he's not small) 

Nigerian Does 
Mustang Meadows T Avalon (lovely teats and udder, from michigan diary lines, good production, and bred to Patrick from when Badger chewed his tail open and I put him in the extra stall next to the doe stall while Ava was in heat and she broke in to help herself) Hoping for more does if we keep going.
Ava's 3.5 month doelings by Buckeye to be evaluated in the fall when they kid. I'll probably breed them to Durango at 40lbs/8months for kids with SWEET udders and teats and small stature. 
Woodland Haven Ava's Sugar
Woodland Haven Ava's Ginger
Woodland Haven Ava's Lavender

That's it. And yeah, the ground is frozen now, so no more fence work until May. I may get out the chainsaws that came with the house and if I can get them working, there are a few choke cherries and euro cherries that AREN'T 40+ feet tall that I can take down assuming that frozen wood isn't an issue. There is at least one that is too big for me that we will have to hire out for, but that's a later expense. It's also right in front of the house in the big doe pen. I agree with DH. Those trees when they grow large DO look like nightmare forest trees...but for different reasons-potential goat poisoning reasons.

Also, there's still that wasp nest in the wall of our house that I need to figure out. How do you poison a dormant nest that you can not reach?

Sorry if this was a little jumbled. Today is a "sick day" for my oldest and he's a handful putting it mildly.

Oh, and my youngest discovered and pieced together how to play DH's high school trumpet. That might be another reason why things are jumbled. So it is not quiet here. I really need to take the slides and mouth piece out of that thing and HIDE them. 4 year olds do NOT need to be jamming on trumpets in their undies and socks at random hours. Sure glad I don't have nerves to be jangled at all.


----------



## animalmom

My nigerians vary in their length of lactation.  I have one doe that I have been milking steadily for over 5 years.  I have another doe that is good for only 8-9 . months.  Not much of an answer for you, sorry.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's a good answer. Thank you! I guess I'll keep an eye out for good lactation length then.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> A lady in Pepperell sells it for $20/gallon (which is going grocery store price, I guess). It might be magic though...or organic or something, and I'm not going to do that right now, so I'll probably ask for a fair bit less. Maybe I can pay for hay this way and enjoy milking as much as I want?


She must have some pretty hard core customers to get $20/gallon. I have no idea how many goat milk drinkers there are in your area but if you have a reasonable price I suspect you would sell all the extra.



rachels.haven said:


> Also, there's still that wasp nest in the wall of our house that I need to figure out. How do you poison a dormant nest that you can not reach?


Long stick, just knock it down. Wasps die in the fall from lack of food. Only the queens survive and it isn't in the nest you see. They build new every year and that one is empty. 



rachels.haven said:


> I really need to take the slides and mouth piece out of that thing and HIDE them.


Just give him the mouthpiece and have him learn how to use it properly. Who knows, he might turn out to be a trumpet virtuoso.


----------



## rachels.haven

The trumpet is hiding now. Son 2 started teaching sick son1 and there was much giggling and intentional trumpet flatulence noises, then really loud trumpet honks started breaking out and things got real. So under the cover of lunch I spirited that horn away.  The husband can enjoy their proficientness later. Plus there is some concern about them breaking it. They're little kids and not very careful. I'll let them play more later.

I think I'm going to try sealing up the void on the wasp nest hole with more trim next chance I have a ladder holder then and hopefully end this wasp saga for the year.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

It sounds like you have been and still are busy!  Is your fence secure enough to keep the coyote out and the goats and dogs in?  If so, then I know that has to be a relief for you.  I hope someone takes care of that coyote (maybe SSS) so you need not be so worried.

Sorry that I can't help you with the goats.  I see that others have commented so maybe they can help answer your questions.

Now, Miss Rachels.haven, what I am about to discuss is because I care about you.  I certainly don't want to come across as condescending.  You have proven yourself quite capable of doing just about anything.  But I would prefer to ask and be perceived as condescending than fail to ask and you end up getting hurt.  So my question is this: how familiar are you with using a chainsaw?  I ask only because when my Beautiful Gal and I first moved to our place in Arkansas I had only used an electric home owner's type chainsaw, and that only a couple of times.  So I knew I needed to learn as much as I could about chainsaws, felling trees, and safety.  I watched a series of videos put out by the British Columbia Canadian government that explained chainsaw safety and how to fell different types of trees, located here.  I am by no means an expert now, but I am so glad I watched them.





And in case you think you don't need to invest in some safety equipment, here is what I did one day using the chainsaw: 


Hope this helps, and that you are able to get those trees cut down.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Snow dogs.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm not familiar at all other than reading, YouTube, and watching and listening to my dad. There's a good chance the ones I've got won't start at all. We took the snow blower in that was also inherited and it was too worn to be worth fixing. The little chain saws may be the same way. I will get safety gear, but only if I have something that starts and is in good shape. The neighbors said he used them a lot. They will probably need work if they start at all so I will have plenty of time for getting safety gear and trying to get prepared. The neighbor said he'd teach me the ins and outs if I wanted to learn, so I'm not on my own.


----------



## rachels.haven

And my fence is only 4' tall. It won't keep a coyote out, but that's what the dogs are for. With the dogs the predators have to be gutsy enough to approach the fence while being barked at, climbed the fence while the dogs harass them, and jump down into a pen already surrounded by dogs ready to get the animal that doesn't belong. As long as the dogs are on the job, the fence + dogs should work.


----------



## Bruce

Yep, best to take the saws in for a checkover and tune up. You want them running well. 

I learned the same way as STA, YouTube videos, lots of them. I started with a small homeowner saw just shortening cord wood I bought since some of the pieces were a bit long for the stove. Cut some low limbs that were in the way. Cut up a few trees that had dropped on their own. Finally got to cutting standing trees. The little Stihl MS180 C-BE was really over taxed doing that so this year I bought an Echo CS 590 Timberwolf. BIG step up in power and speed, also weighs a fair bit more so I think I'll use the Stihl for limbing after dropping trees with the Echo, then buck them with the Echo. I still need to make another scabbard to carry the second saw on the tractor. Biggest issue is I really have no decent way to get the gear out to the woods. I'm still a rank amature but I do have the safety equipment.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I think I'm going to try sealing up the void on the wasp nest hole with more trim next chance I have a ladder holder then and hopefully end this wasp saga for the year.


Oh, the nest is up inside the eaves? Bummer, yeah close up that hole. I've only had paper wasps and far as I know there are no nests that aren't in the open.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, they left their hive out front on a tree in the fall (so I crushed it) and went into a void in the house trim and started coming through the house walls as they died for the year. I knew they liked to dig, but not go into walls. New to me.


----------



## Bruce

From what I read they will try to "winter" in attics and such if they can get in. Of course they come out into the house looking for food. I think the biggest concern is if a mated queen is up there hibernating because come spring, here comes the nest and eggs. Definitely DON'T need a nest in the attic!


----------



## rachels.haven

Chewing on that. Thank you. Good to know.


----------



## rachels.haven

We have a wind advisory (up to 50mph) and the world is sopping wet (pond full) and cold. That's most of the equation for losing trees. I wonder what behemoth is going to randomly fall today? Although maybe it's a spring thing and the water may need more time to work it's magic, is what I'm hoping.
...I need a pattern here...No bough and tree dodgeball should be played here today, gosh darn it.


----------



## Baymule

Hope no trees fall in places you don't want them to.


----------



## rachels.haven

We survived.
Dogs guarding chickens. Chickens not visible from window.




Baby goats.


----------



## farmerjan

Your African violets are beautiful.  I used to raise alot of them.  Watered them with the water out of the fish tanks and they did great.  The goats are cute. Glad there wasn't any tree damage.   Puppy is really growing.


----------



## WolfeMomma

Such cute goats!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks, I'll give them an extra cuddle to pass it on to them, and thanks farmerjan. Those are my first trailer violets- and they're minis. They grow and bloom like little weeds. I usually keep my avs in my lab, but those and a few normal minis fit there, and the kitchen needs the intentional disorder and greenery.

We did have some tree damage that I need to take care of, but no one got scared or hurt, so I'm satisfied.

More snow is falling. The amount of winter water this area gets is amazing.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> and the kitchen needs the intentional disorder ...


Is that what it is called? I thought our house was "severely cluttered". Now I know it is "intentional disorder" ... only I'm pretty sure there is nothing intentional about it.


----------



## rachels.haven

But otherwise it looks like no one lives there. You can tell that to anyone who questions your "intentional disorder". The unintentional disorder stems from the children. We have to prove we live here too, right?


----------



## Bruce

You have young children, therefore a plausible excuse for mass clutter!


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, closest goat neighbor is selling out of chickens, rabbits, and her finnsheep for cheap. Too bad I don't want sheep. I definitely don't have enough grass even if I did want to play sheep. Looks like someone could get a starter sheep herd for $200. I think it has to due with relationship (therefore none of my business) stuff, but I hope she's doing okay.


----------



## Baymule

I sure would be tempted on the sheep. Lamb is good!


----------



## rachels.haven

It would be more tempting if I knew more about sheep. Bred pregnant ewes from a breed that kids multiples and wethers for eating would be interesting if they were goats.


----------



## Baymule

Sheep are easy. I go feed in the mornings and there is a new lamb/lambs. I have witnessed only 3 births in 5 lambing seasons. I just sat and watched, they did not need me. If I had to baby them, stay up all night, pull lambs, and jump through hoops, that ewe would be leaving. 

If they are a good deal, you could always resell them.


----------



## rachels.haven

What about parasites? I hear sheep get them bad.


----------



## Baymule

Not any worse than goats. If you get serious about Sheep, you can take fecals  and select for parasite resistance.


----------



## Baymule

Not any worse than goats. If you get serious about Sheep, you can take fecals  and select for parasite resistance.


----------



## Baymule

Oops.


----------



## Bruce

"*Finnsheep - Wikipedia*
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Finnsheep
The Finnish Landrace, _Finn_ or _Finnsheep_ is a breed of domestic _sheep_ native to Finland. It is one of several Northern European short-tailed _sheep_ breeds, but is notable for its high incidence of multiple births – it is common for a ewe to have three, four, or even five lambs at once."

And 
Finnsheep breeders association


----------



## rachels.haven

Naw, I'm not really a sheep person. 
If I got sheep my 4 year old would never let me live it down because he wants the next animal we do to be a dairy cow-specifically a (giant) holstein but he'd settle for any of the other bold spotted ones (especially a Guernsey named Guern) and I could take care of it forever for him. Unfortunately for him, cows are a whole other level and definitely not for hanging out with kids...Maybe when he's 14 I'll get one for him instead of a car. He's been asking since we moved here-only A LITTLE (giant) dairy cow.

...I feel like if we got a cow we'd need to build a separate barn shelter, a separate hay shelter for round bales, get a trailer, get a different car, get a round bale feeder and stock tanks, bigger milking stanchion, stronger fences, different manure management strategy...I think I'll just take him to someone's dairy farm store and buying some raw cow milk for Christmas, because I am not smitten by cows-yet. Some of the smaller breeds like jerseys are beautiful.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Naw, I'm not really a sheep person.
> If I got sheep my 4 year old would never let me live it down because he wants the next animal we do to be a dairy cow-specifically a (giant) holstein but he'd settle for any of the other bold spotted ones (especially a Guernsey named Guern) and I could take care of it forever for him. Unfortunately for him, cows are a whole other level and definitely not for hanging out with kids...Maybe when he's 14 I'll get one for him instead of a car. He's been asking since we moved here-only A LITTLE (giant) dairy cow.
> 
> ...I feel like if we got a cow we'd need to build a separate barn shelter, a separate hay shelter for round bales, get a trailer, get a different car, get a round bale feeder and stock tanks, bigger milking stanchion, stronger fences, different manure management strategy...I think I'll just take him to someone's dairy farm store and buying some raw cow milk for Christmas, because I am not smitten by cows-yet. Some of the smaller breeds like jerseys are beautiful.


Not trying to sell you anything ....but...in the 70 s when I had my farm, we had six milking goats and six cows all in the same small barn, the adult cows as well as calfs would ALWAYS step aside while I was pregnant so I could feed them, they were so loving and kind...guess it is all about how they are raised. 
My vet now, became a vet due to his pet cow he had growing up. He just put her down last year....be it sheep, goats, chickens ,ducks or cows....animals will respond to kindness.


----------



## Bruce

I'm not real sure you have enough space for a cow anyway.


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw. That's so sweet. Yes, and very little grass. Maybe in ten years when all the trees have fallen down and the goats have stopped new weedy ones from growing up.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh my goodness. I love my kids. We went to local dairy farm and spent $5 on a half gallon of unpasteurized, unhomogenized, normal milk for my youngest to enjoy for the holidays (or whenever, that's not super pricey considering price of producing milk). He asked the farmer himself to see the cows, so he got to pet and introduce himself to a herd of about a dozen extremely silky, fluffy soft normandies and normandy crosses. In the car he got sad because he really wants one of those cows now. They had spots. He's in love with the cow milk and cows.

(The other kid got frozen feet because he wasn't wearing snow pants and handles cold about as well as I do.)

We're still not getting cows, but that was fun.


----------



## thistlebloom

Rachel, I'm reading through your journal and am enjoying it very much. I'm at the part where you have just moved -love that little barn!- and I got sympathetic stressed over your driving through a blizzard in the dark in sub zero temps. Whew, so glad you made it ok!
Rainy yucky indoor kind of day here, so perfect for catching up.


----------



## Bruce

How far is that dairy from your house? Maybe he can work there when he gets older.


----------



## farmerjan

Normandies are a great breed of dairy cattle and make a good "dual purpose" breed too as they carry alot more weight than the standard dairy breeds that we are familiar with.  More meat on the calves for butcher.  Neat that your son likes then so much.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's a good idea @Bruce . I'll try to make that his plan. His eyes light up every time he saw a cow picture in the grocery store afterward. I wonder where he's going to decide to take this cow-obsession business.
Thank you @thistlebloom . I think we're finally getting settled in here after all the chaos. It took a while.

And @farmerjan , I guess the dual purpose-nature explains why they were selling beef in their farm stand too (and berkshire pork, and duck and goose eggs). The cows were really lovely too. They were way friendly and I've never seen cows in such good shape with such a soft coat texture. Whatever they're doing for them over there, it's working. I hope they sell lots of $5/half gallon milk (and beef and pork) and are able to continue with their adventure as long as they want. 

I'll probably be back on Monday for some pork and beef.


----------



## Bruce

farmerjan said:


> Normandies are a great breed of dairy cattle and make a good "dual purpose" breed too as they carry alot more weight than the standard dairy breeds that we are familiar with.  More meat on the calves for butcher.  Neat that your son likes then so much.


ENABLER!!!!!


----------



## thistlebloom

I just looked Normande cattle up. Those are some very pretty cows. I pay $6 per half gallon of raw cream line Guernsey milk. Kind of a luxury, but it is delicious, and if I'm going to drink milk at all, I'd rather it be the real deal.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'd pay something like that normally if it's good milk and it helps other small farmers get by. I expected more along the lines of $8/half gallon the way prices here go, but $5 for something that nice is wonderful. And right in time for the goats' dry period to start next month. I kind of wonder what it costs to make a half gallon of milk and professionally bottle it like they do.

personally, I still like fatty, creamy, thick lamancha/ND milk, with just a hint of goat funk the best, but for cow milk that was stellar, and milk from cows that like attention with nice farm owners is even better. Maybe it's just because the only cows I've ever met have been angus and never anything dairy, but today felt really special.


----------



## Baymule

I have researched Normande cattle, they are drop dead gorgeous. If I were to have a dairy cow, I'd want a Normande. I'd have to go way far away to get one, because there aren't any here. 
glad that y'all had such a good time, maybe you can take your kids to see the cows on a regular basis. Sounds like a lovely farm.


----------



## rachels.haven

Never say anything is settled. Never. A neighbor I've never met before that does not border our property and is nowhere nearby, with a revine and huge pine tree wooded hill between us sent an angry text accusing our dogs of barking all night and keeping them up all night since forever.
Here's the kicker-they rarely bark all night. And when they do have bad nights, it's rare and justified. Also, when I stand by our mail box for the kid's am bus, which is as close as I ever get to their property (and their home is still a ways off) and our dog barks I can BARELY hear it, leaves on or off. I'm flabbergasted. 

I'm calling the ag commissioner who is also the animal control officer to know my rights. We're in a right to farm town, and you have to sign something when you buy a house telling you you ARE in a right to farm community and that means smell, dust, and noise any time of night or day from farms, but I need to know if that includes LGD's for sure before telling this guy tough nuggets. If the dogs can't work I don't know what we'll do. My kids would be in danger any time they left the house and that really loud coy-dog is still coming in and out. Animals would die, the coy dog would go back to work on destroying my chicken run and coop, and my kids could get mauled or killed. I can't really be expected, as a gun rookie, to be an armed guard for my children every time they go ride their bikes or roll on the hill, or to have to carry a gun to walk 300ft to the barn in the dark so I don't get stalked to the door again (and they see you first!). This is supposed to be MY HOME.

I could threaten to fire a shotgun off every half hour all night long instead of the dogs, but I really don't want to do that. I like my real neighbors. This is really a blow.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Never say anything is settled. Never. A neighbor I've never met before that does not border our property and is nowhere nearby, with a revine and huge pine tree wooded hill between us sent an angry text accusing our dogs of barking all night and keeping them up all night since forever.
> Here's the kicker-they rarely bark all night. And when they do have bad nights, it's rare and justified. Also, when I stand by our mail box for the kid's am bus, which is as close as I ever get to their property (and their home is still a ways off) and our dog barks I can BARELY hear it, leaves on or off. I'm flabbergasted.
> 
> I'm calling the ag commissioner who is also the animal control officer to know my rights. We're in a right to farm town, and you have to sign something when you buy a house telling you you ARE in a right to farm community and that means smell, dust, and noise any time of night or day from farms, but I need to know if that includes LGD's for sure before telling this guy tough nuggets. If the dogs can't work I don't know what we'll do. My kids would be in danger any time they left the house and that really loud coy-dog is still coming in and out. Animals would die, the coy dog would go back to work on destroying my chicken run and coop, and my kids could get mauled or killed. I can't really be expected, as a gun rookie, to be an armed guard for my children every time they go ride their bikes or roll on the hill, or to have to carry a gun to walk 300ft to the barn in the dark so I don't get stalked to the door again (and they see you first!). This is supposed to be MY HOME.
> 
> I could threaten to fire a shotgun off every half hour all night long instead of the dogs, but I really don't want to do that. I like my real neighbors. This is really a blow.



A angry neighbor who is coward enough to send a text accusing  your dogs of barking all night is full of hot air...let the grumpy old fart send you a formal letter of complaint, then contact you animal control person,.when the AC person sees the distance he lives from you, and  with no way to prove that it was your dogs barking / alerting to the coyote or coydog......don't  spin your wheels over a idiot,  if he doesn't  like too darn bad, he hasn't  got the num nums to politely  come to your door and talk....how did he get your phone number ?..some people are just grumpy people....born that way and will die that way......


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, I'll do my best. Right now, I am mad (and still haven't replied, mainly because of lack of polite reply and not knowing the laws for SURE). I may just go ahead and ignore him I'm so mad.

You can barely EVEN hear the dogs when they do bark from the other side of the barnyard dsjfdskfdsjdsfkfjsdljsdfjk. 






						Producer's Pride Castrator Premium Bander at Tractor Supply Co.
					

Find Producer's Pride Castrator Premium Bander in the Livestock Veterinary Supplies category at Tractor Supply Co.The Producer's Pride Castrator




					www.tractorsupply.com
				









						Producer's Pride Castrating Bands, Pack of 100 at Tractor Supply Co.
					

Find Producer's Pride Castrating Bands, Pack of 100 in the Livestock Veterinary Supplies category at Tractor Supply Co.Producer's Pride Castrati




					www.tractorsupply.com


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Lol, I'll do my best. Right now, I am mad (and still haven't replied, mainly because of lack of polite reply and not knowing the laws). I may just go ahead and ignore him I'm so mad.
> 
> You can barely EVEN hear the dogs when they do bark from the other side of the barnyard dsjfdskfdsjdsfkfjsdljsdfjk.


Totally ignore him, let him call animal control.....you are within you rights on your own property, he has no proof of it being your dogs, could of been the coyotes making noise...prove it. The burden of proof is on him, not you.
Piss him off and don't  respond to something that holds no meaning..


----------



## thistlebloom

rachels.haven said:


> Lol, I'll do my best. Right now, I am mad (and still haven't replied, mainly because of lack of polite reply and not knowing the laws for SURE). I may just go ahead and ignore him I'm so mad.
> 
> You can barely EVEN hear the dogs when they do bark from the other side of the barnyard dsjfdskfdsjdsfkfjsdljsdfjk.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Producer's Pride Castrator Premium Bander at Tractor Supply Co.
> 
> 
> Find Producer's Pride Castrator Premium Bander in the Livestock Veterinary Supplies category at Tractor Supply Co.The Producer's Pride Castrator
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.tractorsupply.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Producer's Pride Castrating Bands, Pack of 100 at Tractor Supply Co.
> 
> 
> Find Producer's Pride Castrating Bands, Pack of 100 in the Livestock Veterinary Supplies category at Tractor Supply Co.Producer's Pride Castrati
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.tractorsupply.com



I second Barb on this. Ignore him/her. To respond even politely I think would accelerate the toxin.
I can feel your justifiable anger. I figured that's where that bander and bands came in.


----------



## Baymule

I couldn't like that post. I loathe people like that. By all means, find out about YOUR rights to protect your livestock, children and yourself. What a moron.

 Coyotes woke me up at 2 AM, I got up 3 times to go out on the porch and listen to see how close they were. The dogs don't bark when the coyotes are howling, maybe they know something I don't. When I DON'T hear or see anything, sometimes they go nuts, makes me wonder.....


----------



## Bruce

I agree with Barb. Make him make the complaint and prove YOUR dogs are barking and if the RTF includes protecting your animals he has nothing anyway. 

Perhaps he should be told that if there were no predators, peoples dogs wouldn't bark at night. He should take it upon himself to rid the neighborhood of predators and solve his own problem.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Baymule said:


> The dogs don't bark when the coyotes are howling,


Interesting....mine strike up the band when the coyotes are singing.  They howl with them, and then they cuss 'em out, and then they howl some more, lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

He can complain but it won't do anything. Today a miracle happened and the head agricultural commissioner/barn inspector/town animal control officer called about 8:30 am and asked if he could do a barn inspection, so he came and went already. He said we look like a model farm, said we should get officially, legally classified as a farm (have to figure out how), join the farm bureau and mass goat club, and that the dogs are covered by our right to farm law.

My husband is still mortified that we're offending someone and is caught between being outraged and feeling like our privacy is violated (and loving the dogs, I didn't realize how much he likes them) and feeling bad about them doing what they do, but hopefully legally that is the "end" of it. I'll work on him. Our guests last night did not hear the dogs, and they were as loud as they get. New footprints out on the shared driveway this morning and all.

Oh MY GOODNESS, that was a short and intense crisis.

Now I get to decide if I make a polite response to the man and what to say since we are safe from them. I think I'm calm now.

I do need to get that bander, rubber bands, and a camping wire saw. One of my does has a scur that needs to be worked on as it's just starting to press into her head (but not an emergency). I wish I was the one that disbudded her. Even the does that I wasn't sure about their disbudding job are looking good still .


----------



## farmerjan

OH the joys of the jerks...... don't respond. If you get any more texts, make sure the guy who came and inspected your farm is aware.  It is actually better if they respond since he says you are legally covered.  Texts are considered legal for any kind of court things.  If they are threatening, then you have even more rights. 
Or respond and just say , received your text.  Please contact so and so ( the office of the guy who came out to inspect) if you have anything else to discuss.


----------



## thistlebloom

Happy news about the inspectors comments and advice!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Regarding the neighbor, remember that a soft answer turns away wrath. (Prov 15:1)  My advice is to be polite to him, but notify him of what the law says.  I like the suggestion that you ask him to contact the name of the inspector.



rachels.haven said:


> He said we look like a model farm, said we should get officially, legally classified as a farm...



Wow!  That would be neat to see.  Are you going to call your place "Rachel's Haven Farm"?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

@SenileTexasAggie, very wise. I'll do my best. And in regards to farm name, first I checked with DH if he wanted it "our last name farm", which he thought was funny and didn't particularly, so I just used my goat herd name for the form today-Woodland Haven Farm. I think the important thing was that there wasn't much to see. I keep things moderately clean, swept often, and uncluttered and all the feed is in cans and hay put away. We still have rats, but it's an open air building with no predators, so why wouldn't they be here, I guess. I may have to get a barn kitty at some point. At least they are small rats here.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> He can complain but it won't do anything. Today a miracle happened and the head agricultural commissioner/barn inspector/town animal control officer called about 8:30 am and asked if he could do a barn inspection, so he came and went already. He said we look like a model farm, said we should get officially, legally classified as a farm (have to figure out how), join the farm bureau and mass goat club, and that the dogs are covered by our right to farm law.
> 
> My husband is still mortified that we're offending someone and is caught between being outraged and feeling like our privacy is violated (and loving the dogs, I didn't realize how much he likes them) and feeling bad about them doing what they do, but hopefully legally that is the "end" of it. I'll work on him. Our guests last night did not hear the dogs, and they were as loud as they get. New footprints out on the shared driveway this morning and all.
> 
> Oh MY GOODNESS, that was a short and intense crisis.
> 
> Now I get to decide if I make a polite response to the man d what to say since we are safe from them. I think I'm calm now
> 
> I do need to get that bander, rubber bands, and a camping wire saw. One of my does has a scur that needs to be worked on as it's just starting to press into her head (but not an emergency). I wish I was the one that disbudded her. Even the does that I wasn't sure about their disbudding job are looking good still .


I wouldn't say a word to him about his text...let him call animal control and talk to the man who just left your house.....let him keep his foot in his mouth and his head up his ....well you get what I mean, ....MERRY CHRISTMAS TO YOU AND YOUR FAMILY


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you, you too. I really don't want to reply, quite tired, so I won't for now.


----------



## rachels.haven

Merry Christmas all.
May you all have a happy, quiet, and cozy night.


----------



## Bruce

You too! May the coyotes visit somewhere else tonight


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Same to you my friend


----------



## rachels.haven

Wow. The dogs are super important to the chickens. We took the dogs on a walk in town on the rail trail with the inlaws. We were gone for about an hour. I came back with two tired dogs and discovered chicken feathers everywhere. Something got at least one of my egg eating chickens in our short absence. That would be why the dogs bark at night. The woods are always watching and the dogs have to watch it right back. I should be glad it wasn't a doeling, I guess.


----------



## Baymule

You are right about that, the woods are always watching!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Sure am glad it wasn't  something worse, ......any dog that protects is priceless.....


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Gosh, Miss @rachels.haven!  Any idea what it might have been?  Do you have installed game cameras that will capture pictures of the predator(s)?  I hope you can get rid of it/them.  I hope your dogs are OK.


----------



## rachels.haven

The dogs are doing good. They were just out with us taking some time off to be pet dogs when something came around. I'm a bit afraid of what I'll see with a game can. We're infested with things people should be shooting but aren't and I'm trying to deny that.

A game can is a good idea though. I'll strongly consider it.


----------



## farmerjan

Just one missing, feathers around..... no holes in the fence that you can find?   Probably a hawk unless there is something like a bobcat around.


----------



## rachels.haven

Possibly. We do also have bobcats. Oddly I've yet to see a fox. It could also still be a coyote. I don't trust them not to go over the fence. The important thing is that the dogs are back at work.


----------



## farmerjan

If you have coyotes close you seldom will have many foxes.  They don't co-habitate the same general area well.  Coyotes will often kill more than one if they are running around going nuts.  They are like raccoons, they will kill for fun.  Foxes will grab and go if they can carry it.  But coons and coyotes will kill for the fun of it,  then carry off one.


----------



## rachels.haven

A hay lady in town I was in touch with earlier contacted me on Sunday. She brought in some second cutting from NY that she was sure my goats would love. (She sells what she grows until she runs out normally) It's about $10/bale, which is normal rate in this horse town (my littleton hay guy is $8/55lbs bales). I knew I didn't have enough to get through winter, so I said yes to 1,800 lbs of it BUT she said it had to be delivered that day because of winter weather and she'd waive delivery fee if it could be that way, so i said yes to that too. That would have included putting it in the hay loft for me with an elevator if my large gate was 10ft instead of 8ft 6" (thanks fence guy, told you so, I'll address that later). So I had almost a ton of hay delivered to my garage for me to put away as usual. Those $10 bales were about 70lbs each, dry as a bone, and grass FULL of alfalfa. I am very, very happy. The goats are also very happy. I think after this massive bale I'm going to let them eat through the other hay and use the alfalfa hay going into kidding. That hay is really a blessing. It is also being stored on the ground floor of the barn because I am not (s)he-woman.

My bucks are wormy again. Time to muck out and worm (then repeat 10 days later, and again if needed). It's annoying. I got fecal samples collected today to do before I dose.

New lamanchas came and it looks like they have had bad hoof rot at one point. It does not seem to be active and no limping, but their hooves are terrible. I have Koppertox on hand and am ready to use it. My goats occasionally get a touch of it if I neglect their hooves, but nothing like these. Dry bedding will help. Nothing smelly, just deformed, pocketed hooves, some separation. I'm a little irked. I can handle this, but that looks so painful. These are NICE goats. It shouldn't have happened to them, and if I'd known, I'm not sure I would have paid what I did for them. Regardless, they're in a good place now, and I like things clean and dry and I stay on top of feet so they should improve. My lamancha herd is done for now.

Welcome Lucky 4-leaf Count Chocula and Kaos Farm Uranium. Come and heal and get fat and grow bigger. The other lamancha buck I got from the same place is quite fat now and his feet are improving slowly. I'm hoping these guys do the same.

Part of me wishes I could add teats like this into my nigerian herd. They're only an hour and a half away. Pricy, especially considering that my interactions with Avalon the Bucky are still not always great.
http://tinyhillfarm.com/?page_id=64

I gave Ava back her doelings. No more nursing has taken place. Her udder is still messed up from their rough treatment of it, so I'm glad they're seeking lunch elsewhere. Every time she starts to fill it cracks. I'm trying to dry her off (still) without traumatizing the area too bad. She should not get tight. I'm hoping daily attention, antibiotic ointment, and cleaning will fix it. She really loves kicking me in the face. Sometimes it works better to just lift her rear half up, prop her up on my leg, and clean and butter her udder and let her kick. I'm still bigger. Not helping her learn good behavior though. If she doesn't improve her behavior by her next kidding in April I will probably sell her and she can go kick someone else. I'm hoping for does out of her by Patrick. I love sweet Patrick.

Happy New Year everyone!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Have you ever used bag balm ?  Used to use it when I lived in NH on my goats , worked great in the winter....
Hope you catch a break from the snow  .


----------



## rachels.haven

No, I'll try that. Thanks!


----------



## rachels.haven

Avalon says, "hi".
She's a beast.


----------



## Bruce

Bummer on that gate. I put in 12' gates and they are none too large unless the tractor is driven straight through. No corner cutting if a gate isn't much wider than the vehicle. 

Will the hooves improve to "couldn't tell there was ever a problem" with proper care from now on?


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Avalon says, "hi".
> She's a beast.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Will the hooves improve to "couldn't tell there was ever a problem" with proper care from now on?



Not sure. I'll find out, I guess.


----------



## rachels.haven

I guess I could show pictures. I think the pockets and separation will go away as I cut them out and it grows. One hoof on the young buck looks like a ball. As he was delivered here I was told it got stuck in a fence. I flattened out the bottom until I saw blood and as the blood recedes I will flatten more. I'm afraid to look at the doelings feet. She's so sweet and looks like a fawn. I don't want to hurt that sweet little face.


----------



## Bruce

"Got stuck in a fence"
OK, I don't know much about goats but that sure sounds like a load of goat pellets to me.


----------



## farmerjan

One thing we have used on cows udders that get chapped or even with some frostbite is the people lotion, Aveeno.  It's cheap in comparison to some of the "animal remedies" and I like it.  More "runny" so will go on in the cold as opposed to bag balm which will get very "stiff" unless you keep it in where it is warm.  Of course, it feels better to them if it is warm when you put it on too.  And the Aveeno will work into the skin real well.  No residue either when the next milking comes around for the cow.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks @farmerjan ! I've got that. I'll try it tomorrow.

@Bruce It's possible his hoof rotted off at one point, or maybe he did get stuck in a fence and it got very damaged, but I'm willing to just see it as what I've got now, let's see where we go with it.


----------



## rachels.haven

The hoof could also be nutritional. We'll see.


----------



## Baymule

We once bought a donkey because we felt sorry for him. He was standing in knee deep mud, his legs had no hair and were covered in sores. His hooves were grown out and curled up, the worst I have ever seen. With time, care and love, his legs cleared up, his skin was healthy and the hair grew back. His hooves took time to correct. His feet toed outwards. Consistent trimming and care brought his hooves back in good shape and his feet finally straightened, pointed straight ahead.

You got nice goats with lousy feet. You are already addressing that issue. To promote growth and healthy hooves, for horses I use Horseshoer's Secret. It is great stuff. The first link includes a list of ingredients so you can see if any of them would not be good for your goats. 









						Horseshoer's Secret
					






					www.smartpakequine.com
				






			https://www.statelinetack.com/item/farnam-horseshoers-secret/SLT122486%20011/?srccode=GPSLT&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI9pu70rXh5gIV0xZ9Ch0EiwNKEAQYAyABEgKkJ_D_BwE
		


You can also use Mane and Tail Hoofmaker cream that you rub into the hoof. It works too, plus it will harden up your fingernails. 





__





						Mane n Tail Hoofmaker 32 oz with Pump | Straight Arrow                                           Big Dee's Horse Tack & Vet Supplies
					

Mane 'n Tail's Hoofmaker by Straight Arrow helps maintain strong, yet flexible hooves on your horse and moisturizes to help reduce the incidence of drying, brittle and inflexible surfaces.




					www.bigdweb.com


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you! I like those. I may even be able to find them locally considering it's horse country.


----------



## rachels.haven

THE MUCKING IS FINISHED. My New Year's resolution is to never let it go 5 weeks again. Time to milk, run fecals, and worm.
I didn't clean the bantam coop, but I'll do that when I cull the hatchery cockerels in the next few weeks.


----------



## Bruce

You have the next 4 weeks to test your resolution


----------



## Baymule

You should be able to find them at Feed stores, Tractor Supply or farm stores.


----------



## rachels.haven

Anyone have any tips on what to do with this foot? It's the worst hoof on the worst goat. I'm having trouble finding that pale, healthy sole tissue when I cut to boot(so I quicked him), but nothing stinks, so I guess we could be worse off.


----------



## Baymule

I would start him immediately on the Horseshoer's Friend and rubbing the Hoofmaker cream on his hooves every day. These are damaged hooves and are going to have to grow out, with the care and attention that you give your animals, it will take time, but you will truly get him "back on his feet" again!


----------



## rachels.haven

Alright, time to check the Farmers' Exchange (25 min) then and if they don't have it TSC (40 min, and having to brave X-mas clearance and tiny toy animals with the boys). Psyching myself up to it (or I may take DH and have him help with kids in car when I go in, then we hit walmart next door). Alone TSC runs are fun. With kids...nope.

Last night the big coyote came by and fence fought with both dogs. I guess the party pack has moved out so he's coming through. That thing's barks and howls are something else. It's nice to not have to worry. DH and I listened. Bailey followed him along the fence, not letting him in and Badger barked from in front of the barn when he came close enough. That was Badger's first time working nights. He's got a lovely low Wo, wo,wooo bark. I think he's going to be a big, big dog.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, free shipping from tsc on those items. No trip necessary.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Alright, time to check the Farmers' Exchange (25 min) then and if they don't have it TSC (40 min, and having to brave X-mas clearance and tiny toy animals with the boys). Psyching myself up to it (or I may take DH and have him help with kids in car when I go in, then we hit walmart next door). Alone TSC runs are fun. With kids...nope.
> 
> Last night the big coyote came by and fence fought with both dogs. I guess the party pack has moved out so he's coming through. That thing's barks and howls are something else. It's nice to not have to worry. DH and I listened. Bailey followed him along the fence, not letting him in and Badger barked from in front of the barn when he came close enough. That was Badger's first time working nights. He's got a lovely low Wo, wo,wooo bark. I think he's going to be a big, big dog.


Fences and  LGD's ...gotta love them.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Lol, free shipping from tsc on those items. No trip necessary.


I was going to suggest using the phone to locate the product before you drove out in hopes of finding it. But this saves you all the driving!


----------



## rachels.haven

I found a son #2 video.






Cow pedicures in a fancy dairy. And some have spots. Thanks YouTube.


----------



## farmerjan

The farm I tested this afternoon is a "rapid exit" like the holstein farm in this video.  It does make the milking go faster as the cows all get to go out quickly rather than all following one by one through an exit gate.  Most farms here do not feed any grain in the parlor and it is the first time I have seen this type of feeder in a parallel as this one is called.  The cows are milked from the back, so you can get more in the same amount of space than the ones that milk the cows from the side which is called a herringbone.   And I have to take exception with his "crazy Jersey" comment, but then I am partial to "Brown cows" in general.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today I slid on my bum all the way down the hill to service the chicken coop, which made Bailey very concerned so she whined and tried to get in my way and check me out until I reassured her I was fine (the chickens took a break from egg eating, but are back at it as of today, btw-what a mess). Our 6 or so inches of snow has partially thawed and refroze so the whole ground is covered with about 4" of ice. Then I crawled and carefully picked my way back to the ground level back door. My crampons are arriving on Wednesday. *facepalm* Alternately I could drive to REI and get gag worthy expensive ones. But then I'd have to go to REI.

Carrying 5 gallon buckets of water to the barn over ice is also challenging.

Right before Christmas I fell on some random ice right outside the garage door flat on my back and shoulder one evening and it was agony to breathe for several days, so I consider myself out of strikes this year and I am being very careful. I'm going to be doing minimal barn visits until the crampons come I guess, and minimal walking in the snow if possible. Just like in my childhood, snow is still pain, just not cold, sandblast your face pain-more like pulverize you pain.

Drying up Summer, Saffron is pretty much dry, Ava's udder improving painfully slowly, but faster than before with the lotion, antibiotic ointment, and the bag balm that came yesterday. Her doelings are nursing a little but she's kicking and headbutting them away. Saffron's getting big and wide. Not much more to say about the new buck(s). The nigerian bucks are themselves, as usual. Epimetheus Lace is being herself too. I'm separating and graining/alfalfa pelleting Kaos Farm Uranium because she is thin and doesn't have the pluck to compete with the others in any way-she just sits out on the ice all day so no one bothers her, especially Ava who is being a real pill again lately. I may grain/pellet the lamancha bucks too to help their feet grow. They are also a bit thin. Ava's doelings are NOT thin. They are round, so nothing but hay and water for them.

Working on getting Badger to stop baseball batting people with his paws and trying to chew them. It's not good with this weather. I'm wondering if the komondor part of him makes him so airborne and crazy. He's now as tall as Bailey, but not as long and rectangular, and has good days and bad days with behavior. He's mostly a bit of a blockhead with little hints coming back in that he wants to help and be your friend. If he'd just stop bouncing...He even bounces Bailey, then she beats the baloney out of him until he starts yelping and running away. I'm not as brutal as she is. His body is bigger than his brain. I WILL out consistent him on this, and he WILL stop jumping.

Contemplating my new chicken flock. I love leghorns for their food drive, speed, and rate of lay. I find them high strung, but not crazy. White eggs are one of my favorite colors. I do not like their combs, but I could get used to them. With that food drive there is also the chance that they started the egg eating. They are always ready to start a feeding frenzy. McMurray listed their True Blues as one of their "best" layers this year. Last year they were only "good". I think they added more leghorn to the "breed". I may get some of those too after I empty the coop. I'm contemplating keeping my rooster. Despite never showing any tendency towards it, I'm worried he may harbor some egg eating too. I'm wondering if it would be better just to make a clean break and restart completely-BUT the older the rooster, the less teen age"drive" he should have. I may crate him with an egg for a few days to check. There's a good chance it's just the hens in the nests. He's far too busy of a rooster to hang around the boxes (but I could be wrong, I guess). If I do a clean break and depopulate, I can brood chicks in the coop....meh, plenty to think about, plenty of time to do it in.


----------



## thistlebloom

Ugh, be careful on that ice. It seems that even when you are being ultra careful your feet can just shoot out from under you unexpectedly.


----------



## farmerjan

Do not crate the rooster with an egg/eggs to see if he is eating.  The boredom of being crated, with no hens to take care of, will turn him to the eggs even if he never touched them in the past. A chicken/rooster/hen will go to extremes if crated for any length of time and they will do what they would not do out loose.  
As for the leghorns..... find some that are rose comb instead of the single comb.  Some of the bigger hatcheries ought to carry them.  Try Ideal in Texas, I have gotten birds from them in the past and had very good service.  Don't know if they have rose comb leghorns but there are breeders that have them.  You could subscribe to the Poultry Press and find a breeder of rose comb leghorns but they would be more show quality and might not lay as good.
Hamburgs come in different colors, lay white eggs, are fairly active like leghorns and have rose combs. Considered to be non-sitting fowl like leghorns. 
If there is any way for you to make a trip to Eastern States Expo... the BIG E.... in Springfield Mass, they have a huge poultry show put on by the Northeastern Poultry Congress.  You will see more breeds of chickens , turkeys, waterfowl than you can imagine.  You can google it, show is Jan 18-19th . 
There will usually be a few companies that set up booths with poultry supplies,  You might find something to stop your hens from eating eggs.


----------



## rachels.haven

McMurray has the rose comb leghorns. They don't lay as well though.
Springfield is an hour and a half away. For a special occasion, it's do-able. Let's see what happens. A poultry expo would be fun even if I wasn't looking for solutions. I've considered roll out nest boxes, but people report hens going into the rollout box through the shoot and having a hay day or learning to catch eggs, so I've held off.


----------



## Baymule

I hate egg eaters. Those are MINE.


----------



## rachels.haven

yeah, I know. I wouldn't mind as much if they would eat neatly and not foul the other eggs and bedding and would eat less afterward but they really love making a mess and getting obese...and then I get whatever they stoop to give me to boot.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Right before Christmas I fell on some random ice right outside the garage door flat on my back and shoulder one evening and it was agony to breathe for several days, so I consider myself out of strikes this year and I am being very careful.


That was LAST year! But I don't suppose it would be good to start striking out again so soon in the year   



rachels.haven said:


> I've considered roll out nest boxes, but people report hens going into the rollout box through the shoot and having a hay day or learning to catch eggs, so I've held off.


Sounds like they aren't very well designed roll out nest boxes then. A hen shouldn't be able to reach the eggs once they have gone down the back let alone get into the collection area.


----------



## rachels.haven

I've thought about this one. 






						Laying Nest
					

A budget-friendly roll-out nesting box for up to 6 hens. Also has legs for nesting ducks.




					www.premier1supplies.com
				




The reviews I read were on amazon...not exactly a fountain of quality, I guess. Frequent complaints of that on different models.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> I've thought about this one.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Laying Nest
> 
> 
> A budget-friendly roll-out nesting box for up to 6 hens. Also has legs for nesting ducks.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.premier1supplies.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The reviews I read were on amazon...not exactly a fountain of quality, I guess. Frequent complaints of that on different models.



At $30 I would consider trying one to see of it works...but I wonder if your freezing temperatures  would make the plastic brittle ?


----------



## rachels.haven

Quite possible, but I'd be willing to try. If I don't have to take them down to wash them when a feast happens it's a lot less likely they'll break.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Quite possible, but I'd be willing to try. If I don't have to take them down to wash them when a feast happens it's a lot less likely they'll break.


Don't  the eggs roll to the covered back where the chickens can't  reach them ?


----------



## Baymule

Build your own.









						New rollout nest design Picture heavy-edited 1/21
					

Many of you have gotten my plans for a 2 unit rollout nest box and I have talked with several others about how to modify the plan to make it even larger.  I have been using a box that has 6 nests and for the past year it has worked beautifully.  Recently I have noticed several birds trying to...




					www.backyardchickens.com


----------



## rachels.haven

If they let them and the box hides them well enough. I'd read reports that hens learn to stick their heads down the shoot and get into ALL the eggs, or a few reports of "egg catching" BUT if this one is designed right, I shouldn't have to take them down and rattle them around to clean up after egg feasts. I'll think about getting 2 of them and trying them out. If they can't do that, the risk of breaking them in the cold is less. I'd also like to get one more of their "X-tough 1 sided hay feeders" to use for the goats. I really like them. AND premier 1 is the cheapest place to get decent carabiners. I should be able to make the free shipping cut off if I do decide to try the boxes. 

The nest boxes are still back ordered. Drat. Maybe I'll just keep waiting and thinking for a while then. 

...OR I could get an incubator and do that thing again. That is always an option.

Building my own is an option. I wouldn't even have to be that careful.There are nest box pads that adapt boxes to be rollouts. I'd just need time.






						Roll Out Tray with Flap for Nesting Boxes
					

Roll-out tray prevents hens from eating or soiling the eggs. For use with a ChickBox or as a DIY component in your own nesting box.




					www.premier1supplies.com


----------



## rachels.haven

The issue is, it costs around $50-75 to replace 14 hens and a rooster. I'm thinking it will cost more than that to revamp the nest boxes to rollouts. But I still get to keep my stock. Lots to think about.


----------



## Bruce

The nest boxes are pretty much forever. What happens if you eat your $75 worth of current chickens, replace them and happen to get more egg eaters? I guess I've been really lucky to never have had an egg eater!


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, this is only my second time having egg eaters, and the first time was REALLY obvious. She'd hover by the nests all day, beat up the hens in the nest box to kick them out, and gorge and she was non laying and FAT, FAT, FAT from all the eggs when I butchered her...like, I'm not sure how she was still alive with an abdominal cavity that packed full of a softball sized wad of fat,and fat on everything else. It tested my stomach, that butchering. I still remember the texture and how I couldn't even find her intestines at first  🤢  Egg eating is not good for hens.

I may still get the roll outs, but I have to admit, it makes me a little sad to have to take their eggs away before they've had a chance to brag about them in their egg songs, and sit on and horde all of them when they lay, and contemplate being broody and turning into a t-rex. It's part of being an annoying chicken. I'll go stew (think) some more.


----------



## rachels.haven

GAH. What happened to the price of Prohibit soluble powder? Last year at some point I bought a packet to use in case of emergency. Went back to jeffers to look for any extra info other than packet back. I can tell you I think I spent about $45-75, not $215. That's got to be a glitch. They have to have accidently combined product pages or something. It's $30 on caprine supply.


----------



## Baymule

$215? No way? There's got to be something wrong.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ooo. Wonder if someone's going to get paged over that.


----------



## rachels.haven

I checked the goats over yesterday and the two lamancha bucks have nice, dry feet despite being pocketed still. I'm hoping that will be good for growing out the compromised tissue without starting new infections.  I noticed Buggy is putting on muscle as he continues eating like he's starving to death (I decided tobegin graining him yesterday too, since I'll be using the horseshoer's secret supplement anyway, maybe we'll normalize him eventually) Mineral feeder got emptied. All bucks but Patrick still have pale eyelids. For some reason he colored up fast.
The does occasionally get wormy in the winter and right now a few are border line and I think I need to worm a few of them coming up, but they have not been wormy like my bucks have. My little guys got wormy right after rut and didn't bounce back super well, and it looks like the new guys are doing that post move thing goats do. The new bucks also started a "eating hay off the ground in the barn" habit which probably isn't helping. So now just a little hay is inside in a feeder, and the big hay bag is OUTSIDE. They don't seem to eat it off the ground out of the barn. All the hay may wind up there soon (although I fully support midnight snacking when they're sleeping in the barn and I like decoying the at the inside rack in the am for water bucket filling).

Today I will worm the does in question and start hoof treatment.


----------



## Xerocles

Egg eaters. Cheap enough to try, work or not. Cheap plastic paint tray on the nestbox floor. Heavy board across the "paint" end, so they lay on the angled "clean up" portion. Egg rolls down the tray and under the board. If it doesn't work.....you will probably eventually paint something anyhow.


----------



## rachels.haven

Nom, nom, nom, let's get fat! And moisturized feet!



(Above buck is just about what I'd call fat...although it's mostly hay belly, he's still ribby)

Newest buck, from the same place as buck above, but has only been here since new year's approximately. He's woolly, but there's not much to him yet.


----------



## rachels.haven

Nom, nom, nom, don't want to be left out, already fat!


----------



## Baymule

Oh goodie! Your hoofmaker came in! It sure will do your fingernails good too. I guess I ought to get some for ME! My nails keep breaking off from all the torture I put them through daily.


----------



## rachels.haven

It sure smells good. I may use both hands to apply it so I can be "using" it too. What a fun product.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sold the whitings and company (listed yesterday at soup hen price) AND the rooster with full disclosure. The guy wants to try and breed them anyway and whitings are apparently expensive birds. Bailey like the guy so much I had to lock her in the barn. She wanted to clobber him with affection. She was acting like a massive puppy.

Went out and did a grocery run and got stuff for kid smoothies. Got shavings from farmers exchange.

Went to dairy for more milk and some pork sausage. My first GOOD pork. Very little flavorings, but it was lean and the porky flavor was mild.

Mucked everything everywhere (goats, silkies) and got hen house ready for new chicks.

Goats are locked out under their barn wings because it's nice weather right now-above freezing by a LOOOONG shot and I want things to stay clean. High today was 65. Tomorrows will be too, then we will stay mostly above freezing until Thursday.

New reports on town fb page of an XL, brightly colored coyote trying to go for dogs while in view/arms reach of their owners. Latest dog was a 50 lbs collie type, owner saved it.

@Bruce
Someone's giving away their alpaca herd of 8 for free on the farmers' exchange bulletin board. Want some more friends?


----------



## Grant

If I was 


rachels.haven said:


> Sold the whitings and company (listed yesterday at soup hen price) AND the rooster with full disclosure. The guy wants to try and breed them anyway and whitings are apparently expensive birds. Bailey like the guy so much I had to lock her in the barn. She wanted to clobber him with affection. She was acting like a massive puppy.
> 
> Went out and did a grocery run and got stuff for kid smoothies. Got shavings from farmers exchange.
> 
> Went to dairy for more milk and some pork sausage. My first GOOD pork. Very little flavorings, but it was lean and the porky flavor was mild.
> 
> Mucked everything everywhere (goats, silkies) and got hen house ready for new chicks.
> 
> Goats are locked out under their barn wings because it's nice weather right now-above freezing by a LOOOONG shot and I want things to stay clean. High today was 65. Tomorrows will be too, then we will stay mostly above freezing until Thursday.
> 
> New reports on town fb page of an XL, brightly colored coyote trying to go for dogs while in view/arms reach of their owners. Latest dog was a 50 lbs collie type, owner saved it.
> 
> @Bruce
> Someone's giving away their alpaca herd of 8 for free on the farmers' exchange bulletin board. Want some more friends?


If I was close I’d consider it.  Too far from here to even think about.


----------



## thistlebloom

65 degrees? Wow, I'm assuming this is not typical Mass. winter weather? Congratulations on the quick sell of your flock. What breed are you considering for replacements? I need fresh hens next spring, almost ordered some chicks online the other night, but came to my senses. I need to wait until I cull my old hens first and I don't want to deal with that just yet.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> New reports on town fb page of an XL, brightly colored coyote trying to go for dogs while in view/arms reach of their owners. Latest dog was a 50 lbs collie type, owner saved it.


 Just too scary, that collie was as big as the coyote! I hope you aren't going outside without your gun.




rachels.haven said:


> @Bruce
> Someone's giving away their alpaca herd of 8 for free on the farmers' exchange bulletin board. Want some more friends?


You going to cart them up here?


----------



## rachels.haven

*Hastily packing 8 alpacas in Honda Odyssey*


----------



## Grant

Br


rachels.haven said:


> *Hastily packing 8 alpacas in Honda Odyssey*


Bringing them to Missouri or Vermont?


----------



## farmerjan

It's past time that the Mass game & wildlife people do something about that coyote.  Everyone always waits for someone to get hurt then they will go all spastic over it instead of just making it a point of just disposing of it before it gets to that point.  Please be careful.


----------



## rachels.haven

We are doing our best. A little scary because you tend not to see these critters until they want to be seen with all the forest and lack of home/street lights even in town (can't ruin the new england ambiance, now can we?). Local word is that whoever is in charge of fish and wildlife is not a good person and never does anything for anyone unless there is financial incentive, so no one will probably get any help until there's a lawsuit or very bad publicity up in the air, like a death or serious injury of a child I've never lived in a "anti gun" state, but apparently that means they never get of their rears and tell YOU to get a gun. Lazy hypocrites. I believe there was a bear that was chasing people out in fitchburg for the last year on and off that got taken care of...but I think it was the police that shot it finally, not fish and wildlife. I don't think fish and wildlife actually do anything but collect money for the time being.

At least I have big dogs. They seem to see and get offended at everything at night (including owls whoWHOOOOing at the top of their lungs on the roof, that was an interesting shouting match between Badger and a bird). We have our gun licenses, and DH could bring one home tomorrow on his way home from work, but I still have only had that one run in during the day that I could have seen the coyote and used the gun-if I had it with me while the kids were playing outside. Every other time the coyote would have had the upper hand and I would have had no target (now shooting blueberry leave eating turkeys is another matter, but that's not a dangerous matter for us)

Last night the dogs wouldn't calm down until I let the goats in, so the goats were allowed back in at about 12:30 last night (this am?). Point made dogs.


----------



## Baymule

Good dogs are a Blessing! I can' believe the level of stupidity over that coyote. Yes, I said STUPIDITY. He wouldn't have lasted that long here!


----------



## farmerjan

@Baymule  you cannot the believe the levels of stupidity in Mass.  Believe me, it is considered the absolutely worst of the New England states.  A bed of a$$hole rich hypocritical democrats and they are nearly as anti-gun as NY.  And as it seems that they are getting here in Va which I never would have thought..... but we are controlled by the "washington and richmond" idiots just like they are controlled by the "boston and martha's vineyard " priviledged and the NYorkers that are controlled by the ny city idiots.  Even Vermont and NH are getting to be stupid about some stuff.  I may be a new englander by birth, and in part of my heart, but I am no longer of that stupid mindset/group. 

Texas has had so many moving there from places like Calf that I have heard there are some changes in the politics down there in the city areas and that there are so many that it is somewhat affecting some of the voting, too.  It is a little scary.


----------



## thistlebloom

It's  happening all over. People move away from a place, then want to make where they moved to have the same politics that ruined the area they came from. They don't see the cause and effect. It is scary. We embraced the life here when we were the new kids.
But it's changing and it makes me so sad.


----------



## farmerjan

I have for years said the very same things you just said @thistlebloom .  People move to a "new place" then try to make it just like where they came from.  When I first moved to Va I got all kinds of grief because of being a Yankee.  I acknowledged that I was a Yankee, and that I came here because it wasn't like where I came from and that I didn't want it to be like where I came from,  because I never felt that I fit in there.  I was too "country" for the area of Ct where I was born and raised.
  I remember when I first went to the feed store and wanted non-medicated feed;  which was still made;  because I didn't want to feed arsenilic acid to my birds.  It was used as a appetite stimulant which made the birds eat more, produce more, grow faster.  I made the mistake of saying that I used to get feed without it in Ct and heard all about the go back where I came from if I didn't like it "here".  So, I learned to NEVER make a comment about "where I came from" until many years later when I became accepted for wanting to be here because I LIKED things the way they were here.  
And yes, I found another feed company that didn't put it in the feed.....

Today, we deal with so much more of the "move here with money they made elsewhere, then try to implement things that they used to have" .... frequently from the overflow of those that come to the DC area and then spill out into our more rural areas.  And the ones that take a vacation and see the cheaper prices here, then don't like some of the "backward ways" that we do stuff.  Or don't like the "live and let live" of the things like, this is my property, if I want to keep 10 junk vehicles for parts, that is none of your concern, even if you don't like the way it looks.....These kind of people may or may not see the cause and effect.... the thing is that they believe that THEY ARE SMARTER and RIGHT and that us "dumb old farmer types ... yeah us Deplorables"  just aren't smart enough or SOPHISTICATED enough to do things the "right way".   These are the ones that think that their money entitles them to "be the boss" over us that don't know what is good for us.  
 Like the WITCH next door not wanting the cell tower... they are from Mass...... yet accused us their first year here of  "you southerners are all the same with an attitude towards all the yankees that move here" .  We felt quite priviledged to be included in the "rest of the southerners".....since we are as much or more Yankee than them because they had come here from Ohio but were originally from Mass..... all because we wouldn't cut our prices to make their hay in the field right next to our field at the same time so it would be saving us money.... HUH?????  They got another neighbor to make it one time, then a different one, then no one will make it for them because she is impossible to deal with.  I could go on and on.  Suffice to say the next time her horses get out in the road, I will call the sherrif's dept and not do a thing to help as I have done twice in the past.  Maybe one will run out in front of me the next time and I can sue them for damages.....


----------



## thistlebloom

farmerjan said:


> *Today, we deal with so much more of the "move here with money they made elsewhere, then try to implement things that they used to have" .... *frequently from the overflow of those that come to the DC area and then spill out into our more rural areas. And the ones that take a vacation and see the cheaper prices here, then don't like some of the "backward ways" that we do stuff. Or don't like the "live and let live" of the things like, this is my property, if I want to keep 10 junk vehicles for parts, that is none of your concern, even if you don't like the way it looks.....These kind of people may or may not see the cause and effect.... the thing is that they believe that THEY ARE SMARTER and RIGHT and that us "dumb old farmer types ... yeah us Deplorables" just aren't smart enough or SOPHISTICATED enough to do things the "right way". These are the ones that think that their money entitles them to "be the boss" over us that don't know what is good for us.




Yep. What you said. The same exact situation here. Our state has exploded. There were just slightly more than 1 million population when we moved here, mostly conservative people. Now it's getting to be more of a liberal majority, and they mean to conform us all to what they deem best.


----------



## Baymule

Texas is a multicultural state and always has been. I’m proud of the diversity we have here. Sadly here too the liberals promise something for nothing and tickle the ears of the ignorant. I don’t mean ignorant in a stupid way, but ignorant of history, where we came from and ignorant of other countries that have followed the Pied Piper off into the land of free stuff. Indeed, ignorant of current events going on right now. Take it away from the other guy and GIVE it to me...... we always called that robbery.


----------



## rachels.haven

We hit 69 degrees today. Time for the temps to tank back to freezing.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Have you had to deal with a lot of snow this year, such as clearing sidewalks, driveways, and such?  Poor Miss @thistlebloom had to deal with that recently, and I think Mr. @Bruce has had to do so as well.  (We here in Arkansas have yet to have any snow, at least where we reside.)

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes. There's no way to get around it, and we've got an outrageously long driveway. Sometimes we give the plow man an extra $50 to do our driveway, but that's a lot of hay money so we shovel a lot.

Yeah, I don't like snow.


----------



## rachels.haven

Forgive me, I'm having a doubting moment on Badger. We've been having a long run of the bads from him. What are the chances that a puppy that without constant discipline fights goats off their alfalfa buckets through the fence and tries to turn goats (and people) into his personal chew and aggression toys is going to grow up to be a good lgd and be able to be unsupervised with livestock? I (and only me) have to be in arms reach to majorly discipline him any time he's anywhere near a goat (or my kids or husband). He only really respects me, and only after I discipline him FIRMLY in the last 2 minutes. I'm starting to wonder if his breeder should not have put komondor in the mix. We're really going to have 3 years of this kind of behavior?

He's not even behaving with goats through the fence so I'm not seeing how he's going to calm down and reform and be decent. I'm concerned about the risk he poses to the goats across a fence when he's supposed to be able to at least be WITH them without major concerns. He seems to see them as toys and food.


----------



## Baymule

Wow, this is going to take a lot of study and answer. Why don’t you take this to the LGD section and post it there? I’ll be on my laptop tonight and can post better there than on my phone.


----------



## rachels.haven

Alright will do. He's acting more like a dog that needs to be a pet IMO. I'm becoming very worried. I've been trying to out consistency him on everything but it doesn't seem to be working. It's like I'm fighting his wiring to chase and beat up stuff. He's great with chickens though...but goats are not chickens (and neither are my kids).


----------



## rachels.haven

Barn cat rescue brought us some ferals today to help with my rat issue. Two black cats-brothers probably. One looks like it might turn friendly, the other still looks like it wants us to go burn in h311 (he's a little scared kitty). Bailey took a long look during my intro and approved the additions and lost interest. Turns out Badger is terrified of cats. I assumed he had been exposed to cats as a pre-8 week puppy. Looks like he may have been. He's afraid as in, tail between legs, afraid to go in the WHOLE barn, baying while trying to stay away, ready to pee himself afraid. Never seen that reaction in a dog before. I made him come into the stall to intros (to make sure he wasn't going to explode into the stall and try to kill them during the night) and he about died. Nope, he's not going in there under his own power.

The catch is that these are little, undernourished 6 month old cats. They're like, barely not kittens. Badger's greatest fear is kittens. If I drag him too close he starts shaking.

It kind of looks like he might not protect anything against mountain lions or bobcats...or neighbor cats.

I'll be supervising this. I think eventually he's not going to care about them.


----------



## rachels.haven

On a side note, I didn't repot my violet leaves in time. They're blooming. Bad indoor gardener. Anyone need any extra baby violets?


----------



## Bruce

Pics of the new kitties? I'm sure they will fill out with a little TLC and decent food.


----------



## farmerjan

Oh, I miss my  african violets too.  If I was close I would take you up on the offer.  Used to have about 15-20, did as you do and put all the broken off leaves into soil and root and start new ones.  Would water them with water from the fish tanks and they bloomed like crazy.  I had several fish tanks, and raised up several varieties and sold them back to the local pet store.  They liked them because they were raised local and pretty healthy.  Mostly would trade for other fish.  I used gravel and real plants and let the fish droppings help to feed the plants.  Another thing to want my own house for again.  Really going to push to find somewhere to go next year.  No sense in getting too worked up over it now due to the upcoming surgery.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

@farmerjan, I sure wished we lived closer I would be more than happy to give you some help during your recovery


----------



## rachels.haven

I'll get the pics of the cats up. They're just black with gold eyes. Cats are funny critters. I think if they can stay alive they'll be fun here even if they're not friendly. The cat food in their cage is going to draw the rodents of various types right to them too.

I'd mail you some violets in the early spring @farmerjan if you'd like. I'm probably going to pot up all of the good size clones but only keep one or two of each variety once they're established and blooming. The rest will have to find other homes. It could give you something to play with while sitting down, and I wouldn't have to throw extras out.


----------



## farmerjan

We can talk about the violets.  I have some styrofoam containers that they ship vaccines in that would work.  Some are not "airtight" and they would protect the plants.  I would love to have them.  Thank you for the offer.  I really need more to do, but hey, I have a housefull of stuff to move when the time comes, whats a few more plants.  I already have 2 pretty big spider plants that are decendents from my mom's plants...... It won't be until at least March before I am home from the rehab and all.  If you find new homes for them in the meantime, that's perfectly fine.  But I will talk to you  after I'm home and able to do some things..... Thanks again.


----------



## Baymule

African violets were at one time, my favorite. I had way too many of them, LOL I think it is great that you are sharing them. BYH'ers are the best!


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> African violets were at one time, my favorite. I had way too many of them, LOL I think it is great that you are sharing them. BYH'ers are the best!


I'd send some to you too. I think there are going to be plenty provided disaster or disease doesnt strike, lol. I even have a couple of padded boxes from back when I restarted after we move in the office waiting for something.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sigh, here's a plot twist on the teenage puppy. Today I was watching the two dogs playing and Badger collapsed and had a very pronounced seizure.

Oddly enough, he was quiet and almost polite afterward. 

Grreat.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Oh that's horrible.  I wonder if it has any bearing on his behavior?  That would be another issue I'd bring up with the breeder.  In fact, you might start thinking about talking to the breeder about legal consequences.  It would do this breeder a world of good to stand behind her animals.  

I think the quietness afterwards is a direct side effect of the taxing effects of the seizure.  Poor guy...


----------



## rachels.haven

I think her sales contract would prevent that. The only thing it says is that to her knowledge the puppy was healthy at time of leaving. Puppy had just come home from the vet getting his last shots when they were all to be picked up. I guess worst case this will turn into a learning experience. A stupid, sad, messy, humiliating, expensive learning experience. 

Locked out of the barn to prevent more accidents on the hay. Getting a stairway baby gate tonight.


----------



## rachels.haven

An LGD with siezures when he gets excited is probably a dead LGD, isn't he?


----------



## frustratedearthmother

rachels.haven said:


> An LGD with siezures when he gets excited is probably a dead LGD, isn't he?


It certainly would not bode well for him...


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh man, enjoy a nice, cold glass of lemonade for me tonight. I'll need it. The breeder seems to be a potato. So far towards his seizures we've established:
1)getting your dog vaccinated causes seizures
2)it can't be epilepsy (genetic) because his mother, father, and siblings are not seizing
3)there are probably toxins in his environment or head trauma that caused this
4)I should rush him to the pet ER now (except that would stress him out and probably cause another seizure and he is sleepy but normal 5-10 minutes after, and he didn't die when he had a milder version of this I thought was a pulled muscle when he was a baby, he's not dead now) The vet will COME HERE when I can get him to come. I feel based on past experience and what I am observing that it is for his best to do it that way.


In regards to his behavior towards livestock we have established:
1)there are no bad dogs, only bad owners-I am causing this
2)behavior around livestock is all training
3)he is not becoming predatory-that's ridiculous-I'm allowing him to think he's supposed to become predatory.
4)I should hire an LGD guru to tell me what I'm doing wrong and fix this.
5)I should definitely not give up and put him in a shelter (I would not, and never suggested that I would put him in a shelter, I didn't say, but I would get him euthanized)

I may tell her what the vet says, but I'm not talking to her anymore beyond that. Too much fun.

It also sounds like diagnostic tests are going to be very expensive. I'm not sure what we're planning on doing.

...kind of makes me wonder how I could have avoided this and never do it again. They LOOKED normal. Breeder (owners) were not super young. The adult dogs were all in with stock. All the questions were answered right. I guess the buildings were new, puppy pickup day was scheduled exactly at the 8 week legal age deadline. Contract was short. Breeders (dogs) were young.

This is a mess.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sorry to be a downer. 
On the positive side,
Goats are fed,
chickens are good, 
dogs are stable,
it's almost time to start dinner.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

You're not being a downer - but you are right that this is a big ol' mess!  I don't have any words to help you except that I hope there's a miracle in store for you and for Badger.


----------



## thistlebloom

There was no way you could foresee the problems you are having. No reason for you to feel humiliated either IMO. You have had a bad experience, and Badger is probably a fluke. You didn't cause it and the breeder is just covering their butt and being unprofessional about accepting any sort of responsibility for the dog they bred.
Since she's not helpful in the least I would stop communicating with her. Do what you see as the best for your family  and move on.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I am so sorry to read this, ......hopefully  your vet  will be able to give you some information that will help you with decisions


----------



## Baymule

There is no way that you could have seen this coming. What you said above checked all the boxes, there seemed to be nothing amiss. I would not communicate any further with the breeder. 

This sucks. I am sorry for you and your family, I am sorry for Badger and I am sorry for Bailey. It just sucks.


----------



## rachels.haven

Snowed 2" today. I shoveled the part of the house and drive shaded by the house on the north side. The rest melted.


----------



## Baymule

You got snow and I got rain. At least I don't have to shovel rain.


----------



## rachels.haven

Badger had another seizure tonight at feeding time when I was dishing it up in the barn. Really, really, heart wrenchingly sad to watch him stop eating, lay on the floor, start whimpering, and convulse. When my brain turned on I shut the barn door and ran for Mark. When we got back he'd just finished and Bailey drove him away from the door, and away from us, loudly, acting like she was going to kill him if he didn't stay back. She wanted to come in the house with us tonight. I think she's scared. The vet comes at 11 tomorrow to "talk about it" as his wife put it. This is such a cruel thing to put him through.


----------



## Baymule

I am really sorry. These seizures may be related to his bad behavior. I'm no vet and certainly not a neurologist, but his brains aren't wired right and I have a sinking feeling that it won't get any better.


----------



## rachels.haven

Last night was rough on the dog. He was a mess this morning.
We get to wait on the "everything but epilepsy" bloodwork to come back, but the vet says that considering his good body condition and his history, that Badger has epilepsy, and it can cause behavior changes before seizures, like agitation. We're starting his meds today to let them build in his system and the vet wants him rehomed to an indoor, non guarding home.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

rachels.haven said:


> We're starting his meds today to let them build in his system and the vet wants him rehomed to an indoor, non guarding home.


I know that's not how you envisioned his life to be - but it really is probably best all around.     At least now you know it's nothing that you did, or didn't do, that caused this.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. Maybe after this is all over when I work up the nerve we'll find a more reputable breeder somehow and try again.


----------



## Hens and Roos

sorry to hear of his health challenges,   that the meds help and you can find a good home for him.  When we fostered, we had several dogs come in with seizure issues, the one dog was adopted by a couple that cooked all his food for him and that helped him.


----------



## rachels.haven

Breeder emailed back inquiring to know what the diagnosis was. I told her what I said above. She gave me the, "good luck finding him a new home!" then "oh yeah, can I have those test results?"  Yes, she can have a copy. She's a terrible breeder with no intention of helping the little hurt mess she brought into this world. She'd better watch out. I may need to spread the word. I'm mad.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

I know I may be the dissenting vote here....but...  If the "product" is not suitable for the job for which it was intended - the purchaser should be compensated.  I'd at least approach the breeder with that.  If this breeder routinely sells pups she might want to keep on friendly terms with her previous clients.  

I once sold a litter of Westie pups and a couple of years later was contacted by one of the puppy purchasers saying that their pup had a skin condition.  I asked them if they wanted to return the dog and get a refund - they didn't want that.  I asked them to neuter the dog and send me the vet report.  Then I refunded $400 of their $500 purchase price.   They were happy and even though I've never sold another puppy - it just felt like the right thing to do.  Maybe your breeder could be persuaded to do "something" to ease her conscience.


----------



## rachels.haven

I think I'd need to inflict a conscious on her first.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

rachels.haven said:


> Thanks. Maybe after this is all over when I work up the nerve we'll find a more reputable breeder somehow and try again.


This is a very tough situation...I can sort of relate....I hope you can find good people to take and care for him


----------



## thistlebloom

frustratedearthmother said:


> I know I may be the dissenting vote here....but...  If the "product" is not suitable for the job for which it was intended - the purchaser should be compensated.  I'd at least approach the breeder with that.  If this breeder routinely sells pups she might want to keep on friendly terms with her previous clients.
> 
> I once sold a litter of Westie pups and a couple of years later was contacted by one of the puppy purchasers saying that their pup had a skin condition.  I asked them if they wanted to return the dog and get a refund - they didn't want that.  I asked them to neuter the dog and send me the vet report.  *Then I refunded $400 of their $500 purchase price.* They were happy and even though I've never sold another puppy - it just felt like the right thing to do. Maybe your breeder could be persuaded to do "something" to ease her conscience.



That was extremely decent of you. I applaud that.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Breeder emailed back inquiring to know what the diagnosis was. I told her what I said above. She gave me the, "good luck finding him a new home!" then "oh yeah, can I have those test results?"  Yes, she can have a copy. She's a terrible breeder with no intention of helping the little hurt mess she brought into this world. She'd better watch out. I may need to spread the word. I'm mad.


Yeah she can have a copy of the test results ... when she refunds your money.



frustratedearthmother said:


> If this breeder routinely sells pups she might want to keep on friendly terms with her previous clients.


I seriously doubt the breeder will give out Rachel's name to prospective future buyers. She doesn't seem like that sort of person based on the info we have. Likewise a contractor is only going to use happy customers when a prospective new customer asks for references.


----------



## Baymule

Poor messed up puppy. At least now you know why he acted aggressively. How did you find the breeder? On Craigslist? You can post vet results and a warning to other buyers with her name and town. There may be others.....


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, she's not getting any test results. She just threatened to call her lawyer if I told anyone...and the police because I MUST be giving him head trauma which is amusing considering the vet was just here and I think he'd be able to tell and wouldn't have prescribed anything.

Well, Badger's about to start seizing again. Pharmacy hasn't called yet, so I guess we'll go bug them.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Bruce said:


> I seriously doubt the breeder will give out Rachel's name to prospective future buyers.





Baymule said:


> You can post vet results and a warning to other buyers with her name and town. There may be others.....


That's what I'm talking about!  It's not libel or slander if it's the TRUTH!  Let her call her lawyer.  At this point I'd be looking at small claims court.  (of course I don't know what you paid for him and what the amounts to "small claims" in your area)


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I would be on her case like white on rice....slam her breeding reputation into the ground Rachel,  she is NOT a responsible  breeder.....🤬


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> She just threatened to call her lawyer if I told anyone.


Just the facts ma'am, as you've posted them here. Bought this dog from this breeder. It is having seizures. Breeder is claiming no responsibility though the dog was sold as being without health issues.

I wonder how many of her other customers would contact you and say "ME TOO!"


----------



## Baymule

If I were you, I'd call the police and report that she is threatening to turn you in for animal abuse to cover her backside. Get ahead of the game. File a report, then it is documented.


----------



## farmerjan

I agree with @Baymule ;  get a little "paper trail".  I don't suppose that you recorded any of her phone calls???? Do you have any of the texts?  Plus, you have had the vet, who can verify that the animals are not abused there on your place, so you have already taken the first and most proactive step to try to deal with the issue and are a conscientious  dog owner by contacting the vet.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

See if your vet will write a letter/statement saying that Badger is in good physical condition, there are no signs of injury and that he has a seizure disorder.


----------



## rachels.haven

The beauty of things is that
a) Nobody's phone works well in my town so this was all over email.
b) the vet was out today for this puppy. I'm not beating him.
c) the town animal control officer/barn inspector was just out to inspect our barn. He knows my name, my dogs, and all the animal's conditions. They're not beaten. Quite the opposite actually. Right now everything's grousing about the dive in temperatures.
E) as soon as Badger is rehomed I'm leaving reviews and buyer bewaring just the facts in as many places as I see fit (might consider doing it earlier, but DH seems most comfy with it this way). She certainly doesn't want him back. She just wants her business protected. Her business is selling defective dogs with an intentionally vague health contract. People should know. I've been asking around to try to find GOOD places to honestly list him up as a pet and several people want to know who the breeder is. I got the name of some rescue/local groups who can place dogs with people who take great pride in taking in "broken" (as DH put it) animals and giving them good quality of life. If we can't home him we'll get him euthanized.

I didn't research the breeder enough. Adds on CL, website, we did a visit and things looked all good there. BUT Yelp tells me they've only been breeding goats since 2017.Wish I'd checked that but have you ever checked yelp on a farm? Only in New England. Not where I came from. If I'd seen that, I'd have skipped them. No puppies from new commers (you don't see me breeding dogs...although if I were inclined I can tell you I'd do a better job). If I can ever work up the nerve to try again with puppies I will definitely do better checking up. Maybe fingerprint and run a background check (I wish). If puppy backyard breeder and scam artist comes up on that print out we'll run like the wind-if it were that simple.

More likely I'll never buy an animal priced at more than $350-375 again. When any more than that is on the table people's brains turn off when the dollar signs turn on and it turns into something that's just done because of cash. I never want to buy another dog again. Cash grabbers.

At least when you buy a goat, especially an adult or teen aged goat, you know it's going to eat through it's purchase price in 4-6 months or less and there's a good chance the breeder LOST money on it.

Anyway, enough rant. Somedoggie got his meds tonight. DH locked him up and said he didn't look like he was doing too good again-another episode coming on. I'm starting to wish I could just get him put down and be done with this because he's really suffering, but we'll try and give him some dignity.

I'm mad, but I've got a plan.
The test results will just say he doesn't have organ failure or things like that. They're looking for abnormal blood work-anything BUT epilepsy causing a problem. The actual tests for epilepsy I believe are very, very, prohibitively expensive from what I understand.

Sorry if the post is unclear/fragmented. I'm tired. G'night.


----------



## thistlebloom

This is tough for you. I feel bad for your Badger, not your fault, not his fault. But it is hard on your heart.


----------



## Baymule

Oh, you are deeply angry. I would be too. Why is the test for epilepsy so expensive?


----------



## rachels.haven

It gets more and more specialized. I believe one approach involves in MRI, another checking the DNA (but that might not be common practice yet, I just read a paper on it). The common approach is to just rule out everything else and start treating the seizures.

Maybe today will be a better day.


----------



## rachels.haven

Animal control called me. After the situation was explained they advised me to get a refund and return the dog. Good advice.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

rachels.haven said:


> Animal control called me. After the situation was explained they advised me to get a refund and return the dog. Good advice.


That's another one on your side!


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

H


frustratedearthmother said:


> That's another one on your side!


Holy moly this is getting complicated. I hope she just does the right thing so you can move on from this whole situation


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Animal control called me. After the situation was explained they advised me to get a refund and return the dog. Good advice.


Yes, but she's already said that isn't going to happen. I hope they can treat the epilepsy and a good family home is found.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

This breeder should figure out that her reputation is important if she wants to say in business.


----------



## thistlebloom

Did the breeder call Animal Control on you? Why were they there?


----------



## Baymule

thistlebloom said:


> Did the breeder call Animal Control on you? Why were they there?


It sounds like she turned you for abuse. What an evil witch


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Very typical Massachusetts  attitudes , so sorry Rachel


----------



## rachels.haven

I know, I'm starting to want to get the heck out of here! I hate this. She tried to turn me in for abuse to intimidate me out of telling people about Badger as I rehome him myself (??? how's that supposed to work?). Luckily we'd had the person in charge of animal control AND agriculture in our town out just last month to do a barn inspection so they didn't bother to come out and just called me on the phone to ask me if I was beating my dog (and the phone let the message through in a timely fashion by some miracle). He met the dogs last month. Beaten dogs aren't happy and outgoing and in Badger's case, somewhat rude attention hogs. That lady is rotten to the core.

Telling our ag commission and animal control guy a fish story about beaten dogs on the weekend and leaving your name (I think you have to own complaints like that) is a great way to get the word out in town that you're a terrible breeder though. I don't think the police are going to bother me again unless she makes good on her threat to call the state police too and they bite. I'm a little concern she's going to sue us now, but we'll see. Lawyers are expensive. But so is being rotten.

About now I wish I never got Badger. Dog parks are fun, right? Bailey's got lots of dog parkin it in her future so she doesn't wind up down because my nerves can't handle this.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Holy Crap - I guess she thinks the best defense is a good offense.  What a b...witch!  What can she sue you for though?  You bought a dog from her that has a seizure disorder.  That's the truth and she can't change that.   She may very well be all bluff and trying to scare you into being quiet because if it goes to any kind of legal action she can't fight the vet's findings.  Have you been able to get any of his seizures recorded?


----------



## thistlebloom

Sue you? What planet is she on?


----------



## Bruce

The "sue everyone who you think will be intimidated and cower if you sue them" planet. There are certain high level  government "officials" like that.


----------



## rachels.haven

Not sure. Planet New Hampshire, hopefully not too rich New Hampshire. I'm sure she can claim her non-OFA certified dogs are healthy(if i could turn back the clock...) and maybe because I didn't do all the expensive tests at a specialist I'm not allowed to say anything to anyone ever. It doesn't make sense for me to do those tests. I'm not going to breed my dog. I want to get rid of my dog. He is unfit to do the work he was sold to be able to do (or even to live with my kids) and I don't want to put thousands into him right now. I'm settling with taking good care of him until someone else takes him (or until I get him euthanized). It was her job to do the tests with her breeder dogs, not my job on my dog that was meant from the start to be neutered as soon as he stopped growing. The dog has epilepsy, as per the vet.


----------



## thistlebloom

rachels.haven said:


> The dog has epilepsy, as per the vet.



And that's the bottom line. Period. 
I'm in complete agreement with your thinking.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

X 1000 @thistlebloom


----------



## Baymule

Not all puppies have epilepsy and not all breeders are ugly, evil, nasty piss-pore excuses for human beings. Don’t let this sour you on another puppy....... someday.


----------



## farmerjan

She's on "planet New England nut cases"   they are mostly all nuts up there.  See why I moved south.... except there are too many nutcases in the northern part of Va now..... moved here from affluent areas that think they know more, are smarter than, and a few levels above the average dumb, blue collar,  working class. Sadly, new england has fewer and fewer of the salt of the earth thrifty yankee types anymore.  The natives have been forced out by the flatlanders that have moved in with money.  I know, we have had relatives in CT, VT, NH and many have not been able to afford to live there as the moneyed people have moved in with higher paying jobs, and the ones that are into the "finer" pursuits in life like skiing and such.  That is why they were offering so many incentives for new, beginning farmers to move to Vt because they were losing all the "quaint village atmospheres" as the farms just could not afford to operate anymore.  Been going on for about 50-75 years.

Just make sure that you keep all your e-mails....PRINT them out.  And since you have already been contacted by the authorities...... and they have done a previous "study" of your place and were pleased with and more than satisfied with your "operation"  she has no idea of what she is  opening up herself for.  It is VERY FORTUNATE for you that you had that "inspection" of which I am sure she is  totally unaware of, and it is a big black mark against her for doing what she did.  DON'T get yourself into a big upset..... you are in a good position here.  So sad for the puppy, but maybe the medicine will control it and you can find him a family that he can be happy with.  If not, and you have to euthanize him, all recorded by the vet, you have grounds to go back and countersue her if she  decides to pursue this.  Just try to not lose any sleep over her.  Just take care of yourself, your kids, the animals, and hopefully you can help Badger.   It's not your fault for getting him in a good faith purchase.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

@ farmerjan nailed the Massachusetts  and parts of New Hampshire  attitude right on its head.!
That is why " the breeder" if we have to call her that, is attacking you first, they are all known as " Mass. Holes " for a reason...
Does she have a Facebook page,? I am sure you have enough friends on this site that wouldn't mind sharing a review of their "friends heartbreak and problems with this dog she sold our friend" your name, city or state doesn't even need to be mentioned.....PM me the information  I sure would love to write. a short story about my friend and her family's heart break about their puppy that was sold as a healthy LGD and turned out to have heart breaking  seizures that the vet has confirmed ...and how the breeder isn't  willing to refund her money.... etc...your name wouldn't  even be mentioned, ....but I sure will post mine, and my town and state.....


----------



## farmerjan

B&B Happy goats said:


> @ farmerjan nailed the Massachusetts  and parts of New Hampshire  attitude right on its head.!
> That is why " the breeder" if we have to call her that, is attacking you first, they are all known as " Mass. Holes " for a reason...
> Does she have a Facebook page,? I am sure you have enough friends on this site that wouldn't mind sharing a review of their "friends heartbreak and problems with this dog she sold our friend" your name, city or state doesn't even need to be mentioned.....PM me the information  I sure would love to write. a short story about my friend and her family's heart break about their puppy that was sold as a healthy LGD and turned out to have heart breaking  seizures that the vet has confirmed ...and how the breeder isn't  willing to refund her money.... etc...your name wouldn't  even be mentioned, ....but I sure will post mine, and my town and state.....


 @B&B Happy goats !!!!!!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh dear. We're in for it here. I can't stand adult brats.  Maybe I'll just hide for the rest of our tenure here.

and @B&B Happy goats , I'll let you know if that's necessary (working on getting un mad still over here). None of her pages have reviews-google, fb, yelp. Even one bad review would make her look very bad. I'd only want that if you could keep your name and contact info out of it. She's probably love to sue you too if she's the kind of person she's making herself out to be and I don't want to give you that.

I put out a request for a list of good rescue groups in the area for my puppy on our town page and a vet from the other side of town gave me a contact in a good rescue group that might take and place him despite his mixed heritage because he owes her a favor, and is also passing my info onto one of her clients who likes special needs pyrs. Maybe something good will come of it.

Snowing again, btw. This time not just 2". Pack it up and send it to australia, please. I'm so over that snow stuff.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

I hope the rescue comes through for you.  It would be a good end to a bad situation.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Oh dear. We're in for it here. I can't stand adult brats.  Maybe I'll just hide for the rest of our tenure here.
> 
> and @B&B Happy goats , I'll let you know if that's necessary (working on getting un mad still over here). None of her pages have reviews-google, fb, yelp. Even one bad review would make her look very bad. I'd only want that if you could keep your name and contact info out of it. She's probably love to sue you too if she's the kind of person she's making herself out to be and I don't want to give you that.
> 
> I put out a request for a list of good rescue groups in the area for my puppy on our town page and a vet from the other side of town gave me a contact in a good rescue group that might take and place him despite his mixed heritage because he owes her a favor, and is also passing my info onto one of her clients who likes special needs pyrs. Maybe something good will come of it.
> 
> Snowing again, btw. This time not just 2". Pack it up and send it to australia, please. I'm so over that snow stuff.



My dear Rachel....I am a born Yankee...I AM NOT AFRAID of her , or putting my name out for anyone to read up there...my family has alot of  history  in the area where you live...
she would have a really difficult  time with a costly attempt  at trying to sue ( me) out of state, ...she would have to hire a Florida attorney to represent her. , and how can you sue the truth ? " it's  my friends distraught  and my sorrow for her family that I would write about" ..." and the" laws that are needed to protect my friends rights  from a uncaring and accusing breeder" ....
if she has no social media pages on herself and her dogs , then there are local newspapers that I can write to...
As to quote the wicked witch in the wizard of OZ.  ....." WANNA PLAY WITH FIRE SCARECROW " ? .....just send me the information  when your ready for me to light that match     your friend Barb


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Do what works for you and your family, but please know I am here if you need anything


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you, I will. I just need to spend some time thinking about how I really want to approach this. I WILL be leaving reviews and telling people. I think I'd like the puppy somewhere else or put down so she can't accuse me of animal cruelty and come after me afterwards. I also really want that last blood work back.

As a side note, the frantic pre-seizure bouncing, biting, pawing and ripping at people and Bailey behavior has stopped. He's still a bit of a snot, but I think THAT might be puppy behavior(big puppy that can put his feet on my shoulders behavior -I WILL be addressing THAT too). I think he's stopped destroying my short milk stand, which he started doing on Thursday, if I remember right, and when the seizures really got bad. He may still have had one or two in the last 24 hours, but none in front of me. I think his medicine is starting to work. He still needs a non-guarding, lower risk, away from goats and off my property home though.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I think his medicine is starting to work.


 
I agree that he needs a non working job, can't depend on a dog that might have a seizure at just the wrong time. 

I had a thought and I expect the answer is "No" but do you have a sales contract that states the dog is in good health?


----------



## rachels.haven

Not really. It states that you have to take the puppy to the vet in order to get a "health guarantee" (from the vet, as far as the vet can see, unfortunately). It was my first red flag. The next one was when I was driving up she was force feeding them coccidia medication and they'd just come home from the vet. Animals get coccidia, I didn't think that was a big deal at the time, but in hindsight, I should have walked then.


----------



## Bruce

On the plus side (small though it may be) your bad experience is educational for those who have never bought an animal from a breeder.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

U


Bruce said:


> On the plus side (small though it may be) your bad experience is educational for those who have never bought an animal from a breeder.



Ummmmm, a bad breeder who is not taking responsibility  and taking the dog back ......


----------



## Bruce

Yep, lesson 1) Get IN WRITING that if the dog comes down with congenital issues, the breeder will refund your money and take the dog back. 

I'm sure there are a lot more lessons here. I wonder how many of the other pups she's sold have epilepsy.


----------



## rachels.haven

Considering officially making Badger's breeder's name part of his name on town registration and rescue paperwork. O'neil Hill Mini Farm's Badger has a majestic ring to it. I'm not sure I'd leave reviews on her google/fb/yelp pages if you haven't been there though. There's also still that legal risk-Massholes and all. I'm not sure you'd need to. She doesn't make herself look very good. Deering, Mass sounds like a scary place.


----------



## rachels.haven

...But then again, maybe he'd like to move past that place...


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I can't  think of a finer name for his registration , it sounds very majestic  and oh so fitting


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> ...But then again, maybe he'd like to move past that place...


 It's  nice to know your roots, perhaps he should be registered with that name....


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> O'neil Hill Mini Farm's Badger


Or maybe "O'neil Hill Mini Farm's Epileptic Badger"


----------



## rachels.haven

It was fun reading the last couple of responses last night. I really needed a smile.
I've been having more trouble with the puppy. He's dangerous and needs to be put down. My vet is out of town, but I'll ask him to do it when he gets back. Until then, Badger is tied to a tree and staying there. I may tie him in the barn at night for shelter so he doesn't freeze.
Without Badger to chase and bite her Bailey has been running around being beautiful and happy, and took the opportunity to introduce herself to the lamancha bucks when I was doing their water. She likes them a lot. They are her size. I wish I got a picture of that. That dog smiles.

Anyway, wish me luck. I hope the vet doesn't think I'm a cop out, but I have to keep me and my family safe.


----------



## thistlebloom

In my opinion it doesn't really matter what the vet thinks, he's not the one living it. If Badger is dangerous at your house where he's familiar with your family and property, he's not going to be less dangerous elsewhere.


----------



## Bruce

That is sad but clearly necessary. If the meds were going to stop his seizures that would be obvious. But it seems like they just helped a bit.


----------



## rachels.haven

He attacked me yesterday twice. Bailey saved me the first time when he knocked me over because I wasn't expecting it. The second I manhandled him into the barn and slammed the door. Bailey is done with him and so am I. She has NOT gone to visit him on his tie out.

He doesn't make sense. No growling, no barking, just trying to rip me apart and there's no one home in those eyes at the time. If it were my kids he'd gotten yesterday he'd have killed them. We're done. I should have had the vet euthanize him on Friday. Today I cried all day, tomorrow I'm getting the vet.


----------



## thistlebloom

That's terrible and scary, he seems to be deteriorating rapidly. I wonder if he has a brain tumor that's causing the epilepsy. 
Glad you're okay Rachael.


----------



## thistlebloom

Just thinking out loud here, but I wonder if any university's animal studies department might be interested in him (after euthanization) for brain studies.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

We (I) support your decisions,  you are the one that has eyes and hands on him...do what is best for you and don't  worry about it


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. I feel very blessed to have Bailey and very lucky to have gotten out of that. If Bailey wants in the house I think she gets to come in from now on.

I'm not sure I'm in a position to give him to a university right now. I can't even lift him into the car alone alive. I'm going to need at least DH if not a second person to take his remains for disposal. He is very big and very heavy.

I need to stop intermittently crying and focus on something else to compose myself. I'm telling myself that crying over an animal that wants to eat me is ridiculous.


----------



## thistlebloom

rachels.haven said:


> Thanks. I feel very blessed to have Bailey and very lucky to have gotten out of that. If Bailey wants in the house I think she gets to come in from now on.
> 
> *I'm not sure I'm in a position to give him to a university right now. *I can't even lift him into the car alone alive. I'm going to need at least DH if not a second person to take his remains for disposal. He is very big and very heavy.
> 
> I need to stop intermittently crying and focus on something else to compose myself. *I'm telling myself that crying over an animal that wants to eat me is ridiculous.*


I was thinking your vet might be in a position to know if there were any interest and could perhaps handle the body donation.

I get it, you're not crying over what he is, it's what you hoped he'd be.  Crying is very normal and probably not a bad way to deal with this whole mess. You'll get past it, but right now it's a black hole.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

I am so sorry.  You're crying because you have a heart and because you had hopes for Badger.  Those hopes about what "could have been" have been dashed.  It's not his fault and that's unfair and that's worth crying about also.  Badger is broken and the kindest thing you can do for him now is to end his suffering.  My heart breaks for you, him and the situation.


----------



## farmerjan

I would take the dog  to the vet asap and have him put down humanely.  All you have to do is say he went after you and you will not rehome him.  It isn't up to the vet, and you are responsible for him.  If he were to go somewhere  and he bit or hurt someone else, you would feel so badly.  I agree with @thistlebloom  completely.


----------



## farmerjan

I think that there is more than the epilepsy.  A tumor seems a very good possibility.  You are totally right and I agree with the others that you ARE entitled to cry, because you had such high hopes and wanted him to be an integral part of your homestead.  It is sad for him, and for you, but it is not your fault,  Have him put down for everyone's safety and well being.  I agree that the vet might know if there was a university vet dept that might be able to use him as a way to teach others and maybe they can find a cause.  Plus, if that were to be done, and there was a good cause, you would have a very good case to present to this breeder for returning the purchase price.... and it would give them some hard evidence that there was something wrong with the dog that was not caused by anything you did.  Regardless, there is obviously something wrong and you cannot ever trust him nor allow someone else to take a chance on getting hurt.


----------



## Baymule

I was thinking brain tumor too. If a university won’t take him, what about the vet doing an autopsy? 

Really sorry this has turned out so badly. Something is broken in Badger, he can’t help it, but that doesn’t give him a free pass. We stand behind you on your decision. Big hugs. You need one.


----------



## Hens and Roos

nothing more to add that hasn't been said already.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Gosh, Miss @rachels.haven, I am so sorry you have had to deal with this.  I hope can come to have peace in your heart as you do the right thing.


----------



## rachels.haven

I made horchata last night to break the tension. Bailey got her loft back today. Our barnyard is hers again. I tried to invite her into the house but the house does not smell like hay so she left out the open door shortly after I went to go feed the goats.

I think things are going to be okay.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

i am so so sorry rachel i know how hard that is ou loved him and you gave him the best life he could have had the short time he was normal its not yours or his doing he had something neither of yall could have changed and i doubt he would have wanted to any of yall, its better for him to end his suffering and for your babies and you.


----------



## misfitmorgan

she has yelp reviews now......

Sorry you had to go thru all of this, that lady is a vile person.

On the note of another puppy again.....there are good LGD adult dogs who often need new homes thru no fault of their own. We got Rosie as an adult and she was perfect and we loved her!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. That's how we got Bailey. She's the best and I owe her big time. I don't want to think about a new dog just yet, but DH just said the same thing last night when I was attempting to be down on humanity and myself.

This whole experience has been an interesting study on humanity on multiple fronts. Badger's breeder keeps altering her response to the reviews and Yelp keeps telling me about it. I guess she figured insulting people who wonder about her reputation wasn't smart and now she's switching to upright lying about what happened...or maybe she's crazy...all over a dog that couldn't help any of it. I think I want to be past caring about what she does. I might try to find a way to tell Yelp to stop telling me about her edits. I do want those reviews to stay up. Already had to fix that with Google. BUT I have better things to do than even that...like letting Bailey in the house to go bed-testing (when I really should be tidying the house, but making her happy is easy and fun and everything else takes effort). In my defense I was cleaning my room when this transpired. She makes the sacrificial alter bed that came with the house look really good. Good dog, keeping those covers safe!



).


----------



## rachels.haven

However, she prefers the room at the end of the hall where we put our first attempts at buying the kids mattresses that we save for visiting cousins (Ikea, thin memory foam, too firm and hard for long term use). She does not like high beds. Taking Bailey bed testing was the fun thing the preschooler and I did today. Watching a dog is a perfect activity for a kid who hurt his foot last night and can't run around today.


----------



## Baymule

Bailey is such a sweetheart. Give her lots of hugs, it’s good for both of you.


----------



## Bruce

That bed was a freebie with the house?? Wow.

We all feel for your pain with Badger and the breeder. Don't let her run your life into the ground. You never know when the right dog will happen by. @misfitmorgan and @Mike CHS both found good ones.


----------



## rachels.haven

No worries, and thank you. It's time for me to try to let go. It's okay for me to mourn for Badger and what could have been. But I don't want to be mad. That hurts too. And I will definitely try to consider a ldg in need of new employment if one comes up and feels right. Not ready yet though.

Naw we didn't get the whole bed, just the bed frame came with the house. It doesn't come apart very well, even the pointy bits and is ridiculously tall and probably wouldn't have fit in the previous owner's new appartment. I find it comical, but I really appreciate having a bed stand very much. We never had a real one before. We did have a king sized mattress already, but we had it on the floor in the last house which gave plenty of support, and the big size meant my kids who didn't used to sleep through the night couldn't kick me out of my spot in the bed when I got too fatigued to play the "get back in your bed" game. Kids expand when sleeping, they never tell you in the kid manual. But we love them. And they love tying things to and climbing those dangerous bed posts, but that's kids for you. Now we have the whole package bed-wise, (but not because we are good adults who plan ahead and buy furniture, we're just blessed/lucky).

Today was probably the first really good day since things went South. I'm so happy to be able to be happy. I think we really had been stressed out and not realized it.


----------



## thistlebloom

Bruce said:


> That bed was a freebie with the house?? Wow.
> 
> We all feel for your pain with Badger and the breeder. Don't let her run your life into the ground. You never know when the right dog will happen by. @misfitmorgan and @Mike CHS both found good ones.



Exactly.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

she such a good dog! she needs to be spoiled.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Naw we didn't get the whole bed, just the bed frame came with the house.


That's the part I meant! Don't need an old mattress but that frame is lovely.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. I love having a bed. We paid a lot for the house, but we didn't just get the house it really improved our quality of life.

And we definitely will. It's wonderful to have the privilege of spoiling Bailey. I always want this to be her happy place and for her to know she's home. Plus, it's easy to spoil her. She gets the biggest kicks out of doing a circuit of the house and visiting her kids. I'm so glad we have her.

I should probably set something up at some point and work on her biggest behavioral issue-trying to jump up on and climb into the laps of guests and strangers (she's no anti theft dog). She'd love meeting more new people and the process of obtaining new manners and social skills. If it gets warm enough I think we should take her down town a few times a week and go on a walk to do just that. That was the one bad habit she came with (other than collar slipping, that we all know about and have ways around, and it appears to be more of a chubby neck-small head structural issue). We don't get new people coming through our place often enough for me to rehabit her around the barn yard. I should have time now to do it now that I'm not forever trying to fix Badger. (and she isn't that bad on this issue, and is very responsive, so I don't see this as going to be a painful process, just a reconditioning process and she'll need to practice regularly to remember)


----------



## farmerjan

If the collar is a problem, get her a harness.  That is nearly impossible to slip and will teach her some manners.  Might be better for you both.


----------



## thistlebloom

I'm glad you are seeing some sunshine in your life again. Your plan for Bailey sounds good. That's something the whole family can enjoy, taking Bailey on excursions to town. She's a great dog.


----------



## rachels.haven

I typically will use a slip lead, the fat ropey kind, not the kind for small dogs at the vet. It squishes her neck when necessary and stays on. If that fails, we will go full on harness. She's VERY good on lead, so a harness is a good suggestion I hadn't thought about. You just have to remind her that most people don't want a face full of wet dog nose and a booped snoot every so often...


----------



## rachels.haven

The big coyote is back, moaning and howling like a horror movie wolf on the hill all morning. Bailey was all about telling him he wasn't coming in here right back (and I yelled at him with her, you know, like a crazy person). Good dog. We're all doing our bests, even us crazy people.

I can't get over how much Bailey loves her goats and how happy she is now. She really seemed to take the brunt of the bad puppy situation and is doing GREAT now.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Way to go Bailey!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh man, not now. The gf of the man who brought us Bailey contacted me today and let me know that he is looking to re-home another of his parents' dogs-a large intact meremma male. This is a bit too soon. He may also be a wanderer. I think I need to pass.


----------



## Grant

In between a harness, regular collar and a choke collar is a Martingale collar.  It’s all I use.  If it gets caught up in something it is loose enough for the dog to slip it off, but attach to the d ring ant tightens up enough not to slip off, but not choke. Really about the most humane collars available.  I buy from Amazon and they are very reasonable.


----------



## Baymule

I am happy for Bailey and you. Not so happy about the big coyote. 

A neighbor called yesterday, there’s about 20 acres between us. He heard a puppy whining so went to investigate, thinking someone dumped a puppy. Uh......nope. He found 5 coyote puppies. He got to thinking that their mom probably wasn’t too far away and he was unarmed. So he skedaddled out of there. 



rachels.haven said:


> Oh man, not now. The gf of the man who brought us Bailey contacted me today and let me know that he is looking to re-home another of his parents' dogs-a large intact meremma male. This is a bit too soon. He may also be a wanderer. I think I need to pass.



Maybe. Maybe not. Further investigation wouldn’t hurt. Intact? Nuts come off ya know.


----------



## rachels.haven

Will he stop wandering at our place though? A lost dog is a gone dog here. Or a liability, I guess at best. I always forget that. Happy New England.

@Grant , I like that idea too. It would look nicer than my slip leads, not sure about the convenience factor. I'd have to test. We'll see. Maybe I'll try one next chewy order.


----------



## Bruce

I hope someone gets that big coyote soon!! 

Re the Maremma. Does it climb fences and wander or wander if it happens to find an open gate? I know it is early for you but it might be worth a look.


----------



## farmerjan

Sorry, I am totally against you taking the Maremma.  You need to get your situation back to a good place with Bailey.  I realize that you want a back up for Bailey.  I did some farm sitting for an older man, a couple of years when he would go to his place in Alaska and to visit other friends.  He was retired and wanted to farm..... VERY VERY smart man but no common sense.  He got 2 Maremma pups and they grew up.  They were wanderers.  Then they started killing his lambs.  Granted, He had NO experience with LGD's, and didn't have any idea of what to do, not do, with them.  Then when he got out of the sheep because he thought that "nature" would weed out the "weak ones"  and the healthy ones would just survive.... the dogs took care of any that would have been replacements, and the others had worms and so he sold the last few that didn't die.  Then the dogs had nothing to do so wandered even more.  
So it wasn't the dogs fault per se, but they did take off alot.   Both before and after the goats were gone.  

If the dog is a problem now, unless you have REALLY REALLY GOOD  fences, he probably will continue to be a roamer.  Still, since it is from the same people that had Bailey, it would be tempting.  And yes, fixing him would help with the wandering.


----------



## rachels.haven

It would be too hard to read with two big dogs in my lap. We'd break the couch and my Kindle could get squashed. 




Jk, not a regular occurance, but it was funny to pretend to ignore and watch her try to gently squash the front half of herself between my lap, the couch, and the wall and watch the cogs turn in her head that day. She's far too big and long backed to be a lap dog but she really wanted her fanny ON despite not being able to turn around or get off the couch once in place unless I let her. I pretended not to notice and just kept reading around her for a while. The next reading session with her in the house she came and sat next to me and not on me-less squishing. She's gradually figuring out what works in the house (for instance, the paw doesn't).

Plus, I am too emotionally tired for another dog right now. I need to enjoy this one for a while.

 That doesn't mean I'm not sad he's going to be sold NOW, but I'm 100 percent with @farmerjan on this one. My gut says no. Bad timing at the very least. Maybe some day we'll try again with another lgd but not for a good long time. Bailey is not suffering for lack of fun and new experiences in the mean time. She's a hoot.


----------



## Baymule

Listen to that gut feeling. Bailey is a wonderful girl!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you, she so is. We are so lucky. You should have seen her face when the four year old jokingly scolded her for something. She was DEVASTATED. She is so special and wants to be a very good girl.


----------



## thistlebloom

I think only you know what you and your family can handle. I'm glad you're enjoying Bailey so much, and that she is also enjoying all of you. Love that pic of her in your lap. What a sweet girl she is.


----------



## Baymule

Even my psycho b!tch Paris, is crushed when scolded. To be so crazy, she has such tender feelings. 

Bailey just wants to make you and family happy. What a love.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, there's someone who wants to hunt coyotes on my land and possibly onto the conservation commission land behind our property (allowed if not posted otherwise). I think I would like that as long as they let us know when they are out and will stop hunting if we are uncomfortable with something. It is coyote season right now. I wonder if they can bag the big one?


----------



## thistlebloom

That sounds like a good possibility. Wouldn't that be great if someone was able to get that big freak?


----------



## farmerjan

We have a few that come in and hunt coyotes.  Since we are not "right there" like you are living right there on the property, it isn't as big a deal for us.  But if there is anyway that you can get the population down, especially the big one that is much more of a threat, I would encourage it if at all possible.  Ask them for some references, maybe with surrounding farmers?  And ask the game commission people, if they are a reliable conscientious person to allow to hunt.  Many times they will actually refer hunters to landowners that are having a problem.


----------



## Baymule

farmerjan said:


> We have a few that come in and hunt coyotes.  Since we are not "right there" like you are living right there on the property, it isn't as big a deal for us.  But if there is anyway that you can get the population down, especially the big one that is much more of a threat, I would encourage it if at all possible.  Ask them for some references, maybe with surrounding farmers?  And ask the game commission people, if they are a reliable conscientious person to allow to hunt.  Many times they will actually refer hunters to landowners that are having a problem.


x2


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Go for it


----------



## Bruce

How much land and where is the house on it? I'd hate for a stray bullet to come through a window or by shear bad luck hit one of the animals. I agree that you want to thoroughly check out anyone who you might let hunt and make sure they know where the homestead is so they don't fire in that direction.


----------



## rachels.haven

We have 6-7 acres if memory serves. The home and barn area is in one corner and only use about a fifth of the lot. The coyotes come from the side opposite the house, so anyone hunting should be back towards the house no matter where they stand. It is a concern though. I'm not sure if he'll get around to my place. There are LOTs of coyotes this year. Here's one of my first attempt at a phone panorama of the area coming off the conservation land...or at least part of it. Panorama shots are fast, so I only got part in the frame. (Eta, the rest of the property goes deep into the trees and up the hill, and far to the right and ends up being a lot of space. apparently camera preferred to focus on the yard, maybe I'll try again someday, or maybe panoramas are not practical and something I'm bad at)





Someone else is hunting the conservation land today, and it's occasionally very noisy. Bailey decided she wants to hide in the buck stall with her therapy bucks. They like her, so good deal. I'm glad she's just insecure when guns go off as opposed to frantic. I hope somebody bags some coyotes.


----------



## rachels.haven

Better picture, sideways, but gives a better idea. I don't think we're really ever safe from stray bullets next to the conservation land any day besides Sunday (hunting illegal on the Sabbath here), but someday there will be an electric or physical fence marking things more clearly for roaming armed dumbheads. The hunter using my land was conditional upon our comfort, of course. And he has to tell us when he's out so we can stay out of the way. Please pretend the very dead trees are not in this picture. They are on my list. (Eta, omgees, website righted the pic! Amazing!)


----------



## Bruce

What is the building in the distance on the far left side? Having an uphill behind your target is ideal since any shot that doesn't stop in the animal should stop in the dirt .... unless it ricochets off a rock. 

Seems like the panorama worked out pretty well. I have no idea if my phone will do that or not. The best I do with my real camera is take a series of shots making a small overlap. Maybe it has a panorama feature, I have no idea. 

Just checked the phone, son of a gun, it does do panorama. Would have been useful to know that when I was at th Grand Canyon in Nov.


----------



## thistlebloom

In Idaho a 100 square inch square (or rectangle I suppose) sprayed orange on a tree is equal to a no trespassing sign.
It might be an inexpensive way to mark your property boundary until you can fence.

Hope the hunters are successful!


----------



## rachels.haven

The building to the far left is the neighbors empty barn (was alpacas). I think it's just under 500 feet from our house, and their house is just over that. If you mean my chicken coop, it's maybe 80 feet from the house (some slack from a 100 foot power cord). We're looking into a the ditch/seasonal brook (or whatever mass calls it). The bank rises up on both sides. The more gradual, less steep side ends with our house at the top. The steeper side ends with our boundary line at the top. Coyotes rally on the crest of the hill to the right of center.


----------



## Bruce

Darn those things, why can't they congregate at the bottom!


----------



## rachels.haven

Noooo! That would be closer...and in the water this time of year. The world does not need aquatic coyotes, lol.


----------



## Baymule

thistlebloom said:


> In Idaho a 100 square inch square (or rectangle I suppose) sprayed orange on a tree is equal to a no trespassing sign.
> It might be an inexpensive way to mark your property boundary until you can fence.
> 
> Hope the hunters are successful!



In Texas, it's purple paint. A purple band of paint on a fence post or tree is the same as a No Trespassing sign. A lot cheaper too!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Noooo! That would be closer...and in the water this time of year. The world does not need aquatic coyotes, lol.


Yeah but it isn't safe to shoot them up on the ridge, the bullet that misses could travel a LONG way.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ah, I see. There is the area in the front half of the property where they come through to get to the road that is flat, but you would have no incline advantage and the trees are thicker there and during snow melt it is a mud pie (our protected wetland). Idk. Hunting behind the property on the conservation land would probably be the best. Everything is hills, rocks, and trees. Somebody was sure something today somewhere very nearby. Maybe that will be good enough to move the coyotes out of the area for the rest of the month. Or maybe that's why we have a coyote problem on our property in the first place.  

I kind of wish they didn't protect every mud puddle in Mass so I could have a fence up by now (not to mention protecting all the puddles is going to cause a health epidemic as insect borne illness move north as they have been doing, and not allowing mosquito spraying on said puddles-not sustainable, not safe, but sure sounds nice from their urban office or city dweller home with the windows shut and ac blasting). No more whining from me for the night though.


----------



## rachels.haven

You know, baiting is legal here. They could be baited down to the water, or even to the close side near the fence. The big one already comes there probably to try and pick fights, or so says the snow tracks.


----------



## Bruce

Night scope, 30-06 and bait! Sounds like a hunters paradise.


----------



## rachels.haven

Uh uh. No night hunting or Sunday hunting in Mass. Maybe night time house and livestock defending if the opportunity presents itself. I think that's legal. Definitely not hunting, right?

Oh, I wanted to record that I'd added Hoegger's Herbal wormer or supplement for worming or what's it to the goats diet weekly after their last dose of wormer. It says it's safe for pregnant goats, but wormwood, so I'm doing half dosage for them and being cautious. I'm relying on the conventional wormers and skipped the "cleanout dose". If it can help take even a bit of the load off of the real wormers, I'd do it. I haven't done fecals yet to make sure, but their eyelid color seems to be rebounding faster than normal over the past two or three weeks and they're not acting wormy again so maybe it's doing SOMETHING. I still think there's a lot of hooey surrounding the poisons we call herbal wormers, but if they work even a little they can join the other poisons I keep to help my goats beat the worms. I'd like the Hoegger's to work here so I can save the tested meds for emergencies and no wear them out as fast.

And the lamancha bucks with the rough feet have a line of tight, normal, healthy hoof growing out of their coronets. Now it's thick enough to see, and I should get a picture. They've got a long way to go, but we're on the way there. The black buck (who has been here a month longer than the brown) has been growing more hair as well, but THAT is taking forever. His poor footballs are still bald on the bottom. I'm sure his decency will be the last thing to come back...if bucks have decency, which as I type that I'm beginning to doubt.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Baymule said:


> In Texas, it's purple paint. A purple band of paint on a fence post or tree is the same as a No Trespassing sign. A lot cheaper too!



The same is true in Arkansas as well.


----------



## rachels.haven

Those laws don't apply here, but I will probably do the purple or orange paint anyway at least for my own benefit before I put in the electric wires. I need a feel for the size of the place. So far I mainly only know the back half near the house.


----------



## rachels.haven

After a night spent awake with a vomiting child I got the phone call saying mu first order of chicks this year was in- soggy chicks! McMurry didn't send out a shipping notification for these guys, so it was a surprise. The dry chicks should be here in a day or two and should be brooded in the coop.


----------



## thistlebloom

Why were they soggy?


----------



## rachels.haven

Because they're definitely not ducks. They're soggy chickens.

They're not soggy yet, btw. I'm keeping them DRY for today. These chickens kind of have a drinking problem. They never seem to want to stop.

But in all serious-ness, they're just active, healthy soggy chickens.


----------



## thistlebloom

rachels.haven said:


> Because they're definitely not ducks. They're soggy chickens.
> 
> They're not soggy yet, btw. I'm keeping them DRY for today. These chickens kind of have a drinking problem. They never seem to want to stop.
> 
> But in all serious-ness, they're just active, healthy pekins.



Oh! duh, I didn't look at them closely, now I see their little bills, hahaha!


----------



## High Desert Cowboy

For coyote hunting at night or in areas where you worry about where their bullets might end up a 12 gauge with #4 buckshot is solid coyote medicine.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

rachels.haven said:


> After a night spent awake with a vomiting child I got the phone call saying mu first order of chicks this year was in- soggy chicks! McMurry didn't send out a shipping notification for these guys, so it was a surprise. The dry chicks should be here in a day or two and should be brooded in the coop.
> View attachment 69581





rachels.haven said:


> Because they're definitely not ducks. They're soggy chickens.
> 
> They're not soggy yet, btw. I'm keeping them DRY for today. These chickens kind of have a drinking problem. They never seem to want to stop.
> 
> But in all serious-ness, they're just active, healthy pekins.


 i was starting to be conerned about you i was thinking surely she knows those are ducklings right lol


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Maybe night time house and livestock defending if the opportunity presents itself. I think that's legal. Definitely not hunting, right?


No, definitely not hunting. Protecting your animals and family from coyotes is reasonable.


----------



## rachels.haven

Um, so as of today I've received 13 soggy chicks and 53 dry chicks. I did not order 53 chickens. I ordered 35 pullets and 3 roosters so I could pick one or two males. Now I have 66 birds to de-tick and de-deerfly the yard not counting the 13 silkies I have to cull out the roosters from (not sure what I'm going to wind up with still, hopefully 5-6 pullets and Mr. Teddy)...That escalated quickly. Now I'm a crazy chicken lady? Maybe when I'm not sleep deprived this will be funnier. At the moment I'm more along the lines of and maybe  because apparently I have no control over my life. But hey, everyone's bedded and has food and water and I went to the store and bought a bunch of consolation chocolate (to watch myself feed to the piranha kids apparently). Kids are enjoying the soggy chicks and the four year old hasn't vomited all day and is feeling better than I am.

DH says he feels sorry for me but he feels really sorry for the person who ordered 19 pullets and received 91. I think I'll survive. I might need a bigger waterer.


----------



## Bruce

Laughing at DH's comment!! I know they send "packing peanuts" in the winter but that is for small orders. 35 is NOT small and they didn't need the extra bodies for warmth. I wonder how many of the extras are cockerels. Did they mark the 3 that are SUPPOSED to be cockerels?


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Holy Cannoli - that's crazy chicken math!  Is there even a little bit of a silver lining????   Can you sell the extras?


----------



## Baymule

You need this.


​












						Super Sexy Chicken Lady T-Shirt
					

Discover Super Sexy Chicken Lady T-Shirt, a custom product made just for you by Teespring. With world-class production and customer support, your satisfaction is guaranteed. - I Never Dreamed I'd Grow Up To Be A Super Sexy...




					teespring.com


----------



## rachels.haven

Nope @Bruce . The only thing they did mark for some reason was the leghorns. That's the first time I've ever had anything marked and I didn't ask for it.

Did I get someone else's order? Did they get the digits swapped and just send anyway? Did they just sent me a ton of cockerels? Did the first hatch of the season not sell well and I got a bunch of straight run extras? I guess we'll find out. 

I can sell the extra pullets (I've seen listed for $50/pullet, some $25) but if they are female I wouldn't mind keeping them. There's a big demand in the area for inexpensive "non-organic" normal eggs, especially colored ones and these are all production birds-leghorns and whiting in blue and green (and brown). They are flighty and forage well and lay even better. Hopefully they don't eat eggs right off the bat (new deep, dark nest boxes going in). Before I sold the egg eaters I had someone asking me for 8 dozen weekly, and other people requesting 3-4 dozens weekly in the same time frame at $3.50/dozen. I've noticed that most sellers here only do organic or "locally fed" (mill their own feed) eggs for $4-6/dozen and only catch the affluent buyers. Everyone else appears to be out of luck and stuck with nothing between that and the grocery store.

If we go that big they will all be ruthlessly free ranged all the time once adulthood hits, and I may cull down at winter to my favorites and rehatch some next year out of that.


----------



## Bruce

People pay $25-$50 for a STARTED pullet?  

Sounds like maybe you found your niche in the egg market. Around here organic feed is about twice that of non organic.

The "issue" with providing 8 & 4 dozen a week year round is that you have to light the coop in the winter or get a ton of chicks every spring. You'll need to carefully manage the flock and with that many hens I don't know how one tells which are your great layers and which are slackers. Shame to cull the good layers just based on age. I've got older girls that lay better than some of the younger ones.


----------



## rachels.haven

Duckfarmerpa1 said:


> They are here... I have 32 and counting!!





Bruce said:


> People pay $25-$50 for a STARTED pullet?



Yes, the affluent are strange animals.
...I mean, income wise DH brings in a lot income-wise but mortgage+heatingoil+electric bill are high enough I don't think I could afford to think about stocking my flock with $50/ pullet birds ever (or even just one, too easy for a chicken to die).  We are not at the top of the income bracket here, and the things I see "rich" people do boggle my mind...feels out of tough with reality.

Yes, seasonal culling and  coop lighting would have to become a thing. We'll see what happens. I wouldn't count my chickens yet. I may just have a bunch of extra cockerels to feed and grow out. 18mo+ layers still sell around here, btw. The sell well too.


----------



## Bruce

Amazing since a lot of people who are raising for max egg production dump the 18 month old girls since most likely their first year of laying is the best and I THINK even with light they aren't as productive in the winter.

I wonder how many of those "rich" people are in hock up to their cowlicks. Lose a job, lose everything.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, I think I know what you mean. I'm afraid to wonder what the average debt per household is here. Our mortgage is probably barely on the scale. I don't like thinking about that though. Ugh, too much debt in the world.

I actually like the older layers as long as they don't just shut off from Oct to May (like a Marans or Welsummer), don't start laying thin or bad shelled eggs, and they play nice with others. The eggs are bigger and it's nice to have stability in a flock. The production birds that lay large amounts of eggs don't always make that criteria or survive long enough to be old though. I'm not sure what I'll do, or if I even have to worry about that. First they've got to be pullets, next they've got to survive and not eat eggs.


----------



## rachels.haven

@Bruce I believe you wanted a picture of the barn cats. Here's one. They are both identical. I think we still have both...not sure though.

Sorry about the graininess.i had to zoom. They are still skittish.


----------



## Baymule

The sex links are fantastic layers for 2 laying seasons, after their 2nd molt, they slack off. If you want to produce eggs, that would be the way to go. Get red sex links, the next year get black sex links. Then you would know the difference. I used to have them and slaughtered on their 2nd molt.


----------



## rachels.haven

I had to take out the photo of the undetermined number of soggy chicks I have. If you think you're safe doing something, chances are mass has some law to get themselves involved in it. Stupid, stupid mass.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> @Bruce I believe you wanted a picture of the barn cats. Here's one. They are both identical. I think we still have both...not sure though.
> 
> Sorry about the graininess.i had to zoom. They are still skittish.


Hard to know if you still have 2 if they are identical! Maybe put out 2 bowls with some kind of food they just can't resist and maybe you'll see 2 cats.


----------



## rachels.haven

The extra chicks are the chicks with blue dots on their heads, are males added for warmth and are leghorns. Extra dinner or cull chicks. Mystery solved.


----------



## Bruce

That is ridiculous!!!! 35 chicks do NOT need "packing peanut" chicks to stay warm in transit. 
Geez, if they are giving you cockerels they could at least be a breed that has some meat on them.


----------



## rachels.haven

...yeah, I guess there are a lot of them. I'll process them when the go for my boots whatever size that winds up being, maybe sooner.


----------



## rachels.haven

I guess people didn't want many of these in February. 




__





						Murray McMurray Hatchery - Frying Pan Special
					

A smaller, lighter bird for fryers and these will fill that bill. They are white feathered, yellow skinned, light breed cockerel chicks from our White Leghorns.




					www.mcmurrayhatchery.com


----------



## Bruce

They don't want them any other time of year either.


----------



## Baymule

Skin and gut them when they react the appropriate size...…...what? 2 or 3 pounds?


----------



## rachels.haven

Right about!


----------



## Bruce

Call them Leghorn Game Hens and you'll be all fancy!


----------



## rachels.haven

You want a laugh? Sometimes I have to remind myself why sometimes I get frustrated when interacting with others here. Then I take a step back and laugh.

Here's one of the ads for $50 laying hens. Apparently leghorns are not commercial breeds. And easter eggers.





						Turkeys geese ducks chickens - farm & garden - by owner - sale
					

We are a small better then organic, sustainable agriculture farm utilising holistic practices and...



					worcester.craigslist.org
				




and meanwhile, people in my town are going after each other on their FB page because someone is getting their deck painted by pigeons daily (we're next to several large cities and hardly rural, but of course no one can admit that either) and they want to contact an pest control...people don't want them to because the pest control will KILL them. And pellet gunning them is reportedly illegal (just checked, jail time for a month and a fine of $20?). And poisoning them is supposedly illegal (don't want to check anymore)...in fact it's illegal to even scare pigeons ...Someone wants them to contact a wildlife rescue. SAVE THE PIGEONS...Some probably less rich person says he'll shoot and eat them all and is a troll. Oh the drama! And this is why I only check that group about once a week unless I have a need.
...Yikes, let's just log out of all that for another week and we'll see which unbalanced party comes out most alive...

...And people in the town are again opting out of statewide mosquito and insect pest (tick) spraying because they love nature from the comfort of their own living rooms with windows and doors tightly shut and never have to be actually out in it.

...I feel like I might be living in the wrong neighborhood and me, my family, and my delicious leghorn game hen cockerels all need to come back to earth. It sounds like next they are going to outlaw farming and make everyone become a "rescue".

Maybe when I sell animals I just won't let anyone come here to look at them incase actual farming DOES eventually become illegal.

No more FB zoo exhibits. Going back to being a nice person now.  I remember why people are difficult here. All done being mean.

(...jk, just waiting for the yearly "save the turtles, don't accidently smash them in your car you unethical filthy human scum" campaign to start again where they encourage people to stop traffic and have their apparently worthless kids risk life and limb to move turtles from one side of the road across traffic to the other)

Very confusing.


----------



## Baymule

Sounds like a bunch of inbred morons to me. All their food comes out of a box with a shelf life of 43 years...…….We are in the 4th and 5th generations of food from a box...……. and this is what you get.


----------



## rachels.haven

I believe they like the term "middle class rural suburb" for themselves best.

Actually they are an upper class, but not top tier, bedroom community full of estates between 2 and 5 acres (and we are enjoying ruining our larger than normal one by adding livestock fencing and farming actual livestock).

I'm very grateful for my mother and father. While they weren't and aren't perfect, we weren't affluent enough to be box people so we lived on home made bread, beans, bunnies and eggs for my early childhood (after we all became anemic and later moved around we had to add cheap beef and chicken instead of just bunny, but I learned to cook and like cheap cuts best as a result). While my family situation now is stable, I really don't want my kids to fit in with the types in the above posts. It's really not healthy on any level or for any length of time. Plus, it makes me sad.

You're not a rural anything if you can call city hall to complain about a pothole in the downtown and get it fixed with in the week as opposed to being told to drive around it and laughed off the phone or being told it will get fixed when they get around to it-meaning in the next few years. Or if you can walk to your closest neighbor's house in 5 minutes or less. Or the cops could be called and arrive in less than 10 minutes. Or you talk about how cute and sweet bears are when they knock on your windows looking for things to eat. Not rural. But this is where we live right now so that DH can work where he does (I'm grateful for his good stable income too, btw, we are ridiculously blessed/lucky).

Now, it's MY TURN WITH THE STOMACH BUG. Thank you, children! Too much sick kid cuddling.

Btw, my soggy chicks are SOOO happy to see me this morning no matter how sick I am. These are so much more fun than the khaki campbells were. I'm amazed.


----------



## Bruce

Interesting that the Pekin's are more fun than the KCs were. I've heard (mostly from @CntryBoy777 that KCs are pretty entertaining. 

Don't eat those extra WL cockerels, grow them out and sell them for $50 each!


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, Bruce. What a very local idea.
Khakis ARE entertaining. Ducks are hilarious. When i had them mine had always been big on running away starting very early. These guys not yet. 

I had a Pekin pair once. I sold them for the noise issue because of close neighbors. They sort of ran away when you tried to catch them... slowly, but they were already over a week when I brought them home, so less imprinting. We still enjoyed them due to their slower, calmer nature. Their main drawback is rapid weight gain and noise these may have been Jumbo's so instead of foraging they sat behind the AC and ate the insulation off the wires. We'll be ready for that if they start being destructive. Wealso wwill not overfeed them. These are not Jumbo's.

 Phone glitching so time to go.ww


----------



## Baymule

Cure for stomach bug is apple cider vinegar. It will stop diarrhea, vomiting and even food poisoning. I mix 2 tablespoons ACV with 2 tablespoon honey in a small glass of water and sip on it. Don’t gulp it down, but finish it in about 30 minutes. In less than hour, you will be ok. ACV is nature’s disinfectant, it kills the bad bugs but not the beneficial gut bacteria that you need.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you, I believe it. I may have to go out and get some acv if the freezing rain ever slows and roads clear...and never be out of it again.

ACV and REAL sushi ginger would be lovely right now. Supposedly that also kills bacteria and the taste is nice and settling too. I got just a bit on the two days I was working up to being sick this time and it seemed to help push the unavoidable off during the daylight hours. I'm out now, of course. 

Maybe the acv if I can get it can help DH get over this too. He's starting to get sick too as of this afternoon. Then we are done, I hope.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

rachels.haven said:


> Nope @Bruce . The only thing they did mark for some reason was the leghorns. That's the first time I've ever had anything marked and I didn't ask for it.
> 
> Did I get someone else's order? Did they get the digits swapped and just send anyway? Did they just sent me a ton of cockerels? Did the first hatch of the season not sell well and I got a bunch of straight run extras? I guess we'll find out.
> 
> I can sell the extra pullets (I've seen listed for $50/pullet, some $25) but if they are female I wouldn't mind keeping them. There's a big demand in the area for inexpensive "non-organic" normal eggs, especially colored ones and these are all production birds-leghorns and whiting in blue and green (and brown). They are flighty and forage well and lay even better. Hopefully they don't eat eggs right off the bat (new deep, dark nest boxes going in). Before I sold the egg eaters I had someone asking me for 8 dozen weekly, and other people requesting 3-4 dozens weekly in the same time frame at $3.50/dozen. I've noticed that most sellers here only do organic or "locally fed" (mill their own feed) eggs for $4-6/dozen and only catch the affluent buyers. Everyone else appears to be out of luck and stuck with nothing between that and the grocery store.
> 
> If we go that big they will all be ruthlessly free ranged all the time once adulthood hits, and I may cull down at winter to my favorites and rehatch some next year out of that.


Okay before i forget again Rachel check your protein percentage on your feed bag it might not be high enough. Most unless my hen find a broken egg they don'
 Eat them. I feed a game bird(all flock raiser) with 28% protein with chicken scratch along with scraps and they don't go after the eggs(i also have a tendency to throw eggs for them when we have to many 20 dozen on my counter as I type this)


----------



## rachels.haven

Okay, I will. I think I was getting 18 percent layer. That should be okay. They will be getting more than ample protein when they are big enough the weather breaks. We have insect issues.
Honestlu it was probably boredom that started it. We had coyotes getting them during the day that would go after us too and a tenacious hawk with bad habits so the chickens had to be "protected" and cloistered away for a long time until the fence and dog came. We won't have that issue this time if I can help it.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Yeah mine dont get locked up so havent had that experience. We had a hawk coming in and fly into the coop a shot gun shot made it stay away. We have stray cats, dogs and coyotes taking birds before they vanish for some unknown reason (don't look at the smoking gun)


----------



## rachels.haven

Wow, you just got a shotgun and the critters started going away? AMAZING.
I should go on a vacation to my parents house and learn how to do that. They dissapear things too, I'm told, and they'd let me practice on some of their raccoons and coyotes. (My dog might be happy to disappear a hawk and all, since it's a bird that "doesn't belong" going after her charges, the chicks and ducks) My husband is still not happy about the fact I will probably get a gun in the next year or so, and I'm worried if we do start disappearing things and it got out at all the local crazy city people who live here would get us in serious trouble for...something? anything they can? Every second they can until they find another target? I know some would say, "let them try" but this is Massachusetts, and people don't make sense here, laws don't really protect people, and the people with lots of money and lots of voice can get away with a whole lot, and that's sure not us. I feel I should keep our head down as much as possible during our tenure here, and try to make friends with people in the (NORMAL, still attached to reality) farming core of our town before I do anything that could become known and cause waves. Or maybe someday we'll move. One or the other.

Today I am kicking the chicks outside into the brooder coop, which used to be Mr. Teddy's bantam coop. The bantams have the big coop for now until I can process the roosters. The chicks need the closer space to make the most of their heat lamp anyway. I'm not sure if I've got the lamp adjusted right yet in the chicks coop at the moment so I guessed by feel and pulled the 9! packing peanut leghorn cockerels and put them in it and I'll see how they act.

In the last day or two we've lost one packing peanut leghorn male and one leghorn female, so I guess the leghorns are the weak ones so far.

And speaking of the leghorn roosters, I don't think they're going to make processing weight. They come after your hand in the brooder and bite at age fluffy and puffy and 2" tall. I don't think their brains to hormone ratio is right, and life's too short to have tiny showdowns with nine dingbat baby roosters over the waterer and feeder daily, so eventually I will need to make them go and just dispose of them. Eventually. But today they're going to tell me if that coop out there is all comfy and I'll worry about culling later (the coop is probably fine, I just want to be SURE). The last leghorns I had were straight run too and they didn't go after me until they were at least 16 weeks-which is almost processing size. But it doesn't matter I guess. Darn chicken hormones. At least nobody will get seriously bitten or spurred this way. Pity too, because they're cute for now-key words being "for now", I guess. But that's chickens. I have my doubts feisty chicks are going to turn into chill, relaxed, respectful, safe to be around roosters. (...In fact, I don't think I've ever seen that happen in all my years of chicken raising.)


----------



## rachels.haven

Leghorn cockerels say the new coop and heat lamp setting is great. We'll get the other million chicks out shortly.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Is there any way you can set up your coop so the waterers and feeders go through the fence so you don't have to deal with the nasty little buggers.  Maybe you could get 'em to harvest size that way?  Or... maybe just not worth all that hassle...   Or Craigslist for $2, lol!


----------



## rachels.haven

I like that idea. I'll take a survey of things and consider it, do some brainstorming.


----------



## Bruce

Jesusfreak101 said:


> I feed a game bird(all flock raiser) with 28% protein


28% seems pretty steep for regular chickens.


----------



## thistlebloom

Rachel, considering where you are located, just be cautious about what you may mention about things that disappear. When we lived in over regulated CA out in the semi rural area, a neighbor shot a redtail that was killing his homing pigeons. Somebody found out about it, he got caught and it was ugly. I believe all raptors are protected, but I don't know if there are extenuating circumstances or conditions that exempt that. There are _certain_ people out there that may have a reason to target you.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

I mix it with chicken scratch mine havent had any problem but i do let the free range an only feed them once a day. I also have duck and geese in with them.


----------



## rachels.haven

thistlebloom said:


> Rachel, considering where you are located, just be cautious about what you may mention about things that disappear. When we lived in over regulated CA out in the semi rural area, a neighbor shot a redtail that was killing his homing pigeons. Somebody found out about it, he got caught and it was ugly. I believe all raptors are protected, but I don't know if there are extenuating circumstances or conditions that exempt that. There are _certain_ people out there that may have a reason to target you.


No worries. If I ever gain the ability to actually disappear things while here I will probably _never _post about it here or anywhere.


----------



## Bruce

Smart woman. SSS.
You do have to be careful with the raptors, some of them are trackable.
And no I've never killed a raptor. Knocking on wood, I've not had a problem with them killing my chickens. Now foxes and coons, they are a different story.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Our stupid neighbors here have killed eagles,  hawks, owls ...anything that is a pest to farm animals is fair game


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

To deal with the roosters, you could do as the Texas Aggie did when he decided to go into the chicken farming business.

A Texas Aggie decided to go into the chicken farming business.  He was having trouble getting any of them to survive.  So he called up the county agent, who was an Aggie as well, and told him his troubles.  "No matter what I try, the chickens won't come up.  I have tried planting them deep, shallow, watering and fertilizing, not watering or fertilizing, and nothing seems to work."  Replied the county agent, "I'm not advising anything until I take a soil sample!"

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Bwahahahah!


----------



## Baymule

We had leg quarters from a young EE rooster Saturday night. Our two little granddaughters thoroughly enjoyed it. Not a lot of meat, but tasty. I have found that spatchcocking scrawny roos is the best way to freeze them, they stack up fairly well and don't take up as much room.


----------



## rachels.haven

Coppered the goats today, trimmed hooves on Ava's babies and the lamancha bucks. I have to admit, Ava's still a monster, but i love the temperament on at least 2 of them, maybe all 3. There are still the remains of 2 dark pockets on Mr. Buggy, the black lamancha buck. On Mr. Brownie one I cut off almost all of the dead hoof tissue, down to white or pink (or oops, blood pinpricks). Some of his toes are still tear drop shaped and but we are SO close. The dead hoof tissue was all smushy looking and deformed but dry and used to be rock hard (thanks for the treatments, now it cuts).
Taking pictures when it's chilly is less fun. Sorry about the lack.


----------



## Bruce

Moving in the right direction with those hooves!


----------



## rachels.haven

Wow, I woke up to a message over Yelp from Badger's breeder. More evidence I'm dealing with a crazy person breeding dangerous dogs. She claims to be so sad I chose to put down the "poor puppy" instead of giving him back to her...that's funny, I still have the email back where she refused to take him or do anything other than what is directly stated in the contract, and also the other email where she stated "good luck finding him a new home". That's pretty plain. I'm so glad I have that all in writing.

Her email will be documented and I will not be replying. If she ever gets threatening the police have already offered to help me out with her. 

Her email isn't as upsetting as it would be if that email had been sent right after the incident. I've already found peace on this issue. She can't take it away from me.

On a more positive note, first kidding date is Saffron on March 19. 😁 So excited and counting down for my first lamancha kids.

I also found a long time supposedly good breeder in the area that will do disbuddings for $15. I may just book my goatlings. Disbuddings still gives me nightmares and she has several people saying she is fabulous. Fox's Pride breeds mostly Nubians, but also lamanchas and a few saanens and are CAE negative.


----------



## rachels.haven

I also walked in on Bailey snuggling her barn cat in the loft this morning...which ever of the identical twins it was. As long as they don't have a falling out it looks like the barn kitties are safe with her.


----------



## thistlebloom

rachels.haven said:


> Wow, I woke up to a message over Yelp from Badger's breeder. More evidence I'm dealing with a crazy person breeding dangerous dogs. She claims to be so sad I chose to put down the "poor puppy" instead of giving him back to her...that's funny, I still have the email back where she refused to take him or do anything other than what is directly stated in the contract, and also the other email where she stated "good luck finding him a new home". That's pretty plain. I'm so glad I have that all in writing.





Unbelievable. What a crazy lying destructive woman that is. Scary to have people like her walking around loose.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I also walked in on Bailey snuggling her barn cat in the loft this morning...which ever of the identical twins it was. As long as they don't have a falling out it looks like the barn kitties are safe with her.


I'm betting on a lifetime of BFF with those two. Maybe the other cat will join in.


----------



## Baymule

I am sorry that idiot woman is still stirring things up. I agree that ignoring her is the best. 

Disbudding for $15? Sounds like a bargain to me! Glad the hoof treatments worked so well.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Heck, if she's showing remorse it might be a good time to ask for a refund!  (or not... )  I get wanting to not deal with her.


----------



## Bruce

Remorse or she's noticed her business is getting bad press.


----------



## thistlebloom

People like that don't have remorse.They're only interested in themselves.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

What does


Baymule said:


> We had leg quarters from a young EE rooster Saturday night. Our two little granddaughters thoroughly enjoyed it. Not a lot of meat, but tasty. I have found that spatchcocking scrawny roos is the best way to freeze them, they stack up fairly well and don't take up as much room.


 spatchcocking mean?  You have all these terms that throw me Baymule...


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

Baymule said:


> I am sorry that idiot woman is still stirring things up. I agree that ignoring her is the best.
> 
> Disbudding for $15? Sounds like a bargain to me! Glad the hoof treatments worked so well.


I got mine done for $10 each...we live in Hicksville USA!


----------



## Bruce

Duckfarmerpa1 said:


> What does spatchcocking mean?  You have all these terms that throw me Baymule...


Google! (They have that in Hicksville too, right?  ) 
Quite roughly it means you remove the backbone and flatten the bird out


----------



## Jesusfreak101

That explains so much lol i never looked to closely at a heb cooking area where they ciok chickens flat i was wondering how lol my kids are dangerous to stop to long in one area to shop lol


----------



## rachels.haven

Spatchcocking is the best way to process quail. Yum.


----------



## Baymule

I use kitchen shears to cut down both sides of the backbone. Flatten out chicken, vacuum seal and I’m not storing that big empty  space in a whole chicken. Saves freezer room.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Plus added bonus no back bone no finding tiny bones in broth why didnt you shate this sooner bay honestly how rude i been fighting tiny bones for no reason...


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I watched a YouTube video by "Keeping It Dutch", and in the comments some people mentioned that human urine can deter coyotes.  Here is the video if you want to watch it and read the comments:





Do you think you could get your husband to urinate in a pot and when it is full you could pour it along the back boundary of your property?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Bruce

You don't think her pee is good enough??


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh dear. This can't go anywhere good. 

DH's pee wouldn't work. The coyote would take one wiff and be like, "hmm, desk job. Mild mannered computer programmer. Has never had a violent thought in his life. Civilized pushover." and trot on by. And alas! I am not a male alpha dog. Alpha b!tches only strike fear in the heart after they have bitten you up and rearranged your body parts. In absence of that awe inspiring testosterone we have to work for what respect we get and I will not be biting any coyotes today.

But in all seriousness, once I get the propertyline defined, I may see if we can test what you suggest @Senile_Texas_Aggie . I'd like to make that part of the hill and the trail where the coyotes come over on our land less appealing and let them know we know they're there and this is OURS. I've also used citronella to mark vertical surfaces when I've had issues with marking and feral cats. It's pungent enough it may throw things off just a bit if human essence doesn't work or isn't available.


----------



## Bruce

Once you have the property lines determined you can put up some concertina wire just inside. That should slow the coyotes substantially


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Miss @rachels.haven,
> 
> I watched a YouTube video by "Keeping It Dutch", and in the comments some people mentioned that human urine can deter coyotes.  Here is the video if you want to watch it and read the comments:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Do you think you could get your husband to urinate in a pot and when it is full you could pour it along the back boundary of your property?
> 
> Senile Texas Aggie


If this is real...coyotes would never come anywhere NEAR our land.....guess what...they are all over!!


----------



## thistlebloom

I have heard it as a deterrent to deer also. But nope, they just walk by and laugh.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ah, so I SHOULDN'T blame DH if it doesn't work.


----------



## Xerocles

I found out a few years ago that human urine IS a deer deterrent. IF you happen to be peeing at the same time the deer walks by...and IF you happen to have a .30-30 tucked in the crook of your arm at the time. That deer never bothered my garden again (yum). (And in was only several minutes later that I realized I forgot to "put my things away") But otherwise, not so much. They're so used to ppl and our myriad scents, it's just another moment in the lives of, for them.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Ah, so I SHOULDN'T blame DH if it doesn't work.


He'll just claim he needs more beer to strengthen the deterrent smell.


----------



## rachels.haven

Accidently gave Ginger, one of Ava's does, scours yesterday. I put some grain in the alfalfa pellets I'd started them on for the cold weather. It looks like everybody else wasn't as into the grain as she was and she gorged.  Ava had a little mess on her, but I think it was from Ginger as Ava's rear is clean and Ginger sticks to Ava because she is THAT doeling that everyone has that never wants to stop nursing. So I put out the baking soda, and Ginger went to town on it, gave her some probiotics, and am hoping for the best. If there's anything else I should do, feel free to let me know. She'll definitely get more probiotic paste later, and maybe some vitamin B paste too, but right now I want the baking soda shes eating to reduce the acid and the hay and water to slow her down before I put more strange stuff in her.

We went down to 2 degrees this morning, and we are going back up to 30 now, so being cold is less of a concern but I will keep my eye on that doeling. She's a pretty little thing with a nice straight back, and not as barrel-like as her siblings. I want to keep her and grow her out not have her kick the bucket for a silly reason. She may be staying.

I ordered a new milk stand for the nigerians today from the same place I got my big stand from. When B. would start feeling like he was going to have seizures he'd go nuts and start going after things and rip them to bits and one of the things he got was the small milk stand my husband made. DH is too overloaded right now to build another with me, so I will pay someone else to do it, I guess. Hay money for someone else.


----------



## rachels.haven

Frosty bucks braving the cold and ice for some sun


----------



## Bruce

Some sun does make things warmer, certainly warmer than in the shaded barn.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

So, a


Xerocles said:


> I found out a few years ago that human urine IS a deer deterrent. IF you happen to be peeing at the same time the deer walks by...and IF you happen to have a .30-30 tucked in the crook of your arm at the time. That deer never bothered my garden again (yum). (And in was only several minutes later that I realized I forgot to "put my things away") But otherwise, not so much. They're so used to ppl and our myriad scents, it's just another moment in the lives of, for them.


So, are you saying, I should actually tell Chris to go tinkle around the perimeter of the garden this year?  Yikes. Ugh. He’ll have to much fun with that!!


----------



## rachels.haven

They also seem to get kicks out of standing on the ice. I don't get it, but I guess I'm not stuck in a stall all day not wanting to go out barefoot in the snow. They jump on the ice, they head butt each other, they twirl in circles and slide around...until it gets warm enough that their feet start crashing through then they go inside and hide some more. The nigerians didn't do it so much before but since the Lamanchas arrived they all do it.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

That’s a beautiful 


rachels.haven said:


> Frosty bucks braving the cold and ice for some sun
> 
> View attachment 69876


picture.  That tan one sure does have some long legs!  Our new triplets are all legs right now


----------



## rachels.haven

Duckfarmerpa1 said:


> So, a
> 
> So, are you saying, I should actually tell Chris to go tinkle around the perimeter of the garden this year?  Yikes. Ugh. He’ll have to much fun with that!!



Could be worse. I bet tinkling on the deer would work as a derrant too...


----------



## Bruce

Your bucks like to ice skate!


----------



## rachels.haven

Duckfarmerpa1 said:


> That’s a beautiful
> 
> picture.  That tan one sure does have some long legs!  Our new triplets are all legs right now




Thank you, I love their legs.

I think you're talking about Lucky 4-Leaf CD Count Chocula, aka, Brownie. He turns 1 next month and his kids hit the ground with his last owner in April. He's got a lot of growing to do still, but his sire has very long legs too, so I think he's going to keep them. Brownie is the buck with the damaged hind foot, but that's not sticking with him for much longer.

This is Brownie's dad at the top of the page presently (I think he's for sale so he may not be there for long). LOOOOOOONG legs.

https://lucky4leaflamanchas.com/bucks.shtml

and here is his mom also at the top of the page
https://lucky4leaflamanchas.com/seniors.shtml

So I guess imagine a fusion of those two and you have a picture of little Brownie.

Me, I don't know how to get goats to stand for pictures yet, but someday I hope to get a decent picture of each of my guys (out of rut, hopefully) and not play merge these goats.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> He turns 1 next month and his kids hit the ground with his last owner in April.


Did they really breed him at ~ 6 months?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yup. personally I'd have waited a little longer to see what he's going to turn into, but it's their herd. I'm surprised he pulled it off.

I'm not sure entirely why they sold him. I guess he's going to be very dairy and this breeder wants to breed for show. Also, with that bad foot he wasn't going to win anything. His last owner was able to pick up a buck she had her eye on and she may need to keep her buck numbers down. Last year his sire also got dinged at linear appraisal for front legs that turned out, but who knows? Personally I don't plan on using him until he matures a little more. He still looks like a baby to me. No does robbing the cradle here...except Avalon...darn Ava. 
His legs look straight right now.


----------



## Bruce

You are looking for milk not show anyway, right?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, definitely. Dairy, but correct.
There's a trend among show lamancha breeders to breed for bigger and taller and I want no part of that. And neglect production, which is not good for any dairy breed.

If I wind up not wanting to keep or use Brownie (like if his legs began turning out upon maturity like dad) Longvu lamanchas is only a 40 minute drive away, where I got Summer. I LOVED what I saw there. I'd be happy to get a buckling from him, and I'd wait for the right one to come along. The main reason I didn't this time was concern over how close they may be in relation to Summer. I don't need to worry about it today though. I think there's a very good chance Brownie will be a great herd sire though which is good because I like him.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ugh, collected a fecal from the black lamancha buck, and discovered lots of tape worms all over it in my gloves hand. Eprinex doesn't kill that. I might get some equimax into the two L bucks and the doe that came with them and watch my other goats...unless this is something you're supposed to wipe out, but I don't think so.

And here's a cute picture of some ducks I found laying around. Man, I wish I had me some poopy ducks.
Beginning Week 1





Week 2???




There is what I am assuming is a tape worm in this pic. A few got stuck in the glove, but this one made it to the picture. I guess I should finish the fecal now. Blah. Everyone's eyelid color is great.


----------



## Baymule

EEEWWWW.......worms! LOL Never know what you'll dig out of their butt. Nothing like a fecal to give you a clear picture of what you need to do!


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, I just held him on the clean milk stand until he ran out of food, got mad, and pooped. He's the only one of mine I know for sure does that quickly. Kind of funny in a mean way, but no butt digging today. No patience does sometimes pay off.

I'm actually only seeing tapeworm eggs today. That's weird. Maybe winter is getting together with the hoeggers stuff and we're going to get a break. He's up to 800 eggs per gram of tape worms and tape worms alone-not tons, but apparently enough to start shedding pieces of themselves into his poop.


----------



## Baymule

Worm parasites are one of those thing that I wonder why they exist. They serve no purpose other than for themselves.


----------



## rachels.haven

Me too. I've come to the conclusion that they are one of those "there's a niche so we must fill it" types of things. They want that stray, unused nutrition and safety. I think they'd say that existing only for themselves is plenty reason to exist.


----------



## farmerjan

Baymule said:


> The sex links are fantastic layers for 2 laying seasons, after their 2nd molt, they slack off. If you want to produce eggs, that would be the way to go. Get red sex links, the next year get black sex links. Then you would know the difference. I used to have them and slaughtered on their 2nd molt.


That is what I have done, even actually using 3 colors so that  I could keep some of the older hens because of needing some x-x-large/jumbo eggs for a customer that year.  Plus, you can weed out the hens not laying and they will be fat great for soup and chicken salad.
If you are looking just for layers the different sex-links are the way to go.  The blacks usually get a little bigger as they mature, but the also tend to be more aggressive. They kill out better for size but they also eat more overall.  All of the sex-links are egg laying machines.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's very interesting. I've never heard that before, but I believe it. 

If I wanted to do that I could do red sex links, black sex links, and California whites. The whites will always be my favorite temperament-wise, although out of the four I got, I lost two to laying complications, so that should be taken into account if I did go that route. I bet the other sex links have better livability.


----------



## Baymule

Sex links will continue to lay after their 2nd molt, but drop off dramatically. They still eat as much though. I had a black sex link that I kept as a pet. Robin had a bad attitude, was Queen of the coop and lived to 7 years old, even making the move with us here. She is buried by the garden gate.


----------



## Bruce

I can't give you any long term laying numbers or "survivability" because Aurora and Gretel are only 8 months old but so far they have been laying machines. 5+ eggs a week since they started early/mid Dec. Austra Whites from Meyer - White leghorn X Black Australorp so not sexlinks. They are more leghorn size/shape than BA and are laying USDA Large.


----------



## rachels.haven

It got up to 60 today SO here's a nice picture of the fence...and a buck. Not one of my big name bucks, but I love this little 35-40lbs guy that I brought from Michigan. He's too "friendly" to give me much to take pictures on unless I want him up on the fence begging 24/7, but today eating hay in the sun was more pleasurable than begging for food and scratches. He really likes it when you stand over his petite self and scratch him down both sides from his ears to his tail. He carries good production, thumb length teats, and nice tight udders with good, very soft texture. Very good feet too. This summer/fall he gets his cousin Avalon's, three doelings as his first keeper breedings. Assuming they get big enough by then. They appear to have his growth rate and size and can still fit through a cattle panel. It took him 9 months to be stuck, if I remember right.

Mustang Meadows T Durango (with Buggy the photogenic in the background, I promise he's prettier than that)








And while the adults went out to play the tinies got to own the pen and do whatever they wanted. They ate all the things, then they napped.

Death nap of Kaos Farm Uranium (Emi)




I blame Sugar (the one my husband is convinced is obese, bless his heart, she just has big soft stomach bones)




Ginger with a shadow of Lavender




Easy breezy cover buck. With a side of Durango and Patrick.




NOM NOM NOM -Buckeye, Dad to doelings in picture above


----------



## Bruce

Very nice


----------



## rachels.haven

One more. Here are the does. Lace on the left appears to be open and will not be a milking yearling after all. Summer to the right of her is stretching.


----------



## Baymule

Nice goats, they are your babies!


----------



## rachels.haven

Ugh, it's time to get Saffron's grade registration tattoos on and her tail is too big for the tattoo outfit to fit around even with the ear release depressed. Looks like I'm going to have to figure that one out. Oh brother. She did get her cdt though.

On the positive side I dealt with Lace's scur loop quick and easy and probably at the last possible moment before it started pressing into her head. I will probably band Buggy's big scur after I can cdt him. It looks a little tacky and has circulation. He seems to want to knock it off anyway and I'd rather avoid a blood bath.


----------



## thistlebloom

I like your beautiful goaties. Yay for sunshine and warmer days!


----------



## rachels.haven

Just checked. The countdown has begun. 22 days.
And nothing is safe from the goaties. 


















Actually I mostly just have a cold so everything is funny, you know, as I feel terrible. But it really is 22 days until Saffron's day 150. I guess it's time to start giving her twice a day grain rations instead of just once. I guess her cdt got lost in the haze of household illnesses we keep picking up at church that I don't want to think about any more than living through it requires.

And there is a tattoo pen on the way for Saffy's tail. So she will have her tattoo done like a 140-160 lbs rabbit.

That's Emi, btw. She's a cute little 50lbs princess goat.


----------



## thistlebloom

Emi says "Hay kid!" lol
Cute goat and cute (human) kidlet.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Hope you feel better soon


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, thanks. The barfing was 3ish weeks ago though. I feel for that poor emoji.


----------



## Baymule

Being sick is no fun. Passing it around the family is worse than no fun!


----------



## thistlebloom

Not laughing that you were sick, (poor you) just at your emoji empathy.


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> Being sick is no fun. Passing it around the family is worse than no fun!


But I thought "sharing is caring"!!


----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> But I thought "sharing is caring"!!


Only at work to someone you don’t like. Hahaha


----------



## rachels.haven

Today I drove up to TSC in Pelham, NEW HAMPSHIRE and got myself 7 pekins, so now I officially have ducks. Hmm, fancy that...
I also got the kids $7 worth of dairy cows and deer with little action figure guys for them to break. Christmas clearance toys in almost March are the best. Ultra clearanced. Also some conversation hearts on clearance from the Hannaford grocery store next door. I guess today was shopping the holiday clearances Saturday.

19 days.

There might be a new bred nigerian doe coming to live here in the next week. Something Promiseland, Old Mountain Farm, Twin Creeks-ish might be coming into our nigerian genetic mix. The buck she was bred to is in the "Beau" line of Promisedland goats, so this should be an interesting breeding. The doe will be a 3rd freshener, has a collapsible udder, cow sized teats, good orifices, and good udder texture, and milks around half a gallon/day.  Next breeding time I'm thinking of crossing her to Durango, and having my two Mustang Meadows goats be kind of the start of my herd line, but Patrick or Buckeye wouldn't be a terrible crossing because she already HAS the teats and milking equipment. They would help in the conformation department in her offspring and I think she has a few little flaws in her linear appraisal. I think she'll fit in well here. Her owner says she's friendly but not obnoxious, near the top of the pecking order but not overbearing important traits for nigerians I've discovered.


----------



## rachels.haven

Forgot the picture. DAY ONE!


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

How many goats do you have?  They are beautiful!!  So, I have two bucklings.  My hubby thinks we need to sell one, that we don’t need a wether.  How do I convince him that my buck needs company??  He thinks if he’s next to the girls...he’ll be ok.  Plus, my does are free range....I think it will make him cry!!  The thought of selling him breaks my heart!  But, we definitely don’t need two bucks with the exact same looks and genes.  Ugh

so, are these your first ducks?  Do they have a heat lamp or just the pad?  Do you happen to know how warm it keeps it in there?  If you need any tips, I’d be more than happy to help...after all..I am..@Duckfarmerpa1...      Who just sold her ducks!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you!
I've had ducks for a long time. These guys will join my other "soggy chicks" outside when they're about 3-6 weeks, depending on the weather and how their down growth is doing. They need that white fluff. Yes, they will use the heat pad. The heat pad hovers around 100+ish degrees and only heats what is touching it. The ducks heat up and then have to walk around and cool off.  The room is about 66 degrees. They don't normally cluster, but my tsc ducklings are afraid of people and I've kind of chased them into the corner for the picture. Chicks will use my $15 walmart heat pad too, usually crafted into a tunnel. I like the pad because of the reduced fire risk and because babies brooded with natural dark/light seem to be calmer and more relaxed. It's good as long as the inside temps are normal. They just need a little boost.
I have 13 goats presently. Too many/5 bucks, and 8 does. The new goat will make 14.  
My husband mostly leaves me alone to manage the animals, so I don't have to convince him of much. I know what I can handle while keeping everything in the condition I like. We're going to try to break even or make a profit this year (lol).

In regards to convincing your husband, I know I've heard that having a lonely goat will make them break out to find company, in your case it may be on the other side of that fence with those desperately seductive does. That may be compelling to your husband. If you can swing it with him you can always keep both bucks until you decide what you want to do-or indefinitely. It is your herd, and it has been done before. I can't judge. Just be aware that selling goats is very difficult in the winter, bucks especially, so if you are going to sell one, sell before or after winter before the hay for the year has stopped coming in. Your one buck MIGHT be okay next to the girls with no pen mates, but mine would get desperate to get them, not just for mating, but because he's a goat too and is desperate for the head smashing and bullying and alliance forming and snoozing with the BFF's in the sun that goats do.

Then there is the issue of uncontrolled fence breeding out there, but my guys aren't exceedingly talented at wooing and luring the right end of the goat to the fence for that so I can't say much about it besides the issue existing. B&B would know more about fence breeding. I think she dealt with the results of an incident if my memory serves. A hot wire or two might prevent this issue.

I don't think a buck eats that much more than a wether, if he's willing to let you keep a wether with your guy, so by the slippery slope fallacy a second buck would be okay too??? 

Convincing one's spouse of anything is difficult. Mine is a remarkably stubborn man, but he respects my space and my little "kingdom" outside so I don't have to convince him of much. I wish you luck is the most I can say. Worst case scenario, you will still have your one buck. (may or may not worth mentioning, a buck apron might be an option for occasional romps here and there might be appropriate, but I'm not sure I'd want to rely on them to control breeding long term).

All that being said, we on here tend to be enablers and you know your situation and spouse better than us. I hope you guys can work out what you want to do. (secretly I hope you get your goat dreams here)


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Fence breeding happened  here and next door....where theirs a will, there's a way !.....


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

Lol!!  Yes! We ARE enablers on here and I love it!!  So far, my goat dreams ARE coming true!  If it comes down to it...I’d be willing to get rid of a pig to keep my little guy.  But I’m not sure if that will convince him?  The pot belly is really no work at all, and eats barely a thing.  She’s sooo easy!  BUT..I , like you...do all the work!  He does bring me water right now, as our water tank handle is frozen...it’s plastic, and he doesn’t want to risk ruining it with a hair dryer.  So, he carries water.And he’s been helping me milk Busty...which has been quite a chore!  I have to return the milk machine...we were being cheap and didn’t get a good one.  It’s junk.

Anyways...you’ll have 14 goats!  That’s great!  I have 9 now, and I think that’s a good number..because, I have an awful lot of other animals too.  If I had to get rid of everything tomorrow..I’d keep the goats for sure.  Fence breeding?  Oh geez!!  This is going to be very tricky!!  So...would you suggest keeping both boys as bucks because Willy would be too rough on Walter if he were a wether? Oh, I just hate that smell!  Ugh. Willy loves to crawl on my head....I don’t think he’s going to want to stop being so affectionate with me...which is great...but that smelll...ugh!!  But, our last buck was too rough and a bit mean to me...I couldn’t handle him.  I don’t want Willy to get that way...so I’m handling him as much as possible.  I actually hold the triplets as they nurse off Busty in the milk stand, so they’re a bit like bottle babies?  

The heating pad for ducklings is better than a heat lamp?  Huh?  My barn is definitely not as warm as yours, but I don’t get them this early.  I’m not getting them this year...or at least I don’t think I am.... I had 43 ...it was great until mating season...then it was awful.  My ratios were terrible though.  But, I just sold them to make room for the mini pigs that we are starting to breed.  The pigs are a a lot less work!!  Much less mess!!

ill be picking your brain in a few weeks when I have to wean the kids....not looking forward to it...


----------



## Jesusfreak101

My thought if you want a buck buddy look for another buck that you like then buy him and sale your extra 😁


----------



## rachels.haven

Uh...my ducks are in the house.   I think my husband still loves me by week 3.

I bought these ducks knowing that most will probably be male. STRAIGHT RUN means mostly male, right? The girls will stay, the extra boys will be a part of us always. 😉 I really hope we get one or two ducks out of this batch. I bought sexed ducklings earlier from McMurray. Those two drakes will be our breeder boys. The rest of that batch of 14 were girls. Hopefully the boys won't be too rough with 6+ girls to split their attention between. You want the ducks to COMPETE for the drakes' attention, and not get it every time, based on my past experiences. And ducks are waaaay sloppy. Their purpose here is insect and slug control. If the pekins don't do that job I'll try muscovy again, but THOSE gorgeous birds reproduce out of control just as a fact of life and DH asked me to hold off as we were over-run every year until I got them all processed. They also eat a ton including the bark off fruit trees. Hopefully pekins will be better.

If you love Willy like that and want him to stay that way with you he should be a wether. He will be nicer that way. He will mature and "buck-i-fy" when rut comes. If he's a nigerian he may not completely come out of that after rut. And my nigerian bucks like to bite if you let them. If you want a pet, go the wether route for him (for you). Someone who has kept bucks with wethers should know better if he'll be okay and how okay. I've only observed, and not kept any myself and my bucks are all rough on each other and personally I am glad they are all intact. They're all equally rude. Willy will probably be okay enough with his lot in life, bucked up by the other buck or not. It will probably be less stressful to lose the buck parts and he will definitely live longer as a wether. The only draw back will be that his buck buddy will make him stink too. (I think Jason at Coghill farm on youtube keeps a buck and a wether together and Tip and Top both look great, Tips not traumatized. All my goat friends ate or sell off their wethers...or don't wether at all because their stock is enviable, something I hope to achieve).

If you want genetic variation available for your herd you should rehome/sell the sweet dear and find a healthy herd with traits you like and get yourself a second buck. You may not need that at this point. It's up to you.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

Honestly, I didn’t want another buck at all, then these two were born!!  Well, this is kind of what I was thinking.  Busty is a big goat, she has some planer goat in her.  So most ND are smaller.  Perhaps we use Walter as the buck, since he’s a bit smaller.  And not near as attached.  He’s kind of shy.  Maybe he would create better, smaller ND goats?   I would love if Willy could stay just the way he is!!  He’s my snuggle bunny!!


----------



## rachels.haven

You should do a thread on this and see what BYH thinks, especially as they grow. It could be fun.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

rachels.haven said:


> You should do a thread on this and see what BYH thinks, especially as they grow. It could be fun.


You mean separate from my journal?  Ok....can’t hurt...thanks!


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

Jesusfreak101 said:


> My thought if you want a buck buddy look for another buck that you like then buy him and sale your extra 😁


I think you’re right.  Ugh.


----------



## Baymule

I’m thinking of keeping a wether for my ram Ringo. I just took a ewe out of his pen as she is due in a month. I have a pretty Black wether that I sure wished was a ewe. Maybe he’ll get a name besides Dinner. LOL


----------



## Bruce

I think Ringo deserves a buddy! After all, he only works a few days a year. He needs a social life.


----------



## rachels.haven

14 days. Getting ready for D's #2 birthday and enjoying unseasonably warm weather. We're happy.
 Meanwhile people 25 miles from here are being warned to not let their children or pets outside unsupervised.








						Coyote Warning Issued After 4 Surround Woman, Dog, Southborough Police Say
					

Police in Southborough, Massachusetts, issued a coyote warning Monday after aggressive coyote behavior was reported to them. A woman who lives on Asaree Drive reported that she and her dog, an 85-pound Shepherd mix, were surrounded by four coyotes on Sunday night while the two were in their...




					www.nbcboston.com
				



Looks like the reality of someone getting bit or killed might be coming sooner than I thought. It makes me sad. And people still have the gall to bemoan coyote habitat under the police's official warning when clearly coyotes are doing great, becoming more numerous, bigger, more aggressive, and spreading. They thrive in populated areas where they are not controlled. And in Mass in general with so many laws protecting them. They make their bed by protecting hybrid eastern coyotes, they have to lie in it, I guess? Too bad other people have to lie in it too. Oh well. I hope their  "healthy coyotes" don't eat too well any time too soon.


----------



## Baymule

People are stupid. Poor coyotes......until they attack your children and eat your dog.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, that's very true. Southborough is an affluent, mansion filled place according to DH. It's not Hicksville. That should not have happened there.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Yes, that's very true. Southborough is an affluent, mansion filled place according to DH. It's not Hicksville. That should not have happened there.


In Hicksville, the coyotes would be shot, or at least they would be here.


----------



## thistlebloom

That's exactly why they are in the affluent areas. People are more helpless.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Looks like the reality of someone getting bit or killed might be coming sooner than I thought.


Quite scary! Do you have your personal protection now that you have your license?? 



rachels.haven said:


> Yes, that's very true. Southborough is an affluent, mansion filled place according to DH. It's not Hicksville. That should not have happened there.


More froo froo snacks in those places?


----------



## Jesusfreak101

If it hadn't been for a dog we had when i was five named daisy and golden retriever collie mix i wouldn't be here coyoties are extremely dangerous to small kids. People need to put their big pants and act like a grown up. Less a pex predators mean more coyoties which means more bullets are needed. e


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Sorry if i was blunt but i grew up in a neighbor hood inside Austin tx and that's where I met the coyote.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's funny. The favorite motto by the wildlife people and common folk around here is, "coyotes are harmless to people, unless you aggravate them", so I guess that lady was aggravating them by walking her german shepherd. That's why when the big coyote came after my kids and me in our back yard animal control and fish and wildlife could justify not helping us. We were aggravating them by being there, in our yard, building a chicken coop and my kids playing in the wading pool in their suits right behind our house. Never thought I'd move to an anti gun state and be told by law enforcement and fish and wildlife to go buy a gun and shoot stuff because they didn't want to help me, and that I'm on my own unless they can drive up and see something. Maybe someday we'll move back to hicksville and be safe.

Yes, my husband and I have our license to carry, but my husband still has serious reservations about bringing one home. With all the stress from work his health has been deteriorating. I don't want to add to it.

What I'd like is a time to have my dad come up and help me pick out an appropriate gun-not overkill and the problems that come with that and not underkill-and then teach me to shoot it like he taught my brothers and mother. The 1 hour course we paid $200 each to take in order to get our $100 licenses basically covered how to unload handguns and reiterated to not shoot things behind your target (also told us how to lose them by getting in fights at home or having mental health issues). If I called my Dad and had him come down now and get us armed I think my husband would become even sicker, and he's not doing well already. Chronic fatigue and an endless chest cold is a lousy way to go.

For now I've got a collection of axes left by the last guy and I may take the handle off one and use it as a bat. This is probably still illegal somehow, but I need SOMETHING.

Lol, I could always get my rabies shot do this...in Nashville. Although I think if this happened here the father would be run out of town or something else horrible and cited and sued by the state for everything they had to throw at him. Maybe even lose his kid. Surely he and his two year old were hunting.
https://www.wkrn.com/video/dad-kills-coyote-with-his-bare-hands/4261477/
(Actually, my mom corrected me when I was talking to her earlier, this happened in New Hampshire, it just made news in TN, apparently, her coyotes don't act like that, she says or they would be shot)

Mass coyote season is only Oct-March 8 so it's almost over now. I think our law here only allows farmers to shoot coyotes out of season and we can never discharge a firearm within 500 ft of another house. Sure is great only farmers have kids (I think we'll always have animals the duration of our stay here for this reason alone). It feels really uncomfortable to be told I need to be an armed guard for my kids while they play in our own, mowed yard. They really have problems here and someone is totally going to get killed because of lazy, irresponsible, disconnected, starry eyed mismanagement of these things. I kind of hoped I won't be here for it, but it looks like I will. I feel bad for whoever is going to suffer for this. Really, really bad.


----------



## Baymule

Your husband needs to transfer out of there. It's hard to deal with high stress day after day. He may need some home "spa" treatment. Draw up a hot bath for him with some lavender added to the bath and let him soak and relax. Have his favorite meal prepared, feed him well and tuck him in bed. You can't take away the work stress, but you can mitigate some of it at home. He might make good money, but sometimes it isn't worth it, next to what it does to his health.


----------



## rachels.haven

I whole heartedly agree. I've  expressed this over and over and am extremely concerned. His project is released to the company this month and to the public next. The plan is either that things need to change dramatically for the better at work after that, or he will need to find another job. I'm actually less worried about coyotes coming after us at this point and more worried about this. 
I can try to give him spa treatments. I think what he needs is a long staycation at home with a lot of sleeping. It makes him himself again, he starts not wanting to go back and looking for other opportunities, then promptly gets sucked back in when it is over. But you know, cool looking project on the resume, potential promotion on the horizon because he's the most senior guy who tolerated the nonsense and performed up to their standards and stayed, and more autonomy after all that if he ever does decide to change jobs(It's not like this at every office) It's his decision to stay but hard to watch.


----------



## High Desert Cowboy

I will forever appreciate the fact that not only can we shoot coyotes year round here in Utah but they pay us $50 a coyote to do it.  You’re very smart in wanting help to better prepare yourself for a firearm, many don’t and that’s how accidents happen.  I hope your husband can have some sort of change, it’s normal to have a little stress at work but when it starts to have a negative impact on your heath I don’t care how much it pays it can’t be worth it.


----------



## rachels.haven

Wow, I didn't know Utah did that. I'm impressed.


----------



## thistlebloom

Maybe you need to move west.  

So sorry for the stress your husband is going through  .


----------



## rachels.haven

Where we're at in the country, I think the only option we've got is to go west...unless we want to head up to Maine, or live in the ocean, both of which I'd really rather not.

So something kind of funny, and more light hearted has been going on lately. So for the past week or so I've been being woken up at about 5:30-6 am by what I assumed were very large crows sitting in the trees and babbling their heads off. This morning I actually put my glasses on and realized that they are sitting on the deck railing, and not the trees and are vocalizing loudly into the house windows for some reason. Also, that they are about 2 feet tall and are not crows, but are ravens (according to audubon). This didn't make sense for a few hours, but when I went out to go put some rejected scrambled eggs in the dog's dish and came face to face with a large black bird about to swoop off the gate and fill up on Iams I figured it out.

Yeah, they're waking me up so I can hurry up and fill Bailey's dish for them. It empties overnight and filling it is the first thing I do in the morning. Last year they stole kills from the hawk (he had plenty, there were chickens strung up by him in trees everywhere, plenty of my chickens dead for everyone). This year they are opting for a less dangerous, more domestic route and waking me up to feed them. Looks like I need a new strategy for feeding my slow eating dog if I don't want two pet ravens. They're not afraid of people, btw, just like everything else here. I wouldn't mind if they started beating up raptors for me, I guess. But at the same time, I happen to know that big black birds make big, goopy, slow drying puddles of birdie poo so I'll need to decide what to do.


----------



## rachels.haven

Also they are standing Bailey's marrow bones up on end and picking the marrow out. Bailey doesn't seem to be thrilled about that, but I'm still not sure if her following them around stopping them from getting her food and bones scattered around is a game or work. She seems to be enjoying it.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Bailey has pet ravens ...🤭


----------



## Baymule

Everybody needs a pet. Sentry has a pet chicken. She lays him an egg in his dog house!


----------



## rachels.haven

His pet lays him breakfast. Lucky dog!


----------



## rachels.haven

I was wrong on the location of the father strangling a coyote that tried to drag off his 2 year old. It made Nashville's news, but it occurred in NH, of course. My mother corrected me. She says the coyotes in her area would not act like that or they would be shot on sight so I double checked and she was right.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

Baymule said:


> In Hicksville, the coyotes would be shot, or at least they would be here.


That’s what do!!  Shoot that dang things!!


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

High Desert Cowboy said:


> I will forever appreciate the fact that not only can we shoot coyotes year round here in Utah but they pay us $50 a coyote to do it.  You’re very smart in wanting help to better prepare yourself for a firearm, many don’t and that’s how accidents happen.  I hope your husband can have some sort of change, it’s normal to have a little stress at work but when it starts to have a negative impact on your heath I don’t care how much it pays it can’t be worth it.


We have so many coyotes that they seem to be immune to humans?  Last summer, one walk right down out tree line.  Chris was 10’ one way, ducks 10’ another way..he didn’t even notice..just kept on going.  He wasn’t sick, didn’t look, bad, I’ll, raid, etc...just didn’t care that he could’ve had a meal!  We got lucky that day!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> "coyotes are harmless to people, unless you aggravate them"


----------



## thistlebloom

Would breathing be considered aggravating?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, Victim blaming much, eh Mass?


----------



## Baymule

I stepped out on the porch and coyotes were VERY close, I quietly told my husband to get the pistol. When he came out, they went silent, they were close enough to hear us. He went to the end of the driveway, yelled and shot into the ground 3 times. That usually makes them move on.


----------



## rachels.haven

I will remember that. It may get used.


----------



## farmerjan

It is open season on coyotes here in Va.  Some counties  used to pay bounties but not anymore as there were guys who were going around and shooting them and making a pretty decent amount of money.  Farmers all here will encourage anyone to shoot them on their property.  On several of the places we rent, we tell any of the hunters to shoot any coyote they see. They have decimated the sheep population in Highland county which is west of us and that used to be one of their biggest farm "products" ,  The sheep industry most every where here has gone so far down.  Partly due to the loss of market for wool, and then for the loss of lambs to predators.   I followed a young coyote up the road one night by chance on my way home from work, and when I realized what it was I ran it down.  Had lost several cats over the previous weeks and I am sure that they were a good part of the reason.  
Last night I heard them not too far from the house outside at about 8 p.m..  There were several "voices" in the group, and I am sure it is some of the ones I heard this summer when they were young ones learning to hunt.  

It is true that coyotes DIDN'T USED TO  bother people. They used to be much more shy and were seldom seen that close to populated areas.  They also were kept in check by hunters.  Now you have all the bleeding heart a$$holes that are tree hugger  idiots wanting to protect all the wildlife from the horrible things that the big bad humans have done.   Add to that all the gun laws like you have encountered there in Mass by all the democratic idiots that have put all the restrictions on hunting, guns, and all that, and you don't have a snowballs chance in he// to  protect yourself.   And yes, I am getting a little political, because those are the ones that have passed all these laws that are "good for the public" and let the "authorities"  take care of it.....  You have come face to face with all the stupidity of that and the "authorities" aren't going to do jack sht for you.  

You are also dealing with more of these coyotes, and the hybrid crosses that are called coy-dogs..... and they are getting bigger and less fearful of people. 

All these idiots have the "BAMBI"  complex and nature is just not like that. 

Here in Va we are dealing with it since the entire gov has gone democrat, and the laws that they are pushing on us.  I just hope that some of the ones who never voted before get some sense to vote in the next election.  
The thing is,  and it is sad, but just allowing a little law here and a little law there that will maybe keep you safer,  allows more and more control to be taken out of the average persons hands, until the next thing you know is that it is so far gone that people sit up and say..... you have to do something and the govt says that they are doing all they can, and next thing is you have to live with it.... and become prisoners in your own home and yard.  

And all you folks in Texas had better sit up and take notice too because there are too many of these types moving there to the cities.  It's the big cities where the density of the population gets the votes to swing in a direction that sensible people in the country don't want.  Here in Va we have been controlled by DC and Richmond, and big cities where they are all deciding what is best for us.  If you spend anytime watching Fox News, or listening to someone like Sean Hannity, you will see that the populated areas of Texas are slowing turning that state.  Believe me,  it is scary.   Texas has always had the reputation of the "wild west" mentality, but the  city population growth, and with idiots like from California that move there for the cheaper costs - lower taxes - more jobs - and all that are also bringing their screwed up politics with them.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

Baymule said:


> I stepped out on the porch and coyotes were VERY close, I quietly told my husband to get the pistol. When he came out, they went silent, they were close enough to hear us. He went to the end of the driveway, yelled and shot into the ground 3 times. That usually makes them move on.


That happened here a couple nights ago...Chris opened the front door and spooked them!!  Dang it!!
@farmerjan ...I won’t get into politics...but, we’ll said!  I agree we need to be able to have guns in our homes...under lock and key for when me maw and paw paw are Grand sitting.... I used to be sort of ...um, more of a liberal thinker in my views..not a tree hugger at all...but I was, and am nieve.  I think all people are good....all the time.  Unfortunately I’m finding out the hard way that it’s just not the case.  People might mean well, trying to be kind to coyotes, but they don’t understand how dangerous they are to valuable animals.  Honestly, I think most people...in cities..don’t even think of farmers.  They don’t realize, or care where their food comes from.  They’d rather have it delivered ready to cook, all cut up..or just order in.  Chris and I know very few people that cook every night, and good, healthy meals, made from scratch.  It just takes too long.  And, yes, if my hick town ever gets more than one stop light I just might pickit!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Week 2 on the New Hampshire duckies.

Here's a blurry raven. Zoom on a phone...


----------



## farmerjan

@Duckfarmerpa1  you hit it right about the people nowadays wanting their food cooked ready to eat, delivered to their door and all that.  The farmer means nothing to many of them. The sad thing is they are the ones that are getting to be in the majority, and the younger generations  (millennial or X or Y or whatever they are)  have very little understanding of what it really takes to get that food in the "ready to eat" form, nor do most care.   So as long as they get it, they don't care how, or where it comes from, and have no respect for the ones that have made sure they had it, as long as they can get it at a cheaper price.  It is going to destroy the farming industry in this country.  

Many on here are "Mature" adults.... what happens when most of us are gone?  The future of this country is going to be in the hands of people who don't understand or respect what made us the independent and self sufficient people we were and are.  And they won't be able to "get it" as far as what it takes to keep this country fed and taken care of because all of our resources have been put aside for "cheaper".....

The predator load is increasing, and that is scary.  I feel for @rachels.haven  because I know what the whole attitude of the ones in the authorative positions is,  up there.  What she is dealing with just with this coyote issue is a good example of how out of touch with common sense people have gotten.  And my family on my mother's side came over on the Mayflower, and my father's side has Native American - Mohawk - in it from up there..... so I am an original Yankee...... but so many of them have gone off their rockers.


----------



## Baymule

I don’t mind people moving to Texas— as long as they leave their stupidity that screwed up where they came from—far, far behind them.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

i second that bay!!! i haven't a clue what group i belong to but i say this most of the folks nesar my age that i have met don't have the sense God gave them nor the ability to think for themselves. its all about what i can get and how convienent it is for them to get it. they don't want to wait for it either. i came from a family who is and has always been up and over their heads in debt for lack of wanting to budget. i am obsessed with budgeting and wanting to stay a far as a i can from any kind of debt. my husband and i were shopping for a truck and a house and he wanted to do the dumn thing and make payments on the truck. the truck was 48,000 and the house was 164.000 for a grand total of i just lost my mind 212,000. he was frustrated with me cause  i broke down crying i cant handle going into debt so instead. we saving as much as possible to outright buy something and have already out right bought a new to us truck and a brand new trailer and lots of other little things he need for his company. i know people aren't going to like this but take it from this (as of march 25) almost 29 year old when i say they don't teach a lot of things that are needed to know in school and if someone isnt passing they don't care they just let them get by so they can make that money. one of my husbands cousin is a prime example of that . My grammar my be horrid, however that being said i can spell the word she, he, her, him, they and others. his cousin cant . he use to text me and it would take me 10 min to figure out what word he was spelling. it was that bad and he graduated.... to me that's scary and when we discussed how the government was run and that the people are in charge he didn't know anything I am not conspiracy theorist however i do believe they are being brainwashed and that the bad people (or dumb) in our government are taking and making this their advantage.


----------



## farmerjan

Baymule said:


> I don’t mind people moving to Texas— as long as they leave their stupidity that screwed up where they came from—far, far behind them.


The problem is @Baymule  they aren't leaving their stupidity behind.  I have several friends on some of the cattle forums, and they are mostly all older, many are tried and true Texans, who are of the don't bother me and I won't bother you, ranchers that have been there for generations.  They are getting very concerned about what is happening with the influx of people into the Dallas-Fort Worth-Austin- and other cities and the way the voting is going.  Not just for things like guns, but for farming/ranching and water rights, and a whole host of other stuff.  That is what has happened here in Va.,  yet agriculture is one of the top income producing commodities here...... and they are trying to regulate it out of existence because there are those that listen to "experts" that are all book learning and no common sense, no practical knowledge,  about things they may know all about, but have never actually been out in the field to put into practical use.  It is getting very concerning.


----------



## High Desert Cowboy

Same thing is happening here in rural Utah.  People move here for the scenery and to be able to afford a little property.  They build their dream home to retire to and put in all their green landscaping and plan to live out their days in this quiet little town.  Then when the farmer next door decides to expand his feedlot, build a pig barn, fertilize his fields he’s the bad guy and now there’s a battle. Imagine a small town that now dictates that you can’t have a horse in town unless you have over an acre of grass per horse, you can’t build any new feedlots or barns within 5 miles of the two big towns, and water needs to be going to the manicured lawn that costs thousands to install.  Its a sad joke, and it’s going to keep happening and people will wonder why food is more expensive, why so many small “family farms” have gone under, and why this lovely little town is so ridiculously full.


----------



## farmerjan

@High Desert Cowboy   AMEN.  What you just said is exactly what is happening to this area of Va and we have the misfortune to only be 4-5 hours SW from DC,  so all the jerks that are in the government there moving out this way.   Plus we are on the N/S interstate 81 corridor, and I-64 E/W so easy to get on the highway to go to Richmond 2 hrs, east,  Charlottesville, 1 hr east, Roanoke 1 + hr south,  Harrisonburg 1 hr north;   just too many people now.
We are having all the problems with spreading fertilizer here, especially using poultry litter, and now there is some of the bio-solids being applied.  A dairy farmer friend has spent over 25,000 to fight a rich, moved here from elsewhere, neighbor to get his poultry houses approved and built and he has to go back to court again.  Over 2 yrs later than it should have been, and he has finally got his first flock of birds in...... We are fighting the neighbor that doesn't want to look at the cell phone tower that should have been already up and providing service a year ago, and over 18,000 in lawyer fees.  Now Verizon has joined the suit, and they are still going back to court again...... but hopefully it will be pretty much up by then.  Still, it is the financial toll, as well as the stress that is working on all of us.
As you said, they want their stupid ridiculous lawns , that need water in places where green watered lawns were never meant to be;   and in our case, they have cell service there on the hill, but the he// with all of us down over the back side and out in the more rural parts where we have little, spotty, or no service..... because they don't want to look out their window at a single upright tower..... like they own the view......


----------



## Bruce

Duckfarmerpa1 said:


> Chris and I know very few people that cook every night, and good, healthy meals, made from scratch.


Like your sister?


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

@farmerjan ...my son is a ‘millennial’...he can’t stand his generation!  He thinks they are all lazy and rely on the computer and cell phone too much.  My son is dedicated to making himself better each day through hard work...not on the farm, but through his ultra marathons and his elite weight training.  But, as you said...he is one of verrrry few.  He fears his generation will be the one to push the “ button’ for a war...because they are so used to pushing cell phone buttons all day!  Ugh.  And, the yuppies that want to eat at restaurants that serve ‘farm to table’ meals...they like the sound of that because it’s trendy.  They are picturing these manicured fields, etc.  they have no clue what a real farm looks like, but I really don’t think they care.  As long as the latte is in the machine when. They push the button at Starbucks..,they’re happy.  That’s just that’s my take on it..,I could be way off.  They seem to be used to instant gratification.  Not having to work for things.  It’s a shame, because these kids are missing out on valuable life lessons when you actually earn something you want, instead are just given it.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

Bruce said:


> Like your sister?


How’d you know??  When we go there, she gives me all these very fancy take out containers to bring home and use for misc stuff.  And my brother’s house...doesn’t look they even live there!  When you open the cupboards all you see are protein shakes, etc.  they are always eating out and on vacation.  In Fl right now, the fancy sister is in Vail...ooh laalaaa


----------



## Jesusfreak101

That's what sequin is like you can't have chickens free ranging in your yard they have to be in a enclosed run and coop and it has to be cleaned daily with waste put into a air tight container the disposed once a week in to a city approved location. There are several mall citys like that around here. And even if your allowed birds you can't have roosters. Oh and it has to be 100ft from any residence.


----------



## rachels.haven

Gee, I know what wanting a cell phone tower on your land is like...reception here comes once in a blue moon, when the wind is blowing just right, otherwise I need to go walk to the mailbox. I can't believe your neighbor is that short sighted. Just what does she think will happen to them if an emergency pops up? My mother's neighbor LITERALLY died because he fell and couldn't get back up and she was only a couple hundred feet away at her house and happy to help. No cell coverage. The first night here it was under 10 degrees and we got locked out and DH almost broke his leg because of a sleep addled, bad decision. No cell coverage. Not, not, not smart.


----------



## farmerjan

Duckfarmerpa1 said:


> @farmerjan ...my son is a ‘millennial’...he can’t stand his generation!  He thinks they are all lazy and rely on the computer and cell phone too much.  My son is dedicated to making himself better each day through hard work...not on the farm, but through his ultra marathons and his elite weight training.  But, as you said...he is one of verrrry few.  He fears his generation will be the one to push the “ button’ for a war...because they are so used to pushing cell phone buttons all day!  Ugh.  And, the yuppies that want to eat at restaurants that serve ‘farm to table’ meals...they like the sound of that because it’s trendy.  They are picturing these manicured fields, etc.  they have no clue what a real farm looks like, but I really don’t think they care.  As long as the latte is in the machine when. They push the button at Starbucks..,they’re happy.  That’s just that’s my take on it..,I could be way off.  They seem to be used to instant gratification.  Not having to work for things.  It’s a shame, because these kids are missing out on valuable life lessons when you actually earn something you want, instead are just given it.


You are right and thankfully there are some like your son and my son that understand work and real life....


----------



## farmerjan

@rachels.haven ;  that neighbor doesn't care except that it might lower her property value when they go to sell.  She spends at least half her time in Mass near Boston somewhere with her family....daughter and grand children, and leaves her husband here to take care of the "rescue"  horses she has, that they never ride......she couldn't get up on a horse if her life depended on it......I wish they would go the HE// back to Mass........ they have service right there on the ridge so it is of no concern to her that there isn't any service down the hill  1/10th of a mile, there is no cell service INSIDE the fire dept that is about 3 miles away, and the service on down the hill on my side is so spotty that any bad weather, wind or anything can throw it off as well as several totally dead spots.   But when he had his heart attack, they had service so that is all that matters.  I am not one to wish bad on many people, but I really do wish she would have a heart attack down on my way where there is no service and find out what it is like.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sounds like she needs to hurry up and sell before the tower goes up, right?    Her property value will not have fallen yet and all.
It makes no sense how people can justify trying to erase the evidence that other people exist in the world by trying to control what those others do on their own land. I'm following your saga and hoping you and your son win.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

I think, in this day, and age...there need to be cell towers everywhere!!  Look, I HATE my cellphone.  Used to never carry it when I was ‘disabled’....but..Chris nagged the heck out of me...so now I do.  And, it’s come in pretty handu..like the time I passed out and broke my tooth coming out of the barn in November.....I was very happy to have my phone!!  I hope they get you your tower @farmerjan !!  Well, everyone!!


----------



## rachels.haven

It's hot and windy today and it feels really weird-heavy, damp, and tempestuous with dark cloudy skies. If we were down south I'd say a tornado was coming, but I don't think Mass does that. I let the 5 week old juvenile ducks out of their pen with the silkie roosters that I still haven't processed yet are out roaming too. There's a kiddie pool involved. Hawks seem less inclined to go after things when there's a big white dog laying around *knock on wood*.
The numerous chicks having taken over permanent residence in the big coop. The keeper bantams, Mr. Teddy and his 7 or 8 girls are in the bantam coop now instead of the large one. Later I'm going to finish their run and cover it and they'll be set.
9 days until Saffron kids.

My goats are all collectively refusing to drink out of green buckets now. I am genuinely confused. Same water. Clean. Different bucket color. They'd rather go thirsty. Clearly they've held a meeting on this. Their heated buckets are green, I guess they could be burnt out on the color. Weird animals.

Speaking of water,THE HOSE HAS COME BACK OUT.  No water has been hauled for a few days now. Maybe we've survived the cold season?


----------



## rachels.haven

Uh oh. I took the dog food away from the ravens today and they just noticed. Now they're following me from window to window in the trees around the house vocalizing. Animals here are weird.
I'm not sure I want ravens around during kidding, but if those are non-legit concerns I may consider letting them have dog food so I can use the restroom without birds expressing their feelings through the windows. My kids do that enough.


----------



## thistlebloom

Yay for leaving the hose out! I have been bringing mine into the laundry room after every trough filling, but yesterday decided to live on the edge and just rolled it up by the faucet. 
Ravens are very smart - and apparently voyeuristic - I think they are not to be trusted during kidding. Maybe they'll move on if they can't get any food for a few days.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> If we were down south I'd say a tornado was coming, but I don't think Mass does that.



According to the NOAA's US Tornado Climatology web page, there has been an average of 1 tornado per year in Massachusetts, the same as Vermont where Mr. @Bruce resides.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's nothing!


----------



## rachels.haven

Changes this morning. As of today in light of the corona virus spreading DH (and everyone else) will be working from home for the foreseeable future, so no more 40 minute commute for him for now. I wonder how this will affect our farm's rhythm. Our church will only be televising it's big Bi Annual general conference thingy instead of letting people from all over the world who want to come and gather in mass numbers ask for tickets and go to a conference center and potentially cough all over each other and spread this new super cold. Corona virus is in the same group as colds, if my memory serves BUT even a cold can kill. It's the respiratory system we're talking about. My pet peeve lately is when people call COV19 "a bad flu" to diminish the seriousness as if they can't remember historically what a bad flu does. Plus, there are vaccines sold every year to rein in the flu's spread. This doesn't have one yet. It's like a lethal cold if you're not a kid.

I may go pick up a few human groceries before we get totally shut down. Not stocking up, per say, but at least not be out of milk and cereal for the kids.

8 days to first due date.

So a while ago, something happened that blew my "non-seroidal rheumatoid arthritis" diagnosis further out of the water. The rheumatologist up here didn't want to go with that diagnosis or treatment in the first place, and just wanted to watch and see, favored maybe fibromyalgia. In the fall I had to emergency stop with a medicine I had been on, and over the weeks to month following aches and pains I didn't realize I was having went away and it was like the sun had come out of the clouds for me. I think I might be done with the terrible, nagging, aching pain. It hasn't visited me since the fall. I kept waiting all winter for it to come back and it has not, even over the coldest period of the winter (I still get rather severe reynauds but normal for me).

That was really weird and lasted a very long time. I was supposed to make another appt when I started having issues this winter, and after stopping that med (the ONLY med I was on), they never came. I should probably update the doctor at some point, I guess, and make sure she doesn't want another appointment to be sure. But there wasn't much to see last appt other than the fact it hurt to move at all, so I'm not sure what she'd want to do.

No long term meds for me again I guess.

I'm still a little annoyed I still can't eat wheat, barley, rye, or sort of oats without some quality bathroom time, puffiness, and SOME body pain for 2-3 days and I'm not celiac (so therefore this can't be legit, and I should be able to eat what I want, right?), but I'll take this. I never really got along great with those foods anyway-to a lesser degree. I still miss doughnuts, sourdough, and pizza though. Doughnuts would almost be worth it if I wasn't a parent or married to someone who cared about me as I reap the punishment for my poor judgement. Lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yess! Dr. agrees. No more rheumatology appointments unless suddenly everything comes back. Based on how everything went away, I doubt it will.


----------



## rachels.haven

Heheheh. Area is out of hand sanitizer (and TP for some reason) but not out of 91% alcohol at the farmers exchange-by the gallon. If I felt like I needed some I'd do this. I'd need that aloe.


----------



## thistlebloom

T.P.is being hoarded because the media told everyone they better stock up on it. No idea what the reason is for that. There are several paper mills in the US that make it. Maybe we're going to need it to mop up all the BS being spread around.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

@thistlebloom ...you are way too funny  😷


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, I didn't think widespread diarrhea was a symptom of coronavirus, btu it looks like that's what they're preparing for. Either that or we're all going out tonight on a house TPing party, but I didn't think you used the nice stuff for that...too pricey, and they literally bought it ALL. Except the Seventh Generation stuff. That was all that was left last night and apparently it's too pricey and terrible to use even in an emergency.


----------



## High Desert Cowboy

Its 40 miles to the farm so I can only imagine how nice it would be to be able to work from home.  It makes sense to only televise conference this year.  I’ve gotten to go a few times and that’s a lot of people from all over, and they don’t just fill the conference center they cover temple square as well.  The governor has recommended no get togethers of more than a hundred people, outside of schools.  There’s no TP to be found, and in all the emergency preparedness it’s one thing I’ve never really thought about, but there are ways to survive without it.  My big question is if we end up having to self quarantine, what exactly does that entail?  Are we still allowed to go out and feed our animals, or travel to farms and ranches.  Most of my friends have all or part of their ranches and farms at a distance from their house, anywhere from 1-30 miles away.  My pig barn is 40 miles.  I’m curious to see how this all plays out.


----------



## rachels.haven

I never went to Conference even when I was living in Utah. Too many people period. I can't even get through a college football game in the stands. You're braver than me. Plus, I can't imagine we make the SLC neighbors happy. I'm glad they changed the plan this time from a biosecurity standpoint this round. That could have been a nightmare.

I've been wondering that on the animal feed issue actually. I don't think we can last for months in the feed department. Few people can. Maybe I'd last a month. We have browse...in the right season, and we're not there yet. Not many are in the US. I really hope you and your pigs wind up okay. There is no browse and usually no pasture for pigs to graze on. You NEED that feed.

Personally I am not worried about toilet paper. I am chuckling about it behind my keyboard. We have a cheap bidet toilet attachment. We got one as an experiment when we were trying to save money any way we could fresh out of grad school. It is effective at TP expenditure reduction. Today my brother texted me a picture of someone who plumbed a sink sprayer into their toilet water supply, and now I want to try that too. It may work better on the boys who are the main TP users at our place. The adult bidet is a little too...easy to make a huge mess with-set it and run away and flood the bathroom so it's adults only. A sprayer you have to hold down would be a little harder to do that. As it is we go through about 1 giant sam's club package in about 6-8 months, so we've bought TP maybe twice since moving? I'd love to get it down to 1 big pack for 4 people per year. Good for the septic. I'm glad we didn't need TP it last night.


----------



## High Desert Cowboy

Looks like they just canceled all church services until further notice.  This just keeps getting more interesting


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh dear. 
You know, we just may not have gotten word yet, but I think we're still on here. I teach primary (go five year olds!). I hope the ones who live with grandparents or older parents stay home.


----------



## rachels.haven

Nevermind, DH says they cancelled church here too...world wide. No more primary for me, I guess.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, apparently there's a moose wandering around town. I guess that doesn't exist either-just like the mountain lions that don't exist but are illegal to shoot and coy-hybrids in general (but don't get me started).
Good luck deer fencing that sucker out.


----------



## rachels.haven

Found one of the Clydes sleeping on Bailey's mega pillow in the loft while she barked at bark-howling things in the night. Clyde came and hung out with me from across the room while I fed pregnant goats. If you zoom in near the litter box you can see him.



Photographing shy black cats is exciting.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

Ok, first...there is absolutely no TP anywhere in this county either!!!  I typically have enough for...a year?  But, last time shopping, Chris scolded and said, you don’t need more of that...we’ll...now what??  My son is down to two rolls.  He said he’s goin* to use leaves!! 
next...I have fibromyalgia too.  To be perf3ctly honest, I’m not sure if it aff3cts me or not, with all the other junk I’ve got go8n* on?! I have arthritis, etc, so, who knows. But, I do take meds for nerve pain...which can be for fibromyalgia, but I’m on it for a slew of things. No clue if it works...but, I don’t want to stop, because what it it does?
Next..I have rheneuds too!!  Really really bad!!  Im on 5 meds for that.  Two years ago I got ten ulcers on my toes that winter...this year...none!!  Not due to the meds...I’ve been on them for a long time...due to Muck boots!!  And, just plain getting healthy and being active.  I also believe, for fibromyalgia, and all types of things in those categories...the more you do, the better you feel.  Before, when I didn’t do much...my back and bad leg were a mess.  Now, if I sit around..my back is a mess, but if I’m working, running, etc..I feel great!!  I think the blood flow, the endorphins, energy, all of it plays a roll.  You know?  I’m very glad to hear you are doing better and won’t need to go back to the rheum.  I go, but only every 6 months...I have to get a calcium injection for osteoporosis....and then she gives me a once over.  But, I used to be there monthly...so, this is great!!

as for the food allergies...I have them too...we haven’t been able to pin mine down exactly yet.  I’ve had the tests, I’ve done the elimination diets, etc.  it seems, like, just plain food makes me cough.  I think, honestly, it stirs up drainage.  What can you do?  Oh well.

sorry to hear your hubby will be at home...but perhaps that’ll will be good...just don’t let him mess up your chores!!


----------



## rachels.haven

You have my sympathy on the ray nauds for sure. I had ulcers start up when I was a teen living in iowa during the few weeks every winter it stayed in single digits to below zero and couldn't get warm ever for more than a few minutes in the firey, burning shower....I loved and hated those showers-so painful. And cuts in general on hands and feet won't heal if they can't get good circulation so ulcers are a BAD thing. The rest of the things you have to deal with prove you're a stronger person than I am. What I had going on was ENOUGH for me. Wear loose, properly fitting boots summer or winter (for me) or you will mess up your feet with raynauds. Ooo, those ice feet. It's like frost bite no matter the weather and worse when it's cold or WET. I hate wet feet if it's even the slightest bit chilly. Frost bite in the summer.

My muck boots do pull my knees out of joint if I pull them off wrong or wear them for too many hours, but joints that are easy to pull out of place is a genetic thing that runs in my family and it's usually easily dealt with or worst case corrected with surgery (ie, if it occurs often on the jaw preventing you from talking, eating, or constantly slipping out and "locking up"). It hurts and makes things not work properly when you need them to, but it's not chronic pain-more annoying. When it's cold I wear my muck boots anyway, rubber boots any other time, but creating ulcers would be a deal breaker-burn the boots kind of thing for me. You don't need that.

I don't officially have fibromyalgia, btw. The doctor just mentioned it as more likely than non-seroidal (sp) rheumatoid arthritis. For about two years back there everything was just a world of pain, especially if it got cold and my muscles felt like they didn't heal for weeks if I used them (so I used them anyway, harder, because...upset). It really gets to you after a while. My michigan doctor decided it was RA and put me on meds that I eventually developed terrible side effects to and I didn't get any benefit from, so I refused them in favor of the pain. And then I moved, got a new doctor that just wanted to watch me, I had my medical emergency and stopped that other med, and it all mysteriously went away. I hope that's the end of that long saga.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

My shoe size is technically a size 8 1/2, but I always go with a 9....it drives Chris crazy!!  Because I have plantar fasciitis, and he thinks if I wore a smaller size I’d be fine.  The plantar is no big deal any and hardly ever bothers me.  I wear the larger shoes due to the rhenauds, but he doesn’t understand.  I used to not even be able to wear ankle socks that had a ridge on them...they bothered my feet...but, I’m doing soooo much better!!  I will say I wear a very supportive sock now.  Nothing cheap.  It makes a huge difference.  I just bought myself a pair of spring Muck boots because with my bad ankle, 8 can’t mess around with rubber boots.  It’s just not worth it.  I’m really glad you’re doing so much better!  And, isn’t it funny, how, sometimes, a different doctor can make such a huge difference?  Sure helped me last year!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes! That's amazing and a little scary. Always pick doctors carefully in life is something I've relearned again and again. 

Take care of yourself and enjoy your animals! I'm so glad you're doing better and you can enjoy hanging out in this online farming community.


----------



## Baymule

I got all caught up. Haven't been on much this week due to having the little grand daughters. Took them home tonight, got them asleep before their parents got home.


----------



## rachels.haven

@Baymule , I'm so glad they got home without getting stuck somewhere. It's much better to risk being stuck somewhere as a family with the kids under the care of their parents  That would be traumatic for my kids, at least.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today was a fun day. During a break in the rain and wind we all got to play outside with the dog. Big dogs are fast. Our big dog likes stealing hats like it's a joke. Then she runs across the yard and tosses them away and runs off like it's a joke and invariably either the boys or Mark would go get it while she watched. Thank you Bailey. My husband thought it was hilarious. 

I got the biosecurity screening back from UBRL on the goats I actually did get blood from. All clean and ready for kidding! One of my nigerian bucks appears to be impossible to get blood from because of loose and elastic skin and veins (please let me be wrong and have better luck next time?) and Buggy the black lamancha buck needs to be drawn/collected sent out to Waddl by blood and PCRed because he's one of the rare goats that messes up the serum Johne's test. Govt offices are locked down here so no samples going out now. I'll finish that later, I guess. I feel a lot better that all the others are good.

6 days until day 150 for Saffron.

Gee, 2 adults cleaning and not going anywhere means the house is remarkably tidy. Plus, my kids are getting older. I guess today 5 for the youngest is the magic age. I wonder what it will be tomorrow?

Nice Friday.


----------



## Baymule

I'm glad your husband is working from home for awhile. Maybe he can destress and still get his work done. He needs some farm time.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

What has happened to the big coyote that was such a menace to you earlier?  Has it been dealt with?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

@Baymule We're doing just that. Lots of rest. Work is more distant and easy to mentally and physically step out of when it IS more distant.

@Senile_Texas_Aggie He is probably still out there. He hasn't come to "fight" and talk trash to Bailey lately, so I don't know where he is. Maybe when everyone is stuck on their own property someone will get bored and take the opportunity to gun him down. He'd make a nice coyote hunting trophy at that size.


----------



## rachels.haven

Week 3 for the ducklings has begun.

One of the Clyde the Cats sat on a hay bales stack while I slid his dish of food up to him and he ate. One Clyde is brave!

Saffron's due date is Thursday!


----------



## farmerjan

Ducklings are really growing.  Va is now declared an emergency and all schools closed for 2 weeks at least.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks!
Closing the schools will definitely slow the rate of spread.


----------



## rachels.haven

The pictures of our grocery stores cleaned out are hitting the town fb group. The super premium, very expensive slaughter house/butcher has been emptied by the rich/stupid crazies. That blows my mind.

Hmm, there may not be milk in the store for us when we run out.We may be impatiently waiting for Saffron's milk to clear and stop being colostrum. Aw well.


----------



## farmerjan

There was a full cooler of milk yesterday when I made my trip to Walmart.  I bought a gallon because I did not feel up to going in the total opposite direction for milk from the farm where my cow is, after going to walmart and doing that whole trip by myself.  I also filled a prescription while there for the pain pills that I wasn't going to bother with, but when the PA asked what my pain levels were, and I said 2-3 maybe, and that I hadn't taken but a couple of the pills, and didn't plan to fill the prescription, she said that I ought to because I might need them when I started the therapy..... I can always use them some other time if I don't need them for this.   So I have them in case.....

I think that the "panic" will settle down and that the stores will get more stuff in and it will get back to somewhat more normal shortly.  I think many were "reacting" to the declaration of emergency, and thinking about the kids home for 2 weeks at least here in Va., and all that.


----------



## rachels.haven

Your PA is smart on the pain pills. I know pain pills can be addictive and a controlled substance, but it's better to have them and not take them then flush them or whatever the rules say, than to wind up suddenly in agony and not have them .Flush'em after and have a little party, I guess (that being said, I can't tolerate strong pain pills other than bumper Ibuprofen, so maybe my thought is worthless, lol). 

I hope the milk winds up being like that up here. Either that or the grand restock happens here. We've got another day or two, I think. I absolutely love having something to milk in my "backyard" and not having to go to that dairy cooler. Next year I think at least one of the 2nd freshener girls is going to skip her date with the buck and milk through for me.

 I'm also glad we were more or less prepared for our declaration of emergency and what followed. No panic for us. We could probably go for a month on what we had, but we'd be down to "boring food" -dry rice and beans- eventually. That being said, dry rice and beans is fairly close to MY normal diet. The husband and the kids would be the ones having the adjustment, I guess.

Yesterday I started my garden plans. The kids never seem to eat what I think they should eat, but if I can help it, we'll have backyard produce too. I've done that before and at least _I_ get to eat fresh peas, beans, lettuce, tomatoes, cuecs, and squash. They're older now. Maybe they'll eat more.


----------



## rachels.haven

Kicked the ducks out yesterday. Once they foul the bucket in 24 hours or less and start peeping over the bucket edge and biting the window ledges and oggling you while you eat meals that's probably enough. They have plenty of down and the other ducks are young enough to accept them.

Saffron's tailhead is starting to become mushy so I set up the isolation stall. I'd better get out there and feed. I'm late due to kids staying up late last night.

Good morning Rachel's Lab!


----------



## rachels.haven

Saffron's getting sunken in the flanks and around her tail head and ligaments are starting to feel doughy. Her udder is filling and it is sooooo pretty (teats are still rather small, but that's life). I don't think she's going to make it to Thursday. But it's COLD today!

Since Saff's been in the kidding stall, Avalon has decided she's going for as close as she can get to herd queen and going to beat the bejeebers out of Emi the young lamancha, all over the barnpen, all day. The other goats dish it up back, but Emi is just running away all day.  Not playing nice with others is one of those things I will get rid of an animal for. So I'm thinking Ava might not be here much longer. She's so dang moody. When she's good she's very very lovey and nice, but when she's not she's bitey with people and violent with the other goats and you never know what kind of day it is and I don't want to put up with it forever. It's a pity though, because she milks so well and kidded so easily last time. I actually like that nigerian udder. Oh well. I don't want dead goats (or to be pinched when I turn my back on what turns out to be moody days). She should be in a nigerian herd full of other feisty, dominant goats and not a mixed one where half are mostly easy going (until picked on). She's a bottom of the pecking order goat with goats her size. She kids April 6th, and as soon as she's out of colostrum I may list her...if I don't chicken out and fall in love with that stupid butter udder again.

But moderately peaceful goats would be nice.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Can't  say I am a fan of misbehaving  obnoxious  goat behavior  myself,.... they either  all get along or the trouble  maker goes to another new home. Maybe  Avalon will smarten up for you soon


----------



## Bruce

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> According to the NOAA's US Tornado Climatology web page, there has been an average of 1 tornado per year in Massachusetts, the same as Vermont where Mr. @Bruce resides.


Not sure where that comes from, in the last 40 years I can think of only 1, maybe 2, reported tornadoes. And those were "maybe" tornadoes, could have been microbursts. In any case, they would be considered "tornadoes" by those who live in Tornado Alley with the same level of intensity we consider a "snow storm" in the south.



rachels.haven said:


> I was supposed to make another appt when I started having issues this winter, and after stopping that med (the ONLY med I was on), they never came.


  What was that drug Rachel?



thistlebloom said:


> T.P.is being hoarded because the media told everyone they better stock up on it. No idea what the reason is for that. There are several paper mills in the US that make it.


And they make it 24x7x365. The shortage of TP will be resolved when all the panic hoarders have their 10 year supply filling every room of their house 



High Desert Cowboy said:


> Are we still allowed to go out and feed our animals, or travel to farms and ranches. Most of my friends have all or part of their ranches and farms at a distance from their house, anywhere from 1-30 miles away.


Yes you can go out in your own yard/property even if you HAVE the virus. Just stay 6 or more feet away from the farmer neighbor when you chat "across" the fence.



Duckfarmerpa1 said:


> Because I have plantar fasciitis


I THINK that is usually caused by shortening of the calf muscle often from standing at lot (though I had it once and I had a desk job). Do you do stretching exercises for your calves? Try standing on a stair step so you can lower your heel below flat.



rachels.haven said:


> Closing the schools will definitely slow the rate of spread.


Even though I don't think there have been any cases IN the schools.  



farmerjan said:


> I think that the "panic" will settle down and that the stores will get more stuff in and it will get back to somewhat more normal shortly.


I agree, there will be stuff in the stores again after everyone has stocked up for the the next couple of years.  Then there will be few people in the stores because they don't need anything and have nowhere to store more anyway.


----------



## rachels.haven

No kids yet.
Bought a pair of orange Saboten hoof trimmers online, they came, and today I got to try them out. I always thought trimming right was difficult and I was an idiot. Turns out I am not an idiot (today). The Burgen and Ball green handled shears are just terrible. The new ones also have a screw to let me take them apart for sharpening. It was amazing-like snip, snip, perfect claw with an edge right along the growth band and parallel with the coronary. I had my doubts because the new ones felt so light, but they work great. I did the bucks today. The does will be later, probably tomorrow if I have time.


----------



## thistlebloom

I love it when I get a great tool and find out I'm not an idiot all on the same day! Yay for you!


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

@Bruce ...my plantar fasciitis came on during my ankle rehab because I pushed it wayyyy too hard.  I stretch it a ton.  I roll it on a bottle of ice water...don’t worry, they gave me all the moves during PT, but’s it’s a problem issue that never really goes completely away, you have flare ups.  I just have to be smart..which typically I’m not, because I feel great and want to run around the farm like a schoolgirl!!


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

rachels.haven said:


> Saffron's getting sunken in the flanks and around her tail head and ligaments are starting to feel doughy. Her udder is filling and it is sooooo pretty (teats are still rather small, but that's life). I don't think she's going to make it to Thursday. But it's COLD today!
> 
> Since Saff's been in the kidding stall, Avalon has decided she's going for as close as she can get to herd queen and going to beat the bejeebers out of Emi the young lamancha, all over the barnpen, all day. The other goats dish it up back, but Emi is just running away all day.  Not playing nice with others is one of those things I will get rid of an animal for. So I'm thinking Ava might not be here much longer. She's so dang moody. When she's good she's very very lovey and nice, but when she's not she's bitey with people and violent with the other goats and you never know what kind of day it is and I don't want to put up with it forever. It's a pity though, because she milks so well and kidded so easily last time. I actually like that nigerian udder. Oh well. I don't want dead goats (or to be pinched when I turn my back on what turns out to be moody days). She should be in a nigerian herd full of other feisty, dominant goats and not a mixed one where half are mostly easy going (until picked on). She's a bottom of the pecking order goat with goats her size. She kids April 6th, and as soon as she's out of colostrum I may list her...if I don't chicken out and fall in love with that stupid butter udder again.
> 
> But moderately peaceful goats would be nice.


That’s funny, my bossy, moody goat is my Pygmy mix.  She’s a handful!!  I could never get rid of her, but she’s not predictable and does not play well with anyone except Busty and her own kids.  Hmmm.  The other two are soooo laid back, Busty just gets me with her big brown eyes....


----------



## rachels.haven

Buck/doe twins, all by herself sometime earl in the morning. She's already in love and a very good mother. Probably the best one I've had kid so far. 
The next kidding date is April 6th and is Avalon. Time for a break.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

You goat to love good mommas!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Congratulations    , got to love a easy kidding and a good mom


----------



## farmerjan

Nice to have new babies and a sense of "normal" in all this craziness.


----------



## rachels.haven

As of yesterday evening, I've had to start milking Saffron due to side favoring on the part of the goat kids. I got a quart today.
Normally I wouldnt try it-colostrum is gross-but we have been out of milk for several days now and it would be really nice to have milk again so I did, then I had DH and the kids try and it just tasted like milk at this point...so by some miracle we have milk now and don't have to go out for it.
And because we haven't gone out and don't plan to, the person who was going to do my disbuddings is still willing to have us come down and do it despite having high risk individuals at home.
I feel extremely blessed on multiple fronts now.


----------



## rachels.haven

Up to 5 cups this morning. Her udder is softening up post kidding too.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

That looks good enough to drink ,   nice amount of morning milk !
How are you doing with no school and DH working from home ? ..... I bet the kids are enjoying more family time


----------



## rachels.haven

I put some goat videos on my youtube channel...just me talking around goats.
I also ordered a lot of T posts and clips (and nice hand held shower heads for the house so I can wash shower walls and uncooperative kids and animals) from Home Depot and they can bring it and leave it on the driveway as usual. I will let things decontaminate there. Yay free delivery for orders over $45.

I can't stand not doing much because I don't have the equipment. If we're going to be hiding in our castle on our little estate I'm going to get busy and work on those goat pens. I want a buck pen in the back by the chicken coop, and to make the doe pen even bigger. That way our home will be one step FARTHER from being just a decorative 90's estate and one step closer to being a useful farm. Don't get me wrong, a big house with loud, spastic kids is a Godsend right now, but I don't want to sit around waiting (and cleaning) and wishing for things to be better out there forever.
So charge(!), I guess?


----------



## rachels.haven

I went to Fox's Pride for disbudding today. The daughter was fast and efficient and the trauma on the kids was minimal. They were literally up and bouncing before we got home, and went back out with mommy who had been turned out with the general population. 

We're getting a million more inches of snow today. Yay. And things have been ordered to shut down here now and us to stay home. Farm stores will be kept open. 
14 days until Avalon's due date. Kidding in a pandemic...


----------



## rachels.haven

Btw, DH has been getting much better. Heartburn is going away. I think he's only gotten it maybe twice. No more getting sick in the bathroom...He's not sleeping the best as of last night because he's worried about our family and friends (we're losing an extended family member to stomach cancer now, surprise! and his mom is in the hospital with coronavirus symptoms after traveling to San Francisco and back) but I still think he's sleeping better than before when working in the office. He's also lost 10 lbs already as he recovers, and is still losing. He even had the peace of mind to set up his man cave downstairs-his one beautiful piano, the one he needs to throw out because it is unmaintainable (converted player, over 100 years old, no parts that fit it, and tuners hate it and can do fairly little for it), desk, computer, nice microphone, and he stole the beat up front room couch (he wants to replace it...when we're allowed out again). His man cave looks like a man cave of a guy with 2 master degrees in music and a bachelors in computer science is supposed to look like again. It's so good to have him back.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Farm stores will be kept open.


Went to ours yesterday for layer. Seems as of last Sat they are open now only for online/phone orders, pick up at the back door. The young lady came out the back door, I told her what I wanted. She went back in, rang it up and came back to tell me the price and get my credit card. She came back with the card, receipt and the 2 bags of layer. Got to plan ahead the next time. 

Interesting that they have started "pick up" ordering and Hannaford has shut that service down so the "shoppers" can stock shelves instead of pull from them.


----------



## rachels.haven

I would love our Hannaford and Shop'n Save to do that. Cleaner and less risky. So far just the feed stores are here are.


----------



## rachels.haven

My milk jars are winding up all the way full now.

Saffron's buckling is very correct. Too bad the bucks from a recorded grade are unregisterable. He has been listed for sale for a low price with a deposit to hold him until weaning day. The doe will be listed too, just not yet. Keeping pretty goats out of the freezer first.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

They sure look healthy and happy !


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you!
I may have added a couple of extra dwarfs over the pandemic. The other lady in town that does goats makes most of her money traveling and doing petting zoo birthday things and goat yoga (yes, we live in THAT kind of place) is currently trapped out of the country and she has no foreseeable income over the next few months with the disease going around, so she's selling almost everything. She had these two two year old does that were the size of my Michigan buck out of her best doe with a positively thrilling udder. And these may be that does last babies...and they are so small she can't find a buck to breed them to, so I bought them. And now she's got just a little more money to pay her farm hands while she's stuck out of the country. They are the two red brown ones. They will be registered on her return and she'd like to buy a doeling from me when things settle down in the animal parties business. For now when she goes back it looks like she'll go back to being a nurse again.

She also wants me to "foster" one of her pregnant does too in exchange for a doeling, but I'm not comfortable with that level of liability no matter how. With my luck, that would be the doe with a death wish or with serious kidding problems and I'd lose her.

Anyway, here's a video of the other goat lady, probably still stuck in Peru.

I'm excited about the does I did get because their pedigrees look like this. And I'm pretty sure one is polled. She didn't think she would even be able to breed them because they wound up so small, but they match my buck in size and they are wide enough IMO.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Goat yoga is ok, it gives the goats something  to laugh about   ...I couldn't  open the video of goat lady, but that is great that you are getting good deals on new goats. How many are you up to now ?


----------



## rachels.haven

Ooo, bad question. 
6 dwarf does
4 lamancha does
Saffron's 2 kids
2 lamancha bucks
3 dwarf bucks

I paid for another Promisedland lines dwarf doe to add to our gene pool, but they got the flu and then everything got locked down up here before they could drive up on their way to get some of their own goats (and drop her off on the way), so we will eventually have one dwarf...someday...maybe.

I also have my eye on another registered lamancha dairy lines doe that the owner wants to sell to a good place as she's getting out of dairy lines goats and switching to solely show, but that won't be until at least June, maybe July or August. And if she's in good enough shape she will not be bred in the fall, but will be milked until she goes dry with Saffron and Summer then allowed a dry spell.

I do not plan on keeping any home bred does this year until I get to know my own does better...although Avalon's litter is going to be tempting.

So yes, those are my numbers.  Don't tell DH where they hay is going.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Lol, I would do the same if we had more space, Leon just started whining the other day about " can we get another baby goat " ? Lol,  gotta love them goats


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh no! _He's_ getting baby fever? You've got it bad!


----------



## rachels.haven

My posts came today (ON A NEW HAY PALLET). The clips came earlier. I've already got the cattle panels. I think it's time to start carrying panels and banging posts until the sun goes down...tomorrow, obviously. It's dark now.
...I wonder if DH would be willing to help me... The fewer times a panel hits me in the face the better and they are really meant to be carried by two and all.

I've got a hay delivery coming on Tuesday. Geesh, next time, fill the barn up to the roof. Hay was hard to find.


----------



## Baymule

I am glad that your husband is feeling much better. Stress can be a killer, good thing he has some down time to get back to being himself.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! In that way things are great. On the other hand, the world is falling apart. We will probably survive, but man, the stuff hit the fan fast. I hope everyone stays in and safe.


----------



## Baymule

Yes you will survive. Yes the world is falling apart fast and I think the worst is yet to come. Stay home, don't go anywhere and stay safe. This is a wake up call for millions of people right about now. Sure is giving people something to think about.


----------



## Bruce

Pounding some posts will give your DH some exercise and an outlet for stress 

That lady was understandably pretty stressed out. I'm sure the Peruvian temp workers likewise trapped at Smuggler's Notch Resort (where DD2 worked until 1.5 weeks ago, laid off when they closed due to the virus) would love to swap places with her. Their work visas have expired but they can't go home. I guess that technically makes them "undocumented immigrants" even though they want to go home.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ugh, that's a very uncomfortable situation. I hope they don't get trouble for being here!


----------



## Bruce

I assume they won't, it isn't like they are staying on purpose. Fortunately the resort is putting them up in the housing they rent during their work time and providing groceries. No way those "kids" (mostly college age, come here to make money) could afford that with no job.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bluebird Pond Erudite, aka Eri that I paid for earlier came to live here yesterday so her owner didn't have to feed her anymore. The new ND I got are changing my opinion on ND. ND are not supposed to be dominant snots with people, always trying to one up and bite you. Maybe I don't want to quit with them after all.
Sugar and Ava are on my mental sell list now for being default snots. Buckeye goes best with Ava and isn't super milky so he's probably on it as well. Count, the Lamancha chocolate buckling with all the Little Orchard in his pedigree is also under evaluation for his feet. I need to see that they want to behave or I don't want him on my does no matter how nice he is. Emi, one if the doelings that came with Count needs to be evaluated for feet too and I know it...but I don't want to (!) Saffron's babies are also in my list to list. Ava's new babies will probably be on the list as well. We won't be this high in numbers forever. Maybe we'll even make hay money.

The question is, when to list them taking the virus into consideration?

Ava's due date is next week. Time to start 2x daily checking ligaments. She is so sweet with late pregnancy hormones. This happened last year too. Maybe if I pull her kids... (plus she won't be able to pick one to reject when I milk her like she did to Ginger).


----------



## B&B Happy goats

List them anytime you are ready to sell them, you should have buyers with this virus going on and people wanting to be more self sufficient..just put in your ad " practicing social distancing " and don't  let potential  buyers hang out or go in the barn (close quarters to you) , have them bring a leash , pay and leave...I think that is what I will be doing with rabbit kits and chicks in about three to six weeks...


----------



## rachels.haven

The mother of all buck pens began today. I got two cattle panels in, and then it started raining. Oh well.


----------



## Baymule

It is storming here. I have a ewe that is 20 days past due, swollen vulva, bagged up and wants tummy rubs. I saw her get bred and wrote it down. I think I'll go check on her.


----------



## Baymule

Nope. Eating hay, totally unconcerned.


----------



## rachels.haven

She's smugly waiting for you to go to bed or get in the shower or sit down to dinner, don't you know?


----------



## Bruce

20 days past due?? Wow, I hope those babies don't get so big she can't deliver them.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'd start to be suspicious she didn't take and got an extra round in if she goes too long. I really hope the babies are still small.


----------



## rachels.haven

South wall of the buck run done. It's a triangle with the existing fence as one wall, so the only part left is the lOOOOOOOOONG haul back to the fence. DH helped me put panels over the fence this time. That's SO much easier.

I also got tarps on order and coming so I can build a cattle panel rain shelter in both pens. Then the bucks should have the option of staying out while in rut so less fencing gets trashed when they're in sight of the does. In the current arrangement it would be hard for them to be in sight of the does at all.


----------



## rachels.haven

Funny story...
I trained the ducks to come running when I yell, "HEY DUCKS!" as loudly and unprettily as possible (and the females hollar back with their lusty ear splitting quacks) for lockup purposes.

Today I put all the goats out (except Saffron and her mini saffrons because of fence jumping) and this after noon the time eventually came to put them away. The does come first and know to come to the fence and follow me when I yell "Hey does!" (less ugly). Then it was the bucks turn in their pen...and wouldn't you know it, "Hey BUCKS" summoned all 20 pekins as well as my male goats, through the open yard fence from the very far corners of the backyard.

Darn ducks. "B" and "D" are two different sounds. Learn to differentiate. HMPH.


----------



## thistlebloom

That's cute!  🤣

I taught our two young barn cats to come to* HEY cat!* I did it with Kid#2 in mind, since he's a cat lover and likes to see them when he visits. The high pitched 'here kittykittykitty!' that I used to use for general cat purposes just seemed a little too fussy for a brawny young guy. His interpretation was always like 'here...kitty...kitty' in a low voice. Summoned nothing. So Hey Cat! seemed genius to me. He thinks it's weird . But the cats come running so that's what counts I guess.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I also got tarps on order and coming so I can build a cattle panel rain shelter in both pens.


If you plan to leave it up in the winter make sure to add something to the top of the panels to keep their shape. I used to have an inverted U shaped cover over the blueberries, covered with poultry wire to keep the birds out. It is now an M shape. 



rachels.haven said:


> Darn ducks. "B" and "D" are two different sounds. Learn to differentiate. HMPH.


Try "Quacken" or "Quackers". GoldShawFarm's YouTube channel - lots of ducks. His "schtick" (they all seem to have something) is when he opens the duck house for the day yelling "RELEASE THE QUACKEN!".

If you don't love that WONDERFUL suggestion, I suppose you could use "HEY BOYS".


----------



## rachels.haven

Then i could have the bucks AND the boys cavorting around the front yard. That could be fun. 

I think I want to use "HEY MOTHER DUCKERS!"...because only 2 of them will be male when I'm done with this grow out period. Also, because it will make my neighbors think I'm crazy(-ier than they already think I am).


----------



## rachels.haven

I will definitely think up something to keep the cattle panels shaped up over the winter. Or I may take them down in the snow. We'll see. Winter is cold.


----------



## thistlebloom

rachels.haven said:


> I will definitely think up something to keep the cattle panels shaped up over the winter. Or I may take them down in the snow. We'll see. Winter is cold.



I have used cattle panels as shelters year round for years. Currently my hay "tube" which is four panels horizontal (2x2) and 8 panels arched up and connected to the horizontal panels about half way down, if that makes sense. It ends up being about 32' long by about 8' wide by 8' tall. I got 9 tons of hay in it and it works great, you just have to pull the snow off daily. 

I have made smaller temp ones for my wethers, and mini horse  and mule, and it's the same deal. If you are diligent in pulling the snow off they are handy and durable. And cheap!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I will definitely think up something to keep the cattle panels shaped up over the winter. Or I may take them down in the snow. We'll see. Winter is cold.


They will be fine if you take the tarp off. I was amazed that poultry wire held the snow, figured it would fall through. 
"Remove the snow daily" - yeah that would have been a good plan if I had any idea it was going to be a problem. In fact I never even look at the garden in the winter, nothing going on out there. Didn't know it happened until spring.


----------



## Baymule

__





						Ringo’s Lambs! Baymule’s 5th Lambing
					

While she doesn't produce ewes, you can always depend on her to produce butcher lambs for hay money!  Maybe she is just thinking of doing her part to pay expenses on the home place.    She will eventually give you another ewe lamb.  Did you breed her daughter this year?  Did her daughter produce...



					www.backyardherds.com


----------



## rachels.haven

Yay Scottie! Congrats!


----------



## rachels.haven

Made no progress on the fence today. Instead I cut down a mid sized yew tree growing in what would be the pen.  Somehow I thought they were only trees in their native land. Silly  me.

It looks like our property used to be a cleared area fenced with barbed wire on one side. On the boundary there was a tree that "ate" the wire. Maybe it had pine trees before, as they are human dwarfing, but I'm not so sure. Aw well, maybe someday when the mortgage is paid off we'll clear it.( I will do my best to fence it before then for safety's sake.)
This entry needs pictures.


----------



## Bruce

Yes it DOES need pictures 
I've found the perimeter of the fields from days long past the same way. Really rusty brittle barbed wire several inches into the side of trees, laying on the ground "attached" to a rotted post, on the ground, no post. 3 strand. Find a piece and start lifting and a whole lot of leaves and dirt move out of the way as the wire comes up. Gotta be careful where I walk and I'm sure not going out there without shoes.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's a picture. You can walk in the woods, but it's going to cost you. Pulled a bunch off my clothes on the way back and 6 or 7 off the white dog that didn't make it into the dish soap jar. These guys crawled out of my shed clothes onto the white hot tub (the only thing I know for a fact it works for) or I pulled them off my skin. The rest of the pictures will have to wait. Kill ALL the ticks!


----------



## Baymule

Creepy. They are out already up there? Gheesh.


----------



## rachels.haven

Deer ticks never really stop. I would love to get fencing up and the dog and the poultry out there to have a Bonanza at some point.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Here's a picture.


Eeeewwwwww!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Stay  out of the woods , those things are NASTY ...yuck


----------



## rachels.haven

The good news is that they don't appear to be thick in the yard or on our side of the ditch/creek this year. I think the dog is keeping the deer and critters out of the immediate area and maybe we're getting a BIT of a decline. And the ducks and silkies I guess are working and soon we'll have a bunch of normal chickens out too.

I'm afraid I've got to go out in the woods eventually, otherwise I can't make any changes to the woods. I'll permethrin a set of clothes and that does help-one or two ticks instead of almost a dozen (yeah, I found a few more after that photo, but nothing bit luckily).


----------



## High Desert Cowboy

Reminds me of a joke a friend told me recently, with all the talk of coronavirus he said “Hey it’s bound to get better.  Tick season is just around the corner.  Then we’ll have Corona with Lyme!”


----------



## rachels.haven

BWAHAHHAAHAHAH!


----------



## rachels.haven

Found out we are not going to be selling milk ever here. Animal inspector did not know what he was talking about. We'd have to be licensed and inspected and put in a fully equipped separate parlor as per mass regulations do monthly testing on our bill no matter our scale, and always have a bacterial count lower than pasteurized milk after pasteurization. And the state wants machine milking. The above is why there are only 29 sources of raw milk in the state, and they are way bigger than us. Oh well. Good bye, dream. 
I'm ashamed I believed the town animal inspector and even thought there was a chance here. I'm not even allowed by law to dig a hole on most of the property...Milk sales, lol!


----------



## farmerjan

@rachels.haven .... go on the website RealMilk. com.  They have lists of each state, what is required, what is allowed,  and other things.  Also Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund.. (FTCLDF)... good source of some of the legalities..... here in Va we can sell raw milk for pet consumption only.  However there is a grey area with herd shares and cow shares.  Both should be covered in the above websites.   There are so many liabilities to consider.  VT will allow raw milk sales, certain restrictions,  CT used to but I haven't kept up with it for the New England states.  Some states absolutely will not allow it for even pet use.  The thing you can do, is "give it away" and people can make anonymous donations, in CASH,  in a jar when they say,  " pay for their eggs".... You have to be very careful though on some of it.... but there are ways.  The cow/herd share is a way to go for many of the states like here in Va., to get around it
Most all do required that the  animals be milked by machine due to bacteria that can be transmitted from hands to teats and ultimately to the milk.  Again, you can "give it to them"  but if it is someone that might be questionable..... you should not engage in a situation that could come back to bite you.
You can board someones animal, you do the work, and they can get the milk from their own animal.......  but believe me, if anyone ever gets sick, then you could lose everything..... one of the reasons I tried to impress @Duckfarmerpa1  about having a liability policy  to make sure they are covered.

Mass is not a state that you want to "run afoul of"......


----------



## rachels.haven

No, it's not. I get the impression they would be excited to soak you for all they can if you give them the opportunity as if taxes aren't high enough already. And then anyone who has a beef with you will sue you. There is an incredible amount of social butt covering here and I deeply resent it.

Real Milk . com was one of the places we consulted before we moved here, but their table is vague for Mass and it's not their fault. You apparently can only get a copy of the rules if you contact the state and draw attention to yourself (kind of like the "being allowed to shoot coyotes if your a farmer farther than 500 feet of your neighbor's house" thing, that's not public knowledge and you are only told the law in full if you ask).
I don't believe herd share or pet milk are allowed here and I don't want to get in trouble with donations or whatnot. I'll just be dumping.

I was rather upset last night and this morning. The state and local laws have already provided several obstacles  to setting up a farm and even just making our property safe. It's like they support agriculture, but only the hobby and pretty looking kind that can't support itself and I was very discouraged. I'm finally getting the feeling that they're saying that you can do as you please as long as it is what they want. Anyway I was so down my husband suggested we eventually move. His job is not his favorite anyway (although much better working from home) and it may dry up or move to a location where he has a very long commute. We just moved though. But I guess if we stay long term we'll have a really expensive house with really high property taxes, with property we can't do much with, in a really expensive area, surrounded by people who don't want us here (and treat us like we're dumb trailer trash because we spend our rather sizable income eating up the mortgage instead of...appearances maybe? I like our priorities better than theirs though-stability and all), in a state that doesn't want us here either, which all totally sounds great.

 I don't know. Maybe tomorrow things will look better.

Yesterday no work was done on the buck pen. I took the dog out for a walk because I didn't feel like working with cold metal in a cold, windy drizzle and then it began dumping. It looks like it's going to rain all day today. Oh well.

Lots to think about.


----------



## Bruce

Hmmm, do I Like or Frown??? 

Sure does sound like a tough row there Rachel. I think the Magic 8 Ball would say "All signs point to moving eventually". Hopefully somewhere more agriculture friendly with a local job for DH. 

In VT you can sell raw milk directly from your farm or a store the farm owns. That said, not many do. The Farmer's Market lady and husband that I get my beef steaks from have a 180 cow dairy. They could sell raw milk but don't because of the insurance needed to do so.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, we see VT as an option. There are a few others too. Tech jobs are the main issue. DH can also teach music up to a college level with is level of education, as well as in a piano studio again, but tech jobs pay better and help with retirement plans faster (and I could see him teaching college in his "retirement" like his dad is).

My mom still wants TN, specifically the one her friend left when he passed away next door. Then I can help her annoy her uppity neighbor lady who thinks farming is "appalachian" (translation from uppity: trashy) with perfectly legal and protected farming and selling very fresh, labeled "pet milk" and trash their view further with beautiful goats and bucks to go with mom's dragon goose army (ever met someone who loves african geese? that's my mom and they are her babies. They come to her for loud hugs, which blows my mind.).

Right now I think we're just surviving this. Plenty of time to think. Not planning on having to act on anything soon.

TSC curbside pickup order tomorrow.
Time to cook dinner now.
Things seem to suck today, but we're not doing so bad. That was just crushing.


----------



## Baymule

I couldn't live in a place like that.


----------



## rachels.haven

My mom's house? yeah, my husband doesn't want to be their neighbor either. The geese only listen to women-and only those who walk with confidence and look like my mother. They are crotch-bitingly, hissy, nasty to men and people they don't collectively think they recognize. They are ear-splittingly loud and make LGD's look like the strong, silent type even when just chatting. So we probably won't ever live next door, lol. I think the geese would eat Bailey.

Massachusetts? I'm temporarily stuck here. We moved here because our home in Michigan more or less kicked us out and DH needed to leave the last office to grow his career and he thought this position would be a good opportunity. We'll eventually leave. I don't belong here. No five year plan though. It appears that's how you get stuck somewhere.

On the positive side, I've gone from just dwarf goats as a novelty to bigger goats for providing milk to my family and maybe some dwarves with serious milk potential and quality over the past year. It's just not time to sell milk, which is frustrating, but I'll get through it.


----------



## Baymule

I would probably like living next to your mom. I couldn’t live in Massachusetts with those stupid crazy laws.   I wonder where y’all will go next? I do think that you are doing an admirable job of doing the best you can with what you have.


----------



## Bruce

Is DH equally not enamored with MA? If so he can look for new employment in other, more suitable states. When one comes along, you move


----------



## rachels.haven

That's the plan. He's fairly flexible on where he lives. He likes walking and biking places and exploring. Here works, but just barely as it's very walker and biker unfriendly (narrow winding roads, people will avoid you, but then they will complain and/or post pics of you on the town fb page to make an "example" of people doing things they don't like, a little obnoxious-but i want my publicity post still).

He still wants his project to launch so it can not be a secret anymore and can have the pride of seeing it to the end-I guess he can also tell family and friends and put it on a resume then too. The virus put that off. His thing is cool, so I don't blame him. We'll see what happens after that (dlksjfsdkjfkfdj!!!). Moving this time has left us tired of moving-it was a very difficult move. I need out, but it's a balancing act.

Like you said, we need a good career opportunity, in a good place at a good time. 

Ava's kidding date is tomorrow. Her ligs are stubbornly there, so we'll see. Summer the lamancha kids the week after.


----------



## Bruce

Hopefully the launch date is soon (after the virus) but I agree with him, putting a big project on your resume is a lot better than "I worked on a big project that I can't mention because it is still in development". 



rachels.haven said:


> but then they will complain and/or post pics of you on the town fb page to make an "example" of people doing things they don't like, a little obnoxious


A LITTLE obnoxious????? No Rachel A LOT OBNOXIOUS! Gee I wonder why you find it difficult to live there. I guess if you want exercise and fresh air there you are supposed to drive to the gym. The fresh air part is where you walk from the car to the building??


----------



## rachels.haven

They are precious dumb potatoes, but they are our neighbors, and we have to live with them. Makes for a very unhealthy social climate, I have to admit.
I really hate it when they pile on the teens though. I don't get it. Since when is adults bullying kids okay? To other adults to boot.

Oddly enough, the unmoderated group for the "rotten" rejects from the main town group is slightly better. So far they've limited most of the piling to college kids and other adults-and they still hate each other, but they are usually active aggressive socially and not as passive aggressive. Easier to tell who the crazies are, who the idiots are, and who is just plain mean. Better for avoiding and ignoring while still getting information and communicating as necessary.

Side note:The lady that threatened me about shooting coyotes always claims she "knows a guy" who validates her position or feelings in every conversation about everything she chimes in on and she is always in the "right" by her narration of her supposed brave (outrageous) exploits and confrontations. I believe she is one of the more valued town crazies. She may have still been a threat to me, but she is a pathetic individual worth avoiding apparently. I feel comfortable brushing her off now as a nut instead of worrying she's going to send her "friends" after me. They may exist, but only in a very, very loose definition of the word.


----------



## rachels.haven

I wouldn't worry about the town's social scene too much, @Bruce . We really don't belong here. We know the social climate and norms here are unhealthy and insane. Eventually we will move on. This is a temporary place.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

im sorry that you live in a place that you feel is temporary..and not a homey place.....I wish you felt more welcome in your own town


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! I wish I could say me too, but some of the things I've run into here I don't _want_ to fit in here over. We'll be fine though. We will do our best!


----------



## rachels.haven

And my house feels pretty homey! Especially after living in all this time. Lol, maybe I'll just social distance forever. Plus I'm healthier than I've been in over a year-no post church Tuesday strep throat, no Tuesday colds. Last week I noticed my throat felt different. Turns out if you don't get sick every week after church your tonsils and lymph nodes go all the way down after a few weeks and it feels GREAT.
 I think I have no immunity to the bugs people carry here and a cold or strep throat every single week was more exhausting than I thought so this is a nice break, in that respect...or it would be without all the death and destruction. 

Sheesh, strange times. I never thought I'd live through times like these.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> That's the plan. He's fairly flexible on where he lives. He likes walking and biking places and exploring. Here works, but just barely as it's very walker and biker unfriendly (narrow winding roads, people will avoid you, but then they will complain and/or post pics of you on the town fb page to make an "example" of people doing things they don't like, a little obnoxious-but i want my publicity post still).
> 
> He still wants his project to launch so it can not be a secret anymore and can have the pride of seeing it to the end-I guess he can also tell family and friends and put it on a resume then too. The virus put that off. His thing is cool, so I don't blame him. We'll see what happens after that (dlksjfsdkjfkfdj!!!). Moving this time has left us tired of moving-it was a very difficult move. I need out, but it's a balancing act.
> 
> Like you said, we need a good career opportunity, in a good place at a good time.
> 
> Ava's kidding date is tomorrow. Her ligs are stubbornly there, so we'll see. Summer the lamancha kids the week after.


All good things come in their own time. This is where you are for now. When you are supposed to move from there, the door will be there for you to open and go through it.


----------



## rachels.haven

You said it. 
Very serious business, moving, so we will carefully consider any open doors before taking it. We are definitely learning as we "grow up". I doubt we'll ever learn it all.


----------



## Baymule

I'm not grown up, probably never will be.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

Baymule said:


> I'm not grown up, probably never will be.


Some days I feel like I’m 80, some days I feel like a teen....I much prefer the teenage years, so does Chris....


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Baymule said:


> I'm not grown up, probably never will be.



I hope you don't grow up.  You are a really fun person just the way you are.


----------



## Baymule

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> I hope you don't grow up.  You are a really fun person just the way you are.


I’ve got that contrary maverick streak in me..... LOL Humor helps everything.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Hang in there Rachel, the right opportunity  will present itself
, and please stay as you are.."forever young " , it helps alot when you age


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I really hate it when they pile on the teens though. I don't get it. Since when is adults bullying kids okay? To other adults to boot.


Perhaps they have someone in a high place to emulate which "validates" their behavior.


----------



## Duckfarmerpa1

Bruce said:


> Perhaps they have someone in a high place to emulate which "validates" their behavior.


@Bruce ...why are you up so late?  Geez!


----------



## rachels.haven

@Bruce , something similar has been said quite often within the walls of this home.

Ava is in early labor. No ligaments. Goo. Very affectionate. Will nip if you stop scratching her and don't watch your back. She's a lively one. Hoping for pink. Then I will wait and see how her hormones and behavior go over the next few weeks.


----------



## rachels.haven

Triplet bucks for Mustang Meadows H Avalon by Rosasharn WS Sir Patrick. She started kidding at 3:30pm just like last time. THIS time there was no bus to catch.


----------



## animalmom

No use in telling us she had triplets if you don't back it up with proper documentation.  No pics no trips.  Please and thank you.


----------



## rachels.haven

I agree with you. I need to muck out the stall first and figure out why this year Ava seems to only have enough milk for one buckling. She's still fat, good eyelid color, but she didn't bag up much and babies are hungry enough to take a bottle when last year she was so full and tight she was leaking all over a month early.
So bottles, shoveling, then pictures. They have fun colors.


----------



## rachels.haven

Two bucklings in a bucket.



Bailey watching me shovel.



New girl Eri likes babies. All the babies.




One of the Clydes watching me shovel.




Third buckling out of a bucket while I shovel.


----------



## farmerjan

What a complete diversity of colors.  Baby goats are cute for the first couple of days......


----------



## Bruce

Duckfarmerpa1 said:


> @Bruce ...why are you up so late?  Geez!


Was up late, was up early   I fall asleep fast but sometimes when I wake up WAY too early and can't get back to sleep for a half or full hour I get up and read forums for about a half hour, then go back to bed.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! I like them.

And that's what fourms are for!

I got a message from my lamancha bucks' last owner. Apparently they bred the younger yearling brown one (Lucky 4-leaf Count Chocula, lol) to several does and it turns out every single one of them that has kidded already has had serious kidding problems-and now one of the does is dead. And there are still a few left to kid. Apparently he throws kids with big blocky heads and shoulders and she told me to use caution if I breed him. Well, that in addition to his feet that never wanting to behave and must be trimmed weekly is the final nail in the deal. He will be sold at a much lower price than I bought him for with disclosure to someone who wants to take the risk to get more Little Orchard and Barnowl in their herds. Apparently trusting my instincts and not breeding him to anything until I saw what I was getting was a good idea and I will not be losing any does (FF or otherwise) to his genetics. His kids resemble Count's father-large headed and front heavy with weak feet. Oh well. His mom is a 11*milker, and his father is a *Buck but I don't want a herd of does with bad kids or a year of huge shouldered and headed kids. I'm passing up a lot of good dairy genes though. It's a little sad.

I can get another second lamancha buck, but I want to wait for a buckling out of the breeder I got Summer from. I had asked him earlier about a buckling when it looked like Count wasn't going to pan out feet and conformation-wise, but unfortunately this year the only breedings he'd consider herdsire-worthy would be offspring of a half sibling to Summer and he'll let me know next year when he finds and gets a new buck to breed to his sound footed herd.

I also got contacted by the guy who did our fence. He wants to use us as a referral for another goat person, except he cut a bunch of corners and the fence is unraveling by the fence post and he needs to honor his 1 year workmanship guarantee, splice in some wire, and wrap the fence around the post like it's supposed to be (AT LEAST) to keep the fence from falling apart. We told him he could use us as a referral if he fixed up the fence. He sent the person to us for the referral anyway but did not come or set up a time to fix the fence so I didn't get back for about a week, then got back to the lady and said I couldn't yet because he had to come and fix somethings first, and then I'd get back to her and let her know if it could contain goats as it's supposed to be one wall of my megabuck pen and she's wanting the fence guy to make a fence to pen her goats. Hmmm...I'm glad I didn't use it to fence in any goats and just as a barrier for the dog vs/coyotes war. As soon as we had the lady come looking for the referral and no appt for the guy to come out and at least look at if not fix the fence I got the feeling that that would probably be the last I saw of that fence guy. I hope I'm wrong, but I'm thinking I've gotten "New Englanded" again. That house next to my mom in TN is looking better and better.
Bottom line is, Bailey wants her fence fixed! She uses that thing to keep stuff out! Bailey would give a chunky referral at this point.


----------



## rachels.haven

Also, I'm on the hay hunt again. The hay guy I was working with (not my normals) appears to have flaked on me. I've found a feed store with okay priced 2nd cutting and not quite as okay priced alfalfa hay that will deliver by the ton.


----------



## Bruce

Bad news on both Count and the fence guy. I suspect it is a lot harder to get the fence properly tight after it has been cut. Might have to splice in a piece long enough to wrap around the post and then tie back to the existing run. 

There is a reason I like to do my research and do things myself rather than trusting the work to "professionals" who are more interested in moving on to the next job than doing quality work. Unfortunately one doesn't always have that option, me included.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, nobody wanted to put up a woven wire fence for us. If I'd wanted wrought iron, I could have it, but nobody would continue the conversation once woven wire was on the table. DH has a friend who was a building contractor who mentioned in passing that with the current (past) market contractors here can pick and choose and set whatever price they wanted for whatever job they wanted to do and turn down or ignore the rest. It's hard to even get a painter here. I think I was dealing with fallout from that.

He would indeed need to splice in new fence to fix it. I doubt he will, but maybe I'll be surprised. I offered to let the lady with the referral come and see the fence if she wanted so she doesn't get as messed up as we did if she chooses to go with him. Nobody else does it in the area, so my guess is he will get her business, but maybe she can "help" them do it right.

Aw well.


----------



## Bruce

That is pretty sad. It really isn't all that hard to put up woven wire. Yeah I had to buy some equipment. Bought 2 come-alongs so I could pull high and low. I made fence stretchers with scrap 2x4s and some through bolts, washers and nuts, T post pounder. Already had the post hole digger. That's all the equipment you need though I did also buy a fence hammer and clip bender. 

If one has the time the money not paid to the fence contractor would easily pay for the "equipment" with a lot left over plus contractors always add about 100% to the cost of materials, save a ton of money on that as well.


----------



## rachels.haven

I did indeed to that math. The main reason I didn't do it myself was that I have trouble doing things like postholes. I did a lot of heavy manual labor as a kid that I probably shouldn't have and one of the things it left me with was elbows that lock up if I do too many repeats of thrusting a shovel or a post hole digger into the ground over and over again. My husband hates digging post holes so I decided to go the pay a professional route. I could probably figure out the fence stretching with the right equipment and tools, and I may eventually wind up doing it all too. I just have to figure out how to work smarter not harder on those wood posts. Luckily POUNDING posts is an entirely different motion and you don't keep a firm grip on the handles of the driver when it impacts the post.

But how many people can say they've removed a dozen several hundred pound full sized 3-4' cement deck footings from the ground as a teen and got them to the curb, or shoveled and dug endless yards of dirt all summer for years, eh? (want cheap labor? have 6 kids, I guess, as an adult all the work I do is easy compared to what I did as a teen.)

I lost a whiting juvenile to that hawk from last year today. Bailey was in the barn and not on the deck because it was dumping rain. We had a red tail earlier that let itself be clapped away and was leary of the dog, but this smaller one wanted to fight me for it's kill, so of course I chucked a dog dish at it's stupid face, which offended it enough to leave. It didn't get to eat any of the chicken. The whitings are now too big to carry off and string in trees but not as big as the 12 pound pekins (uh... nor will they ever be that big). The silkies stay close to the house and have tons of roosters keeping a lookout-roosters I still plan on eating, but I guess they're useful. I may need to start having things to further throw at the hawk on the porch or poor Bailey's going to lose all her dishes. It's not afraid and rather aggressive with kills and I worry a bit that it will try things with the kids if they try to "save" any chickens. It's also small, but becomes obsessed and apparently you need to threaten it with death by great pyrenees food bowl before it deins to move it's lofty self at all. Also it. keeps. coming. back. for hours. Lots of chasing off occurred today (after the whitings got locked up).

I bet Bailey's going to get the chance to eat that bird someday if/when it kills a chicken in front of her-or if it bothers her kids, I guess. He definitely ISN'T one of hers and doesn't belong. She knows her birds and gets very offended when I add birds and don't tell her about it (yeah, she has to sniff each one, it's funny for everyone but the new birds-like the ducklings and chicks). I won't be handing her any hawk and I hope she does eat it dead while I'm not looking. She even gets offended if wild rabbits get too close to the chickens, so no easter bunny here, I guess.

Several of my baby violets are trying to bloom in their baby cups now. That happened quickly. If the post office and public in general wasn't such a high risk place it would be time to pick what I was keeping and mail off or give away the rest to whoever I could. I guess they'll just have to get bigger and bloomier.

Summer is next up to kid. Day 145 is Sunday and day 150 is Friday so hopefully between those.


----------



## Baymule

My female Great Pyrenees, Paris, hates hawks and has jumped in the air snapping her jaws at them. She is getting old and spends a lot of time in her dog house or in one of the many pits she has dug.


----------



## rachels.haven

Maybe sweet Bay needs a dog house with another pillow bed to stay out of the rain on the elevated deck so she can survey all that is hers even in the rain.  Hmm. That deck furniture that came with the house will have to go then. Not enough room.

(Or maybe we can use it as a dining room table since we hate shopping and spending money and don't have one as a result. Also, throwing stuff out here is expensive so double points for bringing it inside. More hmmm....DH isn't going to like that BWAHHAAHAHAHAH.)


----------



## farmerjan

It sounds like you have a "chicken hawk"  and although that name has been applied to red-tailed hawks, they are not true "chicken hawks".  The Coopers hawk and the sharp shinned hawk are both smaller and very tenacious.  They will challenge you if they have a prey in their talons on the ground.  
BE AWARE.... legally..... it is against the law to kill any bird of prey.  OKAY that said,  and I will not come out and say that you need to "kill" this bird on an open forum...... this bird will not quit.  It must be "dealt with".  

Was helping my son take care of his fathers'  chickens 2 years ago.  Went by to lock them in one night when my son couldn't get there when his father was in the hosp after a knee replacement.  The chickens were having a fit, and I hadn't turned on the lights so they wouldn't get off the roost poles and try to go back out the trap doors into the runs.  These are purebred show birds and my ex is  fanatical about locking them in.   I saw from the flashlight  that there was a bird on the floor and went into the pen to put it on the roost and realized it was not just the chicken but a chicken hawk eating the chicken,  I am thinking the sharp-shinned hawk, sitting there in the semi-darkness eating this chicken.  I dropped the trap door, then had to figure out what to do from there as it would be able to go over the top of the chicken wire  dividers and get in with other birds in the early daylight hours.  My son is 3 hrs away so no help.  I finally was able to get ahold of him, found and got down a big homemade "havahart" type trap and put it in the pen and was going to try to scoot the hawk into it in the semi-darkness.  Well, the hawk decided to fly up onto the chicken wire division wire, and I finally found a long broom handle that I could knock it off and as it laid stunned on the floor, I quickly picked it up (with gloves on obviously ) shoved it into the trap and dropped the trap's door.  I was going to put it into a cardboard box , then realized it could get out, and then was going to put it into a show carry box for taking the show chickens to poultry show, but realized it could squeeze out the narrow openings at the top.  I drug the trap outside and told my son that it was in there, outside, all the chickens were locked in for the night and it was  not my problem now. 

This hawk had gotten into the coop from the outside chicken run.... that is completely covered with wire to prevent any kind of animal getting into them...... by squeezing inbetween the frame of the run where there was about 3 inches space between it and the actual building.  Seems it had been seen several times flying down and sitting on the top of the covered runs, watching the birds, and had finally found its way in there. 

They are relentless. They will get in a spot that you would never give a second thought to.  They are fast, very agile birds, both live in more "forest" tree type setting where as the red-tails will prefer more open settings.  

Enough said.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, maybe Bailey will get a chance to kill and eat a razor blade chicken then. Or maybe one of the pregnant goats will get hungry for a little protein. Terrible fence jumpers, some goats.

Today I'm on my toes, but so are the local birds. The ravens AND crows in the area are going after birds of prey that are wheeling through the area on the heavy gusts of wind we're having like crazy. The smaller probably chicken hawk got dive bombed to the ground by the huge combined pack of birds. I don't know nor do i care what happened to him. Then a few minutes later the redtail that probably lives nearby had 5-6 ravens on him as he zoomed away. Busy bonepickers, hard at work. Maybe they are good for something. Too bad they aren't that fiesty every day.


----------



## rachels.haven

Come to think of it that small hawk did something similar to your story last year @farmerjan . Yes, he's probably a Coopers hawk.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ugh, one of the invisible barn cats is turning into a normal cat. Today I was trimming hooves with Ms. Bailey locked out of the barn and the main door shut but the wing doors into the barn pens open.
Me: Trimming, trimming, flattening, filing...
Cat: *randomly appearing out of nowhere* MEOW.
Me: look up, then keep trimming because cat can jump over stall walls and out the wing doors and walk through the fence.
Cat: Meowowowowowowowow... *much garbled meowing and sudo talking*
Me: looks up, wondering if cat is in the litter box with a urinary tract infection or kidney stone or dying or something...
Cat: sitting by big barn door, staring back at me, tail going, irritated.
Me: looks away and continues trimming.
Cat: won't stop. For longer than I care to admit.
Eventually I walk over to the door slowly expecting the cat to dart away or hiss or something as I get there. He just "supervises" my walking over as normal cats do. So I open the door. Bailey comes in (to get in the way for hoof trimmings) and after a tense moment the cat walks out because the dog coming in was not part of his master plan and contributed to too many variables. Yeah. The big door is way better than the two little doors when you can make someone open it for you. So feline.

So yes, one of the Clyde the barn cats is becoming a cat now (still not sure which is which). And he talks a lot, like a little crazy shrill person with no words.  And I am a cat servant. Never saw that coming. I mean, my cats growing up made everyone their staff and had long running conversations complete with requests and demands on a regular basis, but they were ALWAYS friendly and they chose to live with us people. Domestic. I figured the ferocious feral barn cats would just stay that way.


----------



## rachels.haven

Moon Mist LOG Purple Summer has gone beyond lost ligaments and has progressed to the point I can almost feel something sort of pushing up in the space below her tail head...which probably means she will go tomorrow, of course, but we'll see. Summer is being very quiet and not complaining or doing much to express discomfort as she progresses, so I'm not sure. I guess she could start pushing in 5 minutes. She's all bagged up too but that means fairly little, you learn fast.
She's not as lovey as Saffy is, but she is still sweet and she's so beautiful (she's a lamancha, after all).


----------



## rachels.haven

Twin bucks for Summer-one cream and one red or brown.
I will take pictures when mom's major cleaning out is done.
That takes our kid counter to 7. Doelings:1 Bucklings 6. The buck fairy is strong this year.
The last doe to kid is Epimetheus Lace sometime between May 9th and May 14th. Maybe she'll give us a set of does? (2 so none are giant???)


----------



## Bruce

6 bucklings??? You need a new buck to breed your does.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's split between two bucks, too. Clearly I need to speak with the management...That's what you do when you're unhappy, right?


----------



## Bruce

Aren't YOU the management??


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Bruce said:


> Aren't YOU the management??



Somehow I cannot imagine Miss @rachels.haven straddling a doe during mating season, at least without the neighbors calling the sheriff.


----------



## rachels.haven

Naw, I was going to have a heart to heart with the bucks about goat meat, lol. I think we can come to an understanding. I let my bucks manage their own equipment, thank you very much.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's a chunky picture or two of Lucky 4-Leaf Count Chocula for his ad. This is the buck that was bred to 4 or 5 first fresheners, settled them all, but he threw nothing but giant, blocky, front heavy single kids and one of the does died in labor (only having a single is the does' department, btw). I'm not sure if he's going to sell. He has his one foot that got stuck in a fence and ripped between the claws that he still favors and it makes him stand funny, and to me he looks permanently immature and nothing like the kids he threw. He gets everything he wants here and has put on both muscle and fat, but I'm wondering if some damage minerally or nutritionally has already been done and can't be undone or if he's just a slow maturer and it's not a good time. And I don't want to shave him this year because if he stays the deer flies will go to town on him, and his well being comes first, so he doesn't look great. I mean, lamancha bucks look downright funny sometimes, but he looks a lot younger than his age-a little over a year.
If he fails to sell, I guess I'll figuratively sit on him until I decide what to do next.
What I want to know is how a buck that looks like that throw kids THAT solid, big, and blocky. Build-wise he's so feminine.














And here are some Summer bucks. The brown one is super compact to the point it's hilarious. The white one is more normal and petite. Both appear to be doing great.



Big goats dirty up stalls fast, btw. I do my best to get them out and back with the others asap.


----------



## rachels.haven

6 silkie roosters ready for dumplings in the basement fridge (our upstairs one is not cooling the fridge for some reason, now I know why God gave us two, which I thought was ridiculous). I left one of the best hatchery cockerels with Mr. Teddy to be his spare lookout until he starts being annoying. He's very henfeathered and one of the better ones.

I'm out of ziplocs otherwise I'd be looking at the extra drakes and production cockerels right now. Apparently I'm in a hungry mood.

The white extra cockerels McMurray sent me are gold comet males. They have a decent attitude and are not stupid/afraid. If I wanted brown eggs I'd consider gold comets to keep. A hybrid between a leghorn and rhode island red is still going to be productive in future generations and a decent meat bird too even if they can't breed true. The males currently feel more solid than the silkies but are still too small at 11 weeks. I might consider doing them as friers next week with the extra drakes. We are going through way too much feed.

Time to get some more goats disbudded. Saffron's buck is huge now and needs a touchup too. I flipped his lids last night and he had little white horns starting under there. He really needs the side of an iron squarely on those little budding stabbers/fence and barn wreckers.


----------



## Bruce

Sounds like the Austrawhites (Black Australorp/White Leghorn) I got from Meyer, cross of 2 productive egg breeds. Their site said as F1 hybrids they won't breed true so I doubt your Gold Comets will. For body type mine are way more WL than BA. They lay amazingly large eggs for their size, must be OWIE every time they lay one. They aren't much bigger than the Exchequer Leghorns who struggle to lay a USDA Medium more than infrequently. The AWs are laying from mid USDA Large to the occasional low end of X-Large. One lays white, the other a very light tan.

Wouldn't be much to eat on the AWs. Gretel bought herself a few nights in the broody buster yesterday, very light bird. My Barnevelder that died a couple of weeks ago  was MUCH heftier.

ETA: Looked up the Golden Comet. Not an F1 and not a cross between WL and RIR, at least at McMurry. It is a Red sex link of which each hatchery has their own name. McMurry says: 
"The Red Stars are a commercially bred strain of chicken developed over several generations. It is not two specific breeds that are used to create the Red Star."

According to Know Your Chickens: "A gorgeous, golden-colored chicken that is a hybrid between the New Hampshire rooster and White Rock hen, this chicken is sure to offer you everything you need in your backyard flock."


----------



## rachels.haven

Ah, I'd accept that anyway. 
And technically I got their name wrong, McMurray calls them "Red Stars" but they are probably still Comets.
I like California Whites as well, but I'd have to get them from Hoover's and I lost 2/4 of my last ones to laying issues and their egg quality was low laying despite xl eggs daily. Nice friendly birds though.

Right now I've got what I've got and blue eggs are still nice.


----------



## CntryBoy777

If ya want XL eggs that ya can count on regularly...yep, ya need to get ya some KC ducks....added bonus is they are great companions to goats....😁


----------



## rachels.haven

I've got 20 pekins, does that count?


----------



## rachels.haven

I didn't mention it earlier but Avalon freshened with an infection on her udder. The day she was going to kid there was nothing then suddenly there was a little spot on the back of it by her leg a few hours after babies. The spot grew and it got the inside of her leg this time instead of around the teats and down the midline like last year. So today I found and called a different vet finally. She had a fever so the vet came out today. So $375 later Ava's on banamine, heavy duty antibiotics, and a tub of silver sulfadiazine and a recheck scheduled for next week. They think it's staph. I'd already given the milking and pregnant does lysign dose one, and the vet didn't necessarily tell me I should, but she said it maybe might could hypothetically help the other does not get a staph infection...lol. It's for cows and all so it can't be _recommended _for goats.
Also, the vet advised I vaccinate all the goats for rabies. There's a lot of it in the area. That sounded weird, so I looked it up. Turns out our county "wins" the rabies race in Massachusetts-we're first. And I probably should get them all vaccinated and avoid exposure to all potential carriers. Sure would have been nice for animal control or fish and wildlife to be more cautious about someone calling them about wild animals acting aggressively around people earlier.
Any way, I guess we'll be doing that. Whoopie.
...this state is so small. How can it have so many wildlife problems?


----------



## farmerjan

Because there are so many "do gooders" ; "anti-shoot" ; "oh, the poor wildlife that we have been so terrible to by destroying their habitat"  and all those types..... I grew up with the BAMBI movie.... but there are people who really do project the "bambi" attitude to wildlife..... and more than normal of them have landed in Mass.,  with all the liberal, the gov't will take care of everything,   IDIOTS.....
I am a native New Englander, family been there since the Mayflower, and I LEFT because so many have gone over the bend.  Wanted to go from Ct. to Vt where family had property and been for over 100 years.  Didn't work and now I am glad.  The flat-landers that all moved in with the anti-this and anti-that ideas, and the moneyed people who came in for the "skiing" and such, have rendered a once very conservative state totally off the wall.  New England was once known for it's common sense, live and let live, hands off what the neighbor was doing even if you thought it was a little strange, the old "use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without" was practiced by the very "tighwad" New Englanders.  Sure it was basically a saying from the early 1900's and the WW I and WW II and great depression era, but it fit the people of New England.  It is mostly gone now.    Thought Va was more pro ag, and common sense.... but in the last few years they are losing it too..... We who have some real common sense and knowledge of the real world and wildlife and the relationship of both domestic and wild animal life, are getting fewer and fewer and being over run by the bleeding hearts that do not understand the balances that need to exist.  
Luckily many on here are of the "old school" of being somewhat self-sufficient and providing for themselves.  Practical about animals and the role they play in a persons life, and food chain.  But, I think Mass got lost in the shuffle early on.

Sorry @rachels.haven , you are fighting a losing battle up there.  

Rabies has become more and more prevalent because of the "anti-hunting" anti-shoot attitudes and the ones that think all wildlife is so wonderful and we have been so uncaring.....  they are becoming a problem because they over populate their habitats,  and then you get sickness and starvation and all that. Prime vectors for disease.

I don't think we ought to go out and routinely just kill everything.... but we need to be more aggressive about the wildlife that  has become unafraid of humans, and quit feeding said wildlife so it loses it's fear of humans.... and we need to dispose of any and all that are aggressive like that coyote you have had problems with.  None of this catching and relocating crap because it becomes a problem for someone else.  
I will live in harmony with most until it goes after my domestic animals, that I have tried to provide some care and protection for.  Once they do that.... they are fair game and will be dealt with.


----------



## farmerjan

Va has been plagued with rabies too, and this area has had several cases in the past few years that farmers have come into contact with.  Know of several that have had to destroy animals, and a few that have had to take the rabies treatments due to being bitten or exposed to saliva and other body fluids... including one farm that had 2 cows test positive for it.


----------



## rachels.haven

The thing I want to know, is when can the vet give us OUR rabies preventive shots...all of US out here.

I am becoming tired of the nonsense so I'm going to stop gawking in disbelief and start rolling my eyes and plotting our someday escape. It's pretty pathetic out there. I should probably just expect it from now on. I've seen enough, I think.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I like California Whites as well, but I'd have to get them from Hoover's and I lost 2/4 of my last ones to laying issues and their egg quality was low laying despite xl eggs daily.


Sounds like a reason to not get CWs!



CntryBoy777 said:


> If ya want XL eggs that ya can count on regularly...yep, ya need to get ya some KC ducks....added bonus is they are great companions to goats....😁


Ah, our resident duck pusher has returned home!


----------



## CntryBoy777

What can I say??....I miss em and haven't totally "ruled them out" as yet, but for now, it isn't in the works to be a distraction at this time.....shoot!!...we still getting garden areas figured out and waterflow around the house.....


----------



## rachels.haven

Compared to khaki's pekins are quiet. They'd probably fit right in!


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> I am becoming tired of the nonsense so I'm going to stop gawking in disbelief and start rolling my eyes and plotting our someday escape. It's pretty pathetic out there. I should probably just expect it from now on. I've seen enough, I think.



Sounds like as good a reason as any to shelter in place.


----------



## rachels.haven

Still not much going on here. Lace is still due May 9th-14th. She's become rather wild after ripping off a scur badly, but I got her on the stand today and touched her udder and didn't get my whole body kicked apart, so maybe there's some hope there.
Went on a tsc run for more red cell. Two of the three new goats need some along with a worming and I was low. They loaded it right in my car and we turned around and went home. Weird.

Today DH went into conniptions because the town FB page had everyone fawning over the natural, native, beauty of a large family group mute swans in town...which are very not native and very large and aggressive...and are protected in this state from any harm because they are beautiful from a distance. I told him to let it go. Everyone in charge of these things here is an idiot. Right is not right here. It doesn't matter if they're about as native as my chickens or whatever. If they're pretty, the state will protect them because they like pretty "nature", just like they like pretty "farming" and pretty "coyotes" and pretty moose and puma and whatever else comes next. We will just need to stay on our toes near that lake, I guess. I give up on stupid and he probably should too. Not worth the aggravation.

Mute swans are big, unafraid birds and one of the few I'm actually afraid of. We had them in Michigan pretty bad-where they were NOT protected and you can easily get a permit to "remove" them and destroy their nests and hatchlings(but never "hunt" however I believe it is illegal to transport them live there, so...same end result). In addition to being occasionally aggressive to people they also destroy all the other birds they can on the lake they possess so they are ecological disasters. Way to go Mass. Way to be idiots again. Not really worth the time.Go fish.


----------



## Bruce

I guess I'm glad we don't have a problem with Mute Swans here! Apparently VT Fish and Game doesn't take kindly to Mute Swans in the state.

There are two Mute Swans in Swanton a couple of towns north, they are only out in the town green's small pond surrounded by a wrought iron fence in the summer. Apparently they are rented from someone in the Champlain Islands where they return for the winter.

And lest you come to the wrong conclusion of the town's name - it is named for British naval officer William Swanton. He was a hero in a key battle against French colonial forces in 1758. Swanton was duly honored through the naming of the town when it was chartered five years later.

The swans didn't show up until 1961, the originals a gift from Queen Elizabeth II.

Seven Days article about Swanton


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> Still not much going on here. Lace is still due May 9th-14th. She's become rather wild after ripping off a scur badly, but I got her on the stand today and touched her udder and didn't get my whole body kicked apart, so maybe there's some hope there.
> Went on a tsc run for more red cell. Two of the three new goats need some along with a worming and I was low. They loaded it right in my car and we turned around and went home. Weird.
> 
> Today DH went into conniptions because the town FB page had everyone fawning over the natural, native, beauty of a large family group mute swans in town...which are very not native and very large and aggressive...and are protected in this state from any harm because they are beautiful from a distance. I told him to let it go. Everyone in charge of these things here is an idiot. Right is not right here. It doesn't matter if they're about as native as my chickens or whatever. If they're pretty, the state will protect them because they like pretty "nature", just like they like pretty "farming" and pretty "coyotes" and pretty moose and puma and whatever else comes next. We will just need to stay on our toes near that lake, I guess. I give up on stupid and he probably should too. Not worth the aggravation.
> 
> Mute swans are big, unafraid birds and one of the few I'm actually afraid of. We had them in Michigan pretty bad-where they were NOT protected and you can easily get a permit to "remove" them and destroy their nests and hatchlings(but never "hunt" however I believe it is illegal to transport them live there, so...same end result). In addition to being occasionally aggressive to people they also destroy all the other birds they can on the lake they possess so they are ecological disasters. Way to go Mass. Way to be idiots again. Not really worth the time.Go fish.



I am sadly, but very GLAD, that you have finally "gotten it" as far as Mass goes......the stupidity just keeps getting worse... you are EXACTLY RIGHT  it is "pretty" as far as all that goes..... and the "oh the poor animals"   the humans are destroying their  _________  fill in the blank.   Swans are very aggressive, of any sub species..... as are some of the "wild geese"  also.


----------



## Baymule

What? Do people there get up in the morning, take out their bottle of Stupid Juice and take a couple of tablespoons of it to start their day off right?


----------



## farmerjan

They self medicate with it at night because they are not smart enough to get up and take anything first thing in the morning.........


----------



## rachels.haven

Maybe they like it when they stand on the lake beach and as the swan gets closer and closer it just keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger until they're shorter than the bird as it stares them down with that aggressive arched neck posture then walks STRAIGHT at them and puts out it's wings and you realize that if you don't run you're going to have to duke it out with a lake ornament...no, it's more likely they like swans in pictures. Pictures are SAFE. They like the idea of swans, coyotes, moose, mountain lions. The swans is the dumbest one yet. I'm pretty sure the ones brought over from europe were probably domesticated ones. That makes them about as "natural" and "native" as geese from a hatchery catalog. Protecting them is ludacris. Self defeating, destructive ludacris.


----------



## CntryBoy777

We sure don't need That to turn into a pandemic.....best to quarentine em to be on the Safe side...... 🤣


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> puts out it's wings and you realize that if you don't run you're going to have to duke it out with a lake ornament


With a SEVEN foot wingspan! Most anyone would feel pretty small "face to bird" with that. Best to practice "social distancing" with them


----------



## rachels.haven

I planted a Shenandoah and Potomac pawpaw today. I also copper bolused all the goats. A bolus is lasting less than 4 months. Hopefully the filter I put on the hose helps with the sulfur and helps this bolus last longer.

Rabies shots for the goats, strawberry and raspberry bed, and this is on the schedule for tomorrow. My family NEEDS fresh cheese.





Tonight ALL the babies will go into a dry, private stall with hay and grain and the moms will get a break (and the babies will get a break from the doe herd politics).

10 days until Lace the Lamancha's day 145. I will be relieved when her baby is on the ground and she is not pregnant anymore and all the does are done.


----------



## rachels.haven

Check! I didn't wind it, and I'm going to tweak the recipe so it's less acidic, but here's our cheese.
The raspberries and strawberries also got put in after I built a pen for them so they wouldn't fight with the chickens. I also planted one of the fig cuttings I started in my lab from someone's fall pruning. I accidently let it mature in the cup and grow mini figs. That might be worth a picture later.
That over achieving cutting's friends are working on catching up on the deck and will be planted later.
...so much to do!


----------



## rachels.haven

Picture did not stick. Piece on plate is proof that it melts.


----------



## rachels.haven

Up to a gallon and a quart of milk today after nightly separation. Ava's milk is the quart and it goes down the drain because of antibiotics, but even she is trucking along (and one of last year's doelings had to spend the night with the babies for us to get much, if course). The family is drinking about half a gallon/day and the rest goes towards cheese and yogurt.

Yikes, the internet is not a super friendly place lately. I popped over to the "other" forums for goat specifically to read what was going on as I sometimes to and popped right back out again. Yep, forums can be eternal september for habitual readers, but, yikes, I didn't expect to see newbie eating going on. It's kind of grouchy and mean out there. Maybe I'll go read them again after this whole quarantine thing stops. I don't think avoiding others is good for people's mental health. It would sure be nice if they didn't "spread the love" and perpetuate the stress they are feeling onto people from a distance who don't deserve it like that. It discourages people from asking the questions required to reach for their dreams. At least let them a chance to give it a good shake even if they are going to quit. I really appreciate that this forum is fairly patient. Everybody starts out asking the same "stupid" questions, over and over again. Facebook is being nasty too. Animal rights people are running rampant on groups. Suddenly every video of any animal is animal abuse according to the general populous . I may just pop off the internet for a while. 

And as a final note, Yay for the human feed store, Sam's Club, and TSC Curb Pickup (and also Farmer's Exchange Curb Pickup, that I probably use more than tsc, but tsc carries the alfalfa pellets I use and other random stuff the Exchange doesn't so we use all 3). Yay for curbside pickup. (Based on what I saw leaving the club doors while we waited for our order to come out, they might be out of all forms of alcohol for consumption and maybe THAT'S why the internet's so mean lately...). They're probably also still out of hand sanitizer and sterilizing alcohol too for all I know, but I'm pretty sure that went a lot earlier. But flour they have, and I think they have most paper products excluding TP. No bread either. Might actually have to go into a store for that. But they do have pasta, frozen kid food, fruit, flour...all the staples of a non-varied diet of small children who eat ridiculous amounts for their size (45 pound kids, I feel like they eat about 25 pounds of food daily and stay all boney).

Oh, and a friend of mine is fleeing the state for a not so "great" in the corona virus rankings location and also a small family wedding, so we are now watching a 15 year old cockatiel for 2 months or so...so I guess we're the temporary owners of an indoor squeaky chicken, who is also fairly grumpy today. No keyboard and booze for you, Mr. Squeaky Indoor Chicken or whatever your name is.


----------



## CntryBoy777

No need to leave and punish us for something some "chicken littles" do.....maybe just remove their "bowline" and let em drift away...ya have enough to deal with, dealing with the laws and property "restrictions"....and your little indoor "buddy"....  😷


----------



## rachels.haven

They definitely might contract it on the way and hand it out to family when they're there-plus there's no guarantee leaving will actually help. No, we're not going anywhere! Our lockdown situation is too good here.

I don't think the cockatiel with be no issue as far as I can tell. He likes his cage, and he's an older one, so I'll rock the boat as little as possible. I just have to keep the kids from trying to feed him everything like they would for a chicken. It's so funny. The bird tries to bite them so they got and stuck the end of a celery stalk in its tiny angry mouth. Feeding it sausage got nixed. No apples, no grass, no outside leaves. I'm buying a tiny bag or two of $5-8 "premium" cockatiel diet that comes stuck together in balls and sticks like cookies and granola bars with dried fruit in it and I'm going to tell the kids those are treats. It's balanced, so it should do minimal harm to add to his normal diet. Unlike sausage and cheese stick (beach ball cockatiel, anyone?).

 unfortunately, while getting the mail today I noticed Ava's bucklings were frantically chasing all the other does around. I kept watch for a while and Ava did not feed them once the whole afternoon and just ran around the pen constantly avoiding them and kicking them off while stressing out and tossing her head as she does when offended. So at evening feeding I got a lambar nipple and bottle, warmed some milk, and conducted the bottle test. Most happy dam raised kids will shun the nipple, especially the big lambar ones without extra incentives and work. These guys started chugging like they'd never seen a teat in their lives. And their bellies were empty. So she's still not feeding them well. So I've got me 3 bottle bucklings then. Next time I think I will just pull Ava's babies from the start. These look a little small for 3-4 weeks this has probably been going on for a while, and the last ones wound up a little small too, especially the one she chose to reject the most.
Aw well, I guess as a bright side if they are bottle babies they can go to new homes earlier and getting nice pictures will be easier and we've got plenty of milk.
3x6 oz feedings, at 8,2,8 o'clocks. I might put together my lambar when they get out of the starvation stage. They were definitely feisty enough for it today, but I'd also like to avoid beach ball goat kids too. Milking time is 8 and 8, so I guess I just have to visit at lunch. Not too bad.


----------



## rachels.haven

Rosasharn WS Sir Patrick x Mustang Meadows H Avalon buckling

Bad shadows! Also, his rump is bunched up still. Taking pictures by yourself is difficult.

This guy is the most sure on the bottle and the roughest on mom. He also eats a lot for his size. I tortured Ava by stalling her with the other two kids for about three minutes on four different occasions today so they could drain her out and get full because their bottle skills were not so great today when they weren't AS hungry. The white/fawn one was on the bottle full time.


----------



## rachels.haven

Proof of cockatiel.







Proof of cockatiel eating sheet music. Nom. Nom. Nom.
Such a little bird.


----------



## Baymule

A friend of mine had a cockatiel that lived to mess with their cat. He would fly into a room calling Here kitty, kitty, kitty. The cat would run in the room, the bird would fly into another room and repeat the joke. One day he got out and was in a tree calling Here kitty, kitty, kitty! Her kids were crying, certain that all the neighborhood cats would eat their bird. They set his cage outside with treats and he went in his cage.


----------



## rachels.haven

They can TALK?! 
Oh dear, that adds another layer of care to taking care of him.


----------



## thistlebloom

We had a cockatiel once. Had him for about a year. The constant squawking became a nails on the chalkboard thing for me. I gave him back to the friend who gave him to us. But he was a friendly little guy!


----------



## rachels.haven

Forced mommy time after primary milking to take the held back milk and feed the slow one. 2/3 kids ate breakfast on the bottle. This one is holding out.


----------



## rachels.haven

I am not a cow person, but this is a cute cow. Appears to have a bonus teat, but still cute in a ploppy kind of way. My youngest would turn green with envy.


----------



## farmerjan

Interesting video.  I would have a cow trained to be tied  ahead of time so she wasn't so spooky.. That may have been the spreading of the straw.  But she did stand to be milked pretty good.  The original way to milk by hand was always on the cow's right side, but it is good that cows will allow people to milk from either side.  
She milks very easy, the teats are good sized.  There is nothing worse than the little tiny short teats.  But I like to use more than my thumb and forefinger to milk. 
I like them higher off the ground.  I don't worry about a little hair or straw in the bucket because it gets  strained out in the house. 
I have milked a few times with one hand on the bucket in case someone wants to pick up their foot.  

I would not give a lamb too much straight colostrum like that though.  Never had a cow to foster a lamb though,  That's pretty good disposition.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I may just pop off the internet for a while.


We would miss you!!!! Just pop off from the nasty sites. 



rachels.haven said:


> Oh, and a friend of mine is fleeing the state for a not so "great" in the corona virus rankings location and also a small family wedding


Doesn't sound like a great plan.


----------



## rachels.haven

This Ava rejecting her babies thing is hard. Today she wants them back...but really only the biggest white one, just like last year she picked "Sugar", her white doe as her favorite and only wanted to feed that one. The other two from last year are still around 25 lbs and may wind up being sold as pets if they are not 40 pounds at a year because I did not catch that mom was underfeeding and it didn't click that I should pull and bottle feed like I am now.
Ava is really something else. Even though I can milk her this year without getting bit every time I pass within reach around during and after and she's not terrible and milks about a quart per milking after overnight without forced mothering sessions (goes to the babies) I'm wondering if I want this doe in my herd at all now for this other reason. She's really a terrible mother. She was herself rejected late as a kid, and that was why she was offered up for sale so now I'm suspicious if bad mothering runs in her particular dam line, and if that's the case, I don't think I want any more does from her, so she should go, and pay for hay.
IDK, I'll have to think about it a bit. Sheesh, goat.
Logically speaking, if I don't want any more does out of her, as soon as the antibiotic with drawl on her milk is done she should be listed.
Her white doe, Sugar, from last year that is big annoys the bananas out of me with the same attitude as her mother had last year, so she may be listed. She also has the keg shaped build I am trying to avoid (as if she's a meat goat) and is always obese. Even though those things alone aren't bad, it's still like, WHY YOU NO DAIRY GOAT? There's a chance she may mature into a deep bodied milker, but I'm not sure if I want to stick around with it.
The other two does out of her are milder mannered but small because Ava did not love them. I will probably retain them and keep applying groceries for a little longer. The tricky thing is, they also tend to get fat, but not grow taller. I'm not sure applying groceries now will make up for not enough milk early on, but we'll see.
And of course, Ava's bucks will also be listed. Keeping those little buggers was never in the plan, as cute and nice as they are.
I may just be having a crabby morning, but I can't help feeling that the above will make my herd more peaceful, stable, and quiet. We'll see. I have to stew for a while.
At least Ava and the bucklings should go, logically speaking. The others need to be evaluated.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Sounds like you and your herd would find it much more pleasant  without Ava and Sugar in the mix.....now may  be a excellent time to sell them ....good luck with the decision  making


----------



## farmerjan

As I always say, I am not a goat person.   BUT, from all I read, and yes I do enjoy reading about peoples relationship with their goats ,  this whole line/family is just not what you want or should be perpetuating.  She causes you to continually have to accommodate her and her attitude.  If you are not happy with the body type to start with, why put up with the rest?   I get that people tend to feel bad about selling something after they have put alot of time and effort into them.... but honestly, that is emotions getting in the way of good sensible practicality.
Beef cows are different, and we have our favorites as well.  BUT. because they are alot bigger, and eat alot more, we have to be more practical.  They have to mother their calf.  They have to produce every year.  They have to raise a decent calf that is saleable. They will get a "pass" if they aren't bred  IF there are extenuating circumstances and they HAVE to get pregnant with the next group so only lose 6 months time.  If not they are gone.  They only get a 6 month pass ONE TIME in their lifetime unless they are very old and we are trying to keep their bloodline going. Had one cow that went 18 months between calves her last 3 but she was over 16 and one was a set of twins.   She earned her place to stay like that.

As far as my dairy cows, since I use a couple as nurse cows, they have to have mothering abilities and be fairly accepting of grafted calves.  They have to milk decent and not give me grief about coming into the barn.  They can't have attitudes and be "kicky"  cows.  I do not need drama every time I go to the barn to milk, or get them in to feed or anything else like that. 
From what @Mike CHS  said, prices down his way are very good.  If you are going to sell, this is the time to do it. Get rid of the whole family line, get some hay put back, and enjoy the ones you have that do "get with the program".   Life is too short to deal with animals with attitudes that make every thing else difficult to do.  You have enough other things there that you can't control, living in the "can't do"  state that you are in.  Keep your home life and farm life enjoyable.


----------



## rachels.haven

The only reason I personally would hesitate to sell her would be that I personally like Nigerian dwarf milk. It is the Jersey milk of the goat world. My family hates how thick and milkshake like it is, but I LOVE it. It is probably not worth the attitude from that goat though. May 24th her withdrawal is done and I will choose.

One of the new dwarves I brought home this year that had a negative preg test before coming here appears to have a more prominent udder than yesterday...this is suspicious. She'd be due in 30 days so the timing would be almost right. It could just be hormones. Or it could be that she didn't feel like being honest on her pregnancy test. She is 6 so I don't expect a huge litter. And she does not look big at all...just appears to be growing a suspicious udder. Hmm.


----------



## Bruce

Who says you can't have more than one kind of milk in the house? DW uses ONLY Lactaid Fat Free. I buy unhomogenized whole milk, mostly for cereal but also for making pancakes. I mostly drink water. DD1 (when here) uses only non fat milk, DD2 uses 1% when DD1 is not here but wants 2% to drink and non fat on cereal when DD1 is here. Personally, I can think of no reason why I would want to pour white tinted water on my cereal.


----------



## rachels.haven

That is what I like to do. Darn ND have concentrated milk and concentrated attitude though. I get the impression I'm going to have to sort through at least my herd to get a group with good production, good udders, and good dispositions all in one package.


----------



## farmerjan

Maybe just a different ND line with a goat that has an agreeable attitude?  I like my jersey and guernsey milk, but shipped a jersey that had a CRAP attitude several years ago....


----------



## Baymule

I feed them. I care for them. I water them. I provide shelter for them. I give them treats. In return I expect them to be good Mother’s and not give me a bunch of crap. I can’t stand people who create drama and I sure ain’t gonna take it from a ewe.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm hoping that this is indeed a case of a spicy lines. Eri, the six year old dwarf with the suspicious udder acts like a normal goat and shares no lines with Ava-she is Promised Land, Old Mountain Farms. That was my hope in getting her. She was described as being near the top of the pecking order and friendly but not obnoxious, with half gallon production and cow sized teats. That was why she came here. So far all but the hand milking teats I can varify and appreciate. She's not as pretty, but she's a dairy goat. And because of that I'd like to whisper an order for a buck and a doe from her.
I do need to sell Ava and at LEAST one of her does, if not two or three. We do have too much spicy and I am sick of it.
I also have Ava's cousin, Durango, as a 55 lbs mature buck. I'd like to keep him-he personally is more handlable than Ava most days- but I will probably consider him under evaluation as well based on daughters temperament.
Sigh.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

I second or what ever number we are on to sale her. I had two does before one was a dream to milk the other a nightmare. She would lay down kick anything and everything I had to keep her all tied up everytime to avoid a black eye. Now the doe i have is nice to milk she makes odd steps rarely and just eat her grain and let's me do my thing and she nursing three kids two are hers and one buckling i recently bought who was alittle young to wean lol. I can't wait to milk her girls they already let me touch their udder lines and teats. I have three milking next year. My husband enjoys this milk better. So i might buy a toggenberg buck or something later to keep the kind of milk he likes. My last were pure nubains these girl is nubian toggenberg and her doelings are 3/4 nubian and 1/4 toggenberg my buckling is nubian sansan. So we see how they work out. But I know what you mean on the milk some are creamer then others. I personally enjoy either goats milk. I wouldn't put up with the biting me nonsense she would be on a freezer date just my opinion. My buckling tries that now he gets smack i don't go for  biting. Thats the same with my rooster and other animals you bite you go. You behave you got a home.


----------



## rachels.haven

Listed Ava's bottle bucklings today. I immediately got a response from someone requesting I hold and bottle feed them until weaning time for them for the same price.
...not if someone else comes along, and that low price will go up if I have to especially if I like what I see. My time, space, and milk are worth something to me.

Meanwhile Ava produced over 6 cups of milk on the stand this morning-a BIG deal because the assumption is that if not with a buckling (and one of last year's doelings unfortunately) constantly harassing her and drinking the milk she'd be producing 3 quarts/day, which is great for a 60 lbs goat. Clearly she knows I intend to find her another barn...


----------



## CntryBoy777

I don't blame ya for increasing price....if they were "animal people" they would know and understand...or, take them and spend their time raising it....  .....Congrats on the milk increase and it is things like that, that makes all the "obsticles" worth dealing with....

I agree with the others on the "problem children"....just not worth dealing with or making arrangements for a few....


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I immediately got a response from someone requesting I hold and bottle feed them until weaning time for them for the same price.


Are mind altering drugs legal there because I think that person must be using them.


----------



## farmerjan

Have to agree @Bruce.... except people just think that you are desperate to sell and so they figure you will accommodate them.  It is really hilarious.


----------



## rachels.haven

People can be a wee bit entitled and out of touch here. I did not expect that though when selling goats specifically as "bottle babies". A lot of breeders don't wean until 12 weeks...these are turning 4 this week!


----------



## rachels.haven

I put up an add for female pekin ducks 3 days ago. Today I sold 7 and made $190...which unfortunately isn't making money with the way they eat and their age (12-16 weeks) BUT I recouped some of the cost of feed and that means I won't be feeding extra anymore-SO MUCH FEED. That means I'm down to 13, and maybe 6 or 7 of those drakes. I'd like to pick a lucky drake, process the rest of the males, and rethink my duck housing situation before time of lay now. I think they need a shed of their own instead of under the chicken coop, either that or I need to block off the part I don't want to be crawling around in the mud for eggs every morning. Something that won't blow over even with this insane wind we get that we've been having today.

Too bad I don't love growing out ducks. I could put out an order for females in the early spring, brood them for 8 weeks, and sell them, apparently very quickly for $30/each here and at 8 weeks that might make money...unlike now.  

Live and learn I guess. Maybe someday I'll go back to layer ducks. I didn't do them this time mostly because I don't want them fitting through the fence and cattle panels and I know these fatties can't, with the added bonus of being too big looking to be appealing to most birds of prey-unlike the layers. Oh well.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> . Today I sold 7 and made $190...which unfortunately isn't making money with the way they eat and their age (12-16 weeks)


You have $27 worth of feed in each bird? Wow, they eat a lot more than chicks!


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Ducks are worse then chicken on eating for sure and geese are worse then them.


----------



## rachels.haven

You said it.
8 weeks and out the door- there's a reason for that rule. 
We went through a bag every few days-YUCK.


----------



## CntryBoy777

rachels.haven said:


> I think they need a shed of their own instead of under the chicken coop, either that or I need to block off the part I don't want to be crawling around in the mud for eggs every morning.


I waited to respond to this cause I've been busy....but, I was wondering what size is your duck area?....the reason I ask is because I had mine under the chickens...we had heavy clay soil and it gets slick when wet, so we used hay in their bedding area and used the deep bedding system of management.....when ya get the eggs use a sprinkle of hay on top of dropping spots.....when it was time to clean it out I would use a pitch  fork and place it in their drylot pen....this kept their pen from being muddy and our footing....when the pen needs cleaning a hoe and scoop and wheelbarrow will get super dirt to your garden....the ducks made their own nests and would continue laying in them until I pulled them out when cleaning....their bedding area was 8'x6' and around 4' high....it was secured with hardwarecloth and we locked them in.....here's a pic...

It was under this bldg and half on the bottom was ducks....and chickens had the other.......I finshed the top and half of it was a brooding area with nestboxes on the floor....roosts and nests were on the left side...we brooded both in the bottom....and chickens had an opening with ramp into roost area.

What I decided that I would do the next time I built something for ducks it would be a 3'x8-10' cage covered back and top and framed sides and front with hardware cloth.....hinge it so either top or back will swing for cleaning....they can see at night and stay on watch...if ya hear them, best to check....cause something has them stirred....


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Did you get any snow from this latest cold front?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Miss @rachels.haven,
> 
> Did you get any snow from this latest cold front?
> 
> Senile Texas Aggie



Yes, three times yesterday. Kind of goofy. Kind of cold.

@CntryBoy777 
The chicken house is 8x8, BUT it's only about a foot off the ground. It has an attached 8x8 run that is also part of their night quarters. No rain protection there though. During the day they get the whole fenced in acre and a half or so to de-bug, de-tick, and de-slug. The run gets slick after rain and it will be hard to get eggs from under the coop without laying in the slippery poop. Our dirt is dust with big rocks, so no clay, but it also gets amazing slick when wet, not southern slick, but definitely slide down a hill or fall in the run if you're not careful slick.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Yeh...that definitely would be a bother and certainly worth a solution.....


----------



## rachels.haven

Single buck from Lamancha Epimetheus Lace. Picture when doe's cleanings are finished.
That brings our total up to 7 bucks, 1 doe, because the world does not have enough hippity hoppity, humpity bumpity. It's almost time to start banding some boys and making processing appts for fall.


----------



## rachels.haven

Summer needed the vet yesterday. Another big bill, but I got banamine and dex in big bottles and the vet can tell me to use them over the phone now if something like this happens again, and she discounted me a little for the emergency call. Summer either started having an allergic reaction to something on Thursday or she's got some kind of tumor in her throat that started acting up then. The first will settle down with steroids and anti inflammatories, the second is a death sentence. She's not better today yet, but vet said it could take a while. We'll see. Hang in there Summer. If it's a tumor, there's not much I can do. On Thursday when this started I both started giving them new hay and gave her a second mastitis shot (the one that will help Ava's udder rash not spread to other goats). Vet says either one of those could have been it. I'm going to go pick up some new hay today after DH comes home from a crazy long road biking adventure (usually about 2 hours) and giving them lots of pellets today. Meanwhile, I finished DS#1's schoolwork with him...

Removed a scur from my black lamancha buck. I had banded it earlier. It didn't fall off and kept scrolling into his temple, so I went to wire saw it off and off it popped. RELIEF. I also collected a fecal and drew blood from him to get his Johnes nonsense broken down to me by the vet-if he's really false positive, negative, or positive and just not shedding. That's heading off to waddl either today this afternoon if it doesn't pour too bad or tomorrow morning (cornell is not doing testing right now). If he's positive even if he's just not a shedder he will be put down and his body disposed of somehow. The town will not let us bury anything on our land and burn permits are for winter only. The buck pen will be quarantined and rigorously tested OR just right off castrated and sent for processing. I'll decide that later. NO JOHNES ALLOWED. Of course the does will be watched and tested aggressively in that case too, but they get very little if any exposure to the bucks per year. Also, everyone besides this guy and the buck I couldn't get a vein on everyone was very negative on their yearly ELISA test, so I don't know for sure what's up.
No one leaves here except for the processor until I get this resolved, I've decided after much thought.


----------



## Bruce

it isn't a tumor and there is no Johnes!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. I doubt he's shedding at least. Several of the goats came back with .00000 or however many places on their antibody test. It's normal to have some traces of antibodies-as long as it's not over a certain amount they're negative and will never be positive and they can ride up and down in that range. But to have nothing suggests they've never encountered the bacteria at all, and some of those "0" goats are his pen mates, so I'm not AS stressed out by this as I could be-puzzled, perhaps, but not panicked. I just need to be concise and decisive if anything needs to be done.


----------



## CntryBoy777

We had an older doe that developed a growth on her neck and she had difficulties at times with eating...I hope yours is curable and allergy related....I sure understand the anguish that it causes....


----------



## rachels.haven

A downer evening. Summer is worse and has begun mouth breathing and gasping. The Banamine and Dex we've got on board aren't helping.
Less bad but still not good is that I milked Lace...sort of. She has one finger length teats, so I pinched a few cups of milk out of her to try to even her out while worrying about/listening to Summer breathe. Lots of rain. The hay I got from the farmer's exchange is very coarse and full of yellow straw but no dust and the goats are okay with it.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> If he's positive even if he's just not a shedder he will be put down and his body disposed of somehow. The town will not let us bury anything on our land and burn permits are for winter only.



So if you have an animal that dies, you have to take the body to an approved disposal site?


----------



## rachels.haven

She's still with us this morning. More mouth breathing. Life is not fun or her right now. 
I'm not sure yet what this area requires you to do with the body. I was going ask the vet. In Iowa we had rendering/livestock disposal trucks, but I can't imagine New Englanders allowing such an eyesore on their roads, nor have I seen any. Not many feedlots or practical people here.

New England wants people to "farm" (keep) pretty horses. Horses die, and horses are big. There has to be some protocol to follow for a 130 lbs goat that is not as big. Summer wouldn't care what I have to do with her body if she dies. Summer is a goat and wants to live so I'll do whatever necessary after the fact.

I'm probably going to call the vet again today, and will get that information on disposal. She'd already said that Summer either was having an allergic reaction and the meds would help calm it and break the cycle or she probably had throat tumors and that would be the end of her, but one last check that there isn't anything else to do shouldn't hurt. It's not going to be good and it will probably mostly be a call for disposal info. Depressing.


----------



## Baymule

I’m really sorry about Summer . It doesn’t sound good for her. At least we can bury our animals on our property. We have lost 2 beloved dogs, 2 ewes and lambs. My favorite ewe is buried under my garden gate. We have 2 very old horses in bad health. They will be buried here. That will require a backhoe, but will be worth it to let them live out their days and stay “home”.


----------



## Bruce

I can bury here as well though not sure where I can find a spot that isn't ledge or full of rocks such that I could dig a hole deep enough for an alpaca. At least I do have a backhoe for the tractor.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, that's another issue. I'd have to rent heavy equipment, and I'd want to have a pre dug hole at all times, waiting to be filled in, but I can find that equipment.

A goat friend of mine dislikes the vet I'm using (putting it mildly) and suggested I get her vet to see Summer. Excede and ivermectin are on board now, and if it doesn't work, the vet has an xray and a scope we can try to get a better idea of if she's salvageable. No giving up until we're sure. Also, she's less expensive than the other vet and does more livestock, less horses and is okay with going extra label for goats. We'll see. I may still wind up with a dead goat but at least we'll try.


----------



## farmerjan

Sounds to me like you are going to be in better hands for the goat. Especially onr that will go extra label as there are things that a vet sees and knows that don't always fit the "accepted limits/norms" for some drugs.  Excede saved 4 head of cattle a couple of years ago when we lost a bunch..... and the bull passed his BSE (semen quality)  exam fine the following year and we are still using the bull. 
Hope all goes better with this protocol.


----------



## Baymule

We know Summer will get all you've got, plus some. Hopefully this new vet will be able to pull her through. It sure won't be for lack of trying.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Good luck on saving Summer.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> A goat friend of mine dislikes the vet I'm using (putting it mildly) and suggested I get her vet to see Summer.


That doesn't sound real good. Did she say why? She and the vet just aren't compatible or she thinks the vet is incompetent with regard to goats? Something else?


----------



## rachels.haven

She essentially said the doctor who owns the practice is ignorant of goats and would kill her. This was from the other goat breeder in town. That practice is for horses apparently.


----------



## rachels.haven

Buggy the black lamancha buck is NEGATIVE for Johnes!!!! Yay!
Sage was indeed giving false positives to his last owner.


----------



## rachels.haven

Now, that negative cost me $130, but just one new buck of the quality I like is $600-1,500 (a buck is half your herd and should be an improvement to your does and serve to lock in quality...and you really only need two per breed, says the lady with 3 nigerians).


----------



## CntryBoy777

I would think it would be more than half....especially if used for more than 1cycle.....really glad for ya the test results were so Welcoming....


----------



## Baymule

Any news on Summer?


----------



## rachels.haven

She started improving yesterday. Yesterday morning her breathing was less impeded and it sounded like there was a lot of loose something in her sinuses rattling around as she breathed. By evening the mouth breathing was gone and she was less loud. At midnight when my husband went to check on her breathing had quieted down a lot and this morning she is getting her voice back and her nostrils are not flared as she breathes. I have no idea what was up in her throat and nose causing her so much grief but I think that maybe maybe *knock on wood* she will pull through. Yesterday wa a good goat day.


----------



## rachels.haven

First egg of the year. The silkies at about 6 months are less slackers now.




Tiny chickens still lay tiny eggs, in case you are wondering.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sold the white and fawn buckling, listed Sugar and Ginger and updated the other bottle buckling's ad. Fingers crossed.

Summer got her next antibiotic dose. She needs to put on some muscle she lost in her rear, but her sides have filled out. Her tummy is full again.


----------



## rachels.haven

I guess I can do this. Yes, he is sucking the middle finger. He already rasped the pointer one raw so I switched.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

Above is Sugar covered in hay dust from laying under the feeder eating.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ginger


----------



## rachels.haven

Crated up remaining extra cockerels. They've been outing each other from the coop and raping pullets. Well, we know how to fix rapist animals here on the farm. Roasted or fried, maybe pressure cooked. 8 males to go. 

Then I get to do the hard job of sorting ducks and picking a keeper drake or two depending on how many ducks I've got. This is made more complicated by the fact that they all look the same, with minor build differences-slightly annoying. Darn pekins. Yummy though. Fast growing too. The next batch I do should be processed or sold by 8 weeks (remember that, dummy Rachel?). I think silkies might be able to hatch a few duck eggs if I facilate it. BIG EGGS for little broody hens. My last silkie loved big duck eggs.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> View attachment 73903




Miss @rachels.haven,

I am about to show my ignorance of goats: does the little goat in the picture have ears?  Are they simply folded back or are they really as short as they appear to be?  

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

@Senile_Texas_Aggie 
Goats are better without ears. 
He is a Lamancha goat. Their outstanding feature is little to no ear, but it comes with a very willing and docile temperament, small standard goat size, and a moderate butterfat in their milk.

I believe we lamancha owners are supposed to tell people who ask that question that we cut them off and ate said ears, but I haven't managed to bring myself to saying that. The truth is that they are born that way and that's all.


----------



## rachels.haven

No more extra roosters unless the keeper whiting cockerels start causing me grief. I believe there are 3 or maybe 4. I will count tonight.
The keeper Drake has been picked. The rest can go, except the freezer is full of meat, so they will have to go one at a time and we will just eat duck once a week. I wonder how many ducks we will wind up with.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> The truth is that they are born that way and that's all.


I still think all goats should have ears 
Maybe I should start breeding Lamanchas selecting those with the largest ears. Maybe I could develop a line that looked like a goat 


rachels.haven said:


> The next batch I do should be processed or sold by 8 weeks


I didn't realize Pekins grew as fast as CX chickens.


----------



## rachels.haven

@Bruce  that they do, but they eat much more. The trade off is that at 3-4 weeks they look and act like mini adults and can go out foraging.


----------



## rachels.haven

Six chickens last night decided to roll the dice and sleep outside in the trees. Six became five over night. Half the stupid chickens decided to do it tonight. I caught all but 3, no thanks to the dog who decided we were hunting them and tried to help me by killing them. Ooo, did she get yelled at and backed up for trying that...she's also lost loft privileges for staying IN the loft to poop and pee when the door was wide open today...because she doesnt want to get locked out when I'm milking in the morning (she's a got food issues with other animals food, but never her own, of course) So yes, no more loft privileges. I need that hay.
I'm afraid I'm in a terrible mood tonight.
Tomorrow I'm trimming wings, keeping birds locked up to retrain, and continuing to keep my remaining hay stubborn poo and pee free.


----------



## rachels.haven

Chicken issue may have started because I took the red sex link males out of the picture and there are no calm, not stupid birds left or alternatively because we had two tons of diseases pine fall across the driveway and block us and two other houses road access in Friday's storm, which meant we had to pay $750 to get it removed and the tree was bigger than they thought and the chipper struggled for over two hours which stressed out everything on the property with the noise...or it could just be that the whitings and leghorns are stupid and they want to die. Yay. Good night.


----------



## CntryBoy777

....sounds like ya could use one....aww heck!!....have another........


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you.
Wings clipped and birds locked in the coop and run. I have 32 or 33 chickens left. 4 are roosters.
Since I was in a counting mood I took inventory of how many extra drakes are on my work order-only 5, thank goodness. They need some fattening, unlike the female ducks and keeper drake it feels like they have been getting the short end of the stick at feeding time. They'll enjoy the next few weeks, I hope. Pekins love their feed and corn. Then my keepers will probably be too fat, but whatever. That's meat ducks.


----------



## Baymule

I raised pekins for freezer meat one time. There is a very narrow window for plucking them before they sprout pin feathers like a pin cushion. Then it takes pliers, a chisel, jackhammer, block and tackle, just to get ‘em plucked! GAH!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes,you sure have. That sounds exactly like duck pluckery. I'm definitely looking forward to that. They'll probably be going one at a time for that reason alone.


----------



## rachels.haven

I found another chicken. Catching her is another matter. Crossing my fingers for tonight.


----------



## Bruce

Good luck with the chicken. 
And BAD DOG!


----------



## rachels.haven

I caught the chicken. They can totally see and run around in the dark. All but one have clipped wings now, and that one is "roosting" under the coop out of reach in the pen and with the ducks at night. They are stuck for now. Stinkers/stupid chickens.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Ya just gotta love it....I lost a KC hen one day and I looked around Everywhere for her....called to her and nothing....I ended up finding her in a rolled up piece of welded wire fencing that was about 20yrs old.....she had crawled into the middle to lay an egg and couldn't get back out.....needless to say I cut her out and collected the egg...


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh man, that's funny. That egg did not need to go there that badly. That poor mother ducker!


----------



## rachels.haven

Uh oh. Looks like our processor is only processing for their retail store until they decide to do otherwise and not commiting to processing appointments and they aren't answering calls to let people get on their tentative "list". Hmmm...
I guess I'd better list the wethers and future wethers.


----------



## Bruce

Well that just sucks!


----------



## rachels.haven

We'll see. But the chance this still may not be the year we get to eat goat increased. I'm not sure I'm ready to make the jump into processing my own until someone can show me how from dispatch to breakdown.


----------



## CntryBoy777

rachels.haven said:


> We'll see. But the chance this still may not be the year we get to eat goat increased. I'm not sure I'm ready to make the jump into processing my own until someone can show me how from dispatch to breakdown.


Very similar to a deer...as far as separating parts...ya can find many of those on utube....


----------



## Bruce

I'm with you there Rachel. There are lots of things I've learned to do via YouTube but I think processing a larger animal is something I'd like some hands on tutoring the first time.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> We'll see. But the chance this still may not be the year we get to eat goat increased. I'm not sure I'm ready to make the jump into processing my own until someone can show me how from dispatch to breakdown.



Rachel, I just did that with one of our wethers, my neighbor helped and we got him done in about a hour...wasn't  as tough as I thought it would be. ....


----------



## CntryBoy777

It is like cuttin' up a chicken....only on a bit larger scale....the 1st few chickens that I cutup wasn't anything to brag about...but, I certainly got better at it....the finer cuts come with experience.....


----------



## rachels.haven

I called a processor about 50 minutes away and they ARE processing so I booked the 4 standard wether and future wethers for Sept 3rd. They'll be smaller, but shouldn't be tough. This place is farther than 15 minutes and more expensive, but goat is still goat. I will consider doing any unsold Nigerian bucks/wethers myself, but I'd still want a gun for dispatch, and I'd have to reopen that debate with DH. Maybe I can get a captive bolt or similar and it would put him at ease. I have time there. Also, they are very nice bucklings. They may sell.


----------



## Bruce

What is DH worried about? I ASSUME you aren't planning on an AR15 with a 50 round magazine and a bump stock.


----------



## farmerjan

Don't do a captive bolt.  It is not a guarantee the animal will be knocked out enough, and it takes some skill to make sure they hit the right spot. You've gone the whole route to get approved for owning a firearm.  Get one before you can't get one in Mass at all.  After what has happened here in Va with this stupid governor, anything can happen and Mass is a  much more restrictive state ordinarily.  You want the animal to die quickly and to be able to cut it's throat with complete bleed out.  Can you handle if an animal is not dead and you are trying to cut it's throat as it comes back to awareness.


----------



## rachels.haven

I won't do captive bolt then. I think I could handle killing it just by throating it but of course I'd rather not. I'd rather be humane, plus noise is a factor.
Several concerns on owning a fire arm here. My main one is as follows: The kids' doctors require you to disclose your firearm status. They write it down. It ends up in their state database. That makes me uncomfortable. They may not take away your guns, but give them any reason to take your kids and I'm sure they will. My kids are safe, healthy, stable, and happy. I wouldn't trust the state with them worth a goat duki.

My husband is mostly worried about his crazy kids somehow managing to get into it at any time of them living at home. He is also more center leaning in his views on politics (not left, not right) and I think he feels owning a gun will somehow push him right. BUT a gun is still just a tool though-a tool state agencies told me to get as they offer no protection for my children against their wild animals. It also, strangely enough, feels like caving to the wackadoodle lefters here to me. It's like they're saying, " don't want to be a good little indoor dwelling follower? Fine, be pushed into this box with other state declared "undesirables" so we can find ways to abuse you and tell you what to do better" which makes me realize why every farmer and sportsman around here that I've met seems sad and bitter. The state mistreats them by over taxing, loading them up with far too many laws they MUST follow or be punished, and not supporting them at all. But I digress.

So basically, it's complicated why we don't have a gun here. The simple of it is that I don't feel good about it here yet. We are licensed. When/ if the situation arises where we need one we will get one that day, if at all possible. Until then, I wield an ax handle from the ax collection the previous owner left. I may buy a baseball bat or keep my own small personal ax accessible. It's good for dispatching and inflicting major damage and not awkward but not too small. I keep it sharp.

Oddly enough, I'd feel more comfortable owning a gun in a place like TN, where I'm less likely to need one because the neighbors usually enjoy shooting or trapping or have simply already done the vermin dispatching because it's open season on vermin in general. The state is less hostile.

I can get my goats dispatched for me if I have to, no worries. Dwarves grow slowly anyway. I'd like them to be at least 50 lbs first, but I'd take 40. That may be more like 7-9 months rather than just a few. Saffron the lamancha's 9 or 10 week old wether is about 40-50 lbs NOW, for perspective. If the dwarves wethers reach weight by winter or early spring I could always book them then in the offseason when I see they're going to reach that point soon if I can't find someone to pay and do it for me. That slaughter house charges $40 to dispatch. I'd pay someone $40 to come to my house and dispatch one properly, or I'd be happy to bring them to the slaughter house and have them dispatch and bleed out and I can bring home and do the rest.


----------



## Baymule

The kids doctor wants to know your gun status? That is way too scary. That is the perfect excuse to snatch your kids away from you. Wow. My first thought....you need to get the hell outa there! 

On slaughter, it isn't hard. but with no gun to shoot them with, bludgeoning the poor things to death doesn't sound too attractive. Most slaughter places do a kill and chill, as you have found out. You need sharp knives and a meat grinder. A food saver and vacuum seal bags (on a roll) are the best way to pack the meat for the freezer. 

Here is a link to the year we butchered 3 hogs. it was a good feeling to process our own meat. 





__





						Feeder Pigs 2017
					

I raised mine with pasture, excess veggies, bought feed.  Then to butcher for a "kill & chill" @ $50 per head.   They were killed, washed, dehaired, gutted and hanging  when I went to get them.   I had them cut off the head, feet, cut into halves, then those into 3rds at back of shoulder, front...



					www.backyardherds.com


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you for the link! No, the hammer stun option does not feel good to me either. So I've got my Dexter Russel butcher knives from my Muscovy days, the inlaws gave us a vacuum sealer and the stuff for sealing...I need a meat grinder then-in time. I'll look for a good one closer to the time of. And I will get out of here when I can.


----------



## Baymule

You aren’t cut out for that kind of control.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Couldn't you get a good gun safe in which to store your guns?  You may not can keep your names from the database of the pediatricians, but I really don't think you have anything to worry about as long as you practice gun safety.  You can also assure your husband that he won't automatically become a hardcore right-winger by owning guns.  I have owned guns for years and haven't become one yet -- although I have been having the strange urge to tune into Alex Jones at Infowars lately!   (Just kidding on the urge.)

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, too many rules does that to a person, doesn't it?
That is mostly the way we'd do it if we did. I believe the Mass law is that you have to stow both gun and ammo in separate locked boxes, so I'd need two locking box things.


----------



## Bruce

I agree with STA. I don't think the pediatrician's query means "if you own guns you are unsafe to have kids". I believe it is to make sure that if there ARE guns on the property they are safely stored and not available to the kids. Kids have accidentally killed other kids when they got into guns that were not safely stored. If you have no guns, they don't need to ask further questions about how they are stored.


----------



## farmerjan

Sorry, I lived in New England, and had friends and family that lived in Mass.  I would not put it past the "authorities" to want to know about the guns and the best way is to do it in a way that seems very innocuous by having pediatricians want to record if you have a firearm or not.  nd yes, the very far off the radar ones would use it as a "standard" of judging you as unfit to have children, or to keep your children.   I realize you are in Vt  @Bruce ,  but as one who has roots in New England that goes back to the settling of Ct.,  the changes in what used to be old fashioned common sense and values of  independence and stubborn "yankee " ingenuity, is unbelieveable.  My great grandmother would talk about the changes in her lifetime, and my grandparents would talk about the differences from when they were young to when they were in their 70's  and older.  Our families have roots in Ct., and in NY,  and in Vermont.   Mass was a state to get through as fast as safely possible due to their restrictive laws and outlandish  overbearing attitudes.   

There is an agenda in Mass, and wanting to know if there are guns in a house where there are children is an invasion of personal privacy.   I wouldn't trust them as far as I could throw a locomotive.


----------



## SA Farm

What about getting a crossbow or something along those lines? I think you can get small handgun sized ones from Amazon in the states. Just a thought 🙂


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm not sure how that would work for butchery, but I thought about it. Unfortunately so did the legislature here. Crossbows are illegal for hunting unless you are disabled with a doctor's note. If I used it to shoot coyotes someone could argue that I was "hunting" and get me in trouble.
But I could always consider it. Worst case, someone finds a shot coyote and decides to go after me for killing their beloved coyote pets. I am able to lawyer up if I need to-it's just gross (everybody does here and sues their neighbor like it's a hobby.)


----------



## rachels.haven

All the remaining panels are in place for the buck pen. Now I just need to pound posts and clip or tie them on.
But putting your kid through school takes time, so we're not exactly on the fast track here.
It's a solid wall of tick infested rogue landscaping greenery out there. The bucks are going to have a field day.


----------



## rachels.haven

A big tree somewhere on the property fell today a few minutes ago in the gentle breeze. It was very loud and caused a huge dust cloud, which at this time of year means a pine was involved somehow because they were spreading pollen today starting at about 10 am. All the poultry spooked and the dog woke up to look around. Many branches fell for several minutes later. I'm not sure exactly where it is because the woods are so tall and large I feel like an ant back there. DH was just saying no trees looked like they were going to fall in that area as we sat on a 3' in diameter rotten log and looked around. Never say that. Our woods are not particularly safe. Nope, not letting anyone put up a tent there and camping. Sorry. Little camp fire maybe, but I'm going to be there on the alert at all times. Bad trees, bad bears, bad coy-things, rabies.
I'd rather clear the woods, fence in the property, and plant grass and orchard trees-BOTH SHORT.
These woods are really working my nerves with the hand fed animals and spontaneously shattering 50 foot trees. Kind of makes me miss Iowa.
I'll go find the tree later.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sold 19 chickens for $20/each today after listing them Friday, and gave away 2 roosters. 7 more whiting pullets to go. I've decided I need CALM chickens regardless of the color they lay. The silkies are turning out tiny eggs like crazy(...for bantams) We like those fine, let's get some more brown eggers.
I liked the attitude on my gold comet/red star/cinnamon queen meat males, let's get some (16?) of those in the female model, and some australorp pullets (16?) and a rooster or two. I need to be able to handle my birds, not have them flying 20 feet in the air every time they see their own shadow and roosting at night in the trees. I may reduce later. Apparently they have no trouble selling.

Having trouble letting go of the 4 leghorns. They are calmer than this batch of Whitings and they are set to begin laying on June 8th. I should probably let go of those still too crazy leghorns.


----------



## Bruce

Calm is good!


----------



## rachels.haven

I also got some "farmer junk" from premier 1. Ooops, that wound up being more than I intended. Aw well. Hope DH doesn't notice.
More extra tough hay feeders, an alfalfa pellet feed trough, some heat lamps and bulbs, and a big chicken feeder. Do not calculate that bill. I am gagging, but I am happy with the quality of their stuff as compared to TSC or the feed store. I'd rather just buy it once, not once a year.


----------



## Baymule

I have been on a quest for that just right chicken breed. I hate mean roosters, the latest is in the freezer. I have heard many good things about White Rocks, good layers, CALM roosters and big brown eggs. I’m thinking that will be my next breed. They are white-boring. I really like the flashy colors, colored eggs, the chicken that “wows”.  But I’m thinking boring white is looking better and better. LOL LOL


----------



## Bruce

I have 3 White Rocks, what do you mean "white-boring"? They are always some shade of white and brown, especially if it happens to rain and the dust bath calls 

No rooster so I can't say if they are calm or not. The hens lay in the low to mid range USDA large. If you want BIGGER, my 2 Barred Rocks average the high end of Large and lower end of XLarge, sometimes as big as the low end of Jumbo. My Austra Whites (White Leghorn x Black Australorp) have averaged Large since about 2 weeks into laying back in December. They've been hitting XL almost every egg for since mid April. They will be 1 year old in 3 weeks. One lays white, one a SLIGHTLY light brown.


----------



## rachels.haven

@Baymule , could you find a breeder and get a surplus older rooster from them? I've really loved my black copper Marans roosters and my orpington roosters (the ones that weren't stupid cannibals feeding their own chicks to hens for mating points). Those breeders had been breeding for a while and ATE rather than bred all the mean ones-that is the key, because that part of temperament is largely inherited. Good luck finding a breeder raising gentle roosters with hens that LAY though, lol. Inbreeding for good temperament can cause inbreeding depression either way.
The whiting males from  McMurray aren't aggressive either. They're just really high strung. You won't even know you've got a cock in the flock. Just the rare crowing and fertile easter eggs from all the hens...
People don't really breed chickens here in this state, I've realized so the breeder option is out for me. They get them from hatcheries and sell them for $20-25/pullet. That makes money, but does nothing for temperament of the breed.
 I don't think I made money today (down to 3 hens, 2 of which got loose, and 2 cockerels) but I fed them nice, high protein pellet and did a lot of bedding changes because I like it neat and dry. I wasn't raising them in the mindset of a profit. I did make an embarrassing amount of cash, but I probably already spent that much raising them, so it really is just embarrassing. Sure am glad I'm not organic. Inorganic only, lol.
If it's any indicator, one of my buyers used to raise and sell pullets as a business and she was happy to pay $20 per hen and bought 17. She also says there is no money in breeding them. You just get them shipped sexed and sell them, in and out. I don't think there was enough money for her in pullets either and eggs are better.

I did something non farm related that I'd never done before. I went to the grocery store for things I don't get in our sam's order and lobsters were very steeply on sale so I impulse bought two little guys and steamed them. Kind of nice. I don't like the tails, arms, or claws, but the little legs are fun and picking/chewing the meat out of the body is good. Nice and salty. May have also eaten a tomalley-tasted like butter. Nothing numbing yet. It was probably fine. Tails and claws are for the husband. Not crunchy enough.

I am on the hay hunt again. The alfalfa I got from the hay lady of Groton is crap-all stems, and hard too. She said she'd buy it back from me. We'll see if she does. People here have not surprised me with their integrity. In the mean time, I need to visit the farmer's exchange and see what they've got and if it will tide me over until second cutting time. The loft is emptying fast.

One leghorn hen (yep, sold the others), two loose true greens, and 2 cockerels left. 
New chicks come the middle of June. This is the last try. Then I'll eventually try quail or just more bantams if these two fail. The silkies are doing surprisingly well. Coturnix quail are too dumb to cause issues and will just be locked up 24/7 but while I enjoy their eggs I do not enjoy watching them. Their mouths are creepily large down the sides of their faces and they are really brick stupid. But eggs is the goal and each 8oz bird lays an egg every single day without fail until they die in a year or two, so they serve their purpose well. They also have a taste to me that is somewhere between turkey, duck, and really good heritage chickens when those extra males do have to go.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I don't like the tails, arms, or claws, but the little legs are fun and picking/chewing the meat out of the body is good.


Those are the parts I HATE to deal with on a lobster! What a pain picking out little tiny bits that don't even add up to food  I'm not a big claw person though, kinda mushy. I prefer the tail .



rachels.haven said:


> In the mean time, I need to visit the farmer's exchange and see what they've got and if it will tide me over until second cutting time.


I'm fearing there will be no second cut again here this year given how dry it has been. I asked Al if he could do me some second cut this year IF he can do a second cut. The 2 alpacas are picky boys, they don't like the thicker stemmy stuff which is what I got the last 2 years. They pick out the thin grasses and sleep on the rest after it falls or I pull it out of the wall feeders to make room for another flake. I suspect 70%+ of what I put in front of them ended up on the ground. I bet if it was all edible, by their standards, I wouldn't go through ten 40# bales all winter.


----------



## rachels.haven

@Bruce ...I guess you're also a man. You guys can have the squashy parts.
The hay thing is not good at all. Our weather is very similar. Do the alpacas eat pelleted hay alright? It's expensive, but there's no waste, and it's my emergency fallback.
Edited: The horse people here will not let the area run out of hay. The price will just spike steeply.


----------



## farmerjan

One of the biggest purebred poultry shows, in the east,  is held at Eastern States in Springfield, Mass., in January.  Called the Poultry Congress, there have been exhibitors there from all over the country. 
There is the Ohio National also, but the Congress show is very well known.
Some of the best Leghorns were bred by James Rines Sr., and his son David.   Jim had SC Light Browns and David had the SC Dark Browns.  I got breeding birds from them way back in the 70's.  A son Jim Jr, in one of the carolinas had his dad's bloodlines.   One of the premier breeders of Japanese bantams is also from  Mass.  
You can find out about alot of the poultry shows and many breeders advertise in "Poultry Press".   One of the top breeders of White Leghorn bantams was also from the New England area.  There have been several other breeders of other breeds from the NE states.  The top breeder of Standard Old English Games was in VT.  These were show birds, not fighting birds, although the dispositions are for them to be "scrappy".  

Wyandottes are a very quiet easy going breed of chickens.  There are several colors of  both Plymouth Rocks and Wyandottes so you don't have to have "boring white colors".   Wyandottes have a rose comb as opposed to the single comb. 
I still like the New Hampshires,  and have not had aggressive males.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. I'll do some more homework and find the Poultry Press. I would love at least another rooster from a breeder. I'm not sure what shows will be held, but if I can follow the event, eventually I will go. Visiting a show would be a great way to spend an afternoon just for fun alone.


----------



## Baymule

I like the black copper marans, but have not had any. Wyandottes I have had in several colors and I like them also. I have had sex links and they are laying machines. Now I have Easter Eggers, Cream Legbar, and Welsummer.


----------



## rachels.haven

My welsummer hen was lovely. She was a fair weather layer at my latitude, but a better disposition you could not ask for. She was independent, yet quiet and happy with life. Not a very loud bird. You're very lucky there. I don't know legbars, but I've had some very fun easter eggers. Sweet choices.


----------



## Xerocles

rachels.haven said:


> I won't do captive bolt then. I think I could handle killing it just by throating it but of course I'd rather not. I'd rather be humane, plus noise is a factor.
> Several concerns on owning a fire arm here. My main one is as follows: The kids' doctors require you to disclose your firearm status. They write it down. It ends up in their state database. That makes me uncomfortable. They may not take away your guns, but give them any reason to take your kids and I'm sure they will. My kids are safe, healthy, stable, and happy. I wouldn't trust the state with them worth a goat duki.
> 
> My husband is mostly worried about his crazy kids somehow managing to get into it at any time of them living at home. He is also more center leaning in his views on politics (not left, not right) and I think he feels owning a gun will somehow push him right. BUT a gun is still just a tool though-a tool state agencies told me to get as they offer no protection for my children against their wild animals. It also, strangely enough, feels like caving to the wackadoodle lefters here to me. It's like they're saying, " don't want to be a good little indoor dwelling follower? Fine, be pushed into this box with other state declared "undesirables" so we can find ways to abuse you and tell you what to do better" which makes me realize why every farmer and sportsman around here that I've met seems sad and bitter. The state mistreats them by over taxing, loading them up with far too many laws they MUST follow or be punished, and not supporting them at all. But I digress.
> 
> So basically, it's complicated why we don't have a gun here. The simple of it is that I don't feel good about it here yet. We are licensed. When/ if the situation arises where we need one we will get one that day, if at all possible. Until then, I wield an ax handle from the ax collection the previous owner left. I may buy a baseball bat or keep my own small personal ax accessible. It's good for dispatching and inflicting major damage and not awkward but not too small. I keep it sharp.
> 
> Oddly enough, I'd feel more comfortable owning a gun in a place like TN, where I'm less likely to need one because the neighbors usually enjoy shooting or trapping or have simply already done the vermin dispatching because it's open season on vermin in general. The state is less hostile.
> 
> I can get my goats dispatched for me if I have to, no worries. Dwarves grow slowly anyway. I'd like them to be at least 50 lbs first, but I'd take 40. That may be more like 7-9 months rather than just a few. Saffron the lamancha's 9 or 10 week old wether is about 40-50 lbs NOW, for perspective. If the dwarves wethers reach weight by winter or early spring I could always book them then in the offseason when I see they're going to reach that point soon if I can't find someone to pay and do it for me. That slaughter house charges $40 to dispatch. I'd pay someone $40 to come to my house and dispatch one properly, or I'd be happy to bring them to the slaughter house and have them dispatch and bleed out and I can bring home and do the rest.


I'm a couple days late to this party, but I just gotta stick my big nose in here. The doctor asks if you have guns in the house? Seriously? I'd have to say "None of your D@#*  business (and it isn't)....and as much as I hate to lie about ANYTHING..... if forced by law, I'd look them straight in the eye and LIE. Do they also ask if you drink alcohol, smoke pot, have extra-marital affairs or drive over the speed limit? Ultimate silliness.
Now, I am a self-professed "gun nut", but I never encourage anyone that they should own a gun. Personal choice. Your life, your decision.
BUT. One statement you made.
"When/ if the situation arises where we need one we will get one that day, if at all possible."
PLEASE, please, _please..._reconsider this. It's like saying, when I need to travel out of state, I'll buy a car. 
Buy a gun, don't buy a gun. Like I said, your decision. But. If it's ever a possibility, do it NOW. Take additional classes to train yourself with THAT PARTICULAR GUN. And PRACTICE, on a regular basis.
It's like a teenager borrowing a friend's car, learning just enough laws to pass the driving test, and never driving again till they're 30 yrs old and buying a Corvette.
Guns and cars are most dangerous (to their owners and innocent bystanders) in the hands of those not trained and familiar with their proper use.
Apologies. I'm far from MA, and I don't have a dog in this fight. But as an American who values my right to own firearms, I must give sound counsel when I hear things like this. One untrained person having an "accident" gives the rest of us a bad name.


----------



## rachels.haven

@Xerocles , you'd get your kids taken away here. Valid point. They do not ask about any kind of drug use in the home or a stable family.


Xerocles said:


> BUT. One statement you made.
> "When/ if the situation arises where we need one we will get one that day, if at all possible."


There is some background on this I did not include. My husband has some gun experience. He doesn't personally want to own one, but as a teen/young adult he enjoyed scouting and target shooting with specific other kinds of guns. I do not like the gun he's named off that he knows. I want my dad to come down and go with me to pick up the two guns he's picked out for me that he has found is good for killing things. He picked me out a "kid level" .22, and one he thinks is better for dispatching things. He has used them before and will teach me to use and maintain them like he taught my brothers after I left home. My Dad won't be down for a while, but "if the situation arises..." we'll go get the one my husband knows OR I'll go talk to his cousin the next town over, who has already offered to help. But I trust my dad on this more. He's found the crappy ones that broke or he doesn't like and good ones, and the ones he's used the most and the way he uses them isn't very different from what I'd be using them for.

If we move this will cease to be an issue. I could get a firearm and not even mention it because the kind we need is not really a big deal anywhere else. It's not like I want/need an assault rifle here. It would be for target practice for accuracy, and killing goats and coyotes. The end. (and you know what? It's come to my attention as my kids get older they are TERRIFIED of anything vaguely dangerous...like butter knives and mouth wash. My parental fears are starting to tone down on that front. They'll just never be around it by their own choice until they are old enough to not be terrified and i think that's just fine. The questions at the doctors' office is inappropriate and invasive and probably state policy since he asked for both kids appointments and took note of the answer.)

Keeping a gun unloaded, clean, and locked up separate from the ammo is not a huge deal. I really don't want to get pushed into the next level of scrutiny from the state though until I have to though. My kids are happy, healthy, well adjusted, and clean, but I butcher my own animals, don't wear makeup, I look very young, and I dress in hooded sweatshirts and jeans as my wardrobe and not mall clothes, and don't speak the new england "language" here. They could probably drum up some excuse if they wanted to take my boys away. Sometimes my boys walk outside in chicken poop with no shoes, for example (and then I get to wash their feet  ). Or I let them play outside in the fenced in yard unsupervised sometimes as 5 and 7 year olds (sort of). Or they drink unpasteurized milk and cheese, would be a legitimate one (milk from goats tested for milk-borne diseases, I might add). We all do. And personally I feel it's safer than the store milk and cheese but that's a whole other can of worms.

I will probably get a firearm this fall to do any wethers that don't sell. My husband has the option of getting "legal insurance" from work or just a lawyer period, and we are willing to do that to prevent the state from jumping up in our business if we decide to exercise our right to own a gun for the previously stated purposes.


----------



## Baymule

That is just messed up.


----------



## Xerocles

rachels.haven said:


> @Xerocles , you'd get your kids taken away here. Valid point. They do not ask about any kind of drug use in the home or a stable family.
> 
> There is some background on this I did not include. My husband has some gun experience. He doesn't personally want to own one, but as a teen/young adult he enjoyed scouting and target shooting with specific other kinds of guns. I do not like the gun he's named off that he knows. I want my dad to come down and go with me to pick up the two guns he's picked out for me that he has found is good for killing things. He picked me out a "kid level" .22, and one he thinks is better for dispatching things. He has used them before and will teach me to use and maintain them like he taught my brothers after I left home. My Dad won't be down for a while, but "if the situation arises..." we'll go get the one my husband knows OR I'll go talk to his cousin the next town over, who has already offered to help. But I trust my dad on this more. He's found the crappy ones that broke or he doesn't like and good ones, and the ones he's used the most and the way he uses them isn't very different from what I'd be using them for.
> 
> If we move this will cease to be an issue. I could get a firearm and not even mention it because the kind we need is not really a big deal anywhere else. It's not like I want/need an assault rifle here. It would be for target practice for accuracy, and killing goats and coyotes. The end. (and you know what? It's come to my attention as my kids get older they are TERRIFIED of anything vaguely dangerous...like butter knives and mouth wash. My parental fears are starting to tone down on that front. They'll just never be around it by their own choice until they are old enough to not be terrified and i think that's just fine. The questions at the doctors' office is inappropriate and invasive and probably state policy since he asked for both kids appointments and took note of the answer.)
> 
> Keeping a gun unloaded, clean, and locked up separate from the ammo is not a huge deal. I really don't want to get pushed into the next level of scrutiny from the state though until I have to though. My kids are happy, healthy, well adjusted, and clean, but I butcher my own animals, don't wear makeup, I look very young, and I dress in hooded sweatshirts and jeans as my wardrobe and not mall clothes, and don't speak the new england "language" here. They could probably drum up some excuse if they wanted to take my boys away. Sometimes my boys walk outside in chicken poop with no shoes, for example (and then I get to wash their feet  ). Or I let them play outside in the fenced in yard unsupervised sometimes as 5 and 7 year olds (sort of). Or they drink unpasteurized milk and cheese, would be a legitimate one (milk from goats tested for milk-borne diseases, I might add). We all do. And personally I feel it's safer than the store milk and cheese but that's a whole other can of worms.
> 
> I will probably get a firearm this fall to do any wethers that don't sell. My husband has the option of getting "legal insurance" from work or just a lawyer period, and we are willing to do that to prevent the state from jumping up in our business if we decide to exercise our right to own a gun for the previously stated purposes.


Children walking around outside barefoot? QUICK! Take those kids away and lock the parents up! Heresy! Madness! LOL
Again, apologies for butting in where advice was not sought. It sounds like you have your act together (except for living in a ridiculous state like that). Best of luck to you, and one more bit of unasked for advice. MOVE! C'mon down to SC. We'll ask at the border if you have a gun, and if you say "no" we'll give you one. But keep in mind, we're the only state in the country to get an "F" in social distancing rules.


----------



## rachels.haven

Someday! Probably sooner than anyone wants to be uprooted (even me). We've got to finish our chapter here. A new long commute to work in heavy traffic would be the deal breaker for my husband. 

The lobster here was good. Tastiest Mass-resident I ever ate.


----------



## rachels.haven

All 34 chickens including the 4 free roosters sold today. Add was up for 3 days. There sure is a market for pullets here. 

Time to clean out the coop and prepare for the chicks on June 15 and the following week (if I don't cancel one). 

We're down to silkies and ducks for birds for now.


----------



## chickens really

I enjoyed your introduction to this journal. Was awesome. 👍
Hello from Alberta, Canada. 😊
I am birdless. Too much work with cold winters that last 7 or 8 months.


----------



## Mike CHS

Baymule said:


> That is just messed up.



I noted about three years ago (in both SC and TN) that they now also ask if you ever suffer from depression.  I would be surprised if this wasn't tied to the gun question also.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, here you're not allowed to handle a gun period if you have a history of mental illness or have been institutionalized from what I understand either. I'm very lucky not to have any issues there. Several of my siblings and mother have had to lean on meds for mental health before. I don't think they'd be allowed to touch a gun here.


----------



## Xerocles

rachels.haven said:


> Yeah, here you're not allowed to handle a gun period if you have a history of mental illness or have been institutionalized from what I understand either. I'm very lucky not to have any issues there. Several of my siblings and mother have had to lean on meds for mental health before. I don't think they'd be allowed to touch a gun here.


I'm pretty sure the mental institutional thing is federal, asked on the mandatory federal background questionnaire (4473), and technically required to be reported by each state to the feds (though not always adhered to...i.e. Look back to Nov 2017 to see how even the military did not report properly). Though in Mass, they probably report hangnails if they think it will keep someone from getting a gun.


----------



## rachels.haven

Good to know, and yes, they certainly do.
The general attitude from the laws here is that they GIVE you the right to do anything, if they feel like it. Anything else the answer is default no...unless you go through a bunch of red tape, and only maybe. My husband calls it "old fashioned democrat/liberal". It's very different than the attitude of the, say, university liberals, or the liberal attitude in big liberal cities like Seattle. It's a special kind of liberal here. Very stuffy. No freedoms. IMO, prone to corruption.
And this is coming from someone who doesn't identify as republican, democratic, or a third party.


----------



## rachels.haven

A heat wave started yesterday and will go until next week-mid to high 80's, maybe some 90's. Saffron, my giant elf eared lamancha horse goat really struggles in the heat. It's making me realize that if we do move to somewhere like Tennessee, she should not come, and that is sad, but she pants hard and lays around and really wilts and suffers when it goes above 80-85. Poor big dear.

I'm morning milking 3 lamanchas and getting a gallon and a half now. Ava's bucklings will probably sell soon. She does not appear to make enough milk for them and milking. Bucky shenanigans have started coming from them, so they are getting mom on the stand 3x daily and draining her dry every time (mom doesn't really want to feed them still). They hit 8 weeks on the 2nd of June, so I really need to cut at least the lunch round, but MAN do they bellow loud. You'd think they were dying, not in a dry, cool stall with premium food and fresh water, all of which they eat and are quite round on. Ava's leg is getting better now that she's not running away from them all day long. I think the infection was taken out with the antibiotics a while ago, and now it's just chafing healing. She's also holding weight again. Apparently you can't run from relentless babies and eat at the same time.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Do the alpacas eat pelleted hay alright? It's expensive, but there's no waste, and it's my emergency fallback.


They have their maintenance pellets. I've never bought, or even thought about, pelleted hay.



rachels.haven said:


> @Xerocles , you'd get your kids taken away here. Valid point. They do not ask about any kind of drug use in the home or a stable family.


They ask about alcohol and drug use here. All part of the "healthy body" thing. There are a lot of alcoholics. 
And I REALLY doubt MA would take away someone's kids simply because there are guns in the house.


----------



## rachels.haven

Cheese, cheese, cheese...
In the middle of getting this milk turned into Jack. Thank you, Lamanchas.


----------



## farmerjan

Bruce said:


> They have their maintenance pellets. I've never bought, or even thought about, pelleted hay.
> 
> 
> They ask about alcohol and drug use here. All part of the "healthy body" thing. There are a lot of alcoholics.
> And I REALLY doubt MA would take away someone's kids simply because there are guns in the house.


Don't doubt the amount of control that Mass has or how they would turn a "gun in the house" situation into a take away the children situation just because they want to exert control over some trumped up BS charge.  Mass is a lousy place and has been for many years.  My brothers godparents lived just over the line in Mass and it was an education what they used to do back 40-50 years ago.


----------



## rachels.haven

Cheese pressing in two stages.









Buggy, the Lamancha buck, suffering from black goat syndrome as he shows me they crushed the hay racks I got ripped off on Amazon with (long story short, description, photo, and product not what was sent, return shipping more than product, garbage racks, aw well,  More new racks on the way from premier 1 now and the seller was reported back in the fall when it happened. They are probably still at it.)


----------



## chickens really

Hello 😀
I was told and now wondering if the Lamancha breed actually suffers from the heat because they don't have ears and no horns? 
I'm not sure so asking if that's a true statement?


----------



## rachels.haven

I don't think they suffer any more than any other breed on a general basis. Only one of mine struggles with heat. The others seem to enjoy it. I believe they were developed in a warmer climate.

They do have more issues with the cold than the dwarves because their coat stays thin.


----------



## chickens really

rachels.haven said:


> I don't think they suffer any more than any other breed on a general basis. Only one of mine struggles with heat. The others seem to enjoy it. I believe they were developed in a warmer climate.
> 
> They do have more issues with the cold than the dwarves because their coat stays thin.


Oh..I'm not familiar with many breeds. I'm just getting into goats. Thanks for replying. 👍


----------



## rachels.haven

No problem. And when I say they have trouble with the cold, I don't mean you can't keep them in cold areas. Mine are in Massachusetts, after all. They just sometimes need a warm, dry stall or a blanket if below 10 and their coat is unimpressive.


----------



## chickens really

rachels.haven said:


> No problem. And when I say they have trouble with the cold, I don't mean you can't keep them in cold areas. Mine are in Massachusetts, after all. They just sometimes need a warm, dry stall or a blanket if below 10 and their coat is unimpressive.


I see. My friend has Nubian goats and they also need a warm barn. My little goats wintered really good in a covered pen and insulated dog house.  I have a Fainting goat Doe and Fainting/Nigerian Dwarf wether. 
I bought new babies but they don't apply to winter yet.


----------



## rachels.haven

That is your barn. I'm glad it worked for them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Does this look like a good chainsaw for emergencies and small weekend warrior type projects? The last storm made me realize we are stupid not to have a simple one we know for sure works. One of the neighbors got blocked out to the road and he attacked the huge tree with this type of chainsaw and got it reduced enough to move so his hybrid could pass (in his road bike uniform). It wasn't a huge chainsaw, but it wasn't tiny either and it was definitely electric.








						Milwaukee M18 FUEL 16 in. 18-Volt Lithium-Ion Battery Brushless Cordless Chainsaw Kit with 12.0 Ah Battery and M18 Rapid Charger 2727-21HD - The Home Depot
					

The Milwaukee M18 FUEL 16 in. cordless chainsaw delivers the power to cut hardwoods, cuts faster than gas-powered models and delivers up to 150 cuts per charge. The battery powered chainsaw is designed



					www.homedepot.com


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Does this look like a good chainsaw for emergencies and small weekend warrior type projects?


Seems reasonable from the questions and answers but I have to wonder how they sell the saw and a 5.0AH battery for $319 ($349 after this month) or the saw only for $253 when they charge $249 for the 5.0 AH battery by itself. The bigger 7.5 AH battery is $349. The reviews are mainly positive.



rachels.haven said:


> Cheese pressing in two stages.


Did you buy the cheese press tools as a kit or single pieces?


----------



## chickens really

rachels.haven said:


> That is your barn. I'm glad it worked for them.
> [/QUOTE
> Definitely was sufficient and was totally covered with proper ventilation. They did really well with the set up. This winter will be better though.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Did you buy the cheese press tools as a kit or single pieces?


Unfortunately separate. The pan was bought shortly after our marriage because I couldn't cook on non-stick (only cast iron, darn it) and the dutch oven is brand new...and having it drop and shatter definitely crossed my mind.

We will probably get that chainsaw then (more stewing must follow though-pricy). I don't like being trapped in our driveway and there are a few more behimoths set to fall soon.


----------



## rachels.haven

I wouldn't mind if we could use that kind of set up more. Dry dirt floors and ventilation are good for goat health.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> We will probably get that chainsaw then (more stewing must follow though-pricy)


Yep, the battery ones are expensive. Stihl makes one that costs far more. I guess the up side of the battery saw is very little maintenance and very easy to start  Still need to put bar oil in it and sharpen the chain but not much can go wrong with an electric motor. On the flip side, my Echo Timberwolf was $399 at the local dealer, figured I'd rather buy it from someone that can service it rather than Home Depot. Plus they are 5 miles away, HD is over 30. It is a beast, far more than one would need for the occasional storm downed tree.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, I'm going to get me a Count the Lamancha replacement buckling. Lace's breeder has Count's sister, Little Orchard CD Hot Shot. She crossed her with Rustic Woods JH Legend, who is a Jen-mae-ka-kids, lucky*stars, Kastdemur's buck with a good udder history and good feet. He looks promising as a baby, and not too front heavy. I'm going to grow him out and give him a try. Saffy's doelings needs a mate next year.

Meanwhile, someone is coming to look at Count tomorrow. They've come from far away and will probably take him for his lines.
One of Ava's bucklings are also going tomorrow.


----------



## chickens really

rachels.haven said:


> I wouldn't mind if we could use that kind of set up more. Dry dirt floors and ventilation are good for goat health.


This year everyone will have access to my totally insulted and vented Coop. It's big enough for 4 goats. 8X12 Shed we converted.  Floor is insulated also and covered in flooring. Rigged up for heat too. My chickens lived like queens and kings. 
My husband built it like Fort Knox. 👍
Last winter my kids were definitely okay but I just need a warmer set up.


----------



## rachels.haven

I edited it out once, but Durango the nigerian buck is up for sale too. In his pedigree, with the last goats that are subject to linear appraisal, lurks bad front legs. Apparently there's a defect that shows up around two with Nigerian front legs. He is two, and his front legs are suddenly not straight, his knees don't want to unbend all the way and are no longer straight. That needs to not be here, but it makes me sad. The rest of him is amazing.
I've seen it said once that it often follows Rosasharn goats, and that is where his roots lie, so I guess I'll also watch the other bucks too. Almost every Nigerian has Rosasharn roots though, so I'm not sure if it's really true. I'll just keep watching. No one gets a free pass on this issue, not even Dur.
Buckeye is two the 17th of n xt month, and Patrick is two next year in March. I'll keep watching then.


----------



## rachels.haven

Count left today. Ava's bucklings left today to be eventually wethered when old enough. More hay money, I guess.
Found hay.
Sugar and Ginger are still up for sale.
Buckeye and Durango are up for sale in the buck pen. (I don't want to use Buckeye again but may reconsider if he stays, Durango definitely needs to go and and he may be castrated and butchered if he stays or if his legs get worse, unless they magically fix...man, that snuck up on me and that's so sad. Magic eraser fix please?)


----------



## rachels.haven

Swam through brush to put up more posts for the buck pen. All but three panels worth of posts done. Once I finish those I need to tie or clip them on (depending on location) and employ the bucks to clear a space for their shelter. No ticks oddly enough (knock on wood).

One of my kids got a poppy seed tick sitting in the basement today playing minecraft. They keep getting ticks IN the house. The barn yard/yard is very low on ticks, but apparently they are in the basement now. Or in random places like the bedrooms upstairs (and the house is BIG) or stuck to walls around the house. Creepy. 

I made more cheese yesterday. I set the last block in the oven to keep it safe from flies while it dried so I could wax it WITHOUT fly spawn in it and DH baked it...Next time I'm taping the oven shut or locking it. I think I'm the only one who knows how to unlock it.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Hope ya get a handle on the ticks....  ....I have a great dislike for the nasty creatures.....if the house is off the ground they can crawl up from underneath....I've dealt with them before and am feeling sumpin' crawling on me, right now just thinking bout em........sorry bout your cheese.....maybe a sign letting him know the next time...BTDT........


----------



## rachels.haven

Ewww...you DO know ticks. Creepy imaginary guys creeping on you after you've already flushed the actual ticks. THAT feeling.

I'm probably going to spray the outside of the house and will need to get rid of the mice coming and going in the basement.

Thanks on the cheese sympathy. It was quite a dramatic night, lol. We all recovered eventually. DH might still be recovering from the look I gave him. That cheesy sucker took all day and night to make.


----------



## Bruce

Ticks and cooked cheese 
I have fortunately never had to deal with ticks (knocking on wood long and loud!). I did once make "pizza bread". Did you know that pizza dough doesn't do well proofing for a hour at 400°F? Since then I've tried to turn my brain on before the oven.


----------



## rachels.haven

That is difficult. Most people's brains run on autopilot in low energy mode, especially when hungry.

The buck pen is done at 6:30pm. I set the bucks on it. They are complaining about being away from their barn but eating still.

The does went out today too.

I fenced the ducks out from under the coop with chicken wire. It's time to do those drakes. They are getting rapey. Off with their heads, I guess.

Good day. (not particularly so for the lady ducks)


----------



## Baymule

Ticks in the house.....yeah, EEEEWWWW! I'll say this for fire ants, there aren't as many ticks as there used to be. There is still ticks, I hate them. The guineas keep the yard and 2 pastures clean.


----------



## rachels.haven

One safely waxed cheese in the broken fridge that is only running at 55 degrees. We're keeping a days worth of milk, yeast culture, bread, and apples in there. Also fermented turnip pickles.




I invested in some weights to press my next cheese. And by invested, I mean a neighbor who was moving or cleaning their garage put them at the corner with a sign that read "free" beside them so I picked them up and carried them home. They are 14.8 pounds each and should really be 10, but they are free, so I'll give them a shake. One needed tape. The crack is sort of visible here, but now it's been sealed with silver adhesive, lol.


And the rapey drakes lost their heads today. We're down to 7 ducks, 2 drakes, and I may still do the more aggressive one of them.
And my kitchen is a mess and the dishes are stalking me.
Bye.


----------



## Mike CHS

Baymule said:


> Ticks in the house.....yeah, EEEEWWWW! I'll say this for fire ants, there aren't as many ticks as there used to be. There is still ticks, I hate them. The guineas keep the yard and 2 pastures clean.



I used to treat every Fire Ant hill until last year. Now I treat the majority of hills but leave enough alone to take care of ticks.  I don't know how scientific that method is but I'm not seeing any ticks in the pasture.  I saw a couple the other day when I was trimming the tree line but that's it.


----------



## Baymule

A wheel of cheese! You are talented. I do like your free cheese press too.   I can't wait to see how that turns out.


----------



## farmerjan

I think those weights will be perfect for you..... great find!!


----------



## rachels.haven

I think I'm going to give the goats a break from browsing today. The does had so many gnats yesterday they left a cloud on their stampede back to the barn that covered my son and I as they passed and Durango in the buck pen is going lame from his knees and just wants to lay around and hide from the others a lot of the time now.
 I took Durango off CL. I kept getting interest in a $50 buck for meat, but kept getting snubbed because people don't want a "diseased" $50 buck for meat. What do they expect for that price? (And technically, he is not diseased, his knees are not straight and are wearing out finally because of it) NEVER discount anything on CL. It becomes such a headache. Entitled brats, the people here. Price is a customer quality filter. Durango has an appointment for castration and if I can find a processor he will go sooner, in a month or two to spare him, or he will be added to our order in September if I can keep him walking.


----------



## farmerjan

Sorry for the buck to be feeling the pain in the knees and it has increase very fast hasn't it?  A processor might be able to fit in a single goat somewhere along the line, but at least you have the Sept date.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you.
Yes, he inches along for a while so I stayed in denial and now it's picking up. I'll check with the area processors. After yesterday's ducks I'd really like to be done with home butchery for the year. He will probably make September if they can't fit him after the de-musking period.


----------



## rachels.haven

It really brought it home when he started sleeping like this or on his own outside when all the other bucks are piled up on eachother inside. If he were human there would be a fix for him, but bucks only want to breed and fight/play, not get his knees worked on. Plus, it's a genetic thing. A single minded breeding animal with even one very bad gene has no purpose unfortunately.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Price is a customer quality filter.


So jack the price up! For $50 he won't taste good but he'd be REALLY tasty for $150


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm going to try bose. I spoke with another goat person today. He's got Sweetlix mineral and replamin weekly to every other week, but maybe not enough selenium for him with our sulfur water? Then if that doesn't work he will go. Last ditch effort. He's be my first goat with deficiency symptoms if it is selenium. Even the babies so far haven't had any symptoms and they should be the ones to show first, but just in case we'll try this first.


----------



## Baymule

Sorry that he is in pain. I know it hurts your heart. You take good care of your animals and this has you down. If it is mineral deficiency, maybe there is hope. If genetic, we both know the answer.


----------



## rachels.haven

Feeling impulsive today. I have begun marking off the back 650ish feet of west propery line. Finding the markers is a pain. Pounding t posts isn't. The field had been blasted and rock picked. Thank you, husband's ancestors!
South propery line is a tumbled down rock wall/ long pile. Not straight, just like on the map.
North propery line is the shared driveway.
East property line goes from the rock wall through the pond to the driveway.

I want 6 strand electric fence up eventually so dog and does can roam, but no trespassing/hunting signs first.

Edited: not 650...unfortunately like 800+ feet. DH went out and corrected me. Neither of us can find any more markers. Time for a tape measure and to get the survey out.


----------



## farmerjan

Ambitious.....but then you are young and in great shape and trying to work off "stupid Mass idiot laws and rules"........

 I am waiting for the surveyor to put in the pins at the property I am "buying" .... and the owners are going to put in t-posts alongside so we both know where the pins are.  I will be fencing it also..... yep, a lot of work.... but I will be doing some field fencing (woven wire) and might go with the 4" stuff to keep the chickens and such out of the roads ( it borders 2 but one is gravel so not too crazy)..... will see after I get it, and probably won't do anything until winter when you can see the contour of the property, and my ankle will be well healed and before  I do the knees..... There are some trees I want to remove, yanking out the boxwoods behind the house that have grown for 40 years unshorn or  shaped that are huge and are too close and too dark..... and all that I will be able to see better when there are no leaves on the trees and the sight lines for the property lines are easier to see.


----------



## rachels.haven

I don't envy you there. That's going to be a lot of work. Necessary, but a lot of work but if anyone can do it, you can. The stuff I'm doing myself is kind of a drop in a bucket. I'm pretty sure I only got 166' of that really long boundary marked. We will probably wind up paying someone to mark it eventually if we stay so I can finish things and none of this that I'm doing now will matter, but whatever (markers may be more like 300' apart now that I've reached the "straighter" part, which is less good for us). I got to throw T posts across the creek and pound a line of posts in an old, now forested cow field (sad). I wish I could bring it all back to farm field, but that may not be for me to do here. I'd probably have to battle the state to do that and moving is easier.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> We will probably get that chainsaw then (more stewing must follow though-pricy). I don't like being trapped in our driveway and there are a few more behimoths set to fall soon.





Bruce said:


> Stihl makes one that costs far more. I guess the up side of the battery saw is very little maintenance and very easy to start  Still need to put bar oil in it and sharpen the chain but not much can go wrong with an electric motor. On the flip side, my Echo Timberwolf was $399 at the local dealer, figured I'd rather buy it from someone that can service it rather than Home Depot.



Miss @rachels.haven,

Sorry to just be commenting -- I have been embroiled with my water line for a week and am now trying to catch back up on BYH.

Have you bought a chainsaw yet?  If not, have you looked at the battery powered one that Dewalt makes?  Ace hardware sells it for $229.00, which includes a charger and one battery.  I currently don't own that model yet, but I plan to buy it for my wife soon.  I own a number of Dewalt tools and have been happy with them.  I also own a Stihl gas powered chainsaw and am happy with that.  Anyway, that price should be less of an "Ouch!" for you.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

I went ahead and bought the chainsaw from home depot. It should arrive soon. I totally would have considered the one from Ace. Dewalt is a decent brand, and that's not a bad price. I take it the size isn't too intimidating or hard to handle, but still big enough to get stuff done.
We might have a couple of bigger gas powered chainsaws from the last owner. I think they are stihl, but a lot of the stuff he left is too worn and on its last legs (hope he was better off), so I assume one or more of them may not work or may just barely work. I may still take them in before I get rid of them and see if they run, and if they do learn about them too and see which ones I like better.

Bailey got snapped by a 18" snapper this morning. Husband asked not to have to eat it so it was removed out of the barnyard for now. I deeply do not like big snappers where my kids play barefoot. Made husband duck enchiladas with homemade sauce instead for now. There is more enchilada sauce where that came from.

Someone gave me 5 sexed month old female pekin ducklings that they bought for their daughters to play with over quarantine than realized they were in too deep as they ballooned in size. So now I have 7 females+5 new females+2 drakes. No more ducks. Really. We don't even like duck eggs.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> Bailey got snapped by a 18" snapper this morning. Husband asked not to have to eat it so it was removed out of the barnyard for now. I deeply do not like big snappers where my kids play barefoot.



Huh?  What is a "snapper" -- a snapping turtle or something else?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep, a snapping turtle. Small by southern standards, but big by here. They are EVERYWHERE.
Our town considers them sacred and innocent. I think they might be yummy if brined (the turtles, not the towns people).


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Bailey got snapped by a 18" snapper this morning. Husband asked not to have to eat it so it was removed out of the barnyard for now.
> 
> No more ducks. Really. We don't even like duck eggs.



This made me laugh! Husband asked not to have to eat it........he knows you oh so well! Maybe you should have just found a good recipe! You could have boiled the duck eggs and chunked them in the soup! LOL LOL


*Creole Turtle Soup*

Your hardest task will be to find turtle meat. My first advice would be to cruise the Asian markets in your town, if you have any. Or, if you have the funds, you can actually buy wild snapping turtle meat online. It'll cost you, but the tub of meat is enough for several meals. More likely, however, you will be substituting. Alligator is the closest thing to turtle in my experience, and frog legs come pretty close, too. Barring those options, I might use a combination of chicken thighs, pork shoulder and clams. (I've never done it, so you'd have to come up with your own ratio.) You can skip the clams if you think that's too weird, but remember that turtle does have a seafoody taste. Once you've cleared the meat hurdle, everything else is easy.

Prep Time20 mins
Cook Time3 hrs
Total Time3 hrs 20 mins

Course: Main Course, Soup
Cuisine: American, Cajun
Keyword: Creole, soups, turtle
Servings: 8 people
Author: Hank Shaw
*Ingredients*

2 1/2 pounds turtle meat on the bone, or 1 1/2 pounds boneless
4 bay leaves
Salt
1 cup flour
8 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 celery stalks, minced
1 green bell pepper, minced
1 1/2 cups minced onion
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 18- ounce can crushed tomatoes
3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
1 tablespoon sweet paprika
1/2 teaspoon cayenne, or to taste
1/2 cup dry sherry
1/3 cup chopped parsley
2 hard-boiled eggs, chopped
Grated zest of a lemon
Black pepper
2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
*Instructions*

Start by making the turtle stock. Put the turtle meat into a large pot and cover with 8 cups of water. Add the bay leaves and about a tablespoon of salt. Bring to a boil and skim the scum that floats to the top. Drop the heat to a bare simmer and cook until the turtle meat wants to fall off the bone, about 2 to 3 hours.
Remove the meat from the pot and pull it off the bones. Chop as coarse or as fine as you want. Strain the turtle broth and put it into a pot set over low heat to keep warm.
In a Dutch oven or other soup pot, melt the butter over medium-high heat and stir in the flour. Cook this, stirring almost constantly, to make a roux the color of peanut butter, which will take about 10 to 15 minutes.
Add the green pepper, celery and onion and cook for about 5 minutes. Add the garlic and cook another minute. Add the chopped turtle meat and stir to combine.
Stir in a cup of the turtle stock at a time until you the soup is the consistency of gravy. Add the tomatoes, Worcestershire sauce, cayenne and paprika. Add more turtle broth until the soup thins a bit. It should be thicker than water, thinner than gravy -- like chicken and dumplings if you are familiar with that. Simmer gently for 15 minutes, or until the vegetables are soft.
Finish the soup with the sherry, parsley, lemon zest and hard-boiled eggs. Add them all, stir to combine and simmer for a minute or two. Add salt, black pepper and lemon juice to taste. Serve alone or with rice.









						Turtle Soup Recipe - Creole Turtle Soup | Hank Shaw
					

A classic turtle soup recipe done New Orleans Creole style. This is an old school turtle soup recipe, done with snapping turtle.




					honest-food.net


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, I kind of wonder if I shouldn't have put the bucketed turtle in the bed with him. It was kind of stinky. But I was mad. It bit my dog. Maybe he would have let me eat it if I didn't.  My "look what I caught and is your dinner" vibes were probably too strong...I guess.


----------



## Baymule

We have alligator snapping turtles here, nasty, you sure don't want to tangle with one of them!


----------



## rachels.haven

Just caught another turtle. This one was bigger and meaner and heavier. He almost did not fit in the 5 gallon bucket. This one got dumped somewhere of my choosing. Maybe he'll get squished. That's kind of a lot of turtles in one day.


----------



## farmerjan

They are traveling to find mates or to lay eggs once it gets warmer. They are a menace, will devour ducks and ducklings in the water. I realize that there is a need for them as a balance in  nature.... but I hate 'em.


----------



## rachels.haven

Not farm animals, but here are newborn guinea pigs. Mini adults already eating solid food. Nature's little Cheetos. These ones aren't too crazy. Last batch was.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Someone gave me 5 sexed month old female pekin ducklings that they bought for their daughters to play with over quarantine than realized they were in too deep as they ballooned in size


And so it starts.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> And so it starts.


The flood of unwanted quarantine poultry?


----------



## CntryBoy777

Turtles will also eat eggs....my grandpa used to kill every terrapin he saw.....he hunted quail way back when and didn't want them eating the eggs.....  ....I used to have a guinea pig as a pet when I was in 8-9th grade.


----------



## rachels.haven

I don't think I'd kill the turtles that didn't pose a threat to the children, but I certainly understand that.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> The flood of unwanted quarantine poultry?


Yup. I'm sure more jumped into it without proper research first than those that did their prep work first.


----------



## rachels.haven

I had a sobering day today. I got a trio of Muscovy to help with the horses of deer flies from a lady in Fitchburg who is selling out partially to cut memory ties with her mother, who was in a nursing home when the virus swept through. So mom is now dead. Mom's friends they used to hang out with at the home are mostly dead (she said one pulled through). They used to sell duck eggs through that network so now their customer base is litterly gone anyway so they may as well sell the flock off. And they didn't get to say goodbye to any of their friends via funeral because for a while that was not allowed here. She was pretty broken up. Our nursing homes really failed the family and the residents here. She said that yes, they mostly all had dementia but they were good bright people and their lives were cut short. I'd never thought about all that before...not that I needed to, but maybe I did today.
Anyway, I look forward to the day when this can all just be a memory and we can look back and question if it was really that bad. That's a privilege. I want that opportunity. It sounds like other areas of the country are already bouncing back. Hurry up, Boston.


----------



## rachels.haven

...I mean, my in-laws friend in a nursing home died of it, but they were able to visit her and attend her funeral, and they expected her to go relatively soon of something. PA may have been a little kinder (although about as effective) in their handling of things. Better for closure.


----------



## Baymule

Hospitals did not allow family in to say good by, no last rites, nothing. No funerals, no contact, nothing. How sad, how empty for the families.


----------



## farmerjan

I have a hard time understanding that if the patient/resident in the nursing home has it, why were a few family members not allowed to go see or stay with them with the whole gloves and mask thing?  I mean really....... My former fiance' 's obituary that was in the paper over 2 weeks after his passing, mentioned that the family appreciated the care that the nursing staff gave him.... so no visits there either.   Very sad for all concerned with losing family and friends in that situation.


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> I have a hard time understanding that if the patient/resident in the nursing home has it, why were a few family members not allowed to go see or stay with them with the whole gloves and mask thing?  I mean really....... My former fiance' 's obituary that was in the paper over 2 weeks after his passing, mentioned that the family appreciated the care that the nursing staff gave him.... so no visits there either.   Very sad for all concerned with losing family and friends in that situation.



Gloves and masks are not 100%. But they are better than nothing, so the common person gets them. 
Real PPE was in short supply here with not even enough for front line doctors for a while (I think we are doing better now). Therefore, no visitors, no funerals, no gatherings...it's still Mass here. People in the state govt hate being told what to do but love to tell others what to do. Expect heavy handedness. Also, incompetence.

For example: Our big order of masks got taken away by the feds, so we took some sport's team owner's private jet to china and brought our own order home to be guarded at gunpoint at a secret location (and then we shared with the neighboring states that were in horid shape). Try that on an individual basis here and you'd get shot and your dead body would be sued and fined, lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

Went to the silkie breeder to buy a second Mr. Baby Teddy rooster for a second 6-7 girls I'll be hatching (planned)...may have come back with an extra rooster (less planned)...I should put up pictures tomorrow. One might be a frizzled silkie. The other is a 4 month old version of the winky chicken I already have. They are both fabulous. I may have also decided that the silkies are already exceeding our egg needs and eating almost nothing because this rooster is apparently a GREAT forager and with ducks coming into lay we are going to be more than fine without production birds. So I guess it won't hurt to put 30 or so silkie eggs that we don't need in the incubator and hatch some ladies for these handsome featherdusters. They will be inheriting my 8x8 coop. We may not get winter eggs from them, but I think we'll be able to put some away for the dry spell. Fresh eggs last a surprisingly long time in the fridge. I like the idea of having a bunch of chickens that cause very little trouble and don't eat that much but stay fat and happy and lay pretty well. Extra nice food for them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Stand training for Saffron's Dahlia




Two new flock sires. The one on the left is young and needs a few more months to mature. The one on the right is over a year.


----------



## Finnie

Baymule said:


> I have been on a quest for that just right chicken breed. I hate mean roosters, the latest is in the freezer. I have heard many good things about White Rocks, good layers, CALM roosters and big brown eggs. I’m thinking that will be my next breed. They are white-boring. I really like the flashy colors, colored eggs, the chicken that “wows”.  But I’m thinking boring white is looking better and better. LOL LOL


I haven’t read the last 8 pages, so you all are probably done talking about chicken breeds now. 
But I just have to put my plug in for Swedish Flower Hens, if you want colorful birds and nice roosters. Well, my two roosters are nice, at least. 
Egg color is a boring pale cream, and probably medium size. I have 4 hens, and some seem to lay every day while others take days off. Well, 2-3 eggs a day and sometimes 4.


----------



## Baymule

I like the looks of Swedish Flower Hens, they are pretty. I haven't had a lot of different breeds, I had several rounds of sex links, Wyandottes in several different colors, Easter Eggers, Delawares (hated them), and barnyard mutts. Next will be White Rocks with probably a few colorful hens thrown in for fun.


----------



## Bruce

I have some White Rocks, decent birds. The stars of the flock at the moment are the Austra Whites - Meyer hatchery White Leghorn x Black Australorp. Sized and shaped closer to the Leghorn, laying lots (like 5 or 6 a week) of Large to XL eggs. Of course they are just now a year old so I don't know how they will do in the next few years. Not particularly skittish.


----------



## rachels.haven

Our fridge upstairs has been broken since march appears to have been fixed today (watching the inside temp fall), so I've got somewhere to store milk that's not in the basement. Maybe the old fridge with the failing seal and doors that don't close well can go back into service as my cheese "cave" soon when I can get the freezer emptied.

Also, Ginger, Ava's smallest doeling was in heat today, so she got separated and all males in the pen (excluding Saffron's buck who got done earlier) are invited to a fancy castration party tonight. DH will help hold my aspiring meat wethers. I may let them stay on their mothers for tonight as a consolation prize. Lace's 4 week buckling can extend and wants to work as a buck, so he's getting done early. The other two were 8 weeks yesterday.

DH drove me an hour and got three week old muscovy ducklings who should be decent quality to grow out. I see two drakes and a duck already, but we'll see. They're only week old. I can usually sex them by body shape at a week, but it's more accurate to wait until 2 or 3. Having two nice drakes to use over the low quality local ducks wouldn't be terrible. One nice duck would be wonderful too. The duck and one drake is chocolate. The other is black.


----------



## Baymule

Castration party! yay! Wethers for the freezer are a good thing. We took lambs to slaughter, I presold several of them and their new owners paid the processing. We got 2 for our freezer. I'm getting this slaughter thing down better. Cut the "hallowed" leg of lamb into steaks, debone and tenderize for chicken fried steak. Forget about the fancy-schmancy lamb chops, just lift out the backstrap and cut in 3/4" wide pieces. No bones and no gristle or connective tissue. 1 shoulder into stew meat, ground meat the rest. Lamb shanks for soup. Practically no bones to take up freezer space. It's only taken me 5 years to figure this out. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

...that is food for thought. I wonder if I can get something like that done. Freezer space is a valuable thing.


----------



## rachels.haven

I've got to get my mulberry trees in the ground! They've got leaves opening up!


----------



## rachels.haven

Humid, "hot" day today. 
I was supposed to go on a multi leg feed and grocery run, but decided to procrastinate and put up the buck's shelter instead. So now they have a tarped, 12' long by 6'+ high cattle panel hoop house with a hay net and they are OUT of my little barn. So now I need to go take a shower and get to that feed and grocery run.
No pictures, because I intentionally left my phone inside. When it's hot, humid, and sweaty the phone sticks to my pants and therefore me in my pocket and it gives me the heebie geebies. Plus, by the time I was done the sun was high and makes for bleached pictures.
I think I'll make the does a hoop house in their pen too, but it will have to be somewhere a little bit hidden. I hid the bucks' behind a tree and the does are in my front yard and all. Gotta keep dh happy (amid more work drama, lol).
School's out, can you tell?


----------



## Mike CHS

Have you ever thought about writing a book about your adventures?  You and several others on this forum have an uncanny ability to make the readers "see' your story.


----------



## CntryBoy777

rachels.haven said:


> I've got to get my mulberry trees in the ground! They've got leaves opening up!


I've got several mulberry trees here ya can have....from a couple of inches in diameter to 18" and some are 10-20' tall....ya can have em if ya want em....all ya have to do is dig em up.... 🤣 ....I know......


----------



## rachels.haven

Bwahahahahah @CntryBoy777 , I wish. Not sure they'd surive moving to frozen mulberry heck, but I really wish.

 No, @Mike CHS , but maybe someday. I worry that there would be a lot of shoveling of poop and moving goats from pen to pen in it. That and moving feed. I feel like that's most of farming. It's a very nice rhythm to live but I'm not sure if it's book-able. Maybe a family or personal book. I should probably be doing a personal journal in writing at least. It's useful. The problem is, when I end the day I'm usually falling asleep on the floor during my kids' bedtime routine if there's any down time. I'm not awake enough to write at the end of the day.


----------



## rachels.haven

As a side note, it appears Bailey is shedding to bald this year instead of just a thin coat. I've been putting off brushing all of her because of it. It ALL comes out and she's becoming a pink and black leopard print dog. That's not right.

Also, the hair from the mats she had when she arrived that I did not cut out but instead brushed out is STILL there and I've been brushing it every week or so to keep it from refelting. It really wants to. I really should have just shaved her bald. The areas where I did cut mats off to bald are now normal hair (which is trying to fall out too as the bald spots grow, lol). It goes to show, I guess that you need to do it thoroughly, correctly ONCE, not cut corners and think your being merciful because you didn't take your dog's pants off. (maybe the bald spots will spread to her legs and tail next?)
I rang the vet and he says there's a decent chance the bald spots will start to fill in a few weeks. No itching, scaliness, or irritation-just pink leopard print. 

Someone's going to look funny this year. Luckily we're all self isolating so no park walks with the big friendly dog.


----------



## Baymule

Poor Bailey. No trip to the beauty shop for her. Bald dog. That reminds me of the first time my horses got rain rot. Their hair fell out and I freaked out. I was sure they had mange or something terrible. No, just a lot of rain, hot humid conditions and a bloom of bacteria on their skin. I mixed up Pine O' Pine in a bucket of water and sponged it all over them, which got the bacteria under control. In a couple of weeks, new hair was growing in.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lace is stealing the title of meanest and most difficult goat from her buddy Ava. She milks well and has decent ff teats though. I'd like to not get my face kicked in though.


----------



## rachels.haven

One rutty buck shelter. The side pulls down for better shelter. They've cleared enough low foliage and are starting on the higher stuff and branches so walki g is possible though not pleasant yet.


----------



## rachels.haven

I am bringing this lamancha buck up from Georgia. His breeder values many of the things I want in my herd including good feet, excellent production, as they are a dairy, and has made great strides conformation in ways that are not present here.


----------



## rachels.haven

This doe is coming with him. I'm very excited about her too. They are penmates so they should keep eachother company in transport.


----------



## rachels.haven

This buck is also coming here from Derry, Nh. He is a diluted Count Chocula line (the lamancha buck I sold). The sire is more traditional type lamancha. The dam is Count's half sister. She has very good teat placement and a splendid udder and should be excellent. Sire's udder line is nice as well.
If we move Buggy/Rustic Woods Black Tie Affair's previous owner would like him back, so I needed to replace him and Count. Two bucks per breed are ideal. Plus, I'm still not sure about this nigerians as a dairy breed thing...When my time goes short I occasionally wish I did not have them...but the milk is incredibly rich even if they tend to have a terrible lactation curve and produce little but take just as much of my time to produce it. Also, they are spicy goats, especially compared to the laid back, people pleasing lamanchas (that produce GALLONS as opposed to cups).


----------



## rachels.haven

Also, I need somebuck to breed Saffron's doeling to. SHE'S staying with us if we move.


----------



## Bruce

CntryBoy777 said:


> all ya have to do is dig em up


And drive them a LOT of miles north! 



rachels.haven said:


> I'd like to not get my face kicked in though.


Time to tie the rear legs down. 



rachels.haven said:


> They've cleared enough low foliage and are starting on the higher stuff and branches so walki g is possible though not pleasant yet.


You need taller goats!


----------



## rachels.haven

I need a less pregnant lamancha buck. He is too round to want to reach up. He's plenty tall. Buck pregnancies last forever though...
Maybe the new guys will help when they come out.
And yes, I do tie Lace's feet down. She takes all she can get and waits for the opportunity. We'll see how this plays out. I may need to tighten her up a bit. I'll win. It just shouldn't have to be war. I'm surprised it's come to this.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh, I forgot. Here are Bailey's bald spots. She has one on both sides. The more I brush the farther up and down they go. There's a lot of long topline hair covering it, but it's there. The hair appears dead and wants to come out so she's just going to have to look funny. Her skin is happy though ànd no itching. Kind of putting off brushing her as it makes the backyard look like I'm torturing a dog regularly and her appearance doesnt help that image.


----------



## farmerjan

I am not at all up on goat lines and all but didn't @One Fine Acre  have some goats with the "Black Tie"  breeding?  They don't post much. But they used to show and would post how things were going.  Also miss the posts from @Southern by choice and @Goat Whisperer ... even though I don't have goats, I enjoyed reading about some of their comings and goings and all.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'll go check. Black Tie is the Buck's formal name, his herd name is Rustic Wood's but I wouldn't mind journal hopping later today.

Oh dear. This is the week the 90's are supposed to start and last night we just started hearing rats in the wall behind our bed. Getting ready for baked rotting carcass smell. It gets VERY hot in the void behind the wall and in the attic void. I wish we could find and block where they are coming in.

This house may be grand, but times like these make me wish it was tighter even if it were smaller. We really only needed a normal sized house, but with a property we were allowed to farm, and all houses available then we as grand or grander than this. Our last house was too small at 840 SQ feet for 4 people. This one is 3x the size a least. Not sure if finished basement is included. We leave most of it empty and clean. We just live here. With Soon  to be dead rats in the walls apparently. Yuck.

Oh well, maybe the rats will leave, lol. right!

I found a baby mouse that escaped the heat of the hay loft yesterday and was laying out in the sun dehydrating in the middle of the floor. It's ears and eyes were shut. I started feeding/drowning it in goat milk and put it in a toned down 80 degrees dying incubator and it filled up on milk and and revived somewhat. It may still die or be fed to the cats, but I'm interested in trying. It was still doing well at 2am when the rats were partying/chewing the walls.


----------



## rachels.haven

I pinioned the muscovy ducklings. I'm still thinking 2 drakes and a duck.


----------



## animalmom

Oh great storehouse of all Moscovy knowledge, how do you pinion the ducklings?  Inquiring minds are wanting to know.
mega thanks.


----------



## rachels.haven

animalmom said:


> Oh great storehouse of all Moscovy knowledge, how do you pinion the ducklings?  Inquiring minds are wanting to know.
> mega thanks.


I did it a bit late, but in the first 7-10 days of life when their bodies are still only investing resources in developing legs and following the o speedy mom, you catch them, open their tiny flabby, undeveloped chicken wing, which should still be all cartilage at the top at this point. Find their thumb, then with a pair of sharp kitchen sheers remove below the thumb. Avoid the joint. You're just essentially taking their finger or a decent part of it. The younger they are, the more it's like piercing an ear rather than limb removal and they really don't bleed. They get more upset at being caught and held, than the pinion. You only have to do one side.

I do this to avoid a duck rodeo or losing my females to wandering...also there is an obscure, rarely enforced federal law that required domestic Muscovy to be marked by pinion or clipping the back row, which is pointless (and they're only supposed to be food, not show animals or pets, but that's ridiculous, so it's not enforced). Pinion might make it so you can not show, as show ducks must either be all white with maybe a cap, or less than 10% white, if my memory serves, and you can't prove what the pionioned wingtip would have been (but it's been a while, so fact check me, I guess).
I pinion for reduced trauma on us all later. I'm pretty sure wild Muscovy would die here.


----------



## animalmom

Thanks for the info!  Sure beats catching and trimming every year.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, and guessing when the time is right and winding up with a duck over the house.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Wait can you do this with other ducks, chickens and geese???


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, I learned on coturnix quail, but chicks and ducklings and goslings can be done too. Early would be the key. It's like clipping the flight feathers except you are removing the place where the flight feathers grow. Are you having a problem with escaping, flying birds?


----------



## rachels.haven

I have concocted a plan for white eggs, lol. I wonder if it will actually happen,


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Lol yes they like to escape mostly during the cooler season they never go far. However the chickens love flying into my garden.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's a pain. Adults you didn't pinion should probably have the flight feathers on the last segment of their wings hacked off as penalty for garden wrecking and future chicks can be pinioned. 

Oh man, those chickens butthead garden wreckers. Don't get me started there.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Lol I clip their wings some are smart enough to still get out. One i dislike alot the moment she stops laying i am earring her lol. She a new layer this year so she has a short term pass.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I have concocted a plan for white eggs, lol. I wonder if it will actually happen,


Um, get chickens that lay white eggs?

 Unfortunately they are mostly Mediterranean breeds with large combs and often an "attitude". Potentially flighty and aggressive toward the other birds. I got 2 AustraWhites from Meyer last June. They are White Leghorn X Black Australorp. Mine are mostly white with the odd black feather, shaped and sized more like a leghorn than a BA and lay L to XL eggs. Aurora has a larger comb (though not as large as the Anconas I got in 2012) and lays white. Gretel has a somewhat smaller comb and lays a very light beige. Neither seem to be aggressive toward the other birds. Of course there is no guarantee as to what percentage of AWs will lay a purely white egg.


----------



## rachels.haven

I thought about those. Unfortunately they are sold out until the end of the year, and I'm taking the last three or four months of this year off as maintenance only months. These might have an attitude. They'll sell well if they do. People really want them around here.


----------



## rachels.haven

It's Fathers' Day, so we got the usual, "fathers you're not good enough, be better" talk at church, delivered by one of the ward dads over Zoom (the polar opposite of what mothers get on mothers' day, but it's funny because it's predictable). Then I made my husband a NORMAL, non gluten free chocolate cake, which turned out looking like a cow pie, because I don't make cakes...also, the recipe was large, now the boys are in trouble. Lots to eat over the next week. But it has sprinkles, so that fixes everything, right...giant cow pie with sprinkles... I missed his birthday with cake, so he gets one now, in the usual fashion. 
I also discovered some hamburger in the fridge that passed it's use by date yesterday, so I wound up making DH cheeseburgers for lunch (?) to save it. I don't typically eat lunch and the kids just wanted ham sandwiches, so just for him, I guess.
And his one request for a special meal (we always do that for each other special occasions) was fried boneless "chicken wings" so lots of food around here. I'm attempting to gluten free that one so I can eat some. If the first batch fails the rest will be normal, flour breading. It's a little awkward to season the breading right when it makes you itchy when it gets on your skin and you can't try it to test for correct spice balance, but whatever. Tapioca starch breading attempt first. If it's an abomination, flour it will be. I have some nice self rising stuff hiding in the cupboard that will make the plan B breading awesome if need be. I may get it out and make biscuits, although I just made a batch of corn tortillas and those usually go over well. Plain quesadillas are always a fallback for kids who refuse everything. They'll never be as good as a family's that been making them for generations, but hey, mediocre, but better than store bought, non-itchy bread products work for me.

Meanwhile, someone ran around and spray painted the N word and obscene images on buildings all around town last night...so of course one of our board of selectmen had to go and take pictures and post on town page so everyone could publically virtue signal, denounce the graffiti, tell others to beat their kids, and blame the town republicans *facepalm*, say this would never happen in THEIR town, and announce that they're shocked that gambling is going on in the establishment to prove their innocence and superiority or whatever...erm, how about we NOT give publicity to someone's little stab at an attention grabbing, hurtful joke in our 99% white town? Let's not be culturally inbred teens and act like well rounded, mature adults who have had plenty of exposure to life in general...maybe...

I wish someone would claim the artist spelled the word wrong so someone would chime in, "no I didn't" so we can all be done with it. But I choose to have no opinion on this beyond the obvious so...

...clearly the answer here is MORE baking and cooking.

...lol...

This song applies to goaties too, right?


----------



## rachels.haven

Porch Panthers


----------



## Baymule

You mentioned moving again. Is your husband happy with his work? Moving animals would be an experience, but can be done. You have put a lot of work into your goats, building a nice herd.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, but here's a picture of my kids learning to grill. Guess which one's the one who figures everything out and is a wanna be firebug and which one is normal.


----------



## Baymule

Yes, you have a lot to be thankful for and you need to keep looking on the bright side.....to make it bearable.   The mindset around there just does not suit you.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> If the first batch fails the rest will be normal, flour breading.


Try chickpea (garbanzo bean) flour. It is gluten free and great for making fried onion rings. I think it would work well as a replacement for any wheat flour breaded food.



rachels.haven said:


> Let's not be culturally inbred teens and act like well rounded, mature adults who have had plenty of exposure to life in general...maybe...


Sadly there are many millions who never grew up past the "inbred teen" stage. 



rachels.haven said:


> Porch Panthers


Our cats are looking like that as well. Too dang hot! We do NOT do 90°F.


----------



## rachels.haven

Rain! Instant green in the part that hung in there...and the other part not so much.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

My weed flowers.


----------



## CntryBoy777

We have more weeds here than grass, so I certainly feel for ya....


----------



## rachels.haven

Rain all done. It was heavy and brief. I hope that's enough. We keep getting fires in town. They burned down the only "high density" (low income, subsidized) apartment complex allowed in town a few weeks ago and several "brush" fires occurred in random places. The result was a lot of cleared brush and 9 families with small children homeless, so yes, rain is good.


----------



## rachels.haven

The last two mornings after milking I've been working goat feet since I've neglected them for the past...3 months or so. Tiny feet can be a pain. I've come to the conclusion that I've bred some dang nice dwarf goats. My home bred dwarfs and the Ava line are two to three snip per foot animals and did not require reshaping for have rot or goofy hooves except for Sugar who has one toe on her rear foot shorter than the other for some reason since birth. All her other feet were outstanding. I did Ava's three, and the two windfall tiny nigerians in about 20 minutes with the two windfalls taking the longest. Ava's girls have nice long level backs, and very straight, correct legs. Rumps...eh, Buckeye wasn't an improvement on mom's outstanding long, level rump. This year's buck over Ava should be better. They are all very small and of course they have Ava's attitude (Buckeye ALSO has a bad attitude, but more buckish). If you offend them, they hang onto the grudge, and sneak up and bite you later. It sure makes things lively-little snots. Patrick's bucklings with Ava were better natured despite being male. I have more hope for that cross. Ava's doelings will be evaluated on udder quality and all around everything at freshening. Does in milk sell well, as do little babies. I had listed them, but they're not Tiny Angels, Sugar moon, Promised Land, or Old Mountain Farm, which is where the fad is here lately, so nobody bit. Also, with their attitudes, the pictures were lousy and I didn't shave because of the thick deer flies.

 I will need to work more on the lamancha feet. They could be a lot worse, but I prefer better. So far I've done Emmy, who has feet I do not like, but she gets by, and Saffron, who's rear feet have been warping a bit because of the way she stands with her massive udder.

Milk production is down to a gallon and a half in morning down from two gallons and a quart that it had been, so fall is coming. I've been milking once a day and letting the babies grow on the rest, so that's what we get except for Ava's 2-3 cups at night, which is always topped with a cap of cream by morning (I drink that, nobody else likes rich milk).

My plan is to breed in September and have January-February kids to get a jump on the coccidia. This year I had to treat. Maybe next year will be better. Plus, I might be able to make some ethnic holidays better with the extra males.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> so fall is coming



I have not even half started my summer stuff nor finished my spring stuff yet!!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh no. Pekins lay eggs. Poopy little eggs randomly in the yard. Looks like we're in the duck egg business again. No pictures. It was unflattering. Bantam pekin sized. I wonder if these taste fishy like our khaki eggs did.
Mr. Teddy has at least one broody hen. I wonder if she'd like to raise us some pekin ducklings when the egg size and shells normalize?

Btw: We've have muscovy eggs, but I'm letting those build up in nests for a hostile takeover now. I want to make some beef duck jerky and we use duck like beef in cooking and I'm almost out of extra pekin drake. Muscovy eggs are like better goose eggs. Very thick and big without the I ONLY EAT GRASS flavor.


----------



## Baymule

We have gotten a few showers here the past few days, not a lot, but enough to settle the dust and cool things off a bit. Amazing how rain greens up a pasture.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Rachel this is why I wanted to clip the chickens wings permantly that alo g with the death of my lettuce, several zucchini and a few other plants.


----------



## rachels.haven

...grr, melon murdering fowl.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Yup need to get the tomatoes protected before they ripen they already started eating the green tomatoes


----------



## rachels.haven

Grr. That's one of my pet peeves. I hate it when they eat MY garden. I about wrung some silkies necks when they picked off every green bud from my little fig tree and started on the bark.. I fixed it, and I controlled my temper.














Here are the two windfall goats I got when quarantine started. They've gone from 35 pounds and 16" and 38 pounds and 18" to 42 pounds and 19" and 50 pounds and OVER 19" (goat measuring issues). Drawback is I don't think the lady who sold them is interested in registering the goats she sold me at a discount anymore now that they're turning out nice and worth it even though she said she would (lol, said). They are very nice and have a lovely pedigree, but if I can't get them registered I'm going to have to sell them eventually. But who knows? Maybe she will. I offered to pay registration fees and $50 for the 30 minutes tops it takes to do the registration. I hope she does. They don't have great feet or good parasite resistance, but they should have great udders and they are built very nicely. Also, their temperaments are lovely-almost as nice as the standard goats. I'd enjoy having this line.


----------



## Baymule

I hope you can get the papers. Why people let things like that go is beyond me.


----------



## rachels.haven

These guys were supposed to be culls because of stunting, and she didn't want to bother registering them for me unless they reached breedable size, which was our agreement (I gambled that they would and this time it appears to have payed off, if they didn't I would sell them to a pet home eventually). She got back to me. I'm hopeful she will get it done.

*I believe she's working as a nurse right now and probably a little busy.


----------



## rachels.haven

...Waiting on rain again...75% chance with flood warning and severe storm watch sounds good, right?


----------



## Bruce

Sure ... if you are a storm chaser. We are getting a little spit from the sky at the moment.


----------



## rachels.haven

Rain late last night into today. Hoping for second cutting hay. I've been watching the fields of the place where I prefer ot buy my hay and it really hasn't grown since first (like a good brown lawn). This water is a RELIEF.
...If the local stuff fails it's not that price of shipped hay is much different, so I'm not sure why I'm worried. Most hay in the area is shipped in. The local guys tend to be the same price, but better quality, probably because of reputation.

Lace the goat is weird. I already knew she wasn't the brightest goat. And she isn't the nicest tempered goat. And she tends toward being high strung and headstrong, but this is downright weird. While I was filling water buckets she came over so she could LOUDLY talk over me, which is nothing new, but then when I stopped talking she went and found herself a bunch of cobwebs on the fence and ate them before walking off to the next post to find more. Yuck? She throws really pretty babies, so I wouldn't mind getting a doe kid out of her. Sounds like I'd better keep her away from poisonous spiders or she will eat their delicious homes and get bit. Not hay, goat.


----------



## chickens really

That's funny. Ozzy my goat eats all the spider webs from under my picnic table.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

Opened a cheese today. It's alright. Not dry like last time. Nice flavor, a little sharp. It melts.

My husband is glad I left the town Facebook page so I can't ask if everyone is eating their traditional New England July 4th snapping turtle soup this weekend... I can't tell you how much I want to poke that tiger. Food history of areas is so fun, and even more fun when it would put bees in everyone's bonet.


----------



## rachels.haven

Also, I took the does and meat wethers out today (notice I said "meat wethers") and made them go to their wooded pasture. They ate a lot and then a storm started rolling in, and I almost lost Bailey out the gate in her "pre storm thunder" run around the yard that I knew dogs did but not her in the process of getting the goats back to the barn. So dog got shut in garage where she's currently pretending she does not exist while we (hopefully) get another blessing of a storm.

OH and Mr. Teddy babies are hatching in the incubator. It's just my old cheap digital plastic thing, so I'm no sure how the hatch rate is going to go, but 27 out of 30 made it to lock down. It often goofs up when the humidity climbs and lets the temp drop a bit, but we'll see. I have a broody silkie, maybe she needs a few.


----------



## Baymule

LOL We have 2 thunder babies. Paris hides in her doghouse. Trip wants in OUR house-and we let him in.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm avoiding letting her in now, but if I did let her in the house during a storm, I bet she'd be a happy dog. 

We've been having to teach and re teach the "thou shalt not push rachel over and shove into the house or barn when you feel you're entitled to it" lesson so she gets fewer liberties unless necessary until she gets it down to pat on all fronts. I've reclaimed the barn for the most part, so no more barn pooping. The barn is MY space, not her toilet. That totally fixed that. She gets to sleep there at night with the door open until I take her out with a biscuit in the morning for morning milking, and I shut the door. Now I need to continue re-claiming the garage, which has now become her latest attempted possession of passion since I let her in. And I don't need to be mean. Out consistanting her works, it just takes time. First step is to just prevent shoving and passing me and getting what she wants (my threshold, my door) , the next is to demand space at the door and send her back a few steps every time, after a week or two she starts just gives me space at the door as habit, then I use the "in" command to invite her into my space when I want her there...and I'm willing to give her space in the garage if the thunder gets bad. It's secure there, so she can't magically get out of the fence while panicking and get hit by a car. She's just not allowed to live and poop in there like she tried to do with the barn. Sorry, no free pass.

I'm surprised she needed a manners recap, but I guess that's life with a dog. They are opportunists, and mine is ready to be dominant, but in a good hearted way even if poop is involved. She mostly owns the barnyard(sort of, at least at night). Why shouldn't she try to own the garage and barn?


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> She mostly owns the barnyard(sort of, at least at night). Why shouldn't she try to own the garage and barn?


Isn't that the way to increase your standing in the community, by adding to the land you own? 



rachels.haven said:


> traditional New England July 4th snapping turtle soup


Hmmm, didn't know about that tradition. We have 2 (at least) snapping turtles in the pond. 

Teeny Tiny Turtle was originally spotted in the fall 2 years ago. At the time it's shell was MAYBE 2" long. I saw it (ASSUMING) a couple of weeks ago and it was about 6". I checked with Google and yes they do grow fast the first few years.

Today I saw the larger one in the pond, streaming green algae from the edges of its shell, sitting on the bottom a few feet from the edge. Went to get the DDs so they could see. When we got there and started approaching the area where it was it got nervous and swam into the murk. DD2 saw it but DD1 didn't.


----------



## rachels.haven

That sounds like food storage.
Actually, I'm not sure I (or most people) would ever eat one unless it was brined and brine switched out quite a bit, and then deep fried. The ones I caught stank. But apparently they were a thing once. I'd blame the british there, except instead of snapping turtles apparently they used "green turtles". The tradition came over with the colonists where there were lots of snapping turtles and I guess they thought "eh, close enough"?

The smell does not stop me from telling my husband the next one I catch will be eaten. And who knows, maybe I will.


----------



## Bruce

Near as I can find "green turtles" are green sea turtles, not freshwater turtles. Having never eaten turtle of any sort I have no idea if one stinks more than the other. However since I know my farm pond is mucky clay bottom with no input other than rain, therefore pretty stagnant, I have to believe anything living in there will be kinda stinky. A sea turtle at least has a vast expanse of water and I think would be cleaner.


----------



## rachels.haven

They'd probably be pre-brined. Still probably not a good idea though. I don't know if they reproduce super efficiently anymore, unlike our snapping turtles that you can find all around town here larger than their supposed top size, but whatever.

Also, wikipedia says something about a kind of poisoning green turtles can occasionally cause...so I think catfish are better. Catfish soup with potatoes, onion, bacon/ham...but then suddenly that's southern fare.


----------



## CntryBoy777

🎼Jambalaya, crawfish pie, and fillet gumbo🎼....
They eat big snappers down in Cajun country....some go over 120lbs...they get real big in the bayous....


----------



## farmerjan

When I was a kid growing up in Ct, my grandparents had a big "pond"  which was originally an ice pond to cut ice blocks and store in the ice house.... about 4 acres I think.  Anyway, there were quite a few snapping turtles in it.  When we could get them flipped into the boat on their back, and I'm talking the nearly the size of a wash tub.... the chef's that worked at the restaurant across the road from my grandma's house would gladly take them.  They would keep them in large wash tubs, clean water daily, feed them like lettuce, for at least a week or 2.  The clean water changes every day would help to "flush out " the muddy, murky watery taste I guess.... they made them into soup.  I am  sure they shared it with us but I don't really remember it much.  We would try to catch as many as we could because  they did a number on the baby ducks and they did eat alot of fish too.  The fun was in the trying to catch them....We were very respectful of their powerful jaws;  my dad saw to it that we learned VERY EARLY,  by taking some pretty stout tree branches and showing us how they would snap at them and break them right in half.  Since we also swam in "Nana's pond"  we were very eager to keep the population down.


----------



## rachels.haven

That does sound very fun. They let you have a piece of the culture that was going away as well as making the pond safer.

Personally I don't think continuing turtle soup would have wiped out the snappers, as some of the websites suggested. They have a habit of, like coyotes, existing in isolated pockets, then when the pressure eases migrating out and taking over again-at least that was what I saw down south and in Iowa (everyone killed snapping turtles, because they were destructive and EVERYWHERE, and they never went away completely, always a mild danger). Plus, I think they reproduce fast and very well, and as bruce suggested, they do GROW fast. They will likely stay with the land until pollution does them in-all over the US. I would not be surprised if turtle soup faded out because it was bland, or an acquired taste, or very labor intensive and the younger generation didn't understand the value there.

And I bet that treatment would take the mud flavor right out of them. Southern snapping turtle prep documentation recommends lots of brining of the meat with water changes-one place said for three days. What you described is basically long term living brining without the salt.

...So there is culture and color here, and not just snobbery. That would make this place more tolerable. I feel like the current locals have successfully buried or lost it because anything not sophisticated or chilly is too country. Aw well. Maybe I'll get to dig some more stuff up before DH's job changes to make life interesting. He may have to move me before we get run out of town.


----------



## Baymule

There is a soft shell fresh water turtle that is a green color. They are highly prized for soup-or at least they used to be.  They are a big deal in Cajun country.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Plus, I think they reproduce fast and very well, and as bruce suggested, they do GROW fast.


My research says they grow fast the first few years then slow down and that they are 15-20 years old up in the northern areas before they breed.



CntryBoy777 said:


> 🎼Jambalaya, crawfish pie, and fillet gumbo🎼....
> They eat big snappers down in Cajun country....some go over 120lbs...they get real big in the bayous....


How do they get them into the boat?


----------



## CntryBoy777

Bruce said:


> How do they get them into the boat?


Drag them to the bank...or a sling between 2 poles, if there are 2 people in the boat....but a large alligator snapper is best handled on a bank and placed in the boat once they are no longer living....like gators....


----------



## rachels.haven

The silkie hatch is done with 10 chicks...out of 27 developed eggs on day 24. I'm going to try one more hatch with this incubator, this time not stuffing it. If the results are similar I may invest in a more expensive model, as in more than $80. I like the cleanability of the model I have, but it doesn't have enough vents to open, imo, and it vibrates just a little as it runs. I had several backwards pippers (I, uh, helped them make it when they stalled due to lack of room after the first few died) too, so I'm suspicious of temp stability too in addition to the vibration. Something's just off.
Hey, but 10 silkie chickies is better than no silkie chickies!

Lots of illegal fireworks going off tonight and all day today! (all fireworks are illegal in this state, lol) Happy birthday chicks!


----------



## Mike CHS

We usually have a lot of fireworks going off at this time but it has been so dry that everyone is afraid of starting a grass firel  

The outside dogs will be happier.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, Bailey is celebrating Independence Day cowering in a stall panting like it will save her life. She'd probably be happy to grab a flight and spend the holiday at your place.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## Baymule

Bailey could come to our place and sprawl out on the floor with Trip.


----------



## CntryBoy777

....it's okay Bailey....it'll be okay........I promise that it will come to an end and things will get back to normal real soon....hang in There girl!!....


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, I'll show her.


----------



## rachels.haven

Not rats in the walls. Last night we caught a very large mouse-almost rat sized, but deer mouse colored. Normally the mice are tiny here. Time to keep killing, I guess. We've got to avoid last year's weeks of stink when they died off.

Maybe I'll leave them presents for the barn cats...
SEE KITTIES? I CAN HUNT.


----------



## farmerjan

I will catch them on the sticky traps, and have a couple of cats that will come pull them off if I call and they are around to hear me.  Otherwise, I will pull them off and give to whatever cats are around.  There are quite a few cats missing... the landlord poisoned a bunch last year with anti-freeze I think, several crawled to the house and feeding area and died or I had to put them down.  I think he has gotten several again this year.  And there are the coyote packs that have been making the rounds again.  I can't prove it, and I hope to he// that he gets over run with rats and mice again after I am gone.


----------



## farmerjan

He also had the guy who used to do my lawns and weed eat, shoot the barn swallows, because they made a mess on his tractor..... never mind the mosquitoes they ate and all the other bugs.... I went off and I told William that under no circumstances was he to shoot the barn swallows.... landlord be d#@%d.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sheesh, I paid $100 to HAVE feral cats placed on the property, and it was worth it and I should have gotten a few more. Darn landlord. He sounds like a piece of work. @farmerjan , I bet he will be over run when no one is waging the war. I hope you're rid of him soon.

We had a barn swallow tragedy this weekend. Last week about mid week, I found an almost fledgling swallow on the ground in the barn not doing so hot, so I put him back in his nest. Yesterday while I was milking he jumped out again trying to beg from his parents and smashed himself to death on the cement barn floor on impact because apparently the last early jump didn't teach him anything. His feathers would have been done coming out of their sheaths by Wednesday this coming week, and he could have just gone, but they were still pin feathers now, so no flight there. His parents checked out his dead body and left. No more barn swallows. There was only one in the nest. They're already not so smart as nestlings. They don't need some dense guy hiring out to shoot them. They really did a number on my barn carpenter bees and I'm grateful for that.


----------



## CntryBoy777

What a jerk!!....really hoping for that closing date for ya!!....


----------



## Baymule

It won’t be long now @farmerjan and you will be on your own place.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I hope you can control your mouse and rat infestation soon.  Those animals can be quite messy and destructive.

Miss @farmerjan,

I am hoping you get your house soon.  You have endured enough craziness -- it is time that things got better for you.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

I think our drout is ending. Rain came late night hard and keeps popping up on the forecast. Maybe we'll get some local hay after all.


----------



## farmerjan

@rachels.haven   I just realized I made these long posts on your journal, so I reported them and asked they get moved to my journal..  Sorry, I thought I was on my journal.... this internet won't change back and forth.... takes forever... and I was reading yours and tried to change to mine to make the "catchup posts"....


----------



## rachels.haven

No problem. I don't mind. It's like the newspaper getting surprise delivered to the door.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ugh, the nigerian dwarf puppy mill lady who can't keep a civil tongue in her head in dwarf groups online, who told me no one cares about pedigrees, yet sells her pedigreed doelings for a minimum of $450 each (going up to...a lot), and told me I should give her one of my Rosasharn bucks for free so he doesn't "clog up my buck pen" and bring him to her over two hours away, is hounding me for information on the goats I'm selling.

I'm sorry, I'd rather eat my does than send them to a goat puppy mill. They don't deserve that life. And my time is worth enough to me that I'd rather not deal with crazy, self centered, rude people. Fb hasn't even shown her I've seen her message and she's already taking on an accusatory tone as she screams into the void. Lol, none of my time or my goats for you. I have better animal poo-poo to shovel.

Venting over. Dude, people are weird. Especially the slightly more expensive animal people who think they like tiny goats.
BACK TO MY HOLE TO HIDE!


----------



## farmerjan

I fully realize that you are selling to whole different markets and all that..... one of the reasons that the stockyard is nice.... if someone is buying to take home and keep, they will find out who the seller is through the office.  Mostly, they go to another farmer that will put them on pasture, or on feed, and I don't have to justify anything on the animals.  No, I have no control over where they go, but I don't have to deal with crazy people like that idiot goat lady you are.  I agree, better to eat them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Good point. I'm not sure what our stockyard/auction is like, but man, this lady gives off major "don't answer this one" vibes and she makes it tempting to at least maybe scope it out.

The frustrating thing is, the doelings are nice now. They grew substantially over the past few months, and I like what I'm seeing. I'm selling them because I picked my one with what I think is the best, mildest attitude, and I'd like to use these two to pay for our new arrivals. They're even a good size and ready to breed and freshen out. They're a good deal. But they're not going with her especially because I'd have to deal with her in the process. Grr.


----------



## rachels.haven

I left a present on the porch for the barn/porch kitties. They were not impressed and want to know why it's not a second can of fancy feast.




I'd get more pictures of interactions with the cats, as they are doing that now, but they're still on hair triggers and if I don't "speak cat" properly they get hissy and defensive and I don't want to get bit. DH does not speak cat at all and they kind of go after him...they don't appear to like men. I idly wonder if that's why we're getting more deliveries to the garage door and more kind of tossed onto the porch instead of up by the door, lol. Two little black five pound kitties going after delivery men in the name of fancy feast...


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's a pic of Buckeye I took for his ad. Yes, he is over weight, and the tip of his tail is white, rendering it in appearance a permanent fish tail.
I need to worm, copper, and selenium, and hoof trim all the bucks in preparation for breeding season and as maintenance. Apparently moving them stressed them into a worm outbreak and they've gone pale. I guess they liked laying around in their tiny, 1x3 cattle panel pen. That was too small! Honestly guys!


----------



## rachels.haven

Bucks done and ready for breeding season. Just in time for the grandma time zoom call.
Does next.

Edit: It just occurred to me that I bolused last 2.5 months ago, but Durango and Bugs are showing signs of being low again, so we're probably on a 3 month schedule. I could have stretched them a few more weeks, I guess. But yikes, there's nothing in the soil, I guess. And if the soil is that devoid of nutrients, (and most of their hay is very local, because cost) by that logic anyone or anything eating "local" or locally grown produce is probably getting less nutrition than someone getting produce from elsewhere, just like the goats..so I guess I won't try to eat too local.


----------



## rachels.haven

Durango is raising funds in the form of alfalfa pellets and the lushest second or third cutting hay, more alfalfa the better, for his buck pregnancy awareness fund. He'd like you to drop the bags and bales off in his food dish in the back buck pen asap. This is a serious issue. Buck pregnancy is a lifelong condition (if they have anything to say about it) and require increased nutrition for support.






...and all four bucks look like this, so I think we're putting the boys on first cutting. WHICH is good, because second cutting isn't looking good at this point according to my hay guy today.

Durango weights 55 pounds. That is too many pounds for his frame right now, IMO. The bucks all had rocking bellies as they "ran" to and from the barn today. Too much grass hay, I guess?


----------



## farmerjan

Now, when these pregnant bucks have their kids you can retire and live off the millions you will make from the Guinness book of world records, and the rounds of exhibitions around the country.....


----------



## rachels.haven

The white layers are here. 14 are doing well. One is not. The giant silkies were terrified, but are mixing well. Those polish just want to scratch and eat like crazy. Fiesty, tiny birds.


----------



## farmerjan

What are the chicks with the white heads?  Giant Silkies?  Polish?  Interesting looking chicks.


----------



## Bruce

farmerjan said:


> I went off and I told William that under no circumstances was he to shoot the barn swallows.... landlord be d#@%d.


Good for you. The landlord could probably afford a tarp to throw over his tractor. 



rachels.haven said:


> There was only one in the nest.


Sad. We had 5 that fledged last week from an "I don't know where" nest. They or their parents chose a "plant hanger" behind the deck as the fly in restaurant.
 
It is fun to watch the parents fly in and feed on the wing. I'm surprised I managed to get a picture of the one not on the wing. There is a second set of 5 in a nest in the lower barn alley that are nearing fledge stage. Same area as every year we've been here (first set fledged July 4 2012 while I was finishing up the stall/coop conversion). I talk to them several times a day. There have been only 4 chicks in past years. 



rachels.haven said:


> Fb hasn't even shown her I've seen her message and she's already taking on an accusatory tone as she screams into the void.


I would think FB would allow you to block a person. But then I don't do FB so I don't know. 



rachels.haven said:


> I left a present on the porch for the barn/porch kitties. They were not impressed and want to know why it's not a second can of fancy feast.


Any time we find a mouse in the house it is a partial and barfed up.


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> What are the chicks with the white heads?  Giant Silkies?  Polish?  Interesting looking chicks.



I hatched silkies earlier from my birds, today I picked up polish from the post office. I'm hoping for a good attitude and they're supposed to lay through winter their first year. The polish chicks are tiny compared to the "bantam" silkie chicks.


----------



## rachels.haven

I MADE A HAY BALE PULLEY TO GET THE BALES UP TO THE LOFT WITHOUT LIFTING THEM UP THE STAIRS!!!! It's redneck, and will need modifications, but I'm so happy!

The 2 new lamanchas (doeling and buckling) come on Saturday...which is tomorrow.

I went to my hay guy's place to look at hay. There's no 2nd yet, but I got 4 firsts and it's super nice, very leafy, and not much straw and the goats APPROVE so we're getting some bales delivered.

I discovered I'll need to redo my nigerian buck pen soon or we'll go above the 7% inbreeding quotient rule (don't buy two bucks that are loosely related and have another from that line, apparently). I can go up to 12%, but lower is better unless you're doing it on purpose, and someone offered me two extremely nice, extremely milky, correct uddered nigerian bucklings with different lineages to help with that, so I took them up on that. One is the last "Dawnland" kid, as the breeder sold out and sold a pregnant doe to the breeder I'm buying from.

Not sure when the last lamancha buckling is coming home. His family was going on vacation and using him as a doe emptier, so I'm waiting on an email.

My big lamancha buck is probably going to a new home this fall. His previous owner asked for him to stay in New England and I'm fine with that. I can take my herd more in my direction that way. And right before fall is a great time to move a buck to a new herd. He came here in a sheep sized box in the back of a truck. Now he weight tapes in at 185 pounds so I don't think he's leaving the way he came. He's a big ripped guy...and fat, because fat bucks is apparently how we roll around here...or maybe how THEY roll around here.

Pictures later. It feels like a bathtub out there today. More rain is coming. (hopefully?)


----------



## rachels.haven

@Bruce , and I didn't block that lady because I'd rather know if she ever starts talking slander about me or my goats in public. It's a little twisted, but I'd rather be able to report her and get her booted from the group than have her start a conversation involving me without me. She's the kind of person to do that too. I'll just ignore her as weird and unhinged as she is for now. I don't think I've given her the opportunity but she is rather nuts and would do that. The moderators in the local groups delete her "comments" from posts on a regular basis so they know she's a live one.


----------



## Baymule

You are wise to ignore her and not  block her. Is that state a home for wackos?


----------



## rachels.haven

Might be. Moving here has been... enlightening?


----------



## farmerjan

If not enlightening, which by the way is very nice of you to say, as in very tactful;  it sure has been an education.  I am not ashamed of the Yankee roots I have, as my ancestors were hard working and very frugal independent people..... but I have never been so glad to get away from the liberal idiots that have taken over a good part of the northeast.  Not everyone is like those in Mass.; but it is considered the worst state up there by the old blue collar, working, redneck, get your hands dirty,  salt of the earth types, in the surrounding new england states.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

farmerjan said:


> If not enlightening, which by the way is very nice of you to say, as in very tactful;  it sure has been an education.  I am not ashamed of the Yankee roots I have, as my ancestors were hard working and very frugal independent people..... but I have never been so glad to get away from the liberal idiots that have taken over a good part of the northeast.  Not everyone is like those in Mass.; but it is considered the worst state up there by the old blue collar, working, redneck, get your hands dirty,  salt of the earth types, in the surrounding new england states.


X100


----------



## rachels.haven

@farmerjan , your ancestors (and a few of my husband's before they jumped ship for the "west") built the rock walls and cleared fields and fought off predators like wolves and tried to scrape together a farm. I'm pretty sure these guys in the last 30-50 years just fouled it up. It's definitely different groups in charge.
Those big pine trees we have here in this town that will randomly catistrophically fail and shatter- those were for forestry/timber farming and they were supposed to be cut down for wood at somethng like 30 years if the memory serves...but times changed, and the people living and in charge here now do not like forestry. They just want giant trees...with tiny by proportion, unhealthy root balls. Giant trees unsuited to being giant in this climate and soil. I feel like they are a good example of the change that took place. Frequently you are not allowed to cut down trees without the neighbors and town's and possibly even state's approval. That's a far cry from tree farming.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I MADE A HAY BALE PULLEY TO GET THE BALES UP TO THE LOFT WITHOUT LIFTING THEM UP THE STAIRS!!!! It's redneck, and will need modifications, but I'm so happy!


I can't believe you didn't give us pictures!


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> I can't believe you didn't give us pictures!


It's 90 degrees, and it was supposed to rain, so now it's a bathtub (just enough rain for the humidity). Tomorrow my hay comes, so there will be pictures then.
Here are the new buck and doe, Atlas and Trinka.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I have been off the forum for awhile and am just now getting caught back up.



rachels.haven said:


> Buck pregnancy is a lifelong condition (if they have anything to say about it) and require increased nutrition for support.



Buck pregnancy?  BUCK PREGNANCY?  I have never heard of such a thing, which I guess isn't surprising. If things don't work out as Miss @farmerjan has discussed about being in the Guinness Book of World Records, then maybe to treat the condition you can buy for each buck a pickup truck and a set of hand tools and tell them to get to work!



rachels.haven said:


> I hatched silkies earlier from my birds, today I picked up polish from the post office.



Is "polish" in the sentence above referring to Poland, or is it intended similar in meaning as furniture polish or car polish?

A very puzzled Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## farmerjan

Polish are literally a breed of chickens.  Google them, there are several different types.  Bearded and non-bearded.. different colors.  Silkies are also a breed.  If you are interested you could go to The American Poultry Association.... it is the equivalent of a breeders bible for different breeds.... like the American Kennel club for dogs.... Every breed that is recognized for purebred show is in the APA Standard of Perfection..... There is also an American Bantam Assoc that deals with strictly bantam sized chickens.  Then there are multitudes of "breed associations" that promote the specific breeds.... like different dog breeds have their own associations.  
There are chickens shown that do not meet the APA standards, and if someone is working on a breed or color, they will have to show them and a certain number of people have to show them, and breed and raise them, and then the breed or color pattern can be submitted for recognition.   
So I think that she was getting chicks or possibly adult polish, from the P.O. when they arrived there.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes @Senile_Texas_Aggie , polish is pronounced like from poland. There's some debate if it refers to their country of origin or their "pol" of feathers. I picked up some polish chicks to add to the group. I think they'd cross well with the frizzle rooster I have and they're supposed to lay through winter their first year. Winter's coming. If they are calm for us, they can stay and my 3 roosters will have enough girls to feed. If not, apparently I can sell pullets for a goofy price here and make back my investment including feed and then some. The polish are supposed to be standard, but the silkies that are 3 days older are still larger than they are, so I guess I don't know what I got and will have to see. The black with a white cap lay the best out of the McMurray ones.

Buck pregnancy refers to my bucks being big and fat. They're on first cutting now, so they don't look as bad. Lol, I'd settle for ONE pickup truck and a good sized trailer so I could take my goats places without having them hang out with the kids in the back of the van. The bucks could drive, I guess, but I think I'd rather drive.

The 16 week buck I got from Georgia (Atlas) is in full face showering, blubbering rut now. I took away Trinka, his companion that he came with the first night when he started courting her and gave him a 16 week wether. The wether went ballistic over the next several days and it wasn't good for anyone. Then rut suddenly hit Atlas HARD and the screaming, constantly molested wether got mercy and I chucked Atlas in the buck pen, where he is very happy. He tried to tango with Buggy, my big black lamancha buck, and Bugs knew just want to do (Buggy is not in rut, so there was a lot of buck play fighting and now they're all BFF's and plenty of buckishness). All the bucks are very happy now. Atlas is still the only one in full rut. The nigerians are halfway there. Buggy is himself. The wether went back to milk-land with mommy and is finally quiet. I guess coming up from Georgia to Mass is like fall coming for that little buck.
Pics from a few days ago.











Happy handsome Buggy.


Here's my hay pulley. It's literally just a pulley and rope tied to a beam. I will be improving it with use. i want to put a board down in front of the barn doors to shield them from the sliding bales. There are a few boards that will work in the loft, I think.


----------



## Baymule

I love your barn!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! It's a good little barn.


----------



## Bruce

I still think they need real ears! 

It is a nice barn. 
Have you considered adding a block to the pulley system so you can reduce the effort needed to get the bales up? And maybe an extendable "arm" to the rafters so the bales can come up without dragging up the side of the barn?


----------



## rachels.haven

I want the arm. I have to think through that one and build it first though. Working on it.
Oddly enough, I don't really need a block pulley system. I was prepared to need it but was surprised to find I can lift those bales on the line with one pulley just fine. It's not hard at all. The bales are only 40-55 pounds, and all I really have to do is two firm tugs and then I walk backwards and it lands the bales on the "landing pad" up there (read, piece of scrap plywood I put up there which is masquerading as the floor). We did 11ish yesterday, and could have done probably 3x as many without breaking a sweat, but DH had to go inside and fight with his job instead of untying and shoving over bales for me.

What I really need is something that holds onto bales, then releases them on impact so I don't need a second person untying them in the loft.


----------



## Bruce

Ah, you need hay grappling hooks! Though I don't know if they would self release.


----------



## thistlebloom

You need an antique one like @mystang89  refurbished and used!


----------



## mystang89

The one I use has a trip cord on it that may be what you're looking for. I've got a video of me using it on my journal if you want to see it. Might be what you're looking for.


----------



## rachels.haven

Very fancy! I'd need to find a mini version of that. It may have to be a back burner project for now. I'm not sure they exist.

Your barn is nice too-it's a real working one too! Mine is just an extra garage that the last owner did up as a barn to avoid having to pay hundreds of dollars worth of various town and state permits and having to let the neighbors have say on whether or not he built it in a town meeting (and when I moved in I ruined it by putting in stalls and animals, poor spare garage), so everything needs to be small, since it's kind of meant to be a man cave/big garden shed.

I guess I'll keep my eyes open for a grapple of the right size and do some research. I may have to build something.


----------



## farmerjan

If you can find an older book or some kind of picture or something, I would think that someone who does some metal work... maybe a machine shop or metal fabricating place, could take the design and make you something like that.... and it is "moveable" so not like you will have to leave it behind when you find a place where there are sane sensible people, to move to .......


----------



## Baymule

Haha! Garage barn and you had to go and RUIN it!


----------



## rachels.haven

I know...Poor little man cave...It had to grow up and be a real barn now. But it is MUCH better than an 8x8 shed and a 4x4 goat house, which was what I had before. It's a woman cave now and it's only for me, my dog, and my goaties.


----------



## rachels.haven

One more hundred degree day and then we get a short break.
I was feeding a bucket of alfalfa pellets daily to make up for the first cutting, but in the head Saffron and Summer's wethers started scouring bad so I treated the wethers with a coccidia treatment-they weren't due for it but you never know and I needed it stopped fast. No response, and that was when Saffron started, so I cut the alfalfa and put out baking soda. I also let the kids have all the milk. It's going over 100 and one goat's kids were losing water fast, and so was Saffy, so not bleeding extra water off them seemed to make sense. Lace is a hard headed idiot still, but she is putting it in the pail in excess of what her kid needs and Ava is trickling along as she does so we are still getting a little milk.
Last night Saffron's rump was clean for the first time in two days and the kids appear to have stopped so it looks like heat+alfalfa=runs. Lesson learned. Probably acidosis. Saffron is rejecting the alfalfa pellets in her grain completely now to boot which suggests to me that's right.
We got more hay put in the loft. About 2/3 is out of my garage now. Dh's quality of life is in the toilet right now so I feel bad asking for him to catch and scoot bales for me...although it's probably the most satisfying work he does all day. Doesn't stop the guilt, but whatever. Maybe I'll do none today to make up for last night and the day before.
Lace's scurs have grown to the point they are big enough to be handles. Not long before she pulls them off again, but it sure makes her easier to handle until she does. If the head is controlled, the body has to follow, and it's harder for her to trip you (she's small lamancha size, so it's a hazard) or try to break your fingers in her collar when leading her around. Moron goat. High producing moron goat that is filling my kids' milk cups.
(Grumpy, grumpy, grumble)

On the covid front, Sam's club curbside pickup is working great. The kids may try the school's "robust remote learning plan" bull shirts, but they think they're keeping the kids on devices from 8:55 to 3:15. No way! So we're still looking. And they think they will be phasing more kids into going to school every two weeks. To me that suggests they know it will spread through schools but they want that government cash and to say they are "ahead". Not my kids. I want physically healthy mentally healthy kids (and us adults). We're living for the long haul and not just this year's school federal funding


----------



## Bruce

How old are your boys? I bet they could unhook and shove a few bales even if it took both of them to do it. Tell them it fulfills their school PE requirement.


----------



## rachels.haven

Good idea! And soon! They're 5 and 7. They are light weights and still little weigh less than the hay bales and while they're out of the "I have to preserve them from themselves" phase, they are still in the "getting in the way" rather than the "help a little and get bored" stage, but I've got my sights on them as hay bale pushers as soon as they can. We don't do too many bales at once. They'll be able to do it eventually. 

I think my dad started me on solitary work projects (don't stop or come out until X is done, figure it out yourself type things) when I was 8 or 9. I was tall for my age and stubborn though, and my family culture was what it was and the culture of my home is different now. I think I'd rather my kids work more WITH me, come to think of it, and that should lower the working age. They just have to get strong enough. I'm also hoping that my kids doing projects with an adult will help them work better with others than I do and also not do things like ruining a van engine like my brother did when he was "don't go visit friends until you've changed the oil"ed and he didn't get the oil cap on the bottom threaded back on properly (which was hilarious, because after that my dad still insisted that boys were better with cars and refused to teach us girls how to drive manual-but had any of us girls totaled a car and cost him thousands of dollars when there wasn't that much to go around?...NOPE, not even a little bit of totalling of his cars occurred from us girls).


----------



## Bruce

Yep and it may be different now but the cost for me to be on Mom's car insurance (the only car) was like $600/year, sisters didn't cost anything. And who NEVER damaged the car? Hmmmmmm????

OK, so you add a few blocks to the lifting rig for mechanical advantage, yolk up the boys in tandem or side by side and have them haul the bales up to the loft where you unhook and move them to the stack. All they have to do is walk back and forth and connect the hook to the strings on the bales. Even a 5 Y/O can do that. 

You're welcome for the super helpful suggestions


----------



## rachels.haven

omg, I had to explain my outburst just now.
Dh takes your tangent and says that if scooting the bales is a problem we should harness them, calibrate the pulley rope length, and have them repel off the barn as a counter weight to lift the bales up to us and have them run up the loft stairs over and over. They get tired, we get the hay.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, us girls were always timid drivers, to the point we couldn't drive with our dad, but I think that was more his issue than ours. 
So the dwarfs might be staying.
And I sold a dwarf buck, who is on a payment plan and is only staying until the farrier can pay him off (Bye, Buckeye) so naturally I had to pick up a couple of other guys and here they are so far with their udder history-dam and grand dams. 








The black one is Dawnland BF Obsidian (pending) out of Dawnland RR Little Bee by Amethyst Acres Belle-Fiorello *B and the other one is Mye Heart's APR Antonio out of Ole’Humble Acres Annalise by Tiny Angels ApolloPoket Rolex, both are waiting on their papers to go through. Both dams have good deflating udders, good medials, good sized teats and orifices, and everything I look for in a buck meant to continue improving my line towards milk production. I may have trouble drying off their offspring like a standard goat, which is what I hope for-good production, potential for extended lactation, along with good MILKING teats and MILKING udders (but with a good attitude, which is why Buckeye was sold, as he's a blockhead buck that I don't love to handle). Obi, Ant, Patrick, will be my core guys, and they are unrelated. Durango is loosely related to Patrick, but if he can prove himself, any potential inbreeding can be diluted with the other two bucks, leaving me with lots of choices for future breedings. Dur's full brother has improved and given tighter attachment in udders while adding nice, big, thumb length teats that are nice to milk, so I'm willing to wait around on Dur. Plus, he's a stinky, somewhat honry pet. And he's a buck that is NOT over height, which is apparently rare here and he should throw small, light babies, as his line is prone to do.

I decided that I like the massively fatty nigerian milk, everyone else and the cheese can enjoy the lamancha and any extra ND milk.

The flip side of this is that I can do more breeding and cull more heavily and remove dams and kids I don't like, potentially keeping their doelings to see if the sire improved them, but after this year I should be able to be a lot harsher and that includes making herd cuts for TEMPERAMENT.

Ps: I flipped Ava's does, Sugar and Ginger, twice the last time the last few times they did their "you did something I didn't like so I'm going to stalk you around the pen waiting for a good time to bite you" thing. The second time was about a week ago and they haven't tried it since. I figured if someone does it for pack goats, little 40 pound dwarf does should be able to learn too and it looks like they didn't like being overpowered, tipped, and held down on the ground and it's more of a deterrent than nose flicking or spraying when they bite. They don't make my herd cut, but they are redeemable for someone else's. They WILL have manners when they leave. If they don't sell this fall with the covid lack of funds, I may keep a doe kid or two of them if sired by a mild mannered buck for a critical evaluation as they grow out and sell them for more in milk in the spring along with any offspring I don't want to grow out. 40-45 pound goats don't eat too much over the winter.

oh, and the catch with the little new bucks is that they are only a month old and a little undersized, and will probably miss rut...height wise, but they sure are cute as cat sized kids now. I plan to put them over Patrick and Durango's babies that are retained for next year.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Dh takes your tangent and says that if scooting the bales is a problem we should harness them, calibrate the pulley rope length, and have them repel off the barn as a counter weight to lift the bales up to us and have them run up the loft stairs over and over. They get tired, we get the hay.


Perfect! I bet they'd like that more than just pulling the rope to get the hay up.


----------



## rachels.haven

OH YEAH.
That's the beauty of having little wingnuts-I mean boys.


----------



## farmerjan

O M G   the picture in  my mind of them "rappelling "  off/out of the barn door to counter weight the bales of hay to go up to the loft..... 
HOLY COW....


----------



## Bruce

I think it would be great! Just make sure it is strong no stretch rope, not bungee.


----------



## thistlebloom

If I lived next door to Rachael I would volunteer for the rappelling part! Running up the stairs not so much.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

What incubator do you have i am looking at a new one and don't want to get one that doesn't work.


----------



## rachels.haven

Magic fly 12 egg incubator hatch-dont recommend. My mother likes her digital farm innovators one, but I can't bring myself to spend that much yet. She was given it by a co-worker who needed to stop hatching so she didn't pay $200. She's keeping it and has had very good success with it. I should just use my silkie bators.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Thank you! Will make sure to cross that one off the list. There are some many out there. And some are ridiculously priced.


----------



## Baymule

I have an Incu-view and i like it. I researched incubators and found a thread on BYC on Incu-view that was over a thousand pages long. I read enough of it to see that they had excellent customer service and i bought one. 





__





						incuview-incubator-kits
					






					incubatorwarehouse.com
				




I got the deluxe so i could get the egg candler, but it doesn't work on brown eggs.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, you are better off buying one of the new, high powered (chargeable please?) Led flashlights for a candler. They won't do good marans eggs, and sometimes struggle with super blue eggs, but they can blast through brown just enough for fertility checks. Hard to see after though, lol.


----------



## chickens really

I have a hovabator 1588. Forced air. It's a fantastic incubator. I usually had 100% hatch rates. I still prefer the Broody Hen though over incubator.


----------



## Bruce

thistlebloom said:


> If I lived next door to Rachael I would volunteer for the rappelling part! Running up the stairs not so much.


Rachel could pull you back up each time. 



rachels.haven said:


> Yeah, you are better off buying one of the new, high powered (chargeable please?) Led flashlights for a candler. They won't do good marans eggs, and sometimes struggle with super blue eggs, but they can blast through brown just enough for fertility checks. Hard to see after though, lol.


I have a flashlight that I bet would candle even a dark Marans egg. Of course you would have to build a box to contain the light with just a proper size hole to look through at the eggs or go blind.


----------



## thistlebloom

Bruce said:


> Rachel could pull you back up each time.



That's hilarious!  🤣
That would be so sweet of you Rachael! Especially since  if you were willing to haul my hiney up, you could easily do 3 bales at a time...
But maybe you would do it just to see an old lady have fun!


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Rachel could pull you back up each time.



Naw, then she'd hit and get pulled the side of the barn too. Ouch. Gotta run.


----------



## thistlebloom

rachels.haven said:


> Naw, then she'd hit and get pulled the side of the barn too. Ouch. Gotta run.



it's okay! I have protective gear!


----------



## Jesusfreak101

I could see you actually doing that thistle lol


----------



## farmerjan

The pictures that you inspire me to imagine....

Won't see me doing it that is for sure....guess you would need someone on the ground to revive and repair all body damages....I could do that.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Ya could train a dog or goat to pull it up with a son leading it...or even use a rider mower to have them pull out and back...while ya direct and unhitch the bales..... 🤣


----------



## farmerjan

A riding mower sounds a whole lot safer/saner to me.....


----------



## thistlebloom

farmerjan said:


> The pictures that you inspire me to imagine....
> 
> Won't see me doing it that is for sure....guess you would need someone on the ground to revive and repair all body damages....I could do that.



Hey! Teamwork! 🤣


farmerjan said:


> A riding mower sounds a whole lot safer/saner to me.....



With little boys driving it?


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Lol I am think NASCAR could use a new act at that rate lol.


----------



## Bruce

I don't think Rachel would really want those 2 little boys having the "keys" to the riding mower!


----------



## rachels.haven

...oh dear, that's a scary idea. Yes, please no keys for the boys to the heavy, cutty, cool colored, choppy thing-and yes, it has keys, that are hidden somewhere. I have a hard enough time keeping them out of the washing machine and using it as a "merry go round" (dkfjsldkjsdlkfj!!!!! on so many levels!).
...come to think of it, I don't think we're anywhere far enough from the me saving them from themselves phase.


----------



## rachels.haven

I let out the little bachelor roosters. The girls and Mr. Teddy are locked up in the 8x8 coop with the chicks. The bachelors are running around red alerting at everything like the hollow headed nuts they are.







Two very washed out roosters in morning light.

The silkie flock has been locked up with the chicks for over a week now. The polish chicks are smart-still tiny-but sharp. The silkies including the adults are not so bright. Teddy does his best to kick shavings in the water, trying to show off and feed his ladies for extra rooster points, and the polish pullets figured out how to clear it out so they can drink (the waterer can only be raised so far when there are chicks and adults together). If the chicks would just grow I'd hurry up and free range everyone together for maximum chicken fun.

I'm probably going to have to do something with the pekins. I usually lock them in the chicken run at night, and the chicken run is a terrible place now poo-wise with the rain and duckery. Honestly, with DH's work stress and no time to build another shed I should probably just sell them off and restart when he can help me or at least when we're not trying to survive a bad time. The younger kid wants me to keep 5 of them. If we're selling ducks, I'd like to be done with them all and restart all together with the exact sexed ratios we want when ready, so I disagree. It's just sad. They're good ducks. I just can't devote the time to shed building right now.

The goats keep having ploppy poo. I'm beginning to think it's the hay. The poo always seems to follow when they've had the chance to eat as much as they want all day and night long. The thing that makes me doubt that is that the bucks are fine and normal and on the same hay, so I'm not sure what's up. I guess the bucks don't get to eat as much as they want and I limit them to one bale per day. The goats have also been coughing when they eat it (course as it goes down? they gulp the straw and all) and occasionally have white snotty noses-maybe once or twice a week. I am fixing to stick someone with a thermometer, but I know what feverish goats act like, and no one acts off at all other than the above, so I doubt I'm going to get anything.

I should probably do a fecal on the plops, but again, no one has pale lids, and no one acts tired or wormy. I'm just sick of the mess.

Oh, and Lace is the first Lamancha starting a heat, hollaring at the bucks across the barnyard, and driving the month old nigerian bucklings crazy (uh, a little too ambitious?). She is also terribly behaved again. Among other things I got headbutted yesterday by that jerk, so I think it's time to notch and band some scurs. She is also listed for sale until breeding time, which it is not yet. She is pretty, and is really just a young goat and has a lot of developing and growing to do (in the head too), but I'm thinking I don't want to stick around for it if someone else would appreciate her more. She's a hard headed goat, and I don't want to keep goats around I have to be super firm with and expect bad behavior from. I've already got Ava. Moving her onto a herd would also take away her place in the pecking order and give her a humility check, and probably eliminate a lot of the issues all together. She's got some of the best genetics on this side of the country, but a terrible attitude at the moment. If she doesn't sell, she'd better chill.

Here's empty Lace and her meat wether guy.




The wether with the processing appointment is sweeter and easier to handle than his mom, and I handle mom daily and him almost never. Pity, Lace has nice feet.


----------



## rachels.haven

People in this state keep meeting my low "expectations" for them and it makes me so sad. My husband was 45ish miles into a 47 mile ride on his road bike and he ran out of water. He stopped at our gas station in town, covered his face, and asked to go to the bathroom to fill his bottles and was turned away. Now I've got a husband with weird recovery symptoms and I've got to put him back together again. He usually brings about half a gallon of gatorade dilute, and did today but he went through it. When he came home he drank about another two quarts before his shower, but it did not appear to be fast enough. Massachusetts, you have lost your "M". You should be embarrassed, but you are far too arrogant for that. Time to feed the guy who just burned through over a day's worth of calories in less than 2 hours, and keep him drinking and resting (some movement is good). I'd be mad, but I'm too busy being sad and disappointed.


----------



## Baymule

What is wrong with those people? Are they given RUDE transfusions at birth? Or are they just born that way? How sad.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Fear is a powerful "motivator" and it is sad that sooo many are terrified beyond "good sense".....I sure wouldn't want to be stranded on a "lilly pad" in the middle of a "storm".....always better to have at least "some" close enough to help ya "back to shore".....


----------



## farmerjan

BOTH, the larger number of natives are born that way...... and all the transplants that have been around for years are even worse than the natives that are too uppity for their own good.


----------



## Baymule

Texas is derived from the word tejas (tay-HAS) meaning friendly. We are a friendly bunch of people. I just don't get rude people. Smiles and politeness are free.


----------



## farmerjan

In Mass, arrogance and rudeness and stuck up know it alls and you are way below me.....  is the norm.  That and stupid drivers on the road.... and believing that they can just keep raising the taxes on the average guy because they have all their money in protected accounts....That's their entitlements.....free to them, costly to the "little dumb, average working peon of every color...."


----------



## chickens really

Poor guy! They definitely should be ashamed of themselves..
He only needed water..Wasn't asking for much.


----------



## rachels.haven

Husband survived the night, btw. Blue lips and lack of feeling in hands at 80-85 degrees really had me concerned but it all came back. I think he just got badly dehydrated/electrolytes off and tanked calorically, but man, he had me thinking cardiac arrest for a while there. Any chest pain and we would have been on the way to the hospital so fast.


----------



## rachels.haven

Also, it appears none of the goats have diarrhea this morning. I'll take that too!


----------



## farmerjan

So glad that he is okay.  Dehydrating in this heat is really bad.  I felt it a week ago and I have been doubly careful since.  Worth it to me now to buy a 10 lb bag of ice and put in the cooler with extra water and even some sodas for sugar and caffeine...   as well as the 4 bottles I carry in the little pouch type insulated bag I carry on the tractor.  The water bottles I freeze half full, then add water to fill and they slowly thaw for me to drink when I am on the tractor.  Try to carry some tea and other drinks too.   I realize he can't do that but do you freeze the water/electrolytes like half bottles, then just add to fill?  I started doing that because sometimes even just cool water isn't enough to get me to cool off enough;  and I drink the cold water slower, so think it helps me more. 
Just glad for all that he has recovered from it.


----------



## rachels.haven

You sound well armed. Sugar (energy!), salt, water and ice are all your friends.
He doesn't freeze the water bottles. Unfortunately he goes through the bottles too fast on the hot rides. I can suggest it. I think he also needs more racks on his bike somehow or to go only when it's cool enough to not sweat so hard. It's ridiculous how much a person can sweat. His ultra light, road rash preventing, silly spandex bike clothes get HEAVY (Gross, gross, gross...but whatever). If he can get more water bottles on board and possibly half freeze them it may help. Not riding so hard may ALSO help, lol. This morning over breakfast he downed another quart flagon of water and was still down way more weight on the scale after than i should admit on his behalf because of water loss. Real weight loss doesn't happen that fast.

He will not be riding for the next few days. We have head advisories out and he doesn't ride when it's over 90. It's also supposed to rain after that and riding in the humidity over x degrees is brutal too because sweat doesn't work anymore as well and it kind of cooks him. And he's also going back to work tomorrow. That always curtails things a bit. He took a few days off after getting too close to hitting the wall/breaking point with his job and the ride was part of his "relaxing" and burning off stress. Emotionally he'd be worse off if he didn't do this, but physically he's pushing himself, so I'm not sure what to think. Exercise=good. Killing or almost killing oneself=bad.


----------



## Mike CHS

You know it already but men's obsessions can't be overcome but the damage can be controlled.  I have been there and done that but not with bikes.    I love it that you have a good handle on what you can do to make sure he can survive the obsession.


----------



## CntryBoy777

Maybe on those days doing fewer miles would be a better solution, because some riding is much better than no ride, and that is much, much better than lying flat of your back in bed wishing ya hadn't....


----------



## rachels.haven

Sigh, that's what I tell him, but you can't change a man or a man's mind very well. I've said my piece, and he remembers, so now I've got to let him figure it out himself and let time prove me right (or wrong occasionally, lol) That's how our relationship usually goes in both directions since we're both fairly stubborn and determined but don't like conflict.
Last year he hairline fractured his shoulder on a rough patch of road shoulder because he gave a pushy car too much space. THAT he regretted. Hopefully he won't have to do something similar with heat exhaustion to come to the conclusion that fewer miles can equal consistently riding throughout the week=more fitness and more consistently feeling better from the stress relief. And if he doesn't, I hope he finds a system to cover his needs without thrashing himself like he did Saturday. I'm sure he'll figure something out, one way or another.
He's probably got the rest of the week to stew about the problem. It's HOT again.


----------



## thistlebloom

Does he have a Camelback type water pack? I prefer them to frame mounted water bottles, but you do sweat under them of course. They make some very low profile ones now.





__





						Buy Packs And More | CamelBak
					

Shop and find Packs and more here at CamelBak. Shop today!




					www.camelbak.com


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, if he will wear it I think he might be getting one now. Thanks!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> ...come to think of it, I don't think we're anywhere far enough from the me saving them from themselves phase.


Sounds like those boys will age you to about 90 before they are old enough to leave home!



chickens really said:


> He only needed water..Wasn't asking for much.


And it was tap water from the bathroom for gosh sakes! 



CntryBoy777 said:


> Maybe on those days doing fewer miles would be a better solution, because some riding is much better than no ride, and that is much, much better than lying flat of your back in bed wishing ya hadn't....


Or maybe one ride in the morning and one in the evening, skipping the hottest part of the day.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, I had a pudding pooer goat again today, so I pulled a few fecals on the goat that was runny and a few that had no symptoms AND....
...everyone has a ridiculous number of coccidia. Even the asymptomatic goats, which is why it seems like they're taking turns having pudding poo.
I called the good vet, since I'm dealing with 24 goats in that barn (bucks across the barnyard appear to have been spared) and she recommended maybe snooping around and looking for some of the harder to get a hold of things, and mentioned a Rx for the sulfa drugs, but doesn't like them as much because of the antibiotic part, but says they usually do a good job nipping it back if I have to use them. She seems to think the adults can muddle their way through things. Alternately she mentioned a medicated feed. We don't use tons of feed though, so I'm not sure if it would help or just breed resistance. I'll consider it after treatment.

So I guess at this point I'm going to break out the baycox for the keeper kids from this year-Dahlia, Trinka, and the new ND bucklings Obi and Ant. Then I'm going to corid the rest of everyone, since I don't have much Baycox and it's extremely expensive, so at least those who have a scouring baby's rear end to lick and infect themselves (3?)...and Ava because she had pudding poo for a while too. Then the others I will watch like a hawk, I guess.
After treatment I will clean the goats' sheets, and get rid of some of oocysts in the environment.
The wethers will need to be corid. Their processing date is coming.
We won't breed resistance this way I hope.


----------



## farmerjan

I have a calf on the nurse cow that is loose/watery.  Decided today to treat for coccidia... this heat seems to help them find everything you don't want to deal with.


----------



## rachels.haven

I know. Something about cooking the animals in the humid soup of summer really bring the inner bugs out. Who doesn't love forcing drugs down throats in a sauna?

Here's Saffron's cocci-hunch. Her side is making funny noises again and if you tap the hollow before the hip it sounds like a drum, but she's not terribly bloated. There's pudding poo waiting. I picked up the corid tonight. I'll be force feeding it to the adults tomorrow morning. She's barely eating a half ration. But now I can help!


----------



## CntryBoy777

I didn't "like" it cause ya are having to deal with such....  ...but, because ya know what ya are facing and have a "plan of action" to combat it with.....so much better, than guessing and throwing the "kitchen sink" at it hoping something will work....


----------



## Baymule

Your husband needs to get a mule. It will turn around and come back home before it runs itself to death. LOL LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

Good news for us, it looks like only the top pecking order does need treatment-excluding Summer, so we get to keep having milk during treatment and withdrawal. All babies will be treated. Go figure goats.


----------



## Mike CHS

We seem to get a coccidia bloom in about half of our keeper lambs every season after weaning.  We still pull enough fecal samples to confirm that's what it is but I keep a couple of water cans with "Corid" written on it so I just treat all of them when I put fresh water out each time.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> After treatment I will clean the goats' sheets



And their pillowcases?  Seriously, what does it mean to clean goats' sheets?


----------



## rachels.haven

The thing that gets me is that 2/4 of the adult does that have coccidia I've only had to worm once in the year I had them, so I guess worm resistance doesn't apply to coccidia.



Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> And their pillowcases?  Seriously, what does it mean to clean goats' sheets?


The shavings in their stalls where they sleep. Some goat keepers call them sheets. I'd happily give them pillows with pillow cases if they would just be toilet trained, but a goat is a goat and they are potty pellet sprinklers and pee just about without thinking.


----------



## rachels.haven

Don't know if I mentioned it, but I banded Ms. Lace's scurs and took her off CL at least until they fall off. Having tender horns has taken her down a notch. She's still a punk, but she's grunting at others when she would have normally smashed them.

Realized I miscalculated and have been giving Lace and Saf too much Corid today. Saf is bloaty and Lace has been going light on the hay to I rechecked my math. I wonder if I can stop them early and if I've given them enough of an edge over it yet. Probably not.

If I can get out to the feed store, I'd like to clean the stalls today or tomorrow if the weather cooperates.


----------



## rachels.haven

Brought home my second hand picked lamancha buckling. Apparently he's been busy servicing his breeders' herd without permission since she left him in until 5 months and now that he's gone she's going to lute everyone. Not sure if I'll use him without growing some more or not. Done with bucks for a few years. Then on the way home stopped for DH to get a dryer vent cover to prevent swamp flies from just walking into our house and he fixed it.

Rosasharn WS Sir Patrick is in the breeding pen with Mustang Meadows H Avalon, Bluebird Pond Erudite, Woodland Haven Ava's Sugar, and at the last second Buttercup, aka one of the does waiting on the breeder to register her. Buttercup and Eri are throwing themselves all over him but he just wants the buck pen buddies back. Poor Patty never really goes very rutty or pushy, so I'm thinking I'll need to just wait this one out and give him extra time to get his work done. Bros before does, appears is his motto. All the dwarf bucks are thick in their ever ruts and everyone including Patrick stinks. The does love it and have been spending time harassing him. Patrick has been calling for me to release him and his buddies to come over all day instead of giving them any mind. Poor Patty.


----------



## rachels.haven

Down to the two female guinea pigs. No more baby pigger for my kids. I kind of hate the boars. No personality except for their "job".
I keep waiting for this "tropical storm" but so far all that's happened is that it's overcast and extremely humid. The weather forecast keeps reducing the predicted amount of rain we should be getting. Hmm, looks like I may have cleaned the yard for no reason.
Humidity got so oppressive I've started making a pitcher of only lightly sweetened horchata for "breakfast". Just enough calories to maybe count as a meal if you drink about a quart, and lots of hydration...not enough to send you inside for the restroom, but enough to keep you from feeling sick after an hour or so sweating your clothes out. I've got to learn a new drink for this. There are sure plenty of hydration drinks out there.

So today I redosed everyone with a large dose of herbal wormer because I'd let it go during the coccidia treatment. Now I smell like garlic and wormwood and now rutting bucks. DH says he can smell me coming. About to hit the shower.

Lace's wether left me a new poopy splatter on the barn wall this morning. Well, it looks like he's still got coccidia (or maybe he over indulged in milk, please?). Butcher date is September 4th. Good grief. He's cute, and sweeter than mom, but I need him out of here and maybe Lace too as soon as her big scurs fall off. One is almost off. The other probably needs more pressure from a second band. Then I may re-evaluate her. She tends to be such a nasty goat...unless she doesn't want to, but good luck predicting her mood today (today I imagine her scurs hurt, and she's decided it's my fault and she's angry and refused to come in for grain or let me close to her, but being hit by her scurs ALSO hurts, so no sympathy there). I'm glad her babies appear to be sweet and friendly with fairly little interaction. That's one argument for keeping her until she kids next year, hoping for a doe. The other is that she appears to be a heavy milker with a very well attached perfect looking udder. Kids with constant coccidia and a dam with a bad attitude are major strikes against her. Also, her udder texture is that of a rubber ball and when I milk her, her nice long teats squeak, as weird as that sounds. It literally feels like I am milking a kids inflatable walmart ball. I can't tell you how weird that is. (also, I should say that she did not get wormed today, because she's busy being feral at the moment).

I put up a breeding pen with Patrick, Ava, Eri, Sugar, and Cocoa/buttercup/whatever the kids are calling her on Saturday and they are finally quieting down. Nobody likes changing pens, even Patrick with all his new girls. Bros before does, I guess. I'm hoping to have kids when it's cold and that will help us avoid so much coccidia. I may also separate and bottle feed. This coccidia thing has been a pain. 

Next breeding pen will be Durango, Lavender, Ginger, and Chip. I'm thinking the first week of September, since we have a barn and good heat lamps now.

Then the lamanchas as soon as they start cycling. I think I'll try to use Atlas on everyone and get some Lucky*Stars influence kids since my other new guy (named Max) is grandson to the infamous Barnowl Count Dracula as opposed to the son, like my count that I sold was. I'm hoping to get the perks of that line without the ugly moose look and difficult to birth kids. My plan is to grow Max out a little more before giving him girls, and make sure he's not big and clunky, and that he is refined enough. He's got nice width in the rear, which is nice to see in a dairy goat. He's also got a dash of lucky*stars in his pedigree, so using him on the other buck's kids should bring out some nice traits assuming the Count Dracula influence doesn't dominate all. Splendid udders and high production and technically correct builds, but not goats I love to look at. Clunky and too tall. Lamanchas should be smaller and deep and round, and if they're tall, refined looking not moose-like. No milking moose.

Anyway, I guess I'd better open the barn for the dog. It's getting darker and darker and it's only noon. Then I need that shower. Everyone's avoiding me for some reason...Nobody loves me after hugging the bucks (and forcing herbal wormer smoothie down their throats).


----------



## rachels.haven

Oddly enough, while I'm not getting any love, nobody's asking me to do mom stuff for them at the moment either. Maybe smelling like buck is the secret to not being nagged into the ground by children. I even got a load of dishes in.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I keep waiting for this "tropical storm" but so far all that's happened is that it's overcast and extremely humid. The weather forecast keeps reducing the predicted amount of rain we should be getting. Hmm, looks like I may have cleaned the yard for no reason.


Yep, it shifted west and is heading directly for us. But still only expecting 2+ inches total. Predicted winds overnight went from teens to mid 20s with gusts in the 30's from 8-10 PM then 51 at midnight then back off. It is going to clock from east (we NEVER get east winds) now until 10 PM to north at 11 then WSW at midnight.


----------



## rachels.haven

Good luck @Bruce . Luck might be what it all comes down to weather wise with this storm. Apparently south of here it's very windy so we're missing the boat somehow? The wind was gusty high up here, but not low enough for trees so no concerns yet. It's just starting to really rain now.


----------



## Bruce

We've made one "storm planning" change. Moved Sister-in-law's tent off the back deck and into the tractor's place in the barn. After all there is no tractor in there right now 

And no, she isn't going to try to sleep on a really uneven and rocky surface. The move was just to make sure the wind didn't damage it. She will sleep in the spare room upstairs in the house.


----------



## rachels.haven

Survived the wind storm. Will go survey tree damage later. Got an hour or two of rain, then sun, then overcast and suddenly heavy wind into the night.

Hope you did okay, @Bruce.


----------



## Baymule

Hope no trees fell on your fence.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Hope you made it through OK.


----------



## rachels.haven

Nope, no trees on the fence. One of my "watch" trees nearby the fence dropped a huge bough, but other than that and lots of little branches down the barn yard didn't change much.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Hope you did okay, @Bruce.


No issues. A couple of inches of rain through the day. The ancient sugar maple in the front yard dropped a couple of dead branches, not big but one is probably 15' long. A small bit of firewood.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Whatever happened to Wile E. Coyote?  Did he go away?  And I seemed to recall that at one time you were having problems with hawks getting your chickens.  Did that resolve itself?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

If the dog is out and working and not living (and pooping) 24/7 in the barn the hawks don't risk it lately.
I'm not sure what happened to that big coyote. Several armed people quietly wanted him dead, so I'm hoping he got shot. The mass of coyotes will probably be back in the fall and Bailey will be waiting to bark them off.


----------



## rachels.haven

Upduckdate:
This morning the muscovy drake ravaged one of the pekins. He must have known someone was coming for him to buy him as a dinner drake since i don't want to breed pied white heads. I also sold the pekin drake to the man so the injured duck will have no males to molest her as she tries to regain her walking ability and her bleeding stops. If she doesn't recover I will do her in, but we will make accommodations for her for a while. My five year old has claimed all the remaining 8 pekins for himself and his own tiny duck kingdom and says I am not to sell any more, and he can count, so I guess she'd better live. It's not normal for a muscovy drake to be so aggressive to other ducks, so I guess I'm glad he's gone. Sorry duck.

I still have a muscovy drakling, btw. At least one of the solid colored ducklings I bought is a drake. I think the other two are hens, but they are a VERY solidly built line that I am not familiar with, so I'm still waiting before saying I'm sure...at 8 weeks. He's sure not mature though. There is also a nest due to hatch under one of my white head girls. She was standing off it this morning in her nesting spot and it was not hot so there may have been some hatching occuring. They don't like to sit directly on the little guys as they pip. Drakes there too, I'm sure, and not keepers.

I kind of want to find a white hybrid layer drake for the pekin girls. My son likes his ducks white. I can stick with that theme. He'd also be lighter on them when he did breed. I may not mind not letting them have a drake boy toy either. The ducks of a 5 year old do not have to breed. 

And finally, I'm trying to convince my husband to help me build 5 year old Dan a duck shack this weekend. I'm tired of having them exposed to the elements in regard to egg cleanliness. The ducks do not mind, but I sure do. They love rolling their eggs in mud and poo. Blah.


----------



## Baymule

I'll take a pass on ducks. I've had Pekins-off to the freezer they went. I had runner ducks-I gave them away. My last effort were Muscovies-the ultimate farm duck. Nope, didn't make it-Trip decided they were on the menu, killed and was eating them when I found him. He lunged, snarling, at me to protect his kill and I beat him half to death with a handy pine limb. Took his damned ducks too. So, no ducks for me. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, yes, muscovy are that good. Worth fighting and getting a whooping for. Yeah, you'd better skip them with that dog around. Also, knowing them, they probably started the mortal battle with Mr. Trip themselves.

Well, the nest sitting muscovy has demonstrated her hatching intelligence by pushing almost every single one of her fertile, developing eggs down the hill out of the nest. She is down to two eggs. Guys, I don't think I'm getting any baby muscovy out of this pair of females I bought that had been bred for "egg laying and production". Both are epic fails on the incubation front (one abandoned her nest in favor of 4 week old ducklings, this one is rejecting and not caring for her eggs). Maybe the trio I bought from a local farm that breeds show quality ones will be better next year when they mature. Meanwhile, this pair might find themselves back on the market for egg laying since I don't really need more duck eggs (got 7 eggs this morning out of 7 birds counting the lame one and most are goose egg sized).

Lace is refusing to go down in milk production to just meeting the needs of her baby. She looked really uncomfortable this morning. So I persuaded her up on the stand and she matched and therefore doubled what Summer put in the pail before her, giving us over a gallon this morning for breakfast. Both got a huge, milking ration. I'm hoping to put some flesh back on Lace after the coccidia she had. That butthead can apparently make milk and now Saffron is dry (thanks cocci!) so we need the milk. The bucklings I'm raising are hungry and so are the human kids.


----------



## rachels.haven

The pekin eggs tend to be large. We do get doubles, but these don't look like doubles.


----------



## rachels.haven

Silkie eggs for fairness. These are creamy. I still like bantam eggs better than large chicken eggs, and chicken eggs still beat duck. More yolk to white in bantam chicken eggs.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sold Rosasharn MM Mili's Buckeye yesterday. He called for his bros all the way down the long driveway as they took him away, so it was a little sad. I didn't want to use him, but still sad. He will get many girls this year though, lol. He'll be happy when he gets there.

Having a "I hate people" day. Earlier I sold a couple 3 definitely female Pekin ducks. I had hand sorted them at maturity. We ate the drakes, and of course I double checked when crating at time of sale-a paranoid practice I will never quite doing now. They all quack. The next day they emailed and wanted me to refund and replace one of them because they were convinced one was a drake because she mounted other ducks. She quacks, and they acknowledge it. I said no, if it quacks (and I know it does) it's a duck. Eventually they decided she was a duck and told me so.

Now they want me to replace her with a healthy, not beat up one, one because their drake, that they got ducks for because he was raping chickens, beats her up without mating her and he is beating her into the ground and beyond submission and is going to kill her. Their argument is that because when they pick her up NOW she barely honks at all now, so she must now be male or hermie, so they and their drake deserve another duck to destroy.

I said no and now I'm ready for the fallout.
But hey, all ducks I sold WERE female. They were checked and rechecked. Our egg production went down accordingly. I'm mad as a hornet. And their drake's behavior is not my problem. I'd consider taking her back without refunding, but I don't want anything to do with them again and I definitely don't want them coming to my home. Letting known nuts come to your home is unsafe.

Entitled people suck.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Oh Rachel, entitled   people are  just horrible  to deal with...sorry you are among  a bunch of them......
I have a girl who bought two rabbits and I GAVE her a nice free buck....she has been texting me for baby pictures, wanted pictures of both parents, birth dates and on and on, this has been going on for a week.....( she is raising them for meat) ....I finally asked her last night if she is making a $#==@<;;& baby bunny album to show the next kits.....people are beyond stupid


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, that made me smile. 
I've got to remember, people are stupid, now it's time to let it go.
Btw, I feel sorry for my friends left in Iowa. Apparently they got hit badly with very high straight line winds recently (still wish I were there on some level, but you know, I'd rather have DH)


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Massachusetts  was a nice place to live and grow up ..from 1952 to 1968...then off to New Hampshire...till 1970... New England has been totally  changed by the "city slickers ", very sad changes....
Hope you can hang in there until your next move


----------



## Baymule

People are idiots. The worst part is that they are fertile, they breed and replicate themselves.


----------



## rachels.haven

The thing that gets me is the lack of critical thinking and the assumption that other people similarly lack it. IT HURTS.


----------



## farmerjan

B&B Happy goats said:


> Massachusetts  was a nice place to live and grow up ..from 1952 to 1968...then off to New Hampshire...till 1970... New England has been totally  changed by the "city slickers ", very sad changes....
> Hope you can hang in there until your next move


AMEN to your comments.  Conn., from 1953  to 1981 when I moved south;  but spent months and months in Vermont with cousins on their farm as a kid and every possible vacation/long weekend  with my family at our "cabin" , in VT also.  
Yes New England has totally changed from the "old salts", down to earth, hard working people that settled there to eke out a living and a lifestyle.   A sad to the  thing to lose that old "Yankee ingenuity and work ethic.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

farmerjan said:


> AMEN to your comments.  Conn., from 1953  to 1981 when I moved south;  but spent months and months in Vermont with cousins on their farm as a kid and every possible vacation/long weekend  with my family at our "cabin" , in VT also.
> Yes New England has totally changed from the "old salts", down to earth, hard working people that settled there to eke out a living and a lifestyle.   A sad to the  thing to lose that old "Yankee ingenuity and work ethic.


The days of when a "hand shake sealed a deal".... and a "man's word" was enough  ...
THOSE were "the good ole days"....honesty and integrity  have been lost along with common sense and responsibility...very sad to see how much "progress" has changed everything for the worse....


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, I'm getting buried in eggs from the pekins and silkies. Dare I list the eggs for sale?


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> Hmm, I'm getting buried in eggs from the pekins and silkies. Dare I list the eggs for sale?


Why not ? ...are any fertile  ? ..sell them either way as long as you can deal with the people who come to buy them


----------



## rachels.haven

We'll try for a while then. Maybe I need a pig.
 The chicken eggs are fertile, but they're not breeder quality yet, and I will refrigerate them so they won't be sold for hatching.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Hmm, I'm getting buried in eggs from the pekins and silkies. Dare I list the eggs for sale?



Let the egg drama begin! Might be more fun to hide in the bushes and throw them at passing cars. Plus you could teach your kids how to run really fast!


----------



## rachels.haven

Great idea, that would reduce my stress level considerably and may even help DH decide he wants to move, lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

I think I'm going to need to develop a thick skin and learn to watch the zoo animals if I'm going to be selling anything here.
There is culture shock, and then there is learning to deal with a foreign culture. I have gained a lot more respect for those working retail or with the public in general here in 24 hours.

Tonight Sam's club is providing us with a deep freezer that we will go pick up, then they will ship me a mini fridge for the porch, and I will continue trying to not lose my temper and not tell people where to get off while trying to sell eggs. Let's call this egg sale thing a study of humanity. Weird, demanding, entitled, honorless humanity.
I wonder i wonder if I need a guard goose? My dog is so good tempered, geese are always grumpy...they should complete each other and our guard team...or maybe they'd just eat DH and the kids and only respect or like me like my last geese...but man, some days I'd really like to turn an angry, wrath filled flock of geese on some of these people...which sounds very much like something my mother would do, so I should probably not, and just keep being patient for now.


----------



## rachels.haven

Got our freezer! DH just got off a 50 mile ride so he and I didn't unload or set it up (...somewhere?) but it's here and not sold out. They might be sold out now, but we should have enough room for a little goat meat now. It's a small chest freezer after all.

Of course, the first thing the kids said when they heard we were getting a freezer was "GOOD, now we can buy lots and lots of freezer pops!".  ...you know, those frozen ice tubes with almost no flavor for in the neighborhood of 200/$5 at sams that we let them have. That just about brought DH and I to tears. Maybe we'll start with ONE new box, in the normal freezer...after they've cleaned up all the hiding wrappers that seem to be breeding all round the house from last time.

DH is still reaching for a century ride here. They've had another round of people jumping ship on his team and monday is going to be hard, so better ride hard now too. He's going hard on the late night video games too...that's his other brain number (until grumpy, blunt, not a night owl me wakes up at whatever hour and makes him go to bed...hope I didn't say anything too mean, as I often don't remember by morning).

Had some interest in poor, listed Lace. Someone wants to know if I'd take $200 for her if I knew she was going to be "raised organically and have a great home". I said nope (plus too close to the going meat price), tried not to get upset, and sent them to look at the goat dairy in Pepperrell that sells goat kids for that (not young, pedigreed, disease tested does in milk in good condition, thank you very much). Lace is a very nice goat for around here. Her attitude is just poor and I'm telling myself I'm sick of it. The offspring of her brother 40 minutes from here sell for $600/each (I'm asking $400, in milk, tested, mostly stand trained, below milk market value here). If I could figure out how to safely work and get along with her she'd stay. It's also impossible to raise goats organically here. They get LOTS of parasites in the rain and climate variation that herbs do not take care of alone, even in a dry year (like cocci!), and the soil is so poor you need selenium and copper to the moon and back because the soil has nothing in it. Neglect one of those, and you will quickly need a vet visit and real medical care, not holistic herbs alone. I've been lucky learning. Also, my vet doesn't like to come out if she can text me instructions and do Rx for me online.

Lace's wether is super sweet lately, and tries to crawl into your arms whenever he's separated from unfriendly mom (TOO BIG). I wish he were a doe. He'd be staying even with his past coccidia issues. Taking them to butcher day is going to be a sad one (but a relief). Lace had better watch out. Too many more "will you take half price or free or her" and I'm going to just give up and keep working on that numbskull in the name of getting a sweeter doe kid and giving her more time to settle in.


----------



## Baymule

I'm glad it's you up there and not me-I couldn't keep my big mouth shut and would probably get evicted from the state.


----------



## Baymule

Your poor husband and his stress filled job. I guess everyone hates it and they keep quitting. Hope he gets some relief.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> I'm glad it's you up there and not me-I couldn't keep my big mouth shut and would probably get evicted from the state.


I am wondering if this is a good idea and it is really that you are just smarter than me, especially lately. It would end the pain quickly on all fronts  (...hmm, that sounds bad...) and we really don't fit in here. I'm not sure exactly how people think or if they do for themselves at all regardless of  their self tuoted "income bracket" or "education". (where's the "independent thinking bracket" or just plain thinking bracket?)

For example, fairly conservative Tennessee, where my mom lives is going all virtual for school with covid after watching their neighbors burn and coming to grips with the fact that no city or state is isolated or an island. I've been following their district publications and I'm not convinced this wasn't the plan all along, regardless of kids in bad situations (but the state will probably find a way to help, as they are not a bad state). My kids district is going "hybrid plan" which means they are throwing teachers, staff, and buss drivers, under the bus (lol) and sending all kid 4days/week with only 20% of kids remote. They're holding in person sports events at our park now with people sitting arm to arm. Extracurriculars have begun. People DON'T keep a polite covid distance at grocery stores...or at all (2 foot rule please for my locally misantropic self?), and it makes my skin crawl. They are arrogant, "educated", and cocky. It couldn't happen to them. All it's going to take is ONE person and this state is GONE the way of the current covid "winners" and stubborn TN will be better off than us FAST. It's like they didn't remember that we didn't do so great with one, single, main outbreak at the beginning. People just couldn't handle it and honestly, I'm worried for them and their kids.

Don't get me started on laws, culture, or driving. I feel covid is less offensive to dwell on in writing. And heck, it's supposed to be temporary.

 Anyway, I've got to go. I'm late feeding the goats. Apparently I am lazy and the ducks are telling me this so loudly that I'm sure the neighbors can hear.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Rachel if you speak up to these kinds of "Yankees " you will gain their respect or they will avoid you altogether....either way you end your fustration with their BS ...YOU have the animals for sale that they want...ball is in your court,  play the game with your rules and please yourself...not them


----------



## rachels.haven

That surprises me. I guess they either will or go away like the duck abuser lady. I will totally stand my ground. Giving in to someone who isn't close family runs contrary to my nature, and irks me to no end.


I'm only asking $400 for Lace, btw. Not so nice does in milk go for more than that here. She has that squeaky, rubbery udder texture and smaller orifice than I'd like in addition to her headstrong temperament, so I think it's justified.


----------



## rachels.haven

Is this a good deal? This would be an experiment. No big pigs wanted here, as last time I got any major exposure to pigs I was reacting to something in that tent at that fair. It could have been alfalfa hay, or alpacas, or it could have been (most likely have been) pigs, but I'll never know if I don't try it.









						Bred Gilt - farm & garden - by owner - sale
					

Bred American Guinea Hog gilt due late September for sale. Piglets will be crossed with Kune Kune,...



					westernmass.craigslist.org


----------



## frustratedearthmother

I love my AGH's.  They're very docile and really taste good!


----------



## rachels.haven

LET ME IN. I'm done eating and finished here. -Lace, beautiful butthead.


----------



## rachels.haven

My beautiful butthead's butt...I mean udder.


----------



## rachels.haven

Nom, nom, nom, nosh, nosh, nosh... -Lace eating at warp speed so she can get back into her spot in the pen she doesn't want to leave.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Is this a good deal? This would be an experiment. No big pigs wanted here, as last time I got any major exposure to pigs I was reacting to something in that tent at that fair. It could have been alfalfa hay, or alpacas, or it could have been (most likely have been) pigs, but I'll never know if I don't try it.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Bred Gilt - farm & garden - by owner - sale
> 
> 
> Bred American Guinea Hog gilt due late September for sale. Piglets will be crossed with Kune Kune,...
> 
> 
> 
> westernmass.craigslist.org



You are asking US? The Biggest group of enablers on the internet? YES! go get one! Heck-fire, get TWO!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Now they want me to replace her with a healthy, not beat up one, one because their drake, that they got ducks for because he was raping chickens, beats her up without mating her and he is beating her into the ground and beyond submission and is going to kill her.


Well THAT is certainly a reasonable request!  
Yes, some people are really stupid.


----------



## rachels.haven

When I politely called her bluff and told her she was full of it she gave in and said she was going to try "drake jail"  for a "timeout" instead of another duck to kill since I wasn't going to give her one. I wanted to tell her she should go with the big butcher knife, but I'm still trying to NOT be my mother and instead I opted to end our conversation. That whole interaction did not impress me with any overall brightness. I will be avoiding responding to her again if she reaches out again. She's got a bad drake, and that's not my problem. If she offs him, she could still have at least 3 young layer ducks giving her massive eggs every day. If she does not, she will only have two, and he may just move onto another when his current mark is dead because the problem is in the drake's head/hormones (the fact drake moved his focus from her chicken hens to the new duck and he apparently couldn't even try to get along or display normal drake or anything behavior is more evidence of that) .

It does take a certain amount of honesty with what ducks are in order to keep ducks. They look cute and are smiling but aren't really pets. She appeared to want to treat them like children...rapey, abusive, violent children? New duck because the "problem child" in her eyes rather than the drake who had already been causing the issue that she bought the ducks for. Stupid. I'm glad I'm not her dog, much less her child.


----------



## Bruce

Good thing she doesn't have any adopted children, she'd probably be trying to trade them back for new ones.


----------



## rachels.haven

Picked up a box of ducklings early this morning for DS#2. Buffs and blue swedish from McMurray. One duckling was bald and deformed and very dead despite only being in shipping for 2 days-made the whole Post Office smell like rotten eggs and workers were not happy, and neither was I. Got refunded for the one, but still confused how a bald and deformed duckling got shipped. I haven't seen one of those except for once one of my friends did a hatch and they had a baldy and it only lived a few days despite pampering because it was "special". If my duckling was alive when shipped it was doomed at hatch and I'm surprised they'd include a bald and deformed one. I may have to switch hatcheries if they just ship everything even if it's missing feathers.
Gross morning. But 10 of my 11 are alive and healthy.


----------



## rachels.haven

Last night in the wee hours of the morning something that can bark, big, but not as big as our Bailey came down from somewhere and barked with our dog nearby our property. It could have been another dog, which is what it sounded like, as we have had a new neighbor and Bay has been using her "summoning" bark to call neighbor dogs for backup lately after something wanders through and something may have gotten loose and answered. It could have also been a coyote, as it is getting into fall, but I like the dog story better and she didn't sound angry. I really need to get that dog a friend. I think even a house dog for daytime hangouts would do. She just needs canine company.

Out of hay today. My favorite hay guy is almost out of first, which never happens, and warning me about having very little second coming out. I think I'm going to get 9 bales of first from him and see if the feed store has scrounged up and trucked in some second yet. $11/bale isn't pretty, but no hay is even worse.

Darn. Looking at craigslist for hay is uninspiring.


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> Logically speaking, if I don't want any more does out of her, as soon as the antibiotic with drawl on her milk is done she should be listed.


You may have already doe this, but here is my opinion -
If you don't like her type, build, attitude, mothering ability, or milking ability - time to cull her and all her kids.  Heavy thick dairy animals seldom produce as much milk as the more angular dairy animals.  They may look like they have nice full udders, but it is usually because they have what are called "meaty" udders.  Meaty udders and meaty dairy animals should be removed from your herd if you are breeding for milk production.  If you don't like her and she produces her own type and personality, get rid of her.  Take the entire lot to the auction.


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> Durango in the buck pen is going lame from his knees and just wants to lay around and hide from the others a lot of the time now.


Has your herd been tested for CAE if they are nursing their kids?



rachels.haven said:


> Good idea! And soon! They're 5 and 7. They are light weights and still little weigh less than the hay bales and while they're out of the "I have to preserve them from themselves" phase, they are still in the "getting in the way" rather than the "help a little and get bored" stage, but I've got my sights on them as hay bale pushers as soon as they can. We don't do too many bales at once. They'll be able to do it eventually.


Our boys used to stack the hay when the eldest was 11 and the other 2 were 7 and 6 respectively.  The bales were 100-120 lbs. and we had to move them down 2 flights of steps into the lower old milk shed.  First DS1 shoved the bales off the pick up truck onto the driveway.  Then both younger boys DS2 and DS3 each put a hay hook into the bales and dragged them to the first set of stairs and pushed them down the first flight.  Then they went down those steps and dragged the bales over to the second flight and pushed them down  When they had a pile at the bottom DS1 went down and with stacked the bales with the younger brothers dragging them into the shed for him.  I used to go pick up the hay from a hay farmer an hour away and bring it home.  DH was working 24/7 at the time and the kids and I did it all ourselves.  By the time DS2 and DS3 were in middle and high school we had progressed to buying it by the field from the farmer.  All the alfalfa farmers were under contract to the dairies for first cut but we were able to buy the field for the second cut which was almost as good nutrient wise.  Since the farmer was selling us so much he would bring it in on a semi as we needed it.  We were feeding at least a ton a week by then.

If you have a good hay grower, maybe you can contact for a field, or portion of a field up front and have him deliver it as you need it.


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> He's also got a dash of lucky*stars in his pedigree,


DS2's La Mancha herd was almost all Lucky Star breeding.  Being on the West Coast with relatives in the Seattle area made it easy to pick up a buck when we were up there.  Also ordered a couple does that were flown down in dog crates. Beautiful goats, beautiful udders, beautiful personalities, lots of tasty milk, both bucks and does were super sweet.  Loved that herd and was sorry when DS2 sold out in college.  Entire show herd (nearly 100!!! didn't realize how many we had - it was a doe year!)  went to one buyer!  If we ever get another dairy doe (or 2 - you can't just have one), we will order them from Lucky Star - hopefully Don and Judy Hoy will still be in business!  Wonderful people!


----------



## rachels.haven

Ridgetop said:


> Has your herd been tested for CAE if they are nursing their kids?
> 
> 
> Our boys used to stack the hay when the eldest was 11 and the other 2 were 7 and 6 respectively.  The bales were 100-120 lbs. and we had to move them down 2 flights of steps into the lower old milk shed.  First DS1 shoved the bales off the pick up truck onto the driveway.  Then both younger boys DS2 and DS3 each put a hay hook into the bales and dragged them to the first set of stairs and pushed them down the first flight.  Then they went down those steps and dragged the bales over to the second flight and pushed them down  When they had a pile at the bottom DS1 went down and with stacked the bales with the younger brothers dragging them into the shed for him.  I used to go pick up the hay from a hay farmer an hour away and bring it home.  DH was working 24/7 at the time and the kids and I did it all ourselves.  By the time DS2 and DS3 were in middle and high school we had progressed to buying it by the field from the farmer.  All the alfalfa farmers were under contract to the dairies for first cut but we were able to buy the field for the second cut which was almost as good nutrient wise.  Since the farmer was selling us so much he would bring it in on a semi as we needed it.  We were feeding at least a ton a week by then.
> 
> If you have a good hay grower, maybe you can contact for a field, or portion of a field up front and have him deliver it as you need it.




We're all tested on the disease front. What I've observed is that his knees respond and go back to normal after a week or two of Bose, so be probably responds poorly to deficiency, as in worse than the others. This may be the only year I decide to work him for that reason, unfortunately, and i will be picky on keepers.

I don't think farmers would sell a field's produce here. Hay is hot, and they can sell out easily whenever, so there's nothing in it for them. All they need is a sign with a phone number and everyone and their beautiful horse want it (oddly, I've not seen any old or thin horses here, which throws me...do they eat them when they get old?) I wish I could contract a field though! And alfalfa too? Alfalfa hay or even just alfalfa/grass runs $40/100 pound bale and I can't afford that. (more wishing)

I may eventually get a buck or two straight from lucky*star farm, but right now these guys will more than do. My only concern with them is that Max's dam is suddenly being sold for "small orifices better for hand milking"...say what? They certainly didn't mention that when I bought him and as a hand milker that is a load of hogwash. So he is one buck that will have to prove himself before he can stay for good. I may not keep him at all. The other buck (Atlas) from GA has genetics that have been in the breeder's family line for a while, and it's fairly certain what he will produce. I think he'll get used this year.

In regards to my nasty dwarf line, it may come to that. One doe has calmed down and is sweet. She can stay as long as she stays that way. One doe has a toe on the rear foot that appears to have just stopped growing. Her personality is okay. And the last doe out of Ava is a giant personality defect. She's up for sale already. BuckeyexAva was a bad pairing, and that's my bad. Both had rougher personalities. AvaxPatrick made some sweet little bucklings with Patrick's attitude last time, and a good attitude runs in his line. I'd like a female version of that. Plus, spring is a season full of change...and for selling non-mothering does in milk unless she changes my mind. I don't think she's going to do that.


----------



## Baymule

Can you buy hay in the field and pick it up yourself? That is usually a dollar or more cheaper than already stacked in the barn. We feed round bales with about 40-50 square bales for back up. Our hay guy stores the round bales and brings them to us as needed (we pay for all of them up front). The square bales are for when he just cant get here. He was down for a couple of weeks with Covid, so I fed out half of the square bales that we had. It sure was nice to see that big tractor coming down the driveway with 2 big round bales!


----------



## rachels.haven

@Baymule , I've considered that. The distance to farms that offer that is prohibitive though. They can make more money selling it from the barn here. 

My next goat in regards to hay other than to put up enough for winter are to get a ball hitch and a small trailer on my van. I'd also like to bring home a few round bales to go with my square bales, and nobody delivers rounds here. It would also let me go get large squares and break them up to store. Dh wants to get a luggage rack on the van, so maybe I'll piggy back getting my van a ball onto his thing when he takes it in. Hauling my own hay in larger quantity would save me a lot of money and let me go get that hay bought off the field and not delivered or in small quantity out of the barn (or, um, ancient dropped semi shipping containers, in the case of my favorite hay guy). Longer hay trip would be more worth it too so the range I could look in would be extended.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's a rare photo of a pregnant buck kidding (or Max photo bombing). 
This is why you don't take pictures of goats. Things never go as planned. Also, dark goat, dark shelter, light background...meh, set up for failure. This was a fun result.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

That is hilarious!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

.....you need to submit it to POW,  ...that is way too funny !


----------



## rachels.haven

State won't let me sell milk?
...fine, I'll start selling my goat poop instead.

Today I sold 7 bags of goat manure. I advertised $5/feed bag. I told the guy if he bought it all and picked it up today after I shoveled it I'd let him have it all for $10 for all, the cost of rebedding the stall (I didn't want to find a place to store it to keep it dry). It's magic on the garden, uncomposted, the soil is only half a step from baren here without it, and I'm out of garden space. Last two week's goat poop and spent bedding all gone. Poof. Six extra feed sacks also gone. Poof. A little extra baling twine gone. Poof. Next two week's bedding in that stall paid for.

Is that the spirit of this state?

Apparently poop for the veggie garden is safer than milk yearly tested for brucellosis and Q fever (willing to test for tb too, if yearly), that is regularly consumed by the family. Too bad no one will tell me what their monthly inspections and milk testing would cost me. Maybe I'd put in a milk room if they'd come clean. Here economy, have some poop instead-apparently the only thing my farm can legally offer you.


----------



## farmerjan

I don't know if I mentioned it..... Go to these 2 websites.  Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund.... and RealMilk.com.  You can get alot of info on what each state allows/requires etc..  
Understand that it has little to do with the animals being tested yearly for brucellosis, or Q fever or even tb.  Has to do with milk quality, somatic cell count (scc) and things that can be contracted through milk, like listeria bacteria.... others.  Some states allow sales, some like Va do not.... so you skirt it with "cow shares or herd shares" .... people paying say a flat fee to "own" part of the animal, then they "pay you" for room and board and labor to milk the animal.  It's all in the FTCLDF website.  They also will offer legal advice, and possible defense for the yearly membership fee.  Well worth it... but the info part is free.  
In order for the state to "test your herd" ;  and according to what ever state rules you fall under..... you would probably have to be approved as a grade A dairy.... and that is an arduous process.... Mass is probably as unreasonable about that as any state.  There are several different "tests done"  for that;  milk samples being done normally every 3 or 6 months.... being on DHIA, like I do as a milk tester, would give you components and a monthly scc count.... don't even know where the closest dairy is to you and whether they are on DHIA.   It is not state required but is a management tool for the farmer.... but you first need to see a list of the actual rules for what is allowed and not..... VT allows milk to be sold off the farm, with certain stipulations.  Most require a dedicated room for the milk to be strained, bottled, stored in refridgeration.... there is alot to it.  Va does  not allow the "sale" of raw milk... many do "cow shares" but quietly under the table... no traceability.  But the liability from someone getting sickened.... we have a million dollar liability policy to cover anything like someone getting hurt on the farm, running a piece of farm equipment, you name it.  I would have to do something different for the cow share deal though.... since raw milk sales are not allowed.... it is a real gray area here.  
Don't jeopardize your house, land, or anything else with it.  We can give it away, and people can make a willing donation, again "under the radar"..... but if you did a cow share, you would have to get written statements about the person doing the milking not being responsible for the milk in any form.  Complicated....


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you.
I've used rawmilk.com. It says sale of raw milk is allowed. No herd shares. No pet milk. Apparently I'm not supposed to give it away.
Basically the way the laws work around here is, you have to contact the local authorities to see if they are favorable to a dairy in town. Everything is in town, there is no country, so everyone is in a jurisdiction. My guy was happy about it. Made it sound like I could start selling tomorrow. In passing he said I should contact MDAR for more info. No rules are posted anywhere online. Our state does this for everything. It's one reason people are so stupid about shooting coyotes (fish and wildlife can GIVE you a copy of the laws, but you can not have them as a member of the general public without asking). If the state does post laws for the public, what you can get are abridged and incomplete. On this there is nothing. MDAR informed me I have to have a separate plumbed, 100% washable milk room with hot water and a drain installed, two sinks, at least two stands. They informed me they want me to machine milk as their preference. I will not. Pounds sand. I breed goats for hand milking (plus, so easy to become unsanitary of cleaning is not complete) And that I have to have monthly inspections that I must pass or be put out of business and fined each time in addition to monthly bacterial counts and that the count must be below the count for pasteurized milk after pasteurization (food scientist mother in law says pasteurized milk is often "dirty", so may be attainable). They gave me a rather informal looking pdf document with the "rules" on it from several years ago. It states all this is regardless of quantity sold. They told me nothing about cost, which was my question contacting them, totally blowing it off but if I've learned anything here, it's that the state foots nothing, you pay everything here so you'd better be affluent or ready to go in the hole. We aren't affluent or stupid enough to just jump into a dark void (erm, not paying mortgage, retirement, not having enough for emergencies in a family of kids isn't worth it) I need to know HOW MUCH, monthly cost, not to have an inspector invite herself over to my house to tell me how I fail long before I've even decided if it's wise to get ready. I still milk in my freaking barn alley with goats standing in the stalls popping their head over conversing with the milk-ee, nagging her to be done for crying out loud.

DH thinks we could have a passable milk room up for $5k or less. He's willing to drop that if we prepare for it. I have no desire to do this if the cost for testing and inspections is higher than the sale of milk+feed+bedding+what I allow for yearly surprise expenses like vet visit, forget profit. They haven't been straight with me on the matter of money, so I don't want anything to do with them.

I do want to do DHIA testing at some point. It's a cool goat thing you can do to show your herd's potential without too much biosecurity risk, but I wasn't planning on it this year, and I still need that cost quantified before diving in.

I don't understand why it's being blown off that I_ need_ to run those numbers before I agree to anything as a potential business owner. Farming isn't pie in the sky dreaming. I come from IOWA. Farming is data and numbers with variables such as weather and nature thrown in to be compensated for or you don't even have a prayer of staying in business. We'd keep the "farm" thanks to DH's high paying, high stress, wonder how long it will last job, but it wouldn't be a farm here really if it can't at least pay for itself (If it makes $1 of actual profit, I'd call it a farm).

But I guess this is the state that charges you 5 years of back taxes if you move after claiming any farming tax exemptions, on soil so poor that I have no idea how anyone gets anything out of it (hay guy's fam has been tilling and manuring fields for 307 years, so I guess that's how they get anything out of it), and apparently it's fairly normal to receive almost no rain all year here, all with sky high taxes to boot (that they do nothing with?). I guess I'm supposed to be a gentleman farmer, hobby farm dreamer and that's all they want to allow anyone to be. As long as they pump money and "power" into their system. Personally I'd like cash out to equal or almost equal cash in, especially before dropping so much of it to come into "compliance" and consenting to dropping an unknown amount more on a monthly basis.

Husband jokes we may need a lawyer to get them to come clean. He'd better be joking.

Anyway, that's my milk situation. Stepping down from the rant box.

Milk room would go on as an addition on the back of the barn, btw. Not sure how the plumbing would work with our septic there and we'd probably have to dig away some of the hillside with machinery and remove some 50' weed trees that shouldn't be there, but it would go there.

So anyway, I sell poop and spent bedding when I'm not hoarding it for myself. Sure hope that's not illegal.
When my mini fridge comes I'll go back to trying to sell eggs (no holds so you can not come at an undisclosed time, no "orders of 12 dozen to fill" by this date, no "surrender the cheap eggs" just a little fridge on the porch with eggs in it, first come, first serve when you let me know you're coming so I can put stuff out occasionally). For all I know they require you to be tested and NPIP for that too, but I don't want to check.


----------



## farmerjan

Requirements for dairying are ridiculous.... but understand that most/some/many people that are "making a conscious choice to want to drink raw milk because it is healthier"  are not that well educated and the first thing that they do is sue someone because they get sick.  I know that many do raw milk for the health benefits, and are well aware of the risks and such.  But the laws are there because they have to protect the miniscule part  of society that is too stupid to use their brain.  Like the one getting burned from a cup of HOT COFFEE..... those idiots. 
I am not trying to defend Mass laws.... or any other stupid laws because I think that the biggest problem is people don't and won't take responsibility for themselves.  But we are not dealing with sensible people or situations any more.  We are in a nanny state (no pun intended)  and people have to be protected against things they don't "get" because they are too dumb to understand what they want and the risks that are associated. 
Have you read any of @babsbag journey into the making of the goat dairy in Ca?  She went through he// with the regulations, and after getting it all up and going, with the snow that collapsed her barn, help problems that caused so much grief with getting the kids fed, and then her health problems and she finally sold it all.  She made it on trailers, so it could be moved, and met all the regs in Ca....
I am not suggesting that you go "commercial"  , but for cleanliness reasons, they want the milk to go directly from the goat teat into a sanitized stainless steel container with no access to the air, or falling hair or dirt or hay strands or anything else getting into it. 
I hear you on the pasteurized milk being "dirty".... again, much of that is due to scc in the milk before it is pasteurized.  That is why the commercial milk companies pay a premium to dairies with low scc because the milk will have a longer shelf life at the store.  SCC occurs in every drop of milk.... in order to have a healthy udder and all, it is a part of life just like a certain amount of bacteria is needed to have a healthy gut tract and it isn't all good.  It has to be balanced.  But that is one of the reasons that most of the dairy farmers do DHIA test..... for the scc counts on each cow.... Other things like pounds produced is important, and record keeping is simpler when we compile everything in one place for comparison and purebred registered cows need the records as "proof" of their production and all so that when they sell an animal, there is more than the farmers word to go on as far as production records.....

Bacteria counts are very important to every dairy farmer that "ships" milk.  "Plate count" has to be under a certain number or they will get a visit from their field rep (from the milk company they are shipping to)  and they try to find where there could be an "unclean spot" in say the milk line.... The farmer can get shut down from shipping milk with a high bacteria count.  
I doubt that 5 G will get the room done and all the requirements met. As soon as you got it done, they would then question the septic being able to handle the water and solutions that are needed to wash and sanitize the milking equipment.  Then they will question your handling of the milk and bottling.... believe me there is alot.  

I think that FTCLDF might be a better site for you to see the "legalities" and requirements.  I would strongly suggest that you do a "goat share" or something like that and have a "restricted" group that gets milk.  OR give it away when someone pays you 10/doz for eggs.....

Conn was the same, we were in a town, the county lines were there from the "old days" and very little was county jurisdiction.  So yes, you have to meet their rules and regs.  Even if the county was in control, if you live within the town area, you are subject to those rules first, then the county then the state. 

You are in a "hobby farm" area, farming is no longer a viable business in most all the New England states unless, like the hay guy, they have been there since the pilgrims and they have managed to hang on to the land.  
And let me tell you that there are now some serious situations with some of the herbicides used on hay... for some of the terribly invasive weeds, that have residual effects, and the manure from the animals eating this hay, and the spoiled hay used as mulch, can carry the residual effects of the herbicide and kill your garden....If you are not 100% sure of where the hay comes from, you need to be careful....so now you have to be concerned that the goat poop doesn't kill the plants it is used to fertilize.  
We use very little herbicide on our hay.  But there are times when we are having an invasion of "sand briars" and johnson grass that we have used sprays.... people don't want that in their hay because they don't want to pay for weeds.... but the opposite side of the coin is what are they doing with the "product out the other end of the animal"?  Everyone wants manure straight from the cow/goat/rabbit/sheep/horse,  mixed in to a nice compost.... but there could be repercussions to that too. 
There are some "organic" ways to combat these invasive weeds, and often the timing of cutting and such really helps... but the weather has made it difficult to get hay made when it will benefit the fields too by cutting with some weeds in a stage that will help to kill them off;  pre seeding stage but close to it so the roots are not fed and they seed heads cannot spread seed.... in essence starving the plant.  Years ago, with big families, you used to go out with a hoe and actually manually chop and dig out things like thistles....Who do you see doing that anymore?????

So when you find "certified organic" products, realize that there is alot more "man hours" in it and that is why it is so much more expensive too....one person can only do so much in a day, even if they work 8 straight hours.....it is back breaking work and in hot weather and such it is impossible to keep up with some of it.  So it naturally costs more than being able to treat a 20 acre field with an hours worth of tractor time spraying and $10 worth of spray ( not exact... just an example for comparison)


----------



## rachels.haven

You bring up valid points, I appreciate that. That totally sounds like this state, and people here. Thank you for "defending" the laws. Sadly, we may just want to move first before I do milk. Those were my original feelings, but I figured I'm biased and DH was hopeful...and still hates moving.

I could always do the egg idea. Herdshares would get me in trouble. The other milking lady in town "trades" and barters her milk supposedly. I don't know how that works for her but I hope it does somehow. She's bred nice udders on her nigerians. Plus, she's tough as nails and needs to get by.

I'll also ask the hay guy about herbicide usage. It hasn't hurt my berries and figs, but I know how that goes. The goat manure does make the lawn go crazy. I could write my initials in spent bedding in the lawn and have it come up in green monster grass (and monster lawn weeds) in a few weeks, so I'm hopeful. Also herbicides are pricy, and a lot of his hay goes to feed my hay man's beef herd and sheep. I'll make sure to keep veggie gardening out of my ad especially, possibly permanently, but definitely while I do my homework, testing and questioning.
Thank you.


----------



## Ridgetop

Farmer Jan is in the right of it when she says you will not get a Grade a dairy parlor up and operating for $5000.  You will need stainless equipment, milking machines, storage facilities, refrigeration facilities, and a lot more.  Also, a large farm or dairy liability insurance policy which may be a problem with your current insurer since unless you are licensed and zoned as a farm or agribusiness they might want to cancel your homeowners insurance.  Read Overthemoon's journal to see all the headaches she had to go through to get her dairy up and running.  She is in California as am I and when I found out what it would take to operate as a dairy, I backed away and found other ways to utilize my goat milk.  Every surface touched by the milk must be stainless steel and food grade, you have to have coveralls and hair nets when working with the milk.  your refrigeration space must have a thermometer and be kept below a minimum temperature so the inspector can check the temperature when they come.  Lots of other regulations as to what cleaning products you can or must use and paperwork as well.  Oh yes and don't forget that you have to have a dishwasher in the milk house to sterilize all the stainless stuff too.

With a minimum of 12 standard dairy does milking for 10 months, all of them high yielders or star does, we had a daily production average of 12-14 gallons per day for that 10 month period.  I had a full size fridge (one of the cold drink cases you see in the  markets) to store my milk, which I kept in gallon sized glass jars DH would get from delis where his crew would go for lunch.  Milk tastes better if stored in glass, and the wide mouths on the jars fit the gallon stainless steel milk strainer perfectly.  I was running 3 pasteurizers every day, 2 of which also heat treated colostrum.  While we drank our house milk unpasteurized, we pasteurized and bottle fed all the kids to prevent CAE which can occur from exposure to other goats.  We took the buck kids to the auction at 6-8 weeks.  By the way if you pasteurize a trick is to put a drop of blue or green fool color into the milk so you know what is pasteurized and which is not.  I only pasteurized in the morning running the pasteurizers for 4-5 hours a day, so I had to hold the unpasteurized milk overnight.  Blue milk meant we could immediately see what to feed the goats kids. Bucks in the dairy world are worthless and only worth meat value.  That value was minimal years ago at $15-20/hd.  Now with the ethnic population the value of milk fed goat kids has gone into the $150 range.  We had 2 milking machines and put 4 does at a time in the 4 goat stanchion DH had built.  Milking took over an hour every morning and again every evening. We were fast, meticulous on sanitizing, udder washing before and after, and teat dipping after each milking.  The milk lines and inflations were brought to the house each day after each milking am and pm, washed, and sterilized.  We did weekly mastitis tests just in case, blood testing annually for CAE and diseases, and vaccinations.  I finally resorted to canning the milk since I ran out of freezer space.  Remember that I had 4 children who were good farm workers at that time who could  handle all the equipment except the pasteurizers, and our whole family was involved in this work.   Even a semi-commercial dairy is *lots of work*.  When the last of the chidren went to college and sold their dairy herd 

If you have a lot of milk - more than you can use in the house - there are other uses for it.  You can raise pigs and calves.  Is there a dairy in driving distance?  If so, check about buying day old bull calves.  You have to be careful about them getting colostrum since most dairymen just chuck the bull calves into a holding pen for the "calf man" to ick up every day.  Depending on the dairy they might sell you some colostrum and you can buy extra to put in the freezer.  Colostrum can't go into the bulk milk tanks so they have the newly freshened cows milking separately.  The "calf man" usually buys all the colostrum and medicated milk from the dairies to feed the calves, but you can save some of your goat colostrum as a backup.  

When we were milking 12 to 20 dairy goats (standard, not dwarf or Nigies) we had so much milk that we would buy our calves from a 4-H friend that had a large dairy an hour away.  _She would  make sure that the calves she sold us had their colostrum.   If you are not sure the calves have had colostrum you can give them some LA200.  Save your 2nd and 3rd day colostrum from your goats to give to the calves.  _We would pick up 2-3 bull calves at a time and feed them 2 quarts of goat milk am and 2 quarts pm.  By the time they were a month old they were eating all the left over alfalfa stems our girls turned up their picky noses at.  At 2 months we loaded those pretty shiny Holstein calves into the trailer and made the one hour trip to the cattle auction.  At the auction the calves sold as one lot.  I got more for my Holstein 2 month old calves than a lot of people got for their Angus looking calves, mainly because on all that rich got milk, my calves were fat, sassy, and had no scours or manure on their butts.  It paid for most of our hay since I could turn over 3 calves every couple of months.  During fair time, my kids raised veal calves for auction - no hay or grain just as much milk as they would drink - up to 300 lbs. or 3 months old.  We also fed excess milk to our pigs.  Soak a bucket of corn in got milk in the am and feed the sitting bucket at pm, do the same at night and feed in the morning. 

Since you can't sell your milk, use it to produce either meat for your freezer or a product you can sell.  Of course those Massachusetts people might react unfavorably if you advertised hand raised veal calves or pork.  The trick too, is to sell the animal *live* and then deliver it to the butcher for free as a sweetener.  You can usually put up ads for your hand raised livestock at the butcher's too.  This will be cheaper and just as profitable as putting $20,000 into a Grade A dairy facility.  That amount is more in line when you consider that all equipment must be food grade, you must have hot and cold water, electricity, lighting, plumbing, concrete floors with drain channels, and walls that can be hosed down.  You can't get away with chipboard interiors.   MA gets *very *cold so you will need some sort of heating as well as extra insulation in the dairy room in the winter too.   

Another trick is to only sell your pasteurized milk privately.  In this case you would *CHARGE FOR THE CONTAINER ONLY AND NOT THE MILK WHICH WOULD BE GIVEN AWAY. * I preferred raising the calves because I got tired of people wanting to come on my property and treating the visit as a petting zoo opportunity for their children.  A waste of my day.  Also you still run the risk of lawsuits from litigious people.  I sold milk occasionally for orphaned puppies and foals, but i let everyone know that selling milk for human consumption was illegal in California and the milk was only for animal consumption.  I would write that on the container too.

A commercial Grade A dairy has a lot of liability.  That is why the rules are so stringent.  When buying raw milk privately you are taking a chance that the seller did not test her dairy animals, use the proper sanitation methods in milking, straining or refrigerating the milk.  Milk needs to be chilled to a certain temperature within so many hours to avoid growth of bacteria.  These rules are designed to prevent that.  Milk testing of herds (like Farmerjan does) keeps track not only of the volume of milk from each animal, but also butterfat%, milk solids, and any somatic cell counts that may show infection or bacterial problems in the milk.  This is all for the consumer's health protection.   

DHIR milk testing can be done without a complete Grade A milk room since it is only for ADGA.  This is how milk stars are earned.  You will get the cell counts, butterfat %, somatic cell counts, etc. but you will have to find someone who will agree to go to the classes and act as your tester.  I had a friend go to the classes with me and paid for her class.  She was a fellow 4-H mother whose daughters were in the dairy goat project.  She and her family were also our milkers when we went on our yearly beach camping holiday.

Selling the manure is a great idea.  you can also compost is in a bin and start an earthworm farm.  Earthworm loan is highly valuable to gardeners who will pay more for the earthworms to add to their garden.  If you are finding it easy to sell the goat compost in Craigslist, you might want to invest in some large labels with a disclaimer on them stating the manure is only for landscape gardens, not for food gardens, and absolving you of liability from any misuse of the product.


----------



## rachels.haven

Clearly we should just move to Tennessee or a similar state and do herd shares. Lol, I feel lied to. Whatever though. One more reason to get out of here, I guess.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

In case you are interested, here is a link to Miss Babsbag's journal: https://www.backyardherds.com/threads/jumping-the-moon-dairy-the-next-chapter.31123/.  I must warn you, though -- reading that journal may make you as exhausted as reading Miss @farmerjan's journal.  I don't mean it is boring.  Instead, I mean she worked as hard at getting her dairy going as Miss Farmerjan does now.  I would be exhausted simply from reading about all the work she did.

I thought of you today as I watched the latest video on the YouTube channel "MN Millennial Farmer".  The video is about the derecho that went through Iowa last week.  Didn't you reside in Iowa for awhile?  In case you are interested, here is a link to the video:






Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

@Senile_Texas_Aggie , yes I did. The wind there is to be respected. In some places it never stops blowing. When it picks up it can be like a solid wall against you. Not a lot of trees. One of the last years I was there they had another massive wind incident and it blew the giant stone chimney down on a cabin where an encampment of cub scouts were sheltering from the storm and killed several. The same storm took out our windbreak of ancient cedars, and turned me into a bird rehabber because you couldn't walk 5 feet without finding turned out nests and no "rescue" would take them unless they were endangered, and they wanted me to euthanize. I was just grateful my brothers missed that scout camp, and I got up with the sun at 4 am to feed fledgling bluejay babies before the resident cats got them until fall (I liked keeping them semi wild until their instincts kicked in and "are you my mommy" syndrome went away and they would  pair off and leave so they could flock up and learn from their wild friends, but still get fed a natural amount of time).

I miss it there, even the constant wind, bitter snowy winters, and laughably humid summers. Magical cool nights, and as long as it wasn't chigger season, plenty of open space to go walk in and few ticks. Small, walkable, towns on grids. Only things that would prevent me from going back would probably be my allergies to alfalfa and other greenery that ran beautifully rampant, and maybe the meth epidemic if that's still going on. Knowing how slowly the time moves there it probably is.

Lots of accountability for your and your family's actions in those small towns too, which they sure don't have much of here. That coin has two sides depending on who your family is.

EtA: and the wind DOES howl there when it gets bad and doesn't stop.


----------



## farmerjan

I had heard about the storm but hadn't seen the damage.  Thank you @Senile_Texas_Aggie  for posting it.  I honestly haven't been on the computer much except to come on here, and do a little banking and bill paying, with all the things that I have been trying to do and get set up at the new house. 
We had a derechio go through here about 8 years ago?    We were out of power for 5 days.... right around the 30th of June and got power on July 4th about 2 in the afternoon.  Switched back and forth with my son with the generator to keep all the fridge & freezers running.... I was farm sitting and he had a whole house generator that automatically kicked on, so was able to go there and take a shower.  I spent the better part of the day hauling water to pastures that had wells that wouldn't run without the electricity..... son was tied up with VDOT for 12 hour days removing trees and whatever.... they had so many of the locals with dump trucks hired to haul trees and debris.... 
It was a tough deal but we got through it.   But there wasn't the same crop damage as in the corn belt states with the flat expanse of land.... 
My heart goes out to those guys yet they seem to be accepting as it seems that the winds out there are pretty common but not to that extreme.  This is going to affect cattle prices down the road because where are they going to store all this grain that will be harvested with all these bins down.... It will get trucked to wherever they can find, costs will go up.  
Everyone should realize that feed prices will be going up as a result of this too.  And our cattle prices for the feeder calves will go down because they will be paying more for feed so will have to adjust to paying less for the calves since they work on such a small margin....
It is all so interconnected, not just within a certain area or community, but throughout the whole country.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep. Corn is king and beans are queen. That's why price is on the radio every morning (there).


----------



## rachels.haven

Btw, rut is here this morning. Lots of drunk bucks in the buck pen "helping themselves" and grunting and roaring to prove who exactly is the beastliest...you know, half men half goats probably weren't invented because the Greeks and Romans thought goats were cute. How very characteristic of them. I moved the buck hay racks so I don't have to go in the pen anymore. I don't need to be peed on.

Anyway, Patrick in the breeding pen is not rutty. He is rarely rutty. I do think he got his first doe this year last night, so maybe we'll get SOME Patrick babies from that well behaved guy. I may need to give him a whole 2 doe cycles to get all 4 covered. He's, um, a gentleman. Without the other bucks he has hardly any smell at all. He does love Ava though...as his bff, which may not result in her being bred, but one can hope-cuddle buddies and all. Cause she's the buckiest one and it feels like home in the buck pen when they hang out.


----------



## Ridgetop

If you are worried about Patrick not covering the does try a marking harness.  If he is a standard dairy buck, it will fit since they are adjustable.  I have tried a lot of them over the years and after selling up when the youngest 2 went to college, I had given away my old standbys 15 years ago, I had to buy new ones several years ago.  I ordered new marking harnesses, from several 3 different suppliers, The first one would not stay on the sheep, the adjustable nylon webbing was narrow and kept working out of the adjustable buckles.  The second one was the same, and then broke  The third harness I ordered was like the first 2 and was unusable also even though we tied the ends of the straps together to prevent them working loose,  By the end of the third day the ram ended up with the harness partially off and his foreleg was caught in it so he was hopping on 3 legs!  Al these marking harnesses, different brands fro 3 major suppliers were made the same way.  1" thin nylon webbing with adjustable buckles.  None of them stayed in place on the rams, even though they all had a good review.  My old marking harnesses that I had given away   were made of thicker and wider webbing and worked great all the years I used them.  

Still in the search for a good marking harness I found the Matingmark harness.  It is made n New Zealand or Australia.  The selling feature was that instead of pinning in the crayon you just had to slide it in and it clipped in  I didn't care about that as much as the basic fact, would it stay in place on the rams?  There were several U tube videos     and the harness webbing looked to be wide enough so I bought one with several crayons  It was not much more than the others and I had already spent a lot on the 3 other non-working harnesses.  

The Matingmark harness was great.  It stayed in place.  The ram marked all the ewes just fine.  Every 2 weeks I replace the crayons for a different color in order to show that the ewes have recycled and remarked.  We didn't have to remove the harnesses to do it.  Just unclipped the old crayon and snapped in the new one!   Replacing the crayon with a different color every 2-3 weeks helps me keep track of projected lambing dates.  I don't field lamb since the coyote threat even with 3 Anatolians is so high.  I need to keep track of lambing dates to move ewes into the jugs. (This is a personal preference rising from when we raised dairy goats, whose kids never had a chance to nurse even colostrum.  I pasteurized and heat treated everything.)

Matingmark has an XL size for those huge Hamp and Suffolk rams but I have Dorpers and they shed their wool so I didn't need the XL.  Most other brands of crayons will work in the harness too if you already have them like I did.  A couple  had a plastic lip that was too high for the cli on arrangement.  I did drill one breast plate to take a crayon with a pin but no longer need that.  I now order only the Matingmark crayons since I can get multiple packs on Amazon Prime, and they are the same or less $$ than other brands.  They also come in Hot, Mild, and Cold temperature texture so you don't have the crayons melting uselessly down the ram's legs in summer.  My Dorpers breed every 8 months so sometimes, like now, they are breeding in 100+ degree temps.  

After reading this, I realize that it reads like an ad for Matingmark.   I don't have any stock in the company or work for it, but this is the best harness I have found on the market.  I now have 3 of them since I have 3 rams, all in different breeding pens right now.  Using breeding harnesses really cuts down on the work load.  No need to check each ewe's udders or ligaments (I have18 bred ewes) constantly to figure out which ewes are due to lamb.  Just write down the marking date(s) and then figure out the projected lambing/kidding dates and put those on the calendar.  I love using marking harnesses.  You never miss a breeding either as long s the ram has a usable crayon.

FYI:  Another reason to replace the crayon every 2-3 weeks is that even if the crayon is not getting used by mounting ewes, it does wear down and get clogged with dirt and gravel when the ram lays down to cud and sleep.  If you have have lush meadow pastures for your sheep it might last longer, I have dirt and scrub.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh man, a harness would be awesome. I could mark breeding dates on the calendar better that way, with no more bum checks. Patrick is unfortunately a dwarf, but maybe there are some options out there. Maybe I can mark the does with smearable paint or something if I can't find a harness for the buck like Sandi Brock on youtube does. Time to go looking around for options.

And as a side note, our neighbor down the hill appears to have taken on our barn cats. The cats only show up every once in a while for a snack now, I assume when they get out of the house, then they run back over the hill and faaaaar away. This has been going on for a while. I don't really care that much. The cats have chosen. Barncat rescue seems to be happy with it and offered me another pair whenever I'm ready. I'll probably check to make sure the neighbors actually want the two Clydes, tell them they can have them if they do, and start over. I guess I made them too friendly. The cats may have also missed living in a colony, as I think the neighbors have another cat or two, but it still makes me wonder what they're feeding them to turn them into such devoted pets.

The place that did my goat disbudding also has a litter of barncat kittens I've been put on the list for pickup in a month or so when they're weaned, assuming there are enough. They are handled regularly, so they are friendly so I may be able to keep them collared as a visible marker they're owned, but I'll have to get them vaccinated and fixed myself so more cost. Plus, they'll be young and the risk of them getting eaten is greater. We'll see.

The rats are back in the barn, btw. Really big not afraid of you ones that somehow have gotten the better of my electric trap, so I have to dream up something and disappear them.


----------



## Ridgetop

CATS  CHOSE THEIR OWN HOMES!    

None of our feral cats which we adopted on the feral cat relocation program have stuck around.  Our last tame kitten belonging to my youngest daughter deserted us for the neighbor who fed her regularly thinking she was a stray.  _They _now own a beautiful calico cat.  We have also tried to get kittens, but the old days of people with boxes of kittens for adoption in front of the markets disappeared long ago.  My children knew they never had to ask "Can we have one" then, they just each picked out their favorites and took them home.

Sadly we are inundated with ground squirrels (although we have now caught and disposed of 2 more making a total of 5, rabbits that gnaw the bottom of the hay bales causing a danger of the hay stack toppling over on us (2 disposed of) and RATS!  We have to order rat traps since apparently they can escape from our Squirrelinator.  Glue traps are not heavy duty enough to hold them, and the old fashioned snap rat traps will take off a dog's nose.   

As for the cost of spaying, doesn't your feral cat relocation program do that first?  Ours neuters the cats,  gives them shots, and cuts off the tip of one ear to ID them.  If yours won't or if you are getting kittens from another source, call the spay and neuter program in your local town.  In MA all those PC people should have one.  Most of the spay and neuter clinics do it cheap, using several vet students to do the work under the supervision of 1 vet.  They also often provide cheap vaccinations.  I only used to do rabies after the first year since it was difficult to catch the cats.  Rabies I am particular about since it is a big problem in the border states.  You can also call the vet college and see if they would like to practice on your cats and do it for nothing.  Our last 2 litters of cats we caught and gave a friend whose friend was in vet school  Her friend took the cats to school and they used them in their lesson on spaying and neutering.  Got 8 cats and kittens neutered for free that way.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh, it makes me feel better that your feral cats didn't stick around either. Thanks for sharing.

Absolutely. The feral cat program does alter all their cats. All I pay for is the FIV test I request. The cats from the fellow goat breeder would be all on me, which is fine. I'll check for a spay neuter program if there's a pair of kittens for us. That's an excellent idea. The barn cat rescue may even be able to give me contacts. They don't want any extras from us. I'd want the kittens ear tipped too. They's still be barn cats.

Rabies will need to be done asap here. It's BIG in Massachusetts. The same neighbor who has the cats got bit by a rabies positive bat recently. He said the bite hurt, the shots hurt, but the bill hurt 1000x more. I will happily pay for any of our cats to get it done before release since we all want to live here. Kittens will be staying in the house or kenneled until their shots are done (forget my allergies). Barn cats come done and stay in the acclimation suite until a little after shots are effective.

I have a live trap for squirrels and weaselie sized things I'm going to try on this cat sized rodent as my next trick. What I saw today was too big for a snap trap. Must. kill. rats.

What can you do about ground squirrels? They sound pesky.


----------



## rachels.haven

We are getting some rain today. I'm hoping it's enough to wet the ground down. We've either been pretty much skipped completely this year, or only been given enough rain to dampen things, and when I go to weed the garden I discover the ground is powder and I still need to water.


----------



## Baymule

I hate rats. There are videos on youtube on making water traps. Since a rat or mouse can jump really high, you put water in a trash can so their feet can't touch bottom and they drown. There are all kinds of lures to get the rats/mice over the trash can.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ooo, I forgot about that. That is an excellent idea too. I think I've got a spare plastic can left by the last people too.

Had a fun night tonight. At 3:30 am night owl DH started hearing something knocking around in the barn so we went out to check. Saffron's doeling, the only doeling we got this year. was down unresponsive and convulsing so we rang the vet and called her away from her family to throw spaghetti at something neither of us can identify. She got valium, antibiotics, thiamine, a steroid and prayers.

Fingers crossed she's alive and better by morning.
No more stuff is allowed to happen in this journal today. Too tired.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Hope she's doing better!


----------



## rachels.haven

No, sorry, lost her some time between 9 and 9:30. Lost my first non newborn or still born goat.

Time to see how to dispose of an animal in a place I'm not supposed to dig on (stupid laws). Not that we could dig. Too much bedrock. I hope her body is not contagious. I should probably hurry.

Darn it, this is going to hurt when it's over.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

So sorry you lost her.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

That's   darn sad,  I am so sorry ...


----------



## Baymule

I’m so sorry that you lost her.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. That was a long day on multiple fronts.

Vet suggested seeing if a pet crematorium would take her or taking her to UConn for necropsy with included disposal. After a very early morning with little sleep after (and dH staying up all night, so he couldn't drive either), we found a place 45 minutes away to do it for $100. UCon is 1.5 hours away, too far and not enough sleep (also $275, but knowledge would be nice).

Body's gone, I'm still sad, but that's life.
Next week the wethers go. Our appt is confirmed. Then we'll be done with our 2020 kids. Luckily all their names are things like, Wetherby, Wedder the Wether, White Guy, and Orange Guy. They've been slotted from birth for their purpose, so less sad. More like a relief.


----------



## Ridgetop

It is a shame to lose a kid  Particularly a doe kid.  Did the vet have _any_ idea what happened?  Could it have been a bite from a poisonous spider or snake?  The symptoms sound really bizarre with seizures and convulsions.  Here we have dead animal pickup for free.  They will take any thing up to the size of a goat or sheep which are about the size of giant breed dogs.  For our horses we have a local man, second generation, who hoists them onto his flatbed and takes them to the rendering and disposal plant.  Illegal to bury them here too, although the main reason we don't is that you can hardly get  ick into the ground much less a shovel to dig a hole large enough!

I probably wouldn't bother fixing the kittens from your friend's cat litter.  I would take a female and let her have kittens in the barn.  Fun for the children, and a continuing source of rat catchers for you.  Definitely rabies shots but we never gave our barn cats any vaccines.  We have a lot of coyotes here and a cat's life is usually short.  Except for old Tom who lived to 18 years of age in the barn.  We did not pamper him with food, just some dry kibble occasionally and he caught the rats, mice, baby bunnies, and occasional lizards,  Probably the ground squirrels too.  

To catch the ground squirrels we bought a "Squirrelinator" trap which worked like a dream.  Just don't let the LGDs get to it!  Unfortunately the trap is too big for rats which simply ooe in, eat the bait, and ooze out again.  We have ordered a "Ratinator" from the same manufacturer.  You do have to be willing to dispatch the captured pests yourself since it is a live trap.  I have no problem killing the creatures once they are trapped.


----------



## rachels.haven

See...I'm not crazy...rending trucks and animal collection still exist! I've been feeling crazy on that lately. Those were important services where I grew up too. What a preposterous idea! I'm afraid I can't imagine composting with all the bears and coyotes around. That would be like a buffet, possibly even if we could dig to 6 feet. Then they'd hang around! Safety 101...and yeah, we can't dig more than a few inches without machinery because of the rocks, not that I won't try when it comes to planting my trees. I just have to adjust my plans if it's too rocky.

That's a good idea on the barn cats. That is probably what my friend is doing with her barn cats. Good barn cats are hard to find. We'll see what's available in the litter and how that goes down.

So, I forgot to mention, I put about 10 eggs out in two silkie nests for two silkie hens on Sunday. One hen kept switching nests, the other is not super committal yet...so I put all 20 in one nest. Ehehehehehe. So I have 20 silkie eggs under one silkie now. Somehow that little chicken got bigger. Wonder what she's going to think when they start popping out...They didn't have a great hatch rate in my bad incubator, so I've got to stack the odds in our favor, right? Candling at 9 day, and I'll take out the clears. That number should go down. I doubt she can heat them all forever.

Time to go out and face the day.


----------



## rachels.haven

And no, the vet had no clue what it was. Honestly that scares me most of all. Saffron, the Doe's mother has been a little depressed and thin since she had coccidia and not eating grain, but plenty of hay, all dried up udder, and rejecting grain and alfalfa, but nothing really to show the vet though (good famacha and the scours gone). Am I going to lose her too?

...although she had a fully blown cocci-party with all the guests/symptoms, I keep telling myself. And she has started filling out again after switching to second cut hay. And adult recovery should take time. The doeling was fat, healthy, vigorous without and coccidia symptoms(got her prevention anyway because of the adults getting sick). She went light on her food the day before, skipped it that evening (still ate a cookie) and then bam, death throws, vet visit, and gone the next morning.


----------



## Ridgetop

Those are really strange symptoms.  Too bad you couldn't do a necropsy.  Hopefully Saffron will perk up and survive.


----------



## rachels.haven

I was grumpy yesterday, but Buggy's always happy to see me. His eyes tend to get HUGE when he sees me. There's probably a thought bubble involving food and does up there, but he's 200lbs of cute anyway. He's not always cooperative for breeder style, stacked pictures (read: I don't know what I'm doing) but whatever.


----------



## rachels.haven

Rebanded Lace's only remaining scur, did all tattooing I got behind on minus half of saffron's tail so I can see how it turned out (she's so thin and I don't know why, but I wormed her with novel prohibit yesterday, because if it's not worms, IDK what else to do+she was a little pale), broke up Patrick and his girlfriends. I'll add the other dwarf does tonight then we'll wait ten days before adding Durango as the cleanup/next breeder for the other does. Patrick has great eyelid color, but the other bucks need some wormer and all need hoof trimming.

The dwarf does could use a little pedicure love too, or at least they should. Ava's doelings seem to always have perfect feet-bad attitude, low maintenance tootsies. Now they have green faces too. I might wait for that to dry before giving them a chance to decorate me.

We are now getting lots of rain. Trees are starting to turn colors, but I'm hoping it's not too little too late.

Well, you know how Lace the lamancha is a crazy snot? A friend of mine bought a doeling from that breeder recently and it turns out that doeling is also a "mad" crazy snot and she's got softball sized bruises up and down her arms now from the doeling boxing her as she tries to handle her (and breeder won't take her back apparently). I think that breeder somehow produces wild snot goats.
On that note, Lace has been not sucking for me lately actually. She still has a rubber udder and smallish orifices, but she's sticking to routine better. Having one fewer scur/horn/weapon seems to have improved her attitude. Funny how that works.

Anyway, it' time to go take DH out for Dairy Queen to celebrate his product launching and going into use. He's a little fried, but the idea of a blizzard seems to perk him up.


----------



## Baymule

Our Dairy Queen recently built a brand new and updated DQ right next to the old one. Covid close down/drive thru only was the perfect time to do it. New one is open, they tore down the old one. It’s hard to beat DQ, unless it’s Whataburger.


----------



## Bruce

And here they've closed all the DQs, no Whataburger anywhere (though I have to say I wasn't all that impressed when I went to one).


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, that's too bad, @Bruce . They probably should close them here, along with schools and as much opportunity to spread things as possible. Mass has a chance at control of this covid thing and the general feel here is that the storm is over, which leaves me feeling kind of like we're sitting ducks. Not sure it's necessary or wise to open indoor dining, bars, or schools with 3' student spacing. I feel like we watched part of this happen already in Ca and now Ca is topping the charts and it won't be long for us under current circumstances.

That being said, our DQ was an outdoor pickup window with all the masks and rules and safety shield windows in place to protect the workers. I bet VT could get away with that-maybe even on limited staff so there's even less exposure? But whatever I guess...

As I type this, I realize this whole situation is lousy and lonely. We need a vaccine, or a month to six weeks of strict control measures to wipe it out (painful though). 2020 is turning out to be one lonely year.


----------



## Bruce

When I say closed, I mean permanently gone, some years ago. Almost all of the Friendly's went the same way. And many Pizza Huts.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh no! Not Friendly's! Guess we're never moving to VT. Those were dh's favorite childhood restaurant(and they're never packed here, so it wouldn't surprise me if they aren't doing well).
But on a more serious note, wow, that's rough. General decrease or lack of business over recent years? 
In any case, that must feel a little odd. Those pop up like mushrooms anywhere else. We don't use any of those much, but there always seems to be one within an hour here, which is good for the location. They're nice to have around for those 2-3 times a year we go out with kids and don't want it McDonald'sish or too formal.


----------



## Bruce

There is 1 Friendly's left in Vermont, in Williston (near Burlington). The one in Colchester is now a CVS. There used to be one in Brattleboro off Exit 3, there was a Pizza Hut there as well. We stopped at one of them for lunch after picking DD2 up from Riding camp (in NH) for many years. The PH is now an Urgent care place. If the Google street view image capture date is correct the Friendly's is abandoned with a chain link fence around it.

We used to have A&Ws as well. YEARS AND YEARS ago we'd go to one for lunch from work on occasion. It closed and was replaced with a quick lube place. The only VT A&W that I know of is in Middlebury and it is still a drive in, not open in the winter.

We had an Arby's YEARS ago, closed and became a Blockbuster (shows how long ago that was). Now it is a 5 guys. I think that is the only "something turned into a new restaurant" I can think of.


----------



## rachels.haven

GASP. (DH would be scandalized)
Actually, that reminds me of where I grew up, except instead of replacing businesses in the buildings they'd just go vacant until somehow they would be "given away" for $5 if anyone wanted them (my guess is the landlords stopped paying mortgage and beat it when the rent stopped and the cascade of ownership went from there). People usually didn't want the buildings so the town slowly got less and less full but still got by somehow. There weren't lots of choices of food or shopping in town...or within about an hour's drive. Not sure what it's like now, but rural places don't change quickly (outside of businesses closing, apparently), so it's probably the same. 

I hope 5 guys is doing it for you, since that's what you've got, sounds like. We had two pizza places in town that tried to hang on for the longest time (and got closed soon after I went to college for health code violations), a chinese restaurant an immigrant family opened right before I left, and a BK and McD that opened around the same time as the chinese place. One of the two hotels nearby tried to run a diner if that counts. No clue what's left now. The hotel may have had yet another fire. I may have to google maps that and see who's still around. 

There weren't really enough people in town to support all that and very few that could afford frequent eating out. My dad made 5 figures so he was one of the better off ones, but he had 6 kids, and a few of my siblings had extensive medical issues so we didn't eat out much either-lots of beans and rice (which was oddly better for me because of my wheat issues that would make me sick after bread, not so much for my normal siblings, who were probably justified feeling a little deprived, but what can you do).


----------



## Bruce

I've only gone to the 5 Guys once, it is down in Burlington. But there is one at (IIRC) National airport in DC so I had a decent lunch there last year. Note to air travellers - don't bother with the burger place in the food court at JFK in Terminal 5!

We didn't go out much when I was growing up either. We did sometimes go to one of the original Marie Callender's (cherry pie for dessert - yum!) or the nearby Bob's Big Boy. I walked past what is now the oldest operating McD's on the way to Jr and Sr High school. It was the 3rd one built, 3 years before I was born. Stopped for fries on the way home once in awhile. And when I say "original" it still is! There is no "inside" other than for the employees. A couple of tables outside.


----------



## Bruce

Ridgetop said:


> Today he announced that he is raising our state income taxes by 54%!


You need to do a little research, that statement is false. You can start breathing again unless you are making over $5M/year. The actual % increase over the prior highest tax rate for those people is 28%. I wouldn't be happy about that if I was making $5M a year but it doesn't affect most people in the state.

"California’s top marginal tax rate is 13.3%. The new proposal would add three new surcharges on seven-figure earners. It would add a 1% surcharge to gross income of more than $1 million, 3% on income over $2 million and 3.5% on income above $5 million."

"So the top tax rate would be 16.8%, on income of more than $5 million and the combined state and federal tax rate for California’s top earners would soar to 53.8%. With the deduction on state and local taxes capped at $10,000 under the Trump tax cuts, the top-earning Californians wouldn’t be able to deduct the new taxes from their federal returns.

The tax would only effect the top 0.5% of California taxpayers. But that small group of super-earners — many of them in tech — pay 40% of the state’s tax revenues, according to California’s Franchise Tax Board. The new tax rate would also apply to capital gains, which accounts for a large share of tech income, since California taxes capital gains at the same rates as ordinary income."

CNBC article link


----------



## rachels.haven

Ran a fecal on Saffron-she had maybe 4 coccidia on the entire mcmasters slide, and one lonely barber pole worm egg. Not the issue. Prohibit and Baycox worked if there was ever a problem this week. I should have checked before treating, but she's been in emergency mode for a while now.

Took her temp with my stupid goat flexi tip thermometer (sounds great until you realize goats have anal sphincters, and don't believe in temperature taking, dang it). Between the thermometer bending and my own incompetence, I couldn't get a reading above 92.7. She does feel cool. I'm pretty sure she's dehydrated too. Her fecal pellets were rock hard and her skin texture feels off. 

I've got a weak slow motion skeleton goat with a hay belly that just keeps getting thinner and thinner with no more fire in her eyes. She's been routinely tested for the big three goat diseases twice in her tenure here, so I'm counting them out.

So of course I texted the vet again. I feel like that's the theme of this year. She's very busy but will try to fit me in this afternoon if she possibly can.

So far this year I've called the vet once for Avalon the dwarf's udder skin staph infection, then Summer's weird throat issue, Dahlia's dying, and now Saffron. If I lose Saffy, I'll be down to four lamancha does (and three bucks, which is an excessive number for that ratio). I'm starting to feel like my standard goat dears are less hardy than my hard headed, serious, mean, short legged dwarf goats.

This morning before all that I let my winding down favorite goat out to eat some browse, which she did with slow motion enthusiasm. If she's around tomorrow we'll do it again, let her have some soft green stuff.


----------



## farmerjan

I'm thinking there might be some sort of blockage in her throat or further in???? I confess it is more than I am even trying to guess at.  The "hay belly" suggests worms that you have eliminated as a cause.  What about some sort of blood samples for maybe some weird other disease?  Any universities that have vet schools that might be interested in looking at it.  Your vet could help precipitate that along..... many of the university vet schools like to have some of the oddball stuff to study and have the students work on?  Don't know if UConn would be any help.  There is a good vet school in Md and of course VaTech.... also UMiss is supposed to be a very good vet school and there is one in Tn that is good too.  Grasping at straws  trying to maybe come up with something that might have gotten overlooked.  Hey, it took that BIL handyman to look at that tall sliding cabinet in the kitchen to realize that I had other options for a bigger fridge.... Now I see all sorts of other things.


----------



## Baymule

And you feel so helpless. No known cause as you watch her wither away. I hope she makes it. It’s good to let her out to browse, might as well. It won’t just her and it makes her happy.


----------



## Ridgetop

Bruce said:


> You need to do a little research, that statement is false.


You're correct Bruce.  DH said it was actually a member of the state legislature that proposed the 54% hike.  However, if it were possible to pass it and not get lynched (wait that is now considered a racist word) but anyway, the liberal dems here would try to do it  I really don't know how they expect the working class to manage.  This is one of the most expensive places to live, and we are being taxed to death.  

Hope you can find out what is the  matter with your goat.  Have you tried Vitamin B complex shots?  They can often perk up a depressed goat with poor appetite.  I used to give them regularly to my goats when they looked a little off or were not eating properly.  Usually they perked up and started eating.  If you have been worming and dosing for Coccidia, you might have upset the rumen balance with all those antibiotics/wormers.   I use a horse paste probiotic for stomach upsets to reinnoculate their stomachs with friendly flora.  Because it is a paste I could shoot it down their throats. Because it was very salty they immediately drank water.  A Dutch acquaintance with sheep uses Bulgarian and Greek yogurt in a drench gun with the same result.  I don't want to be unkind, but depending on the replacement price of the doe vs all the testing $$ and meds costs, I would probably just cut my losses and cull her.  I hope it is not something contagious and I know you would rather know what it was.  What about copper deficiency?  Has she lost color in her coat recently?


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! I'll listen to anything at this point.

The vet came and said she has no idea what's up and the "hay belly" is free floating fluid in the abdomen which is very not good. It's probably not going to end well. I decided I wanted a CBC, maybe to help us figure out if/what's failing, partially for curiosity's sake. I've been feeling/seeing a strange structure on her right side. Apparently that's her kidney floating there. Blood work will get back tomorrow.

The vet said she doesn't think anything is wrong with my husbandry. She thinks there's something wrong with Saffron. She is a grade and was sold unregistered without papers. It's always possible she was actually older than I was told or has had this issue before.

For supportive care I asked about getting her fluid into her GI tract to help with her abnormally rock hard, tiny pellets. Looks like I may be going to TSC for some timothy pellets and hay stretcher and we're going to try to make a mash and get her to eat it. I'm not sure it will help, but I haven't seen her drink in a while. Obviously she's drinking something or she'd be dead, but more water and roughage and calories will hopefully help.

Right now Saffron is roaming around the barnyard eating the brush, upsetting the bucks (there's a doe in sight that doesn't think their rutty selves are God's gift to does) and doesn't care the others aren't following her. We needed to weedwack the fence line anyway. I guess I'll wait for that bloodwork in case it says she's magically fine, but prepare myself for the worst.
Sheesh, bad luck.


----------



## rachels.haven

Got the blood work on Saffron back. Not great. The vet interpretes it as pointing to cancer and Saffron will be terminal and not bouncing back. I agree, as this was my first impression when this started based on the way she acted and the way the situation matured, but I preferred to think it was worms or coccidia or bad nutrition (that somehow only one goat was getting).

This morning she was less bloated with fluid in the abdomen but she was almost unable to get up, so she will need to be put down soon. Oh well. On the day she goes we'll do extra pellets/scratch all around for everyone to celebrate her life (started doing this for my special ducks/chickens that died, wow, look where things have gone).

I'll need to move onto plans for her body soon since i can't bury this one either and she's a big goat. This time I wish I could. Maybe if they'll do it I could arrange for her ashes back from the crematorium. I may just settle for her collar to be nailed up on the wall though when this is all over if it can just end.

What a string of bad luck. Poor Saffron. I can get her to eat a little grain, but then she just looks at it like it hurts, but she still really wants it. Today I ran around and found her leafy branches from her favorite trees and after eating on them for a few minutes she went to go hide under the stall table from them looking at them like they hurt too. Poor sweet goat.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Got the blood work on Saffron back. Not great. The vet interpretes it as pointing to cancer and Saffron will be terminal and not bouncing back. I agree, as this was my first impression when this started based on the way she acted and the way the situation matured, but I preferred to think it was worms or coccidia or bad nutrition (that somehow only one goat was getting).
> 
> This morning she was less bloated with fluid in the abdomen but she was almost unable to get up, so she will need to be put down soon. Oh well. On the day she goes we'll do extra pellets/scratch all around for everyone to celebrate her life (started doing this for my special ducks/chickens that died, wow, look where things have gone).
> 
> I'll need to move onto plans for her body soon since i can't bury this one either and she's a big goat. This time I wish I could. Maybe if they'll do it I could arrange for her ashes back from the crematorium. I may just settle for her collar to be nailed up on the wall though when this is all over if it can just end.
> 
> What a string of bad luck. Poor Saffron. I can get her to eat a little grain, but then she just looks at it like it hurts, but she still really wants it. Today I ran around and found her leafy branches from her favorite trees and after eating on them for a few minutes she went to go hide under the stall table from them looking at them like they hurt too. Poor sweet goat.



So sorry she is hurting. I know you are too. Big hugs, it’s not an easy thing to do.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

I'm so sorry.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. I told the kids and they were also upset. They like Saffron.

Wethers went to the processor to be processed tomorrow. This means tomorrow I start milking 2x daily instead of 1. Those wethers ate and ate that milk like crazy!


----------



## farmerjan

Sorry for your goat.  I had a cow that was used as a nurse cow. Came off a dairy that I tested for many years. 1/2 hol/ 1/2 jersey....  Lara.... she got to acting just blah, and had the vet check her thinking there was some problem in the uterus.... infection??? No she had tumors, and there were quite a few.  Her "calves";  hers and 2 grafted calves;   were only about 6-8 weeks, so I asked vet about if there was something I could do to get a little more time for the calves.  He gave her an IV with some dextose, dexamethesone,  and something else, vit b complex, and she perked up.  She got to eating again.... I was hoping for a few weeks. She rallied, and about 6-8 weeks later started to act blah again, so the vet said see if she will respond to it.  We did a second time, and she came around again.  By now it was mid-later summer, and when she started acting like she didn't want to eat again I said okay, enough.... and I put her down.  The calves were well grown at that point, she had a nice spring and summer overall, and I wasn't going to try for a third time.  So instead of getting a few weeks I got another 4 months..... I have 2 of her daughters and several granddaughters, all are beef crossed, but her progeny carry on.  Her last daughter is expecting now for a fall calf.   She could be a witch to other cows, but she was great once I got calves grafted on her and I could milk anytime too.


----------



## rachels.haven

Just desserts for Saffron until the end! Slow mo goat party just for her! Olive, hickory, oak, maple, honeysuckle...she loves it and it deflates her water belly a bit (then all the lumps are visible unfortunately). She appears determined to never lay down again too. Sounds like she heard me on the "if she can't get up or eat" bit.
She may not last long, but she can go out enjoying herself.


----------



## Ridgetop

SO SORRY FOR YOU.  

IT S HARD KNOWING THERE IS NO HOPE.  SAME THING WITH MY PROLAPSE EWE.



farmerjan said:


> She rallied, and about 6-8 weeks later started to act blah again, so the vet said see if she will respond to it. We did a second time, and she came around again. By now it was mid-later summer, and when she started acting like she didn't want to eat again I said okay, enough.... and I put her down.



We did the same thing until we could wean her lamb off her.  Weaned early at 6 weeks but she had suffered enough and really was showing pain in spite of her 2X pain meds.  When there is no hope euthanasia is the kindest thing you can dol

 to all who have gone through this sad process.


----------



## Baymule

Deeply felt love comes in many forms. In this case, love comes in honeysuckle, olive, oak and other browse. In a land surrounded by idiots, it is a comfort to be able to come to this forum where others "get" you and grieve with you. Big hugs my friend and give Saffron a hug from me too.


----------



## rachels.haven

Saf's down, appetite coming and going. Doesn't seem to be functioning well GI wise and the look in her eyes is going from "give me cookies" to "make it stop" so I made her one last appt tomorrow. The kids are very upset. She's their favorite. I'm going to try to find a crematorium that will come and get her so my distraught kids won't have to ride in the van with their favorite goat's wrecked, slightly gross body since covid has turned everytrip into a family affair (no cousins or babysitter to keep them busy, dang it). There will be tears and trauma from everyone if I do it myself, so I will pay for that.

I've got 100 bales of the area's first second cutting coming on Wednesday that I will not touch until mid to late winter. That should top us off. Everything else they eat will be brought in and kept on the ground floor of the barn.

We ate silkie cockerel from the freezer tonight. SO GOOD. It tasted pre-brined. You just have to get over the color of the bones and connective tissue. The kids actually ate it, so the flavor and tenderness was spot on enough to counter the appearance. 6 mo of being fed forage by the rooster, then being offed as soon as they filled out and became randy paid off. 





I have a confession. I am allergic to tomato plants with some sensitivity to tomatoes, but I still eat them. If people can drink once in a while and enjoy it, I can eat a tomato once in a while and get a day of heartburn and feeling off afterward, but still enjoy that sucker. Touching stems left in or juice drips I miss are an itchy affair though. My sandwich on too thick and stiff GF bread had tomato and cuke from the store on it. No. Stinking. Regrets. Hah. (gotta rebel somehow, right? stupid allergies.)


----------



## rachels.haven

Extra pellets all round tonight in honor of the life of Saffron the Goat, gentle and always willing, herd queen (because she was the biggest). May she lay down to hog the feeder from all the short legged fat nigerian dwarf goats and smaller sized lamanchas tonight in Goat-halla simply because she can. Good girl.


----------



## Ridgetop

You saved her a lot of suffering.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bailey had a routine shots and vet appointment I forgot today.
Apparently she has lyme.   

That's three bad things with my animals. Can I go home now?

Noticed runny eyes on 2 of my nigerian does. I'll be looking them over tonight.

Cleaned the convalescent stall and the doe pen stall to get the memories gone. Sure wish that would change the luck.


----------



## Ridgetop

They say things come in 3's.  Hope that is it for you!


----------



## rachels.haven

Got my 100 bales of hay today. Bye dollars! It's nice hay though and the hay man is very low this year. He said he was only getting 20 bales/acre and normally he gets around 100. He'd like to start brokering hay to make up for it, but that's tricky. I'm going to load the loft for winter and get back in touch with him if I've got any room, and see where he's at.

He also moved into the town we live in this year with his GF. He confirms that it's almost impossible to farm here in this town (next door to the one he grew up in) and is having trouble getting permission from the city and state to maintain his ditches as the town wants to call them and his fields "wetlands"...except they are hay fields, which back up to someone else's hay fields. And the town is trying to claim them on his property for "conservation"(which used to just be about keeping everyone's well water quality decent and is now about whatever people want)...and hay and farming is how he makes his living and pays mortgage/taxes...so...The wetlands designation begins apparently 10' outside his new back door. I'm cheering for him to get the town to let him work. He says some of the other hay farmers got their permissions and are quite frosty with the sway they have in town govt and use it to limit competition. Personally I'm glad I'm not him. He's got my business and if he needs people to give him a good word I'm willing to go to town meetings where the locals get to decide what he does on his land. I. Like. Farming.

 He also reports people coming to slack jaw at him doing his fields and other people coming to poo on his property while he's clearly home and in sight...so we all stood there scratching our heads at the local crazy people(property pooing resulted in a police call, btw). So people are really crazy here and it's not just me. His LGD is a central asian shepherd puppy, and quite frankly, I hope the pup works on the locals too. 

He says he's not surprised I lost a few goats this year. It got really hot for here and he says that's common when that happens. His family has sheep and a few goats along with their cattle and horses and feeder pigs at the big farm.

I went over Avalon today. Guess what? She's still a turd-tossing her head and kicking and refusing to be cooperative, making too much eye contact, and being defiant. Nothing outwardly wrong though. Clear runny eyes. She may just be in heat and that's causing her to act off and under the weather, but I think I'm going to run a fecal on her if she doesn't improve in a day or two as she's lost weight. Her famacha is good, but that can hide things. Naturally I worry about rabies since we've already got lyme on the property and rabies and lyme are the two diseases neighbors have warned us about, but I'm pretty sure there are hormones involved. She was blubbering around the pen today. Any time I work with that goat I want to put her back on my sell list-so pretty, but so difficult. I may evaluate her and make her a part of my spring cuts this coming year. It would be a relief.
And finally it looks like Patrick may not have bred many does, as they were all fawning over Durango now that the right amount of time spacing has occurred and it's Dur's turn. And Dur is not a gentleman and he does not miss the buck pen. 
The Patrick thing puzzles me. He's down in the bachelor pad, breeding his male friends like the rest of the bachelors. Weren't the does good enough? Darn bucks. 
I guess we'll know when the kids come if he got busy or just missed his boyfriends the whole time. I could have sworn he bred at least a few of those does.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> He says some of the other hay farmers got their permissions and are quite frosty with the sway they have in town govt and use it to limit competition.


He better hope they aren't on the board that decides who gets to farm their "wetlands" or he is screwed. 

If he only got 20 bales/acre this year so did they, sounds like "competition" might mean fewer locals have to buy hay from far away.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep. That's the thinking. Frank's also really good at mold, dust, and stem free, high quality goat/cow/sheep quality hay. The other farmers mainly do horse. Most horse people here don't buy local hay because it's pricey and sub par for the price, is what I get from talking to my horse neighbors. Also no alfalfa. (um, so they pay that $40/100lbs bale + delivery from an importer bringing grass, alfalfa grass, and alfalfa from out west)

We told him he needs to get on the board to deal with this issue. _I _was told when I moved in I needed to come to meetings and join in and my "farm" is a couple of chickens and a herd of goats. Frank is a real farmer who pays the bills with his farm and his family has been doing it for generations. Me? I play. I'm a hobby farmer (and the laws are going to keep it that way). My great grandad was a chicken farmer, and some of the greats pre immigration did horses (and died falling off!). Hobby doofuses like me shouldn't be on any ag board. That's offensive. I hope he gets on the board and gets a piece of the pie-ie, his pie/his property that he already bought and pays taxes on. People and legislative bodies have a lot of nerve here. Farmers should be allowed to farm especially legit ones.

We also wondered where all the old horses (and other old animals) here go when they start looking unsightly. There simply aren't any. Where I grew up there were old horses living the last of life to its fullest. It's not like they stay young forever. 

Avalon is starting to go the way of Saffron. Vet says, get an autopsy if she dies, this is weird and nothing like she's seen before and she's done goats for a long time and as quite a bit of her practice. Meanwhile, treat for liver flukes that are easily mistaken as barber pole worm eggs if they are found at all. I also need to look for parasites that are atypical. So tonight my mean girl gets valbazen, then when the noromectin plus comes I will start on that. She might be pregnant and those drugs aren't good for bred does, but if she dies, she won't have kids either. I'd rather save the mom. The symptoms and saf's blood work could be similar to liver fluke, but apparently they are uncommon here. I've got to save this goat even if she is a stupid goat.


----------



## Bruce

I take it alfalfa doesn't grow well there? Because if it did a haymaker could bring in some serious money if people are willing to pay $40+delivery for hay from out west. Charge $35 and sell out of "product" fast.

And if the other farmers are doing poor quality horse hay that the horse owners don't want to buy, what do they do with their overpriced hay?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, I think alfalfa needs a different soil pH, and probably fewer rocks than are in our dust.
I'm not sure what they do with it. I just know they sell out of the hay they make over the winter. It gets that "local" stamp and it typically goes for $12-14/bale. It might be organic. Horses need stemmier hay, right? Because that's what they tend to have. It's not goat quality so I don't watch it too closely. It, um, makes me "long for home" (or in other words, it makes me think "get me out of here"). I prefer a place with dirt with more loam and organic matter.

Ooo. Before this goat disaster started I wanted to put up pictures of "my" alfalfa that I've been "growing" in the strawberry garden-now complete with an in ground wasp nest. Apparently in the hay or pellets I've been feeding the goats there were alfalfa seeds. It's kind of anemic alfalfa with tiny leaves, but it bloomed purple flowers and is just chugging along. Alfalfa makes me sneeze, and it's only two plants, but it's SOOO pretty. Maybe I'll do that if I don't keep losing goats, but if I forget, let it be known that it was documented here and at least I can grow alfalfa, lol.


----------



## Bruce

Horses need stemmier hay? I assume there is a  with that because I thought horses were pickier than goats, sheep and cattle. Or is it their owners who are pickier? 

All I know is MY alpacas are picky, they don't like the more straw like parts of the bales I got from Al last year. They'll pick out the grass blade stuff and leave the rest. LOTS of bedding in those bales (as far as my alpacas are concerned). Hopefully he is going to do some second cut squares this year so there will be less "stem". I suspect the pair of them wouldn't even go through 15 small squares in a year if they ate it all.


----------



## rachels.haven

Alpacas sound similar to goats. I bet the second cut will serve you better, and I hope you get some. The goats will literally spend all day picking all the mature stems out from the green if fed first and you will be left with a big pile of mature stems under the feeder with NO green. Now if you feed them all green and soft they'll still waste some "undesirable" green parts, but it will be less than if fed hay with the yellow.

Horse owners around here, on the other hand...the lady behind the register at one of my feed stores gave me the rundown on them. I think a nice way to put it would be that they are "eccentric". It might also be true that around here they waste more than their horses do.


----------



## Bruce

And I thought goats preferred stemmy weedy stuff to grass? So confusing!


----------



## rachels.haven

Weeds, yes. Stems no. More non toxic weeds the better.


----------



## Bruce

Yet they will strip bark off trees!


----------



## rachels.haven

I know, right?
...Fed one part of a payday bar the other day and they've been known to grab plastic bags from people at treat time and down them. I do not entirely understand their "picky". Not sure anyone does.

For instance, I was petting poor sickish Avalon just a few minutes ago and she decided to bite and try to rip off my finger while I wasn't paying attention  Clearly she's not picky (and probably feeling better, the snot). That "sweetie" is not picky.


----------



## rachels.haven

So I may have gotten fed up with Ms Bailey's back end and called in professional help. The groomer had her melted all over the floor before I even left, so I figured it would be fine. Now I have a glow in the dark dog that smells like a girl, but no just wants to matt back end. Here's clean Bailey, for the first time in her life. The groomer says a spring grooming to remove the undercoat in preparation for summer and a fall grooming should do it for her, and I think that's fair. She recommends against shaving for outdoor farm dogs. Sunburn and flies. FIVE HOURS for $200, twice a year...I feel like the groomer's getting the raw end of the stick. This groomer does other big outdoor "farm dogs" and she does a good job. The worst Bailey did was sit on her.













Bailey really enjoys eating treats, being pampered, getting a bath, meeting new dogs and humans off property, and sitting on people, so she came back tired yet energized and very, very happy.


----------



## rachels.haven

Other pics from today



Ducks






Broody.





Fluffy bums stuck in the halfway house with half grown ducklings. The duck house is half built.





Bucks.




No mats on the bum.


----------



## rachels.haven

And I should mention, it's started raining in the last few days and the temp is dropping hard. It was 45 this morning at 7 am-a big difference from the 90 degree days and 80 degree nights. I guess summer is over.
School and apple time.


(Also want the adult ducks house finished so they quit pooping up the coop run at night when I pen them there-yuck)


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachels.haven,

I am glad to see you got Bailey all cleaned up.  The price for the cleaning sounds like a good deal.

You have such beautiful place.  I seem to recall you having a small pond somewhere on your place.  I also seem to recall that you had a tree that was leaning out over the pond, or perhaps had fallen into the pond.  Whatever happened to that tree and pond?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

@Senile_Texas_Aggie 
The pond is dry and did not fill this year, and the trees on the pond haven't gotten worse and are maybe even doing decently with the drought and for the most part lack of storms. I'm guessing because their roots are not drowning right now. The pond might stay emptied with climate change and natural change of water flow and all. The neighbors over the hill reported it had been shrinking over the past decade and this year it only got slightly wet down there, so I'm hopeful. Other than the big trees around it collapsing when it's wet it breeds deer flies like crazy in the mud and this year what we did have was not as bad as last.


The barn wings are now full of hay. Now to fill the center of the floor to the top! Slow going, but doable on one's own. (bale tied on each side of rope, pull one up, then the other, throw rope down, and head down to tie on more). I got help from Danger Dan, son #2 yesterday (5). He can help pull up bales and it does make it easier, which is amazing, and he decided he was going to "grapple" the bales away from the loft door with a bungee cord he spirited out of somewhere (no, no, no, but if I take it what will he find next?), but he has ZERO fear or sense of heights and seems to find swinging on the pulley towards the open door exhilarating so it may have taken longer to do yesterday's twenty something bales in the end with all the hauling him back in the loft door and such. Not sure I'm going to book him for help in the future for another year or two (this is my kid, he magically climbs walls to get into everything including up high, tries to play in the washer, and I'm afraid every time he goes near a second+ story open window...someday may he grow a little fear without having a disaster first). This kid makes me feel crazy.


----------



## Baymule

Bailey looks beautiful. Wow! I am impressed. I’m not going to show her picture to Paris or Trip. They already know I have fallen down on the grooming job, no sense making them feel ugly. LOL LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

I did an informal, non-edited video. Very, very informal.


----------



## Bruce

Looks like a real easy milker!


----------



## Baymule

That's a good stream of milk! Do you milk once or twice a day?


----------



## rachels.haven

Her, twice for now. I may start drying off next month, maybe the month after. The other milking doe, Lace I'm cutting down to once so I can dry her off so she can put more energy into growing. Lace is a difficult hard headed goat though, so I still need to find some stand time with her so she doesn't go completely wild and unmanageable. Summer, on the other hand, is a dream and a very good girl and a very easy milker.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss Rachels.haven,

I am glad to know that your pond didn't provide as good a breeding ground for the deer flies.  I would hate to try to work outside with those pests continually biting.

That was a humorous story about your fearless son, Danger Dan.  I so much wish you could have gotten pictures of him in action.  I suppose it would be hard to take pictures and then try to grab him before he goes flying out the window.



rachels.haven said:


> And I should mention, it's started raining in the last few days and the temp is dropping hard. It was 45 this morning at 7 am-a big difference from the 90 degree days and 80 degree nights. I guess summer is over.



I forgot to ask you about this.  Are the temperatures forecast to stay cooler for awhile, or is this a momentary (couple of days type) dip?  And Mr. @Bruce, if Miss Rachels.haven is cooler, then I suppose you are as well.  Maybe that will make doing chores easier.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

I'll get a picture of Danger Dan Danning at some point, but yes, that one was one I had to be more on the ball for or else. 
I may not have much on my other son yet because he's more along the lines of Anxious (or Angry) Aiden, and he tends to stay out of trouble and not do life threatening things for fun, but I may get some pics of him at some point. He's got a way with the goats. He goes out there and they talk him out of a lot of tantrum storms. He's still here, he's just not giving me gray hairs at the moment.

Looking out at the forecast it looks like we're staying cool at least for the next 10 days. I see one day with a high of 80. Chores should be easier. I expect Bruce is going to be getting plenty more done up there in VT. I, for one, am using it to load hay.

Note to self: Do not feed goats payday bars-even a little bit. Too addictive. Just one bite and they will jump you every time. Pretty sure when they look at me now they just see a giant peanut caramel bar head now. *shiver* disturbing.


----------



## Bruce

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> And Mr. @Bruce, if Miss Rachels.haven is cooler, then I suppose you are as well. Maybe that will make doing chores easier.


Definitely cooling down here, not that it was TX or AZ or CA hot anyway. Wind in the low 20's gusting to low 30s today. High today maybe 65°, dropping 10° tomorrow. Narrow miss on frost yesterday morning but we should be safe for the next 6 days.


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> he decided he was going to "grapple" the bales away from the loft door with a bungee cord he spirited out of somewhere (no, no, no, but if I take it what will he find next?), but he has ZERO fear or sense of heights and seems to find swinging on the pulley towards the open door exhilarating so it may have taken longer to do yesterday's twenty something bales in the end with all the hauling him back in the loft door and such. Not sure I'm going to book him for help in the future for another year or two (this is my kid, he magically climbs walls to get into everything including up high, tries to play in the washer, and I'm afraid every time he goes near a second+ story open window...someday may he grow a little fear without having a disaster first). This kid makes me feel crazy.



Maybe he will end up a lineman for the power company.  No indoctrinating liberal college and a 6 figure income.  Win Win!


----------



## rachels.haven

Only 16 bales left in the garage. Yeah, I may have gotten 187 bales in the loft last year. That seemed like so much, but my loft is barely half full right now. I guess I'll be getting more and pulling more up. Topping up for that lack of good hay season will make me feel a lot more happy and prepared.


----------



## Baymule

Nothing like the wealth of stored hay for the winter!


----------



## farmerjan

As long as you don't have any leaky roof spots, hay doesn't go "bad", like so many other stored things.  It will dry out a bit more and lose a little of the protein content over time, but having extra hay to carryover is money in the bank.  You can rotate it out so that you are not piling new hay and burying the left over. 
 We have hay in the one barn that is probably 3-4 years old.  Not musty or anything.  It makes fine feed if you are running short and you can supplement with a little grain if the quality has lessened. We were glad to have some of those sq bales left over a couple years ago when we were running short to supply some of our regular customers and others were calling begging for hay.   At that time, any hay was easy to sell as the animals need a certain amount of bulk and there wasn't any around.  
 We like to carry over at least 100-200 rolls and 1,000 sq bales into the next season as you never know what the year will bring.  Granted we are on a much larger scale than anyone else.... but you ought to try to have enough on hand for 2 years, and then replenish and rotate out every year to stay ahead.  We don't have 2 years ahead, but at least have an extra 1-2 months.... Since in the worst of the winter we will feed 150  rolls a month,  it doesn't take long to use it up.  Years ago when all hay was made loose and then in small sq bales, people fed what an animal could clean up in a couple hours and they kept their animals in decent flesh and working condition.  Today, with everything getting bigger and "more"  we waste alot of hay with putting out several rolls at a time to be able to get to more places.  There is something to be said about limit feeding.  Especially ruminants.... because they will "rework" the hay a couple times before it passes through.  Horses are different in that their hay goes right through... so a little, more often, is better for them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Heheheheheh. I have more tribble chickens now. I will count tomorrow.


----------



## farmerjan

Sorry, this dense transplanted Yankee to the south cannot figure out what "tribble chickens" is... not in NE Yankee talk or in "southern language"....?????


----------



## Baymule

Yeah, what is a tribble chicken? A terrible dribbler (bad basketball player?)


----------



## rachels.haven

Must...photograph... tribble...chickens...
I'll get better pics later today of the chicks, but here are some of the juvies from last hatch. Mr. Teddy babies are proving hard to sex out.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

I was expecting something like this (from here):


----------



## rachels.haven

...I guess those are more gold comet/sex link colored, aren't they....aw well. I can't get everything right.


----------



## farmerjan

So they are silkies crossed with something else????


----------



## rachels.haven

Nope, all silkie this round. The polish are still immature so no eggs of theirs got hatched. Maybe later. The polish do not seem super bright and the silkies are smarter. The best chance for any polish genetics to survive would be to cross them either the two silkie roosters and breed some chicks with more brains and less head fluff so I will likely let the silkies hatch some.


----------



## Baymule

I like Polish. I say that, never had any, so if I had some, I might change my mind. I had never had guineas, I got some a couple years ago, they are dumb as a box of rocks. Their stupidity is amusing.


----------



## rachels.haven

You'd probably like them. They are not bright, but sweet, and mine are staying close to home. They may be brighter than guineas and definitely less nutty than the guineas I've met.

That being said, mine are still babies. Maybe they'll grow out of it and grow some smarts, right?


----------



## Baymule

We have 2 male guineas. They have discovered their reflections in the chrome trim on DH's truck. They get all excited and chatter up a storm to their "friends". Dummies probably think their reflections are females. 

I like the Tolbunt Polish, they are beautiful.


----------



## farmerjan

Hey, @Baymule  didn't you have some guineas hatch a little while back?  Did you lose them?  They are the worst mothers and they aren't real bright all around.  But they do like to eat bugs and ticks.... just got to incubate them and raise them that way.


----------



## Baymule

farmerjan said:


> Hey, @Baymule  didn't you have some guineas hatch a little while back?  Did you lose them?  They are the worst mothers and they aren't real bright all around.  But they do like to eat bugs and ticks.... just got to incubate them and raise them that way.


Yeah, out of 11 hatched, 4 survived. Then my #%&%^^ dogs went on a tear, guineas were on the "toy" and "menu" list. I beat hell out of my dogs with dead guineas until my arms were sore. I raged, screamed my lungs out, ranted and raved like an insane looney idiot. I went utterly ballistic on Trip when I caught him munching on guineas twice in the same day, beating him with one of the guineas until the guts came out of it, then I switched to a flyswatter. I locked him in the backyard for 3 weeks, making a point to go in every day, not look at him, speak to him or touch him. He came out very subdued. I couldn't catch who was doing the killing, but all the dogs (not Paris) were chasing them. So all 4 got their guinea beatings. Haha, the day I went ballistic on Trip, the sheep ran to the far corner to hide from me. Whatever was wrong with me, they wanted no part of it. 

The new pup, Sheba kept chasing them, totally clueless when I scolded her. So I finally lost it on her too. I clipped a leash on her and we chased guineas. Or rather, I dragged her LOL. I'd get close to the guineas, and whallop her with a rolled up newspaper, while screaming at her. For some silly reason, now guineas aren't all that attractive to her anymore. 

Out of 7, I have one left. One. Neighbor had a snake get after his, the male flew over here, so that makes 2 lonely bachelors. If we could catch the darn things, I'd take them both to the neighbor. He thinks he has several female youngsters. 

So that is my guinea story. I enjoy the dumb things, don't know whether to start over or give up due to the blasted dogs.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Baaaaad dogs.....


----------



## rachels.haven

No kidding! The worst thing I can say abou Bailey lately is that now she's an egg thief and a food bully. I'd be so ticked if she started killing the poultry she's supposed to guard (I'm ticked enough at the egg stealing). I hope getting beaten with a dead guinea fowl haunts them in their dreams-zombie guineas, back from the dead to flog them with their dead carcasses until the birds explode. Guineas-NOT what's for dinner. Not sure I'd have the guts to do that, but they totally deserve that association.

No, the polish aren't guinea dumb. They just tend to pick a special friend or group of friends and get "lost" from them and be sad and making it so they can see doesn't seem to help. They also took several weeks to figure out how to go back to the coop and nobody perches. It's like they have no memory or ability to remember anything period. I don't even think they can really tell eachother apart. They are very handleable, but they just kind of float from one activity in life to the next. It's a little sad, but they certainly DO get along with silkies. The silkies are much smarter and feistier than my McMurray standard polish girls. The positive thing is that they are hens, and my roosters already want to shepherd them.

Hey, but Polish are supposed to lay better than silkies their first winter, and we need eggs.


----------



## rachels.haven

Mr. Teddy BABIES! Take 2! A different hen took up nest sitting on the remaining eggs. I really should candle later and take out the bads so she can continue.


----------



## Baymule

Sounds like Polish are dumber than guineas. I didn’t think it possible. LOL At least they fly up in a tree to roost.


----------



## Baymule

frustratedearthmother said:


> Baaaaad dogs.....



Yes! BAD DOGS! They went totally off the rails. I had a HUGE pack disorder. Maybe if I had doped them all up with Ritalin I could have still have some guineas. I should write a post on it.


----------



## rachels.haven

100 bales put up and stacked away. About 60 coming tomorrow.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> 100 bales put up and stacked away. About 60 coming tomorrow.



Wealth!!! I’d rather have hay for the winter than diamonds. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

You said it.
In addition to that more silkies are hatching out under the new hen to boot (and plenty more broody hens envying her to take the nest when she gets off so they can try to hatch every one). Go magical multiplying chickens, go.


----------



## rachels.haven

Three new chicks and a few more eggs trying. I took out the rotters and the one that pipped and died, then separated off the eggs someone snuck in and had developed and put them under a different hen. Fingers crossed for the late ones.

Durango has been crying in the pen because the preggers does are bullying him and he's a disgusting, pee covered, blubbering fool, but in the end he's just a little guy and wanted to go home, so I sent him home to the bachelor pad, took my 87 pound yearling lamancha doe out and put her with the dwarf does, and added young Atlas to the three mature lamancha does I have left in their pen. I wonder if we'll get everyone bred this year. If Atlas fails, Buggy is waiting for does, I just want to bring my inbreeding coefficient DOWN before using him and bringing it back up. He's a little local, short bodied, but has great feet and throws easy milk daughters. Not sure I like his dam's rear udder attachment, but I think his other daughters have turned out okay in that regard.

For Trinka, the yearling doe, I'm shooting for 100 pounds before I breed her. She's getting there. Maybe November or December if she's still cycling. She's still...kinda short. Wide, but short. Not sure I buy the whole "87 pounds" by the weight tape thing. She's also NOT happy to be out of the lamancha pen and in with those pesky dwarves.


----------



## rachels.haven

One of the late hatchers got booted from under the new mama and looks like it got chilled. Might have underlying issues, but it never hurts to give it a chance. My hands don't stay warm enough so it gets popped in the incubator after getting breathed on a lot and a little massage to get circulation back (ie, i made it mad enough to try to live). We'll see what happens. Late hatchers often die. The hens abandon them for a reason. I'll get a picture if it survives.


----------



## farmerjan

Getting pretty late for you to have chicks up there????? One thing, the late ones in the fall seem to feather quicker.... cover their chilly butts!!!!!
I had a hen that came with the house when we moved into it in CT, that we called the wild hen because we couldn't get her to go in the coop for anything...then she produced a batch of chicks in DEC ... I let my different pens of purebreds out loose regularly  so the roosters naturally caught her.... and then when it snowed, she came in when I was doing some feeding with the door open.... and realized that if she came inside, she could have food all the time instead of having to scratch around for it and whatever I put out for her.... Within 2 days she had all the chicks in with her so she became the resident "inside" wild hen.  I put eggs under her several times after that as she was a super good momma....


----------



## rachels.haven

I didn't realize how fast the cold would come this year when I set the eggs, but I've had them hatch eggs in sub freezing temps too and I find I don't mind it. They do stay in the coop, and I have the old mini coop to keep them in here.

So I miscounted chicks. Apparently a hen that was sitting in the corner was stealing chicks as they hatched, she got bored of them, then left them all over the coop, so now there are 12 hatched chicks, 2 dependable broody moms, and one pipped egg still trying to hatch. Here's the none the worse for the wear chick (okay, so he's ugly, sorry).





Older chick pics.


----------



## rachels.haven

Grand total is 14 chickers. The one I "saved" has not splayed legs, but something is up with them so it may be a loss, but that's still pretty decent. Nest box is DUMPED...but the two snuck in eggs are under a different broody.


----------



## Baymule

Broodies! That is so much fun, great batch of chicks. Congrats!


----------



## farmerjan

Good for you and for them.   I think we will see another moderating warm up for awhile.  I hope the other broody has a good hatch.  If the 2 eggs you snuck under her hatch soon and the rest are delayed much, will you try to put the chicks under these 2 momma's?  So the other hen doesn't quit the eggs too soon?  I used to do that if someone would get a few eggs in "late" and then they were hatching out over the course of several days or a week.  Some hens won't take strange chicks, but some are just "the more the merrier"... those hens are priceless.


----------



## rachels.haven

Those two are the last eggs that aren't golf balls in the nests, so we'll be done. I'm doing what I did with my Muscovy reproduction and limiting things. I think these silkies will take anything that peeps. They were trying to mother the month old ducklings, as big as they are (which made for very content ducks ). My plan is to leave those two eggs if they hatch with the broody sitting on them, and moving them to the brooding coop with the others if it works out. No more chicks in theory.

Made cajeta today. Poured it into the jar boiling and sealed it, turned it over and the seal took after it stopped boiling and cooled. Wonder if it will last?


----------



## Baymule

How do you make cajeta? I bet that would be yummy over home made ice cream.


----------



## rachels.haven

I made this version. 








						Cajeta Recipe (Mexican Caramel) - Isabel Eats
					

This Easy Cajeta (Mexican Caramel) recipe is made with only 5 ingredients and is easy to make.




					www.isabeleats.com
				




There's another page with just a little bit about canning it.






						How to Make Cajeta
					

Cajeta is a goat milk caramel that's easy to make and delicious to eat. This article will give you detailed directions for making this simple, but scrumptious, Mexican confection.



					www.everything-goat-milk.com
				






Well, looks like as the non-visually impaired adult in the household I'd better get up on my wasp spraying game. There's a nest of bald faced hornets in the kids unused playset to spray before we can have an oil delivery. There's also a nest of yellow jackets nearby in my strawberry garden I should probably take out too. I didn't know where the baldfaced nest was, and honestly I didn't know the bald faced hornets were wasps. Everything's been really non-aggressive to me. They bump into me sometimes, but go away. They also get stuck to lights at night like flies or moths. They were pretty ticked at the oilman though.


----------



## Baymule

Those recipes sound yummy. I don't have any goats milk. Oh well.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

LOVE, LOVE, LOVE Cajeta.  Haven't made it in several years, but I could probably be convinced to make some more!



Baymule said:


> I don't have any goats milk. Oh well.


That's easily fixed!


----------



## Ridgetop

Extra hay in the barn is always best.  Never enough.  Here DH and DS1 fight me over bringing in a full year's supply each summer.  Hay prices are already $1/bale higher than when I asked DH to stock up.  So annoying.  We need more covered storage area for hay.  DH prefers to work on his "retaining wall".  This wall will not be as useful as covered hay storage but it keeps him busy.  He needs to enjoy his retirement.


----------



## Bruce

The retaining wall may increase the value of the house when you sell it and move to TX  Covered hay storage maybe not so much depending on if the buyer will have hay eating animals.


----------



## Ridgetop

Retaining wall will do nothing for value since it is just holding up some dirt behind the tool shed!  DH suggested that I could use the new flat area for grazing the sheep but it is only about 25' x 30'!  LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

...sometimes the men we live with are weird and stubborn. If I can, I try to let mine be themselves so I can watch them be the interesting animals they are-probably a little at their expense, I admit. They often still don't make sense in the end though, but who cares. Good luck changing them, lol (any of them..). Also, plenty of time to prepare for an emergency or concoct plan b if it applies to the situation.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> ...sometimes the men we live with are weird and stubborn. If I can, I try to let mine be themselves so I can watch them be the interesting animals they are-probably a little at their expense, I admit. They often still don't make sense in the end though, but who cares. Good luck changing them, lol (any of them..). Also, plenty of time to prepare for an emergency or concoct plan b if it applies to the situation.


Haha, yup, weird and stubborn. On fixing stuff, mine uses duct tape, super glue and a hammer. I just hope he's not doing so much damage that I can't undo it when he's not around.


----------



## Mike CHS

I'm going to stay away from these most recent comments.    P.S. I no doubt relate to several of them.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Boy, you ladies surely know how to hurt us guys -- just tell the truth about us!


----------



## farmerjan

DS sent me a text this morning, asking if I could rake the rest of the hay today.  Now, I told him yesterday,  that I had to go to the farm in Winchester... 2+ hours - 125 miles away -  and they start before 1p.m. so I have to leave no later than 10:30.... okay, so he can't remember?????  But he did say .... this is for the record books....... "can u rake the rest of the hay today? Gonna bale it tomorrow.  Rain on Friday,  _just like you said....*"  OMG.....*_  Of course, he didn't remember the part of I was going to be gone all day today.... or that it is ALL RAKED  but the last 5 rows he had cut just on monday eve and told me not to rake on tuesday.....  gotta love them whether they are sons or spouses or siblings or .....
And no I am not perfect... sometimes I don't listen to what he says either....of course, usually I have a good reason to not listen.... like I already know what I am going to do and will do it better than what he is telling me....


----------



## rachels.haven

I can't say or judge anything about anyone else in BYH, btw. Only my husband and sons. My kids have little to no self preservation instincts or are crazy hyper and are always getting into trouble and my husband has his late stage glaucoma and pupil issues and while he's brilliant at abstract concepts like programming, music, encyclopedia, and every college level math type subject to the point it could make you feel inferior if you got him talking but didn't actually know him, he has to learn all physical world knowledge the hard way...sometimes to the point of absurdity or endangering himself (and he has little patience for that kind of trial either). Most of the time I let him figure it all out on his own and forget his vision loss, but occasionally I need to step in and keep things safe or find things. But I prefer to enjoy them all being themselves even if it's silly. 

I do have some areas I exercise my wifely "power". Husband is not allowed on roofs over 8' tall though (6' preferably) and ladders over 3' due to past close calls that logically shouldn't have been near misses. Depth perception and full field of vision do occasionally matter in life. Also, no chainsaws for him. I think I've also forbidden him from trying to learn to fly helicopters, lol, but somehow I doubt he'd even have the inclination to try with how he feels about driving normal vehicles. I'm pretty sure he77 for him would be having to drive a truck and back a trailer through a gate or having to become a semi driver. Small vehicles and good visibilities and/or backup cameras for him. (I also prefer to drive at night if we're staying off the interstate style roads and to do as much of our driving as possible period, but that may be more my issue than his.)


----------



## Baymule

And they love us for all our imperfections too.


----------



## farmerjan

This is not being said in a critical or smart a$$ way... but your husband sounds like he is brain smart and practical dumb.... like really smart people that have all this knowledge, and no common sense..... Have an uncle like that... not a lick of common sense but very very smart.....and the man I used to farm sit for, that now is passed away....he could tell you stuff that was WAY OVER MY HEAD and PAY SCALE  (LOL)  but he didn't have the common sense to walk the sheep along the fenceline to get them up to the gate.... or understand that they needed certain kinds  of care,  like worming, because he thought they should just be "natural"...... just not an OUNCE of common sense.... hes was  a nice man, little different as most all really smart people are,  but just didn't have any practical knowledge of stuff that I just take for granted.... guess that is why he had tons more money than I have too.....😉


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Depth perception and full field of vision do occasionally matter in life.


I wouldn't know  I've never had depth perception and never will. Didn't have full field of vision until I was 50 years old and even with that one eye is not fully focused. But that is a LOT better than only having GROSS color and motion in the non focused eye. 

On the other hand, I don't have glaucoma or pupil issues.


----------



## farmerjan

After my accident in 1989, I lost some of my depth perception.... it is annoying but I can compensate most of the time.  Cannot imagine how you managed @Bruce  for so long.  I do mostly have full vision.....it scares me to think of ever losing my vision.... one of the reasons I make it a point of having a once a year eye checkup....


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, I think eye issues are more common than we think. The brain compensates amazingly well most of the time so many people don't even know, others do but get along fine. DH has eye issues that run in the family, but not many consistent ones. The man makes up for it by memorizing 2+ hours of complex piano music in a few weeks of time when he feels like it. Not something my brain would want to do. The wanting to do all the driving is probably the results of the little quirks that occur while riding in the car while the driver has limited depth perception. As far as I can tell it's safe, but different than I (and most people) would drive.

And yes, we all have different types of intelligence and I feel like our marriage brings it home for me. Though I do have to work at it to be as "perfect" as I want I do well in the academic and knowledge sphere and have never struggled or wanted more out of myself in that regard, but he does leagues better without trying. He reads wikipedia and has a snap trap memory for facts, dates, formulas, and figures. I do better intuitively with the applied stuff than he does and my spatial intelligence is a little easier to access when I need it and he has to struggle and work through or let me help.

He also has more emotional intelligence than I do though...like, a lot more. He "fixes" the crying kids after I make them cry when I wouldn't know where to start. I always feel a few holes short of a doughnut on that level. I'm glad he likes me, because I'm a real potato a lot of the time and probably a russett too-brown, bumpy, plain, starchy.

Life is better with him and the contrast. Plus, he's good humored, has no malice, and is well aware of his short fallings and strengths so he won't and can't let it get to his head.

He will never join the cult of the tractor or car repair though.   The poor guy can't stand it when mechanical things break.


----------



## Bruce

farmerjan said:


> Cannot imagine how you managed @Bruce for so long


Not so hard when you don't know any different  I'm sure it is harder for someone who loses sight in one eye as an adult. I didn't even know most of the world saw things differently than I do until my mother mentioned that she was sad I didn't (when I was a teen).  And I didn't understand what 3D looked like to people until I read Dr. Susan Barry's "Fixing My Gaze". She gained depth perception about 20 years ago and described some of how things looked different to her. Thus I can intellectually understand it even though I can't experience it.

There are ways to compensate, one being touch. You know you are too close to the car in front when you touch it  JUST KIDDING. But if you can see the rear bumper you can't hit it, right?  But that is how I get a screwdriver into a screw. Overlap is another as is knowing the actual size of objects. I think that depth perception is good for about 15' so "normal" people judge the visual world using all sorts of indicators just the same way I do.


----------



## rachels.haven

Losing vision quickly as an adult apparently felt like the world was quickly getting darker and smaller but not quite being able to put his finger on why. It started when we were dating and he was diagnosed about a year to two years after we got married when I finally got him to go in for a checkup (normal Dr. rapidly got him into a specialist, next day if I remember right). Turned out it was permanent, but there is life after permanent vision loss, even if the amount of it is a large percentage. The adjusting and coping with reality part took the longest and understandingly enough it sent him into a small depression and made him feel very mortal for a long time. It's scary to not be yet 30 and find out that ground lost can not be regained and is difficult to control, one could wake up blind tomorrow, or even if he's lucky not be able to see the kids graduate from high school. He still has moments, like now when he's over due for an appt and we're all getting allergies from the fall which are making his eyes act up, but he's coping well. We all forget about it for long periods of time and his brain will fill in the gaps with random stuff normally and flashes of light or dark when he's tired (or occasionally giving up and showing voids, which probably terrify him most of all). I think he's still got 30-40% left, and it's mostly in the shape of a car windshield or computer monitor, so he maintains his independence and his life stays the same (kids hide from him by dropping down and laying on the floor, for instance, and he doesn't like going grocery shopping when there are directional arrows suspended from the ceiling at random places and people ready to harass you for violations).
His pupils tend to stay dilated too, making his eyes adjust to changes from light and dark poorly adding insult to injury, but he's ALWAYS had that issue and no one really knows why. I get the pleasure of holding his hand/arm and making sure he doesn't trip or walk into things when we go into dimly buildings from outdoor light levels. *I'm just being clingy, honest!* 

Moral of the story, I guess is, if you feel like somethings changed about your vision RUN to the eye doctor because eyes are screwy and not totally understood and much can not be recovered. And you need those suckers.

Me, I'm lucky in my health. I have some minor heart issues, but the doctors here decided to back off on the autoimmune diagnosis after more looking into things, so I'm hoping to be around as long as he is so I can make sure that whatever vision level he's got, he can adjust to it as smoothly as possible, be looked after as strictly necessary, and maintain as much independence as possible if things get bad (and I'm turning 30 this year, and he's only a few years older than me, but sometimes...).

But yes, no roofs or ladders if I can help it for DH, which can be hard sometimes because he is a man and roofing is one physical skill he DID excel at once he learned and that's a shame. He's good at shed building too-very mathy.

Come to think of it, it might be a little late to take him to a place with a big sky to look at the stars, but that's okay. I'll probably take him on a bike-camping fishing trip instead. At this point I refuse to ride a tandem bike though, so he'd better not go blind before I get to taking him-too much like getting pushed down a hill out of control and I'd rather follow him than be pushed down a hill.


----------



## farmerjan

Bless you for your support, and love and acceptance.  
I hope that it stays status quo for a LONG TIME....  to a wonderful wife !!!!! YOU !!!!!!


----------



## Baymule

And that is why marriage is such a blessing. Someone to fill in the gaps where we fall short and need that special someone in our lives. A true partnership in every sense of the word.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

You are truly a blessing to your husband, your kids, and to the world!  Thank you for sharing your life with us.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. I'm giving it my best shot. I just wish I/they could stop the vision loss or reverse it. Eyes are hard! Plus, he's better at photography than I am. WHO would set up and take the family pictures if he can't see?  Or do the decorating in the house?


----------



## rachels.haven

2 barn cat kittens brought home and in a 54" crate in the kitchen today.
Also brought home over 100lbs of goat meat from the processor.

One negative, Avalon went at me today so I flipped/tipped her. She bleated like she was shocked and I held her down until she gave up and she laid there panting...BUT she got up and tossed her (invisible) horns at me as soon as she was out of reach...but was still more respectful as I went though the rest of chores with her. Ava is not herd queen material. She will give in, but she will test EVERYTHING hard over and over. Being with the large goats is good for her, but she hasn't been in with the lamanchas for a month or two for breeding pens so she's too big for her britches and second in command currently (Atlas attempted to breed Summer yesterday, and definitely bred Lace today so we're almost done with only Emi left to cycle). After this kidding I will pull any babies of Ava sell her. I am done. Any kids with that attitude will go. I may sell Sugar her daughter at the same time, and Ginger is already gone. Her last daughter, Lavender is tiny, but is slightly milder mannered so consider her under evaluation. They all need to be split up in a new herd that will tolerate no crap from the new goat. None have what it takes to be "queen" goat. They are just upper middle level snots. If they were standard goats they'd all be gone by now (or back, vacuum backed in those boxes).






I did not love her up as the guy suggests in the video. There will be a round two since she tossed her head. No more biting, butting, or pushing from her will be tolerated though. The dwarves will start kidding around Christmas. Hopefully she got bred by Patrick. If not, she will be gone by Jan/Feb bred by her cousin Durango.

Edited: Ava is only about 65-70 pounds.


----------



## Baymule

Nearly 8 minutes! Is this guy ever going to shut up and flip the goat? Videos are generally boring to me because my internet sucks and it stops, winds, plays, stops, circle of doom, play, stop, circle of doom, shut up and flip the goat!
FINALLY!   

Avalon sounds like she needs to go. She needs to belong to someone else. Haha, flip her every day, she'll start running from you! Or bring her home in a box.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, he's long winded. All it takes is grabbing the opposite legs and holding them there. I think he feels bad about flipping them and puts it off. Or maybe he's trying to convince people it's humane. If you're dealing with a snotty goat, it's more humane and pleasant for the goat than vacuum sealing them and enjoying their company later.

Oh, two more things I forgot. 
Saffron was most likely a nubian lamancha. As the final way to prove it yesterday I bought a half gallon of nubian milk from the kitten keepers (milk is not a biohazard in New Hampshire). Yep, she was probably nu-manancha alright. The husband and kids approve of it and want their cake milk back. The flavor was spot on and her breeder is now selling doelings that look just like her as nubian-lamanchas now instead of lamancha-saanens. My husband mentioned maybe I should add a Nubian to the herd, but I'm not ready to add anything new yet after losing two goats in rapid succession. Maybe I'll get lucky and they'll like dwarf milk this year. (and I miss Saffron and am not totally moved on yet. I definitely don't want to go back to her breeder. That goat could never handle temps over 80 degrees well. There was something wrong with her from the start, and I gave her a safe place to live her life out well cared for then die. I do not need another heartbreak or two next year.)


2nd thing
School started two weeks ago (don't get me started on how intelligence poor our proud "superior" district is with it's tech and how few things actually work that they claim will work...and I live with a guy who could write the tech and be tech support if desired...but that's a trap). 80% of students here are in person 4 days per week as per wishes of the parents (yay, so educated, so affluent, so IMMUNE) and now we have Covid starting up in the high school, the building where the people are most likely to wear masks consistently, keep distance, and wash hands (I mean, have you seen how k-8 graders play?). But don't worry. The district has defined "close contact" as being within 6 feet for more than 15 minutes, and if anyone was in contact with the coviders it wasn't their fault and had to have been done privately and not on their watch, they remind us all. Plus, viruses care what the district defines as the allowed opportunity for it to spread.

And I tell myself I don't care because my kids are remote. 

The most affluent, "best" districts here are apparently having a hard time with covid (a step or two higher than this district). Those rich, entitled kids must throw those drunken after in-person school parties, then run away from the police after giving fake names, and nobody gets tracked or I guess consequences and off the virus goes (Sudbury, some Acton/boxborough). On the other hand where my in law teaches (Woburn, suburb of boston, viewed as a "bad" district) apparently they are ALL doing remote and they're doing okay.

But don't worry. Close contact is being within 6 feet for 15 minutes and the school didn't and won't facilitate that so they won't change behavior. What happens here on is all kids and parents fault as long as that 6ft/15 minutes thing isn't broken.

Done with rant. The way this thing spreads exponentially with asymptomatic carriers as well as people feeling sick and only the sick ones getting tested (and it's still hard to get tested here), I think I give them another week or two. I feel really terrible for the teachers and staff. And the bus drivers.

Sacrificing proofreading and cutting this down to go do chores. Sorry.


----------



## rachels.haven

Somebody's battling for her status in the already bred dwarf/staying dry Trinka pen today. I hope Ava goes down. They've already gone to bloody heads. If Trinka has the guts, she has the size. Problem is, Trinka is very laid back.






OH, and Ava mostly remembered her manners today. She blubbered at me, but did not try to jump me, push me over, or smash me.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## Baymule

Is that 2 kitties?

My daughter is a college professor, her husband is an assistant principal, they have 2 kids in school and 1 in day care. They are exposed to everything. I don't know how they do it. With them moved so far away, DD can't call me at 5 AM to babysit a sick kid. I just hope they all stay healthy this year.


----------



## rachels.haven

Goat has been approved for use as a meat in this household. I may be doing something regularly on Sunday with it.

Oh dear, that would scare me so much. I really hope they stay safe.

And yes, that is two future barn kitties. I really want a pair. Wondering if I have to start with half a dozen to wind up with two permanent barn hands.


----------



## Baymule

I bet goat burgers would be good. Always put a thumb print in the middle of the meat patty, it keeps the meat from drawing up when it is cooked.


----------



## rachels.haven

@Baymule were you one of the people who were suspicious they'd already had covid? If you were (and if getting it gives you immunity) you could be really helpful to them if they do get sick. Best wishes either way. 

I'm super excited for goat burgers.


----------



## Finnie

rachels.haven said:


> And yes, that is two future barn kitties. I really want a pair. Wondering if I have to start with half a dozen to wind up with two permanent barn hands.


Yes, you pretty much do. We would start with a whole litter and their mother, and after a year only have 1-3 left. The third time was most successful. That year we got a pregnant indoor female from a crazy cat lady’s basement. We made her live outside. I fixed up a nice nest for her in the garage, but when the day came, she kept leaving it and coming to me crying. She went to the door, obviously telling me she wanted to go in, so I let her, and followed her as she explored every nook and cranny. She chose the upstairs hall closet which is a walk in. An hour or so later, she started delivering the kittens. Of course, once that was over, I moved them all back to the garage in a large dog crate.

There were 5 kittens, and 3 of them lived the longest we ever had a cat. 7, 11, and 12 years. We attribute their longevity to being raised by a paranoid indoor cat that never allowed her kittens to stray far from the front porch. We think she taught them to be extremely wary.

Good luck with your kittens. Are they male or female? We always neutered our males as soon as they were weaned, but left the females intact just in case we needed more kittens the following year. But the females didn’t always make it to the next year. I wonder if that’s because they were intact. I might try spaying future females and see if they live longer.


----------



## rachels.haven

We got lady cats this time. I'm still deciding on the spay timing. This barn cat thing is more involved than I thought.


----------



## Finnie

Well the tip that was given to me years ago by the place my daughter took her first riding lessons, was that any male kittens would be run off or killed by whatever neighborhood tom already existed in a place. But not if the male kittens were neutered at a young age. So we did that and it seems to hold true in our experience. Different “stray” toms would come and go over the years, and when we saw them, they did not bother our boys. They would just eat their food and our boys would just let them. (We also saw them sitting by and watching raccoons eat their food too. 🙄)


----------



## rachels.haven

The neutering of males is not a bad tip. I've seen it at a neighbor's house who left all cats intact. Only the females stayed. The males either wandered off or were driven off.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> he doesn't like going grocery shopping when there are directional arrows suspended from the ceiling at random places and people ready to harass you for violations).


I wouldn't care much for suspended arrows either. The stores here have them on the floor ... not that everyone follows them. But I am usually at the store late morning, not busy then so no big deal. 



rachels.haven said:


> I just wish I/they could stop the vision loss or reverse it.


That would sure be nice. Good for both of you doing all you can.


----------



## rachels.haven

Personally I like the floor arrows better too. You always know where they will be.
Dh can't see the floor any better than he can see above him, but I don't make a fuss about it. Somehow that doesn't stop him from being the best walk and driveway weeder I've ever met, but when things drop, they are dead to him and for tiny things me or the kids need to come help.

I found it! THIS is the breed of cattle Danger Dan, my cow loving five year old wants, I'm fairly sure. Good luck to him finding it.








						Fjäll - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org


----------



## Bruce

And just how does Danger Dan know about a Swedish cattle breed?
And wouldn't he maybe like a half size Dexter instead?


----------



## rachels.haven

He watches dangerous educational documentaries with us and he saw smalish cows in white with lots of dots. It was on the women who herded in Sweden and all he got out of it was the cattle. I don't think there are any of those here, so we're probably pretty safe. At this point I think if someone walked up and handed him the rope on any heifer or cow he'd be thrilled. But spots and dots! Because five. And fives get stuffed and plastic toy cattle (he has a tiny one stall milking parlor that he loves from clearanced Christmas at TSC, but that's as far as we go). The worst a toy cow can do to you is fly through the air and hit you in the head.

(And the poor kid still thinks we can stuff a cow in the minivan when in reality we'd need a truck, trailer, and a different property in a different state, fencing, barn, and all. Maybe when he's a teen depending on where we're at.)


----------



## rachels.haven

...I guess I'd worry if he watched the documentary and was watching the women. Never mind, no complaining here He can watch all the cattle he wants.


----------



## farmerjan

Longhorns are colorful but not all are speckled.  There are speckled park that have lots of black speckles and splotches.... many shorthorns that are "roans" have some spots..... If you feel the need I am sure I can find some nice speckled cattle for your son.....


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> I found it! THIS is the breed of cattle Danger Dan, my cow loving five year old wants, I'm fairly sure. Good luck to him finding it.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Fjäll - Wikipedia
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> en.wikipedia.org



He likes spotty cattle? Get him some of these!









						Normande - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org
				









						North American Normande Association Information
					

Staff information for North American Normande Association located in Rewey,WI.



					www.normandeassociation.com


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> @Baymule were you one of the people who were suspicious they'd already had covid? If you were (and if getting it gives you immunity) you could be really helpful to them if they do get sick. Best wishes either way.
> 
> I'm super excited for goat burgers.


Actually, DD and the two youngest granddaughters were very sick in January/February. We babysat the kids, Husband got sick, I didn't. The kids got over it pretty fast, DD and my husband were sick for weeks, couple trips to the doctor and even the doctor was sick. It took several months for husband to really get over it. Yes, we think it was Covid, all the symptoms matched up.


----------



## rachels.haven

I hope you're all done with covid then! Stupid out of control cold.

Oh dear, I haven't shown my son longhorns. He wants dairy animals, but longhorns are pretty. I've been around them in person.  very majestic critters. They don't come across as super small either.
Someday that kid may get his cow(s? herd animal?). Right now he just lines up his little plastic cows in their coral panel shoot and puts them in the headgate thing (I'm a goat person, remember?) then puts the tiny inflations on their teats, and disconnects them and then works down the line for all four or five of his girls.

Normande cattle would probably make him happy too, but the Fjall are smaller...and in sweden. Heck, any nice cow or even female bottle calf would make him happy, but Dan is hardly heavier than a bag of feed at this point. I feel like he should hold his horses until he's a little bigger and maybe a lot bigger.

The kid asked the classic "why are cowboys called cowboys if they ride horses" question the other day. It was funny, but very serious. I'm pretty sure he wants them to be riding cattle (I think they may ride ATV's or trucks more than horses in the current day). 
Life is good.


----------



## Baymule

The guy we get hay from, Russell, has a boy, now 12, that is a bull rider. Steer actually, but that kid has grit. He has gone to the hay field with his Daddy since he was a tiny tot. Russell's wife worked nights at the hospital, so he just took the boy with him. He'd take a dog, toys, blanket and kid in the cab tractor. When the boy got tired, he cuddled with the dog and both went to sleep. The boy has raised several bottle calves. He is well on his way to being a cowboy!


----------



## rachels.haven

That doesn't sound like a bad start for a kid either. Plus, he gets to do it with dad. Dan would probably love to grow up like that. I don't think he wants bulls though. He just wants to produce his beloved cow milk.


----------



## Baymule

I had a longhorn bull, sure was glad to bet rid of him! He was white, speckled with red, so pretty! He charged at me. I got a piece of metal pipe, took a "batter up" stance and just before he ran me down, I swung and whacked him HARD on the nose. That stopped him. He'd shake his head and start at me again and I beat him all over with that pipe, chased him off, still beating him until he outran me. He jumped fences like a deer and the sheriff's department was always calling me to put him up. Finally sold him. Durned longhorn nearly started a range war. He jumped the fence, went down the road, jumped a fence and bred a registered Angus herd. LOL


----------



## Finnie

Baymule said:


> I had a longhorn bull, sure was glad to bet rid of him! He was white, speckled with red, so pretty! He charged at me. I got a piece of metal pipe, took a "batter up" stance and just before he ran me down, I swung and whacked him HARD on the nose. That stopped him. He'd shake his head and start at me again and I beat him all over with that pipe, chased him off, still beating him until he outran me. He jumped fences like a deer and the sheriff's department was always calling me to put him up. Finally sold him. Durned longhorn nearly started a range war. He jumped the fence, went down the road, jumped a fence and bred a registered Angus herd. LOL


😱


----------



## rachels.haven

Dang!


----------



## Baymule

Longhorns are popular around here, there are several breeders and they sell then for stupid high prices. Just a mile or so from us is a farm with a pasture full of longhorns. I like to look at them, but don't want any. Well, maybe a skull with those cool horns.......


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> Dan would probably love to grow up like that. I don't think he wants bulls though. He just wants to produce his beloved cow milk.



You ought to have Danger Dan spend some time with Miss @farmerjan.  He'd get to see the dairy cows getting milked and could spend some time up close with some beef cattle.  He'd probably be thrilled!


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, Danger Dan would not want to come home and would want to become a professional milk tester at 5.


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> Lol, Danger Dan would not want to come home and would want to become a professional milk tester at 5.


There is an opening in NJ for a milk tester with Dairy One.... talked to the mid-Atlantic regional supervisor the other day.... although we are "competitor companies" the sup and I talk regularly.... and he said the "girl" that has been the tester there for over 6 years gave her notice and he is looking for a replacement..... SADLY, one requirement is that they have to have their drivers license..... Don't think Danger Dan would qualify....


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol...and that is how my first son suddenly left home to begin his career.

"Honestly officer, I'm a very youthful 16 year old legal driver"  - Danger Dan


----------



## Baymule

Get this boy a cow!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> (And the poor kid still thinks we can stuff a cow in the minivan when in reality we'd need a truck, trailer, and a different property in a different state, fencing, barn, and all. Maybe when he's a teen depending on where we're at.)
> 
> 
> 
> rachels.haven said:
> 
> 
> 
> Normande cattle would probably make him happy too, but the Fjall are smaller...and in sweden.
Click to expand...

Sounds like you need to move to Sweden 
I think he really needs to be somewhere with an active farm animal based 4H group.


----------



## farmerjan

I forgot about Normande cattle.  They are pretty.... but they are "dairy cattle".... you would have a ton of milk.....They do hold their weight well, and the calves make a real decent beef because they gain good.  They have very good rich milk.....several of my dairies have used Normande in crosses to improve grazing ability..... and the cows stay "fat" ...very well fleshed, when on the normal dairy rations with corn silage and such.... they still milked good.


----------



## Baymule

There are no Normande cattle here in Texas. I think they are very pretty cows!


----------



## rachels.haven

Uh oh. Bloody poo and a dead chick in the chick house. Time to break out the corid for the next 5 days

50 bales of hay in the garage to put away. My hay guy is out and he thinks it's to be a "blood bath" come March and he advises me to keep looking until we're at stuffed capacity and if I get desperate he an help look too. Apparently his contacts in New York and VT had worse drought than we did and are out or are down to almost nothing. I'm going to get this stuff put up and decide how much more I can fit.

My "c" key on my chromebook is being insensitive. Sorry for typos I didn't catch. Keyboards getting ruined beyond repair is the number 1 reason I replace laptops. The other being destroyed housing due to kid incidents. Not in the mood for replacing right now, so may need to get some canned air or putty to try.


----------



## Bruce

Yep, mild drought here though not as bad as 2 years ago.


----------



## farmerjan

I feel for you with the drought and the shortage of hay.  This is why I keep preaching to people..... have a surplus.... try to have enough for 2 years stockpiled.  It is easy enough to rotate out hay.... feed from different sides of the barn, when you get down, move all the older hay to the front....do whatever.... but get and keep extra.... We try to keep at least an extra month or 2 of round bales, than what we fed the year before.... so that we have a bit of a surplus.... And if hay is offered to us by guys who want to get it moved so they can put in this years, we often buy it.... at a discount usually, so that we have extra.  
Hay won't go bad as long as it is kept dry....get ahead and then try to stay ahead.  Times like what you are seeing now @rachels.haven  is what taught me to not ever get down to where I am "looking for hay".  Good luck getting some more.


----------



## Baymule

We had a BAD drought here in 2011 and 2012. Pastures burnt up, trees died, beautiful old oak trees just died. It was heartbreaking to watch the trees die. When we bought this place in 2014, it had dead standing trees on it from the drought. We had over 2 months of 100+ degree heat. Eighteen wheelers were bringing in round bales for $125 to $275 for a single round bale. 

People dumped their horses at sale barns and kill buyers snapped them up. One kill pen owner said he shipped out 40 eighteen wheeler loads of horses a WEEK. FORTY LOADS. Ranchers sold their cattle. Some tried to keep a small herd to preserve their genetics, many couldn't afford to do so. 

We were lucky to find round bales for $80 and bought a bale each week. It was not great hay, loosely rolled, but it was hay. Our horses stripped bark off trees to supplement the hay. We fed them as good as we could, but you can't over feed grains and pellets unless you want a foundered or colic horse. 

@rachels.haven if you need to go out of state, take a trailer and have a weekend mini vacation. Maybe you need to go see @farmerjan LOL

For storage, build a hoop shelter out of cow panels. you can put them up with t-posts driven in the ground to tie the panels to. Put a heavy tarp over the bowed over cow panels and lay pallets to stack the hay on.  To keep the ends of the panels from poking holes in the tarp, put foam split pipe wrap on the edges. Wire the panels together, you could probably make a tunnel with 3 panels. Since you have snow, you might need to put a post in the middle of each panel to keep it from collapsing from the snow.


----------



## Baymule

Oh, any animals that you need to sell, sell them now before you can't even give them away.


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> Since you have snow, you might need to put a post in the middle of each panel to keep it from collapsing from the snow.


At least one  Might be worth putting in a ridge pole so it doesn't change from an upside down U into an M (like the "bird excluder" over my 3 blueberry bushes.


----------



## rachels.haven

Snow stinks, eh? I will definitely do something like that if I go that route.


----------



## Bruce

I don't think snow stinks but as you know when it is wet it is HEAVY. BTW, my CP hoops over the berries were covered in chicken wire to keep the wild birds out. Nope, those holes weren't big enough for wet snow to fall through. I imagine it just slowly forze to the wires then to itself closing off the holes. I didn't even think about it until spring when the snow was long gone and the M conversion was seen.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

If I remember correctly, you don't own a tractor, do you?  How will you be able to store all of that hay?  But then, you somehow managed to put hay into the loft of your barn, so I guess you are like Miss @farmerjan, Miss @Baymule, and Miss @Ridgetop, namely Wonder Woman.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

I've got a lot of room in the loft and I may take down a pen or tarp and pallet some.
And yes! We have to be super women! Girls have to have it all, or so we're told by others and we tell ourselves. Plus, the animals are the things in my life that tend to go right on the bad home maker days and there are a lot of those.


----------



## Baymule

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Miss @rachels.haven,
> 
> If I remember correctly, you don't own a tractor, do you?  How will you be able to store all of that hay?  But then, you somehow managed to put hay into the loft of your barn, so I guess you are like Miss @farmerjan, Miss @Baymule, and Miss @Ridgetop, namely Wonder Woman.
> 
> Senile Texas Aggie


Haha, Wonder Woman! Thanks for the compliment!


----------



## rachels.haven

Today my mom came down from TN and we put away 24 of the 50 bales my hay guy brought. Wow, things go fast when you're not descending stairs every 2 bales to tie them on, then back up to pull them up. We aren't particularly buff but finished up in about 30 minutes. We will get to the last few next chance we get and then will get more from the feed store probably to put away since it was that easy.

She started a conversation between tying bales about AI. Her animal science degree required a class on cattle AI, and she wanted to know how different goat AI was to it and if it was easier or harder...That's not something I've thought about in my spare time, but I admit it was a good question. I guess I'll have to go find out now. It sounds like cows are harder but usually I leave "I"ing of my does to the bucks so I know nothing. Meh, maybe I'll have to look it up and have a research party. The problem is, if I find out too much, DH will ask THAT question ("why DO you have so many bucks?") and we can't have that. Regardless, maybe if we ever move nearby I'll secretly have mom teach me how to AI if she ever figures out goats because now I'm curious...although I know little to nothing about cattle ai.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh, and it is official. I will be going to the feed store tomorrow. We need to hit up the auto parts shop because DH's poor, neglected work commute car's battery is flat dead and I can't stand to have a broken down car when it's so simple. $10/35-40lbs bale is better than no bale and I'm almost full up top in the loft. I wonder if I can fill up the extra space on the ground floor before I have to stop. I'd like to USE and refill the ground floor hay and save the upstairs until the area goes dry. Hopefully it's not too soon. Man, after all this pulleying I would have nice buff arms...if I was a man.  I'd be positively ripped.

I've been making the goats clean up the spilled hay and only giving them two meals of hay in the dwarf pen and letting all the feeders empty. Turns out, dwarves eat a lot for avg 50 pound animals. We've cut our usage down to a bale per day instead of 2 and nobody seems to have sunken sides at the moment, so this may not be a bad thing. I'd like to get and try some beet pulp pellets or shreds to try in their daily alfalfa pellets as an experiment. 

Oh, turns out I'm over pelleting the bucks and the ducks like to come and crash in their pen to raid the dishes, so the pekins are running around pooping alfalfa green around the yard like geese. But the bucks are starting to look nice again so the ducks will have to just keep quapping green. I may cut the alfalfa just a bit, but I'd like to keep them on a decent amount because I know our hay is a little high in phosphorus and the calcium may not be a bad idea.


----------



## Baymule

Tightening up on the hay looks to be working. I know you will keep a close eye on the animals and regulate appropriately. Glad that you are getting stocked up on hay, it's going to be a very rough ride for many. Try the beet shreds, if the goats like them, best buy some more before other people catch on to the idea.


----------



## rachels.haven

You said it. I already know the milkers like the beet pulp and it adds to their condition. It doesn't look like their calcium phosphorus is too bad either. It's time to pick up a bag for testing purposes.


----------



## Baymule

Yeah, I never had rats get into beet shreds either. LOL But we are talking about Massachusetts rats...... if they are as onery and idiotic as the people, it’s a wonder the rats haven’t chewed your tires off.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's good to know (um, that hopefully they don't, I guess). I was putting off stocking up on beet pulp shreds because I don't have another feed can or a place on a pallet for the can.


----------



## rachels.haven

Rest of hay going up today. New delivery coming from the feed store with beet pulp tomorrow. That should fill up the loft and part of the down stairs. I think I'll use and replace the downstairs stuff as long as the stores have it, so I'm going to take it easy after this. I've got a family member with a health thingy coming up, so I'll need to put my focus elsewhere for a little bit to keep things in balance.

I should do an official bale count on the loft once it's full.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yesterday I sent Atlas home to the buck pen as all the lamancha does had cycled and had a honeymoon with him, then I herbal wormed everyone and put the dwarf does back in with the mancha does. This of course, prompted all the dwarves to start fighting among themselves any excuse for a good brawl checks out in the dwarf herd.

This morning Lace and Summer were putting the fear of God back in those dwarven "herd queens" and Trinka gets a free pass because she's a lamancha like them. She has no ears. What a relief. No more Trinka slamming.

Well, I've gotten tired of the stupid polish and opted to sell them. They are both dumb and they bite my boots and hands when I handle them and hold on like angry turtles. So two strikes, time to hatch more silkies, I guess. I liked my orps. Maybe next time I'll just get some no fuss american orps or australorps. Or california whites. Or nothing because silkies are fine. 

Anyhow, I got the feed store to bring that 50 bales and some beet pulp to try so now all that's left is to put it away. What fits in the loft is hay storage, anything else is to be used as slowly as I can.

Oh, and the little baby bucks went off into the dwarf's old breeding pen and of course like good little dwarf bucklings they are screaming their heads off because the new pen wants to castrate or eat them or something. But more space for them!


----------



## messybun

rachels.haven said:


> Uh oh. Bloody poo and a dead chick in the chick house. Time to break out the corid for the next 5 days
> 
> 50 bales of hay in the garage to put away. My hay guy is out and he thinks it's to be a "blood bath" come March and he advises me to keep looking until we're at stuffed capacity and if I get desperate he an help look too. Apparently his contacts in New York and VT had worse drought than we did and are out or are down to almost nothing. I'm going to get this stuff put up and decide how much more I can fit.
> 
> My "c" key on my chromebook is being insensitive. Sorry for typos I didn't catch. Keyboards getting ruined beyond repair is the number 1 reason I replace laptops. The other being destroyed housing due to kid incidents. Not in the mood for replacing right now, so may need to get some canned air or putty to try.


You can plug in a desktop keyboard into your laptop🙂


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh goodness, I forgot about that. I may even have an extra keyboard laying around. I pushed it about 5 million times and it got unsticky for now.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hay Guy hay vs Farmers' Exchange hay.
Green color doesn't matter as much as it looks for the non-hay people. The farmers exchange hay is always fine and sweet smelling. I think it's both orchard grass, but the goats prefer Hay Guy hay, probably for the later leaf stage and extra weeds yet few to no stems. I think the Farmers' Exchange caters the most to equids. Do horses like it finer and more sugary?


----------



## rachels.haven

Forgot pic.


----------



## rachels.haven

Obi and Ant the Jr. Bucklings letting me know that they are so emotionally scarred from being moved from a small dry stall to a stall and pen that they need more grain therapy so they can get fat...I mean heal the emotional wounds I inflicted and get over it.


----------



## farmerjan

Hay on left - greener color in picture..... looks more like a "bladey type orchard grass"  like what we make here in the improved orchard grass fields.  The pic on the right looks more like our mixed grass fields....has some different types of hay and it is as sweet smelling as the other....IF MADE RIGHT..... all of our hay this past week has smelled so good because it has dried right with no humidity.  Cutting at optimal time is also important, but it is the making it right that has more to do with the sweet smell...plus the variety/type of hay.  
Greener hay like that also has more nutrition.  The hay we made this week has great color, because it dried faster so did not get bleached out by the sun.  In the heat of the summer, it will bleach more because of the intensity of the sun on it, especially if it is more humid so it takes longer to dry.


----------



## rachels.haven

AH. That makes sense. The feed store hay does go faster and they don't seem to like it as much and they waste more. Their hay also can occasionally come moldy or sour smelling and cause the goats to bloat if they eat it. Last year I also had some bales that either came black or became black in storage. This batch has less color, but smells pretty good, so I'll take it. We had a lot of humidity and this last little bit of the growing season, lots of patchy light rain (not enough to dampen the dirt, but enough to drive some hay farmers nuts, I bet).

Hay guy's hay is preferred by the peanut gallery many times over. Pity he ran out so early!

@farmerjan  you are a hay artist. Thank you for chiming in!


----------



## rachels.haven

Really almost done.



See?




And yes, the five year old is wearing a two year old shirt he dug out of storage/the trash. Dan loved lifting hay with me, so he is proud regardless.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Those two little ones will soon grow into strapping young men who can do a lot of the chores for you.  But now you can still enjoy their help!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. I love them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Now the loft is done being stuffed. There is a path down the middle and I kept the door area clear so I can open it for ventilation. Any other bales would need to be carried up the stairs. There are 9 bales in the spare stall for daily use. I'll arrange deliveries to keep us covered as long as the supply lasts (feed and pellets too!). For some reason the local store is only charging $12 lately to deliver. Sounds like TSC curbside pickup is getting them down. We buy a lot of feed. Here, I'll help.

The husband tried to sneak away and take a nap in the sensory deprivation loft like he did last year after I stuffed it, but the kids got him first. They like jumping around the loft too!


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, the muscovy have hit duck "puberty". 
The last couple of days as a group my trio has decided they are not going to bed anymore and tonight I can not round them up and catch them. They get no pellet on freerange, but they are eating high enough on the hog out in the yard they do not care (but of course they will gorge on pellet if given the chance as long as it doesn't involve lockup). So tonight they will probably disappear. There are 3 ducks, one LGD that goes to bed at some point (yep), and a whole woods full of hungry things waiting for idiot ducks.
Normally I'd have a whole flock of adult muscovy to sweep them away into the coop with, but I just restarted with these gorgeous, well bred, solid colored ducks, and they are all I have right now.
Typically the only thing that convinces them that staying out is stupidity is a predator attack that takes out one or two, but I doubt I'll have any ducks left after that the way the predator load goes here. Normally I'd out consistent them for training, but these have decided they are wild now and too smart for bed and they are FAST.

Oh well. There are many good things to do in life, and you can not do them all, and it appears I will not be doing these right now.

If they survive, I have the stuff for a duck pen in the van picked up from HD yesterday and they will be confined until they go to bed reliably. I will probably put one up for the normal ducks even if they don't since I'm not loading hay right now but this is a bit of a bummer. Time for T Post therapy.


Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, while I was loading hay last week my parents came and stayed two days and my dad finished the little duck house while I was remote schooling my kids (mom loaded hay with me as therapy afterward). The Dan has lost interest in climbing all over the roof (it's about 3' tall) and hanging out inside and the normal ducks have just about transitioned to the new routine.

And this is how you save on feed-by letting the invincible young idiot birds get rid of themselves. Good luck Bailey. Maybe they'll be alive tomorrow.

Rant over.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sheesh, at 11 in pitch black my husband went out and the muscovy were sitting outside their old pen and this time didn't hook and run out and scatter but instead went into it and he snapped that door shut so fast...and then he biffed it really good on a log that was laying on the ground and acquired new bruises because that late EVERYONE is really, really blind. I guess 11 o'clock in the dark is when they are ready. I guess I'll try later.
This onry muscovy stage is lousy. I dread it every time. 

If these were poorly bred muscovy this would be when the drakes would try to attack you for dominance, for context. Then we'd eat them.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> And yes, the five year old is wearing a two year old shirt he dug out of storage/the trash.


Nothing wrong with wearing old clothes to move hay!


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, and I did tell him to put on a shirt. I did not specify that it should be a shirt that fit. I have to be very specific with my kids.


----------



## Bruce

Hey, I wear shirts WAY older than that one! Of course at his age, he's actually outgrowing his


----------



## Baymule

I can't have muscovies here, Trip eats them. I wish you the best with your ducks. They are too annoying for me, thank you Trip! LOL

Love the kids in the barn pictures! What fun! They will have these memories all their lives. Hope they follow in Mom's footsteps and have their own little farms someday.


----------



## rachels.haven

Heheheh. It's raining right now and has rained all day, but here's proof of drought.
https://www.morningagclips.com/drou...p72jvla3ipSkF9j3jHvp4I-0ddeesqJj_QBPZq2rJI3ME

The rains a little late for the growing season, but maybe next year will be better.


----------



## Bruce

Fortunately we only had mild drought up here this year.


----------



## rachels.haven

And our drought didn't look that bad honestly either. The grass just went dormant and people couldn't plant for much of the year or do hay. I don't think trees died more than normal. We did get fires, but this area is a tinderbox of overgrown white pines live and fallen so cynical me says that fires are going to happen and bring mass devastation eventually. It's bad management and unrealistic forestry expectations to expect it not to. A little scary to live in it, but that's life (sort of like spending a lot of time in tornado alley, but not dying in a tornado...like a lot of people here).


----------



## rachels.haven

Yesterday all the ducks pretended to be good at going to bed. Of course the chicken coop was closed off to them, but I guess I'll take it.


----------



## Baymule

I was telling my granddaughters about when I raised a batch of ducks for the freezer some years back. The 4 year old asked, “why didn’t I get to eat one?”  LOL I love the way that kid thinks!


----------



## rachels.haven

She's perfect!
Four year olds are a hoot.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, my husband and kids want another "cake milk" doe-aka a Saffron. Saffron was a la-nub. These are just "nubs"-nubians. This Saturday we are driving to a dairy to check out some does, see if any of them have a temperament I want to bring on and a build I like from the head to the feet. Thick girls. She(s) will come bred. If we like these girls I will probably make the hard decision to sell off the dwarves as their kids wean and go. They eat as much as standards each, fight more, milk less, and are harder to deal with. The math does not make sense and I am ready to give them up.

I know what I can/want to deal with but I have no feelings on adding a nubian or two. I've decided that on this, a goat is a goat. This isn't _my_ goat errand. I'll just be taking care of it.


----------



## Mini Horses

So you do milk them?  Apparently DH & kids drink it....so, it's a go to me!  I love my goat milk.  This spring I will offer a couple of my young goats as trained milkers.  They bring several hundred each here.  My heard is at a point that I can sell 4-5 a year like that.   A good deal of work to train some but most of mine have been reasonably easy.   The milk is good and plentiful.  I have Saanen & SannenxNubian.

I hope you find some acceptable ones!   It's work but relaxing as well -- if you don't have to push some other time issues.


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> I was telling my granddaughters about when I raised a batch of ducks for the freezer some years back. The 4 year old asked, “why didn’t I get to eat one?”  LOL I love the way that kid thinks!


Did you explain that since she hadn't been born yet it might have been difficult?


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh @Bruce , don't start that argument with a 4. According to many kids around that age, they were always born and present and you are wrong and they are right. The fight can get epic. It's as if they are not rational beings but little loud balls of emotion.


----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> Did you explain that since she hadn't been born yet it might have been difficult?



As a matter of fact, I did. Since life for the entire world started on the day she was born, I don’t know if I did any good. 



rachels.haven said:


> Oh @Bruce , don't start that argument with a 4. According to many kids around that age, they were always born and present and you are wrong and they are right. The fight can get epic. It's as if they are not rational beings but little loud balls of emotion.



Yes. This. She is my Ring Tailed Tooter!


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> Since life for the entire world started on the day she was born, I don’t know if I did any good.


So we are ALL 4 years old now? 
Hmmm, not sure what to think about that. Not sure I want to be around another 80 or 90 years the way things are going.


----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> So we are ALL 4 years old now?
> Hmmm, not sure what to think about that. Not sure I want to be around another 80 or 90 years the way things are going.


No, you are not 4 years old, you are just OLD, same as me.


----------



## Bruce

Nah, I'm YOUNGER than you! Though not much.


----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> Nah, I'm YOUNGER than you! Though not much.


I hate to break the bad news to you, but you are still old.


----------



## rachels.haven

Seven year old kept us parents up particularly bad last night with the stupid "I'm scared so I have to wake you up every 5 minutes from 3:30 on" game as he has been doing for the last few weeks. So this morning I got up and angrily shoveled all the poop except for the dwarf bucklings' stall, which doesn't need it. Here are the bantam chicks with their similarly POed mommies.





Today in a few minutes we leave to go to the dairy and look at a few nubians.
Kids who sleep in their own beds get video game time and a piece of candy every morning. Kids who keep parents up when they have no needs don't. Younger son was trying to follow older son's lead, so this is necessary now. Yay parenting. I need to be sane...I mean rested.
Can't focus on much else right now. Got to go run this errand. Will update on nubian situation later.


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> I hate to break the bad news to you, but you are still old.


 



rachels.haven said:


> game as he has been doing for the last few weeks.


Any idea why? Clearly the reward for staying in his bed isn't enough to win out over the "fear"/"manipulation".

I'm glad we didn't have that problem. Good luck!


----------



## rachels.haven

My oldest is high energy and highly strung. I think he's getting too much screen time and not enough running around wrestling and screaming because of remote school. I'm going to try limit his recreational screen time more, see if it changes things. Today we went to Singing beach to catch the sunset after the goat dairy and they ran around and explored after a healthy dose of complaining from son number 1 (wants screen time that he knows I took away). Maybe it will help him tonight. After running around like crazy he talked for over an hour straight on the way home. I'm hoping to get the kids early to bed because DH has a migraine this evening as the result of last night's slumber party but I might need to do a pharmacy run for him first.


----------



## rachels.haven

Danger Dan.




Still haven't gotten Active Aiden to submit to a shearing and somehow he got out of the house wearing my shirt. Aw well. He says the ocean "calls him". I say swim lessons call him louder.



Parent until you drop! Plus, we were right next to the coast, so we couldn't not go.


----------



## Baymule

Beautiful scenery and I know the boys were happy with the playing and running. Kids need that. Parents need that too, in the form of tired kids that go to sleep. LOL LOL


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Beautiful scenery!  So is Danger Dan the younger one and Active Aiden the older one, or the other way around?    Hope you got some sleep last night.


----------



## rachels.haven

You got it right the first time, @Senile_Texas_Aggie . Our first kid has an inborn desire to stop and think and make sure things are not too messy and are a good idea despite his higher energy level and our second one throws caution to the wind at the slightest provocation and yesterday shut himself in the laundry room and quietly spun himself around and around in the washer for a good five minutes while we searched for him (washer door open, not running)-and that's a big deal because I usually have an eye on that kid at all times. I think he'll probably be a little less dangerous when covid ends and he can go to kindergarten and watch other kids and see they're not all racoons. Dan is also wicked smart, but needs more physical common sense when it comes to application. Things seem to work better in his five year old head than they do when he puts them into practice in reality, mainly safety-wise. He's five. He should grow out of it hopefully.

The beach seemed like a good idea because "taking it easy at home" with these guys is just as stressful (and sometimes more) than taking them to a place that they can use their energy and explore. They DID go to bed, right on time too and Aiden didn't get up until 4:30 instead of 3. I think he needed more beach time, lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sunday is goat day, so I did an attempt at braised goat shank and deboned it for the kids. After deboning and hiding the carrots it looked like this.






And here's dinner waiting for people. I made a lot of meat and rice so we'll probably have it for tomorrow too. I tried to get nice lettuce to get the kids to eat it last shopping. I think it's great! The kids saved me lots. Luckily I hid those carrots decently well. They thickened the sauce/gravy too. Apparently carrots are starchy. And yep, my does are dry now, so the cow milk has come back. I wanted to give them a break after the coccidia issue we had.


----------



## rachels.haven

And as a sort of related side note, apparently there are bears VERY nearby over the NH border killing and eating goats in at least two different locations this weekend (???who declared buffet?), so I drove the bucks into their little barn pen from their own pen so Bailey can guard them better. The baby bucks who are living in the barn pen are NOT happy about this, but I don't want my bucks eaten. NH is going after the bears. If it happened in Mass I doubt they would do anything so I need to try to cover my own bases the best that I can.
Word on the street is that guns don't work, dogs don't work, only electric is working, which is just greattttt. I think hibernation is supposed to start at the latest mid December (assuming they don't skip this year like they supposedly have before?). The bucks will be spending the nights at the barn until then, I guess.

Time to stand train the lamancha bucklings while they're up here, I guess. Pffft.


----------



## farmerjan

One of my dairy farmers had a neighbor get a black bear the other day....bow season is in.... 250 lbs so good sized.  I like wildlife in general, but there are just too many now that are too close to the general population of people.... and we keep encroaching on their habitat.... and they are getting very adaptable.  Hope that you can keep the goats safe.


----------



## Baymule

I'm glad we don't have bears to deal with. Coyotes, bobcats and the occasional cougar, but no bears.


----------



## rachels.haven

Did buck hooves today. Gave out herbal wormers and replamin to all. Getting back in that routine after letting it slip for a while. Ranked my lamancha bucks by their hoof quality in case I want to sell one and have two and not three. Durango, one of my dwarf bucks, the one I brought up from Michigan, has someone coming to look at him on Saturday and possibly bring him home to be their new breeding buck. I'll have three dwarf bucks and three lamancha bucks then if they want him.

Btw, we are bringing home this to be FF nubian doe to be Saf's replacement on the milk string.


			Planned Pedigree Print
		


She will come bred to this buck.





						Goat Detail: KING'S ROCK ADONIS - N002055865 (AM Buck)
					






					www.adgagenetics.org
				




I don't know much about nubians, but I would not mind a doeling or two out of that breeding based on how pretty both pedigree are. Nice teats and udder texture on the dry doeling's mother too.

I had the option of getting this doe too, but I held back. Barely. In the name of hay shortage.





						Goat Detail: VVFARM ROYALE PANACHE - N001952381 (AM Doe)
					






					www.adgagenetics.org
				




Yeah, these goats are a lot like Saffron was. I'm not reaady to be BFF's with them, but I won't mind having one (or if I hadn't held back, having 2) around. Those dang ears though. How am I going to get used to those things?


----------



## rachels.haven

Good evening!
I ran the bucks out to their pen today. The baby bucks decided they wanted to go too, so all the bucks are out in the buck pen during daylight.

The does got brought up to the front pen to strip it clean of anything that grew in the last few weeks. It wasn't much, but it's something to keep them busy and get some nutrition and enjoyment out of.

Putting everyone away went...okay.

Max, one of the lamancha bucklings got separated from his "mommy" Buggy (buck) so he ran around the yard in a tizzy. I bought Max half grown, and his breeder did not waste attention on him so catching him involved bringing "mommy" back out and tying him in the barn in sight and the two of them reuniting.

When putting up the does Ava decided to try to bite me all the way back so she got "knee butted" more than I wish I had to. I put her back up for sale, btw.

Bailey, the LGD meanwhile had to be locked in a stall because she's a food bully-only other animals food, that is. She could care less about her own. It's only good if something else wants it.

And that's life tonight.
...oh, and the Muscovy refused to go in again tonight. Hope my husband has better luck when they realize there's no food out there, no more water with pools dumped. This set of ducks kind of sucks. Grow up or die, I guess.


----------



## rachels.haven

I forgot to mention I had a lady come to buy a few pekins later last night-a local vet tech. I've decided to scale back for the winter. She raises alpine goats, but only the does and uses them for milk and brush control. Bailey started going off while we were back there and I told her we got coyotes and bears and things so we'll pay attention to the dog and avoid where she's barking. She responded that that was good and by telling me that last year SHE had a bear break into her goat pen and kill and eat one of her goats and she lives 10-20 minutes from here in Lunenburg. Mass Fish and Wildlife's response was to open an "inquiry" (huh?). Meanwhile the bear moved on and is still in her area, lesson learned, goats are tasty and free food, inquiry let go. So yes, no relocation, no real help with their with anything, and most of all she's close enough to neighbors she can't defend her animals even if she did have a gun big enough to kill or be a deterrent to bears. And if you ask me, that's how you train wildlife to become dangerous. I kind of wonder if it was the bear, also in Lunenburg or Fitchburg or something, which are near to each other, that was chasing people around that eventually got relocated to western mass after months of doing so and several close calls. I'm kind of sick of hearing about bears and other wildlife and what officials are willing to stand by and watch. The lady was very resigned to "that's just the way it is" and had given up. It was sad.
She also asked about our coyotes, and she says the one that came after us early last year was most definitely a coy-wolf. Apparently they're darker in color, and that one was coyote colored/patterned, but darker than I expected. He hasn't come back, btw. Someone probably got ticked off at the right time and finally shot him or he moved on.

It's raining today, so all the goats are staying in their barn pens. Not sure this is going to work long term with the bucks. They need more space. They may have to rough it. 
I'm starting to feel like my hobbies just dangle meat in front of things I don't want to have around here to endanger my family and I'm expected to let the critters come or just conform like the rest of the suburbanites and give it all up. I should probably scale back on the poultry and prepare to move in the next year or so. The dirt is poor and rocky, the people are anti-child and anti-farm carefully cultivated intentional appearances shoveled aside, and the law is attempting to require me to keep my property a wildlife reserve to invite it and not do anything with my ever land all because we have a drainage ditch designated a wetland running through it and we'd need a lawyer even to start trying to fight it.
Maybe if I move to TN my parents can give me a gun safety/care/firing class I actually am satisfied with and i can dispatch critters like my parents do. The dirt is red clay there, but it's open season on coyotes on your land (and possibly period, I don't remember), so things are kept under control, and nobody has bear issues. I'm not looking forward to the idea of moving though. Moving is lousy. Selling a house is lousy. Buying a house is lousy. (Dh's job might improve though, so maybe worth it.)

Oh well. Time to keep trucking.


----------



## Baymule

Time to go. Better things on the horizon.


----------



## Mini Horses

So why are you in your current location?   Raised in area, job location, etc?   

Yeah, moving is a major life change for many -- especially if far, not just other side of town.  But you may have a talk with DH and see if job elsewhere is an option for him and plan from there.  Might be a good time to make a life change.

At my stage, only me to ask and satisfy.  There is good and bad with that...


----------



## rachels.haven

We moved here for DH's job. That's it. We've been here since Feb of 2018.
If we can prepare over the winter I'd like to move in the spring after kidding and numbers decreasing (kidding will be early this year). Not for sure where we're going yet, but where ever we go we will be a lot more careful next time.


----------



## farmerjan

Eastern Tn is nice, more humid.  Way down southwestern Va near the border is nice, but if still in Va then dealing with this idiot Gov Northam.... luckily a gov can only serve one term in Va.  NC western mountain area is nice.   I am a Yankee and would not go back now for love or money.   This house I bought is nice, will be a good investment, but last night I could hear the interstate and was not very happy.... it is not going to be my forever home.... even with all that I am doing... I am thinking that maybe get it done and start looking again in another year.  If son stays with this gf, I need a life of my own.


----------



## rachels.haven

Got 30 bales of "usable" hay from a farther away feed store another goat keeper recommended in Salem, NH. I have put away 15 of the bales in my spare time and have found two moldy ones, so I guess I'll stick to the farmers exchange in townsend, ma until they're gone. More pricey still, but usually they are very selective about the hay they resell and will be happy to credit you bales. Townsend does like light loose bales for the avoidance of mold issue. That can get annoying, but mold is worse.

I don't want to drive 45 minutes to Salem with angry kids in the van, so I'm not going to ask about crediting the bales, plus the other bales in the delivery feel a bit off texture/moisture wise, maybe a little damp or cold anyway (but still short term edible), maybe slightly greasy but the goats say they are good at least and I don't have a way to bring them back (and again, the goats are eating them with gusto they just won't be for long term storage). The moldy bales had black or yellow spots on the side. I will be on the lookout for that as I cut strings. I need something to mulch my fig trees when I lay them down to earth anyway, I guess, and while it seems a waste, a bag of mulch isn't that different in price than the two wasted bales. A little frustrating, but I get to cross that place off my list of options.

Time to feed kids and slip off to TSC to pick up a curbside order of alfalfa pellets before my 10% seasonal reward expires. It's something I guess, and they like the pellets.


----------



## Bruce

Really sad that they are selling moldy hay, make sure to tell the other goat keeper.


----------



## rachels.haven

Will do. It's all put away on the ground floor now. There will be more mold, but the frost is coming, so my fig trees will need it as soon as the leaves fall off (or manure, I guess).


----------



## rachels.haven

Brr. Snow is coming this week. The little silkies are for the most part growing well. I've noticed one or two from each batch fail to thrive and eventually pitter out, but that's what you get with fancy chickens. Goats are fine. Ducks are duckin. Bailey is herself, lonely, and always trying to push the rules, but still doing her job.
The snow will probably not stick or stay long, imo. It's still in the 50's much of the time.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Brr. Snow is coming this week. The little silkies are for the most part growing well. I've noticed one or two from each batch fail to thrive and eventually pitter out, but that's what you get with fancy chickens. Goats are fine. Ducks are duckin. Bailey is herself, lonely, and always trying to push the rules, but still doing her job.
> The snow will probably not stick or stay long, imo. It's still in the 50's much of the time.


Winter is coming. It never got above 50 here today. Misting drizzle for the last 2 days. I don't think I would like your winter!


----------



## rachels.haven

No, me neither. I learned how to drive in the snow on the unplowed streets around Metro Detroit so I have mobility, but snow season is still a very sadistic season where cold, frozen water sticks to you and re freezes instead of rolling off or soaking in. I hate it. Cold, snow, ice, all out the window as terrible inventions.

And freaking frozen shower hair....


----------



## Baymule

Frozen shower hair? That sure puts some crunch in it!


----------



## rachels.haven

Huh. The town has "prohibited" halloween and TOTing this year.
You know, there's a safe way to do that if you use your brain...and I'm very uptight about covid.


----------



## rachels.haven

I was pondering selling out of ducks for the winter so I don't have to carry buckets all winter, but DH wants to keep on keeping ducks. This year we only got a few ticks in our yard. They ate them all, and the huge slugs and a lot of the crunchy frogs. They are lazy man's spray. Not sure lots of pekins make sense long run, but I may look to add a few campbells to the buffs and Dan's swedish (and the muscovy). We need eggs. A few more pekins might go away, maybe we'll keep one or two.


----------



## Baymule

I raised a bunch of Pekins for the freezer one time. I learned things I never knew about ducks.

Ducks don't go to roost like chickens.
Ducks are awake at night.
Ducks never shut up.
Ducks quack at scary things. A LOT of quacks.
Falling acorns are scary things.
Ducks are extremely messy.
Wet duck poop is disgusting. 
Roast duck is very tasty.
Pin feathers were invented in Hell.
Ducks quack all night, did I mention they never shut up?


----------



## rachels.haven

All this is true.
They only go to bed because the only time they get food as adults is at lockup.
Predators really get those loudmouths going, but everything does to some extent. Anyone who says ducks are quieter than chickens has never had ducks. Also, they cause terrible erosion and eat all the grass.

But, if I didn't have ducks, I wouldn't get to shout, "go to bed mother duckers" over and over again at the top of my lungs every night. And I try not to swear, so I need that daily moment of psudo profanity to make the neighbors think I'm a nut.


----------



## rachels.haven

When we had snapping turtles going through the yard this year the ducks were following them in a linr honking up a storm. Before Bailey got bit at/scratched by a turtle beak on the snoot, she was leading the loud parade. It...um...got my attention from inside the house so I could take care of it. They're not all bad. They're just really, really stupid and routine oriented. But they do the same thing every night, so I don't care!
How exactly they brood babies is beyond me.


----------



## rachels.haven

I sold my buck that is Avalon's cousin and the one who had selenium issues earlier this year. Durango will get more ladies this year in exchange for the change. Now I'm down to 3 bucks/bucklings of each breed. I've got a little more hay money now. I should probably send in a blood test and preg test Ava, since I want Ava x Patrick babies before I sell her, then I want to get her and her daughter Sugar sold, as they are both a bit on the bitey side (Ava a lot). Patrick is so mild his bucklings he threw with Ava were the sweetest thing with none of mom's nastiness (...and then she decided to wean them at 3 weeks like she did the previous litter, so they had to be bottle trained to boot, so they were extra sweet and Ava maintained her bad goat status).

I'm also down to one Pekin duck-I sold the rest. The rest are buff, swedish, or muscovy. I need to pen in and free feed them as the insect life isn't doing great with the snow we got and they are eating up all the grass on our acre and a half fenced barnyard. I can't free feed until I pen them because Bailey wants to eat everyone else's feed and keep them off it, and I'd prefer my anti coyote dog to not get diabetes and die because she is stupid about other animals' feed. Sigh, animals.


----------



## Baymule

My sheep don't bite...... if they did, there would be a serious Come to Jesus meeting about that.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, some days I almost do too. It gets really old walking through the pen, turning around to do something and getting my legs or butt bit through my pants because Ava or one of her spawn we still have oozed into my blind spot. I still want to make the best of the lines I've got though. Sugar and Ava are like sharks (how do they bite so well with only bottom teeth???). Lavender, the last doe, is mellower, but still occasionally acts like she wants to. She's the only one in evaluation territory still. The other two will be sold in milk after they kid assuming we don't need the milk to help us stayed locked down during this next covid spike (or to feed their babies during the 8 weeks they need it, I guess). Sugar and Ava should be due to kid by Patrick December on if he felt dominant enough to breed them. If not......Durango got them and I'll be very, very picky about doe kids in case Durango throws more Ava-like biters. I do not need to do this again.
If I can get my herd established I can breed up with good attitude bucks and be extremely selective about temperament and cull to avoid this in the future assuming I keep dwarfing. So far, comparing big goats to dwarves, it's pretty obvious dwarves haven't had hundreds of years of dairy refinement to put that relaxed and chill, just eat and chew cud milking temperament in their heads. They still want to battle it out at every opportunity with anything they see rather than put all the energy into production-even the non-biters.


----------



## Baymule

My animals are for my enjoyment. If they are jerks, I will do my best to train them out of it. If they don’t get with the program, they don’t get to stay. Some, like pigs, are short timers anyway, and my Pig Palace is built do I don’t have to go in their pen to care for them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today the jr. lamancha bucks decided to inform me they weren't blueberries. We got snow, all the bucks enjoyed knocking it all off, then I guess the cogs turned in the teenaged bucks heads and all the boys who weren't glued to the ground by a couple of extra pounds or short legs decided their house is jungle gym and a slide. Looks like they'll be headed to the barn pen today after school until we either move or I build buck house 2.0. Meanwhile the nigerian boys and Buggy just want them to stop making the hay racks inside the structure move. Oh well. Maybe I'll try again with the hoop house in a few months. I'm surprised. Those sides were really, really steep and the house was QUITE tall. Naughty boys.


----------



## Finnie

I remember when Latestarter’s goats flattened his hoop shelter.


----------



## rachels.haven

bwhahahaah! I guess I should have been reading his journal. Goats love trampolines, I guess, and what is a hoop house but a slanted trampoline?
 Bugs, the adult lamancha, and the nigerians look scandalized at the abuse the shelter is being given, but the stinking teens don't care. Typical.


----------



## Mini Horses

I have never had a goat bite me.   That is amazing that you have several that do this.   My bucks have always been respectful but, raised from kids.  You have a bunch of brats there  😁   😁.   Good luck with those unruly teens.    Maybe it's something in your water


----------



## Baymule

Yankee goats--just like her cranky neighbors.


----------



## Baymule

Finnie said:


> I remember when Latestarter’s goats flattened his hoop shelter.


Joe was having the time of his life, he was living his dream. Whenever he came over to visit, I always cooked a big meal. He was a good cook in his own right, but he sure enjoyed good food!


----------



## rachels.haven

Right there with the manganese, lol. Yeah, biting isn't exactly their most intimidating defence...or a defense at all really. They ARE being brats. At most it gives you a red mark in the case of my kids. Goats have been slapped or punched especially if they caught me by surprise and got me squarely on the butt or some other sensitive place and I wasn't thinking. Flipping them is more satisfying and lasts longer in their stupid heads. Selling them will last longer still. That will also nix their hierarchy in the pecking order and make instant underdogs of them. My other nigerians have other issues but don't bite. I'd like to dilute the line with nice blood, cull hard, and sell the nasties off, maybe keeping some of their good qualities in the herd. Last year we had 7 bucks and one lamancha doe (that perished) so I'm a little short on registered dwarf does outside of them-only one other who is middle aged, plus two others that could be registered, but the breeder/previous owner STILL hasn't. Getting out of dwarves might be closer than I think depending on how moody I am next time they bite me. Who knows? It might be a roast goat kind of night. I've been bit an awful lot. Might be time to bite back.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Getting out of dwarves might be closer than I think depending on how moody I am next time they bite me. Who knows? It might be a roast goat kind of night. I've been bit an awful lot. Might be time to bite back.


Don't piss Momma off, she will have a goat BBQ!


----------



## rachels.haven

The coyotes came out of the conservation land and were rallying on the hill last night so the bucks are back in the tiny barn pen trying not to eat and enjoying spitting at the girls after they got over being unnerved by the constant howling all night long.

Pity it's unlikely the town would let me fence my property with electric (town rules say you're not allowed to "impede wildlife", state rules are more concerned about messing up water quality, but town must one up them). That's the final "I need to get my family out of there" nail in the coffin. My children need to be safe, I need to be safe, AND my animals need to be safe. It's that time of year again. Don't like giant coyotes that run in big packs, don't like "cute" bears that walk around, come up on porches, and knock on windows, don't particularly like giant, fearless, stupid moose that are only admitted to be there because the cops take picture of it because they think it's funny...don't like living in a high rabies area with no wildlife control. *grumpy, grumpy, grumpy* Not a lot of sleeping got done.

Bailey worked hard last night.
Waiting on election results was super easy for me with all the distractions. You'd never guess I was only two miles outside of "town". Good thing I dropped off my ballot early and wasn't out when the big pack came down. The little nigerian bucklings look like fat bait to me.


----------



## Baymule

I started this post several times and deleted it. Let's just say that in Texas, we shoot threats to our family and animals, and we can put up fences. Tell me that I can't defend my family because a pack of coyotes is more important? I don't think so.


----------



## rachels.haven

Everywhere else I've lived is the same as TX in that regard (and if you can't shoot them yourself because of their laws, they shoot the threats for you, because it helps prevent law breaking). This place is nuts. I hate it.


----------



## rachels.haven

And, I should add, one should not need an attorney and permission from town AND neighborhood to put up a fence well within one's property boundary line on one's own property. That is not our style even if we could afford it. A move would probably be cheaper and less trouble. All of Mass is "in town", btw.

They call themselves "a rural suburb" and a "right to farm community". I laugh. They used to be rural 30 years ago. Now they are an out of touch, elite, suburban bedroom community of affluent (or pretending to be affluent people) with large lots required by law except for when housing developers pay off the conservation board by "donating"/paying them land. Then tiny lot housing developments go up.

Farming is fencing, and when they keep coy-hybrids, and "cute" well fed bears (that I am actually starting to feel bad for because they're not that bright and will just do what they are conditioned to), keeping your family safe responsibly is fencing too. And don't get me started on how they feel about firearms. I'm not a big gun person, but if you shoot anything off ever people start publicly complaining and try to organize, which blows my mind. Based on the town pets they choose to keep, the only rarely allowed hunting is good for the "family" part of this town. If it went away I fear kids would get attacked by coyotes and the well fed bears would get too bold and start ripping siding off houses to get inside like they regularly do a few towns over, especially the way Fish and Wildlife and animal control "take responsibility" for things. 

I should count my blessings. I'm farther than 500 feet from my neighbors' houses. I am allowed to shoot a gun.

The critters are fine and happy today, btw. I'm getting rid of 3 young roosters to people who want them for meat. I'm a little busy with the kids school and I'd rather not have blood on the ground right now. Pity though. Silkie is really nice meat.

My husband's uncle brought us their big jackolantern for the goats to enjoy. I'm excited to bring that out later today.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> And freaking frozen shower hair....


Your hair must be longer than mine  



rachels.haven said:


> You know, there's a safe way to do that if you use your brain.


The governor asked that people not travel in big groups of unrelated people and keep distance. Apparently people in VT got pretty resourceful with delivering candy. I don't remember all of them but one that sticks in my mind is the candy slide.


----------



## rachels.haven

Candy slingshot anyone?


----------



## rachels.haven

Uh, not sure how but somehow wound up with a bunch of khaki campbells (maybe runner crosses) that someone gave me because they were moving. I guess as soon as they finish their molt I can tell the silkies to take it easy on the eggs and we'll have eggs all winter. I think there are 7 duck and a drake, but I need to grab one and see if it quacks as I am suspicious. So more ducks. Ducks are not easy to get rid of in the fall here, I guess.

Khakis are the ducks you will have but never see...it's like you don't have them. They don't like or want you. They only want extra pelleted feed and laying eggs. If I can get them in at night they should be easy to keep happy by staying out of their way. And they forage for most of their food, so maybe even fewer ticks and slugs. 

Meh

This morning they stopped for a water break and then quickly split to go cover the barn yard for bugs, so no pictures. This should be interesting.

The other calmer ducks have no interest in spaghetti brained companions, so no fighting or anything.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Uh, not sure how but somehow wound up with a bunch of khaki campbells (maybe runner crosses) that someone gave me because they were moving.


My guess is either
They were dropped of in the dark of night
or
You said "Um, OK"


----------



## rachels.haven

I reluctantly said okay with a side of, "maybe eggs for the winter" on my mind. So far there is little to no increase in feed intake. I'm confused. I may be on Pekin feed amounts still.


----------



## rachels.haven

Positive News: Trinka, my last lamancha doeling got bred yesterday. She was 90+ pounds and 8+ months old and will be a milking yearling. I bred her to Rustic Wood's Black Tie Affair because I know his babies are small. Yay for (hopefully) no more open does!

Downer news: I shouldn't be surprised, but this morning it came out that PETA has shut down my snobby town's slaughter house at least for the next three months. An employee messed up using a bolt gun and the pig escaped into a neighboring farmer's field and the peta-files got involved. I'm getting the feeling we'd better just consider the hour drive to the NH one because the Bloods aren't going to be able to keep Blood Farm operating for ever with this pressure. So much for being one of the old powerful agricultural families in town. Too many people with more money than brains moving in.

The problem is, Peta wants the other slaughterhouse I use in NH closed down too. And these are some of the nicest, least eyesore-like processing facilities I've ever seen. They could both be on the covers of newspapers, and the one in our town HAS been because it's done up so pretty, and the other one runs a high end smoke/bbq meat place out of the front of the facility (which makes everything smell SOOOOOOOOO good but is so more expensive than my brain can afford thinking about shopping at).

I need a place nearby to take all my wethers so I can really stuff that freezer locker! Having a processor 10 minutes away was going to be sweet. I wanted to use them this year but covid messed that up. Continuing with my plan for next year if Blood Farm does shut down permanently might have to involve finding a trailer and someone to tow them up to the NH place, or just keeping to 4 wethers a year, which would be a little sad because we have the potential to fill the freezer with meat that I know we eat well.

Aw well, poopy PETA. We know where they're strong now.

Side note: Blood farm was burned down in 2015, if my memory serves, and the other processor I used was also burned down and rebuilt recently. Is this a normal occurance for processors, or is it just normal when they live in places infested with extreme animal rights activists? (you know, buildings getting more flammable and all).


----------



## Bruce

I wouldn't be surprised to find PETA is strong pretty much everywhere. I think their name is inaccurate, they aren't for the ethical treatment of animals they are against using animals for other than pets. They'd probably come by my place and claim I don't treat my chickens ethically because they are locked in the coop at night. Frankly, you'd have quite a hard argument to make for my girls being anything but spoiled (though I don't let them in the house like some people do). I have to wonder how many PETAs have dogs, cats or other pets they leave locked in the house all day long while the owners are working. And SURELY they wouldn't have a hamster or a bird that lives in a cage nor fish in an aquarium.


----------



## rachels.haven

Last I heard Peta was anti pet too, as in they shouldn't have been domesticated. They are ridiculous.
In Iowa where I grew up "People for the Eating of Tasty Animals" shirts were a favorite. Peta's not cool.


----------



## Bruce

I like tasty animals


----------



## rachels.haven

I feel like they have issues with themselves and being human. Here's a primary source if fact checking what I said is something people want since it's so out there. I can tell you my animals enjoy being animals even if domesticated. The pets especially enjoy being pets-no threats, lots of food, lots of comfort. Some days trading places would be nice. Excuse me while I go selfishly abuse my cats by cleaning the litter box...









						Our Position on ‘Pets’ | PETA
					

PETA's uncompromising, unwavering views may be controversial, but they are always true to our driving mission: to stop animal abuse worldwide.




					www.peta.org


----------



## Baymule

People are idiots and these Peta idiots take the cake. 

I feel really sorry for the owners of the processing facility. Shut down for 3 months? I truly hate people who foist their screwball ideas on others and punish them just for living their lives and operating a business that is beneficial to others. Here the slaughter facilities are booking in 2022. Insane.


----------



## Bruce

Are you SURE I'm not abusing this purring 14 year old cat that is laying next to me with her head in the crook of my arm as I type?

They really are black and white aren't they. Yes there are plenty of mistreated animals but that doesn't mean every pet is treated unethically. Seems like they think any "non free" animal is not being treated ethically. Therefore their name is inaccurate. They aren't for the ethical treatment of animals, they are for the non existence of domesticated animals.


----------



## Mike CHS

We could still get animals processed at the place we used until recently but we won't do business with them again so have to find another.  I don't know how many businesses shut down due to the virus but overall, most businesses here never shut down.


----------



## Baymule

Mike CHS said:


> We could still get animals processed at the place we used until recently* but we won't do business with them again so have to find another. * I don't know how many businesses shut down due to the virus but overall, most businesses here never shut down.


Ok, you can't make the statement  *but we won't do business with them again so have to find another. *and not tell us why!


----------



## Finnie

Bruce said:


> They aren't for the ethical treatment of animals, they are for the non existence of domesticated animals.


Exactly!
And, they are also for the making of money. They rake it in by the barrel full. Mostly because they deceive tender hearted people into thinking they are donating to a cause that saves animals.


----------



## rachels.haven

You know, I'm beginning to think this batch of Muscovy just suck and won't be improving. I either ruined them, or being non docile and refusing to be herded is one of the subtle differences of this strain.







Yay for the thrills of semi domesticated waterfowl.


----------



## Mike CHS

Baymule said:


> Ok, you can't make the statement  *but we won't do business with them again so have to find another. *and not tell us why!



Absolutely nothing I can prove but we weren't happy with the end product two times in a row.  Two 115 pound wethers yielded 40 pounds of meat and a half of an 1100 pound steer yielded a little less than 200 pounds of off tasting meat with cuts of T-bone that were not much bigger than our lamb chops.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Unacceptable!  Don't blame you a bit for changing!


----------



## rachels.haven

That's not right. I got about 25ish pounds of meat from each 60-80 pound dairy wether.

Buggy says hi from the barn pen.


----------



## Baymule

Something funny going on there.......


----------



## Bruce

200 pounds of meat from an 1100 pound steer? It would have had to be a bag of bones to have such poor yield. Yep, don't look back though if you know of others that use that processor it would be interesting to compare notes.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Yay for the thrills of semi domesticated waterfowl.


So PETA wouldn't be QUITE as mad at you since they aren't willing to be kept "at home"?


----------



## rachels.haven

This lamancha's pinnae are broken. Maybe some sort of trauma early in life.
She needs a registered name. Her mother's name is lady as in lady luck. I may have one, not sure. Still working on it.


----------



## Nubiansrock

I’m with you! I tend to lurk and read other peoples stuff but I’m just getting going in a goat venture and really need some guiding. So I’m trying to be more active and social. Here’s two of my girls...






and of course my best girl and 3yr son!


----------



## rachels.haven

Lovely! And pictures are the best. I think that's why we're encouraged to share journals.

Love what I can see of your farm setup!


----------



## Nubiansrock

Bruce said:


> 200 pounds of meat from an 1100 pound steer? It would have had to be a bag of bones to have such poor yield. Yep, don't look back though if you know of others that use that processor it would be interesting to compare notes.


We recently took a 1085lb black angus steer to be butchered and came home with 425lbs of meat! Which now our boy was a big boned steer that we fed out for three months instead of the normal two. Because he turned into an escape artist! And we couldn’t find were he kept getting out of the five strand bar wire fence. So into the feed lot he went.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @Nubiansrock,

Welcome to Back Yard Herds!  We are glad you are here.  Since you said in your intro that you are new to goats, you have found a good thread to follow, namely Miss @rachels.haven's journal. There are a lot of other folks on here that also know a lot about goats, such as Miss @chickens really, who resides in Alberta, Canada, and Miss @B&B Happy goats, who resides in Florida. You may also be interested in getting to know Miss @thistlebloom, Miss @Mini Horses, and Miss @Hudson and me, as well as others, who are big horse enthusiasts.

Your residing in middle Tennessee puts you near Mr. @Mike CHS, who raises sheep.  His journal is named "Teresa & Mike CHS - Our journal".  Several others worth mentioning are Miss @Baymule, who resides in east Texas, who raises sheep, and is one of the wittiest people on here.  Another person of keen wit is Mr. @Bruce of NW Vermont, who raises chickens and alpacas.  Another quite witty person is Miss @Ridgetop, who currently resides in southern California, and who raises sheep, among other things.

Another really smart person on this forum is Miss @farmerjan, who resides in southwestern Virginia and who raises cattle, chickens, and hay.

I could go on and on but you get the idea.  In fact, I have yet to meet anyone on this forum who is not interesting in some way.  (For those of you on the forum whom I did not mention by name, please don't feel slighted.  I just didn't want for this post to get too long.)

I hope you will consider starting your own journal.  There is a suggested outline in the thread titled "For those who don't know where to begin."  And pictures.  We love pictures!

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> This lamancha's


The one on the left or the right because the goat in the foreground don't look like a Lamancha - it has ears!


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, somebody just grabbed those ears on both sides and stretched them right out till they flopped off to the side right and left.
Regardless, she's a good girl. Biosecurity testing goes out on Thursday (her herd was supposedly clean and probably are, but you know-checking and all) and when that comes back she can join the herd.


----------



## Ridgetop

Mike CHS said:


> Absolutely nothing I can prove but we weren't happy with the end product two times in a row. Two 115 pound wethers yielded 40 pounds of meat and a half of an 1100 pound steer yielded a little less than 200 pounds of off tasting meat with cuts of T-bone that were not much bigger than our lamb chops.



Since MikeCHS knows how to finish out his butcher lambs, the butcher might have been changing out his prime carcasses for lesser grade carcasses and selling off the prime meat.  Removing a few cuts from each animal he processes would stock his sale cases for nothing.  Also, who raised the steer?  The taste of the meat can change depending on the type of feed it was fed.  However, again the lower yield, small steak sizes, and off flavor would suggest that the butcher is substituting lesser grade carcasses for your prime meat.  Again holding back a few  cuts here and there in a busy operations would make up a lot of individual meat sales. It has been known to happen.  Rates of yield on different livestock vary but not that much!  Definitely change butchers.  

Beef, lamb, veal usually yield approximately 50% meat depending o the grade of the carcass.  I always ask what my carcasses graded.  I have had a couple of Dorset lambs yield significantly less than expected but that was years ago when I wasn't weighing and their access to feed was limited.  They were not in a creep situation and the ewes were crowding them out.   

Well fed lambs (and 115 lb. lambs are well fed) should yield around 50 lbs. of meat at least.  It the lambs are over fed there can be too much fat which is trimmed off lowering the yield percentage.  However fat weighs less than muscle so the drop in yield shouldn't be that significant.  Particularly in your Katahdins or the black faced breeds that are larger framed sheep.  I can't feed my smaller framed White Dorpers much above 110 lbs. or it all turns into excess fat.  However, a 100-110 young Dorper carcass will still yield 50 lbs. of prime meat.  

Hog yield is the best.   They can yield from 65 to 75% since  lot of the scrap meat is ground into sausage.

I weigh my lambs before they go to the butcher, and give a list to the butcher with the ear tag numbers.  I also ask for the ear tags to be included in the boxes of meat to make sure I get my own stuff back, although that is not a guarantee.  I have known my guy for years and he is completely trustworthy, but I also like to make sure that certain long time customers get the larger lambs.  I also ask my butcher how my carcasses graded out.  It pays to know what cuts come from where on the carcass, and what the normal carcass yield would be on your animal.  A large boned poorly fleshed animal can have a low yield but a properly finished out animal will have a normal yield.


----------



## farmerjan

Understand that the yield is based on HANGING WEIGHT.  At least on beef.   I tell ALL our beef customers..... If the animal weighs .... Using this as an example....... 1,000 lbs.  the hanging weight will be between 5-600 lbs AVERAGE.  That is taking away the hide, head, hooves, guts...... then you can expect UP TO 63% (according to USDA) of that as cut out value.  So a 550 lb carcass will yield approx 300 lbs edible meat.  

So again, what I tell my beef customers, if it weighs 1000 lbs expect to get back 25% or more of the weight in actual beef.  That will depend on the cuts, whether or not you get back alot of bone in cuts ..... So a 1000 lb animal will give you back at least 250 lbs actual meat in your freezer.   That is why a better finished animal will yield better as the hide, head hooves will not change in weight, and the guts will change only if you weigh it full of feed/hay, then they leave it overnight before killing so the guts are more empty.
Since lamb and goats are smaller, there ought to be better cut out. 
Getting back 200 lbs of HALF a steer weighing 1100 lbs is not bad.  The off taste is something I cannot address.


----------



## farmerjan

Most all animals are sold with the price for HANGING WEIGHT here.


----------



## Ridgetop

And as you said, a properly finished animal will yield more meat than one that is too thin.  

Keep in mind when buying a steer to butcher is to make sure that the animal is long, thick, and *has been properly fed.  *Animals that have not been properly fed when young often won't finish out properly.  I prefer smaller boned animals to process because they put more meat on the frame with less feed than a large framed animal that requires more feeding and growth to yield the same amount of meat.  The best meat we used to raise were veal calves.  They cost us nothing because we fed our goat milk.  Next best were the dairy calves, again goat milk and the hay the goats refused to eat.  And if we were not concerned about white veal meat we could also give a little grain.  Not much fat, but good meat for nothing except the price of the bull calf from the dairy. 

Sometimes newbies just buy what they find cheap without understanding where the meat is produced on the steer.  The meat often disappoints them in quality and yield.  Look up the different carcasses on line and you will find a chart of where the cuts come from.  Compare that to the Standard of Perfection on the animal and you will see that the judging Standard gives more points to the meat areas.  This is true on all meat animals from rabbits and poultry through steers.  It helps to know where the meat is.  

When my kids first went into 4-H and showed livestock, there was a girl who won all the Grand Champion and Reserve Champion awards.  She did not buy super expensive animals but her father was a commercial butcher and knew how to choose good animals.  He also knew how to feed them out.  She did all the work, but her father's knowledge gave her an edge.   She was a super sweet girl and we really liked her but were glad when she graduated 2 years after DD1 first started showing market animals!    However it brought home the idea that knowing where the meat is on the animal you are raising will help you understand the difference between a nice animal and a champion.


----------



## rachels.haven

Brr, 26 degrees this morning. I filled buckets and the duck pool last night when we were above freezing so all I had to do was break ice and feed this morning. That went well. I think I'll make that a habit. 

I really need to get the dog out on a walk and walk her into the ground. Today she retaliated for not being allowed to try to mooch in and go for the goats' alfalfa pellets by chewing the hose. She may have gotten told off and chased away from the whole feeding area. Hose isn't hers either and she knows it. Not funny, not cute, not happening. Plus, alfalfa pellets give her diarrhea and I need that hose. Right when I thought this morning was going so well. We've also been working on her streaking up and knocking people over by their butts to their knees (or worse, from the front from the crotch for men) . She came with this habit, I fixed it, then recently it cropped back up and I've been working on it for the last week or two. This morning she chose to take the command I taught seriously, so I thought we were all good again, but apparently not completely. She's going to have to figure out the hose is always off limits or she will have to stay at a very respectful distance when I feed any animal at all anything forever. There's too much going on at once to have her adding to it.

New doe is lovely and fat. Everyone else is looking good. I wormed the lamancha yearlings this week. With the kids school I can't steal any time to do a fecal so I just treated. One was scouring so I wormed and coccidiasated him. Scours gone magically, he's filling back out now. I suspect it was coccidia as his breeder said his mom was struggling with it when we brought him home. He had no symptoms so I waited to treat. If this is a reoccurring thing as an adult I may have to chose if he stays or goes.The the other yearling was looking thin. After I looked at pics of his sire at a year old and he's lightly built and on the thin side too, so I guess he may not be wormy, but just light and lean. No real change in my yearling's condition post worming.   He still likes jumping around the pen like a 120 pound kid. I suspect someday he will fill out better once he finishes getting longer and taller. He's taller and longer than my almost 4 year old adult lamancha already and looks like a string bean. Everything I give him seems to just make him stringier...grow just a LITTLE body fat for winter please? Sheesh, bucklings.

Ava is either full of kids or going to kid first this year. Her kids will be pulled and as soon as I have enough milk coming in to fill her babies bottles and feed the kids she'll be listed. No more biting brats is the new slogan. Meanwhile, the countdown to first exposure dates in the breeding pen is starting. Next month on Christmas eve will be 5 months since Patrick went in. I'd love to see some Patrick babies and lots of full udders for milking. Not going anywhere for the holidays has some perks.

Regardless, good frosty, frozen morning.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Plus, alfalfa pellets give her diarrhea and I need that hose.


Curious. I wonder why she likes alfalfa pellets. Figaro, the cat at Lumnah Acres, was begging pig grain until the pigs were processed, now he's begging for chicken feed. Silly cat.


----------



## rachels.haven

She wants what the other animals are enthusiastic about. Remove the goats from the equation and she doesn't want the pellets. The dog has quirks.


----------



## Ridgetop

Years ago we used to feed rabbit pellets (almost pure alfalfa) to our house dogs.  it stopped any gas they had  and did no harm.  In the wild wolves and coyotes eat the full gut of grazing animals which gives them green feed.  When we switched from a corn based kibble (this is 45 years ago) to a rice based kibble most of the nasty stinky gas stopped.  Corn gives our dogs the runs but since the Anatolians are not house dogs except for several hours of family time after we lock up the sheep, no problem.

How old is your dog that is chewing up hoses?  Some young dogs chew them because they are the right size and consistency for chewing.  One of our young dogs chewed all our hoses and we had to drape them from overhead hooks until they grew out of it.  All Erick's puppies lie to chew his hoses too.  We wondered if it was because Anatolians hate snakes and will kill any snake on sight.  

Winter is coming, that is for sure.  With the new administration I have a feeling they are going to make sure it is a long dark winter like Biden prophesied.  There is another run on toilet paper starting here in California.


----------



## rachels.haven

I think Bailey's going on 4-well past hose chewing stage. She only does it while looking at me while I'm out there doing something else that isn't her so I'm pretty sure it's an attention game. We'll get through it. She hasn't tried again since I addressed it with her.

That rabbit food thing is interesting. That doesn't surprise me. I think gas can be fatal for bunnies. Something antigas may get added to help. I may be tempted to see if she's tempted by it. Maybe she has a need. Possibly not because she's never interested in the open bag of alfalfa pellets on the pallet by the grain cans, just what the goats are eating but it wouldn't hurt to try. Her feed isn't corn based though. She prefers the corn ones, but we got one that's sorghum (corn's cousin?) and rice because I think corn makes dog poop smell like the bottom of a big iowan grain bin when they clean it out after shipping all the corn...and I don't want the dog poop to smell like that. Weird? Oh yeah, but that's how I choose to roll. If I had to guess that's probably the smell you're talking about. It stinks. Also it makes her poop bigger and she seems to need more of that food to get full (which also makes it less cost effective) but if she had a choice she'd be an Iams dog, farts and all.

Either way, she's not a bad dog. We just had a bad day and she's a dog.


----------



## Ridgetop

If you have gas in your rabbits(?) maybe you need papaya extract in their feed.  I know that some of the Angora breeders used to use it for hair ball.  

If your dog is eating grass, adding a scoop of alfalfa pellet to the food will help also.   Corn based food does give the dogs looser and smellier stools, more poop piles, etc.  We switched to a rice based kibble years ago and it helps the odor and amount of poop.

Our LGDs will try to get in the stalls and eat the grain - they like the sweet feed but also try the rolled barleycorn too!  LOL  I think they relate t the sheep and I have seen Angel when she was younger trying a mouthful of alfalfa hay with the sheep!


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh bummer, looks like I can't go to TSC in Pelham, NH for curbside pick up and come back anymore according to the state. That's a pity, because the other TSC that's a similar distance away but in Mass is in a hot spot and the goats don't like the farmers' exchange ones (that are $5/bag more expensive and higher in protein...and better).

I can only go for Sam's club if I want according to the state. The only other states on their okay list are HI (lol) and VT.

And Mass does creepy things like track your phone and send you daily notifications to remind you to do what they want. Yuck.

No more agricultural exemptions I guess?

And I haven't forgotten, Mass had a bad, bad hay year and all...surely people bringing hay to be sold will be allowed?

Glad I have my loft full at least. Annoyed again at this state.


----------



## Bruce

You can come to VT but you have to quarantine for 2 weeks before going to the store 

Before this latest rapid increase in cases (anyone remember how long ago Halloween and the accompanying parties was?) we were "green" and #1 (or #51 if you list them highest to lowest) for lowest # of cases/100K people and there were many out of state counties within driving distance that were also "green" so they could visit unrestricted. Now we are behind Maine and Hawaii and are an "orange" state.  Only HI is yellow. We went from < 10 cases per day a few weeks ago to close to 150/day the last couple. 4 deaths in the last week, first ones since July. I can only imagine how bad it will be 2 weeks from now when all the people travel out of state for T-day .... and don't quarantine for 2 weeks  when they get back.


----------



## Baymule

State tracking your phone? Leave it at home and confound them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> State tracking your phone? Leave it at home and confound them.


I would, but to curbside pickup at tsc calling or using their ap is required. I'll figure things out I'm sure. It's just annoying. I may have to come up with a technical solution if my Mass tsc doesn't work...well for us.


----------



## farmerjan

Go back to a simple flip phone.  There is no tracking ability on them.  That is one reason I won't change....I do what I have to / want to on the computer and only do calls and texting on the phone.


----------



## farmerjan

So you go to TSC first, pay in cash so no record of cc, then go to Sam's   (assume that is in NH?).....

Another/continuing reason that I am a permanently displaced old style NE Yankee...... Have you seen some of what the total nut cases in CT are talking.....If Va doesn't get it's act together, I think that Eastern Tenn is looking better and better....


----------



## farmerjan

Bruce said:


> You can come to VT but you have to quarantine for 2 weeks before going to the store
> 
> Before this latest rapid increase in cases (anyone remember how long ago Halloween and the accompanying parties was?) we were "green" and #1 (or #51 if you list them highest to lowest) for lowest # of cases/100K people and there were many out of state counties within driving distance that were also "green" so they could visit unrestricted. Now we are behind Maine and Hawaii and are an "orange" state.  Only HI is yellow. We went from < 10 cases per day a few weeks ago to close to 150/day the last couple. 4 deaths in the last week, first ones since July. I can only imagine how bad it will be 2 weeks from now when all the people travel out of state for T-day .... and don't quarantine for 2 weeks  when they get back.



And every "shut down" then "cautious reopening" will cause another "surge in cases".


----------



## rachels.haven

@farmerjan  on one possible "technical" solution. There might be one or two others. Not that I've thought about it.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> And Mass does creepy things like track your phone and send you daily notifications to remind you to do what they want. Yuck.



If you power off and if possible remove the battery from your phone, it will not track your position, but will give away your position when you call TSC.



farmerjan said:


> Go back to a simple flip phone. There is no tracking ability on them. That is one reason I won't change....I do what I have to / want to on the computer and only do calls and texting on the phone.



A flip phone does not have the ability to determine its position via GPS, but it periodically broadcasts its presence to whatever cellphone towers are around and thus the phone company(-ies) can tell the phone's approximate location.  If the phone is powered off, of course, it won't report on its position.  But Miss Rachels.haven would still need to power on her phone to talk to TSC.

Miss Rachels.haven, I hope you can figure something out.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you @Senile_Texas_Aggie , I'm still hoping the Mass TSC will scrape by. Leominster is not a nice place to drive and the store tends to run out of things and stay out but it just has to work well ENOUGH. And maybe I can coax the goats into eating the nicer alfalfa pellets from the feed store if it does not. There is no reason for their snobbery that I know of. My husband does not share my willingness to bend or break rules so I'll do my best to follow them for a while for him and his peace of mind (until I've exhausted the other options or deemed it necessary, of course). The state is calling them "guidelines" after all. Guidelines with a $500 penalty attached if anyone gets caught...


----------



## Baymule

I love Texas. Remember the Alamo!


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> I can only go for Sam's club if I want according to the state. The only other states on their okay list are HI (lol) and VT.



I see nothing wrong with telling hubby that you have to go to *Hawaii* for a bag of feed. Especially in the winter - you get lots of snow right? Just take a bunch of suitcases for the return trip with the feed sacks!


----------



## rachels.haven

You know, I'm not sure Hawaii would let us in. Our case count is higher than theirs AND nh's. Yet Mass doesn't want dirty NH's germs coming in. Watch out Hawaii, you're next? I'm sure they're quaking in their boots down there.


----------



## rachels.haven

I win. Bailey was in her doghouse on her giant pillow bed this morning. It only took a night long torrential downpour apparently.

(...I have her locked out of the barn because I'm conducting a rat-a-gedon in there and she has dedicated all of her non-coyote repelling powers to trying to sneak her way in there to get at the bait in the snap traps, which will NOT be allowed to happen no matter how stupid she wants to be so this is very good)


----------



## Bruce

farmerjan said:


> And every "shut down" then "cautious reopening" will cause another "surge in cases".


No that will be due to the MILLIONS of people who have hopped on planes since last Friday.



Baymule said:


> Remember the Alamo!


And Hertz! And Enterprise! And Dollar! And Avis! And Budget!


----------



## Ridgetop

I really believe that everyone has been exposed to Covid by now.  With going to the grocery store, gas station, etc. even with wearing masks, the germs get on your clothing, on your mail, on deliveries, etc.  and thus you are exposed to it.  All those college students going to Spring Break and summer functions because they believed they were invincible didn't help either since they spread it to their families when they came home.  

The amount of testing going on and the rate of positive tests is not really a good measure of the virus either.  Many people in specific fields are required to be tested every few days for their jobs.  If they are continually testing each test is counted as an test.  The same goes for positive tests.  Also there are a lot of false positive results coming back too.  I have heard of so many people who have received false positives, and some who did not even take the test receiving positive results in the mail!  The actual death rate is very low and fewer people are being hospitalized.  The virus has weakened to where a lot of people are getting it but not showing many symptoms if they have any at all.


----------



## rachels.haven

My favorite seed catalog is advertising black friday sales. This makes me think...
I need to come up with a way to grow good tomatoes with as little contact with the plants as possible. Some kind of trellis and pruning method. They give me so/so heartburn, but a good tomato is worth it. The plants, leaves and stems, when they touch me give me welts like I was beaten...which looks really funny (and they do hurt, but only for a day or so then they go away). I could probably start with a good flannel shirt...

...or I may not and just stick to other stuff and ground cherries/pineapple tomatillos, which are also good. Can't lose?

The Pine tree catalog sure is tempting.


----------



## Ridgetop

Tomato plants, leaves and stems have some sort of "poison" in them that is designed to stop predatory insects etc.  When you touch them you can get really itchy.  If you are allergic but still want to raise some, try getting some of the OB/GYN cattle gloves to put on before working with the plants.  They are thin gloves that reach up over your elbows and might help keep your skin out of contact with the plants.

I think you last idea of sticking to other stuff is better than chancing an allergic reaction.


----------



## Baymule

I get it on the tomato vines, I break out something terrible. Tomato rash itches and lasts for WEEKS. So that must be why I planted a 32' double row and a 16' double row. I have to wear a denim long sleeved shirt and gloves to go pick tomatoes. We haven't had a hard frost yet and the vines revived themselves from the August burned out almost dead, started blooming and I have tomatoes! They probably won't make it to frost.


----------



## Ridgetop

If the frost comes, I read somewhere that you do not ick the green tomatoes.  Instead you pull out the entire bush with the green tomatoes on it and hang it from the garage or barn ceiling and the tomatoes will ripen.  

Understand I have never tried this myself, but I read it in one of my Organic Gardening magazines years ago, or possibly an old Countryside mag.

I also heard that you can store new potatoes in a covered metal can and bury them in the garden and they will keep during the winter so you can have new potatoes in winter.  Haven't tried that either though . . . .


----------



## Mike CHS

Ridgetop said:


> If the frost comes, I read somewhere that you do not pick the green tomatoes.  Instead you pull out the entire bush with the green tomatoes on it and hang it from the garage or barn ceiling and the tomatoes will ripen.



I did that a couple of times when I had an unexpected frost when I lived in Pensacola and had tomatoes into January.


----------



## Baymule

My tomato vines shot up to 10 to 12' feet tall, then fell over. I'd have to hang them outside from a tree......that would sorta kinda halfway maybe-so defeat the purpose. Not to mention that I plant them close, so they are all interwoven together. Just heard on the news that we will probably get a frost Monday night, so I'll be out there, suited up (WHERE did I put my Haz-mat suit????) so I can pick green tomatoes.


----------



## Bruce

Ridgetop said:


> The virus has weakened to where a lot of people are getting it but not showing many symptoms if they have any at all.


Must be why 6 people have died in Vermont in the last week. The first deaths since the end of July.



Ridgetop said:


> Tomato plants, leaves and stems have some sort of "poison" in them that is designed to stop predatory insects etc.


Except, apparently, HORNWORMS!!! I sure wish the "poison" did those things in when they were 1/4" long. There are predatory wasps that lay eggs on the hornworm and the "babies" eat the hornworm .... but not before it has decimated the tomato plant.


----------



## rachels.haven

Taking a break from heavy lifting for a while and will be using the husband and wheelbarrow and leaving hay deliveries in the garage.

Happy Thanksgiving




Here's our new third son-another oversized, fat, early baby boy ready to go reek havoc with his brothers.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Congratulations!    Happy Thanksgiving to you and your family.


----------



## farmerjan

WOW !!!! Did I somewhere miss the announcement that you were expecting?????  Congrats on the cute new little brother.  That is quite a Thanksgiving  present.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

farmerjan said:


> WOW !!!! Did I somewhere miss the announcement that you were expecting?????  Congrats on the cute new little brother.  That is quite a Thanksgiving  present.


I was just thinking the same thing !


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I'm with the others -- if you have mentioned it in the past, I missed it, too.

So, you have had Active Aiden and Danger Dan.  Now, do you have Mighty Mo?  Richocet Robert? Fantastic Sam?

Whatever you have, congratulations!


----------



## Bruce

It seems that may have been the best kept secret on BYH!! What gives Rachel?


----------



## farmerjan

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Miss @rachels.haven,
> 
> I'm with the others -- if you have mentioned it in the past, I missed it, too.
> 
> So, you have had Active Aiden and Danger Dan.  Now, do you have Mighty Mo?  Richocet Robert? Fantastic Sam?
> 
> Whatever you have, congratulations!


Love  @Senile_Texas_Aggie  's suggestions..... so we wait on bated breath for the final answer.....


----------



## Ridgetop

Boys are fun!  So are girls, but boys are _really_ fun.

They are not really destructive, just insatiably curious and do everything they see you doing.  At the age of 18 months, DS1 could not talk, but knew the difference between a slot and Phillips head screwdriver.  We know this because we thought it was a fluke when DH asked me for a slot head and DS1 toddled over with it.  We tested him several times, then I moved the tool bag onto the counter.  LOL

When DS2 was 4 years old he took all the door knobs in the house off.  We had just finished putting new ones on all the doors with our nifty new electric screwdriver.  LOL  He knew how to work it.  

Probably because we spent the first 48 years of our married lives renovating and building, they grew up knowing what all the tools were and how to use them.   This was handy because they could do anything under DH's guidance and instruction and eventually under their own. 

Soon you to will have your own constructions force!  Destruction force?  Hard to tell sometimes!  LOL

Congratulations of the new baby boy!


----------



## rachels.haven

@Ridgetop , your sons sound like mine.     Yes, boys are fun. I'm glad everyone including you survived. More respect in your direction.


I didn't announce this. I don't handle pregnancy very well and I'm more likely to kill someone than glow while pregnant, so I just wrote about the happy distractions in my life and what I was focusing on to live day to day. Most people in my personal life don't know we have another son now as a perk of quarantine that I find just hilarious. My husband got baby fever early this year and I gave in. I like babies and love our kids, but son #1 was almost 9 pounds, son #2 was just under 10 pounds...and I knew what was coming next and I'm a short, small person so the math didn't work, but one last time. I love him now that he's here, but I can't sugar coat it or pretend and say his then unknown name went...uncursed? on a daily basis as I was sick, dizzy, and fighting low blood pressure every single day so everything I did every day was a big win that I was proud of. (Not his fault, btw. My mother's sons were 9, 10, and 11 pounds at birth EARLY and her mother has a similar birth weight history on her boys, I had the data). Somehow I got my doctor to listen to me and he was induced the day of 37 weeks and is now my smallest baby at 8 pounds, 7 oz rather than  ...at 40 weeks. Funny how quickly doctors go from "you've got lots of room" to "woah, this little guy is solid" to "good thing you were induced, I don't think he would have fit out at 40 weeks" to "large for gestational age" in just a few minutes (ghdfjksdjfsldkfjdslkfj!!!).

Anyway Aiden wants to name his new brother Karen...I don't think he understands how gendered names work or that Karens are negative female characters, and Dan suggested a(male) animal name that I forgot, because we opted for Shaun. I don't think he needs a nickname yet until he starts doing something besides the typical baby things.

As soon as my parents leave I'm going to pull the waking up the husband "early" thing and asking him if he loves me, then telling him three times to go feed my goats biblical style, with an appropriate pause in between until he gets up   . He suffered with me for the last several months, but a little teasing may still be okay.






Right?


----------



## Baymule

He is a beautiful baby boy! You sure can keep a secret! Glad that you can show him off now, he is precious.


----------



## Mike CHS

Congratulations on the new edition and thank you for the smiles I got from your post.


----------



## Baymule

I have to admit that my first reaction was, YOU GOT A TURKEY BABY!! better than a baby turkey! LOL LOL

I had to say that, after all this time, you should know by now how my mind derails........


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Congratulations  to you and your growing family, he sure is a good looking baby


----------



## thistlebloom

What a sweet little guy  😍.
I think he looks a little surprised at his own early arrival. 
Congratulations, well done mom.


----------



## Bruce

OK, so we all thought you were doing plenty of stuff for a normal human, now we know you are SUPER WOMAN doing it all while pregnant!

Painful as it is I'm sure you were glad to be induced, 8# 7 oz is 2# 14 oz bigger than DD1 and 2# 8 oz bigger than DD2. I'm sure you didn't want to push out an 11 pounder! 

Congratulations to you and the family.


----------



## farmerjan

He is absolutely adorable and very alert looking for an "early induction"..... Sorry that you had so much drama during the pregnancy....Glad that they did that though, and he was a "more normal size".   Now you have the 3 Musketeers!!!!!!!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh yeah! They'll be the three _____(our last name)___ boys. Time for trouble!

Looks like Avalon aborted today. This morning she presented with a bloody tail and is draining. Aw well. Give me a little time to catch up and make sure she's open and she may get listed.

I didn't do myself any favors today with "catch up". I suffered a lapse in judgement and took the thawed turkey out of the fridge on hold from last week and cooked a kid level thanksgiving at the kids' request. Bed time. Dumb, dumb, dumb. I can cook a lot fast, but not fast enough. Three hours of cooking, lol, I'm an idiot. Turkey (brainless, plug and play), Gf stuffing from scratch, stofers mix as per request for comparison, squash, carrot coins, gravy, potatoes, crustless pumpkin "pie"...I think I did it in less time than last year, but next Thursday may have been better timing-wise. I got tired and stressed out. Oh well. Dinner all week long-Check! No more meal or dish requests from children for a bit.

All the goats miss my mom. She went around and fed each individual goat a cookie every day she was here and made them feel special, bucks included. Everyone is looking for the cookie lady and was putty in her hands-VERY well behaved. Unfortunately she went back to Tennessee yesterday where she's got her army of geese and rabbitry and a few muscovy and chickens. Everything there expects to be doted on and made to feel individually special too. Tough luck, goaties.


----------



## Baymule

I like your Mom.    Animals are to be spoiled.

Cooked a big meal and overdid yourself...... that is to be expected from you. Yeah, dumb thing to do.


----------



## Ridgetop

Naughty!

My first as DD1 - 7lbs.  4 ounces, second DS1 9lbs. 8 ou., DS2 8b. 6 ou. and DS3 was a 10 month baby (induced 3 times) weighting in at 9 bs. 14 ou.  I feel your pain and applaud your decision to have him early.  I had a friend whose 3 children all arrived at the 8th month, and all well over 9 lbs.!

After DS1, DH assured everyone that I "breezed through" a excruciating 10 hour labor where he got stuck on THAT NERVE - yes, ladies the one they warn us about.  Every cuple hours the nurses would come in and "prep" me for an "emergency" C-section as I became delirious with pain and tried to pull off the oxygen mask.  Each time someone arrived at the hospital and took my "emergency" C-section spt.  Finally after 3 women got MY C-section,  DS1 shifted position just in time to have a natural birth leaving me wrung out and torn badly.  

DH then proceeded to invite all our friends and relatives to come see the baby which he proudly held, while I served coffee.   Both DS1 and I were sickly for several months.  With the next 2 babies I announced that my doctor had _*forbidden*_ any visitors for the first 3-4 weeks.   This worked and I was able to get back on my feet faster.  LOL  Sadly, DD1 and DDIL1 did not take my advice.  DD1 even came home from her C-section a day or two early because she "missed" her first child.  With her 3rd child she attempted to stay longer, but they had cut back the days allowed in hospital.  She missed the boat there.   

I love all my babies but I really enjoyed having the nurses take care of them in the nursery since I knew when I got home it would be all on me.  

You need to go to bed and tell DH and the kids that the doctor ordered you back to bed for bed rest after your foolish 3 hour stint in the kitchen!  For some reason the "doctor's orders' routine works better with men than you passing out on the floor in front of them!  

Be careful!  Gorgeous baby!  Great family!  

Too bad about goat abortion - auction time asap.


----------



## rachels.haven

ugh. Got 12+ inches of fat, wet snowflakes after a night of rainfall and the temp is dropping for the next few days. Time to plug in heated buckets and put on my big girl snow pants, boots, and crampons again.

The woods are very loud tonight with all the tree branches and white pines randomly snapping under the weight and the dog is unsettled. It's like random gunshots followed by...well, tree falling noises. This is when I get to stare at that giant pine next to our house and wonder if we should have spent the couple thousand and had it removed before it falls on the house and causes more than that cost in home destruction. Luckily it had a hard year (??) and is not lushly needled at the moment so the snow is falling off it rather than bending branches to the ground or pulling the whole tree over

Yucky wet New England snow...would prefer the sub freezing sandy stuff.
DH took mercy on us this year and we will not be shoveling our own excessively long personal driveway (if I ever build a house in snow territory it will be near the road, I assure you). The plow truck is coming.

...so, anybody want a care package of wet snow?


----------



## Ridgetop

Being a southern Californians, born and bred, DH and I always used to wonder why homes in midwest farm country were built right on the roadways.  Eventually we realized that if you needed to go anywhere you had to plow your own driveway and often the country road you lived on!   Here we worry about heat stroke and fire season, Florida and the Gulf have hurricanes, snow country has its own hazards!

*Don't you dare try to dig out your driveway yourself!!!  *


----------



## Baymule

We have a long driveway. But we have no snow! NO! I don't want a big fat package of wet snow! if I want a winter experience, I open the upright freezer door!


----------



## Ridgetop

For my winter experience, I turn on the Hallmark channel, sitting on the couch under my soft throw, drinking coffee in front of the electric fireplace with the heat on while DH watches snowy movies.    So cozy and Christmasy!


----------



## rachels.haven

...yes, @Ridgetop , I believe you've got it figured out. 
The plow truck dug us out.
Dog had to be locked up for incessantly barking at falling trees (yes, they ARE a threat, but NO they don't care). Looks like the fence mostly escaped injury (one bow fell on it by the front gates, bent the wire). I'll look at that later.
We don't have to go anywhere so no idea what the road conditions are, but hey, that storm could have been worse.


----------



## Ridgetop

Since California is now in the grip of a statewide quarantine lockdown per out governor and mayor, we have nowhere to go either.   Or rather we have plenty of places to go but they are all closed!


----------



## rachels.haven

sounds like you're going to need a lot more Christmas movie material. That is lousy. I hope you can get everything you need to stay comfortable and happy enough.


----------



## Ridgetop

No problem!   I have toilet paper.  I told the family that I won't share since they laughed at me for buying so much!  They can use straw.

2 freezers of food and meat on the hoof.  We are carnivores - we will survive.


----------



## rachels.haven

I received a stroke of luck this morning. I came out this morning to find Lace, my lamancha that used to have two scur-horns and a bad attitude, with her head stuck in the fence by her remaining scur. So I took the opportunity while she was immobile to band the scur and tape over the band so she can't scrape it off. Fingers crossed this one works and the root gets killed back to her head so this scur mess can be over. She was just starting to use it as a horn again on the other goats, so getting stuck in the fence was a good thing. Hopefully she also quits scraping the stain off the barn with it too, lol. Always fix your disbuddings even if you're going to sell them, especially on does. I'm selfishly glad the scurs aren't the result of my work.

The one I banded off earlier I'm very happy with. It is just barely starting to regrow, but it is thin, normal scur material rather than scur-horn, also it is very slow growing. She won't be using it as a weapon or getting stuck by it as it's more like fingernail instead of HORN.

...and I unstuck her from the fence when I was done banding it in case you were wondering. I almost forgot that part.


----------



## Bruce

She probably won't show you any gratitude for freeing her though.


----------



## rachels.haven

She isn't holding it against me oddly enough. She did decide to declare she's open and in need of a buck all night long last night, so I guess she gets a date today and we get late season kids. The bucks are leaving rut though, so while she was declaring her undying love to them in the dark they discovered they can stand on the table I left in the buck run and are totally oblivious.


----------



## rachels.haven

CDT's tomorrow for all the dwarves. Some of the does will be late for those. The first potential kidding date is Christmas Eve and one of my unregistered does has loosening ligaments. I want to see some udders!

It looks like Lace was slipping a pregnancy today. She was only a month, maybe just short of two bred. I let her fawn over and be bred by Max. We'll see if it takes. Looks like the seasonal does don't always recycle after miscarrying so I'll be grateful for late kids if they happen.

As a side note, DH is getting more lazers to the eyeballs in about 10 days to try to drop that stinking eye pressure and slow his glaucoma. No change in vision, but the pressure is higher than they like for someone in which they are trying to control it. He's had this done once before, and each surgery is supposed to last 5 years until they are no longer effective. It made me mad last time. It takes only a few minutes but hurts for several days. Hopefully he'll let me keep him up on his painkillers this time. Currently he's hiding under the covers in a dark room until the dilation drops wear off. Something to go on each of our dread lists, I guess.


----------



## farmerjan

Sorry to hear about DH needing more treatments for his eyes, glad that the vision is at least holding steady.  

How is the newest little "musketeer"?????  Will you be able to milk and deal with the baby?  

We are looking as some serious snow this week unless they have it all wrong....


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

farmerjan said:


> Sorry to hear about DH needing more treatments for his eyes, glad that the vision is at least holding steady.
> 
> How is the newest little "musketeer"????? Will you be able to milk and deal with the baby?
> 
> We are looking as some serious snow this week unless they have it all wrong....



Amen to what Miss @farmerjan said regarding DH's eyes!  And, yes, let us know you and the little one are doing.

Regarding snow, this diagram is from an article on CBS News. It is the snowfall potential for Wednesday/Thursday:





It looks like you are going to get hammered, Miss @rachels.haven, but you, Mr. @Bruce, won't get much of anything.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Bruce

Nope, no snow here on Wed, just below 0°F temps 🥶 Likely a good day to TRY and catch up on the financial accounting stuff. I think I have 4 LL Bean credit card bills to reconcile now. And yes, I HAVE been paying them and the charges all look OK, just haven't gotten them into Quicken.

DW will again ask "how can we live too far north for snow?" 

Her brother and family live not all that far from Rachel, in NH on the MA border. Looks like they are in the 9" band. His wife didn't want to live in VT, too much snow. I can't count the number of years they have been buried and we've had relatively little snow.  

Looks like DD1's best friend is going to get hit hard, she's southeast of Boston in the 12" zone.
DW's college sailing buddy is in southern CT, looks like he's in for 12" to 16" as well. He called a few days back, I thought maybe he'd gotten big snow in the last storm that ran up the coast but he said they only had rain, lots of rain.


----------



## rachels.haven

...I'm pretending we're not forecasted to get 14" of cold, fluffy, frozen rain... 

The baby is doing okay. Today is his due date. He was large for gestational age when born which made him predisposed for bilirubin/jaundice issues so we had to spend a few days in the hospital at the "electric infant beach" as one non-pediatrician doctor put it. His numbers would not go down so we spent a lot of time checking and rechecking his bilirubin levels at the doctor's office even after we were let out. He has an overly healthy appetite and has been gaining weight very fast and isn't slacking in that regard so we did not get stuck being readmitted. His level went down by two points finally on Monday. He's now over 9 pounds and climbing. If he didn't have the normal post birth weight drop I shudder to think what his birth weight would be if he went to term and was actually born today.

I've mostly been not posting because I'm a little sleep deprived. Eating and pooping helps with bilirubin so I've been feeding him all night at every peep he puts out.

In regards to milking, we will make it work. I need my alone time in the morning. Not super keen on milking dwarves for cups of milk each, but dwarves were breedable in August, and the lamanchas didin't cycle this year until much, much later so maybe there is a place for both if I can handle it.

Today I'm extra tired because it turns out I'm the disciplinarian parent and the boys have been running my husband ragged at bedtime and refusing to go to bed because he's a softy. I've been passing out at 8 pm first because I was constantly sick, now because I'm getting up every hour, sometimes less for baby food catering. Last night I decided to stay up and put the kids through their paces in regard to bedtime before DH fell apart any more-so two or so fewer hours of sleep less for me but they got their BS called and I got them to bed with much tears before 11, which I come to find out is earlier than it has been. It will get earlier and less tearful again.

Lace got her band off again so her scur-horn is safe. Stinker.
Yesterday a small hawk grabbed a silkie while I was letting them range. The ducks got loud and tattled on the whole situation. The muscovy started doing their creepy, preditary "walk like an egyptian" strut towards it as muscovy do (good!), and I ran out with my new bat to persuade the bird to reconsider or play ball (he reconsidered and no hawk was harmed, but man, the birds of prey here practically need to have a weapon brandished over their heads before they do here-as if they are domesticated). As a result the silkie is in the house with only one minor puncture wound and I'm waiting for it to show some spirit so it can go back out. She's a funny little pullet and will probably be out by tomorrow. Back to no free range as long as the dog is living in her dogloo. I'll try to get a photo of the silkie later. I like those silly chickens. They are still laying, btw, keeping us in eggs still. Love that.

I'm afraid I've been slacking on my violet care. Apparently when it comes down to flora vs fauna I pick fauna. Sorry violets.

Sheesh, i still need to get a stall cleaned out for kidding. I guess I'm slacking there too.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Here's  hoping to very little snow, a full night's rest and your new little guy sleeping through the night ... you sure do have a full plate...bless your heart ❤


----------



## farmerjan

Ditto on the "BLESS YOUR HEART".  I guess I did it when I was young.... ain't no way no how,  now.  Hawks are not much less "domesticated" here.... the eagles are the worst... they will actually challenge you.  The bat would win here and it would be a road/storm casualty.

We have gotten about 1/4 to 1/2 inch of sleet/freezing rain/ice pellets and next to no snow.  So much for the forecast.  It is basically going mostly around us.... snow to the west and more ice and more wet to the east.  The storm is actually breaking apart with us in a center section of not alot of anything.  Just messy. 

Except for the getting back on routine, get all the sleep you can whenever the baby sleeps.  And sounds like his system is working well, even if a little bit jaundiced still.... try to stretch out the night feedings so he doesn't start with keeping you up all night. Ask me how I know..... and that was 40++ years ago.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. I will do my best. I just turned 30 at the beginning of the month, so hopefully I can do (have?) it "all". Young = invincible, right? Lots to burn?

I got the bat for other stuff and things, but I brought it out because on BYC there was a story about a person who tried to save a chicken bare handed and got a hawk stuck in their hand by the talon. In the detroit area if you clapped at them once they flew off as if you were shooting at them. It was like they had been shot at. It was nice. Clapping is easy and better for everyone.

Anyway, time to go feed the goats and lock up ducks.

One puffy pullet.


----------



## Baymule

Having a new baby is enough, 2 more kids......then running a farm and even with husband's help, heck, even he needs you too! Yeah, you certainly deserve to be tired.


----------



## rachels.haven

Small photo dump before I disappear again.

My duck horde.





Buggy and Max say I'm not tired out of my mind yet...for cookies. Bugs always says I'm sane. Eyes like that are always right, right?




Sleeping on his due date.


----------



## Baymule

Love the pictures. Precious baby boy!


----------



## Finnie

rachels.haven said:


> . He has an overly healthy appetite and has been gaining weight very fast and isn't slacking in that regard so we did not get stuck being readmitted. His level went down by two points finally on Monday. He's now over 9 pounds and climbing. If he didn't have the normal post birth weight drop I shudder to think what his birth weight would be if he went to term and was actually born today.


 My 11.5 pounder has always been my best eater. He was always willing to try more things than the others. He is now the tallest, at 6’2”. Out of the 5, he was also the only one born before his due date, thank God! The rest were all 2 weeks late. Can you imagine?!


rachels.haven said:


> As a result the silkie is in the house with only one minor puncture wound and I'm waiting for it to show some spirit so it can go back out.


 Oh, you just reminded me that I too had a hawk attack survivor yesterday that I need to go out and see how she’s doing in her hospital cage. 


rachels.haven said:


> . I guess I'm slacking there too.


It’s not called slacking when you’re a new mother and you’re doing the best you can. Don’t overdo it. Those things will all still be there when you are ready to tackle them. It’s more important for you to not let yourself get run down. Even 30 year olds need their rest. Sleep deprivation is real. And, as we all know, babies grow up real fast! Enjoy this time while it lasts. 😍


----------



## rachels.haven

Last night in the early hours we had white out conditions. I was up walking around with the little guy and it was like, "why look at my lovely white windows...". The barn is 100 feet from the house and I left all the lights but everything outside the glass was gone. I haven't had a whiteout since I left Iowa. They are amusing. Luckily we had nowhere to go at 3, 4, 5 am. If we did we wouldn't be getting there. Definitely not going outside either. Don't want to get lost on the way to the chicken coop or something.
It's still snowing, but everything looks okay. It's cold, fine snow with a lot of blowing and drifting, how much we get will be a mystery. Falling fast still. Driveway is plowed now. The front walk and a path to the oil port needs to be shoveled, but it will get done.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Gosh, Miss Rachels.haven!  Whether you are 30 or not, you have so much on your plate it's a wonder you are still functioning at all!  I really hope you can get some rest soon!   BTW, I noticed you changed your avatar. Nice. Of course, I liked the previous one as well.


----------



## farmerjan

AHHHH, the total innocence while out for the count!!!!!! he is cute. 
My son was nearly a week late, only 7lb 7 oz.   he was 10 lbs at 2 weeks, over 30 lbs at a year.  Didn't start walking until 13 months because he could scoot around on his butt......walked in the walker thing fine.  He is 6'6"  as an adult.  SOOOOO glad that he was not any bigger.  He had jaundice and the old family dr that had delivered me said to just keep giving him liquids to get the kidneys flushed out.  He wanted to eat constantly.... and was started on cereal very early, because dr said he was just not staying full with just milk.  He went from sleeping 2-3 hours max,  to sleeping 3-5 at a stretch..... thank goodness as I was exhausted.... and he was the first.  But I was also taking care of the chickens and my horses.....

He's a cutie


----------



## rachels.haven

@farmerjan  WOW, your son grew fast! I'm so glad you made it!


----------



## farmerjan

Yes, he did grow fast.  There are 6 ft men on both sides so came by his height pretty honestly. But he was 6 ft at 12 with size 12 feet...... finally is 6'6" with size 15's or so.... all depends on the shoe and cut.  He thinks it's funny if we are in a store and I see something on the top shelf and tell him that I need him to reach it and he stands there and teases... what's the matter mom, I don't have any trouble reaching it...... that's when you want to kick 'em in the shin....


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, once upon a time there was a LGD team made up of Bailey, Roscoe,and (a different) Badger. Roscoe is 6 or 7 years old now. His owner is the lady that set us up with Bailey. She just contacted me asking if Roscoe can possibly come and live with Bailey as she is probably going to have to move to North Carolina and Roscoe can't come. It sounds like she's going urban/suburban for a job change. So if she gets the job, Bailey gets an old friend back.

I am not sure what happened to their Badger, the third team member. Original owner said he was a fence climber and wanderer and was giving him away for free a while back because he would escape and beg the neighbors for treats. I considered him but decided not to get into that. I don't think Roscoe has those issues and has been settled in for a while and and working hard with no problems a town or two over. Same coyotes as us.

Sounds like I'll probably be getting the vet out to give him a once over and we will need to get another dogloo. The 7 year old's minion cats need shots before I boot them out anyway.


----------



## Baymule

Whoop! Whoop! Yay for Bailey and Roscoe getting to be together again! I bet she is going to be so happy! Awesome, just awesome.


----------



## Finnie

I’m so glad you’re going to be able to have two guardians again! I can’t imagine a more ideal partner for Bailey! 🤗


----------



## rachels.haven

I have does with softening ligaments. Christmas babies?


----------



## farmerjan

Sure, why not.  Your temps are supposed to drop with that cold moving east, snow maybe for your area(?) and 2 kids that are old enough to want to have Christmas first thing in the morning.....


----------



## rachels.haven

Merry Christmas! 
No babies yet. Torrential rain melted most if the snow and right now it's about 60 degrees-raining but what a wonderful present! Green and warm!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Your warmer than we are here in Florida ! Merry Christmas


----------



## rachels.haven

Roscoe's owner changed her mind and wants to wait a little longer before giving him up. She loves him. I don't care. We will be here. It just may go down to the wire. If she can find a way to take him I'd be okay with that too obviously. No one wants to give up the dogs they love.

So I splurged today. I had some cash from selling goats earlier laying around. There's a lady doing goat ultrasounds in the state for $1/mile and $10/goat so I got my does ultrasounded. Here's the result from my FB farm page. 

Ultrasound results
Lamancha
(Bred To:
Hammock Haven Atlas,
Rustic Wood's Black Tie Affair,
or
 Epimetheus Max)
Kaos Farm RWP Uranium-3, maybe 4
Moon Mist LOG Purple Summer-1, maybe two
Hammock Haven Trinka-2-3
Epimetheus Lace-unknown (got stuck in a fence over night by her big scur, appeared to miscarry, exposed recently after calling for a buck all night long, might be very early pregnant)

Nubian
(Bred to King's Rock Adonis)
VVFarm Luck Be A Lady Tonight-3-4

Nigerian
(Bred To-Rosasharn WS Sir Patrick
or
Mustang Meadows T Durango)
Bluebird Pond Erudite-1-2
Woodland Haven Ava's Sugar-3
Woodland Haven Ava's Lavender 2-3
Buttercup-2
Chip-2
Mustang Meadows H Ava-probably open, possible cloudburst pending

...I wonder if this is going to be another buck year? I have resolved to sell anything I don't like to milk and I like whole hand teats, soft udders, and good udder texture AND good stand manners. I get the feeling that things are going to change quite a bit. I'm too busy to dink around.


----------



## rachels.haven

Introduced Bailey to the baby. She wants to stand super still with the very top of her nose gently on his face and inhale his smell and never quit. He was getting cold so I stood up and went in. Instant sad, depressed puppy at the window occurred as she wanted him back. I'm so glad we have her. She'll take good care of him when he's big enough to be outside with the other kids.


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> I have resolved to sell anything I don't like to milk and I like whole hand teats, soft udders, and good udder texture AND good stand manners. I get the feeling that things are going to change quite a bit. I'm too busy to dink around.


Absolutely!  I want to say there is no room in farming for keeping unproductive animals *BUT* before I go there we all have those old pensioners that are eating expensive feed and only are kept because we love them.  Several of our old horses (in their late 20's and early 30's) could no longer eat hay so were on Purina Senior feed.  We still gave them some hay because they liked to gum it.  LOL  That was expensive but they were family members who had taken care of my children on the trails for years.  They had earned it.

With you, culling back to easy milkers only makes sense.  You haven't had those goats for 20 years (like our pensioners) and you need to have well behaved milkers that won't give you carpal tunnel or break a wrist kicking the heck out of you.  Not only that, but you will want to hand over some milking chores eventually to those 3 boys and you don';t want them growing up thinking that your milkers are dangerous or difficult.  Nothing is so pleasant as milking an easy cooperative milker and nothing makes you decide to sell them all faster than a cantankerous b*&^% of a milker.  



rachels.haven said:


> Introduced Bailey to the baby. She wants to stand super still with the very top of her nose gently on his face and inhale his smell and never quit. He was getting cold so I stood up and went in. Instant sad, depressed puppy at the window occurred as she wanted him back.



Introducing your dogs to new babies is so rewarding.   And safe.  Properly introduced dogs (no matter their age) will welcome the new "pup" into the pack.  It is always so much fun to see those giant guardian breeds with their little humans curled up sleeping on them,  LOL  Our first grandson learned to walk holding onto our Pyr and Aussie.  The would stand very carefully and slow their gait to his faltering steps,  When he fell down they were immediately nosing him to check for damage then encouraging him to try to get up again.  Proper introductions mean a dog that is completely trustworthy with the baby.  I got very annoyed when well meaning friends or relatives would tell me not to let the dog sniff or lick the babies.  Dogs that are rebuffed from their charges don't bond to them.  

So adorable that she wanted him back.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yesterday I tried to breed Avalon, who was suddenly in a raging, blubbering heat, for sale as a bred doe. But she wasn't having it and only wanted Buggy, my mature lamancha buck, so Ava is listed and open, lol.

All night last night the goats were VERY loud on the baby monitor. Lace, the other possibly open doe apparently decided to cycle and was going to war with end of cycle Ava and the both of them were driving the bucks nuts. So Lace got bred to Buggy today and the doe war stopped. The bucks are still at it together.

So now kidding season is going to be very long, lol. Hey, but long is okay.

Now we need does to offset last year's buck year, right? (7 bucks, 1 doe)


----------



## Ridgetop

Actually, with the baby last year, maybe that many bucks were ok.  You didn't keep many and now are going to cull down to a manageable number that will be pleasant to work with.  So much nicer.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

_Happy New Year, Miss @rachels.haven!_


----------



## rachels.haven

Happy New Year to you too, @Senile_Texas_Aggie . May you clear much brush and trees and make your kingdom even better this year (but hopefully no plumbing).


----------



## rachels.haven

The husband reports it's going around that we'd need 10 feet of snow to recover from the drought here. And I'm like, who's side are you on?!

...so far we've gotten maybe a foot and a half so I don't think we're recovering, which is both good and bad for me, lol. We'd be well past lamancha losing territory at the 10 foot mark.

And no babies yet. The ligaments seem to be getting soft at night, then firming back up. I've never had that happen before, so I've just decided that the babies get here when they get here. I saw them on ultrasound so they are there.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> And no babies yet.* The ligaments seem to be getting soft at night, then firming back up.* I've never had that happen before, so I've just decided that the babies get here when they get here. I saw them on ultrasound so they are there.


That is the worst ever Doe Code I've ever hear of! They are conniving, deceitful goats!


----------



## rachels.haven

@B&B Happy goats 
 You mentioned this in your journal at one point, but this isn't clumping bamboo, is it?





It's about 3x as large as when we moved in now. The last guy who lived here who was on the conservation board(the anti fence/ farming board), was growing it along with his rose of sharon, barberry, and box. Not sure...this plant or the others were a good idea...it thinks it's coming through the fence towards the doe pen where they are anxiously awaiting it's arrival.


----------



## rachels.haven

Close up picture


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

You could take a piece of it, sealed in a ziplock bag, to your local nursery or garden center and see if they can help you identify it. Or Google search. How long has it taken to grow that far?


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> View attachment 80165
> 
> Close up picture


Sure looks like it, but I am unsure of what kind grows up there....but if the goats love it....ya gotta love it  
Just looked up bamboo in Massachusetts..yepper...you do have a cold tolerant bamboo growing, congratulations  on that score, just don't  let them destroy  the main clump of growth,  the new shoots that grow past the wire should keep them busy and content ....


----------



## rachels.haven

Uh oh. If no dwarf goats kid in the next 11 days appears little Durango was a very lucky buck and bred all the ND ladies this year. I ran a buck with half the does for several weeks weeks, took the buck out, waited a few weeks, put in more does and Durango for the new does and to act as clean up and we are approaching our corresponding break period between sires with no kiddings from the first buck. Still exciting, but disappointing my first guy had problems. He really loved cuddling his girlfriends and the does really loved all over him, I'm surprised he didn't do any covering. All maintenance bases were covered, and everyone was at least a year old too so I'm baffled. Tight, well attached udders, good teats, smaller stature, nice feet, and white on poll, belly, and front legs all around, I guess. I hope none of them go lame when the selenium goes low like Durango did. Durango also got rather bucky as he matured, not as bucky as Avalon, but still not super docile. Aw well.



Hurry up guys! I want to do some milking!!! 



...granted a doe or two could go over day 145 up to day 155, but with the multiples nigerians have and what was confirmed via ultrasound that is unlikely and  delay in kidding beyond the 21st indicates the alternate buck sired the litter.


----------



## rachels.haven

I got a new toy yesterday and just opened it. Look what I can do now for $30.
Here's a "canary feather" from the kids toy slide collection.





I'm so excited to play with this. No more cross eyed fecals!


----------



## Bruce

Could be the first buck is "all hat, no cattle"?


----------



## rachels.haven

The husband observes that he appears to prefer breeding other bucks. Ava broke into his recovery stall after his tail got ripped up by badger and he bred her and produced kids, but that was a one single doe in raging heat, no bucks in sight, he did not have to court the doe kind of thing. He's dominant and bucky in the buck pen, but not in a doe pen apparently.
I may have to hand breed (a single pair in a controlled setting, potentially on leads) rather than pen breed to get this buck's kids. The does are pushy and mean to each other normally in his defense. If he fails at hand breeding he will be sold.


----------



## rachels.haven

I did the does' feet today-10 sets of hooves. Going by feet that had been neglected for a few months three of my lamanchas are on the list for keeping doelings out of-Summer, Trinka, and Lace. I did and ranked the bucks earlier, but are do to be redone next week.

Still. No. Babies.


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> The husband observes that he appears to prefer breeding other bucks.


LOL  Our bucks used to all live together and had a love/love relationship with each other.  My 3 sons and husband used to make a lot of jokes about their supposed sexual preferences.  I think it is pretty normal behavior since others have told me their bucks when housed together would do the same.    

Definitely do the hand breeding putting the doe and buck on leads.  With only one doe to look at and kiss up, the buck will give her all his attention.  Another benefit is that you have a definite breeding date to know when the kids will arrive.  We never did any pen breeding with our dairy does.  I did pen breeding with the Boers but then we only had 1 Boer buck.  I used a harness and crayon on him.  Hand breeding is super easy and fast.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, I only did a pen breeding setup because I had trouble handling the nigerians while pregnant. Those stinkers think they're huge. The actual big guys are easy. Then as I got more tired I figured just set them all up like that. Meh, probably never again.


----------



## Ridgetop

I never had dwarf breeds - hate bending over to control them - don't even like even standard size kids when training!  Luckily my human kids could train the goat kids to a collar and leash.  LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

I briefly exposed Avalon to Patrick on the 29th. It's 22 days later. No cycle despite her only wanting to fight with him so she could have the lamancha buck in the pen across the barn. It looks like Patrick got the job done anyway. If no kids hit the ground tomorrow (day 145 since last exposure in the breeding pen) to the next 5 days (day 150 since last exposure, with a few days on the other side allowable) it looks like Ava will be the only doe settled to Patrick. Apparently the doe my favorite buck likes best is my least favorite. Good grief, the litter she miscarried was probably Patrick's as well. 
I'm thinking I may want to keep this litter of Ava's as bottle babies then let her go in milk (watch them all be bucks).

COME ON remaining does of Patrick's pen. Give me some Patrick does.

Looks like Lace the lamancha may be settled as well (to Buggy, the object of Ava the dwarf's desire...stupid goat love triangles)


----------



## rachels.haven

March 1st, I've decided, will be dwarf evaluation day. Keeping a few for the milk that is my guilty pleasure despite their nigerian dwarfy-ness? And who's staying if so? Or am I selling the whole dwarf herd?


----------



## rachels.haven

Hello,
This morning I found the younger silver partridge silkie rooster with the correct comb dead under the feeder. Last night I noticed he was slow to get around. I assumed he was starting to molt. No respiratory issues or other issues. He was just dead. He's one that the hens don't like because he jumps them rather than feeds and courts them so nobody cuddles with him at night and I think I can assume he was cold (where as Mr. Teddy, the other rooster, gathers the hens UNDER his wings like he did when they were chicks and they all stay warm, and it looks like one of the two hatched babies that are male are following his example). It got DARN cold last night, so I'm guessing Mr. Rapey silkie froze. So....I guess it pays to be nice to the girls when you're a silkie.

By writing this I am procrastinating getting up and dealing with my youngest's afternoon project. After throwing the bathroom plunger around the yard (  ), getting tired of that and swinging from the rafters in the barn knocking over hay bales, and disassembling a wood chair the less fixable way (  ), he moved onto cutting himself some bamboo...and dragging it into the house.(  )Yay. Luckily for me it's very windy so the leaves that remain on it are stuck on good and cleanup is not going to be as messy. But first we have to fight about sticks staying outside...
I was going to try to plunk him on video games for an hour or so and clean up the bamboo before we go get our sam's order. Unfortunately it appears the industrious little boy is very interested in building something inside away from the wind with his panda food sticks. Time to hide the clippers!





Winter clothing+greenery+me pretending not to notice while snapping a pic on my laptop camera.

...Maybe we need to put up a kid barn and pen...

No baby goats, btw. Looks like Patrick isn't a pen breeder.


----------



## rachels.haven

Dan's response to "do you want to go play minecraft?" No. He does not. Real life minecraft is better.


----------



## rachels.haven

Darn you, "bamboo stew".


----------



## rachels.haven

Huh, missed a Dan project. I wonder when he slipped away and did this. The hole in the wall is not new. It's from the lock on the door knob that was accidently slammed into it at some point. I guess that's the way plugs look to a five year old.


----------



## rachels.haven

Goats keep me sane...nice, well behaved, tidy goats...


----------



## rachels.haven

After the kids went to bed the bamboo got dragged right out the back door, I pulled the gps charger out of the wall, I'm not sure where the plunger wound up, and I'm not worried about the hay bales. There were also a few other episodes of "Dan Stuff" I didn't catch to clean up between picture and bed time. That kid was on one yesterday. I think he was tired, which makes him nuts. I forgot to grab the container of "bamboo stew", and now the kids are awake and aware of it, so it has to wait.

The weather is rather stupid today-teens and twenties with a lot of wind to blow the warmth right out of everything. Regardless, after a night of cranky baby still figuring out how to move his bowels (the poor guy wants to sleep, honest!), I needed a longer break than usual so I put Buggy (Rustic Wood's Black Tie Affair) on the stand for a hoof trim because I'd been feeling guilty for skipping one of his 4 feet because his neck is to fat for the milk stand to close and restrain him so when he declared himself done with trimming he walked off the stand. His head is bigger too, so if it would still close it would work, but he's a thick goat all around. I didn't need to have worried. He now has nice feet and they wore down on the frozen ground we've got, so other than a little bit of toe shaping his feet looked great. And I baling twined his collar to the stand. Bugs is a good boy so when the collar asked he just stayed.

With feet that nice I may have to breed him to the other big does I didn't have him cover and have lots of Buggy babies running around again. He's an older style lamancha, but he throws nice udders supposedly and all his parts are nice. Unfortunately last year he gave me all bucks except for the one Saffron doeling that randomly died. She was so pretty though. Supposedly he's had other doelings that have randomly died like my doeling last year, so I will probably continue only using him conservatively from now on until I have does from everyone from him unless they really do keep randomly dying at a higher than usual rate.

I didn't take pictures of Buggy on the stand because (drum roll) Dan had taken and hidden my phone. My other son sort of ratted his brother out so after the goats I called it from my laptop while sitting in his silent room until I found it. Someday he'll grow out of this, I'm sure.


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> Someday he'll grow out of this, I'm sure.


Hopefully you both live long enough!  

These are the stories that you will be able to tell to his children after he has punished them for the same behavior.  And you can also laugh heartily as he tells you about the dreadful things Dan Jr. does.    Make sure your daughter in law knows that it is Dan's genes.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> By writing this I am procrastinating getting up and dealing with my youngest's afternoon project.


Danger Dan strikes again!

I don't know if I should laugh or offer several   Maybe both!!


----------



## Ridgetop

If you don't laugh you have to cry and crying is not worth it.  I often had to leave the room in the middle of scolding my kids for something because I was about to break into laughter about what they had done.   I also had to leave the room sometimes so I would not kill them. 

"I am woman, I am strong".  Repeat it many, many times.    Over many, many years.  

   Oh yes, and reporting Dangerous Dan's exploits here is cathartic!


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, no baby goats still. That means all six dwarf does will be kidding in the next two weeks or so. Heheheeh. More udders are just starting up.

Also, I put in an order for an incubator that can hold a lot of silkie, muscovy, or maybe duck eggs. This might be fun.

Bring on the spring!

Bailey and her pet cats say "hi!"


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw poop, somebody summoned the snow. I'm not in the mood for 13"+ of it.


----------



## farmerjan

Yeah, we are in line for anywhere from 6-12" starting tonight..... 🥶😱

It got down to 10 last night too so the ground is really cold and hard so anything we get will stick.  We still have some white from Thursday morning....it's been cold and windy the last couple of days.  Today wasn';t windy and the sun  was out but the ground is cold.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Aw poop, somebody summoned the snow. I'm not in the mood for 13"+ of it.


You can keep that stuff for yourself! 

Looks like we might get a bit under 2.5" on Tuesday. Of course the last time Mr NOAA called for 1" we got 5 or 6. Then he called for 4" and we got less than 1.


----------



## rachels.haven

This weekend is also the one weekend it goes down to the single digits every night with heavy wind. As soon as it gets warmer tonight then we get the snow. So I guess bring on the wind burn Iowa style, followed by wet New England snow and higher temps. I wouldn't be surprised if it doesn't get this cold again this winter.


----------



## Ridgetop

BRRRRRRRRRR!

To think I wore my long undies in Texas and moaned about 21-35 degree temps on the way there and back.  Two states to cross off my wish list except in the summer!    Our Texas trip was a tropical interlude for you guys!


----------



## Bruce

Looks like you are sharing more with us than I want Rachel! It was -11°F this morning. 
We are looking at a 80-90% chance of 4" or more, 40% chance of 8" or more. Looks like you are 70-80% chance of 8" or more, 40-50% of 12" or more. It could be worse, parts of PA have a 30-50% chance of 18" or more. 

Hunker down!


----------



## rachels.haven

You bet cha to the hunkering down. I put away all the feed that was in my garage parking spot (and van) and I'm ready now to pull the car in and shut the door and no more going out until it's all done.

Bruce, you were colder than us. No envy is coming from me in your direction. I don't think we broke the single digit negatives this week/weekend. One of the kids' teachers was reporting negative nine on Thursday (could have been Wednesday or Friday, I suppose). But I didn't see it.


----------



## Bruce

Well we are farther north so we should be colder right? Usually the coldest time of year for us is the last week of January and the first week of February. All in all I'd say we've been warmer than usual so far this winter since this is the first time it got down to negative double digits. In years past it wasn't unusual for us to go down to -20°F several times and stay below 0°F for several days in a row.

No, I am NOT complaining that is seems to be less cold this year!


----------



## Baymule

No. Nope. Uh-uh. Don't even want to know what that kind of cold feels like.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, me neither. I already did that in Iowa (although they get sandy cold snow and those temps), so you're tougher than I am, Bruce. Michigan spoiled me (and now even warmer Massachusetts). I still feel it's stupid when it goes into the single digits or sub zeros. Too cold.


----------



## farmerjan

We got 6-7 inches in most places.  It is about 30 but still cloudy so no melting yet.  Had some misty like snow yesterday after the bulk of the snow.  Pretty but cold. Maybe tomorrow it will get sunnier and start to melt. You deal.  Not that bad out really,


----------



## Ridgetop

Baymule said:


> No. Nope. Uh-uh. Don't even want to know what that kind of cold feels like.



Me either Bay!  I figure the only time for that is when they bury me.  Or I could be cremated . . . . ?


----------



## farmerjan

One of the reasons that I like Va as opposed to Vermont.... We get the cold and snow, but in small doses most of the time. I like winter for a little bit.  I like the slow down, quit the growing/gardening season....take a break from all the push to get the work done...... the cold "stay in the house except for necessary things"  weather.... I just don't want to have it for months on end..... I had wanted to go to Vermont when I was younger, and had looked into buying out a guy who did AI on farms.... but couldn't make it pencil out.  I mean, I had spent a good part of my life in Vt with family and at a place where our family owned property..... I loved it up there.... but the winters are daunting, and then with having friends in Va, I came south and liked the western part of the state with the Blue Ridge mountains.... 4 seasons,  but the winters are shorter and not as severe... the growing season is about 4-6 weeks longer than up there and the mountains do help to keep down the sweltering heat  that they get in the eastern part, like where @Mini Horses  is.   I don't like the cold rain/icy weather, but..... that's part of it.  So I came south permanently......
Due to the mountains, we do have a later frost date in the spring,  and an earlier killing frost in the fall, then just 75 miles east,  but we have some nice weather, and the summers are not as hot or humid as further east. 
The NC mountains in the western part of the state also have some nice weather.... and they have actually had more snow the past couple of years than we have....storms have stayed to the south many times.... but again they get rid of the snow quicker and the winters are shorter. 
Nope, I'm too old for that kind of weather anymore.  Especially since I have been down here, my blood is "thinner" than it was and I have no interest in going back into that kind of cold even though that is where my roots and heritage is.


----------



## rachels.haven

I had 20 minutes before DH had to start an interview to go do the animals and I come out to  40lbs Ava's Lavender pushing out a bubble under the hay feeder on the fence, so I ran in and grabbed the towel I left out for this purpose. When the bubble burst the kid was presenting with only a head, so I reached in and pulled a foot out and delivered-a buckling, 3 pounds, 7 oz. The next thing out was a good, right way up in the bubble, so I worried less. She was preoccupied with baby one, so there was a little time she wasn't pushing. Eventually she pushed out the baby...and the sack just hung there with gravity not enough to make it drop or pop the bubble. So I popped it, and got it out of the bubble that was just hanging there, and much to my dismay it was a premie buckling with no teeth, no voice, undershot jaw, weighing in at one pound seven ounces. So with the towel I dried buckling 1 off with freezing stiff, I grabbed a puppy pad and stuffed the little guy in my coat-mom didn't want it. Mom also doesn't want to let baby nurse. *sigh*

So I strawed the spare stall and divided it off from the main stall, milked uncooperative mom from her cat teat sized teats (she has almost no milk and wasn't uddered up, so we get what we can and wait, I guess) and attempted to bottle buckling 1 in the house, assuming buckling 2 is a goner. Buckling 1 got some and stopped shaking and didn't feel cold any more so I stuck him in a box. Buckling 2 was an ice cube and struggling to breathe and slowing down so I did the "baby in a bag in hot water" trick until he wasn't ridgid anymore.

Then I preheated the oven to 125, turned it off and stuck him in while I took his brother out out to screaming mom. He wasn't done cooking anyway. When I came back in he was properly cooked so he got a dribble/drowning of colostrum in the mouth then I put him back in and I went out to try to get his brother to actually nurse. When I came back he was sitting up, so I gave him the rest of the bottle (HE DRANK!)

Then I went up to check on baby human, who had fallen asleep with my husband, the interview was canceled, and now I have a baby goat in a box and possibly another coming inside if it doesn't get it together with it's dam. The stimulation should help get the milk running, I hope. Both bucklings will need it.

Happy 145 days since I put Durango in the breeding pen as a cleanup buck. My baby is going to sleep and the buckling is asking for more food. I need to go look up how much he's supposed to have.

Snow is now flying. They're saying 16+ inches.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## Ridgetop

*CONGRATULATIONS!!!  Quick thinking & action!!!*

Take a sock and cut head and leg holes in it for the preemie.  It will help keep him warm until his hair grows in more.  Don't worry abut the weird jaw, it could be because he is a preemie and once he grows a bit it might be normal.  Since he is drinking you will probably be able to save him.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Awesome  save there   @rachels.haven ....I don't  know how you do it, new baby, kids, human kids ....SNOW.  .....you rock mom


----------



## farmerjan

YES  You are pretty amazing. Hope the little one makes it.... and if momma keeps being a B#$@H she needs to leave...... isn't she the one you were wavering over????


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep. She is Avalon spawn, lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh poop. If I go back to bed, will it go away? Also, Bailey and the goats would like to speak to the manager...




While I complain about snow over the top of my boots creeping up the legs of my overalls and down those boots, the poor dog is up to her belly, so I really have nothing to complain about. Regardless, this sums up how I feel.  Bailey and the dwarf goats could probably add a few more 

No new baby goats, and you'd never guess it but Phil saw his shadow.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Always a reminder of why I moved to a warmer climate....NOOOO SNOW   ....maybe  next move will be to a friendlier  climate for you and your family, , sending you WARM hugs


----------



## farmerjan

Is your snow over yet?  Hearing that you will still have more..... glad that we only got the 6-8 inches.  Some melted yesterday even with the cold.... more will melt today as it gets in the mid-upper 30's.  Some sun today will help.  It's not so awful cold... was still this morning but getting a bit breezy now.   Supposed to be real windy by this evening.  Warming the end of the week but supposed to be COLD next week....teens and maybe low 30's....
Nope, rolling over and getting up in an hour will not make it go away.... trust me on that !!!!


----------



## Bruce

farmerjan said:


> We got 6-7 inches in most places.


Curious, I think my sister in law in Arlington, VA said they only got sleet.



Ridgetop said:


> Me either Bay!  I figure the only time for that is when they bury me.  Or I could be cremated . . . . ?


Well, cremation would be a LOT hotter!!!! You'll never see negative temps if they put you 6' under, not likely even freezing temps. Your choice of course 



rachels.haven said:


> Then I preheated the oven to 125, turned it off and stuck him in


OK, that is something you don't read every day! I bet there are a lot of people that wouldn't put an animal in their oven no matter what the temp.

I would think 125° would be awfully hot. Why not something just over a hundred, same as it would be inside the doe?

Still snowing here, no idea how much because we have 15 MPH north winds with higher gusts; drifting all over the place. Maybe 5" so far?? We are supposed to get another 1" by 7 PM, 3.5" more between 7 PM and 1 PM tomorrow and another 1.5" by early Thursday morning.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Curious, I think my sister in law in Arlington, VA said they only got sleet.
> 
> 
> Well, cremation would be a LOT hotter!!!! You'll never see negative temps if they put you 6' under, not likely even freezing temps. Your choice of course
> 
> 
> OK, that is something you don't read every day! I bet there are a lot of people that wouldn't put an animal in their oven no matter what the temp.
> 
> I would think 125° would be awfully hot. Why not something just over a hundred, same as it would be inside the doe?


The oven wouldn't register preheated any lower, but I did turn it off at that point before adding the goat. He had a long way to go before he reached a safe temp, so I was less worried than I could have been. There are old family history stories about premie babies discarded by the doctors of the era being ovened back to life so I figured why not? Different kind of oven, but mine's more controlled so I could make it peak there and stop.

The goat is still cooking-I mean kicking. He had a body temp crash this after noon, so out comes the heat lamp.

He was in my room, but Dan somehow got baby goat poop on the ceiling while I wasn't looking so the goat got exiled to the kitchen where I can watch better. Dan still claims the blob of poop up there is a bug. I'm going to get the little clump of pellets off when it's not so smearable. Now baby goat is onto the tarry stuff and there's no way I want that anywhere else but in the box.


----------



## farmerjan

Family story is that my mom's father was a premie and they put him in a little box right behind the wood stove to keep him warm.  He was in his mid - 90's when he passed away....


----------



## Bruce

You and Barb would get along just fine nursing baby goats together in the house!


----------



## rachels.haven

It's snowing again, I have a mild migraine which makes it hard for me to focus and remember and easy to forget and Dan is on his rampage between classes as usual. Good time for some new baby goats, right? Come-on does, don't save them all up till the end and go all at once!




Snow with polar bear toy mooning.





Dan got one of those squishy sticky texture party favor/vending machine toys stuck to the wall waaaay out of anyone's  reach. Ignore the drawing of a duck eating a fly on the wall.


----------



## rachels.haven

My husband's maternal grandfather was also a premie put in an oven after the doctor discarded him and said he wouldn't live. And for 91 years he did.

Anyway, no baby goats today. The buckling is feeling spunky and bucky.









Hubba hubba, what a hawt bottle you have there, he says. Nigerians seem to come out ready to breed and not very innocent. His brother is already courting and blubbering. Whoopie.






We are not keeping "Tom the Mehing Goat". Listing him would be a lot easier if the children had some other kids to distract them. Negotiations have opened.

Oh, and an incubator arrived today. I need to test it before the 30 day return window closes. Silkie-plosion, maybe?


----------



## rachels.haven

Wait, one more photo.


----------



## farmerjan

If I can figure out a trip up, I want some violets again...... some how, some way....

Adorable kid.... he looks so much better.... GOOD FOR YOU.....


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Wait, one more photo.


Nice!


----------



## rachels.haven

Today I shoveled the chickens, ducks, bucks, does, and kidding stall and pulled the giant buckling off his mom. I'm almost out of frozen milk and the good milk replacer won't be here for a few days and no one is bothering to kid so I'm going to have to make them share the milk there is.


----------



## Baymule

*Today I shoveled the chickens, ducks, bucks, does, *
I bet they didn't like THAT!


----------



## rachels.haven

Scooped them right up!

Here are the goat brothers.


----------



## rachels.haven

I like this pic better. They are pretty.


----------



## farmerjan

They are cute little guys.  Are you just going to keep the doe milking and continue to feed the kids?


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm not sure yet. This is one doe that isn't built for milking and I don't feel like I'm getting it all, so this morning I milked her out as much as I could and put the big buckling back on her. I will probably repeat tonight with the nightly separation with some bottle feeding, then am milking for the little guy. I'd rather milk a different doe to feed the little guy because this doe takes so long to get a cup of milk out with my thumbs and pointer fingers doing all the work.


----------



## rachels.haven

This was a prospective hatching eggs. Dan broke into the lab today. 

...thank you, Dan. I'm still looking for the permanent marker.




  We also "scored" five more than inches of snow apparently. We went out to pick up a delayed milk order as it started and got stuck on the first hump of the shared driveway so we scraped tracks up the hill and drove home. Slippery stuff.

Baby goat weighed in at 1 pound 14 oz today.


----------



## farmerjan

We often use sharpies to mark eggs so that egg could be set... Unless he had to shake them up as he marked them.  There is some bleed through of the markers, sometimes it might affect them, but often I don't see any difference in marked and not marked eggs.  
Bless his little devilish heart.....

That little goat is really tiny..... but sounds /looks like he is doing good considering everything.....


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. I think the buckling is chugging along. The weight gain was a relief. I will breathe easier when he's over two pounds and can regulate his own body temperature. I tried turning off the heat lamp last night and he quit eating again. He is only a buckling, but he's cute and this is good practice.

Dan said he wanted the egg to look like Humpty Dumpty and he wants me to hatch it. I'm willing to try. Now he is loose in the house with a package of tiny self adhesive googly eyeballs to make a valentine for his valentine pen pal, which means we will probably be finding items randomly bedazzled with googly eyes for the next few weeks.  But hey, with this kid, I can't get anything done with or without him without a mess breaking out, so that's life.


----------



## rachels.haven

lol.
If you're allergic to wheat do not bed a stall down with straw (or even the baby goat box inside). Just as itchy and slightly asthmatic as last year. Plus it's $12/bale.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Is 


rachels.haven said:


> lol.
> If you're allergic to wheat do not bed a stall down with straw (or even the baby goat box inside). Just as itchy and slightly asthmatic as last year. Plus it's $12/bale.


That $12 for a square bale ? ...hay here is $8, and I complained about that price!


----------



## farmerjan

Try to find some RYE straw.  It is a real bright yellow color and is not near as dusty or coarse.  I used to get it for my horse years ago, she was midnight black and after a bath before a show, I would bed the stall and she would roll and it would just shine her up more.  It is flatter stalks and much more pliable.  Might not create an allergy reaction.


----------



## rachels.haven

The two unregistered does I have kidded today within hours of each other. Now we are up to six bucks this year. One buck feels polled and his mom has the softest, easily drained udder I've ever milked and is also polled. Durango, the buck I bred them to also had a dam with a similar udder. Pity the buckling probably going to be a wether.

Chip, the smaller unregistered doe had a tougher time getting the kid out, so I think I'll get her into a no-breed pet situation.


----------



## Baymule

Are your babies in the barn or in the house? I'm not set up for bottle babies in the barn, so my 2 are in the house in a dog crate. I don't keep a heat lamp on them. One of them is a runt, undersized and so small that her mom's teat wouldn't fit in her mouth. They are 5 days old now and doing great.


----------



## rachels.haven

Mine are in the house because they need special attention at their size and I don't want to keep going out to the barn.

Today the heat lamp is outside with the babies that stayed out. The little guy got two buddies to snuggle now because 10 was just too cold so he doesn't seem to need it anymore. One is his size now, but wasn't as weak but again, got too cold.
The other is polled (and he got too cold, lol...but seriously, he started freezing up). The breeder of the unregistered does is going to try to register them as of this morning and if I keep nigerianing I may try breeding in some polled goats because his mother's udder is exquisitely soft and empties so fast and the buck I used had a butter udder mother too, but with bigger teats. Not that it matters at that softness. Or I may just sell him later, who knows? So we have 3 in the house, 2 under a heat lamp in a private stall, and 1 out with Lavender running around because the cold doesn't bother him anyway.

Eri has lost her ligaments, her bag is tight and beautiful, and is positioning babies now. _Maybe_ we'll see some new babies today.


----------



## rachels.haven

Duckers.












I've unfortunately listed the muscovy because bear country is not the place to have duck plosions, I've decided. Which makes me sad, but as long as we're here I don't think it's a good idea. Hatcheries are selling the white ones. If we move I'll start over with them.


----------



## rachels.haven

BIG buck/doe twins for Erie late at night (I'm cotton brained today). I thought we were going to need the vet. Our first doe, and oh man, she is angular and pretty. This doeling I like, and I've never said that about a dwarf. Erie is not a human lover, but she is calm and respectful. Her daughter may be the same way. Eri also has a standard goat udder (and she's about 90lbs...). The doeling is 4 pounds, 3 oz, and the buckling is bigger, more like standard goat size. Poor Erie's bum. That doeling came in as a bottle baby but I left the buckling out because he was so huge and didn't seem phased by the cold. Plus, my does love their bucklings the best anyway. Go figure.
For some reason little undersized Chip thinks she needs to feed ALL the babies in the nursery stall in supplement to their actual mommies, so everyone is eating plenty.
Only Sugar is left to kid. Today is day 144 since durango removal according to the calendar (disregard anything I said on the matter in a sleep previously deprived stupor, I checked the records)


----------



## rachels.haven

...you know, I think I might just pull all the doe kids this year. Coccidia prevention and selling might be easier that way.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sugar kidded with 2 does and a silver buckskin buck and promptly forgot about them and went back to bawling for mommy Ava when I took them away for warming back up even after she'd had several hours to get to know them.

I've decided to sell out of nigerians. One of the boys read me the riot act today. It did take me over half an hour to get half a gallon of colostrum from four goats for the baby goats and milk isn't going to be much faster. The first fresheners are learning very quickly and well behaved.

It will probably be a relief to have three fewer bucks and six fewer does.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

rachels.haven said:


> Sugar kidded with 2 does and a silver buckskin buck and promptly forgot about them and went back to bawling for mommy Ava when I took them away for warming back up even after she'd had several hours to get to know them.
> 
> I've decided to sell out of nigerians. One of the boys read me the riot act today. It did take me over half an hour to get half a gallon of colostrum from four goats for the baby goats and milk isn't going to be much faster. The first fresheners are learning very quickly and well behaved.
> 
> It will probably be a relief to have three fewer bucks and seven fewer does.


Pictures please! Can you tie her up or put her in a small pen with the babies so she will recognize them as hers? Maybe put vicks vapor rub on her nose and the kids so they smell right?


----------



## rachels.haven

Naw, if she's not a good mom right off I don't want her trying to mother anything in single digits. I have 4 mommies with 4 babies out there pulling it off. Sugar is an obstinate airhead. She may do better for someone else next year.
Her buckling, may be already sold and as soon as I list the girls they will sell within a day or two. I'm one of the early birds kidding so plenty of bites.

Pics coming when I get on my phone.


----------



## rachels.haven

Silver, not yet "unfolded" and slipping on the floor


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

This kid (last 3) is my shrimp and he is hyper.


----------



## rachels.haven

Polled boy. Would be a keeper.


----------



## rachels.haven

Eri's calm dowling. I love her 😭


----------



## rachels.haven

Sheesh phone, that's "doeling".
Here's the bucket o bottle babies.


----------



## Bruce

They are so small they look like stuffed animals!


----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> They are so small they look like stuffed animals!


Stuffed animals don’t pee on the floor. LOL 

On the rejected lamb I’m bottle feeding, I put Vicks on the ewes nose, all 3 babies and it didn’t work. She carefully stuck her nostrils right up their little butts. Short of.a Vicks enema, I couldn’t fool her.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Baymule said:


> Stuffed animals don’t pee on the floor. LOL
> 
> On the rejected lamb I’m bottle feeding, I put Vicks on the ewes nose, all 3 babies and it didn’t work. She carefully stuck her nostrils right up their little butts. Short of.a Vicks enema, I couldn’t fool her.


I'm sorry it didn't work 😞


----------



## rachels.haven

It's the end of an era. Avalon was bought and brought to someone else's farm today.
I'm checking with Anne Peterson at Rosasharn to see if she wants Patrick back. She gets right of first refusal. Waiting to hear. She will probably not.
My Sugar Moon buckling Oberon's breeder would love to buy him back when I'm ready, she says. (One buck left then)

Then DH asks if I want to keep some dwarves which puts me in turmoil. I guess we'll just go slow and move goats until I'm comfortable again with the routine. Avalon is a good start. I think they will like her. They say they also have a spicy herd of dwarves.

No matter what we do, I'm selling all the Ava daughters and their kids first. If I turn tail and don't sell the bucks and remaining does that would put us at 3 bucks, 3 does in milk (one will be going to a pet home but she's been nursing all the others' babies so I need to wait), and a doeling I would be happy to keep. I've got really, really nice dwarves and the foundation of a really nice herd, but I'd probably be happiest with just the standard goats.


----------



## Bruce

Decisions decisions!


----------



## Baymule

Your farm, your goats, your happiness.


----------



## rachels.haven

What ever I do, we're going to be up to our ears in milk once colostrum stops. I've been getting a gallon a day in addition to the milk the does are feeding to their one buckling each (except for Sugar, no baby on her). And I usually do not milk 2 of the five does in milk (Chip, and Lavender who has teeny teats and is tiny herself).
So we're doing okay. These critters may finally be useful for a while.


----------



## Baymule

With all that milk, make cheese!


----------



## rachels.haven

Eventually we will.  actually, between a half gallon and gallon a day is how much is gone through here. Skinny kids drink a lot.

The next thing I'm excited about is Lamancha Summer and Emi are kidding around the 21st. My husband is excited for their milk but said he'd drink any goat milk at this point. I still want to bottle the doelings, and let as many bucklings as I can stay with the mothers, but we'll see. The lamanchas have me wrapped around their little hooves. Big, beautiful, soft, melty eyes on quiet gentle goats.


----------



## rachels.haven

Huh. Without Ava her daughters have suddenly become well behaved...dang. I guess they won't be hopeless for anyone else or miserable for me to milk now. I think it might be a good idea to avoid dam raising does. That made things difficult.


----------



## Baymule

When you bottle raise the kids, how long do you bottle feed them?
I leave ram lambs on their moms for 2 months, ewe lambs for 3 months. 
Im on my first bottle babies. I bought some lamb milk replacer in case I ran out of whole milk during our Texas Snowmeggdon Event. They don’t like it, yukky! We went to town yesterday and I got 5 gallons of whole milk. It sleeted last night so roads are covered in ice again. I’m mixing a little of the milk replacer with the whole milk and they are ok with it. Instructions on the bag say to wean at one month! That sounds too quick to me. 
Just wondering how long you bottle feed your babies.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh yuck, and I'd bet you don't have the salt trucks we do either. So you are probably shut down.
It sounds like the rules you follow and the goat rules are the same. I've gone up to 6 months on the bottle because I lost track of time this last round with my bucklings while I was pregnant and they weaned themselves. I think Sandi Brock from Sheepishly Me does 8 weeks with creep, water, and TMR for her bottle and dam raised market lambs. If I were a sheep person I'd probably do that too. She does recommend making sure they have CDT when adding grain because of overeating disease. Apparently she had issues with that.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm having a bad day. Got a firm message today. Downsize or be downsized.
Went to open the duck house and instead of my usual eye candy, makes me happy to watch duckies coming out a flock full of faceless, bloody, zombie horror ducks came streaming out.

So I finished hyperventilating and spent the morning chasing faceless ducks around and cutting their throats then leaving them in piles with their faceless friends bleeding out and dying in the snow so I could catch another one over and over again. I couldn't even find where I'd hidden my stupid hatchet from the boys to make it quick, but I was so upset I'd probably have accidently cut my hands off so that's probably for the better.

Of the remaining 5, one is injured, but I'm giving them away to whomever will come and get them first since apparently our housing is not adequate.

So anyway, I'm having a bad day. And apparently when I have bad days things die. No more ducks for me.

That fisher got to take ZERO ducks, btw. It killed several and dragged two to the door, but could not get them out (and then moved onto ripping and eating the bills, jaws, tongues, and faces off of all the rest, I hope it gets hit by a car).

Time for icy rain.


----------



## SA Farm

I’m so sorry for your losses and bad day! Hopefully things get better soon


----------



## thistlebloom

So sorry. Bad day is an understatement.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

I'm so sorry about your ducks


----------



## farmerjan

So sorry for the horrible loss.  

You said fisher.... are you saying you have a fisher cat there?  Or is that your word for another f word?   I am thinking raccoons.... they will kill for fun.  Had them get into a pen of half grown bantam show chicks, and tore legs off and wings off and omg.... I was not only in shock but practically hysterical with grief and anger.... In their case they actually managed to open a locking hook and eye on the door of the coop.... 
You didn't do any thing wrong.... the wildlife is just getting more canny and people wise.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I am so sorry you had such a horrible experience  and such a sad day Rachel,  big hugs to you and sorry for your loss  of your loved ducks


----------



## farmerjan

Got to thinking and I think that you did mean fisher.... a member of the same family as weasels?  They are S.O.B.'s to catch and do alot of damage.  I think they are one of only maybe a couple of animals that will kill porcupines... which we had alot of when I was a kid in Vermont at my grandparents place.  Everything wood outside was creosoted to keep the porcupines from gnawing.... 
So sorry, they can get into the smallest holes, crevices....


----------



## rachels.haven

@farmerjan , my first thought was raccoon too, but the tracks by the duck house were fisher cat. I've heard them in the woods before and I hate them. Honestly we just need some fisher sized industrial strength fly paper...


----------



## farmerjan

Live trap with a piece of the dead duck that you can use without your scent on it directly.  They can get in and out a hole that is only an inch or so around it seems. Need a very well made live trap... havahart won't cut it.
Nothing much will hold them for long.... you would have to check the traps often... In that case, a leg catch trap would be good but I know some on here would be horrified....  until they looked at the carnage you saw.....


----------



## rachels.haven

For sure.


----------



## Baymule

I am beyond sorry for your ducks. What a horrible torture for them. I know you are heartbroken. So sorry.


----------



## rachels.haven

Was warmer today so out of necessity I decided to learn to milk with the baby. The nubian (due later) is obsessed with my human baby. She's not the brightest, but is very sweet and she wants to nose him, and smell him and lick him and just in general love on him and not eat grain. The rest of the goats were terrified of him...as if he was going to jump out of his bouncer and eat them with his toothless gums. So milking and graining the pregnant standard goats took extra long, but whatever.

I kicked the baby goats out of the house into the stall with a heat lamp. Today is take them to get disbudded day because $15/goat is still not a bad deal to avoid doing it myself.

The 5 remaining ducks are being picked up at 6.

I gave my husband some of one of the dwarf's milk that had been fresh for over two weeks now and he thought it as good, but still goaty. He and the boys always find all the dwarf milk goaty where as I don't taste or smell anything. The lamancha milk, on the other hand, is not goaty to them. *sigh*

On Thursday someone comes for a registered buckling ($250), and someone else I meet with at the farmers' exchange with two other bucklings, unregistered, undisbudded ($100). So we'll be down to eight dwarf babies if those work out.

Summer (3f Lamancha) is due this weekend, possibly only one, but last time she had two and she is fairly large. Emi (FF Lamancha) is due the 25th with hopefully JUST triplets and not quads like her mother tended to have.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I'm having a bad day. Got a firm message today. Downsize or be downsized.


 Very very sad!



farmerjan said:


> but I know some on here would be horrified


Whether that is the case or not doesn't matter much, leg holds are illegal in MA. 
Fishers need a larger opening than the smaller weasels as they are about the size of a housecat. Of course cats can get through pretty small spaces.


----------



## rachels.haven

No worries, using a leg catch trap around a partially blind guy and a couple of kids isn't a good idea. Entropy.

Plus, the state reminds us that we are not allow to waste anything of their property that they allow us to take and I don't want to eat a fisher. No compost, no bury, no trash, no leaving in the woods, no accidentally letting injured things get away. I doubt they can enforce that evenly across the population.
(Maybe this doesn't apply to the protecting your farm clause...I hope, but not that much as state has not impressed me yet.)


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

rachels.haven said:


> No worries, using a leg catch trap around a partially blind guy and a couple of kids isn't a good idea. Entropy.
> 
> Plus, the state reminds us that we are not allow to waste anything of their property that they allow us to take and I don't want to eat a fisher. No compost, no bury, no trash, no leaving in the woods, no accidentally letting injured things get away. I doubt they can enforce that evenly across the population.
> (Maybe this doesn't apply to the protecting your farm clause...I hope, but not that much as state has not impressed me yet.)


Are you allowed to hire someone to deal with it for you? Maybe someone who would want the pelt and use the meat for dogs or something? I would think killing it should be covered under the protecting your livestock laws.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> No compost, no bury, no trash, no leaving in the woods, no accidentally letting injured things get away.


What do they expect you to do with a predator then, take it some miles away and dump it on someone else? Which is illegal in VT BTW.


----------



## rachels.haven

Pretty sure that's "wasting" too (maybe we're supposed to dump it in neighboring states?That wasn't mentioned.). I've come to the conclusion that to live here you have to break some laws to follow others because there are so many. If you follow all the people telling you what and how to do everything you'd do everything poorly, as expensively as possible, or not at all (for instance, to legally fertilize your lawn you need to get a license and pay several hundred dollars, and attend hours of classes, something I doubt people here usually do...you're supposed to hire someone (or drive to NH, buy the fert. and pesticides, and apply it anyway while no one who cares is looking)). I'm not going to do anything with the fisher unless it crosses my path when I'm in battle mode. No, it is unlikely there is anyone i can hire for the fisher. My town is pro-predator and they feel nature is like bambi. I'm just going to dream about moving while keeping it all together. And someday, like my parents, when I feel my kids are big enough I will get a firearm and start shooting animals I don't want near my family, animals, and space. And maybe I'll bury or compost or burn them whenever I want (whichever state I'm in) just to spite Massachusetts. Until then, I've got a bat.

Anyway, the ducks are gone. DH says he wants ducks again someday if I get the inclination because he likes them. I say not here. I like ducks too. Maybe later.


----------



## farmerjan

Taking any nuisance or predator animal and turning it loose somewhere else ought to be illegal... because it will then be a problem for someone else.... That includes ANY animal.   I have taken foxes and turned them loose on property where they encourage them for the purpose of being able to run the fox hounds.  But I have also cleared it with the group.  Anything else here gets disposed of....period.  I refuse to contribute to someone elses' possible problem.


----------



## rachels.haven

No worries, I meant dumping it dead and I was joking. I don't get to kill anything.:/


----------



## farmerjan

@rachels.haven , sorry, I was not referring to you taking and dumping anything ..... I was making a statement in general about anyone taking and dumping any animal that is being a PITA at their place.  And I would be trapping this fisher and disposing of it regardless of what that stupid insane "commonwealth"  says... but I get what you are saying.  I sure hope that you get a chance to move from there soon.... one of the reasons that I would not go back to New England.... as deep as my roots are there.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm sorry you sort of lost your home. It is such a pretty place too.

Well, something is baffling me. Summer is due Sunday or Monday, and Emi on Wednesday if I remember right. Well now Lace is growing an udder and is suddenly looking very round...BUT she had massive bloody goopy discharge after she got her head stuck in the fence by her scur and she seemed to cycle twice before seeming to resettle. If she didn't miscarry she'd be due on Tuesday. Currently she should only be about 45 days along. That's too early for bagging up. What is this? I guess we'll see?


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Summer is due Sunday or Monday


Not here is isn't!!! 
OK, maybe you shouldn't have named a doe after a season! I figured it out.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, the man I bought her from said she's named after a song. Her name is Purple Summer. She is fawn colored though.

Lace has a large oily scab on her udder at the top of her teat in a spot you can feel but not see. I caught her self sucking at dry off in the fall and the scab would be about where her teeth would go while doing that. I have a sinking feeling some goat may have bitten herself or worn a spot in her udder and started an infection and now I'm scared that is what her udder will be filled with. But I will find out. Stupid, high headed Lace.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lace's udder is filled with thin, clear, odorless fluid from the little bit I squeezed into a bucket. The nickel sized scab came off and the wound does not look deep. Udder wounds tend not to heal quickly without treatment, so she's getting sprayed with fight back twice daily, I've decided. I don't think her udder is a pus filled mess. I've missed milking her. Love my lamanchas.


----------



## rachels.haven

Good morning.
I put the baby goats on the lamb bar last night. I milked the does still on the colostrum period and refilled it this morning. Two of the four that were supposed to go last night are still here because the buyer canceled last minute.
I'm still struggling to keep my head above water with all the chores, inside and out, which I guess is still normal with a little baby. The outside break is keeping me sane. DH is watching the baby when I go out. He's a saint and a Godsend.
I milked Lavender with her teeny tiny needle teats, she is out of the colostrum period and now my kids have one cup of milk for breakfast. It took me about 20 minutes to get that cup and now my hands are sore. I think I'd rather eat Lavender than milk her again. BUT there is no milk (or bread) at the store because we're in the middle of a 4" storm, so everyone's doing that "why not everyone make french toast" thing? The storm will be cleaned up by afternoon probably and the milk will still be bought out.  Me, I don't mind the milk with a little colostrum, but I'm not going to throw a tantrum on the floor because mom, who seems to be always milking goats, let the milk run out. The world ends if the milk runs out to these kids. I may make bread today if I can pull time out of my ears and have a pair of gloves so it doesn't make me too itchy.

I still have to top off the goat and chicken waters (always try to keep them partially full), but other than that chores are done.

Then I need to get to the laundry. Stupid clothes, lol.


----------



## Bruce

I think you are doing well to stay sane with a new baby added to all the other work!!

Can you get a machine to milk Lavender? I don't know much about them but Lumnah Acres (YT) has a small machine.


----------



## rachels.haven

Possibly. I'm going to sell her with the other dwarves though, so my hands can breathe easy and I probably won't need a machine or to milk her for long. She's kind of "pet quality" in the teat department. Her udder is perfect in every other way though. Aw well.

I did the bread thing. Then it got grilled cheesed.


----------



## rachels.haven

Actually @Bruce I'm noticing that most nigerian people are milking by machine now. Hmm, wonder why?


----------



## Bruce

I don't know, maybe small teats? I think the Lumnah's goats are NDs. Now, if you could get ND ears on a Lamancha .....


----------



## rachels.haven

I feel like we call those goats "alpines". Supposedly ND like attitude (?), lamancha or larger size. One of the best producers though.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes! Kids are using the milk were getting! Also, having the lamb bar on board is such a relief.


----------



## rachels.haven

Good news and bad news.
Surprise! Good news: Emi kidded early (early) this morning between 4:30 and 6 (I was outside with no time device). Buck/doe twins in chami. Day 146.

Bad news: Emi's teats have become conical and are nearly impossible to milk productively and the babies do not like the shape due to lack of definition. I was going to pull the doe right off, but the buck can't nurse either. So I have added Emi to the "I don't like to milk" list, and those does don't come with us if we move and instead get sold. So I am both happy for a doe, happy for a potential processing wether, and happy Emi made it, but sad because regardless of personality I do not prefer her udder.

It's also cold and windy today-not super cold, but the wind makes it "colder".

Time to get over the fog, get dressed, and milk and come to terms with things.

The more goats I freshen the more I appreciate Summer's udder. Lace's udder may stay in the herd too despite it's beach ball like consistency. My herd is shrinking. I want to keep the doeling because the buck I used has a good chance of throwing better teats, but the logical part of me says I shouldn't.


----------



## rachels.haven

Emi's problem is that her udder is so soft that it has no structure. GREAT attachment, but no structure so when it's full her teats disappear and her udder becomes a bag with orifices. I milked her out most of the way and let the babies eat once she had teats. I should probably not keep her still. I may keep her daughter as her sire's dam has a tougher udder with and length teats, as did her paternal grand dam.
I like that goat, and she is a big fan of me. She does not appear to be built to last though. Her feet are narrow and weird, her udder has great attachment but no teat structure, and she has a permanent sniffle (allergies?). If we moved, I doubt I could get anyone decent to transport her. I'm telling myself to save myself the heartbreak of watching her grow old early or having to sell her for a super low price if we pull another quick move.

After fighting and tediously milking Emi (guess what, if you can milk a dwarf you can milk anything, including a bag with holes!), I milked all the dwarves and refilled the milk bar, which had been emptied over night. Then I was so tired from the early kidding that I suffered a lapse in judgment and decided to put Lady the nubian on the stand for a hoof trim. Lady is 200 lbs, not super smart, and very stubborn. We fought, but after fighting her for long, long time (didn't work), then giving her a "time out" without food to think about it where she had to watch the other goats eat ON the stand, I got her on the dwarf stand and properly cut her feet-in the stand for the first time. Previous to this i was cutting her feet while she was standing on the ground with her face in the grain bucket but that always ended in her laying on me and a mediocre hoof job. She still got her grain.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> but no structure so when it's full her teats disappear and her udder becomes a bag with orifices.


I can see why you don't want to milk her, by hand OR machine!


----------



## rachels.haven

...and I like this stinking goat! This one is like a pet.
maybe it will become normal? I wish?


----------



## Palomino

rachels.haven said:


> ...and I like this stinking goat! This one is like a pet.
> maybe it will become normal? I wish?


Do you have a picture of Emi's udder?


----------



## farmerjan

Sorry to hear about all the difficulties in milking the goats.  I cannot imagine.  Short cow teats that you can only get a thumb and forefinger around are a nightmare... and with a hard edema filled udder, it is not fun. 
 You have made a couple of references to a possible move, and a "quick move" ???? Is something happening that means you might be moving soon?  I know you moved to the ridiculous liberal state of MASS due to your husbands job.  Maybe there is something in the offering that looks better?  I realize that having a new baby on top of everything makes it an even bigger chore to take care of things there.... and the predators and totally intolerant attitudes there make it nearly impossible for a "farming oriented person" to deal and survive....I hope that there might be somewhere in the future that you can have animals and the rights and abilities to protect them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Palomino said:


> Do you have a picture of Emi's udder?


Not yet. I was a bit sleep deprived after a late bedtime followed by a night of baby compromised sleep ending at 4:30 am so my only goal this morning was getting the babies stabilized and nursing then taking care of my beasts and my own baby and taking a nap. I will be getting a pic.


farmerjan said:


> You have made a couple of references to a possible move, and a "quick move" ???? Is something happening that means you might be moving soon?


Any move in the tech industry is usually quick. They expect no gf, no wife, no kids, no animals, apartment, so move and come to work in a week or two, MAYBE month max, often across country. While things have become slightly less chaotic at DH's work, they've become more bleak while still being high pressure and dirty politics rich so I can say we've both about come to terms with the fact we need to move on and I can't say we are not looking around (other people at the office certainly have done so). We could always use the remote working situation to make our move a bit lower pressure. I'll need to find transport for my goats and possibly the dog (who doesn't deserve a multi day trip in a noisy kid filled car).


----------



## Palomino

rachels.haven said:


> Not yet. I was a bit sleep deprived after a late bedtime followed by a night of baby compromised sleep ending at 4:30 am so my only goal this morning was getting the babies stabilized and nursing then taking care of my beasts and my own baby and taking a nap. I will be getting a pic.


I understand! I was just thinking, it sounds like her medial is weak. Usually when that isn't strong, the udder lacks shape and when it fills, it just becomes a big balloon, not two well defined halves.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Could you keep the daughter and try her with one breeding to see if she has a better udder than her mom? If she doesn't, sell her then?


----------



## rachels.haven

Palomino said:


> I understand! I was just thinking, it sounds like her medial is weak. Usually when that isn't strong, the udder lacks shape and when it fills, it just becomes a big balloon, not two well defined halves.


I'll take a picture and show.
I will probably try to keep the daughter even if Emi doesn't work out. We'll see.


----------



## rachels.haven

You know, I think it was just severe edema, like, the worst I've ever seen. Today it felt more like edema and it's gone down a bit on one side. Someday maybe I'll get to see her teat shape.


----------



## rachels.haven

If anyone needs a laugh, while I didn't take a picture, apparently today Dan let his marker get out of control and he colored his face blue before school...and then realized that washable marker is washable it isn't that washable. When I came upstairs he had his face burrows in the bathroom corner so I couldn't see him. Naturally fearing the worst I made him turn around...and laughed right in his blue face. He'd been frantically trying to scrub it off and rubbed it everywhere and even the bare skin was tinged blue.

So I made kid cry today because I'm an insensitive jerk and that was no where near to what I expected to find based on the way he was acting. Then we "de blued" him before school.

And that was how Danger Dan narrowly avoided becoming a member of the blue man group.

I need to never be distracted with that kid.


----------



## Bruce

Are you sure he shouldn't be locked up when no one is paying 110% attention to him?


----------



## rachels.haven

...I've wondered...
...poor kids always getting himself into trouble. It's like it's a compulsion
Turns every day of our lives into episodes of "The Dan Show".


----------



## Baymule

I knew a family that had a boy that was a Jack Russell Terrier in a boy suit. One day he darted out in front of a car and was nearly hit. After that, they put a harness on him when they went places. They caught a lot of flak over putting a leash on their kid, but he lived to grow up. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

Yup. That's Dan.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Yup. That's Dan.


He will grow up and he will be ok. Promise.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh, I hope so.


----------



## rachels.haven

There must be a rule that if you pen breed 145 or 150 days after removal of the buck, that will be the day all your does decide to kid-ALL of them (just kidding, more like the same week).

Summer still has ligaments. She has dropped, but that poor girl is holding out. Probably for the better. Emi is still in the kidding stall. Summer's probably going to lose her ligaments then go 5 minutes later and chances are I'll have just checked her and gone in and I'll be in the shower or bathroom or something. If Summer has does, they will stay.


----------



## rachels.haven

Single doeling for Summer on day 157!!!!



(Heat lamp is cool to the touch on the outside, I used a lower power bulb, btw)


----------



## rachels.haven

Emi's buck/doe twins. They are a tad slabby in build right now so I'll need to evaluate her before deciding to keep the doeling.


----------



## rachels.haven

Buck pen breakfast. I trimmed their feet last night and collected dna on the young lamanchas for profiling as adga requires now.


----------



## rachels.haven

Everything is mud right now, btw. Melt is coming.


----------



## Bruce

Melting here now but it will be 0°F by 3 AM. Nothing like a nice solid freeze to make dangerous ice.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce, tell those weather guys to take that back!
Well, kids aside, during the latter part of last week DH decided that after having to live and try to work through our usual swamp fly palooza this summer and fall (and winter since the first part was so warm) he doesn't want to spend another season in this house, so we're going to try to move. He doesn't feel good about leaving his current job yet, so we're looking in the area. 
On Saturday we found a 5+ish acre horse property in Harvard with most of it cleared and fenced off with horse fencing that needs to be replaced (horse fencing doesn't work for goats anyway), but it has a 3 stall, one tack room horse barn with a loft and two hay doors. The house is a little smaller, but it's less extravagant than the one we're in, which would be a relief. No ac, but the house appears to be built to cool itself, and we are ready to put it in if we get the house.The schools are on the level, the medical is the same as here. It's closer to a bigger office for DH's work where he can have more employment options if things sour or fold further in his organization.
So we're going to put in an offer.
I'd rather leave the state but I can't force DH to. He's willing to sacrifice the budget to get me a cleared property, no swamp critters to go after the children, with the bonus of bigger, nicer barn, andmore normal house...I'll go with it. Mass is creepy, but it appears to be good for the kids and DH's eyes. I'll put up with it for now. I'm incredibly lucky as it is, I keep reminding myself.

...And if this house or the next or next doesn't happen after we've done all we can do, it wasn't meant to-and maybe I get to move to TN instead, right?    Dh is having fun knocking around his maternal-grandparents' stomping ground. Someday I'd like it to be my turn to go live near my family again (and get out of dodge).


----------



## Bruce

More big changes Rachel!


----------



## rachels.haven

Also, as a side note, after removing Avalon the whole herd relaxed and suddenly milking and handling became a breeze. Then both DH and another mom breeder near me advised me not to get out of nigerians completely and to decide after the worst of it is over (little big baby, lots of kidding in cold weather, everyone but one nigerian a to be trained FF), and I thought about it and found it logical so I'm just downsizing the adult dwarves. Sugar (ava spawn), Buttercup, Chip, the two Sugar doelings, and the Eri doeling will be staying. Eri's going back with her breeder who wants her back, (I'm not fond of her feet or 90lbs nigerian train size, or smaller orifices anyway), and Lavender is being sold because while her udder is perfect in attachment, her teats and orifices are too small for anything but feeding kids. All the bottle bucklings have gone, and all four dam raised bucklings have deposits on them and will go March 26thish.

In the meantime, we get at least 3-4 weeks before the next kidding, which will be a race between Trinka the FF lamancha (possible trips?) , and Lady the FF 200 pound nubian (possible quads). Lace, if she is pregnant, is then due at the end of May. She was bred to kid last week, but she got caught in the fence by her scur and miscarried. I wish my vet would remove that sucker.

AND the mosquitos are out again. I kid you not.


----------



## Baymule

You have mosquitos??? Heck, WE don't even have mosquitos! At least not yet.


----------



## rachels.haven

We do live in a swamp...*cough* I mean wetland.


----------



## Baymule

You have "swamp skeeters"


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> AND the mosquitos are out again. I kid you not.


It is that warm down there??? At least there is the likelihood of more very cold temps to kill them off.


----------



## rachels.haven

It got up to 45 for, like, three days. I saw the first one (you know, the one I couldn't believe seeing) on day two. Too bad they don't freeze like they logically should. It's going down tonight for us too.


----------



## rachels.haven

Dang. Yesterday evening the wind started picking up until it grew to a constant roar. It's still roaring today. Supposedly the low today was supposed to be 22. I woke up and while it said that, the actual was 12. So... when does the low start?! Now it's up to 20 (w/ windspeed of 20mph).
I started the nigerian doelings on coccidia prevention. Baycox today, then starting a daily dose of calf-pro in a bottle tomorrow.
Summer bashed me in the jaw with her head when I tried to put her on the stand because I made the mistake of feeding her first before checking to see if I need to even up her udder. No chewing today, I guess. I may have wimpy punched her back, it hurt so much I couldn't see straight and couldn't figure out what was bleeding (maybe a little bit of my tongue, no matter though). Not making that mistake again.
Not much more to report. I'll be starting the lamancha doelings' coccidia program at 2 weeks when I separate nightly.
Oh man, I think I want to sell Emi. I love that goat, but I am NOT milking an udder with no teat definition. I feel so guilty.
I also have a cold. It's been a year since I got sick, but on Saturday we left the house on our real estate shenanagans so why not? Aw well.


----------



## Baymule

I'm sorry that you have a cold. Having to do chores when you feel bad, sucks. Hope you feel better soon.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks.
Well, someone came in and offered way above asking price for the house, so I guess we're back to casually looking. This is so much better than "you have 4 weeks to move you and your family (and animals) down here" that it was last time. And maybe there's still a chance we'll leave the state.


----------



## Baymule

Anywhere has got to be better than there.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today I milked Lavender-the goat I said I'd rather eat than milk again. I'd been leaving her kid out at night to nurse full time instead of separating him with the rest of the little bucks so I can milk their moms because Lav's teats were almost microscopic, but he didn't want to be left out of the kid stall and would cry at the door for his friends so I started separating him too and letting him back in with mom first thing for the last week. Well, Lavender decided she WAS going to be included in milking last night. She was empty, but I figured what the heck? Well, this morning she still insisted and so I decided to dink around and try to milk her. Her teats are now about a centimeter long-just a bit longer than the width of my finger so I can milk her now. I got about two cups. And she's happy. Whatever goat. Apparently the separating stretched those teats a bit and she wants to be dairy.

Lady, our nubian is starting on her udder. She has 3-4 inch teats already and the globe part is coming in. She weight tapes in at 200 lbs (then ooo, out of weight tape!) and has no intention of getting on the stand so this might get interesting. I've been (wo)manhandling her onto the stand and while I can do it, it's not sustainable. Wrestling a big goat makes you sore. So I guess I'll try some conditioning and lots of cookies. She. Needs. Her. Feet. Done. The last few times I put her up there I did her feet or there was an ultrasound machine. I can get her onto the nigerian stand but that looks really funny and might break it in the long run.

Trinka is also just barely starting to udder, but I got her as a 4 month old kid, and not an untrained adult, so she loves the stand and I'm not as worried about her training.

This is the year of first fresheners, can't you tell?


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Her teats are now about a centimeter long-just a bit longer than the width of my finger so I can milk her now.


I'm amazed you can grip and milk something that small!


----------



## rachels.haven

Me too!


----------



## rachels.haven

Today's Dan-shenanagans. Other than a stuffed toy taking a dive into a bag of charcoal no disasters were had. (Poor stuffed Mario, off to the washer.)


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Today's Dan-shenanagans


You sure those aren't shenaniDans? 

Looks like he's behaving himself in THOSE pictures


----------



## rachels.haven

Progress was made on Lady the Nubian's stand manners. Now she comes out of the stall, waits for me to take her collar, lays her 200lbs down on the ground and acts like she's dying (not being pulled, I just hold that collar), then she oozes herself across the barn floor to the nigerian stand, I reach down like I'm going to pull her feet onto the stand one by one but as of this morning she puts them on herself one by one AS IF I'm pulling them onto the stand, then she oozes her head over to the grain, still crawling and stands up. This is much less labor intensive but um...kind of dramatic. 

Apparently she wasn't handled much at her dairy home. She is ridiculous. Good tempered, but ridiculous. I'm hoping she comes around and starts acting like a goat soon. I guess I can humor her for now.  

I do need to sell the nigerians. Milking those small teats is giving me carpal tunnel. I need to do it or I will trash my hands. I don't really want to milk by machine-expensive and labor intensive cleanup. I'd rather just have the big girls.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

My goodness that must be a sight to see. Video it & put it on YouTube? Glad she is getting better and hopefully she continues to improve.


----------



## rachels.haven

The angle would be tricky but maybe I'll try.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> This is much less labor intensive but um...kind of dramatic.


Lady the drama queen!


----------



## rachels.haven

Brief report.
My test hatch of silkies on a new incubator I bought under the radar is starting to hatch. I'm not sure how they'll do. My two backup incubators have been reading lower than the thermostat one consistently so it's up to 101 on the thermostat and the inside ones are reading 98ish. I'm not going higher than that in case it warms up and the thermostat kicks it up. I need chick starter now.

The coyote parties have been coming very close lately. Last night at 4:30 am Bailey started going bananas in the barn where DH locks her up (she likes to trash talk with the neighbors' lab all night over the hill otherwise-and that dog is LOUD and the neighbor was a bit of a cowardly jerk christmas before last about it). So we went out armed with bat, bearspray, airhorn, and high powered light fearing the worst then let her bark at coyotes and shut them up until she went to the lab trashtalk place and we put her up again. The goats have been upset during milking. I hate that. Bailey may get to sleep in the doe pen tonight. A few of the goats want to fight with her when ever I try but and she wouldn't mind getting too physical with them so we'll have to see how it goes. It might be fine and a good solution.

Things are melting and going to ice out there.

No more leads on moving the farm (Tennessee instead?)

DH wants me to find a second dog because Bailey is lonely (any dog even that could come out and play daily, even a non lgd). I'm still scared stiff of dog breeders after the last time I had fun buying a dog, but maybe someday we'll get something small, with a soft temperament. I would not mind a less "intelligent", less independent thinking, more normal, happy go lucky dog either, but man...that was a multi ring circus of trouble I don't care to repeat. So here we sit, with a lonely dog. Better than the alternative. I need to just remind her how she slept for a week and how happy she was not to be frantically attacked by the giant (beautiful) cognitively failing puppy. And DH too.

DH is working late, hoping to be able to work remote tomorrow and not have to go in again for the foreseeable future. At some point when the baby is willing I need to make dinner. Thinking of trying my hand at some GF crepes and hoping the kids will eat them. Or maybe I should save it for the bedtime battle I may be spearheading and see if our pizza place feels like delivering 15 minutes away tonight or not (yep, that's how "rural" we are, lol).

...just me with a tot in my lap, while the big boys get their computer time, alone to my thoughts.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> DH wants me to find a second dog because Bailey is lonely (any dog even that could come out and play daily, even a non lgd). I'm still scared stiff of dog breeders after the last time I had fun buying a dog, but maybe someday we'll get something small, with a soft temperament. I would not mind a less "intelligent", less independent thinking, more normal, happy go lucky dog either, but man...that was a multi ring circus of trouble I don't care to repeat. So here we sit, with a lonely dog.


Doesn't quite fit the last part of your description but Morgan Gold (Gold Shaw Farm on YouTube) got a good Maremma pup from Maine. He's getting Toby's half sister in the near future.


----------



## Baymule

I love my Anatolians! I do love my Great Pyrenees, Trip and Paris, but now that I have Anatolians, I won't have GP's again. A couple of months ago, Trip started going over the front gate, so we wired rebar extensions to it and raised the height with 2 feet of chicken wire. It looks like crap, but now I see him standing there studying, probably wondering if he can jump that...... Paris can squeeze through the smallest hole like a weasel. 

My Anatolians don't jump out, Sentry can't even stand on his hind legs, courtesy of bad hips, unscrupulous breeder and surgery to correct one side. Sheba can stand up against the gate, but so far shows no inclination to jump over it. Their coats are SO much easier to maintain. They are more stubborn than the GP's, Sheba still thinks it ridiculous that I want her to sit and wait when I put her food bowl down. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

Bailey doesn't appear to be able to jump very high either. Not a lot of endurance, very obedient. Sometimes I wonder if she is a mix. It might be hard to get one as nice as she is if that's the case. We'd need to clone her.


----------



## rachels.haven

That feeling you get when you go out to milk in the evening after an outing and hear goat screaming from the pen and discover all the keeper bottle baby doelings huddled shivering in the corner of the main pen stall rather than shut in their stall and things knocked over and gone through and the bottle you left out in the bottler stall not where you left it. The human kids were either out with us all day or inside. The milk bar was still full this evening when normally it is empty by now. Two of the doelings are acting hunched and either hurt or sick. This is so wrong. I hate it here.

On the other hand we found a property 20 minutes from here on 7 mostly cleared acres, with a lovely classic style farmhouse done in a conservative way I was used to growing up, with a barn machine shed (may need to be demolished) and an old chicken barn that need renovation for goats but for about half of what our current house is worth but is more to our liking. If our bid "wins" we could be out of mortgage (all) debt in a year and back where we like to be financially. Pray for us if you pray. If not, send us good vibes and wish us luck.

My $40 cell phone connected, recording security camera is on the way, as are a dozen new no trespassing signs and one "trespassers will be shot" sigh, which should be adequate enough to disclose they are being photographed/filmed while expressing my feelings on the matter in a delightfully misleading way. Now I get a kidding cam in a way I didn't want, but fine...stupid entitled bratty people with no boundaries. 

And it could have been anyone. We've sold kids and adult goats so people know we're here now, we have new neighbors with kids, and we have old neighbors with kids lining the road and adults everywhere. Why can't they stay off my property and out of my barnyard (and home yard?!).


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

That is awful! Can you file a police report?? 

I hope the doelings are ok


----------



## farmerjan

A good hot wire all the way around on a plug in type charger that will knock them on their a$$es.... 
I hope the kids will be okay... 

Yes, time to move YESTERDAY....  tell your realtor that you want this property... and make sure that you are the highest bidder.... yes, they can do that if they really want to take care of their client....


----------



## rachels.haven

We're trying. Realtor says the market is highly competitive right now, but he's also told us about stuff we could do that he'd "never advise". 
Best offers have to be in at noon today. We're offering well above asking price, but it may not be enough. I'm nervous.


----------



## rachels.haven

Kid was alive today, btw. So I was relived. Kind of hard to be comfortable here with this continuing to happen. The neighbor complaining about Bailey working to the point I have to put her up at night isn't nice either. That's why I lost my ducks.

The horse neighbor says the same trespassing thing happens to her so now she has driveway alarms and cameras up. I doubt it's any of them. That's nice but scary. At least they'd have horse sense.

I'm waiting to count chicks until the weak ones either shore up or die. Hatch rate wasn't great, but I set a lot of eggs.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Praying  and sending good vibes your way


----------



## rachels.haven

That made my morning. Thanks 😊


----------



## rachels.haven

So our offer on the farm house, 7+ acre hay field and industrial sized chicken facility was accepted. I guess it's time to wait to close and get our own house sold.

Thank you for the vibes and prayers!


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, 6 minutes from the farmers exchange, 8 minutes from our favorite human grocery store, and only 20 minutes from tsc... Now if we could renovate the barn and fence the property as soon as we move in it would be perfect.

Most of all paying off the whole mortgage by the end of the year would be within our grasp. I've missed being debt free!


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

That's so exciting!! Congratulations! I hope closing goes smoothly and you sell your old house quickly. Sounds like a great location to move to.


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> So our offer on the farm house, 7+ acre hay field and industrial sized chicken facility was accepted. I guess it's time to wait to close and get our own house sold.
> 
> Thank you for the vibes and prayers!


HOORAY !!!!!!


----------



## Bruce

farmerjan said:


> A good hot wire all the way around on a plug in type charger that will knock them on their a$$es.


If it is legal, it was specifically illegal in the city we used to live in.



rachels.haven said:


> So our offer on the farm house, 7+ acre hay field and industrial sized chicken facility was accepted. I guess it's time to wait to close and get our own house sold.


Great!!!! Too bad you can't take your barn with you.


----------



## rachels.haven

If it is legal, and I believe it is here, I'm sure there is some way a trespasser could sue you here for getting popped by a fence while causing trouble where they are not supposed to be. It's kind of that kind of place. Laws only apply to those with the weaker lawyer in rich people places and while we could lawyer up and fit in, I'd rather not stoop to that level so we don't have one at all (except for the state required real estate lawyer we're about to use for our property buying).


----------



## Finnie

rachels.haven said:


> So our offer on the farm house, 7+ acre hay field and industrial sized chicken facility was accepted. I guess it's time to wait to close and get our own house sold.
> 
> Thank you for the vibes and prayers!


Congratulations! This is awesome! I hope you get good neighbors.


----------



## Baymule

Congratulations on the new place and praying that you sell the current home quickly and for lots of money. What a screwball bunch of people. Can't get out of there fast enough! Praying that everything goes as smoothly as possible. I hate trespassers.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. I believe we're looking at April 29th, btw.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hmm, I may have found a good companion for me and playmate for Bailey even if Roscoe from her old pack ever comes and takes a place here (if his owner ever gets to move).


----------



## Baymule




----------



## rachels.haven

It's a lovely 60ish degrees today. We went to the property for the informational housing inspection. The inspector did not like the barn. It needs a lot of work or it needs to be demolished. Not really what I wanted to hear but exactly what I thought I would hear. Here's a picture of  the backyard and backside of the barn. Inspector did not charge us for looking at it because he did not want to be responsible if something happened after he looked at it-so we got his input for free there. :/

I have no idea if we're going to be able to find and get contractors to help with any of this-barn or fencing. I feel like this is not quite the time for me to learn to field fence well. I'd rather learn by putting up a practice garden fence well or something first. Fencing in 7 acres is a bit much to learn on.

Counting down time until our new canine packmate comes. 

Meanwhile, here's the baby from a few months ago expressing how he felt today. He laughed and laughed the whole way walking back on the property because this is his first warm, 60 degree day in his life. Somebody loves the sun.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

How sweet  that baby  is !   .... love his sunglasses


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, there are certain perks for kids with semi blind fathers that need prescription sunglasses 😎 .


----------



## rachels.haven

Today to pass time I shoveled the chicken coop, doe stall, bottle baby stall, and the kidding stall, which the kitties have been using as a giant litter box. Minor allergic reaction there. Dumb kitties.

I'm waiting on a special delivery.

As far as other news goes, Lady is making grunting and groaning noises and laying around and looking like she's going to kill the opposition and done being pregnant.




Her baby chute is looking almost ready to go. She still has ligaments though.


----------



## rachels.haven

Meet Moses. He came all the way from @B&B Happy goats in Florida. The kids are experiencing puppy love again and this time the puppy is not a stock dog. He will go and visit Bailey several times a day, but not boss her around or encroach on her turf. His turf will be mostly indoors.




This is the most laid back, human loving puppy I've ever met.

We will eventually have to get another LGD (if Roscoe never comes to live with us), but with baby Shaun still babying hard, I think this will be a good compromise. Along with the field, we are moving from conservation land to the state forest and getting a bigger stretch of woods to watch (but maybe not coyote lover woods as Townsend is farmy and more down to earth).

Moses however, will be very much a house dog. If he barks at the door when people come I'll be happy with that. If not, he's still a super good boy.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

....Moses is exactly where he was ment to be my friend, I am so happy he arrived safely and now is in your loving care with you and your family ....


----------



## rachels.haven

I think he thinks so too today. Followed and played with kids all morning, sat with me and the baby until he fell asleep when classes started.


----------



## farmerjan

AAAAHHHHHH how cute.... 

See how close our "community" is ?????   I think it is wonderful.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

He sure looks content and at home there in just less than 24 hours...that boy has been on a  road trip, met his new family and played with children all day...good boy Moses   ...he just might sleep for a week now lol...


----------



## Finnie

Aww, Moses is precious! What a great idea to get him from Barb! 😍


----------



## Baymule

Awww...... Moses is a family member already! What a pretty pup, and he will be everything you want and more. I love how our community comes together like this.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, I didn't sell Lace (lamancha) last year. Last night she struck out. She is out of one of the nicer bucks in the east with a nicer doe as her dam, but he was dam raised and has a bad attitude...makes me think I need to crack down on Summer's girl's aloofness...anyway, Lace challenges me and the routine every few weeks or so. She's head butted other goats into my knees. She rubs stain off the barn with her scur, and when she did get herself into trouble she couldn't get out of she miscarried (and was rebred and is due May 29th). And she spent a lot of last year waiting for her opportunity to kick me in the face while milking. I got good at keeping my face back rather than she letting it go.

So last night she decided she was going to smash past me as I brought out one of the pregnant does for feeding. My hand was wrapped around the door and when she smashed by she bodily smashed the door open against the stud, crushing my fingers between the door and the stud, trapping me so I couldn't get out and it hurt BAD. So after a few minutes of desperately trying to make it stop I called my husband and by some miracle the phone worked. So he rushed out barefoot, climbed in the barn window (I lock myself in while milking because Bailey and kids can open the door) and eventually we figured out to pry the stud away from the door and I got my hand back. I'm still a little numb. And Lace is listed as a registered, disease tested, pregnant, long as a freight train and rapidly deepening, perfect footed doe from some of the best lines in the country for $200 because I want her GONE 

She will pay for a third of her replacement that I'm trying to bring in from the herd at our disbudding place.

Lovely. No more high headed does.


----------



## caprines.n.me

I'd eat her!  Just for revenge!  (hope you're not offended - just trying to lighten the mood)  But, seriously - you don't need that kind of trouble.  Good plan to let her move on.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's a good idea. If she doesn't sell by this fall she will go with the wethers.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

I hope your hand is ok! If you end up keeping her until she kids, would she teach the kids her bad habits? Or is there a possibility they might turn out decent?


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Human  food or dog food, she would be processed by now if she was here ...I  just won't  do animals that are mean and can't  get along with others...
hope  your hand gets better quickly .


----------



## Baymule

Sorry about your hand and glad your cell phone worked to call your husband for help. You have finally had enough. I don't blame you one bit. My animals are for my enjoyment, if they act out, being mean, they go. 

Lace had the breeding that should have made her the perfect doe. I wonder how many goats in her bloodlines had ugly attitudes like her? Just goes to show you that when breeding animals for betterment of the breed, you have to pay attention to ALL aspects and that includes personality and attitude. What good is it to have a perfect animal if she wants to kill you?


----------



## rachels.haven

Larsen Poultry Ranch said:


> If you end up keeping her until she kids, would she teach the kids her bad habits? Or is there a possibility they might turn out decent?


Her wether last year became very friendly but I do not want to put up with her that long if I have the choice. If she kidded here I'd pull the kids and bottle feed.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> This is the most laid back, human loving puppy I've ever met.


Probably because Barb loved on him a bunch 

How did he travel north? I gather neither you or Barb made the trip.


----------



## rachels.haven

I found a pet transporter with a lot of different people, breeders included, saying they were great over various groups on fb and asked if they could bring him up on their next route. Turns out they were on route to FL then coming up through the east already so he somehow wound up here within two weeks(maybe one, would need to check) of me asking for info. It wasn't cheap, but I don't intend to do it again any time soon.
My husband considered flying down one weekend (driving isn't great on the car)but I think the price would have been similar in the end, except he would have had to rent an unfamiliar car and drive alone. Plus were not vaccinated yet and cases are a-rising.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ugh. I'm pretty sure the state animal of Massachusetts is a tick (on it's mothership, an oversized coyote). Nice yard season over. Went on a walk around the yard for 5 minutes and got covered in ticks again. Where's MY soresto collar?

I didn't notice it right away and almost got ticks on the baby. That makes me


----------



## farmerjan

Guineas at the new farm even if they are noisy.... ticks seem to be worse up north than even here in Va..... we get "em, but haven't seen any yet....
Sorry that you are already dealing with them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. We'll do something-ducks, mobs of chickens, guineas crack me up and I don't mind the noise, so maybe.


----------



## Bruce

Wow. Maybe you need some Guinea fowl? They are supposed to be good tick eaters. They are also supposed to be pretty loud (and none too bright).


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, actually Bruce, the not too bright part of them has been the only reason we haven't gotten guineas here. I don't want to feed the wildlife. Also, they need to come home and all. Dumb things tend not to do that.

It's a lovely day. Everyone's very happy. Too bad we can't take Moses to the park yet. Then we'd all go. I guess we'll just take the kids. I've got to be quick here.

We met with the fence people and the structural engineer about the property and the barn. The barn is a wash. His passion is old outbuildings. He wishes we would restore it, but it's not structurally sound and is going to collapse, probably in the next winter or two. And he told us what it would probably cost to make it safe again. And while it's what he wishes he could see, off the record he says it would be more expensive by a long shot to fix up the barn than to build another one...or two...or potentially three new buildings. It needs a lot of deep work. The second floor probably is what did the building in, he thinks.

So bummer, but the way the finances will work out we get to pick out, and design, and build a new barn now.

The fence people are 35 years experienced and can do it. They measured today. We will get a preliminary quote written up emailed by monday. This was before we knew the barn would not be there so that will change some things.

Waiting on Lady the Nubian to kid. Trinka the Lamancha goes on the 9th.


----------



## Bruce

Maybe the new barn could, in general, be designed like the old one?


----------



## rachels.haven

We could. The resident decorator in our relationship wants it nice, new englandy barn looking.
Personally I'm more concerned about the layout, loft, and getting it built. I really like midwestern style pole barns though. But if he makes it too classy I want it to wind up pepto pink. Or a big yellow smiley on the road/house facing side. That's very midwestern. Functional. Some would say a little tacky.

I'm still getting my mind around the fact we have to get a barn built. I hope the fence building goes smoother and faster than the barn is looking like it will at the moment. It's really important to keeping Bailey in, the goats in, and my kids in and not drowning in neighbors pools. (And Bailey also likes pools.)


----------



## Bruce

"Pepto pink"?  I would say a LOT tacky  There's nothing wrong with "barn red" 

I guess pole barns are cheaper to put up than some other styles. How old is the existing falling down barn, what style? My "not in good shape" barns are pre Civil War. No big machinery back then so the hay mow - drive bay - animal area design isn't the best for storing the tractor and implements. Especially when the mow and animal area are dirt "floor" that slopes down hill and neither have people doors let alone big doors for machinery.


----------



## rachels.haven

The inspector didn't know, but we guess it's from the 1920's or 30's. I saw a lot of what the inspector did so this is not a shock, but i was hoping it would be easier.


----------



## rachels.haven

I have a security cam now. It's on the kidding stall (so I can watch kidding progress from the comfort of my...doing dishes, laundry, and chronic tidying), but I'm going out another $35 for one to focus on the door.


----------



## rachels.haven

One buck kid so far.
Bailey is attending this one.





Aw, did mommy accidentally step on your ear?


----------



## rachels.haven

One black and white doeling with brown eyebrows and gray dapples. She seems to be done. I'm a little worried because there's no afterbirth yet and these kids are tiny for a full sized goat. She also scanned for quads, but that could be wrong.


----------



## caprines.n.me

Congratulations on the new little 'uns.


----------



## rachels.haven

She's done, thank goodness. All went well.


----------



## Baymule

I like the security camera on the birthing room. It does make it easier on you. Congratulations on the lovely twins and a birthing with no problems.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I have a security cam now.


Is it wired or wireless? 



rachels.haven said:


> Aw, did mommy accidentally step on your ear?


Trying to turn him into a LaMancha!

Congrats on the kids, odd that she scanned for 4 but had 2.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Is it wired or wireless?
> 
> 
> Trying to turn him into a LaMancha!
> 
> Congrats on the kids, odd that she scanned for 4 but had 2.


It's a wyze cam that uses wifi, but it must be plugged in so it's wireless enough for me. 😊


----------



## rachels.haven

And we can do the lamancha thing with Lady next year. 😁


----------



## Bruce

I consider that wireless, it does need power  I had to put in a modem repeater in the little barn to get signal to the EV charging station in the big barn. Thus I MIGHT have signal in the lower part of the alley in the big barn where the animals are.


----------



## rachels.haven

I didn't write about it earlier because I was in a rush and busy being tired, but one nap later I can think straight again so I can record it.

Today Dan came out and asked if he could milk the goat I had in the stand (Sugar, dwarf, 3" teats). So I let him scrub her up. It was hard for him, but he started gettin squirts out. Then Aiden came in and didn't want to be left out so he tried. It was harder for him. He's not as mechanically inclined as his brother but he got it. Dan helped me milk Buttercup (dwarf, 1" teats), then we got Summer on the stand and I had one kid on both side of Summer milking out her 8" balloon-sausage teats while she ate. YAY!!! (I finished her because they are still kids)

I think we actually got through all the does a little faster than usual.

Then we got Lace (lamancha, dry) on the stand for graining because I'm fairly sure she is pregnant and Dan tried to get her ready to milk after I told him not to, he snuck back around, and she about took his head off. Yeah, she's going. Dan won't be doing that again either.


----------



## Baymule

It's great that they want to help milk the goats. That has to make you proud of them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yesterday was an emotional day for some of us.
The boys and DH went outside to play after work just before dark.

Moses got sad because after several days of harassing her in that obnoxious puppy way Bailey decided to give in and play WITH Moses who also had the zoomies and so she ran him over three or four times until he decided he didn't want to play and wanted to come in the house. He is just not big enough to rumble with her. No more Bailey play. He cuddled on the couch inside with me and Shaun instead. I didn't know about it until he slipped in and i go told what was up. Poor dog. No more for him if I have anything to say about it.

Bailey got sad because after Moses went in earlier than she wanted she tried to play frisbee with the boys. But she is not a retriever and is instead a serious guard dog so after she caught the frisbee she tried to dispatch the frisbee and now the frisbee is cracked on one side with a tooth mark through it in the other. It kind of looks like a bear got to it. Mark had to take the frisbee, so Bailey got sader and deeply hurt, so she sulked miserably on what's left of the lawn (drought and winter) for a few minutes.

Aiden was sad because he wanted to play hide and seek, except they always hide in the barn in the loft so DH didn't want to play that.

Dan is sad because he wanted to do a snowball fight, but since there is no snow so he wanted to use mud instead except NOBODY wanted to play mudball fight with him. I can't. Imagine. Why. How unfair.

So they all took turns being sad. Way too much emotion for me.

The other goat lady in town wants to bring her newish LGD puppy that is frazzling her nerves and being a butt over for a playdate with Bailey, so maybe Bailey will have someone to pummel that isn't Moses. The puppy is apparently trying to attach herself to the lady's border collie, which will not do and is being naughty to the point she wants to rehome her. I can't afford another LGD right now in time and money, but I can spare an afternoon supervising dogs play and help good behavior just a little bit. They will not be in the goat pen. Next to it with a strange puppy is good enough. Moses will be out of the way. He's my house puppy.

(adding, I guess I could write I was sad yesterday, but I didn't really get sad. The second security camera for the barn door came, and apparently there is only one spot in the barn they will work and the one is already in that spot and you can't see the door from there, lol, but I'm fixing the wifi issue, so it's taking longer than I wanted, but I am not dismayed).


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Moses sister plays with the four big dogs and they sure tumble her around  at times,  but she isn't as mellow as  Moses, ....looks like she is going to a home in Texas as soon as the funds arrive....puppies are traveling more than I can these days.....keep up the good life Moses, you have it made at your new home


----------



## rachels.haven

Please more pets?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, more pets.


----------



## rachels.haven

Darn, black dogs are HARD to photograph! Those are about the only picture I have of him where he looks like he has eyes and I just took them today.


----------



## rachels.haven

Eri loves Lamanchas.












Atlas is getting over liver flukes. My goats keep taking turns getting them and I hate it.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

You actually  did really well, black dogs are REALLY hard to photograph...puppies are even harder to get them still enough to take....
MOSES Looks very happy and content


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> he snuck back around, and she about took his head off. Yeah, she's going. Dan won't be doing that again either.


I don't know, seems like you need to keep her around to teach Danger Dan some animal behavior manners! Better a goat give him a knock for inappropriate behavior than a large dog.


----------



## rachels.haven

She is for the moment, but that's not my plan long term.


----------



## Baymule

Moses is your lovey, cuddly, huggy dog. He is adorable and wears his happiness all over his whole body. What a love!


----------



## rachels.haven

*Sigh* today I got to deal with a yahoo who thought they could shove Lace in a small dog crate and pick up a $50 buckling from a NH dairy in the same trip to be her permanent companion. This is why I don't list goats cheap. I think I'm going to keep her until she kids and either then list her (so she can teach those yahoos a thing or two? some part of me asks) or to really ship her with the wethers.

This, for reference, is all a good guide to goat bucks. You don't house them with does!
https://fiascofarm.com/goats/buck-wether-info.htm


----------



## Baymule

It all goes back to one of my favorite sayings, 

You can't fix stupid.


----------



## rachels.haven

Not entirely true. With goats you always fix stupid. Burdizzio, elastrator, scalpel, or processor.


----------



## rachels.haven

The overwhelmed of moving has set in. The kids have a week off before closing week after next, so I don't have to play teacher/taskmaster then. Dh will take that week off and part of the next so we can pack. We still don't have that much stuff despite the big house...thank goodness.

Yesterday Trinka had small buck/doe twins by Rustic Wood's Black Tie Affair. She's the first doe I've had to date that refused to push so it was a waiting game for the baby to ooze out enough for me to pull. The buckling got a puffy head and tongue. It subsided by the time his sister oozed out. Both were small kids. She's a yearling milker now. She needed evening out, so I milked her and she's doing good on the stand.

Lady is doing well on the stand too. She's just in the habit of throwing her weight around on the way up. Now we just need their milk to clear.

Moses is happy. When I go out to milk in the morning he likes to stand on top of Bailey and bark and jump on her until she does anything, then he tries to get her to play. She is gentle most of the time and he tells her when she's not. He wouldn't have it any other way.

The last doe to (maybe) kid is Lace.

I have one pair of wethers leaving on Friday, the next the following Saturday.

An odd thing happened. The people who wanted Lavender the tiny teated dwarf left a $30 deposit and left with the understanding I'd contact them when she was ready to be separated from her wether. So I contacted them on Sunday via email and text and no response still. I even offered to mail their deposit back if they had changed their minds. So I guess I'll wait a few weeks and relist her as a pet for $250 instead of $150 and maybe get a better crowd?

That's that.


----------



## rachels.haven

Just took Trinka and her kids out. Still deciding if I like yearling milkers developmentally speaking. They still reach the same size. Just small now.

Anyway, the trip stressed her out, so after a few minutes, back she went.









Happy Bailey and mud puppy Moses in this one. Bailey approves of her new kids. Moses approves of MUD and can't pass a water dish inside without jumping in it and knocking all the water out, so he gets water on the hour every time he gets out-and mud too. His coat seems to shed that well though.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Rachel, when my puppies are 4 weeks old they use a new chicken watering  container  to drink from...at 6 weeks they get a regular water  that holds  half gallon and gravity feeds the water as it's  used, but I set it up on a crate so they stand on their hind legs to drink and can't  play in the water....works great for less mess. MOSES was drinking from it , you may want to try that for his water that is inside the house.
On the mud playing lol...you gotta figure that one out lol....  
I think there are only three puppies  in this current litter that are just chilledout like Moses, he. Is such  sweet boy


----------



## rachels.haven

I'll try it. If it doesn't work and he still uses the water as a toy when bored...well, we take him out a lot and the water is cool and fresh there and the  splashing doesn't matter. I think eventually he will stop. If not...well, he is a water retriever breed x water retriever breed. We'll just make sure he gets lots of water every hour or so. I may try a dog water bottle at some point as long as he doesn't figure out how to bathe in that too.


----------



## Baymule

Sure Moses doesn't have duck DNA in there somewhere? Did he get an animal Covid vaccine shot?


----------



## rachels.haven

Big dead tree by the house got removed on Monday. -$750. You pay a premium for reliability around here apparently.
I banded chickens and determined that I have 9 or 10 keeper hens.
Patrick the nigerian dwarf buck was listed for $800 and somebody jumped on it (I bought him from Rosasharn farm for $1,200, not cheap). I expect him to go home on Thursday. That will help with a deposit for goat shelters.
I got the DNA tests for the other dwarf bucks in the mail. Apparently you can't sell dwarves very easily right now if they are not tested because of pedigree faking and crossing in of standard goats to improve production...hmmm...Hopefully they will come back as claimed.
One doeling and one doe is going back with the doe's previous owner in theory.
Lots got done, I'm being crazy busy lately.
Next week=no school and husband off into the next week and it's the week before close. Guess what we're doing? Spring break? No way. It's going to be busy just as it should before moving.

Oh, and I listed Max the lamancha buck. He's going this weekend. I really don't like those darn Barnowl line feet.


----------



## rachels.haven

And as a Moses update: he's doing better with potty training and not going in the house. This has let us let him run free inside more out of his playpen (or crate) with looser supervision and for some reason he's taken it upon himself to eat all the large black ants that come in and pester us every year so I won't be poisoning them and I will be amused. He's also attached himself to Aiden, who tends to be anxious so now Aiden's toting Moses around everywhere he's anxious about going, so I'd consider that a win. Next week I believe he gets another round of shots and I **think** after that we can start taking him out on walks and adventures. Then we can go on walks with two dogs.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

If this next round is his third round , then he is all set to go anywhere  you want to take him..
.absolutely. love that Moses has attached himself to the one who needs him the  most...It's  great for both of them,...so happy that Moses is with you and your family Rachael


----------



## rachels.haven

Tomorrow we are supposed to close on the new place. I've got mixed feelings in the matter. Today was the walk through. Apparently "we"/our real estate lawyer/our agent may have angered the seller. The seller pulled a stunt where they tried to sell the washer/drier separately from the house to us after ambiguously listing it as included to which the powers that be said "no, or buyer can walk" to...so instead the seller sold off everything that was supposed to be included for free (not a biggie to me) and sold off the one or two things DH did agree to buy separately (irritating since we already had a deal, but still no biggie), house is now filthy, they removed no nails/screws from hanging things (though you were always supposed to remove and at least patch at this price bracket) then they went around and took off some of the doors and they disappeared, and stripped off all the wall shelves leaving half inch holes in the drywall everywhere and large gouges in the paint which is unfortunately glossy and harder to patch and paint so a few of the rooms now look like trash...ouch. They hit the kids rooms hard. For the amount we're paying, and the amount above asking price it would be really nice if the walls weren't swiss cheese. No nails and screws everywhere would be nice too. I guess I should be grateful they didn't round up the field.
Meanwhile, this week after close we start hitting the moving out hard. Then WE get to restore OUR house to brand new condition. We will, however, be paying for a professional move out cleaning though (apparently in addition to a new house cleaning?). I do not think I can do a good enough job on the things I see daily. Plus current house is huge.

In other news, I sold a bunch of goats this week. I will update later when things are quieter.

Tonight I'm just a little sad.


----------



## farmerjan

Legally can they remove and "disappear" the doors and such?   I am not sure at this point I would have agreed to the house in the condition it is in....

It pays to take pictures when you first look at it I guess.... you can use them as leverage.... especially in a higher price bracket.... 

I feel bad for you.  I hope that you change the locks once it is yours.... and that the BS stops.  

 SOOOO  Sorry,  but I must say that some of the a holes that live up north are pretty bad especially when they get into higher price brackets and think that they can dictate and do what they want. Then they act like 10 yr old spoiled brats.... it is all about money with so many nowadays.... get all you can and screw everyone on the way to an extra dollar.


----------



## rachels.haven

Legally I think we do have recourse. We had the real estate agent, an inspector, my husband, and me go through and see everything before. There are also already pictures, both ours and the ones from the ad. Let's see what happens (I tell myself). 
Lol, Jan, you are darn right about the jerks. They wouldn't make it long where I grew up. Nobody would want to do any business at all with them as reputation rules. Low brow behavior seems to be the default if they think they can get away with it here. Learning to hold people up against a wall by their word in writing and the law is not fun. Adulting, eh?


----------



## Baymule

Some people need to be taken behind the barn with a peach switch.

What a bummer to have to put up with such childish and vindictive behavior. It’s not a deal that you are going to walk away from, because you want this place, and they know it. But after closing, I sure would unload on them and tell them off. Scumbags with no morals.


----------



## rachels.haven

Our realtor priced out a repair with the handyman he hires and we're going to take them to task on the holes. We don't need the stuff. I'd like the house in the condition we agreed to buy it in. :/


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Can you get the repair costs to come out of their part of escrow closing? That way the repair guy definitely gets paid and they can't get out of it.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

Rachel, THAT IS EXACTLY why they are referred  to as MASS holes.....and I lived in that area from 1952 to 1998...so like @farmerjan ..WE can say it 🤬😤


----------



## rachels.haven

No. They told our agent the holes were always part of the house. They just had screws holding the shelves up in them. So we could either take them to court and lose the house and big deposit over $1.5 k of work or eat it. So DH decided we would eat it and take more retaliation 😒 There have been no new 5+ acre houses on the market in the area since we started this. Realtor will be there when we get the key and we will check things. I fear there may be more retaliation.

On a different note, the fence people want to start right away and these guys appear to be legit. They gave ME a teaching on how to put up a fence. I didn't have to tell them what needed to be done. They've been doing it for 38 years.

I still really want out of Mass, but I guess we'll just keep muddling along...


----------



## farmerjan

Good on the fence people.... Sounds like you will do good with them.  Soon to be former owners are worse than MASS holes... and I am a born and bred "yankee",,,, but believe me,  Mass  people are not even considered real "yankees" because they are 99% jerks.  If these people stay in the area, they will have a bad name with the realtors so will dig their own hole...... 
Sorry you are having to deal with this extra stress, but soon you will be done and they will be a very BAD memory......

Have you sold your other house?   Hope your moving goes well,  at least it won't take as long as mine has, but then I had and still have alot yet to do on this one.


----------



## rachels.haven

The new house is ours now. Our agent decided to gift us a cleaning service visit.
Time to move out and get this house ready to sell. We got even more boxes tonight.
So far I've sold Lavender (dwarf) and Chip (d), Patrick(d), and a doeling we were calling Sprite (d). I sold all four dam raised wethers, and Eri's previous owner wants her backs and paid. Needs to pick up. Today I sold Max (lamancha buck not going to use).
Then I discovered one of Summer's (lamancha) knees is puffy so further sales are on hold until the gang gets tests sent in Saturday and the tests come back. Everyone has had negative cae tests here, so I'm hesitant to jump to panic. Summer has been fighting a lot with the nubian, Lady. She may have gotten an injury. I hope all is negative.

I still have two more dwarf doelings to sell, two more dwarf does in milk to sell, and two more dwarf bucks to sell. And Lace. We will move the goats next week after I build pens and cattle panel huts (with no access to hut sides so no one squishes them).

The extra chickens could be selling better. Maybe I just get to keep them. Hah.


----------



## Baymule

Moving is such a chore. I don’t envy you. It’s worth it in the end, but it’s not much fun during the process.

How nice of the realtor to gift y’all with a cleaning service, it sure will help. Fix up what needs fixing and make it your own. You will make it your oasis of happiness for your family. I admire the way you make the most and the best of living in a state you aren’t crazy about.


----------



## rachels.haven

Moses says hi, and that he did dig no holes. I told him I'm sure you believe him.


----------



## Baymule

Hi Moses! You are such a lovey sweet boy!


----------



## Bruce

I suggest your lawyer talks to their lawyer. Screws and holes in the wall are one thing but removing doors?? Did they take the furnace as well?

Sorry for the troubles, glad the buying part is done.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> I suggest your lawyer talks to their lawyer. Screws and holes in the wall are one thing but removing doors?? Did they take the furnace as well?
> 
> Sorry for the troubles, glad the buying part is done.


Actually, our people spoke to their people and both sides agreed that the sellers were... difficult people, but in not so charitable words. We also met the neighbor yesterday and he seemed to like the people before the seller but wouldn't say a word about the last people themselves. I think we might be an improvement on the neighborhood just by not being a family of...intact male donkeys.

Covid vaccine one done. Mass was too inefficient to do ours, so we went to NH. Second one in three weeks, then once effective I will be more free. Got notified last night I can finally sign up for one in Mass when they've been open to everyone for a while...lol, nope. Caseloads dropping below 1000/day now. Maybe a light at the end of the tunnel is coming? Keeping the baby sheltered from this has been a bit of work. I will be glad when at least the chance if me bringing it home is greatly reduced. Yolo and all...(not the way that's intended, but it fits).


----------



## Baymule

Some people...... their parents should have been spayed and gelded before they had such miserable children.


----------



## Bruce

Yep Bay!

So Rachel, did your people get their people to cough up something to pay for repairs and replacement of stolen items?


----------



## rachels.haven

No. But now we have their house. And we will sully their memory by making it a nice place to be full of trying to be nice people.


----------



## Baymule

Sounds like the neighborhood heaved a sigh of relief.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hey guys, what's this? The row of prongs moves easily up and down with a lever to your left on the seat. I'm thinking hay, but beyond that, I don't know much. It rolls very easily so I'm going to have to hide it from the kids.


----------



## Baymule

AWESOME!!!! You have a horse drawn hay rake!!!! Wow, what fun it would be to hitch up a team and make a few rounds, just for nostalgia sake.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ah. Well, time to get those nigerian and lamancha bucks in harness then!


----------



## Baymule

Heck yeah! Miniature Belgians!


----------



## rachels.haven

View of back yard from very side of the house. The rest see only the chicken house, lol.


----------



## Baymule

More pictures! Please!!


----------



## farmerjan

@Baymule is right.  It is an old Hay rake... called a dump rake.   Mostly used horse drawn, but we pulled it with the pickup the first year when I moved to Va because that is what we had.  Someone sits on the seat, and when you get a certain accumulation of hay , you pull the lever and it "dumps it" . "Fun",  but a hot day on the rake....   Many times you would try to dump in the same "row"  so you had a long row of "raked hay" ... made for picking up with a baler or going around and picking up with pitchforks and pitching  it onto a wagon.  Also, there were horse drawn accumulators that would gather the hay as you went across the fields, so you tried to dump the hay in the same row as you went across the field....


----------



## rachels.haven

Then it looks like the pie before the last guys did chicken eggs and hay.


----------



## rachels.haven

Omg! The boundaries are all marked at the new place. There is some "wetland" (swamp), but only a few feet(so draw a 100' ring around that  ). The sides of the pasture are overgrown, so we'll put in gate and eventually I'll cattle panel over to the boundaries and let the goats at it. Eventually maybe it will be cleared.

Squeee! I have 7 acres! And I know where they are! 

But I need to not get too happy. I need a barn company, a big death trap taken down, and a new barn put up.
Oh no, not too happy here at all.

We're just moving and moving and moving stuff over in the van endlessly.


----------



## rachels.haven

Photo dump time.



Barn. It feels like it's holding it's breath. Cement floor ceiling is caving in some places so I stay out.




The field of our farmette.




Machine shed


----------



## Baymule

Beautiful place!


----------



## farmerjan

I still think that the chicken house could be salvaged.  With the price of lumber and such, you will spend as much to build a 30 x 30 small barn as there is good timber in that barn.  Why can't they take out the concrete on the 2nd floor?  Maybe you need to have a few other estimates for it.   I am sorry, none of my business really, but I see alot of potential there and after being in a few, and not seeing any obvious roof problems in any of the pictures you've shown, I cannot believe that the cost of taking out the concrete and putting in even a half way floor for now, to hold hay and such, would not be a better solution.  

I realize that you are not wanting to jeapordize your family or anyone.  I was married to a carpenter many years ago, and know alot of things that can be done to salvage older buildings.  And honestly, I see more structural questions with the machine shed and the way it is leaning than I see in the chicken house.  

Nice property, typical new england.... is that an apple or a dogwood flowering in the one picture??  It will be nice for you to not have to deal with the stupidness of the place you are now.... 

Congrats....I am happy for you and hopefully this will make things better for you and all around more harmony in the family.  When momma's happy, everyone's happy.....!!!!!!


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> I still think that the chicken house could be salvaged.  With the price of lumber and such, you will spend as much to build a 30 x 30 small barn as there is good timber in that barn.  Why can't they take out the concrete on the 2nd floor?  Maybe you need to have a few other estimates for it.   I am sorry, none of my business really, but I see alot of potential there and after being in a few, and not seeing any obvious roof problems in any of the pictures you've shown, I cannot believe that the cost of taking out the concrete and putting in even a half way floor for now, to hold hay and such, would not be a better solution.
> 
> I realize that you are not wanting to jeapordize your family or anyone.  I was married to a carpenter many years ago, and know alot of things that can be done to salvage older buildings.  And honestly, I see more structural questions with the machine shed and the way it is leaning than I see in the chicken house.
> 
> Nice property, typical new england.... is that an apple or a dogwood flowering in the one picture??  It will be nice for you to not have to deal with the stupidness of the place you are now....
> 
> Congrats....I am happy for you and hopefully this will make things better for you and all around more harmony in the family.  When momma's happy, everyone's happy.....!!!!!!


Actually, the roof is under supported and is coming down according to the structural engineer. I may sniff around a little and see if anyone will get back to me on restoration but contractors at the moment (always here?) are in hot demand so they can pick their jobs so I'm not sure anyone will return calls. To fix the structural stuff the engineer gave us a rough guestimate in the $100k's. Honestly I wouldn't mind chopping the building in half (back half that I did not photograph has the foundation breaking up and sliding down the hill), taking out the cement floor, reroofing, adding the appropriate doors, sistering all the joists and replacing the rotten posts, but the guy seemed to think even tearing down and building an identical structure would be less expensive and difficult than a restore and his specialty was supervising the restoring old barns and outbuildings. But whatever. I like barns. I still like that one. The neighbor said he may have some contacts in the industry, so I may have a sliver of a chance at getting an estimate.
I like the goofy machine shed too, but I think it's going to blow down soon (or a goat could push it down). Its foundation looks better but that's not a lot to save so that beast is probably going to go either way.


----------



## Baymule

If restoration is too expensive you could always salvage materials and use them in a new barn rebuild.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'll look into restoration. (Not going upstairs, but here are more pics)


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

I would at least clarify, in writing, with whomever you end up hiring to fix/demolish the barn what is going on happen with the wood. Lumber is very pricey right now, and there are a lot of people who like doing projects with reclaimed barn wood, so make sure they aren't screwing you over to line their own pockets.


----------



## rachels.haven

Good thinking. 
I have a company in mind for a rebuild that has done every barn I've seen in Groton, including our current one. I'm pretty sure they'd discard the wood.
My husband suggests we take the structural engineer's advice and not put anything living in that barn. Me...I need a few more days to stew about it(although as I type...I should probably listen too).


----------



## Baymule

There is a wealth of old wood in that barn. I’m drooling over the beams! And the outside wood with old peeling paint! Haven’t you seen old wood like that used in upscale restaurants?  The tear down should be done with the respect and reverence that old wood deserves.


----------



## farmerjan

I would really see what the neighbor comes up with as far as names.  Honestly, If you could see what some around here use as barns,  that is in very good shape.  If it were mine I would move my animals into the downstairs and then start jacking up.... and if that little bit of cracks is what they call a problem, then they are really trying to get a new barn job.... that is in better shape than many I see around here and is alot more fixable than some places where they use the barn every day.  But that is me.... 
Yes the price of lumber is through the roof.... and old wood like that is also "full" sized lumber... 2x4's are 2" x 4"... not the crap they have nowadays. Do not let them trash it into a dumpster if you do go and take it down.  
Same goes for the machine shed.... and I would look that over very good too.... 

People nowadays are SOOO ready to tear things down.... and they have probably stood there for 50 or more years...

I realize pictures do not show everything, but I would not hesitate if it was mine to use it and make some decisions about the upper cement floor.  I see no rot on any of the posts... and putting one along side the ones already there, on the concrete would solve that problem in a minute.  Wish I had one like that here....


----------



## farmerjan

Also, you are not wanting to RESTORE it.  You are wanting to fix  and REPAIR it to where it is useable and safe.  Restoration is a whole different class of things.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I need a barn company, a big death trap taken down, and a new barn put up.


I was going to post something but Jan and Bay already said everything I was going to say!!
I'm sure we would all love to walk through the barn and see what is really there. It takes a lot to support a concrete floor. If it can be taken down and replaced with wood I suspect the upstairs would be quite usable. My barn needs a lot of work, I bet it is in worse shape than yours.


----------



## rachels.haven

My fence man found a robin nest in his mixer and left them on the kids playhouse hoping for the best, so now I have something else to do on top of everything else unless I can find a rehabber to dump them on. 
2-3 pellets soaked puppy food every 30 minutes to half hour with a night long break. I should probably switch to the kitten food.


----------



## rachels.haven

They were sluggish at first, but are now full of life again...and smell bad, as usual.


----------



## Baymule

You are their Momma! LOL LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

They are not on my master plan...but yes, for now I am stuck being mommy.
The local wildlife rehab place is full to capacity and I don't have time to go driving around the state. Poop.

The moving is going alright though. The furniture last of the furniture is going and most of the stuff is out. My neighbor is going to move the goats in her trailer as soon as I have pens up.

Lotsa garbage. Anything unused and unworthy of keeping goes out because my brain does not want to deal with it (but not baling twine, if course, 😂 the feed sack is not full yet, plus so handy).


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> My fence man found a robin nest in his mixer and left them on the kids playhouse hoping for the best,


Hopefully that mama robin is smarter than the one here. She built several nests on the main beam of the deck, looks like she finished only one. But she would bolt any time someone walked by even though you can't see the nests without getting down on your knees. Never hatched anything. She back this year doing the same thing in the same place and still bolting. I wouldn't even know she was there if she was smart like the rabbits and stayed still.


----------



## rachels.haven

@Bruce , when rehabbing songbirds as a kid my family quickly learned that robins were dumb as rocks and mostly instinctual little beings. It sounds like your girl has her wires crossed. In that town where I grew up, despite being able to fly and having plenty of other places to walk and hunt, they got hit by cars regularly. As in, feathered splatter on the road. I'm glad your red chested bowling pin didn't hatch anything if she built a bunch of nests, couldn't get comfy and pick one, and didn't stay in one or move on to a new nest spot. These little guys I have were in a cement mixer. They got lucky. They could have become a rock.

They will eventually fledge and get wild, at which point they will go in a flight cage to watch other birds until they are turned out, where instinct will take over. They will not "like" and be friendly with people for long, which I find to be a learned behavior that robins are poor at.
They are pretty little things that eat well though, and are suited for what they do when their instincts work right.


----------



## Baymule

Robins mainly just pass through here, on their way to somewhere else.


----------



## rachels.haven

Happy Mothers' Day all.
Today my husband is giving me the gift of renting the truck another day and I will be pulling all the (wetlands violating) pens other than the barn ones and bringing the panels over here to construct new pens by myself. Mark overdid it yesterday and is sore and almost out for the count. We were were up until almost 2 am and are almost moved in. I've got him on Aleve, in a warm shower and have put the option of Tylenol out there already for him but after the Aleve he could move again (with much difficulty) so he's trying to stick with that. There is light just beginning to appear at the end of this tunnel of moving.
I'm stressing about pen take down and how it may take me more than just today to take down and put up. Regardless, here are some scenes of domesticity over at the new house. Time to go (late) milk and get to work.



Red breasted finger traps




A yellow phal




My 20ish pound five month old...little guy, lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh, and now I have a line of fence posts down one side of my pasture, but they are hard to see in a picture in this lighting. Let's wait for the fence to go up.


----------



## rachels.haven

Huh. There's a small pond out front that I assumed was stagnant and filled with leaves. This morning we discovered they neglected to tell us there were two good sized common goldfish in there. I guess it's time to learn pond maintenance.


----------



## farmerjan

Adorable baby !!!!!  And the 3 hungry mouths WOW.  
Wish I had your youth and energy to do the moving.  I would be done by now.  

Good for you getting things done so well.  Don't panic about the goldfish.  If there is not a pump and aeration system then don't panic right now, they will keep.  They will eat the mosquito larvae and stuff.  We keep them in alot of our horse troughs for that reason.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh Jan, this isn't energy. This is burning the candle at both ends then lighting the middle on fire. But with the kids, living half way in, half way out for another week or two would not be much less stress anyway and would have just prolonged the agony and been worse. We're going to need a week or two to sleep this one off. Sometimes I wish I was a coffee drinker...


----------



## Baymule

Beautiful baby. What a love.

Get it all done, then collapse. I think something stronger than coffee might be warranted, but if you are nursing, strike that. LOL 

Happy Mother’s Day!


----------



## farmerjan

And I second the Happy Mother's day....


----------



## rachels.haven

All but 16 cattle panels are here at the new place (we have about 80 total...oops). DH helped after all. Need to move those 16, the tiny 3x4 coop full of silkies, and pull and pack posts. Truck for one more day.


----------



## farmerjan

God bless you, that is alot of cattle panels.  I think we might have 15 or 20 total... we do have alot of corral panels for catching up and moving cattle out of pastures, but they are not anchored with t-posts.... You will be able to make any kind of pens you want once the perimeter fence is up.... That is great.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. Only 16 more wetlands buffer violating panels to go (anything I did outside of our mowed domestic yard was apparently not allowed, what fun)

So today Dan came to me and informed me we have grass. And then he reminded me that a long time ago I said that if we ever moved somewhere with grass to feed a cow, that he could get a cow. And now he would like me to make good on my word and get him a cow. 🤦‍♀️ (open mouth insert foot) He also wanted a bull so we could make lots of cows. But bulls are dangerous, I told him, so I talked him down to a semen tank (my mother can AI). And told him before we could get a cow, we need a barn to house the animals and hay, a trailer, because cows don't fit in the mini van well, and a truck and that I would work on it but he would have to wait. He seemed to get this and said okay. So now I get to learn about dairy cows...

...He wants a mini...
And I said nothing more. I know better.


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> Thank you. Only 16 more wetlands buffer violating panels to go (anything I did outside of our mowed domestic yard was apparently not allowed, what fun)
> 
> So today Dan came to me and informed me we have grass. And then he reminded me that a long time ago I said that if we ever moved somewhere with grass to feed a cow, that he could get a cow. And now he would like me to make good on my word and get him a cow. 🤦‍♀️ (open mouth insert foot) He also wanted a bull so we could make lots of cows. But bulls are dangerous, I told him, so I talked him down to a semen tank (my mother can AI). And told him before we could get a cow, we need a barn to house the animals and hay, a trailer, because cows don't fit in the mini van well, and a truck and that I would work on it but he would have to wait. He seemed to get this and said okay. So now I get to learn about dairy cows...
> 
> ...He wants a mini...
> And I said nothing more. I know better.


I remember that little bit of conversation way back in one of your posts.... 
A mini would be good if you can find any in that area that are reasonable... And why dairy?  go with a beef or a dual purpose.... and explain that just like the boy goats that go in the freezer to make meals for the family, that a "boy calf" would be for food for the family too.... and make sure it becomes an "it"  at "day old" or shortly there after.... 
When you get close to even considering it.... then things like AI tanks and such can be discussed.... The fees to have it serviced with nitrogen might make it even cheaper to find an AI tech to do the breeding once or twice a year.... or a farmer closeby that does some AI on his own to come and breed for you..... and it is often cheaper to have an animal trailered if you aren't going to be using it more than a few times a year due to the costs of plates and insurance up in the insanity of the northeast.... you have to license a tractor if it goes on the road up there....
Any help I can give please ask.... and get to know any farmers close that have cattle..... might be able to pick up a calf that is orphaned or something..... start small that way... and he might get tired of it after awhile .... or it might be "his  choice in livestock" in the future....and make sure he understands that you can't make lots of cows or there won't be any grass because each one eats WAY MORE than 10 goats every day.....

He's something else.... got quite a memory.....


----------



## Baymule

Look at the Devon breed, meat and milk. I’m buying a Devon steer in December to grain finish for 2 customers that each want half a steer. I’m kinda excited about it even though the meat isn’t for me. LOL The Devon breed has a milking line and a meat line, but no reason why you couldn’t cross the two lines for a meatier calf.

Or, a Jersey cow, @farmerjan’s favorite, and breed her to a small Hereford or Angus.

Dan can do the milking and learn to make butter and cheese. To complete the milking schedule, a feeder pig to feed the excess milk to would be a nice pile of delicious meat for the freezer. Can’t have a pig? Get one anyway, hide in barn with an outlet to a pen for some outside time. Get caught? Home butcher the next day. Pig is gone, problem solved. Another life lesson for Dan-raise and butcher his own home raised meat.

I like the way this boy thinks. By all means, get that boy a cow!


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm going to try to put the cow thing off for a little longer. The darn kid wants to replace my goat herd with a dairy cow operation and we don't have the space or facilities to do that...(and I prefer goats, especially at my scale).

🐄 🐄 🐄 🐄 -Dan's dream farm.


----------



## Baymule

If y’all ever move to a friendlier state, he could run a dairy cow and milk fed pork operation. Be sure to be near an affluent urban area. There are people who want better than industrial meat and will pay for it. The feeder pigs I raise are finished on soured corn, I use buttermilk in every bucket to provide the good bacteria for the pigs gut health. It’s not enough to promote as milk fed pork, just a splash, then I fill the bucket up with water.
Dan the Man has a Plan.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> And I said nothing more. I know better.


Yep, better not say a thing because he WILL remember.



farmerjan said:


> and it is often cheaper to have an animal trailered if you aren't going to be using it more than a few times a year due to the costs of plates and insurance up in the insanity of the northeast.


Shhhh, that would speed up bringing in cow #1!!!! No, you would DEFINITELY need a trailer and an F350 dually to pull it. Dan can get a job to pay for those. Should take at least a couple dozen years given his current age 
But don't suggest it to him, I have a feeling he would take you up on it.


----------



## rachels.haven

Dan always has a plan and plenty of secret "Dan Stuff". We will probably have a jersey heifer or cow in a year or two the way he plots things. I would not mind mini if it made sense. We will need a lot more hay storage though. *Sigh*


----------



## Baymule

Might ought to plan on extra space for cow hay. LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

A good chunk of the pasture. The fence is done. Now I need to put up a buck pen and a baby pen. No time no time no time.


----------



## Baymule

That sure is a beautiful pasture!


----------



## rachels.haven

The robins fledged last night. One has already decided it wants nothing to do with us outside of food, one is now rejecting the dog food beyond just one piece per session, and the last one is still friendly, still eating but that will change in the next day or two. Almost done.


Bigger box will not hold them. Looking forward to turning them out.


----------



## farmerjan

That's something, you guys have done so good getting them this far.  They don't look like robins though.... maybe the "youth stage"  I have never noticed baby robins up close before.


----------



## rachels.haven

They're trying to look grown up.


----------



## rachels.haven

Buck pen half way up. Goats coming at 4. Hot today, but man am I tired of going back and forth twice a day on top of everything else.


----------



## Baymule

You have done  a great job on raising the Robins. It won't be long now, your baby birds will fly away. I would imagine the speckling color on them is to help hide them until they perfect their flying techniques.


----------



## rachels.haven

Got the buck pen finished at 3, at 4:30 I brought the goats and Bailey with the neighbor to their new home. A bunch of them have log poo now from so much fresh wet grass. I suspect this will resolve itself. One milk stand is here. We'll get the other and the rest of the stuff here later.

Our biosecurity screen came back. All clean.


----------



## farmerjan

Congrats on getting things put together so fast.  Of course it was a big help to have someone get the fencing up and finished so quick for you too.  
That is wonderful......


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, it was great I didn't have to fence the main pasture. It was too big. The buck pen was my doing because it needed to be panels and I needed to hurry so we could quit doing the back and forth thing between properties 2x daily. I'M SO RELIEVED. (Edited to add: and SORE. Rocky ground here!)


----------



## Baymule

What a relief! I know that is a load off your mind and so much better to have them at their new home.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today was my first day milking at the right time. It was good. I can't separate the babies right now so I only got 3/4 gallon between all the does. I might up it to twice daily despite the kids and see if I can encourage production.

I turned the robins out today as well. Having them escape and go flying (pooping) around the house was too much. They flew off and summoned all the birds in the neighborhood wether we were outside or not. I hope they got someone to feed them.

Hey, @farmerjan what do you think of milking a JerseyxPinzgauer? There is an 8 month heifer for sale not super close. We should probably still go mini on our acreage, but I figured I'd ask.


----------



## rachels.haven

Last cat caught.
Now bedtime.


----------



## farmerjan

Any jersey(dairy) beef cross will not smother you with milk.  We had a few pinzgauer mixes years ago.  Decent dispositions, good mothers.  You could "share"  with her calf and not get overloaded with milk, and then if you had to go somewhere, the calf could get all the milk for "a milking away".... The subsequent calves would be beefy if you bred her back beef, so good to raise for beef for the house. 
I would say if you just milked with no calf sharing.... 1-2 gallons per milking?   So 2-4 gallons a day... and that depends on how much grain and various things.... and if she is more "dairy" or more "beef".    
Sometimes a dairy/beef cross will take after the beef,  some will take after the dairy.  So the thing to do is see how beefy the calf is.  The more jersey, more than likely the smaller it will be. And probably more production. But you are still looking at an animal that will weigh 8-1100 lbs at maturity.  Pinz's are not a "huge breed" but they are not mini sized.   
If you rotated grazing, then you could get some decent foraging... but 6 acres, plus your goats,  would be still stretching it.  In Va we figure 1 1/2 acres per cow average, during the grazing season.  If you did a good job of fencing and rotating, then you would get a fair amount of grazing.  I don't know how many goats you have or how much they are eating.... You will have a little less grazing time than we do.... our grasses are heading out already, it always seems that they sit there then just jump out of the ground in the spring.... but we will have some decent grass growth into Nov and sometimes Dec.   For the sake of comparison, a mature cow will eat 1/2 to 1 full square bale a day.... 50+ lbs of hay.  So a cow/calf pair will  eat a whole sq bale once the calf gets over 3-4 months.  We figure 1 big roll (1000 lbs) per cow for 20 days... or 20 cows per roll per day.  That's about 50 lbs.   m/l....

I see nothing wrong with the cross...


----------



## rachels.haven

I had never heard of the breed. I think I should wait for a barn on the cow. The goats don't eat much grass or wander far, yet they are already looking fatter.

I contacted a local barn fixing guy. The problem is, contractors around here have enough business they can pick and choose who they get back to and work with and a tumbling down machine shed and a 1930's poultry shed is not very interesting compared to the old, old barns that are around. On top of that our barn may not have much time. One of the corners is starting to creak and groan and pop throughout the day while I am milking. At some point probably the last guys redid the front wall including that corner and now it looks like the wood is starting to bow. It's too little too late, but yesterday I opened all the first floor windows. They've been closed for decades and that with the condensation from the floor has been a serious contributor to killing the structure. Somebody took out the ventilation from the barn and replaced it all with closed windows or pieces of wall so the wood is rotting and the cement floor is heavy and supported by rotted wood...poor old building. I hope it doesn't crush me while I milk. That corner is LOUD. I should probably not be milking in there.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Can you add some additional support beams? To maybe give it some more time? Or start removing parts of the upper floor to make it weigh less?


----------



## rachels.haven

I am going to try to find out.


----------



## Baymule

Or chain around support poles with a large tractor and pull it down. Salvage what you can and start over.


----------



## rachels.haven

We'll see. There was no groaning today at milking. We'll do our best with that structure.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, rats. Now one of the front doors on the barn won't open because it's touching the floor at the bottom. As soon as the garage is clear of boxes I'll switch to milking in there. I was whimsically wishing all that creaking was in my head and it was all fine. Aw well.


----------



## farmerjan

Sorry and sad that it is in that shape.  Looks so good from the pictures, but obviously there is more to it than what shows.  Any new estimates or opinions?   I realize that regardless of the condition, you have the kids and animals to be responsible for.  Shame it is not more sturdy.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I was whimsically wishing all that creaking was in my head and it was all fine.


I have plenty of creaking in my neck but I'm a fair bit older than you  

I hope you can get the barn repaired but I expect it would be really expensive and possibly not doable.


----------



## Baymule

You don’t need to be in there and neither do your animals.


----------



## rachels.haven

No. The structural engineer said not to put anything living in there. No word from the people I contacted. Dealing with contractors around here is like shouting into the void, but whatever.
Second covid shot today (pfizer). The Groton house is professionally cleaned and staged. This weekend is barn and the one wing attic clean out days. We want to list it before June and get it sold. The way the market is at the moment it seems you list it Monday, have an offer deadline of the following Monday, and have it sold on Tuesday. Hoping for the best. I'd like enough from that house to pay off most of this one. Then subsequent paychecks can go towards our living expenses, the barn, and savings.

Summer and a bunch of the babies are hiding in the machine shed rather than grazing. I guess someone had to babysit.


----------



## rachels.haven

Part of the floor upstairs had been replaced I discovered today. Like this.





Hmm, not very original.



So much space. Hey, I found the "disappeared" doors. I'd love even a one story barn with this much room.


----------



## farmerjan

I'd try to keep after some one to come look at it and see if it isn't salvageable in some way.... maybe half the barn with the side that is creaking and groaning taken down to a point where it is more solid????  I am going to ask my brother in CT who goes back and forth to VT and NH if he knows of a contractor looking for work.  Or maybe someone good in your area.


----------



## rachels.haven

Part of me hasn't given up on it yet. I'm still trying to connect with someone. I can't do anything yet though until DH's next big paycheck comes through. 
It would be awfully hard to retrofit with stalls and doors for goats, but it sure is cool. 
There are some concerning/cool things about the roof and second floor I noticed today, but the whole beast needs work at best so I'll skip getting pics of those. 
There's a barn restoration guy in Groton (expensive, I'm sure) who replaces whole walls and roofs on old barns. I would like to make contact with him.


----------



## rachels.haven

And I will take any good contacts if you have any.  I still kind of fear it's all a wash and I'd just be wasting someone's time and I'm going to just have to enjoy looking at it and imagining. The whole structure is wood and it's spongy.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, after waking up from thinking about it all night I should probably come to the conclusion that every part of the barn has a myriad of issues that compounded over time (and numerous repair attempts) and if further repair is attempted, just as the engineer told us, it would be highly expensive and just a short term bandaid. Plus, because of the number overlapping issues someone could lose their lives working on one part and get squished by the other. The more I look, the more I find them and am surprised the building is hanging in there. And then I should tell myself that it would be hard to make into a goat barn anyway. The barn has too few places for doors, to contain the chickens of course, whereas goats need to be more open air. The barn is half buried in the side facing the pasture and the door back there is on the second floor. It would be better just to save the potential trouble and remove the building while in the mean time taking lots of pictures (although I think I've taken them all unless I want to document issues). I'm sorry. I love this beautiful building, but it's a sick tough old building.


----------



## Baymule

Poor old barn that nobody loved. What a crying shame. Hopefully you can salvage those wonderful old beams.


----------



## Mini Horses

Shame.  But some days we must accept reality.   Safety is critical.   Perhaps some lumber can be salvaged.  If not, that's gonna be a bonfire to remember!!


----------



## rachels.haven

I think it was loved. There are some aspects of it that were doomed to fail when they were put in (ie, the roof structural issue) and others that were caused later (side door chiseled out of the concrete with no header or footer to support lost soundness put in and removed means of ventilation followed by neglect). But you can't blame people from way back. It's a 1930's modern building, lol. That may be a big reason why people probably aren't getting back to me (and probably for the best). There are plenty of 1700's, 1800's barns to repair. 1930 is a young barn.
We'll build a smaller one with lots of ventilation, plumbing, and a milk room suited perfectly to goats. When the house is sold and the paychecks equate to enough.


----------



## rachels.haven

This desk stays with me though (assuming the building doesn't randomly crush it one day).


----------



## rachels.haven

Last night marked a momentous occasion. I moved the chickens here. No more animals at the Groton house. They will be going in a used chicken coop I bought from a NH family as soon as I can get a piece of polywall and cut it to fit. Right now they are in the garage in a crate. After all the selling I still have upwards of 20 birds. Sheesh...
We will have two breeding coops eventually. I need to pick up a second cock. Teddy is both the sire and grandsire of a lot of the chickens in there now. Too much Mr Teddy.
They are looking fabulous though. He vastly improved the quality of the flock.

This weekend we shovel the barn and load the very last of our belongings into a truck. The dumpster is on the plan for Wednesday. Then the house can go up for sale.


----------



## Bruce

At the very least maybe you can take down the old barn and use the materials to build a new one. There must be a quantity of good lumber in there. And you know what has happened to the price of lumber in the last year!


----------



## rachels.haven

The two rows of beams down the middle look nice and the center dividing wall looks passable, but the rest is disintegrating warped mush. Maybe the columns upstairs are okay if the bottom gets cut off and some of the more recent roof repair and modification wood might be okay. Maybe. It almost looks like there was a cupola in the middle of the barn that may have been take. Out when the steel roof was put in, but I don't feel good about walking on the floor to find out. Concrete does not have strength under tension unless it has rebar and all. Plus, the barn started talking when I tested the first step. I guess those doors up there are staying.



A removed door in the loft.



Another removed door?



Not sure what this is for, but the cables are loose which is probably not great, my gut says.


----------



## Baymule

On that old desk, if you want to keep that old patina, that took years to acquire, I know how. Get Gojo waterless hand cleaner, not the kind with grit. You want the plain Gojo waterless hand cleaner. Wipe some on the desk with a rag and keep rubbing. It will lift off the grime, not harm the old finish, and shine it up. Try a spot and you’ll see what I mean.


----------



## rachels.haven

The farm down the street hays fields, the neighbor informed us. Potential there.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yesterday the older patriarch of the neighbors to the east caught my husband and told us we had a secret room in the basement that the guy before the last guy used to store his big gun collection...also that he didn't like Bailey barking at night. She barks very little here and then the grass muffles it (and she is by far not the loudest dog in the neighborhood), but I guess that's too much. Would like that barn to lock everything up, I suppose. The housing market in Groton is skyrocketing so paying off this house and building a barn might happen if we hurry up and sell that house soon. *stress, stress, stress*
So today a huge ash pit was discovered under the fireplace out side of what we thought was the edges of the foundation. We found the clean out doors too. Not sure how a pit that size can be cleaned out with such small doors but whatever. The pit continues toward the cold storage room on the right, but ends on the left leaving a void of unaccounted for space between it and the corner next to the garage. The wall by the garage door sounds hollow like a door when you knock on it rather than like cinderblock or framed insulation, but it's covered in wood panel that was probably put up by the last guys. Assuming the neighbor didn't mean the cold storage room, that's where I'd put a "secret" room, and an entrance by the door would be ideal for a gun room. We are tired enough we probably won't think too much about it for a while, but it's fun to wonder.

My vaccinated family is in this weekend for my november baby's blessing. I'm fully vaccinated too so risk of covid should be minimal. (That was a rough vaccine.)

I'm looking at these two barn floorplans now. Not sure we'll go with these guys, but they built my last barn, so I'm going to find out more.








						Floorplan #bf014 - Circle B Barn Company
					

Stall barn with three 10′ x 12′ stalls, two 12′ x 12′ stalls, one 14′ x 12′ tack/feed room, full loft with stairs with risers and one 10′ x 18′ shed overhang.




					circleb.com
				











						Floorplan #bf002 - Circle B Barn Company
					

Five 10′ x 12′ stalls, a 10′ x 16′ tack/feed room and a 12′ x 40′ overhang.




					circleb.com
				



What do you think?


----------



## Baymule

I like the second one. I like the alley down the middle and lots of room.


----------



## Bruce

Oh the intrigue!!

You should get both of them for future animals 😉 I'd probably go with the bigger one, can't have too much space.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

I like the look of the second one too. Is the roof pitch high enough on the non-overhang side you can add an overhang later?


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm not sure. We'll find that out and more when the resources are available.
Today after trying to smash Moses across the field, Lace had a single buckling (I saved the puppy). The lady who wants Lace should take both goats. The plan is for Lace to leave ASAP. Our kidding season is over.
I might be bringing in another goat.


----------



## Bruce

Doesn't "might" usually mean "done deal"? 😉


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep! We have 4-5 acres of pasture to maintain, after all. I may have also brought on a doeling earlier from the same place as this doe, related to Lace, but much, much better than her- better breeding and bottle fed. Sorry Lace.


----------



## rachels.haven

My mother came and also said bigger is better. How about this one? I like doors, and maybe the washroom could be the milkroom since it has plumbing.








						Floorplan #bf016 - Circle B Barn Company
					

Two 60′ x 12′ shed overhangs, three 12′ x 12′ stalls, two 14′ x 12′ stalls, two 10′ x 12′ stalls, a 10′ x 12′ wash stall, tack area and feed storage.




					circleb.com
				




We had a setback with the fence. Turns out the fence guy was not correct and should have tied it to the non-t posts and back on itself like redbrand and I said so and NOT to tension rods attached to the posts. Goats got everywhere today. I got lucky and saw them just after they escaped. I patched with a panel and am praying they do not press out any more places until hopefully (please, please, please) they get back to DH and splice, restretch, and tie the fence properly. The last fence guy we had seemed only willing to fix his work if we gave him a positive referral. Since we're not liars we didn't.(house with that fence will be listed in the next week or so-all done)
Also, Lady snuck up and bit me on the back while I was fixing that fence. Bad lady. She's a G6s carrier, I discovered, so she should be listed soon anyway. I hit her in the butt with the (light and fluffy) bag of baling twine pieces on her way away after her bite and run, fat lot of good that did, but that seals the deal. she doesn't belong here. Some goats just don't, I'm realizing. Her 8 week old buckling is on a bottle, and the doeling can probably be put on one too, or be weaned with grain.

Lace is being all cuddly and clingy after her kidding. Yay moody goat. Almost makes me want to keep her. She's beautiful and has really come into her own, but I don't like the moods and high headedness, and the unreliability that comes with it.

Fence, fence, fence stressing me out. What if we build a barn and it falls apart too. I feel like all we can ever get is shoddy workmanship at best. (not true, as handyman and landscaper we hired were good, but not livestock related)


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

That one looks nice! Yeah, totally turn the wash room into the milk parlor.


----------



## rachels.haven

It will be interesting seeing what's in our price range...and what our price range will be by then. I may still be building the little barn, but neither are bad options. They'd be much bigger than my last one I was making work.


----------



## rachels.haven

Rwoo, roww, the crazy lady took off my butt fluff.




Moses needed a bath today (someone did not want a larger crate, despite the old one being too small), so in front of my incorrectly installed fence, Bailey got one too, and a trim. My dog has a false bottom. I cut about six inches of not butt and fluffy trousers off her, then blended it back in with her coat. It looks halfway decent, but she sure doesn't want me getting anywhere near her rear end again so the front is all I can photograph.





 Behind her is a surprise from the previous occupants...about 5 gallons of concentrated (probably used) citric acid for coolant system cleaning. Not industrial sized dog shampoo. I used Mane and Tails.


----------



## rachels.haven

*


two Atlas doelings and Summer*


----------



## rachels.haven

Lady, who is listed for sale. Her kids G6s DNA tests went in in Saturday.


----------



## Baymule

What is G6s?


----------



## rachels.haven

It's a gene that is in the nubian breed (and crosses). A&M explains it well.








						FAQs on G6S diagnostic testing - Texas A&M Veterinary Medical Diagnostic Laboratory
					

FAQ on G6S diagnostic testing at TVMDL, a genetic test performed on Nubian goats.




					tvmdl.tamu.edu
				



I forgot about it when buying Lady. Supposedly the sire of her kids has two normal copies, so one of them (or none of them) may be keepers. I don't want it in my herd, cake milk or no.


----------



## rachels.haven

and just like that UCDavis emailed me to say they got the Lady kids samples. I guess I'll know in the next few days to a week.


----------



## Baymule

Thanks for the explanation. Just one more reason to buy from a reputable breeder.


----------



## rachels.haven

G6s is trickier that that. A lot of reputable breeders have it in their herd. I only know if one herd "near" me that is entirely G6s negaitve. As long as one parent is normal no affected offspring will be born, is most of the thinking. Some of the nicest Nubians carry it so if you want to use one of the pretty boys (even in the tank), there's a good chance you'll bring it back in.


----------



## rachels.haven

Mallow, the littlest adult lamancha on site.








She needs a medial, foreudder, teats, feet buck, but she's sweet and doing good. She's also milking a half gallon 2x daily despite being small and a ff.


----------



## Baymule

You are the best goat momma. I learn things from you that I never knew. Never even heard of G6s. Are Nubians the only breed that carries it?

Mallow looks like a sweet girl.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. Just noobers and their crosses as far as I know. No need to breed any more goats carrying it here, so Lady will go and her kids will either go or stay based on what they wind up carrying. And if I need more Noobers I'll get them from the negaitve herd, my disbudding place. The reason I didn't originally is because they focus on show and not so much milk. I would rather do linear appraisal and milk test, so I went with Lady's commercial dairy herd that does LA and has a half gallon a day minimum for milkers BUT I'd rather not have G6s. I'd keep Lady's buck if he were clean. Her doe is stunning too. Can I have it all? (Lol, unlikely).

Side note, fence guys are coming Saturday. We need to convince them that they need to splice in enough wire to restretch and tie off the fence properly or we will have a really short lived fence and will have been ripped off again.


----------



## Baymule

I can’t believe how hard it is there to find people who can do a good quality job.


----------



## Palomino

@rachels.haven I'm so sorry you're going through that. That is not fun. When I was breeding, I wouldn't have any G6S in my herd either, but thankfully all of the breeders I know down here are scrupulous about testing for it and wouldn't imagine even having a carrier in their herds. They have some nationally competitive animals too.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> How about this one?


Oh you DEFINITELY need that one!


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, it would be fun.


----------



## rachels.haven

The house is staged (...gaudy, gray, flamboyant, depressing, and impractical all at once, but whatever) and listed. Turns out the sq foot count didn't include the finished basement and the total came to over 4k feet...no wonder we felt overhoused. Similar sized houses are going for 850-900k with the market high like it is and it's a sellers' market. We're expecting it to go for 850ish once buyers compete for it. Odd thing, the only part i miss is the barn. It always felt like someone else's house. 

Our current house is much cheaper, much, much smaller, and a farm house. Higher quality workmanship too and more practical (and more lived in, as it is older). If our plan pans out, even with barn building we want to try to pay it off by the end of the year or halfway into next. Then the rest of the extra cash flow can go into DH's "incase I go blind tomorrow" or retirement fund again. Once that builds up again we can relax. Haven't had that in a while.

Hay is up to $11 for prickly first cut and $12 for prickly late second so...a lot of people have been listing nice goats. I've...um, taken advantage of some of it in the name of pasture management. Some of these goats have been a bit starved so they will take some work, but I should do a herd composition post later.

It makes me want the big barn with the "wash-milkroom". Probably out of my price range though.


----------



## Baymule

Sellers market on the house and buyers market on the goats. Win-win!


----------



## farmerjan

Hope you get the house sold quickly. 

Now, none of my business, but a suggestion.  With the VERY LOW interest rates, it would be to your advantage to finance the new barn, the size that you WANT, with the amenities you want.... because down the road if you do sell the place, something like that is a real selling point with people with animals... especially the horse crowd.... Your money isn't earning anything in the savings... and this gov't is going to destroy the economy with the taxes and inflation and then interest rates are going to start going up.  
I am alot older than you, and I can tell you that in 1966 when my parents built the new house on the land my great grandmother gave my father, they paid interest rates of over 8%  for the mortgage...savings accounts were making 3% interest or more.... daddy worked a 2nd job driving truck several nights a week for local runs from southwest CT to NYC delivering pepperidge farm bread..... and my mom went to work up the road at the local egg farm with only about 4,000 birds, candling eggs with my little sister able to come home from the bus there.... it was a small family operation that sold grade AA eggs to small little neighborhood stores... and they were lucky to get the mortgage, because the land was "paid for" ....Back then you made a whole lot less than today... I think minimum wage that I earned was 1.65......and  mortgage rates went up in 70's and 80's to where there was a time that it hit in the 16% or more.  

At this time, with mortgage rates at less than 3 %,  you would be money ahead to finance it and then be able to put your disposable income away into some sort of safe savings... or invest in gold or silver.... because when the rates start to climb, and savings accounts are paying 5% interest...talking things like cd's that you can lock in.... you will be actually making money off your savings to pay the mortgage.....Can you imagine what it would be like in 2 years to have a 3% mortgage and the inflation rate has cause loan rates to go to 8-10%.... and you are sitting on money in the nest egg because you are actually saving money by having such a low interest mortgage...????

One reason that I have no intention to pay off my mortgage early as I was thinking to do when I took it.  My rate is 2.875%..... Sure I will save the interest if I pay it off early, but should I need to borrow money for something in the future.... and the rates are up to 6 or 8 %... then the money I save with the low rate I am paying, is giving me more money to  have in hand now... so I can save it even at a low savings interest rate,  and then not have to borrow money at a higher rate down the road.  

I hate owing money, and a long term mortgage is alot of interest, but in 5 years if I need money for something, I do not want to be faced with another loan at a much higher rate because I wanted to get this paid off sooner.  

If I thought this was going to be a long time before rates were going to go up, then I would be pushing to make double payments on mine, now that I am not also paying rent and another electric bill.... but for right now, using someone else's money at this low rate makes more sense and to start stashing my "cash" for future projects.  I get a few things done here, then I might start paying it off faster....


----------



## rachels.haven

Good point. We'll discuss it.


----------



## farmerjan

I have reread my post and hope that you don't take offense... I certainly was not trying to "tell you what to do" and it sounds like you will be in pretty good shape if you get the other place sold, to be able to hopefully pay off what you owe on this place within a couple years or less.  
I just have a bad feeling about the future, with inflation and such.... and that if you could get the barn built now on "cheap" borrowed money,  then you would have the place you want and then could stash money away as you mentioned wanting to have a nest egg or cushion.... 
And sometimes the interest deduction off the taxes might help with the tax bracket and make it even more sensible to put off paying it off... 
That is one of the reasons I want to get my taxes and homeowners ins out of the escrow.... it earns me NOTHING in there, and then with the screwup with the tax payment, I am getting the short end of the deal if only for a little while....
I can earn 1.5% in my checking account for pete's sake.... not much but I am getting nothing now....if inflation starts to increase as it will have to, I want that money sitting in my account not theirs.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh no, no offense taken. If I seem short it's probably just the heat wave. We've had similar conversations with DH's father, weighing the pros and cons of that and other options. We're just holed up in the basement together trying not to bake right now.
The showings on the house start today, I believe the offer deadline is next Tuesday and we will be thinking plenty about the exact plan of attack. Input is welcome.
Being the (minor) rebel I am, I think I'd really only be offended if you were trying to make us follow your instructions or berating rather than offering advice. No worries.


----------



## Baymule

Holed up in the basement? Are you having a heat wave? You don't have air conditioning, do you. Ouch.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep, we wound up 95-99 supposedly since Saturday with the same humidity. Swimming in soup. We traded ac for a more kid friendly house. We may fix that eventually.

I'm typing with a migraine here so I'll try to keep it short and clear rather than migraine fogged, but it appears Google maps is reporting my disaster LGD puppy, Badger's breeder's farm as being "permanently closed". Their website says similar. I can't believe it, but it appears they are gone. I wonder if covid got them, or if they causes a disaster in someone's home, they ran out of money, or just tried to intimidate the wrong people. But it doesn't matter. Hopefully no one got too hurt.


----------



## Baymule

A window AC for one or two rooms would help you get through the heat wave. I’ve lived without AC before and just got used to it, but it can be miserable.


----------



## Bruce

Or you wait for it to break. New England isn't Texas after all 

We were near 90 with high humidity a few days ago, low last night was 55° with similar humidity. High today will be 70°, humidity at 35%.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, today tanked fast.
Animal control came. Apparently neighbors are calling daily when Bailey is letting out so much as a peep (our windows are open all night). We are not allowed to leave our dog outside at night. She is not allowed to bark. It is apparently not an LGD's job here. We are obligated to put up electric fence to protect our property. We are not allowed to leave her outside unless we register as a farm. We can not register as a farm unless we have an income of over $500 if memory serves. We have made no money here because we have been here for a month.
I get to put my goats and dog up at night in the dangerous, groaning, leaking barn and pray no one goes after me for my "outside pet" until we've made whatever amount.


----------



## rachels.haven

An lgd is apparently supposed to be a silent attack and kill dog here according to animal control.
It baffles me though, because she has been fairly quiet.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Can you set up cameras and maybe a decibel meter? To prove when the dog is/is not barking and how loud? That should help your case if you can prove the neighbors are being unreasonable in their reports. Might be able to prove they are filing false complaints and that they are harassing you?

Maybe ask them nicely to contact you first instead of calling animal control. If they keep being jerks start calling the county on them? I'll bet there's something on their property not permitted or against code. Might not be the best advice but my knee jerk reaction to someone messing with my animals is scorched earth response.


----------



## farmerjan

I know that you just got there.... but really, isn't there anywhere else the company can transfer your husband to????  CAN'T he work from home so you can go to a FARM ANIMAL friendly place????    MASS people are total IDIOTS....

I hate barking dogs.... but I get the reason you have her... she does not just bark for hours on end....for no reason...

Do you not have receipts from sale of other animals at the other place that can transfer to this property for the income requirements?   Haven't you sold a few goats already?  
DAM#   I wish I had a solution.  

NOW you know why I am out of the insanity of NEW ENGLAND... and I am a born and bred Yankee with roots in CT that family that came over on the Mayflower..... founding families in CT..... 

Like the idiot next door to DS property that was so against the cell tower and is now trying to go back to the restrictive covenants to go after him on his property.... FIND things to be able use against them if you have to down the road....you need amunition that is in your backup file.


----------



## rachels.haven

Turns out the town govt is a mess and there is no agricultural committee or officer right now, so i can't register as a farm even if I'd made x dollars here and there will be no mediation if the neighbors go after me-which they are.
But I'll figure this out. There's got to be a way.
Mass-the something hole state.
No, I am stuck in this state. I'd tried getting us to move out of state and the best I could get was Townsend. I wonder if this will be the time we lawyer up and get stuck going to court.
Meanwhile, bears are ransaking coops like crazy around town, so much so that the farmer's exchange has started selling all the electric fence stuff you need (if you have animals in this state and a bear or coyote bothers you, you will not be helped, but if you have animals and have electric fence, maybe they will help you rather than blaming you). This idiocy is excessive.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

I dunno if it would work with your workload, but could you become the agricultural person in charge? Make changes so the agricultural folks are protected?


----------



## Baymule

I couldn’t live there. I’d get thrown in jail for opening up a six pack of whup a$$ all over the neighbors.


----------



## farmerjan

No @Baymule  you couldn't.... that is why I am long gone from there.... and Mass is probably the worst.... of the NE states...


----------



## rachels.haven

I'd like that. A lawyer may be more suited to the agricultural officer role based on my location and people's attitudes though, and definitely someone with a more put together appearance. I am technically a college dropout (with great grades, in my defense, I just met my husband 8+ years ago while I was switching schools for a more agricultural related major). But I am a nobody. I'm also terrible at public speaking-as in during meetings or if there was a dispute. People would not take me seriously. During migraines I even get a stutter. It's best I stay nobody except for in writing. Unfortunately people just can't seem to leave me alone. This state makes it so hard to control pests and predators, and now "officials" don't even want me to use the supposedly allowed route. What an anti farming "right to farm" place...


----------



## Bruce

DW was the person who couldn't deal with Merlin barking at night. Don't know what the neighbors thought.


----------



## rachels.haven

It's 1 pm. I jut finished stuffing goats and Bailey in panel pens I built in the unsafe building and now there are coyotes barking away IN my pasture. She doesn't bark at nothing. I was worried the creepy things wouldn't let me get back to the house. I need my dog to WORK for the time being.
She likes time off though so as soon as we get a barn built I do want to put everyone away in stalls with her in the alley again.


----------



## Baymule

My neighbors don't care if the dogs bark. 6 places back up to one of our side fences, or about 2 acres each. They go berserk if any of the neighbors dare to walk, talk, BBQ, or do any of normal living in their own yards. Lawn mowers or power equipment run the dogs over the edge. Most of the neighbors have met the dogs and like them. Since the dogs love to run to the front to bark and race up and down the fence, we are know as the "people with the big dogs."


----------



## farmerjan

Believe me, those up there in the NE states are different.... they will never appreciate what the dog is doing or what she is protecting... the old time farmers out in the real country farmland, would not mind... but in these little "farmette" areas... it is a whole different mindset.... and they are another breed unto themselves in Mass on top of it.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah...different breed. Pretty sure animal control got called again when I was milking. Neighbor on the phone talking in a hushed voice about the goats behind a bush while everyone was screaming about being off schedule and confused on where to go and what to do because THOSE NEIGHBORS complained and the ACO is a- 
DH brought up moving. We're getting a lawyer. Yep. A lawyer to keep goats on a 7+ acre agriculturally zone property with a 100' chicken barn, a machine shed, and even an old hay rake back there. This has been so fun.


----------



## farmerjan

My heart goes out to you.... I know that you thought you would be doing so much better with moving to a more "ag friendly" area.... what a bunch of SORRY SOB A$$holes....

DS has spent over 16,000 on lawyer fees for the cell tower and now back to fighting the sorry B#@%H next door on the whole "restrictive covenants" on the AG ZONED land....because she lost on the tower situation, so just doing all she can to harass....

I honestly wish she would drop dead of a heart attack.  I seldom get to that point in a totally serious way.... but she is way beyond......
About like the a hole neighbors you have.


----------



## Baymule

You can’t fix stupid. Not only that, but there is no mandatory sterilization so they breed and make more of themselves.


----------



## farmerjan

Except that with so many of the "alternative" sexes, they are not breeding as fast as they used to.....Thank God for that.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sigh. I can't go a day without thinking about this.
I'm pretty sure we're getting harassed by our neighbor and the city now. Friday the neighbor called ACO during milking, today (sunday) someone was in our driveway during milking and quickly left when I walked by the window inside after finishing. This lawyer thing is getting real. We've contacted an organization that is helping us get legal contacts (as in, on Thursday and Friday we began corresponding). ACO or someone else will probably be back to harass us on Monday-and probably over the goats and milking noise rather than the dog, which they should legally have no grounds to do. We have 7.15 acres of agriculturally zoned farmland, putting us well within the right to farm category in Mass. I have to milk. And this is my property. Even if we did the unthinkable and let them push us around into getting rid of the goats and dog next they'd be complaining about the kids...

On the positive side, suddenly our other house is magically worth over $900k...not that it means a hill of beans until someone offers that much and the keys/money changes hands (this place was pricey too, but not THAT pricey, so we'll have a decent amount left either to attack the mortgage/build a barn, or apparently move and buy another house ( !     !)). I'm starting to wonder if we're just going to finish paying off the other mortgage and hang onto the rest of that cash then use it to get out of here before they give me 30 days to de-goat, de-LGD (who is locked in the barn at night and NOT barking ever anymore), or de-child because the neighbor is annoyed that we're living our lives and they get to decide how and what we do. Or even worse, the ACO help themselves to my animals to "rescue" them from being made to wait during the milk lineup or something since I can't keep them quiet on my normal, if not already quiet farm.

Ah, and rut is starting and the bucks, which ACO caused me to have to lock in the barn by my house by forcing me to lock up Bailey (also in barn), are starting to sing whenever the desire strikes (silly dwarves and their drunken male dwarf songs). And they are locker room fresh as usual. This is going to be so fun.

Clearly I need a whole bunch of RIR and Leghorn roosters crowing, pigs squealing for breakfast, cows lowing at whatnot, or even just to pack that old hen house with leghorn hens. Then the neighbor would never sleep or breathe a clear breath again. AND I could sell lots and lots of eggs instead of just keeping a silkie rooster and a few hens that just lay enough for our family. Or USDA inspected pork or beef (you know, if the fence was actually sound).

Okay, stress rant over. I'll keep you updated. Someone please wake me up and tell me I'm dreaming.
Fun, fun journal entry.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Hopefully the other house sells quickly for good money and you will have more options. The legal people will/have probably told you this but document everything. Can you get a video camera set up on your driveway? Especially if you have no trespassing signs? That will prove that there are people on your property trespassing, they shouldn't be in your driveway without a legal reason or unless invited by you. Maybe take a video of the goats screaming while in line to be milked? To prove they are screaming because they are goats and impatient rather than being injured or abused or whatever these jerks will try to claim?

Also is there any option about going after the seller/selling realtor for presenting the property as a working farm/ag when the neighbors/neighborhood is so hostile? Seems like it was misrepresented to me and it's costing/will potentially cost you a lot of time, money, and heartache.


----------



## rachels.haven

We've picked out some outside cameras. I'm documenting. Time to put on galoshes and keep slogging through whatever comes.


----------



## Baymule

I am so sorry you are having to deal with this. How awful. Why are people so hateful? Maybe you need some of those long crowing roosters. Tell the ACO they are rare chickens, almost extinct and you are dedicated to saving the breed. LOL 

You are gonna have to convince your dear husband to LEAVE that part of the country and go someplace where people actually like farm animals or at least understand and tolerate them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Laughing roosters appeal to me. Non commercial farms here can have only up to 20 poultry, we discovered yesterday. Even 4-5 would be okay. Maybe a few geese... We'd better hurry up and become commercial if we're staying here. That will never do.

Yes, I've "discussed" this NE issue with DH already. For marital harmony I will not go into restating my grievances, feelings, and frustrations here, but I feel they are fairly obvious.


----------



## Baymule

Yes, you need to go commercial. What super annoying breeds of farm animals could you raise? 

Long crowing roosters
Pigs (meat for the freezer)
Geese, which ones make the most noise?

You need sales. When we first moved here, we sold eggs to satisfy the IRS on our taxes. We spent a lot of money on barns, fence, etc, so had to have something to sell. Eggs were easy and fast. Did you say that sales had to be $500 per year to qualify? Eggs at $4 per dozen is not a lot of eggs.


----------



## rachels.haven

We believe the way you qualify is by going to the tax office and saying "we're a commercial farm, give us the tax break". It's not a tax break we want though. If you move within 5 years and your buyers aren't a commercial farm you have to pay it all back immediately. So we'd have to put it all away and not use it. You also get a new set of state imposed regulations plied to you. This state sucks.


The zoning board called us. We are allowed by right to keep goats on our land.

We did not ask, but there is the whole "offensive sights, smells, and sounds" clause that applies to anything if the state doesn't have you in their commercial noose so the neighbors could still try something.
We'll burn that bridge when it comes though.


----------



## farmerjan

Burning something and not a bridge would be in my list......


Yeah, there are some sort of similar regs here concerning the ag designation, lower property taxes and such....payback for the last 5 years taxes or something if the land gets sold for development... and now you have to go before the zoning and planning commission and all sorts of crap....they are not letting farms just get sold willy nilly for development so that this nuisance stuff is contained... stopping idiot out of state/out of town "city people" from harassing the operating farm next door.... and I get that.... we run into it all the time with these people with money (many DC transplants)  that buy these 10 and 20 acre "ESTATES" out in the country, then B@$#H when the farmers cows are hollering after weaning calves, or the farmer spreads poultry litter for fertilizer and they think that their noses should dictate when and IF the farmer can use fertilizer..... we try to be considerate and not spread when there are holiday weekends... cookouts, graduation parties, all that stuff... and we try to spread before a rain so that it doesn't smell much or for long....but you do what you have to when it needs to be done.....

Probably would still be in your best interests to get in the commercial noose, and stash the tax break money... which would give you maybe "more of a leg to stand on" with the goats and the dog????


----------



## rachels.haven

It would help with the goats.

 The dog is not legally allowed to bark at anything outside of the fence and that's hard to prove if the neighbors go off. For instance, what Bailey was doing to get in trouble was putting the goats in on corner of the property between the house and the neighbor with the loudest dog I've ever heard (bark, baby bark, it means my back is being watched and those coyotes had better watch out!) and sitting the hill behind the barn and between them and the state forest and barking coyotes off as they jump the fence and come half way up the pasture. I can't prove she never barked at one outside the fence so she is just not allowed to be out at night and make a peep.

However, a local person told me it's best to lock her up and now I agree. She's only one dog and there are PACKS AND PACKS of uncontrolled, brazen, huge coyotes (feral dogs, really) here. He finds the coyotes and bears too thick for his LGD's. Bailey is happier when the goats are locked up at night. The first night I put the goats away I went out on top of that hill with her, and she was going bananas trying to push me down the hill back with the goats, but I thought she was just being midnight nutty. Well, I got to the top of the hill, and there were literally glowing eyes everywhere, milling around, too close to people's houses to be allowed to be shot. So I hurried up and put her and every goat in the barn, and that was the night I ran back to the house as the coyotes came up out of the field towards my house, barking and howling. They literally come right up to my back door. It's like coyote apocalypse bad. Stupid bad.

I am mostly upset now, about being forced to lock them in an unhealthy building that could crush them at any moment (yesterday it rained, and water poured into the building through the crumbling, shifting walls and soaked all the litter, and despite open windows, ventilation is poor and the building still has it's own climate). It could be my imagination, but it looks like the back wall towards the pasture has shifted even more inwards on it's crack and is going to cave in soon. I wish I'd taken a picture of it when we arrived. Doesn't matter a lick to the bum decoration ACO.

But regardless, the baby is asleep, so it's time to call some barn people. Lumber is high, but I'm hoping that means they are not backed up and the windfall of our last house's value skyrocketing will help us out.


----------



## Baymule

What about a leg trap in your yard for coyotes? A pump up pellet gun is quiet. Can the neighbors see all over your property? Is there a hidden place you could set a trap? It might make the coyotes leery of coming on your place.


----------



## rachels.haven

Leg traps are illegal. They shouldn't be, but they are. Mass is kind of shooting itself in the foot with these feral dogs. I might consider a pellet gun. I've though about a paintball gun. Something both lethal and legal would be nice.


----------



## Baymule

There are gas operated pellet guns that are both quiet and lethal. Shhhhh………


----------



## rachels.haven

*gasp*
On an unrelated note, you're an amazing person.


----------



## farmerjan

Konnibear type leg traps may not be illegal... they are not jaw traps... but the thing to do is just shoot the animal in the trap QUIETLY... and dispose in the back woods...


----------



## rachels.haven

This doesn't limit your wonderfulness(you too are amazing) but Mass only allows box traps and they supposedly must be registered.🤨 I disagree with this state. I guess they want to discourage everything and only grudgingly let you control wildlife or hunt. Back to your apartment, peasant scum!

Oddly enough air rifles are allowed with no restriction unless you are a minor. I'm pretty sure you can accidentally kill someone with one so I may sniff around. It may at least give something a whipping it won't forget.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Yes, I've "discussed" this NE issue with DH already.


I don't think it is a universal problem in all of New England. 



Baymule said:


> Yes, you need to go commercial. What super annoying breeds of farm animals could you raise?


Peafowl!!! Those tail feathers are expensive and during mating season the cocks will drive you crazy with their calls 

Here you can get "current use" tax breaks for ag stuff but you need to have 25 contiguous acres plus the 2 acre "homestead" site. We have about 26 acres.



rachels.haven said:


> We did not ask, but there is the whole "offensive sights, smells, and sounds" clause


What about your neighbor's offensive fat ass and their loud stinky farts? 

Nothing new about city people moving to farm country then complaining about farm sounds and smells.



rachels.haven said:


> The dog is not legally allowed to bark at anything outside of the fence


WTF. OK, please tell me that NO dog in the entire town ever barks at anything outside its property lines. Animal control better pick up every last dog in the city. Plenty of people on our road have dogs that bark at everyone who walks by.


----------



## Baymule

A big YES on the peafowl! Raise them to sell, plus the tail feathers!


----------



## rachels.haven

That law sounds like one of those selectively enforced ones. Basically if someone doesn't like you they can get you. The stupidest part is that the aco tried to justify it by saying Bailey is an adult and should know better. Just like how LGD's don't bark, only attack and dispatch, my adult dog spends hours a day going through Massachusetts layer after layer of ancient and modern lasagna laws. She can read too. Somebody might be a dangerous idiot. Apparently it's not Bailey. She is well aware of such things.


----------



## farmerjan

THEY ARE ALL SELECTIVE IDIOTS.......

Tell him that  Bailey DOES KNOW BETTER.... she is enforcing the LGD code of behavior that says she is SUPPOSED to bark at ANY THREAT to the livestock under her protection.... and barking is her way to inform the coyotes of their rights.... they have the right to stay off the property, if they do not do so, they are subject to anything that comes after them, and said owner/protector has a right to any method to be used against them in a manner with due force to protect the innocent livestock.  

See she is doing her due dilligence......informing the trespassers of their breech of the property boundaries....


----------



## rachels.haven

Woah. Now that was awesome. 😎 Hopefully I won't have to.


I'm putting this here in my journal so I can check back on it later.  Feel free to ignore. I think I need a side shot so I can make sure the angle isn't dramatically changing day to day...
Deciding how urgent it is.
Barn foundation is piled up boulder rocks with concrete over it. This wall is thicker, some parts are very thin with dirt coming through/sunken in. After hanging out with this building I don't think cement likes rocks any bigger than a fist if it does at all. Meh. I guess I won't build buildings like that in the future.








I've got large sheds on order and am waiting waiting in a call from the barn people.


----------



## Baymule

Bailey and the goats need a safe barn! Insulated and sound proofed too.......

What about a sign:
Dear Mean Neighbors,









__





						This item is unavailable - Etsy
					

Find the perfect handmade gift, vintage & on-trend clothes, unique jewelry, and more… lots more.




					www.etsy.com


----------



## rachels.haven

I like that.
I also want this one above my front door (but that's a bag of grain for vanity, so I'm holding off)




__





						This item is unavailable - Etsy
					

Find the perfect handmade gift, vintage & on-trend clothes, unique jewelry, and more… lots more.




					www.etsy.com
				




This is also fun. (And expensive.)




__





						This item is unavailable - Etsy
					

Find the perfect handmade gift, vintage & on-trend clothes, unique jewelry, and more… lots more.




					www.etsy.com
				




I'll stop being a misanthrope once I get out of here, but for now, that is how it is. I just want people to be courteous and respectful enough to leave me alone and they don't seem to be able to do that.

Maybe I'll ask my mother for some lady geese...


----------



## Mini Horses

I have read this with eye popping annoyance at those neighbors and laws!   I live in VA and it is a farming state.  My neighbors are great.  Only a couple of us have farm animals in close proximity but, mostly everyone is ok.  Surely my roosters are heard.  Far enough to have no issues with milk goat noises.  At this time, no dogs to bark but neighbors do.   I hear the neighbor donkeys bray on occasion...it's all good.

Even the occasional escapees are well tolerated by the locals, although drive by are concerned. We work it out.  Everyone along this little community, on this road, is both tolerant and considerate for the most part.

Just so sad that people live in farm animal territory & expect caged gerbil activity.


----------



## rachels.haven

I know. The whole thing just makes me homesick. I'd love to go home-out of here and back to sanity. It makes me miss waking up every morning and killing rat after giant rat in the Detroit suburbs(yay.) There is not a lot of connection to reality in this area. I'd love to move near to my parents in TN, but mostly I'd like to get out of someone else's fantasy land that I keep getting punished for disrupting. Making people mad is not my favorite, especially not crazy controlling people that don't want their paradigm messed with (although I could probably live with crazy if their paradigm extended to only their property because what other people do in their space is their business).


----------



## rachels.haven

No call from the barn people. Typical. Why did I expect differently? Rude. I have another lead I can try-a metal barn company. They can be nice too.
Today a large section of the fence catastrophically failed and now the goats are stuck in the barn. Fence people say they will be here week after next. We bothered them about this weeks ago. Meanwhile my buck pen that I built is doing great.
Shelters are being built now. I am waiting on the delivery setup call. Then I will put up tiny pens around them and start feeding out $12/bale hay and $15/bag pellets as if we have no pasture.
House open house and offer deadline did not go great. 1998 house got called "vintage" and "not updated" also that the barn was unwanted maintenance. Barn was fine and will continue to be fine with no attention. House seemed fine to me-ac, heat, good carpet and nice hardwood. I guess the windows were old?...We got one very lowball offer and turned it down. Now we'll just do a routine waiting for an offer kind of sale.

Today I also decided that I am done with this area so more instability may be coming soon.


----------



## rachels.haven

I may as well do a herd role call.
I have a silkie horde that needs a new cock. No blacks or slivers. I decided to cull the black based line to a pet home after more incidence of cross beak and failure to thrive in just those colors, so all hens are mottled buff.

My bucks are
Rustic Wood's Black Tie Affair-for sale for throwing a high rate of people hating kids that I am tired of dealing with. They would be fine if I bottle raised, but I don't.
Hammock Haven Atlas
Bluebird Pond Dash's Flash-new, Eri's nephew, settled no does at his last home, but was used right off a trailer and it was HOT.
Dawnland Oberon (pending in ADGA pedigree limbo)-growout from last year
Mye Hearts Farm APR Antonio (growout from last year)
Noober buck kid waiting for G6s test to come back
One Blacktie buckling
One Atlas Buckling

Does are
Moon Mist LOG Purple Summer and her kid by Atlas named Elsa
Kaos Farm RWP Uranium and her kid by Atlas named Ellie
Epimetheus Lace(the buyer flaked on me) She has a skittish Blacktie buck kid
Hammock Haven Trinka and her skittish kid by Blacktie named Tonka
VVFarm Luck Be A Lady Tonight (for sale as a home milker) Lady's daughter is also waiting on a G6s test and may be for sale pending result
Merrie Mead Mallow
Little Orchard CD Lacey-makes a gallon on once daily milking
Little Orchard CD Hera-dry three year old, did not settle last year
Tru Leigh Dairy SH Buttah-milking yearling that I am drying up because she is too small for comfort
Fox's Pride Tutti Allegro
Bluebird Pond Erudite
Eri's daughter Eri

Of that I'm only milking Mallow, Lacey, and Erudite. Everyone else is either going dry or feeding babies because running the bucks and does in every night takes so long. Also, I don't need 9-10 gallons of milk/day.
Sugar(sold)'s daughter Jarrah


----------



## HomeOnTheRange

rachels.haven said:


> a metal barn company. They can be nice too.


I am looking at a small 50x80 metal barn.  They can be pricey as well...


----------



## rachels.haven

HomeOnTheRange said:


> I am looking at a small 50x80 metal barn.  They can be pricey as well...


How pricy? I'm looking at 200,000 for a wood barn not counting demolition from one place for a 36x40. I'm concerned they will all be similar (as well as unresponsive). Any less?


----------



## Baymule

$200,000 for a barn? For that price, it ought to be people house quality! Crazy!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> barn was unwanted maintenance


Gee to most people that barn would be a very welcome building for storage, garage, workshop, etc!

$200K for a 36x40 barn? Is this one of those you posted with all the different rooms?


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Gee to most people that barn would be a very welcome building for storage, garage, workshop, etc!
> 
> $200K for a 36x40 barn? Is this one of those you posted with all the different rooms?


No, this was a different builders website and that one with lots of rooms was bigger-something like 30 or 40 x 60. I'm hoping either I'm incorrect somehow or that one builder is outrageously expensive. Things are expensive here but it can't be that bad, right?


----------



## Bruce

I wouldn't think so. For that kind of money I think you'd get a full height poured concrete foundation, electricity, water and sewer!! If that number is anything near correct my 35'x35' smaller timber frame barn in such bad shape I was told it would be cheaper to replace than repair isn't going anywhere!!!


----------



## rachels.haven

I'll let you know. No matter what the house sells for, I think I'd rather pay for a kids college than spend that much on a little barn.


----------



## rachels.haven

Got annoyed with goats in barn soaked, pounded post through the black top in front of the machine shed, by the small half. Goats are going in a pen there. I'm putting it up.


----------



## HomeOnTheRange

rachels.haven said:


> How pricy? I'm looking at 200,000 for a wood barn not counting demolition from one place for a 36x40.


My 50x80 steal building with a cement floor is going to come in at about $110K.  For 220K, we could get all of the wiring, lighting, 3 phase converter, HVAC, insulation and 16kW solar put in.  I thought our building costs were high!


----------



## rachels.haven

There is now a pen built under the small side of the machine shed. Stupid concrete and asphalt.
I'll move the goats tonight. Maybe Bailey won't bark in there. We built a door.
Very tired now.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lady got sold this weekend. Her kids test results came in last night. Her buck is G6s normal. Her doe is a carrier. The doe (Spot the Galaxy, aka Spot) belongs to Dan and he is not selling.  I guess it's time to register them.
Looks like I have a little buck to make experimentals with, maybe add some of Lady's good qualities, but with a bit more mancha. I think I'm either going to call him Lady's Man or Noober.


----------



## Mini Horses

Holy cow on those barn prices!!!    Nothing like that's gonna happen here.  In fact, probably should raise insurance coverage on them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Speaking of which, I finally got a call back from any barn people. The metal barn people are backed up until spring and can't do estimates for a few more weeks because of the price and how hard it is to get construction stuff. But somebody finally got back to me. Not great news, but still news.


----------



## rachels.haven

Almost time for a hay delivery (for the bucks and for winter). Gonna love me some hay. winter security!


----------



## Baymule

Hay is wealth.


----------



## rachels.haven

Old house is now under agreement. A bidding war did occur and house will go for about what Zillow values it at. It will feel nice to only have one place.

I got the little pond working. Not satisfied with the pump, so I'm getting a new one along with media for the water fall filter.

Not farm stuff but this stuff effects it. 
Some of the animal shelters are coming tomorrow. They may be what we winter in (with the chicken house dry enough for hay hopefully).
I'm picking up some new cockerels to quarantine Saturday. Exciting.


----------



## rachels.haven

This is more an update for @B&B Happy goats  than anyone else. On Thursday Moses discovered his true calling on earth-retrieving balls. After about an hour with Aiden and the tennis ball catapult stick he was pooped. Since then he's been retrieving all over the place. Currently he is retrieving sticks out of the tiny pond that fell in while we weren't looking in front of the house. He's not a stock dog. His job is to grab and bring stuff (and be loved on/do the loving). I see lots of slimy sticks and balls in our future.


----------



## Baymule

Playing fetch is a boy/dog favorite pastime. Lots of fun!


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> This is more an update for @B&B Happy goats  than anyone else. On Thursday Moses discovered his true calling on earth-retrieving balls. After about an hour with Aiden and the tennis ball catapult stick he was pooped. Since then he's been retrieving all over the place. Currently he is retrieving sticks out of the tiny pond that fell in while we weren't looking in front of the house. He's not a stock dog. His job is to grab and bring stuff (and be loved on/do the loving). I see lots of slimy sticks and balls in our future.


Now you can keep both Moses AND the kids busy !  ...Next, teach him how to drag a bale of hay for you 😆


----------



## Bruce

And Moses can rescue Danger Dan when he goes a bit too far in his escapades


----------



## rachels.haven

The backup plan sheds have come. The does have an 8x20. The bucks have an 8x8 shed. And I snagged 2 5x7 coops (although supposedly I have an 20 chicken limit unless I go commercial, which we will do). We will cover the floors with polywall to protect against urine and they will only be shut in at night. I also need to put pens around them.

Yesterday I picked up 4 (oops.) silkie cockerels to grow out. One or two may not be a cockerel, but the breeder thinks it is, so we'll go with it. If they all are, they will be fabulous boys.

Here's a picture of my grass in the front half of the pasture where they goats want to stay...it's a lot of alfalfa. Unfortunately the fence is still out. Our fence guy said he would come back, and we keep bugging him. He says this week. PLEASE.

I'm collecting the stuff for a hot wire or two.

It occured to me that the neighbors were quick to tells us the segment of privacy fence between our yards was our responsibility, which means if they annoy me enough I may be forced to paint it alternating pink and purple on their side if they annoy me too much. So I feel semi okay today.

Hay delivery today or tomorrow, assuming my hay guy can get it. I'm getting 100 bales. That will help the bucks who have no pasture and probably don't care about it anymore. Rut started about 2 weeks ago and the pee is everywhere. Yay. rut.

The good news there is that the dirt is so hard, sandy, and rocky it seems to be maintaining hooves.


----------



## rachels.haven

Heh. Forgot my anemic grass.


----------



## Baymule

Pink and purple sounds pretty, those colors compliment each other. I vote for purple and bright orange, with an occasional lime green tossed in the mix. AND paint the Bible verse “Love your neighbor as you love yourself “ on it. Would big red hearts be overkill?


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Pink and purple sounds pretty, those colors compliment each other. I vote for purple and bright orange, with an occasional lime green tossed in the mix. AND paint the Bible verse “Love your neighbor as you love yourself “ on it. Would big red hearts be overkill?


I believe there is an Iowan tradition around where I used to live to paint big smiley faces on outbuildings. I've considered that. Beautiful.


----------



## Bruce

If they keep pissing you off paint a "Kilroy was here on their side". Forget all but one finger on each hand.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

Using the last of my two "same day delivery" credits from TSC for alfalfa pellets today before they expire tomorrow.
Fence is still out. These fence guys...why is it so hard to get a fence around here. More parts are warping the tension rods they used under the fence's own tension without goat help. Please come on, guys.
Yesterday night it rained IN the barn-puddles almost everywhere despite open storm windows (I even snuck around earlier and opened as many as I dare on the second floor). Looks like it really needed all the ventilation it originally had. It mostly didn't rain where i plan to put my hay. Beginning to think this building will not work for this purpose either. Maybe I should hurry up and demo it and put up a temporary structure system for winter hay until the barn is built. I have time to trial and error it out. Probably for the best as I'm seeing more leaning to the left on the right rear part of the building. Hay is going in the front left quadrant. I should probably take my garden tools and barn stuff out of there or it will rust.
My cats are doing their jobs. Keep finding mouse guts everywhere.
The new Little Orchard does are putting on condition, much to my relief. They were a tad thin before. I'm drying off the milking yearling. She needs to grow and can be bred later. The dry 3 yr old is doing fine. Everyone else is doing okay on free choice alfalfa pellets while lusting after their pasture.

Day 2 of 94+ degree heat wave with tons of humidity. Only one or two left. Moses and the kids are camping out in the garage where it tends not to go above 85. Moses must be confined because he poops in the garage. Apparently it's not part of the house for him yet. It's good for him to be confined though. When it's this hot and he runs around like a puppy he over does it in the heat.

Making cheese-farmers cheese and chevre. Need to work up the nerve to test the cold room as a cheese cave. I keep seeing roaches outside though, that concerns me. The line between inside and out is thin here.

DH was thinking about pricing out mini splits. I need to encourage him the rest of the way into it. These temps are not good for babies (or us).


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Mini splits are awesome! Maybe see if there are any 4th of July sales/deals to decrease the price?


----------



## rachels.haven

Larsen Poultry Ranch said:


> Mini splits are awesome! Maybe see if there are any 4th of July sales/deals to decrease the price?


Anywhere else but here maybe. I suspect Heating/Ac guys are going to be like other contractors around here. There's a shortage of skilled labor. We'll need to find one with a good reputation that doesn't tend to screw people over too often and if we can get a hold of them get on their list and wait. No deals and they can name their prices. But I would like to be wrong so let's find out. Not looking forward to the electric bill associated with air conditioners. Our first full month here was completed. The e bill, no AC, was $287. That's around what it cost to power and AC our last house (and this house is modest rather than whatever the last one was). Yuck. I'm not impressed. Unitil is lame. Sweetening the idea of solar with every bill. Or getting out of Mass.


----------



## Baymule

It would be a lot cheaper to just get out of Mass.  Not to mention the happiness of leaving all those snooty people behind.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, it would make them all happier if I left. That's is a perfect argument.
I was going to say that the flip side of that is that if anyone's kids wanted to become plumbers or Hvac people, they get to inherit the cherry picking jobs approach and will probably make plenty.

As a side note, I think the small side of the machine shed where I put the goats was used to store chicken manure with the high side doors used as a place to dump it in and make the pile higher, then eventually they'd get it out, maybe spread it on the field. As it gets humid and wet it starts smelling like a whole lot of chicken poo again.

I caught Bailey blowing bubbles in the water buckets today. It was so HOT. Now it's hurricaning and temp is dropping. Heat is done for a few days. Highs going down to hte 60's and 70's, lows in the 50's. Go figure. I hope this up and down doesn't make the goats or chickens sick (...or us, I guess since we're all in it together now).


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Hubby has been looking at the Mr Cool brand mini splits, they are supposed to be diy and have the coolant already in the lines so doesn't require an ac guy to install, although you might still need an electrician if you don't know how to do that part yourself. I think there are a few other brands that are also diy type. You just have to figure out where the unit will be installed outside the house, and measure how long each line needs to be for each zone. The lines would run either under the house or in the attic and down the wall to each zone unit from the main heat pump exchange thing.

That stinks about the electric bill, our bill here is higher than the old house as well, even though it's electric only and not electric and gas. I'm pretty sure the house is not insulated properly.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you!


----------



## Bruce

Mr. Cools have been self installed at two of the YouTube channels I follow. Doesn't look too hard but you do need to have open slots in the electric panel.


----------



## rachels.haven

Dh likes them. We would indeed still have to call an electrician. He could do it himself(I think... 🤔 He's replaced a whole box/panel before when our forclosed Redford house's one caught fire and got it passed) but in Mass I believe all diy electric and plumbing is illegal (hopefully ac is not now that I think of it) But getting an electrician to hardwire the thing in is less scary than talking to a ac salesman. We have an appropriate outlet there already so most of the electrical is already in place.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

I bought a portable  AC unit that cools,  and  automatically  dehumidifiers, also will heat the room  in winter, covers 600 sq foot room, runs quiet and is under $600 on amazon...plug it in, attach the vent hose to the window insert and done?.so far I love it...energy efficient  too !
Nice looking unit on wheels and can be used anywhere, also filters the air...
Turbo Greenland 14000 BTU,


----------



## rachels.haven

That's a nice one. I'll bring it up. We may have to wait for it to come back into stock or compare units. Apparently it's nice enough that one sold out.


----------



## B&B Happy goats

rachels.haven said:


> That's a nice one. I'll bring it up. We may have to wait for it to come back into stock or compare units. Apparently it's nice enough that one sold out.


I know several people who have them and love them...I am very pleased with mine for the dog lounge( which is almost finished ) can hardly wait to get everything situated and construction done !


----------



## rachels.haven

B&B Happy goats said:


> I know several people who have them and love them...I am very pleased with mine for the dog lounge( which is almost finished ) can hardly wait to get everything situated and construction done !



That's awesome. I hope we get to see a done photo to show off your work when it's completed.
We're going to do something with our AC situation-and something soon. 
Currently it is 56 degrees and chilly so everyone is getting a reprieve, but we haven't forgotten.


----------



## Deecarter

rachels.haven said:


> Hi out there! Normally I don't really care to share much and would much rather hear about others' adventures, but I'm having a lapse of normal judgement, so I think I'm going to start my thread. I've kept yard birds of various forms for a long time, but just started keeping rabbits, and when writing up pedigrees you need a rabbitry name, so this year when I decided to start breeding rabbits in earnest we became Firebird Gardens. We are very much not a farm, unfortunately. We live in a suburb of Detroit, on an acre that I've filled with fruit trees and vines and bushes and a large, fenced in vegetable garden, and every year the lady muscovy stuff our yard with more ducklings than I want to count. I typically put male ducklings in the freezer by 16 weeks and the female ducklings get sold to others who have had losses the previous winter or who are just getting started. The beef duck is great, but I really love my drake Elvis, and Cocoa is not so bad a character, just a little chubby and lazy. The girls are pinchy and huffy and all obsessed with eggs to the point of having little personality, so they typically don't get names, but I definitely know who they are. This year I kept 5 females back. Two are solid chocolate to go with my drake Cocoa, and two are cream pied, one is lavender pied. Elvis carries dilute genes, so his ducklings wind up fun and surprising colors.
> 
> We also breed red English Orpington chickens. They are currently mostly preoccupied laying eggs and fighting with the pilgrim geese through the fence, so there's not much to talk about them right now. They're a great meat and egg breed for this far north, although I admit, I always make sure they have at least 10 hours of light and food and water always in the shed so they stay fat and lay all year after molt. This is my first year lighting the shed. For the last few years the hens got skinny in the winter, so I'd worm them and just pray they'd make it. This year I decided to try lengthening the days with a single puck LED so they'd have more time to eat and drink, and lo and behold, my birds stayed nice and fat, and after molt, they resumed laying at a decent rate. We also have a 4 gallon horizontal chicken nipple bucket with an aquarium heater in it so they never go without clean water, ducks or no ducks. That whole setup is sitting in a stainless steel stock feed pan, so said ducks don't turn my shed into a slop house and frostbite heaven when they get bored.
> 
> My mini rexes came into the picture two years ago when I decided I wanted something that actually let me hold it. And I'm allergic to cats, and minorly allergic to dogs, so something else was going to have to fill the void. I got a broken black doe with fantastic fur quality from my Mom, turned her into a sort of house pet (I despise frozen water bottle and crock season that much). Later I bred her to one of my mom's very nice bucks, and got the black doe (we call her Apple) I currently have. Much later I got a very nice breeding pair of red mini rexes from my Mother, who needed the cage space.
> 
> At the moment, both of my does live indoors. Kits raised inside with my two preschoolers running around wind up pretty much bombproof and are very handleable for showing (how do you not constantly hold baby rabbits that live in the house?) so the does will probably stay in for now, at least until the weather warms.
> 
> My bucks, I'm not sure what I will do with them. Right now they are in due to winter, but I'd like to have an outdoor setup later, at least in the garage. Probably going to build a cage rack and tuck it away back with the rest of my animal stuff. My red buck, who the kids have named Benjamin Buck Bunny (oops, didn't name him fast enough) will not potty train, so he's going back to a wire cage, which I don't normally like looking at in my house, but this is an exception in the name of sanitation. He's sweet and loves the kids and to be handled, but potties absolutely everywhere in his cage EXCEPT for his litter box no matter where you move it, so in the name of sanitation, I think he needs to be housed like a proper rabbit, not whatever it is I've turned the females into. My other buck is a tiny black otter (Beaman Buck Bunny, also lost that naming war) and he does potty train, but does not enjoy people. Both bucks are upstairs in my front room due to some husband related de-contstruction that was going on last night in my basement where I was housing them for the winter away from the does. We have bunnies due the first few days of February, and man, I've missed that. I grew up with parents breeding meat rabbits, so there were always babies around (and they just in the last 8 years or so switched to mini rex). My kids are terrified of bald baby bunnies because they're not cute like ducklings or chicks when they "hatch". The kids also think rabbits lay eggs, and for now I think I'll leave it that way.
> 
> We have geese too. They are pilgrims, and I might be selling them when I get to the end of my patience with them if my mom doesn't want them. This fighting with all other birds thing is really not fun for them. They deserve to be walking the yard, picking at what's left of our grass, and instead the breeding season has rendered them pen birds. This is our first year with them, and normally the yard is fairly peaceful right now, but the geese want to fight through the fence and the chickens are loving it ALL DAY LONG (what's the deal with those dense, crotchety, war-mongering, ridiculously fluffy hens?!). Honestly, if the chickens weren't the ones making the eggs my family prefers I'd probably just have my muscovy duckers and I definitely wouldn't have the geese.
> 
> I'm thinking of adding a pair of dairy goats to our mix. Our township allows it, I can build a decent sized shed for them, and I've got plenty of time to care for them every day, but I've got an entire fence line of 30 foot trees to clear all by myself so I can replace the old field fencing and put up a goat pen to keep the goats out of my fruit trees. The husband is not yet on board with the goats, so hiring to do the clearing is not in the budget. Last year I did about 20 feet of it, which came out to be about a dozen large sumac trees to burn (yes, I CAN do it!). This year I might get a chainsaw, but for now I'm using a bow saw and a hatchet.  Unfortunately we only burned 2/3 of the wood before the snow came and now we have one of our hundreds of groundhogs living under the pile. I'm probably going to enlarge our burn pit and just move the pile into it and burn it one of these days when I get a chance. I wish I could clear faster, but I can't take down trees with kids in the yard, so last fall I used their TV time to do trees every day, and I'd do one or two per day, saw them up into light enough pieces, and drag them back to the pile for stacking. The kids are no longer into TV, so we'll see what happens this year. I might have to be a weekend warrior and make DH watch them. Maybe I'll negotiate for some budget and get some help. It won't be cheap, is the main problem. It's hard work, the property is very long, and felling trees makes lots and lots of burn wood. I'm definitely rounding up what I've already done because those trees are trying to return with a vengeance, as sumac trees tend to do.
> 
> Well, that's that right now. I'll get pictures of everything later. My two year old broke the camera as his major accomplishment this week and we're not smart phone users, so I either get to use my kindle's camera, which comes out grainy, or maybe try to turn my laptop webcam into a camera somehow, which I'm less optimistic about. I think I'll just get a new camera...but that takes time, and I just used up all of my "I feel like being on the computer" time for today already.
> 
> So hi out there, if anyone reads this! And sorry for the lack of photos.


I have a suggestion if and when you decide to get goats.  I think the Nigerian Dwarfs would work great with your set up and they are small goats and easier to handle.  I plan on getting some maybe next year and selling my registered nubians because they are big goats and a bit more than I can handle by myself.  There are also miniature nubians that you might consider.  Good luck on those trees.  I can't imagine how you do that!


----------



## rachels.haven

Deecarter said:


> I have a suggestion if and when you decide to get goats.  I think the Nigerian Dwarfs would work great with your set up and they are small goats and easier to handle.  I plan on getting some maybe next year and selling my registered nubians because they are big goats and a bit more than I can handle by myself.  There are also miniature nubians that you might consider.  Good luck on those trees.  I can't imagine how you do that!


What feels like a million years later I've settled on lamancha goats with a subset of a dwarf herd...and a nubian or two that I'm not sure what to do with. I've had lots of fun...um, "deciding".


----------



## Deecarter

rachels.haven said:


> What feels like a million years later I've settled on lamancha goats with a subset of a dwarf herd...and a nubian or two that I'm not sure what to do with. I've had lots of fun...um, "deciding".


I'm learning too, and it can be stressful, but I love this animal babies.


----------



## Mike CHS

The "deciding" is what makes it rewarding for us amateurs.


----------



## rachels.haven

It looks like you're not allowed to install your own ac in Mass beyond say, a portable or window unit. But it also looks like the state has a program that makes utility company give you some compensation for installing energy efficient AC...maybe it won't be so bad. We're going to do it.


----------



## Bruce

It has cooled off now so you don't need A/C


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm not concerned about it, but today the second floor began falling through in the back half of the barn. In the front half I have 50 bales. I'd worry more if it was up there, lol.
Here we are in the front half of the barn, doing a photo shoot of Lace, who is STILL here. She wants to be a show goat. Also, I found a hernia with intestine in it on her buckling on Saturday, so he went to the meat buyer asap before it could cause him grief, and she is now on my milk string. She only spilled about a third of the milk and kicked the bucket 4 or 5 times, lol. Butthead. But she is pretty. (Ignore my feet and yoga pants and the dirty stall please. I'm so glad no one is in there currently). EVERYTHING is perfect about her now but her attitude and scur.


----------



## Bruce

Nice farming footwear there Rachel 

Sounds like that barn really does want to come down. I imagine if parts start falling other parts will soon follow since there is a shift in support from the displacement. So sad but sometimes it is the best choice.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'd love it to stay up until I got it taken down, but yes, it is going. It looks like the foundation is big rocks they picked from the field (then later covered with a thin layer of cement) and they may have mounded in the back with dirt or manure and with the heavy rains we've been getting the dirt appears to be washing away and the rear building wall appears to be leaning more and more to the left and taking half the second floor with it. The side you'd see from the house is the good one. They redid half of the wall with the doors and it is trying and taking more and more of the weight. The buried north wall and the short west side are working on their two weeks notice. I stay out of it most of the time. If the building falls, the cats will get out (I mean, unless it like gets stomped on by a giant...), we will be needing to clean up and recover what we can, then schedule the rest of the demo and cleanup asap. We'll be okay. I keep thinking I should probably move my milk stand soon. That would be the hardest thing in there to replace...but I guess we don't have a lot else in there.

Moses wants the building to fall sooner rather than later because I got his retrieving dummy stuck on the roof. Now who's the dummy?


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Can you get a shed or something to store the stuff you have in there now until you can get a new barn built? The fewer times you have to go inside is fewer chances it can fall on you. Maybe get all the stuff out (and cats) and push it down with a tractor since it's coming down already?


----------



## rachels.haven

I'll do something soon. I'm afraid we'd have to have a permit even to pull it down with a tractor. Our neighbor would probably love to report any violations, so just in case. It's also about a 40x100 building, which would be a large feat with just a tractor. As soon as I get the estimates from the barn people and we get a date on the calendar I will get scheduled with a demo crew (and they will pull permits and deal with the legal junk). We got some coops, a 8x10 shed (bucks) and a 8x20 shed (does) to get everyone moved into. After I do that the machine shed will be open and I could probably get out of that if it started to fall or even pull stands outside every time, which would be better. I have options. I'll start working on it very soon now since things are starting to fall. I was waiting to put up pens around the sheds until the fence guy came back so the shed pens wouldn't get in the way, but I'm starting to wonder if we got massed again. Supposedly they're coming at the end of the week. I'd like that. I'm feeling a little down on humanity in that regard.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

hang in there!

Can you pre-emptively let the county know it's falling down so the nasty neighbor doesn't spread tales to get you in trouble? Might want some caution tape or keep out signs for the barn to CYA.


----------



## rachels.haven

Good ideas. I didn't think about signage. Those should go up if things are hazardous because of the way trespassing laws work. Forgot about that. I'll do some homework on calling the town and if they could drum up trouble if it did fall on it's own.


----------



## Baymule

Maybe the barn will go ahead and fall soon. Get whatever you have in there OUT and DONT go back in!


----------



## Bruce

Is there any good wood/beams in that barn? If so it would be worth telling the demo guys to take it apart, not demolish it. You could likely build some good buildings with all that is there.


----------



## farmerjan

Any chance it is covered in your homeowners policy???? Maybe get some salvage out of it monetary wise????
Such a shame it was let go before you got the property... but I agree now... not worth saving...


----------



## rachels.haven

No, the building's not covered and we'll look at the idea of saving wood as it comes down. A lot of the wood is mushy because it's been exposed to a high humidity environment for a long time, but we could always take a sample. Maybe some of the thicker stuff? I'm putting up keep out signs tomorrow morning, and tonight DH and I decided to "evacuate" our stuff from the building so no one gets hit on the head by random falling concrete-probably this weekend if not sooner.
Even though insurance won't cover it and the wood may be rotted we still moved from an extremely expensive house to a...still expensive house but much less so (same market that helped us helped the seller here...except it helped us more, as the market kept rising). Our other house is under contract for substantially more than we bought it for. We'll still have to get the attention of a demo crew, but we believe we will be able to afford it either through extras from the house sale or income (or as soon as the house sells, money not being put into the other mortgage). It will be okay. Despite wanting it to work, we factored this in as a possible outcome when we bought the place-then at the request of the home inspector we used we brought in a structural engineer who's specialty and passion was old barns. The barn was always iffy. Moral of the story is, if you have an old chicken barn, don't hill up rocks and dirt behind it, give it a good foundation, reinforce with rebar when necessary, don't take out the cupola/fan system, don't take out the ventilation doors, don't replace the ventilation windows with wimpy storm windows, keep a "Sufficient" roof on the place (opposite of "insufficient", as the structural engineer called it), keep in mind that without stock in it barns freeze, and anything else I'm forgetting.
After the barn is down and the site is leveled we get to choose between fencing it and leaving the property as is, or building a barn there that is "good enough" for our purposes. Both will add to our quality of life and value to the house. We will probably go with the last one because we NEED a barn. Also, the most responsible course of action involving where we live is to stay here until the house is paid off and we have built up a good amount savings again like before we moved to mass-so maybe two years. We'll see if I last that long. I've already had several "I can't take it any longer, I'm leaving" ...moments.

It could be a lot worse for me. My hay guy has for the most part legally won the right to hay his own property in Groton, but now someone on the conservation commission is harassing him by calling animal control, the building department et c for non illegal farmy things. He wants to move, but he can't even think about it right now for multiple reasons. Stupid Groton. So he's going put up a privacy fence to protect himself from retaliating city officials that are mad because he went above them and got the legal right to use the land he bought, paid for, and pays taxes on.    and lumber is still quite high (so I'll pay that (only!) $1/bale increase for hay. I doubt it will help much, but I can't complain(plus everyone else is price gauging right now and he has the decency not to)). Maybe my hay price increase will pay for 3 fence posts.


----------



## rachels.haven

*I would like to add, that we don't actually plan on paying off the house early, just saving so we CAN pay the house off and have decent savings. We learned that this last time. When you don't like where you are, you don't want to pay ahead on the mortgage. Liquid assets are more helpful for the act of moving.


----------



## farmerjan

Especially with the low mortgage rates, let someone else's money work for you for very little cost.  I wanted to start paying extra on mine to get it paid off... but realized that it makes more sense to put extra money into the place and not "borrow" to do the work.... so will try to save what I can as well as do things here that need doing...

Sorry that there is no insurance recourse on the old chicken house.   And yes to all the things you listed.... people were not very smart to close off and not ventilate the building so the moisture accumulated / rot and deterioration happened.  But so many would not value a building like that... or consider the cost of replacing... so just use and abuse...Us homesteader/farmer/animal type people are getting to be fewer and  farther between....


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> Sorry that there is no insurance recourse on the old chicken house.   And yes to all the things you listed.... people were not very smart to close off and not ventilate the building so the moisture accumulated / rot and deterioration happened.  But so many would not value a building like that... or consider the cost of replacing... so just use and abuse...Us homesteader/farmer/animal type people are getting to be fewer and  farther between....


Could be worse. I think if they thought it was a usable farm outbuilding they'd charge us an arm and a leg. Someone down the road had a nicer one with no mound behind it (or paint) and it hadn't gotten the anti ventilation overhaul SO they turned it into a horse barn. It's not pretty but is nice to see. I can't say I didn't have slight "I wish" thoughts looking at it driving by. They DEFINITELY understood the need for ventilation. The cupola looks dinky and a little dumb, but I'm sure it does it's job. Overhauling them is definitely possible, but ours has lost too much ground.


----------



## Baymule

A barn like that, allowed to go to ruin. The previous owners ought to be placed in pig mud up to their necks, wearing a cow plop hat.


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> A barn like that, allowed to go to ruin. The previous owners ought to be placed in pig mud up to their necks, wearing a cow plop hat.


Except that they most likely didn't have a hundred thousand or two to fix it.



farmerjan said:


> Any chance it is covered in your homeowners policy?


No way, no insurance company would insure a building in that shape. Our barns are the same though not quite falling down.



rachels.haven said:


> except it helped us more, as the market kept rising


And your old house had a nice barn


----------



## rachels.haven

I think ignorance and bad, unconsulted diy did the barn in.
Yeah, things aren't great, but we're still rolling along. 
I don't miss the deerflies. I don't miss sitting in the barn during milking listening to the loud clouds of mosquitoes waiting to get bit through my jeans or hat (and they HURT). I don't miss numerous deer ticks. Despite it all we have seriously upgraded in the pestilence department.


----------



## rachels.haven

I got a new barn builder lead today. My horse neighbor told me to call her barn builder-just to do it. He's supposedly available in a few months, that she'd just spoken to him about us for me. Maps lists him as closed, so we didn't do it before. So today I left a call and a text and now I'm hoping and praying and hoping.


----------



## rachels.haven

The rain fallout from hurricane Elsa has re taught me that goats will not walk to the moldy barn to be milked in pouring rain. Aw well. Maybe we should dry off this year, and let everyone rest until we have a clean barn with pens and a nice place to milk up again.


----------



## Bruce

I thought goats didn't go out in a mist let alone a downpour.


----------



## rachels.haven

Mine do most and rain, but apparently not heavy rain. Poo.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today we moved the milk stands, the grain, the panels, and the chicken feed out of the barn. The hay, the garden tools, and the alfalfa pellets will be next. I'll be milking under the back deck. It's set up so water that goes though the deck goes onto a metal roof material piece, into a gutter by the house, then channelled away so the milkstand stuff and I won't get wet. Very molding in that building.
Spoke with neighbor recommended barn builder. Told me to expect an estimate next week followed by a time to come out and look at our soil. When I have the estimate I think we'll get the demo arranged. After all the yuck, spore clouds, and mushrooms...I think I'm at peace with it.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I finally have caught up on your journal again after my having been off the forum for awhile.

You are probably too young to having heard the old Buck Owens' song "Act Naturally".  (BTW, the Beatles did a version of that song as well.)  But I kept thinking of that song and how it applies to you.  It is not about you being lonely, though.  Instead, I was thinking of you being cast as the lead in the next _Wonder Woman_ movie. Forget Lynda Carter and Gal Gadot.  You will put them all to shame. And all you have to do is Act Naturally.  I got that idea from all of what you have accomplished in the months I was gone!  Whew!

It so warmed my heart when two of my favorite people on the forum, namely you and Miss @B&B Happy goats, were able to help each other out by her sending to you the dog Moses.  Then you had the big move, and now having all the fun of adjusting to your new place, with the barn falling down and the fun you are having with your neighbors.  Yet somehow you seem to take it all in stride.  You truly do Act Naturally.  

So I am so glad to now be up-to-date with you and your journal.  Thanks for letting all of us come along for the ride.

Senile Texas Aggie

In case you don't know the song and are interested, here is Buck Owens singing "Act Naturally":


----------



## Baymule

@Senile_Texas_Aggie what a lovely thing to say! Rachel is a BYH hero.


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, thank you @Senile_Texas_Aggie . I'll do my best to act naturally.
I have a great vet. Yesterday I found Dignity, Eri, my one mature dwarf doe's daughter laying in the hay under a rack looking floppy. I took her into the garage and she hada 107.5 temp. I worked with the vet over text and we got it down to 104 with meds on hand, no cost to me and little cost in time to her. Fingers crossed. She's a very nice nigerian doeling (with the typical nigerian attitude unfortunately). Goat body temp should be 102-103, so 104 isn't awful. More antibiotic, banamine, and b12 for her today. My baby was also being crabby, and I needed to make dinner, but somehow it all got done (including a bonus of DH installing a couple of window units to tide us over until we get our splits/mini splits installed).


----------



## Baymule

A regular miracle worker, that’s you. You are amazing with all that you do!


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, thanks.
Now how to I miracle the fence back up and a barn in?

I have chickens coming down with neurological symptoms so yesterday DH was incredibly kind to me, took off work halfway through the day, and we took a live ailing chicken down (up.) to Durham, NH to NHVDL to be put down and autopsied to check for marek's. We went to NewCastle Beach in NH along the way home. It was a nice, quiet, for children beach (so, of course DH swam out deep and got his feet cut up on rocks coming back, and my older son didn't swim out deep and did the same, lol, time for beach shoes, I guess). No sign of Marek's would be nice, but I've decided I WILL be okay/numb either way. We had a nice beach day.

I took Dignity up to the vet's house on her day off for a quick look over so we can switch her to Bio-myacin instead of agri-cillin because her fever is not going lower than 104-105. I will be ordering my own new bottle of both. I have the best vet and I don't know how I got so blessed. She only charged me $26 for the visit and full syringes. (and she has the best dairy cross doe and boer cross doelings, that she showed off. One is so dappled she looks like she is covered in python skin and they are all so, so wide, tenki, and pretty)

Come on Dignity! I am secretly (now not so secretly) keeping a few dwarves still because even though he hasn't detectably lost more vision yet, at some point my husband will lose his drivers' license. I would like to have small goats to fall back on because no matter how hard it is and no matter what he says at that point I'd like to move us to a place where there is good public transportation, and I feel like tiny doe goats and a semen tank are my best bet. I may be saying goodbye to stock animals completely at that point, but a girl can dream. Independence is important. He's spoiling and indulging me now (or trying to). I'd like to return the favor.

But I am being very, very selective on dwarves. I have Eri, her daughter, and one of Sugar's babies from the Ava line named Jarah (and 3 bucks).  I'd like to lean hard into the Old Mountain Farm Ram-Beau and Sugar Moon lines that are available to me here. Hopefully they will produce things that will meet my expectations.


----------



## rachels.haven

*snort* might be Promised land Ramb-beau. I can't keep my nigerians straight (the good nigie herds are GREAT at marketing, lol). It feels like there's a new hottie herd every year. I'm trying to go for good temperament, sound build, high production with teats at least as long as my thumb, and as good conformation as I can get in that package.


----------



## rachels.haven

Another hot day.





Mo is in the harness of shame to go with the flexi lead of shame because he's decided we need to reteach recall. I suspect a neighbor dog is wrapping up a heat. All the neighbor dogs have gone crazy lately. Things are just starting to quiet down and Moses came for the first time without being reeled in yesterday. I do not think he feels too ripped off. Life is pretty good if you're a dog.


----------



## rachels.haven

Btw, I love Moses. He scouts out those big ants and any decent sized flies and stomps them to death and eats them (although he has been killing someone's honey bees outside). And he eats fallen food from the kids. Perfect combo.


----------



## rachels.haven

Since last post the 7 mo old has begun barking. English is too complicated.
I also got a migraine (baby not big on sleeping through the night lately) and when I get a migraine I tend to make impulsive decisions so I went to premier one, got it cleared with DH, and bought an electric netting fence kit and extra roll of fence for the goats. It's time to strip graze. Forget the fence guys for now. We will make a stink about it if they don't get to us this year (a big stink, that electric net fence is expensive and so was the real wire fence).


----------



## farmerjan

So sorry about the fence guys.  I cannot understand people, but it seems it is common with so many now, to not do what they say and stand behind their work.  No excuse in my book... but common.  

Yeah, the electric netting fence is not cheap, but will give you so many options for the area and at least it will save you money in hay now.... 

Hate to ask, but any word on the barn situation?


----------



## rachels.haven

I will get in touch with the barn man some time next week. I want that estimate.


----------



## rachels.haven

1 long nap later and migraine has mostly ended (after symptoms will last for the next few days, but whatever). I made dinner (late) and it's time to go back to bed. Before turning in I checked on Digie before her second dose of her antibiotic and she is down and normal. YAY! It looks like we may lose our Dignity.


----------



## rachels.haven

Tonight on the funny farm (indoors).


----------



## rachels.haven

A few seconds and a zoom learning curve later. I think I may have my hands full with this one.


----------



## rachels.haven

...and yes, he did, in case you're wondering. That'll teach me to eat ice cream in the kitchen and not supervise him.








This update also went to the grandmas. They need to be warned.
Now, to construct a Shaun pen.


----------



## rachels.haven

On a more serious note, today my chromebook decided to stop turning on, the baby teethed and screamed at me another day (tooth #3!), the guy who does the barn estimates was off last week so more waiting, I discovered what probably made Diggie sick (doing better) and found that despite open doors and windows, the barn molded the outside of 30/50 bales of hay(hay man said he'd split the 100 bale delivery after seeing my barn and said he'd deliver the other half later because he is smarter than I am and a kind person), and i found the top half of a large oak tree on the fence from all the rain (in a place the goats had already pulled it out/down)🙁. And it was a biggie of a migraine, so I was not quite ready to take on a tree top even if angry baby was tired of chewing me out for giving him teeth and willing to be content for long enough. So I was down and mad and overwhelmed and ready to give up. So I told my husband who was working afterhours on a work problem. Being the good nature's guy that he is he went out and found my big bow saw from felling trees of heaven in Redford and took an hour or so to cut the necessary ten feet or so of bows off the half a giant tree top that had apparently only fallen parallel to the fence and laid SOME of it's branches on top. We don't have to move the bigger than a man part today or ever.
Tomorrow I need to find some non moldy pallets and get ready to store new hay. Let's try the garage for now. Just like in Redford. Minus the legions of rats, of course.

Long day. 

So yes, I tried to escape the baby to eat my desert in solitude and he scooted around, found a pencil, and drew on the wall at 7 months. Aw well.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I think I may have my hands full with this one.


And you thought Danger Dan was a handful!
You did have one bad awful day yesterday, hopefully today dawns brighter.


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, thanks. I wish I could limit the bad days that have long term consequences. Let's skip the sick goats and unusable buildings, dead electronics and stick to kids tearing up the house or being late, bad laundry day or similar. Yesterday's events list has a whole page of "at least" to go with it though.


----------



## farmerjan

Waiting on the next installment....

Seriously, the baby is ADORABLE.....he is very alert and with it acting..... and yep, writing on the wall is FUN......

How are the other 2 little "darlings" doing?????

Wish I could help with the migraine  though.....


----------



## rachels.haven

The older two are being amazingly low maintenance right now. They love the yard and their room and the pasture. If they are bored they find something to do (all night long if we let them). I never thought we'd get to that point with them.
My husband also got them a hammock to go on hooks he found in the front yard by the little goldfish pond and if they get bored of what they regularly do they go play tip or magic carpet or more tip on that. Dan still wants essentially a tiny Holstein. Aiden still loves everything as long as he can ask all the questions he can dream up. They are in good shape.

The chicken test came back. Nothing abnormal to note outside of lice. Time to treat tonight and clean.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's not to say the boys are quiet or peaceful. No they are loud. And they fight like brothers. 
The pond swimming areas around here have been fun for the boys too. Every so often we make the trek to the ocean like we did on chicken test day. I just need an excuse to drag us all there.


----------



## Baymule

Yup, Dan needs a bottle Jersey heifer. Then he could condition her to milking, leading on a halter and all the attention he could lavish on her. Maybe after a new barn?

I love the hammock idea, i bet the boys are enjoying that!


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, I'm starting to think about doing something like that for a birthday someday soon if we ever get settled and a good fence. This passing fancy does not appear to be going to pass and if I get him the cow, I may get to pick it to make sure it's a good one rather than an auction heartbreak special or something he sneaks off to get on his own with no experience or caution in a year or two while I'm not looking. I don't see ourselves with a huge dairy cow herd though. He's going to have to temper that notion.


----------



## Bruce

I don't think anyone is going to sell a person of Danger Dan's age a cow without parental input!


----------



## rachels.haven

I still don't trust Dan. Plus, there's always the ultimate enabler, Grandma.


----------



## rachels.haven

...it's only a little cow, after all.


----------



## rachels.haven

Buck spa day. I spent an hour doing hooves, copper, selenium, with a famacha check on the six of them. The young dwarves were the rowdiest cry babies... I love the soil here in regards to hoof health. It's been 3, 4 months since last trim and they have been wearing down without too much rot despite the daily down pours.
I ordered sheep rabies vaccines. The vets use them on goats here.

Next I will work my way through the does with copper, selenium, and hoof trims.

I really want individual pictures of all the goats. I may harass the other half. Pics on your own doesn't work well.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hello, 
My name is Emi, and you are my best friend. No, I am not perfect, but you are amazing either way. Let's go have an adventure.
Here I am with my best friend, Eri. Off camera is my best friend, Lace. Also, so are my best friends, the little boys. Later I will go hang out with my other best friends in the pen. Everyone is my best friend, except Mallow, who likes to butt and bite my tail. But that's okay, because my best friends Summer and Lacey take care of her when she does that. Eri and I are at the bottom of the pecking order, but I don't care because life is a big social party. Except when Mallow is tied and Eri and I are not (we stay close by). Then Eri and I stand on either sides of Mallow and take turns butting heads with her when she tries to get us. It's so fun.


----------



## Bruce

I still think they need REAL ears! 



rachels.haven said:


> Plus, there's always the ultimate enabler, Grandma.


Oops, there goes the adult requirement. I'm sure Grandma can't help but give the boys what they want at YOUR house.


----------



## rachels.haven

They have ears. They are tiny and cute and pointed. And when you cross them with something else you get bigger tiny pointed ears. From what I understand tips up is cookie ears and down is elf ears.


----------



## Bruce

Like I said, REAL ears 
I think the Nubians stole the Lamancha ears.


----------



## Baymule

Nah, Rachel cut them off and made sandwiches.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, the dwarves caught the particularly slow lamanchas and grabbed their ears and stretched them out, producing Noobers, and I think we love them both.


----------



## rachels.haven

Proof of hammock.


----------



## Finnie

rachels.haven said:


> A few seconds and a zoom learning curve later. I think I may have my hands full with this one.
> View attachment 86956


If he learns any tricks from his big brother Dan, then you are definitely going to have your hands full!


----------



## Baymule

Of course they stand on it. Surfing?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yep.
They be boys. Why relax? What's that?
Although I think in this one they are both being superman fighting Lex Luther and the ticks.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Lol mine are younger then yours ajd they would go for this. However being five and three i would have to say no hammocks for awhile lol.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, hammock party, then we bet jelly beans on how long until the first kid gets hurt, then  how long until try two. They'd have a blast, bruises and all.


----------



## Jesusfreak101

Lol i like it


----------



## rachels.haven

(and I'd bet my beans on Dan being the first injury, btw, sorry, I reread that and realized I didn't make that clear.)


----------



## Bruce

Well you don't call him Danger Dan for nothing!


----------



## rachels.haven

The netting came on Saturday night and we put it up Sunday as soon as the rain stopped. I attached it to the existing machine shed pen. It was interesting to see who the thick, stubborn, belligerent goats are as the fence came on. The one bitey Sugar baby dwarf had to be shocked again and again and again. I think she has an authority issue. Lace tried to fight with the fence, then stand on it, then posture at it all evening and Mallow tried to bit the netting down first thing, full mouth. That went GREAT. Bailey learned the fence and is now afraid of all the fencing, cattle panels included. Poor dear is very sensitive (bless her sweet, soft food guarding heart). Moses learned the fence this morning from the outside of the enclosure while running loose. He is not sensitive, lol. Loud, but not afraid. He hasn't been shocked twice though so I guess he's figured it out. I think I'm confident enough to run electric polywire around our boundary line a few times now. The fence people say we're "next" on the list, so as soon as they come and go I will start the "stay off the fence" electric wires.

Another tree top fell on the fence, a maple this time, about 20 feet from the last. Just like the last time, if the fence had been tight and not unraveling nothing would have been damaged/changed. I'm going to get bar and chain oil today and get out my electric chainsaw and deal with the tree tops. I'm suspicious if we stay for any length of time I'll need to budget a lot to take down as many trees as I can from that area. It appears to be becoming too wet with our soggy and hot climate. (soil doesn't hold water, but we're getting a whole lot of it)


----------



## rachels.haven

In the mean time we have a thick white cloud of haze and an airquality alert. MassAir rates our air today as "unhealthy" and it's starting to trigger my asthma to boot. We had an alert yesterday too and off and on last week, but this today is comparable to the smog I got to live in while going to college in an urban valley. I'm amused people consider this area "rural". Is there a wildfire or something? Although it smells a bit like ozone or hot metal out there and not smoke.


----------



## Baymule

The evening news shows a map of the western fire’s smoke being carried on wind currents to the east coast. That means you. What about getting one of those painters breathing things that filter out the fumes? Can’t think of the name of the darn thing and too lazy to go outside in the 99F temps to look at mine.

I have an electric chainsaw too! I love it, it’s light weight, the Husquavarna we have is too heavy for me.


----------



## rachels.haven

That makes sense. I've got to get new filters for our air purifiers or filters or whatever. They haven't been used since we left the moldy house, but they will help inside. I'll look into painters options for outside. Too bad I don't have a barn. I'd go to war with the air quality if I could shut everyone in closed stalls.
I know it on the weight for power tools. We got electric for chainsaw and weed wacker because carrying all that weight for potentially hours is unnecessary difficulty and I'm willing to stop for a charge every few hours as a trade. I'd rather not carry the gas around. The weed wacker is great (just need to find the battery after the move, lol). I'm hoping the chainsaw will be too.


----------



## Baymule

I can’t cut big trees down, but I can trim limbs and cut smaller trees.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's probably wise. I'm not going to be doing the big trees either. Trees over a certain size I think should involve an expert. Costly, but living is the goal.


----------



## Margali

I just got the milwaukee m18 electric chainsaw. I'll post how it goes. I'm with you on weight of gas powered.


----------



## Baymule

Not to mention having to yank that durned rope to get a gas powered chainsaw started! I can't pull rope anything, never have had that magic touch and at this point, it's highly doubtful that I ever will.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Is there a wildfire or something? Although it smells a bit like ozone or hot metal out there and not smoke.


Fires in the US west coast AND in Quebec. We are getting smoke from both. I don't notice any smoke smell but the sun this morning was a very ruddy red.


----------



## farmerjan

We have had some of that hazy reddish clouds and they said ours was from the smoke from the fires out west too....


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

No smoke down this way in Arkansas.  Regarding the battery powered chainsaw, we own both a gas powered and battery one.  We bought the gas one first -- a Stihl MS251C.  It works great, but a bit heavy.  Last year we bought a DeWalt 20V battery powered one.  It is so much lighter than the gas powered one and I don't have to yank on a rope, either.  It is the one I carry in the tractor all of the time.  My wife is not afraid of using it, either, versus the Stihl.

Hope you can get through the bad air.


----------



## rachels.haven

It took a few weeks, but I got a barn estimate. The estimate is not great but okay. The man my neighbor referred me to came through. Then he gave me the number of a man who does demos. Maybe we can get the ball rolling on this?
If I can have a barn before spring I may still breed the goats this year.


----------



## rachels.haven

Emotional roller coaster yesterday.
Apparently the demo and site work man the barn guy wants me to use is retired and said the last barn down would be his last barn. He says if his partner likes the barn they'll take it down. Also, the only reason to demolish a building is for the lumber and salvage materials. Our barn has a new metal roof and lots of wood, but it's big and the materials are "hard to get to", so who knows.
The barn man is coming out on Monday after work.
I got a second report back from the lab I sent the dead chicken into a few weeks back late in the evening. Apparently the $100 I paid covers a preliminary exam and then a deeper exam where they mount cross sections of organ tissue on slides. They found multicentric lymphoma throughout the birds system, suggesting either mareks or leukosis. I don't believe in breeding either of those things so it looks like I'm need to depopulate and not keep chickens while here. Watching the few I have had get sick so far pitter out has kind of taken the fun out of things anyway. I hope we didn't spread anything, and I'll take measures to not spread it in the future. Maybe I'll find some layer ducks for the time being if I miss eggs I guess. My extra roosters went to a nice man of Asian descent looking for black meat birds. I think I have about 12 to do in left counting one of the sick ones. Not sure hens are worth meat. I'm not sure where whatever it is we have came from, if we brought it in recently with the new chicks, or it came with the new place, or the new used coop. I guess it doesn't matter. The lab check was worth it.


----------



## rachels.haven

The doe mini barn has a floor covering, troughs, a mineral feeder, and shavings. It needs bucket hooks and a panel fence. That will wait until I get the bucks' mini barn caught up. Then I will pound more posts.


----------



## Baymule

I'm sorry about your chickens. That's tough, you are wondering where it came from, did you do anything wrong and you feel bad about it. Sometimes things are just out of our hands.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm proud to have been an Iowan.




We managed coyotes properly and didn't have a problem.


----------



## rachels.haven

Note to self: I'm allergic to black flies/buffalo gnats. I inhaled a whole bunch on Sunday and the consequences have been bad. The initial can't breath feeling mostly went away after about 24 hours, but MAN I'd like the massively runny eyes, nose, and the hives to quit. Last night I caved and we took a midnight run for benadryl-i hate that stuff, as it makes me completely loopy. The dam was up holding back the tears washing my sinuses last night, but apparently I want to just keep reacting and reacting and reacting...
Last time I did this it was milder and took a week to clear. I guess I was being warned.
For now I'm taking a bandanna with me and at least wearing it in the dark when they are worst. I tried a covid mask and the flies try to creep under. You can tuck in a bandanna. I may see if one of those screen mosquito hats work too, but I'm concerned the bugs are small enough to fit.
Man, this is going to take a bite out if my productivity...
As a result I haven't killed any chickens in time for garbage day. Or really done anything of note.  Those gnats are so gross.

However the benadryl has had sort of a lingering effect so I should be back on top of my game in the next day or two.


----------



## Baymule

Those things are horrible. I used to spritz my hens with vanilla. The gnats didn’t like vanilla. Might work for you, if it doesn’t you’ll smell like a batch of cookies right out of the oven!


----------



## rachels.haven

@Baymule 
GASP, if that works my herd (and me) are going to smell AMAZING. Extract or imitation?

On another note, I hung two buckets in the doe barn and ordered wood to hang the hay feeders. My other half has been having a hard time lately at work, so I may not go get the 8 2x4x8's and other hooks until the weekend. He's in no state for kid watching or ride alongs and baby+2 rowdy boys are not something I can tote to the hardware store at the moment.

I also fixed Atlas's collar as his neck is getting ripped for rut and should probably get stinky and recheck the rest, but it's tricky because they are randy and I have to keep them all in line when I go in. They basically have to come out one at a time for work, because nothing gets done when I go in. Atlas is now my tallest buck. Also, it looks like Buggy has a swollen teat I have to look at. That's going to be fun. His neck is too fat for the wonderful, immobilizing stand, so he has to be tied and that lets his hind quarters wander more than I'd like when doing necessary things to him.


----------



## Baymule

Extract. I also hung those vanilla scented yellow Christmas tree automobile air fresheners in the coop.


----------



## rachels.haven

heheheh. I'm going to make things smell so good!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Geez, Louise, you can't seem to get a break!  There is a YouTube channel I watch called "GP Outdoors", who is located in Ontario, Canada.  The guy who produces it encounters black flies which bite.  He wears a face and body covering when the flies are out.  If I can can locate a video showing him wearing one, I will post on your journal.  He said he got his at a sporting goods store.  

A link to a hat with a mosquito net is here.

Good news for your barn build -- lumber prices are falling.  Here is a YouTube video produced by a guy who works for a wood products wholesale company you may find interesting.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

As promised.  Their wearing the black fly protection gear starts at 1:50.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

I put one of those hats on order. Thanks!
We got another site work man to come and look at it. He lives about 5 doors down and used to be a cattleman, now does pumpkins and landscaping, demo, building, site work etc c. Waiting for an estimate now. He says because of the cement floor upstairs it will be high. The other house will help pay for that, I guess.
He also suggested trying to restore the barn and get a little more time out of it, but it's deteriorating fast (although not in super noticable ways). The back wall and floor under it is down another half an inch. My eyes about popped out of my head. That floor used to be flat...er.

More electric fence came today. This weekend I want the does and if possible the bucks in their winter quarters.

Trying to upload a picture of my mom's and sister's Muscovy. They are out of my flock and they finally let them hatch and these are the spawn...but the phone keeps telling me "parsing failed response" so I guess that will have to wait until I get home.


----------



## rachels.haven

Offspring of my duck flock in TN.


----------



## Baymule

Such barn woes! I don’t envy you.
The ducks are lovely.


----------



## rachels.haven

We'll hash through it. Selling the last house when we did created a good sized windfall. We need good people related resources badly. At the very least I'd like the barn down. I don't really want to watch it fall down slowly. That would be depressing. IDK if a building has dignity, but, you know.

The neighbor who did the site work is also apparently a town powerhouse so he went and found out who complained to animal control for us since we were so inhibited. Turns out, contrary to what the ACO said, it was not ALL our neighbors calling her, complaining and saying they hate us and don't like us et c.. It was one. One of the big box McMansion people to the left of the property, the only one that was living there at the time. Whether they were calling night and day, I don't care. He also says we shouldn't worry about it. We need to register as a farm with town hall (that is unfortunately understaffed because of a town scandal when everyone decent quit because the town admin was abusing power and other things I don't want to hear about) As soon as we CAN do that we will, and believe me, come Monday we will try (neighbor came Friday evening, got back in touch via text Saturday). Right now there is no one to register with, no ag administrator, no ag inspector, and no ag council or ag anything. Then after we do that whenever someone tries to pull that we tell them, sorry, we're a food producing farm (our own food) and we need our working dog to work. We still plan to lock her up at night for the duration of our stay here because we only have one lgd and predators are thick here so she can have a break but we won't be uptight about it. We are partially having issues because the ACO is trying to take over the Ag department and our huge house neighbor is trying to protect his property value from our farming... Neither issue is in our hands or particularly our fault and we will just keep rolling.

Neighbor also confirms the story that a few years ago the small coyotes here were indeed replaced by very large ones (he says 70+ lbs) and he (and the state police officer down the street) takes them out whenever he can, especially when he hays his various properties. And he also warned me that we have a ridiculous number of large, bold bobcats as well. Both used to take his calves if he didn't lock them up in the barn for calving (bite onto back and rip up their sides with their claws). So locking up at night is probably a good idea anyway. Mass has wildlife problems.


----------



## farmerjan

And the wildlife "problems" are out of control in Mass BECAUSE of a..holes like the McMansion neighbors that want to stop all the hunting and all the tree hugger idiots that just "love the wildlife".... until the deer start eating their expensive shrubbery...

I feel for you up there in that cluster......k.  

Sounds like the neighbor that looked at the barn, and has good farming background, is a great person to know.  That is good for you.  And a practical person to be "dispatching"  any and all the predators that they can.  The thing is with the bigger coyotes and all... they become a possible problem with the people too... kids and smaller mammals.  Yeah, probably smart to keep the goats penned at night for their own safety and giving the dog a break.


----------



## rachels.haven

Funny you should mention that, @farmerjan  one went after a lady on the beach on the cape recently. But they're harmless, surely you know that? We're all imagining everything. Us and that woman and the boaters that rescued her.
https://www.centredaily.com/news/nation-world/national/article253141603.html


----------



## farmerjan

If these people would just use some common sense they would realize that if humans keep expanding their territory, and the wildlife keep losing their territory, there is going to come a time where the wildlife is going to lose their fear of the humans, they are going to get more bold with raiding garbage, they are going to attack the smaller dogs and cats,,,,,, and lo and behold, they are going to get aggressive towards bigger prey, namely humans.  There is only 1 solution for an animal like that... plus many times if they start to get too aggressive it is because of them having health issues.... fleas, mange,worms, and then even rabies.... 
Other than humans there are no other real predators of coyotes... so they are left to be able to multiply and then the next thing you know there are too many for the habitat.  

But.... oh, they are a part of nature, we can all live together..... Glad that she was able to get rescued... what is going to happen with the next time with a littler kid......


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> That would be depressing. IDK if a building has dignity, but, you know.


Yep, I know. Some people spent a LOT of time and energy building those old barns. They have character. Not the same as a metal sided pole barn at all.



rachels.haven said:


> one went after a lady on the beach on the cape recently. But they're harmless, surely you know that?


OK, that is some scary. I wonder if the coyote was rabid. Doesn't make sense to go alone after "prey" that is substantially larger than you.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

In 1999 my Beautiful Gal and I moved from Dallas, TX, to Oceanside, CA, northwest of San Diego, so that I could return to work for the company for whom I worked while living in Warren Robins, GA.  Even though I am a native Texan, and except for that year at Oceanside, have resided in the South all of my life, I had wanted to escape the heat in Texas.  So we moved there.  The weather was so nice the time we were there.  Being only 3 miles from the Pacific Ocean, we got the breeze coming off the ocean, which kept things cool there.  I loved it (although my wife did not).  But after a while there was something I missed about the weather in Texas and the South -- thunderstorms!  There was not one thunderstorm while we were there!

I told the above story because I thought you might miss something from Iowa, residing as you have, first in Detroit and now Massachusetts, such as tornadoes!  So here is a short video from the Melanie Metz Storm Chasing YouTube channel of a small tornado that occurred in Iowa and Minnesota.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Bruce

Yes I am SURE she misses tornados!


----------



## rachels.haven

I actually do miss them, thanks STA. They're really cool. If you get to watch one in person you definitely get a feeling for your own smallness and mortality. Most of us stood on our front porch (with a hand on the door and a basement waiting) and do the country oggle when things like that go by.

And if I'm small, so is the next guy, and so are my problems in the grand scheme of things, right?


----------



## rachels.haven

Like, as in, the video doesn't give you a good feel for the scale of things, but that tornado and it's sisters are probably (usually) HUGE compared to you. Huge and fast.

I wouldn't want watching that in real life. Keep the basement handy. 

Thank you for the reminder.


----------



## Bruce

OK, Rachel DOES miss tornadoes. I, for one, have NO desire to be anywhere near one!!


----------



## farmerjan

Me either..... watching it in a movie is enough....


----------



## rachels.haven

On a different note, my mosquito hat came today. It works! My husband wants one too.


----------



## Baymule

I hate gnats! Glad the hat works!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> On a different note, my mosquito hat came today. It works! My husband wants one too.



When he gets his, I hope you two will model them for us!


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, the bug veil needs to be more translucent. I'm pretty sure they look hokey, but I don't care! (as long as I can't be identified, I guess)

Moved fence today and last night does spent the night in their 8x20 run in shed.

We're hiring a husband of an acquaintance who put in their own fence to teach us to do ours. He's out of work from donating a kidney but he should be able to make us learn to do it right.

My gate is too narrow for my neighbor to hay our field. Poopie. He needs at least 13 feet. Not 12. He will also sell me hay from the next field over and several others.

We are fixing the old leaning machine shed with parts from the chicken shed for the purpose of hay storage. Yesterday I heard the main beam snap, I discovered today while we were looking at it with the contractor and his man. I guess that needs to be sistered. That was...unsettling. So we all shuffled out until later.

If building the barn gets pushed off late into the winter then at least we will have hay, shelter, and I will need to make sure I can get water out to the critters in need.

Pricey, but the house is selling, and the numbers still say we are doing okay.

Still waiting on sitework and demo estimate. Will call around again tomorrow.

Starting to get my mise en place. It's taking a while.


----------



## rachels.haven

Listening to these during stuck in the house doing house and home things time. They're fun.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/goat-talk-with-the-goat-doc/id1402229939


----------



## Bruce

I think the kids need hats too! It will make a great Christmas card


----------



## farmerjan

Sorry about the gate being too small.  I PREACH to anyone that is talking fencing to put in 16 ft gates... or at least 2-8 ft gates..... Equipment is too big nowadays to go through 12's..... and if you had to get a truck and trailer through there, you are setting yourself up for tight quarters that you can slip in a snow storm and take out gates and fence..... Guess you must have not been in on that particular thread... can't remember, who it was that was questioning and several of us said 16 ft gates...... we have 2 places where there are a couple of 12's, and I go through at a perfect angle or I get hung.... He//, I have gotten the H with the side delivery rake hung if I don't hit it right because of the angle the  rake is at behind the tractor......and have scraped the gate posts more than once when you come in at an angle that is not perfect.....,DS has to take out a post to get through gates in 2 places.... owners were told that if they wanted it hayed, the posts needed to be moved or able to be taken out.... SUGGESTION..... when they come back to fix the fence... if they ever do... make them take out a post and go back and add a 6 or 8 ft gate where the other one closes against.... they can put in a couple posts, and move the brace back to a previous post.... and make the opening wider....


----------



## Baymule

Yeah, BJ took out a gate post at a 12’ gate. I should have put 16’ gates up all over, but only used a few, the rest are 12’ gates. Oops.


----------



## Bruce

My gates into the "pasture" behind the barns are 12'. But then there isn't any big equipment going in there. Plenty of room for my tractor. I do have a 10' gate just outside the north end of the barn and yep, especially if I have the backhoe on, the angle better be just right because there isn't enough room between the barn and gate to get the tractor in and then turn. If my fields were to be hayed (anyone need any bales of weeds?) they would have to come off the main road. No perimeter fence, I took down the rotting posts and broken hot wire.


----------



## rachels.haven

NOOO, some of them can fit though the mask. And the screen is tiny.
Most kept out is better than none. These also don't seem too aggressive at going at the nose, mouth, and eyes. This strikes me as ridiculous. I think I might treat the mask with permethrin and see how that changes things. I believe they have to touch it to go through.


----------



## rachels.haven

Well @farmerjan The coyotes went ahead and went after a smaller human on the cape yesterday.
https://boston.cbslocal.com/2021/08...attack-north-herring-cove-beach-child-bitten/


----------



## farmerjan

Jesus, Mary and Joseph;  do these people still not get it?  Food being left and feeding animals is only the start of it... they are not afraid of people... they are not just motivated by people feeding them... they are looking at people as prey...... 
I am so sorry for the child... and very glad that the animal was killed... honestly I have my doubts as to it being rabid.... because coyotes have lost their fear of man in general.... if it is rabid, that will "justify" it's aggressiveness and then the bleeding hearts will have an "excuse" for the behavior of the "poor wild animal".....   what needs to happen is for a few of those idiots to get savagely attacked by a pack and then maybe they will realize that nature does not REASON things out.... or make excuses.....


----------



## rachels.haven

I don't think it will be rabid either. Something's going on with the coyotes on the cape, and I suspect it's that people aren't making them afraid anymore, not so much food that they can get to.

Demo estimate went on today. Waiting on word from that.
Other than that it's been a heat wave and baby has been cranky as we hid in the air conditioned rooms, so not much is getting done.


----------



## Baymule

People are Disney oriented with talking animated make believe animals with human behaviors. That’s all they know. It’s only natural that they transfer their own thought and behavior patterns onto wild animals. People are woefully ignorant with an extra dose of stupidity.

Im sorry you are having such heat, your area is not equipped to handle it. At least you have air conditioning. It helps.


----------



## rachels.haven

So for the last two nights the does have broken out of their mini barn and instead of just loafing around their pen as usual they've gone over to the machine shed and broken Bailey out too and hung out with her. Apparently they are friends.

And yes, at night we have been separating them by about 30 feet. Bailey does not like constant goat crowding around dinner and benefits from a little nightly rest and personal space. She cares about them, but not that much. Although she's suddenly started liking them more in the last few days...


----------



## rachels.haven

Sigh. Yesterday I made myself sick all day by putting on lotion  that used to be okay so I could smell like a girl in the morning after the shower. Heat waves with much humidity make you feel gross after about an hour after becoming clean. Apparently that is preferable to having an allergic reaction. I'll take it! So I was sick all day, took another shower, followed by benadryl when the reaction started cascading and becoming enough fun I was worried it would become a hospital trip. End of day. Aw well. DH had to do chores with me stumbling drunkenly behind after waking up from a drugged sleep (I don't handle any drugs well, unfortunately). I need to streamline chores better for him, I think. The little things need adjusting.

I euthanized my last chicken this morning. I sold the others for soup. This one was very sick and I'd nursed it back a time or two. It was pretty vile this morning. All the ducks and chickens I'd processed wouldn't have prepared me for this.

So day before yesterday an electric poultry net for around the coop to keep the bears away and poultry in came in the mail. Today we go get the 6 female ducks.

I'm waiting on a special delivery this morning.


----------



## Mini Horses

Ok...keeping the bears away was enough for me!  Bears?? Geesh, your rotten neighbor problem sounds better to handle.

We do have black bear around here, mostly they habitat the Great Dismal Swamp preserve.  That's about 30 miles out but many highways and some rivers between.  Never seen one live in 20 yrs here....I am blessed.   😁  Couple seen on tailgates at reporting stations.

Apparently a very good year for turkey.  They are everywhere!!!  Huge numbers.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, the black bears here break into coops and kill the birds and eat all the chickens. If you don't have an electric fence (about $500/100ft) Fish and Wildlife blames you. You have animals, therefore you are feeding bears, shame on you, how dare you tempt our bears with your chicken coops/goat sheds. The bears keep getting to coops on my road, so I figured I should just do it. As soon as the fence is fixed the goat pen is also getting hot wires to help my Bailey dog out.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> The coyotes went ahead and went after a smaller human on the cape yesterday.


That is just too scary. I bet people aren't allowed to carry protection against the coyotes. I think at minimum I'd be carrying a baseball bat.


----------



## rachels.haven

I feel the same way too. I recommend the trifecta of personal protection: the bat, the bear spray, and the air horn. Just don't let the horn's button get pressed in your purse (or pocket)


----------



## Baymule

No lotion for you! That’s bad stuff. I can’t use deodorant, taking zinc helps with the stink. LOL Also spray arm pits with hydrogen peroxide. It kills the bacteria that feeds on the sweat.


----------



## rachels.haven

(Probably tmi, but...)It took me years to find (and them to invent it) but Old Spice makes a deodorant called "Wolfthorn" for men that smells like Hawaiian punch that does not make me sneeze. I used to just use stuff sparing and sneeze, but suddenly a bunch of the men in my life that were related to me were using it and not making me sneeze (dad, 3 brothers, inlaws...). There may have been a Dan bathing in someone's deodorant incident involved too, and if that didn't set me off I figured using it would be a good viable alternative. It may still bother you, as sensitivity levels vary, so I'm not really recommending it, (I know better)but that's why I'm not back showering twice a day or just sneezing through the day. Vanilla scents with no musk mixed in are occasionally also okay.

The lotion USED to be okay. I wonder if it went off...meh.


----------



## farmerjan

@Baymule  have you ever tried Tom's of Maine unscented deodorant?   I find I have no problems with the scented ones, but they make an unscented one also.  NO aluminum,  which is my pet peeve in deodorants.  Just thought I would ask.


----------



## Baymule

farmerjan said:


> @Baymule  have you ever tried Tom's of Maine unscented deodorant?   I find I have no problems with the scented ones, but they make an unscented one also.  NO aluminum,  which is my pet peeve in deodorants.  Just thought I would ask.


never heard of it. I haven't used deodorant in years. Working outside in the summer, I sweat all over, not just arm pits. Take a shower, all is well. LOL


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> for men that smells like Hawaiian punch


Why would I want to smell like Hawaiian Punch?????? I guess it would be way better than AXE, that stuff can gag a maggot!



rachels.haven said:


> The lotion USED to be okay. I wonder if it went off...meh.


Maybe they changed the formula? 



farmerjan said:


> Tom's of Maine unscented deodorant?


That is what DW uses. She also uses their Peppermint toothpaste, way WAY too minty for me and I like mint OK. We also use Tom's floss.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Why would I want to smell like Hawaiian Punch?????? I guess it would be way better than AXE, that stuff can gag a maggot!


Lol, Hawaiian Punch is SOOO masculine now, I guess. My dad was probably using it because the antiperspirant bothers him and it seems to do a good job but not leave a scent trail behind him. My kids like it too much. I gave them their own tubes of it. Funny thing is that they still are happy to get into and shred mine to little pieces (but no more deodorant bathing, so I guess that's a win).

Axe is terrible. I'd forgotten about it. The scent kind of reminds me of bucks in rut now. I'm glad that trend seems to have puttered out. School was a dangerous place for a while scent-wise.  Who exactly did it appeal to?


----------



## Baymule

Ummmmm……. My husband….. he wore it. He used to drench in colognes, after shave, scented everything. When I got this chemical sensitivity, he didn’t understand that I couldn’t breathe around him. It took awhile.


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw man, I'm glad he likes it. I'm sorry he had to stop if he enjoyed it. I guess it's a love it or hate it thing. It's a very strong multifaceted scent. I guess it could be quite nice if you enjoy it.
...assuming he did stop and doesn't just still enjoy regularly taking your breath away.


----------



## farmerjan

Yes, I like Tom's of Maine deodorant, use the mint toothpaste and sometimes the one that is cinnamon flavored... don't know if they still make it.  I like that it is flouride free.  But sometimes I use the "store brand" if it is flouride free... the deodorant comes in several scents and unscented... can only get the unscented or the apricot at Walmarts which is where i first found it... other ones at the health food store but they are much higher priced....
They have come out with a man's line of deodorant also....


----------



## rachels.haven

We're starting to change plans on the barn build today. Demo is probably going to be as expensive as the barn. Looking around at homes in the target area.


----------



## farmerjan

Are you hinting "moving" again?????  With the a**hole neighbor I can't blame you but OMG....  . Of course, there might be a better place... maybe across a state line???? Don't go to NY state though....... for whatever you decide....


----------



## rachels.haven

We are planning our Tennessee move, sooner rather than later. The price for demo+building is not something we'd want to spend if we are not going to enjoy living here, and we do not. And I would really benefit from my family near by to help with emotional support and with the kids...

Unfortunately we need to find decent accommodations for the standard goats at our new place or I will not bring them. I will not have them under housed again if I can help it. Depending on what kind of housing we find it may be time to sell a lot of goats, which will make me and the kids very, very sad, but moving out of here, nearer to family, and getting into a more farm friendly, yet closer to city amenities my other half needs will be very good. Definitely checking the zoning of properties. My parents are using their network to help us find a home and other things. We are not in a hurry (but that tends to be when things move the fastest, oddly enough).

As kind of a depressing side note, I tried to bring in a second house dog from Barb, and maybe later test the waters for dog breeding. Dan fell in love with her. Unfortunately the night before last Dan went from troublesome pixie faced to blobby face as his face and ear began swelling up after cuddling little Ms Puppy and scratching his ear. And it's stayed swollen. After talking to some experts it's most likely Dan is probably very allergic to dog saliva that the dogs are putting on each other doing normal (happy) playing. If he isn't too sensitive, bathing the dogs frequently would help. Unfortunately Dan reacted on day 2 after I bathed the puppy...that would mean they'd probably require daily bathing assuming he doesn't get more allergic and that wouldn't be good for their skin. I don't want Dan to be allergic to something that lives in his own house or for the puppy and Moses to have dry skin their whole lives so rehoming both dogs is the best course of action (Dan admitted that Moses makes him itchy and sneeze too. Very much I wish he'd told me earlier). I am bummed. Dan is bummed. Dh is stressed out because he decided we should go ahead and relocate and giving Mass more of a "fair shake" didn't pay off...(Aiden and the baby avoided big feelings of their own here). Poo.
 We will be alright. At least Dan isn't having breathing issues (knock on wood really, really hard). I can look carefully for homes. Ms Pepper puppy is smart and super quick with potty training she's making Moses look potato slow (I get the feeling he wouldn't care if I say this as long as we love him). She doesn't have a care in the world right now, but she deserves a stable home quickly. I'm still wondering if I can pull off Moses, but I don't think that would be fair to Dan or Moe. That's just what I want. 🙁

Hey, at least I still have Bailey. Hands off my mega pooch and giant lap dog, Dan! She's got a job for do. Also, he's never reacted to her. I guess she's not very spitty and she lives outside.
*Knock on wood really hard again for everything above*

(edit: still exploring options, maybe, maybe I can keep my house dogs, I like those guys!)


----------



## Baymule

You should be somewhere where you are happy. As far as the goats go, you can put up cow panel hoop shelters for the interim between moving in and building a barn. Hoop shelters are better than you might realize and would work well until you got a proper barn built. I’d hate to see you reduce your herd after working so hard to have such a fine herd. Plus you would be taking fresh bloodlines to Tennessee, which I’m sure people would be glad to add to their own herds. Think on that. A temporary fix would be better than having to get rid of your very fine animals.


----------



## rachels.haven

My goodness, I needed to hear that this morning. Thank you. That is very kind and timely. The idea of getting out is making me happy, but the idea of selling so many girls I like was getting me down.


----------



## Baymule

__





						HOOP COOP
					

I have more pictures for you @ninnymary !! I built a hoop coop the last week of May. I had chicks in the house, they were driving me nuts and I wanted them OUT! I built the whole thing out of stuff I already had. The tin for the roof was used, the treated lumber for the frame came off the half...



					www.theeasygarden.com
				




That is a link to how I built my hoop coop. Since it will be temporary, You don't have to build it this good, you can drive 2 T-posts in the ground, using them to bow up the cow panel, then drive 2 more on the other end of the cow panel. Tie them with wire to the t-posts. Cover with a tarp. 

You can even build a pallet shelter. Make a U of 3 pallets, put one on top, cover top with a tarp or staple a plastic feed sack on top. They might be a little miffed at moving from the equivalent of a mansion to a single wide mobile home, buy they will survive until you get a proper barn built for them--and you. 

You keep your beautiful goats.


----------



## rachels.haven

My bucks are currently living in one of those thanks to you. The catch is that with goats you have to line the long sides outside the structure with cattle panel and tie it on top and bottom or they climb the sides and smash down the hoop. (Thank you for demonstrating, young bucks.)


----------



## rachels.haven

Apparently we're about to get hurricane Hari or harry or whatever. Well, here we go. Glad we are inland by a fair bit.


----------



## farmerjan

My sister is coming home from a beach vacation in RI today,  to CT  to batten down for this possible hurricane Henri....they are somewhat inland but will get the rain and wind and all that... no flooding at her place they are up high... Hope it is not too bad.  We would gladly take a couple inches of the rain here though.  We did get just over 1 inch finally... but not near enough.  They got about 2+ inches 50 miles south in a real short period of time and it flooded the streets in Roanoke VA; drains couldn't handle it...  but every drop here at least soaked in...just need more.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Apparently we're about to get hurricane Hari or harry or whatever. Well, here we go. Glad we are inland by a fair bit.


Looks like it is going to track west of you then be just a depression when it passes to your north. Probably 1-2" of rain.  At least that is what Mr. NOAA says. We aren't going to see anything from Henri, not even a drop of rain, since it is supposed to make a 90° turn when it gets to western MA.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's a little better. I'll take it. 😊


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> Apparently we're about to get hurricane Hari or harry or whatever. Well, here we go. Glad we are inland by a fair bit.



Miss @rachels.haven,

I came to your journal to post about hurricane Henri and ask if a hurricane is a good substitute for a tornado.  Imagine my surprise when I discovered that I had not been getting notices from BYH web site and so had not read your journal since Sunday!  So only now have I learned about your change of plans regarding your barn. Moving to Tennessee is probably the right move. You should have a bit more say-so on what you do on your own farm than you currently have in Massachusetts. Of course, there are jerks everywhere, including the South, but maybe you can find a place where your family can live in peace and quiet -- to the extent that a herd of goats and 3 boys will let you do that! 

It also made me sad to learn of Dan's issues with allergies from Moses and the new puppy.  I know how much you came to love Moses -- Miss @B&B Happy goats spreads her love on the dogs she raises, and they love in return.  I hope you will find a good home for them.

I will now manually check for updates on all of the journals, such as yours, and not depend on BYH notifying me.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh man, not notifying you? What a pain!
Thank you on the moving sentiment.
On the dogs, we're going to wait until we have a positive allergy test or that he really can't be around them. I kind of hope it was just a bug bite on his ear. We have been outside a lot.
We like the dogs. Puppy even let me sleep through the night last night instead of needing a 4 am potty break. (and man, if I thought Moses had black dog syndrome. I have a heck of a time getting Pepper's eyes to stand out)


----------



## Bruce

I don't even look at the notifications, I go straight to "watched threads". If the name is highlighted and at the top, there are new posts


----------



## rachels.haven

@Bruce and @Senile_Texas_Aggie , that's what I do too. Forums tab, menu triangle arrow down to "watched threads", then there's the list of all the new happenings. I actually turn my notifications off for everything but my journal and private conversations unless it's a thread I'm very interested in. It does tend to randomly not notify me though, so going to the watched threads page once a day is the default.


----------



## Baymule

I go to forums and click on new posts.

I’m really excited for this move for you. You will be much happier.


----------



## farmerjan

Baymule said:


> I go to forums and click on new posts.
> 
> I’m really excited for this move for you. You will be much happier.


I do the new posts thing too.  Then occasionally I will find something new to read and possibly answer.


----------



## Bruce

I don't often go to "new posts", I have enough trouble keeping up with the ones I watch!


----------



## Bruce

Bummer, Henri is psyco. Now sitting on the NY/MA/CT border, will be around Springfield at 8 PM then run straight to Boston and out to sea overnight. Stay dry!!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, Henri just looks like another little storm up here. More south of us got the wind. Soggy.


----------



## rachels.haven

After being strung along by the fence guy that they were going to come and fix the fence (and not believing him), we let him know that this is unacceptable and unless he pulls through they will get a negative review on the local pages and get someone else to do it (normally we'd be a little more quiet than that, but he took pictures to use to advertise...of the fence that lasted 3 weeks before pulling out under it's own tension). Rather than saying "that's not necessary, I'll be there this day at this time" he informed us that our 3.5 acre field has too many bugs, too many ticks, too much grass, is too huge, it's too hot, too rainy and got rather nasty. We told him, that's all fine and we hope he will make it NEXT week as he had stated before that text and that's that. The funny thing is that my kids now run barefoot in that field (which they shouldn't do, but I'll be darned if they listen) and the ticks are gone. It's also dry, because we mowed the perimeter for him yesterday (because dh offered as he was supposedly coming this week "100%" so we asked him last night if he was coming friday or saturday and conveniently he has a friend's wedding this week so "100%" = 0% as we suspected, lol). And none of this was an issue when he as doing it for $10k. If our review means he can't run his own side business for the next few years and has to go work under someone else to learn what professionalism and integrity is again, that's fine. Or he'll just keep massholing along, and I don't care.

I have a semi local farmer's number who does fencing. I also have someone that we can pay that can teach us, although with baby I don't really have time. We really want this fixed before we move. (come to think of it...no, this is not the time to learn)

Getting anyone to do anything in New England has been impossible. We may as well be completely isolated and rural or in an island in the middle of the sea except we're 5 minutes from the grocerystore, library, police station, school....

I'm glad we're not building that barn.


----------



## rachels.haven

As for the new place, I've found an Amish Mennonite company that makes and delivers row barns and delivers in the Nashville area and is only backed up by two months. So we're probably getting a doe barn, a buck shed, and a hay shed once we have a place. I'll need to find a chicken coop because I love my birds and my mother wants to give me muscovy...or maybe see if I can afford another 10x10 or 8x10 building for a coop. So I have options.
Our other house is closing right now. I'm afraid that selling our current place is going to be awful. We're going to need a lot of prayers because we are tired, but we can't rest here.I don't even think we could get a contractor to put in AC unless they were going to scam us (not that we want it anymore, (why we have window units)).

Time to start getting OUT of here.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Hopefully he told you all that whining about why he couldn't make it out in a text so you have a nice screenshot to add to your review. Did the contract for the fencing include any type of warranty or guarantee on how long it would last?


----------



## rachels.haven

I'll need to check with my husband on the contract, but yes, you learn fast here that email or text is king because it is in WRITING. I let my other half set up and handle this fence fiasco because I set up and handle the last one and it went bad. We had a contract and warranty that time but the guy pulled a fast one and somehow it would up "forgotten". I know the contract we had this time has no mention of tension rods and the holders and yet there they are. Technically we could probably take them to court require them to remove the rods and fix the fence, but that would be more time, money, and getting to know more awful people here and I just want out while dealing with as few people as possible.
I do know that when we put in the fence we asked what would happen if it had defects and they said they would fix it, but that was in person. Not good enough. Needs to be in writing.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> come to think of it...no, this is not the time to learn


NOw is a great time to learn (baby not withstanding). Whatever mistakes you learn from won't be repeated when you do it at your next place  

Fencing isn't all that hard (well mentally, physically it can be), you can learn from YouTube videos, reading about people's fencing here. Greybeard was most helpful when he was on the forum.


----------



## Baymule

How does anything ever get done for anybody? I’ll be glad when y’all are out of there, but not near as glad as you will be.


----------



## rachels.haven

Connections. You can only get people to do stuff for you if you know somebody who is a close friend or relative. Sucks.


----------



## rachels.haven

On a different note, our Groton house closed today. Bye, bye.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Connections. You can only get people to do stuff for you if you know somebody who is a close friend or relative. Sucks.


In other words they despise outsiders.


----------



## farmerjan

There are times that  being a "Yankee" makes me ashamed.... but I was from the real old conservative types... and we helped our neighbors if they needed it and respected their privacy too.... and our word was our bond too.....Hasn't been that way in years.... another reason why I got out....they weren't the kind of people that I wanted to be associated with anymore....Way too much concern for money....and all it can do/not do..... and the liberal idiots that  had more money than common sense.... and no respect for a "working relationship" with the land.... just a "tree hugger mentality" .... with no regard to BALANCE.....
I will be so glad for you to get out... and come south .....like I did.....


----------



## rachels.haven

Lace came down with mastitis and a high fever night before last. I'd just brought the vet out to cut off her loopy scur that was growing into her eyeball too. Every time the vet comes out I wind up needing her the next day too. Sheesh.. Lace is getting 2 cc's penicillin g, 2x daily, Banaimine 1x daily, and today up the teats. I guess she just didn't want dry off. She is looking less like a zombie goat now. She deteriorated fast.


----------



## Baymule

Poor Lace. Sore boobies.


----------



## rachels.haven

Day 3 of school the 6 and 7 year old came off the bus with sky high fevers, headaches, sore throats, mild occasional coughing, and are deathly tired. We took them to an urgent care last night and got them strep tested and covid tested. Strep is negative. The only place the kids have been is school and a brief trip to an empty grocery store before close.

I'm so glad our school is following state guidance in word only. Masks for all, just as the state said...except for in the ventilated lunchroom where they pack in all the kids elbow to elbow to eat daily. No physical distancing or calls for ventilation anywhere. Because eating outside or in the classroom or putting kids at least three feet apart or ventilating would "threaten their educational model". We'll just throw those students under 12 under the bus. Northerners are so much more resilient than southerners who are already having kids get exposed and sick in schools in droves. So glad we started late so we could learn from others' examples.

Farm work is in maintenance mode until this gets through. Hopefully this is just a severe cold.


----------



## Baymule

I'm so sorry that your boys are sick. I pray that they recover quickly with no after effects. I think if I was a parent through this, I would home school. Our children are our most precious to us and it hurts to see them sick-anybody's children.


----------



## Bruce

I hope it isn't Covid though with Delta screaming through I wouldn't be surprised. Hopefully the rest of you won't get what they have, not sure how to keep baby safe


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. One thing that shakes me up is that they recognized one of my kids was sick and sent him home on the bus with all the other kids anyway then sent an email this morning letting us know that he was acting sick, and wouldn't talk to the teacher about it, so they called in the guidance counselor, who my sick boy also wouldn't talk to. WHY DIDN'T THEY CALL ME YESTERDAY?! Or take a temp?! Then call me?! My germy kid was on the bus with all the other kids. Even if this is just a cold, a temp of 103.2 is a high temp and these kids are in bad shape. Nobody extra should have to be exposed to that.


----------



## Bruce

Couldn't agree more! Put him on the bus?!?!? And you found out via email TODAY?!?!?!?!?
They most definitely should have called you. Seems like a talk with the principal if not the district supervisor is in order. They NEED to take care of all the kids. How many are going to come down with this in a few days? Their actions could shut the school down for too many Covid cases (if he has that).

Do you know why he won't talk to the teacher or the counselor? Usually kids that age will talk to their teacher.


----------



## rachels.haven

My sons don't like to admit to being in pain or uncomfortable to people they're not very familiar with and it's only day 3 of school. I guess not even teachers or counselors get a free pass (why not try the nurse and thermometer, as thermometers don't clam up or burst into tears...). The 7 year old was already probably feeling terrible as well, making it worse. They really only talk to my husband and I about feelings including health unless their dad or I get them started. They'll probably grow out of it as their judgement and feeling of what's appropriate develops. 

It's not something they do normally at home when in their element. Same child just asked me from across the house, in front of everyone if he needed to poop in the evening if he already pooped in the morning. THAT'S our normal.


----------



## rachels.haven

Also from 7 year old, "do you know if paper is as healthy as poop if you ate it?"



Stinking boys.


----------



## Baymule

@Bruce is right. You need to talk to Principal and district Supervisor. That was so wrong.

I really hope the boys get better soon and no one else gets sick. Big hugs.


----------



## Bruce

DW was appalled as well. Any time our kids got sick at school we were required to go pick them up. No bus rides for sick kids and that was WAY WAY before Covid.


----------



## rachels.haven

Covid test came back. Not covid. Mixed feelings on the matter. We kept the fever under control and they did okay. If it was covid, this was bad but not life threating and they'd have immunity. Aw well. I think they're just starting to get better. They started fighting again, lol.
Baby spiked 103 fever this afternoon. Time to hit the baby meds. He holds a thermometer in his mouth when in a good mood if you ask, but we made a special trip to WM to get an infrared forehead thermometer (have you ever tried telling a 9 mo old to keep his mouth shut? Works about as well as you'd imagine. Makes me worry it would be higher without the air exposure, and as mom I've got to know).

Anyway, we'll probably be done with this in a couple of days, thank goodness.


----------



## Bruce

Glad it wasn't Covid and everyone is getting better.


----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> DW was appalled as well. Any time our kids got sick at school we were required to go pick them up. No bus rides for sick kids and that was WAY WAY before Covid.


Absolutely.

If it was Covid then you’d have the BTDT (been there done that) and over with. But then you never know just how sick anyone will get. So glad it’s not anything serious and all will be well soon.


----------



## farmerjan

Sorry that the kids got a "bug".... and the baby too, most likely from exposure to the boys.  Kids get sick and schools are the biggest "mixing pot" of everyone's germs.  On top of that, with so much isolation the past year or so, there is no 'gradual" exposure from playing or anything, so none of the little bits of exposure that helps to build immune systems.  Glad to hear they are already to feel and act "normal"...

  Have you found anything yet down in Tenn??  Things going okay with your DH and no new complications with his eyesight?  Ever get anything settled with the fence guys? 
How is Lace's mastitis doing?  Hope it got cleared up.  Are you back to milking her for awhile?

Hoping things go along semi quietly for a bit for you.....


----------



## rachels.haven

We're finding lots of stuff in Tennessee. I also found people who make prefab row barns and drop them on your property. My mom is going to look at properties for us. Lots of law reading and flood plain checking going on.

My husband is between eye doctors right now. His last office is not a good one. The office staff is incompetent (not good with an unforgiving disease), exam doctors messed up his Rx costing us a pair of glasses, and the glaucoma specialist is semi-retired, and the doctor he's seeing is more likely to blind him than maintain sight. Good time to move, eh? 

Lace isn't really making milk anymore. Basically I strip her out of yesterday's drugs and what little milk is there, spray teats, give an infusion, spray, and give penicillin.

All three kids have hand, foot, and mouth. We went to the doctor today to rule out chicken pox. 
A little tired.


----------



## rachels.haven

My husband now has Hand, Foot, and Mouth too, and he's got it bad. This stinks.

Last survivor here.

(Farm is in maintenance mode still)


----------



## Baymule

I’m so sorry that your family is sick. Wonder how many kids on the bus got sick too.


----------



## rachels.haven

That goes through my head every time the kids get sick.
This is very contagious to boot.


----------



## rachels.haven

I forgot, actually the pediatrician we took them to said this is ultra common in the area (everyone does daycare and pre-k and they're not so good at being sanitary) so everyone else has probably already had it. My kids haven't. My kids haven't attended pre-k and daycare. And my husband and I also didn't attend pre-k and daycare as children. Anyway that was why she told us to send the kids back to school this week. I don't feel great about that.

You're also not supposed to get it at all much over age 5, 6,7ish. (My poor 4 year old husband?)


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> My husband now has Hand, Foot, and Mouth too, and he's got it bad. This stinks.


Where the heck did he pick that up? I hope he recovers quickly.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Where the heck did he pick that up? I hope he recovers quickly.


He got it from the kids, who brought it home from school. The baby got it too. Adults don't generally get sick or show symptoms from it, like for instance a temperature, sore throat, or painful blisters all over , dontcha know?


----------



## Bruce

Is that what the boys had when the fools at school sent them home on the bus?


----------



## rachels.haven

Yup.


----------



## rachels.haven

Husband is feeling mostly better. Hand foot and mouth if you get it as an adult is bad. I still haven't gotten it.
Our plan for getting out of here is
1)job offer first so work will move us (not the goats, but the rest of us)
2)get a place
3)move the goats and the not goats
4)better express how complicated this all is.


----------



## Bruce

I think you should plan NOT to get the HFM!!!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Here,
step A, which comes before 1) Avoid getting HFM


----------



## rachels.haven

DH has a new job coming now. Slower paced but still within the company. He turned in his 2 weeks yesterday and as a result he gets to meet with all the boss and their boss' (all of which he has been here longer than) so they can try to make him stay. Things are going to be interesting when he leaves because as each person has quit in the last few months he's gotten their responsibilities in addition to his own and as they hired new people they just left him with the people who have quit's jobs so he's become 3 or 4 engineers in addition to himself. The managers and directors are about to have all that go away and end their easy good thing. Maybe I'll get my husband back and he'll get himself back. He's been so tired and burnt out he hasn't even had the energy to go out on his bike or play piano. I'm  beyond mailing male ducklings at this point from all the blatant crappery that has been put out there to try and make him stay. DH calls it the "bad boyfriend breakup" gauntlet. His last boss and team did not do this to him because they respected his decisions and went out to lunch and threw him a party instead. Good man, good team. Stark difference.

I bathed Bailey today in preparation for her yearly vet visit. She is now cloud white with fawn ears and a fawn back spot (my favorite colors). No more mats. I do need to fix her sani cut but after the stress of being groomed I decided not to push my luck and get sat on. I made her day and took her on a mile long walk afterward. Good 120lbs cloud dog.

Bald face hornets and yellow jackets have taken over the doe house during the day. I've only managed to muck half. I also learned about what a moderate allergic reaction when stung is. I'm pretty sure it was the bald faced hornet. That was NOTHING like a bumble or honey bee like I've been stung by before. A 4" bulleye around the sting site felt like it was burning in fire and was HOT to the touch for 2 days. I even got hives. Now my shoulder and wrist on that arm are achy, but that's going away slowly. What a nasty critter. The doe house will get shoveled but I think I'm going to have to wait for a cold day and do it when the sun is not on the doe shed. Those days are coming.

Pending negative tests I'm bringing in two more dwarf does to expand the herd from a lady who breeds for LOOOONG extended lactations. These AGS girls will not look as nice as show goats, but my bucks can adjust that in their offspring and they can hopefully add milk.

No does are getting bred this year until we are moved and have appropriate shelter for them all. The lamanchas may get a dry year if I can't figure out how to get cidrs and pg600 to bring them into heat if we miss the season. That is fine, I guess.

I got a hoof boss. It arrived in the mail yesterday. I'm dying to try it.

My ducks are molting, so no new eggs, but we are fine with that as we have a carton and a half in the fridge.

Pepper the Poodle and Moses the doodle are doing well. Pepper is growing and Moses appears to have become a handsome adult although he has become so jealous of any other dog that when we give attention (or maintenance like a bath) to any other dog besides him he screams and howls like we are nailing his feet to the ground. Poor teenage Moe. I feel bad for him, but I'd feel worse for Pepper and Bailey if Moses got his way and we only loved on or cared for him. I hope he grows out of it. He lives in a multiple dog house, and every single critter here gets individual attention and love, even if there is screaming going on in the background. Silly dog. I guess for him it all started with only him in the house (maybe he wasn't aware that while he was inside in his pen or crate playing feeder toy games I groomed and took care of his outdoor playmate and things were still okay?). After the walk today I brought Bailey in for a drink and when he saw the leash and her on it he had the biggest tantrum yet (I can't walk more than Bailey with the stroller in tow). The other dogs ignore him.  My guess is that they find it annoying or embarrassing. We ignore him for the most part after telling him off. He even screamed through Bailey's bath from the house despite it taking place being across the field. I'm pretty sure Bailey would have loved to trade him. He's a very well mannered, amazing with kids, sweet dog beside that but I'm beginning to wonder if he wishes he were with a different family in a single dog home with only visits from playmates. *guilt*

Anyway, that's the update. Things appear to maybe be getting better. We're trying to get out of here before snow flies. I have no hay and nowhere to store it as even our garage is molding things this year.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Bald face hornets


Those are supposed to be horrible and I guess your experience attests to that! Can you spray hornet killer in there?


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Those are supposed to be horrible and I guess your experience attests to that! Can you spray hornet killer in there?


I can't find any nest even if I go poking around at night with a flashlight. They don't seem to be inside at night when I'd typically spray them. I'm going to keep looking though. I've had a couple of goats stung already.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

rachels.haven said:


> I can't find any nest even if I go poking around at night with a flashlight. They don't seem to be inside at night when I'd typically spray them. I'm going to keep looking though. I've had a couple of goats stung already.


Can you put out a camera to try and see where they disappear to in the barn? Or is there some type of bait you can put out? Maybe contact an exterminator to see if they have suggestions for finding the nest or even a quote for removing them for you?


----------



## rachels.haven

Larsen Poultry Ranch said:


> Can you put out a camera to try and see where they disappear to in the barn? Or is there some type of bait you can put out? Maybe contact an exterminator to see if they have suggestions for finding the nest or even a quote for removing them for you?


I'm going to keep looking, but they will be dead at the first day we go into the 30's and we're already hitting the 40's at night. This is their last hurrah for the season.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

40s!!? Wow! We are finally dropping into the upper 50s at night here, but days are still going back up to 80s or even 90s.


----------



## Bruce

I would guess your Auburn lows don't get anywhere near Rachel's   I don't think it often got much below the 50's growing up South of L.A..


----------



## rachels.haven

Bailey had her yearly vet visit today (new vet). She was an easy load/unloader despite a little thunder from a passing storm and was a hit in the office as she was her usual very very social and cooperative self. She is fat though. Apparently she has gained 10 lbs since her last weigh in and is now 130 lbs. I guess we'll be going down to 2 or 3 cups of dog food/day instead of 4. She didn't want to stand for the whole visit and instead laid down on the floor, where she stayed until she was ready to get up because she was bigger than the techs. She needs to be more like 110 apparently. Aw well. You can't be awesome at everything, Bailey.


----------



## rachels.haven

I splurged and got a Hoof Boss last week. It came and today I did 10 does' hooves very quickly on a whim with most of the time spent walking to and from the stand with the goats. Smells terrible though. Wear gloves when using a hoof grinder. Guess who decided she would just "be careful"? This dork. Seven doelings and the six bucks left.


----------



## rachels.haven

We've found a 6 acre property with several barns and a decent pasture zoned agricultural reasonably close to my parents and DH's office if his remote job ever has to become normal again. It's over priced, but I think we're going to put in a reasonable offer. They have a tractor. My dad jokingly suggests we bargain for it. MOAR CAR THINGS...that I'd have to learn how to keep running on top of the house hold.

There are also a few 15+ acre hay field properties farther from the office and the parents and are cheaper, but that do not fit into my master plan of backup plans. It stings a little, but my backup/preemptive troubleshooting plans often save our butts and I'd like my/dh/the kids figurative future butts saved.


----------



## SA Farm

You’ve run the gamut. Maybe this time it’ll work out? Finally have your farming haven!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I splurged and got a Hoof Boss last week.


The goats don't mind the noise? 



rachels.haven said:


> They have a tractor. My dad jokingly suggests we bargain for it.


Not necessarily a bad idea, just make sure it is what you want rather than merely convenient. And, of course, that it is in good shape.


----------



## rachels.haven

@Bruce , no, the goats don't mind the noise. For the most part they are nice enough to trust me. We can work together.  And I'm not sure I want a tractor yet. If we can afford it someday I can't shake the feeling that for my first one I should probably get one and a trailer that is under some kind of warranty even if I was just going to use it for hay moving and barn cleanouts.

@SA Farm , thank you. I hope so too. Honestly I thought this house was the closest to farming heaven (I drooled a lot over it), but it also has to be family heaven too and especially if Dh is working from home we need about one more room more space to be an office, and if he's not working from home it's about 10 minutes too far from the office for a guy with sight issues. My family went to go see it and wanted me to do it, but it doesn't exactly fit in with my plan to keep everyone else's needs met rather than just mine. I'm not going to link to the house we're considering. It's expensive and kind of pizza hut level log cabin ugly (no offense if that's your thing). I'm not sure we'll be able to get it anyway. The listing history shows the seller doing weird things with the price and the sellers' agent seems to be a bit hands off, maybe not wanting to deal with it. We might be dealing with a nut or a mass hole. We'll find our place eventually though. There are options out there.

This was one of them. It's still a tad far from both parents and work, but it's also a lovely place. My parents went to tour it for us. A little musty, a little dark, but very, very cool. A dream to live in. They have it set up decorated like a cracker barrel. My kids would love to trash that. 

Prices right now make me glad the Groton place we had was over half paid off and sold high. Still, I'm the spouse that doesn't love spending the big money so I'm a little grumpy about what we will probably wind up paying. I'm so tired of looking for a place. We did this already a few months ago.


----------



## Baymule

I am beyond thrilled for you. For all the reasons you have listed, this is what you need to do. You will find the right place, God will show it to you and He will pave the way.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you @Baymule . You take care.


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> @Bruce , no, the goats don't mind the noise. For the most part they are nice enough to trust me. We can work together.  And I'm not sure I want a tractor yet. If we can afford it someday I can't shake the feeling that for my first one I should probably get one and a trailer that is under some kind of warranty even if I was just going to use it for hay moving and barn cleanouts.
> 
> @SA Farm , thank you. I hope so too. Honestly I thought this house was the closest to farming heaven (I drooled a lot over it), but it also has to be family heaven too and especially if Dh is working from home we need about one more room more space to be an office, and if he's not working from home it's about 10 minutes too far from the office for a guy with sight issues. My family went to go see it and wanted me to do it, but it doesn't exactly fit in with my plan to keep everyone else's needs met rather than just mine. I'm not going to link to the house we're considering. It's expensive and kind of pizza hut level log cabin ugly (no offense if that's your thing). I'm not sure we'll be able to get it anyway. The listing history shows the seller doing weird things with the price and the sellers' agent seems to be a bit hands off, maybe not wanting to deal with it. We might be dealing with a nut or a mass hole. We'll find our place eventually though. There are options out there.
> 
> This was one of them. It's still a tad far from both parents and work, but it's also a lovely place. My parents went to tour it for us. A little musty, a little dark, but very, very cool. A dream to live in. They have it set up decorated like a cracker barrel. My kids would love to trash that.
> 
> Prices right now make me glad the Groton place we had was over half paid off and sold high. Still, I'm the spouse that doesn't love spending the big money so I'm a little grumpy about what we will probably wind up paying. I'm so tired of looking for a place. We did this already a few months ago.


I looked at the one you referenced that you said was a tad too far from parents and work and it's nice but not my style.  Then out of curiosity, looked at a few others there on Zillow.... Had to laugh at the one log house that was 750,000 because looking at the pictures, the one bedroom showed a WALL full of shoes right in the bedroom.... WHO in the world needs that many shoes????? WAY TOO BIG A HOUSE for my taste, I like Log homes... but WOW on the shoes.... 
You will find what you want when it is time to find it... and in the meantime I know you are stressing there so I hope it is soon.....


----------



## Finnie

rachels.haven said:


> reasonably close to my parents and DH's office if his remote job ever has to become normal again.


I knew your DH had put his 2 weeks notice in, but I must have missed what his new job was going to be. Glad to see he found something in Tennessee.


----------



## rachels.haven

YES, we've had fun seeing a lot of interesting houses, decor, and photography. I remember the family of millipedes house...That, my folks, is probably a couple thousand dollars of stuff I don't care about. The real estate listings in that area have been entertaining to say the least.

The Osborne road one is the closest to my style, but not exactly, but I don't care that much. I will care about the animal setups more. I just need to keep DH happy in regards to indoors. The house is going to be more or less his and the boys' worlds. All that is assuming that I don't HATE the home or it has functionality issues.

Thanks, @Finnie Come to find out my husband gave them a month's notice. He's just switching teams within his company and to a different branch of the organization-hopefully a more stable, lower pressure one. The other guys on the team say it's very, very laid back and nice and slow paced. I'm hoping DH will get to do more of the things he personally enjoys that he hasn't felt free to or up to doing for the past almost 3 years.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I can't shake the feeling that for my first one I should probably get one and a trailer that is under some kind of warranty


That is why I went with new. Never having even touched a real tractor, I figured I needed to learn as things break and can be fixed under warranty rather than find out what isn't right with a used tractor.



farmerjan said:


> WHO in the world needs that many shoes?????


Imelda Marcos of course! Maybe she moved to that house from the Philippines.


----------



## rachels.haven

As a side note, since the bald faced hornet while shoveling incident, I've been waking up early before it reaches 60 for the past week and shoveling manure until the wasps show up looking for fly breakfast, then going in. Today I finished and either tonight or tomorrow morning i will put it all back together and the goats can use their shed again.

I also exposed Little Orchard CD Hera to Rustic Wood's Black Tie affair on Saturday. Hera has had trouble conceiving for the past 3 years so (as in she's never freshened)...I guess we'll just give it a few rounds before calling in the vet. I'd like to move her bred. I VERY MUCH want her bred this year one way or another.

I also exposed Bluebird Pond Erudite to Bluebird Pond Dash's Flash. Eri has also had issues conceiving, so getting her bred is also a priority. She's already become very...well conditioned so we should get on that. Unfortunately Flash has also had issues settling does last year in his previous home so nothing may come of this. He wasn't my first choice for covering her, but my first choice appears to have rocks for brains and he decided he didn't like her and would rather attempt to skip his date and eat breakfast, try to breed the lamancha on the other side of the fence, mount the feed bucket, court my leg, and just basically avoid Eri...so the only experienced dwarf buck I have it is.  Eri may not settle, but we can try. I'm going to give Dash a chance this year before letting him join the freezer bucks of next year. All of his equipment appears to be working fine and he covered Eri no problem. Next time we'll try my last choice buck for this doe, I guess.

All the other does I have currently I plan to wait on unless we get moved in quickly. I may be playing with Cidrs and pg600 and trying for fall or early winter kids if it gets too late.


----------



## Finnie

rachels.haven said:


> The other guys on the team say it's very, very laid back and nice and slow paced. I'm hoping DH will get to do more of the things he personally enjoys that he hasn't felt free to or up to doing for the past almost 3 years.


That will be great. My son has a computer science degree and he worked for several of the Big Tech companies, and then got burnt out. He decided to leave that field. It would be nice for your husband to be able to use his talents for the things that matter to him.


----------



## rachels.haven

Finnie said:


> That will be great. My son has a computer science degree and he worked for several of the Big Tech companies, and then got burnt out. He decided to leave that field. It would be nice for your husband to be able to use his talents for the things that matter to him.


That is extremely common. Although programmers are extremely well paid, a lot of managers and even whole companies treat programmers like disposable cogs (and some don't even pay well while they do and treat programmers like an unfortunate
but necessary cost center). A good manager that shields team members and says "no" to almost everything but the team's focus while dividing work appropriately among members is invaluable. Personally DH has been lucky and unlucky several times. Your son has my sympathy.


----------



## rachels.haven

We put in a signed offer on a house Thursday and our offer was accepted on Friday. Close would be Oct 29th. The only thing that bugs me is that they haven't changed the ads from "available" or "active" to "contingent" or "under contract", so I guess if they get a higher offer they could hang us out to dry (they probably won't, right? is what my logic says). I'm getting quotes from good transporters on moving the goats. DH is getting a hold of the company relocation people for the dogs/cats/guinea pigs and our stuff. We are shooting for a November move. None of this is too soon. 

DH needed to go into the doctor. He appears to be starting to pay for neglecting himself as he is advancing through burnout (and moving to get out of this mess. yay.). I'll be needing to get him through all that. I'm trying to talk him into taking a week or two off to just sleep and try to feel more like him self, specifically time out of time he's committed to spending at this job both to minimize harm and be sooner. Not sure I'll succeed there, but I'm pretty sure if he could just rest all the difficult things will get easier and we have plenty of those coming.

Last week I noticed I wasn't reacting to wheat as I previously had...so I went and got me some fried chicken and biscuits of course. It's pretty much okay to eat for me now. That's the difference between a sensitivity and an allergy, I suppose. Same thing happens to my grandfather. His body picks something to decide it's trying to kill him, and he reacts (soy, barley, milk, whatever). Then a few years later it goes away. I'll take it though. Hopefully it won't be back. I wonder if my "allergy" to tomato plants will decrease as well. I'd like that.

Meanwhile, Danger Dan has recently declared that he is not stubborn. He is "patient"...Which makes me feel like I'm raising junior Disney villains. Aw well.


----------



## Thefarmofdreams

Congrats on the house! When we were hunting, I often would call to ask to look at a house, only to be told it was already contingent.  One in particular stayed available for weeks, despite being told it was contingent, and then just went off the market.  So i think some realtors just don't update properly.  I think you should have a contract confirming you are buying?  (we had to put down a grand and sign a contract when we put our offer in, months before close)  Good luck on the move! We're doing the same thing, only our close date is indeterminate so its a weird waiting game atm.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thefarmofdreams said:


> Congrats on the house! When we were hunting, I often would call to ask to look at a house, only to be told it was already contingent.  One in particular stayed available for weeks, despite being told it was contingent, and then just went off the market.  So i think some realtors just don't update properly.  I think you should have a contract confirming you are buying?  (we had to put down a grand and sign a contract when we put our offer in, months before close)  Good luck on the move! We're doing the same thing, only our close date is indeterminate so its a weird waiting game atm.


Aw, that would be the worst. I hope that ends for you soon and you get your close (and move in date!)

I hope lazy updating is our problem. Living where we are currently has made me a little gun shy on things like this. Our contract says they accepted the offer but contracts can be broken and I think the seller, if they had another offer lined up, would have the fewest and lightest consequences.


----------



## rachels.haven

But I should not worry too much. We will be okay.


----------



## Thefarmofdreams

for you that they are just not updating and it all works out quickly!


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

If they have a signed contract, the house should be yours. It's a lot harder to back out of a sale as the seller than the buyer. You would have legal grounds to go after them if they tried to sell to someone else after accepting your offer and signing the contract. Your realtor should be able to get you more info.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm back off wheat after reacting one day pretty badly (lol, knew that was coming).
Pest inspection on house went okay.
Waiting on home inspection.
Setting up goat/cat and dog sitters so we can go set up stall pens in the pole barn in preparation for getting goats shipped. Harder than you think when you live in flake-ville and aren't an insider with connections and I moved away from my last goat sitter.
Giving away the ducks.
It's almost time to start tidying and dumpstering things we don't want moved.


----------



## rachels.haven

Sometimes you just have to take a picture of the baby on his little, little legs clad in nothing but his diaper underwear, helping you not do dishes.


----------



## rachels.haven

I don't have more animal pictures. I'm a little short on free time right now. Pictures make the world go round here though.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

I feel the need to explain the thin goats. I've been here too long.
The fawn doe in the back of the last picture is Emi. She's still nursing her February doeling (front right, rear to camera), not milking for us. Emi's a bit of a pet and is super sweet , but she does not appear to be able to support even that kind of milking and herself, so it's my plan to either never breed Emi again, or if her daughter is super nice and doesn't have the same issues (bad feet, cone teats, inability to maintain weight while milking) to pull all kids so I can better end her lactations. Emi is always thin. She is two but looks going on 15. It's more likely I'll just never breed her again.

The broken chami is Little Orchard CD Lacey (center). She is 4. She was giving 2 gallons/day on once daily milking and as far as I can tell she's always put absolutely everything she has in the bucket and absolutely refused to reduce. She is four. I don't know if she's ever been given time off or a dry year, but she's getting one this year unless she bulks up. I finally got her to dry off-that was HARD, and she is just starting to pick up weight. She looked super thin when I got her and is just starting to look normal-ribs going away and tummy starting.

I can't wait to get to Tennessee so I can stuff these dears with soft, rich hay. Alfalfa is available there.

Edit: Inspection came in and we're going for it. Goat moving day is November 10th. Closing date will probably be October 29th. Time to get crazy.


----------



## Baymule

I have a ewe that puts everything in her milk bag for her lambs. I give her whole corn by hand because the other ewes would eat it all. As it is, they will take me down, so I call Ewenique to the cow panel part of the fence and give her corn until the others push her away. She knows the routine and we just move down the cow panel. She sticks her head through the holes and gobbles the corn as fast as she can. the corn helps her maintain weight. 

I am excited for y'alls move. I am relieved that y'all are finally getting away from flake-ville and moving to Tennessee.    Y'all are going to be so much happier. That's a pretty cute dishwasher you got there.


----------



## farmerjan

OMG  your little "not dishwasher" is an adorable little CHUNK..... LOVE his grin.... 

So glad that you are getting out of the IDIOT state of Ma...... not even flake-ville describes it ...... 
I so hope that you really like Tn.... at least it is a more sensible state for farming.... and closer to family.... that will be great for the kids too.  

Pictures of the new house once it is yours???? 

I might be able to come visit sometime... and get some violets even..... Once I get my new "bionic" knees, I want to do some things like meet and visit with some of the members on here... maybe some kind of get together of some sort...
At least you ought to be able to find some "farm sitters" there; ones that understand animals..... and know what being a neighbor is all about.....
AND.....a place that you don't have to worry about shooting predators and other varmints... or the dog doing her job and barking....

I am so glad for you.... and I am hoping that the job move will help your DH and stress levels and that might contribute to his eyesight not deteriorating as fast because we all know that stress can do so much "harm" to the body in everyway....  And hoping that some other "flake" will buy the Mass house quickly while there is still a decent market...


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you @farmerjan !


----------



## rachels.haven

Last week if work for DH. He's rebecoming himself again as he shrugs off the rocks they've been piling on. Someone even tried to pull the "you HAVE to get this working before you go" trick. Nope. They mucked up and neglected that team of contractors' project up enough for themselves then handed it to their overloaded emergency engineer for life support and emergency repairs and now it's their own screwy long term mess and not this super programmer's problem. The kicker is they're hiring *another team if contractors* to replace my one DH. They're not going to be able to replace him unless they hire at least 4 GOOD senior programmer's, and nobody good wants to come into this toxic workplace, imagine that.
A realtor came. Vet appts scheduled. Favorite goat transporter I've used before booked and paid for. Guinea pigs rehomed. Farm sitter arranged. Ducks have a home to go to.
We are going down after close to put up pens/stalls in the barn and get ready. Then we will come back here for 4 days as the movers and animal transporter comes. House dogs and cats go with us in the van. Bailey gets to go with her herd. My parents will receive them if needed. Making calls to book the human movers (relocation company hires them, but we do the leg work).

Amusingly enough my brief stint eating normally and not avoiding wheat products has made me start losing hair from all the itching. It's thinner than it was. Guess I'd better ALWAYS follow the rules or everyone will know I have bad self control, lol.

I. Didn't. Get. To. Eat. A. Doughnut. Excuse me while I go eat ice cream or one of all the hundreds of other junk food options I've got while eyeing the other side of the fence like a goat. Boo hoo. First world dork problems.

Close is the 29th. The prep trip is the 4th.
 Right? Right.

Oh. And I found round bales of 2nd and 3rd cutting only a few minutes from the house that the guy says he can bring his tractor to unload.


----------



## Bruce

When do we get pictures of the new place?
hint hint


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> Last week if work for DH. He's rebecoming himself again as he shrugs off the rocks they've been piling on. Someone even tried to pull the "you HAVE to get this working before you go" trick. Nope. They mucked up and neglected that team of contractors' project up enough for themselves then handed it to their overloaded emergency engineer for life support and emergency repairs and now it's their own screwy long term mess and not this super programmer's problem. The kicker is they're hiring *another team if contractors* to replace my one DH. They're not going to be able to replace him unless they hire at least 4 GOOD senior programmer's, and nobody good wants to come into this toxic workplace, imagine that.
> A realtor came. Vet appts scheduled. Favorite goat transporter I've used before booked and paid for. Guinea pigs rehomed. Farm sitter arranged. Ducks have a home to go to.
> We are going down after close to put up pens/stalls in the barn and get ready. Then we will come back here for 4 days as the movers and animal transporter comes. House dogs and cats go with us in the van. Bailey gets to go with her herd. My parents will receive them if needed. Making calls to book the human movers (relocation company hires them, but we do the leg work).
> 
> Amusingly enough my brief stint eating normally and not avoiding wheat products has made me start losing hair from all the itching. It's thinner than it was. Guess I'd better ALWAYS follow the rules or everyone will know I have bad self control, lol.
> 
> I. Didn't. Get. To. Eat. A. Doughnut. Excuse me while I go eat ice cream or one of all the hundreds of other junk food options I've got while eyeing the other side of the fence like a goat. Boo hoo. First world dork problems.
> 
> Close is the 29th. The prep trip is the 4th.
> Right? Right.
> 
> Oh. And I found round bales of 2nd and 3rd cutting only a few minutes from the house that the guy says he can bring his tractor to unload.


----------



## Baymule

Finally. It is upon you and y'all are moving to a place and a job for your DH that is a much better and happier place. Couldn't be happier for you. Takes FOUR people to replace your husband? And they wonder why he is leaving? Truly the Land of the Stupid. How wonderful for him to get away from there.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Finally. It is upon you and y'all are moving to a place and a job for your DH that is a much better and happier place. Couldn't be happier for you. Takes FOUR people to replace your husband? And they wonder why he is leaving? Truly the Land of the Stupid. How wonderful for him to get away from there.


Yes, at least four people. Upper level engineers kept quitting, and managers kept asking him to take over all of the leaving people's responsibilities over and over. And when they hired new people they just gave them new responsibilities and had DH keep those of the people that quit. Makes me mad. He could do it, but it cost him (dearly on personal, family, career growth, and personal ambitions fronts). Very inconsiderate to say the least.


----------



## Bruce

Yep, some bosses/businesses will take advantage as much and as long as the beleaguered employee allows it.


----------



## Baymule

Well now they can just deal with it.


----------



## rachels.haven

That's where a good manager would come in. But this org doesn't appear to value those.

And yes, they did totally have problems with it. DH had to meet with 5 levels of management above him so they could each beg/bribe him to stay. It sucked. No means NO. If they wanted him to stay they should have been more respectful of his humanity earlier.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> If they wanted him to stay they should have been more respectful of his humanity earlier.


This. Good for your husband for getting out of there.


----------



## rachels.haven

The sad thing is that the manager we had in Detroit that encouraged a healthy work life balance, felt secure in his own position, didn't want to grow his own career, and said no to anyone trying to throw trash tasks on his guys, and recommended DH leave the team because that office was so small he didn't think DH or anyone could grow his career there is still working for the company, I believe he moved across the country, but his team either followed him or became remote...my husband's friends are still working for him, have had very little turnover even during the covid shuffles, and he was somehow eventually able to get a few of them promoted in the last three years despite the guy doubting he could.

Moral of the story is if you have a good manager and they tell you the office is too small for them to be able to help you with career goals, probably ignore them because at this company a good manager is valuable...and sometimes you can squeak by and grow anyway.

But I have really nice goats and we've had good medical care here, and DH's meticulous coding has become even more meticulous and that's a good thing...I guess.

Here's to a hopeful future.
Potato. 🥔


----------



## Baymule

Sometimes you just have to take that leap of faith and step out there. it hasn't been pleasant, but there are bright spots and now y'all are going to a much happier place.


----------



## Bruce

I don't think DH's good manager had any way to know that the place in MA was a hellhole. Seems he was doing what he thought was best for DH and good for him to do so! He could have kept DH to himself and ignored DH's potential.


----------



## rachels.haven

First fall frost of 2021.






I brought home two new goats last night. We have 7 dwarf does/doelings and 12 lamanchas, 1 noober doeling (and way too many bucks, 3 nigerians, 2 lamancha, and 1 noober-buckling). Counting today, 17 more days until goat transport day. 10 more days until we go to set up pens in the new place. And we close this Friday.

There's a bear hanging out on my road and last night the coyotes came up very close to the house and Bailey is not legally allowed to work nor are we allowed to shoot stuff. I hope we stay safe. I'm tempted to let Bailey bark all night our last 3 nights so they will remember us. I also still have my trusty air horn and bear spray collection (And baseball bat, which is more of an intimidation tool than anything else.) I left our town FB page because I got tired of people sharing pictures showing how great they were because they grew gardens for the bears and the bears came to enjoy them and similar activities like "cute" bears breaking into their neighbors beehives.  Where do they think the bears will go next when the gardens run out? McDonalds? Poor bears. Poor children of idiots who have to live here. I don't understand what's wrong with people.

CVI with vet on Wednesday. The two new girls already have theirs ready to go because their breeder is awesome.


----------



## rachels.haven

New girls are the broad Swiss Misses on the right.


----------



## rachels.haven

The rest of the girls this morning, descending on the little red alfalfa wagon.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> people sharing pictures showing how great they were because they grew gardens for the bears and the bears came to enjoy them and similar activities like "cute" bears breaking into their neighbors beehives.


WTF!!!!!  And I suppose they put out bird seed in the spring too. Probably too late for Darwin to take these people out before they breed.


----------



## rachels.haven

Of COURSE they put out birdseed! All the time! That way when they run out of bird feeder they can go tear into chicken coops up and down the road too, as they do (I have an electric fence around my duck coop for just THIS reason).
I don't think it's the bears faults we're having bear trouble. They are totally habituated out here. It's like people forgot how to respect WILD animals.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

The Pyrenees and mini-sable both wanted to pet the baby.


----------



## rachels.haven

Consider the baby of the field...


----------



## Mini Horses

Best training ever for the little guy!!   😁


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I don't think it's the bears faults we're having bear trouble.


Nope, they are just finding food.



rachels.haven said:


> The Pyrenees and mini-sable both wanted to pet the baby.


They are glad you brought the petting zoo to them!


----------



## farmerjan

He is really growing... wow.... and so cute...


----------



## rachels.haven

Well, God loves me.
Last night I got a text from the vet asking to reschedule the herd's CVI appointment for Friday because it would be raining and she had the opportunity to switch the appointment with an appointment down south of us where she'd be helping another vet. I said sure.
I went to bed feeling a little off after frying some eggplant. By midnight I was vomiting and stuck in the bathroom losing all the water I wasn't sending to Mr. Baby Shaun. So by morning I was out of puke and just losing everything I drank about an hour later and Shaun was having the time of his life all night on the milk bar, lol. I just wanted to shake and sleep, so he got what he wanted. So I could hardly walk across room, doing chores about killed me, sending me into more dry vomiting fits there was no way I could have had the goats lined up and ready for their CVI's.

Anyway, today is a slow day. Baby Shaun has been denied the milk bar and distracted and is instead trolling for flavored Polar carbonated water (no sugar, so who cares?). I'm very dehydrated, but I know when to go in for an IV of fluids if I need it. Well, poo. My plans are derailed.

It also looks like closing might be put off until Monday anyway. I guess I'll go watch The History Guy on Youtube.

It's pouring and very windy with breaks of windy spitting. Last night it was so loud. No trees appear to be down. Another blessing.

On a side note, the best way to get your lab ransacked for treats is to put an apple cinnamon air freshener in it and have a 6 year old Dan. Once I get better I have a lot of mess to clean up. After I'm feeling better he's going to be held accountable this time, but in the mean time I don't want him near my animal meds.


----------



## Bruce

That is horrible Rachel!! Any idea what caused the illness? Anyone else praying to the porcelain god?
I hope you get over it fast. Might need some electrolytes, can't blow everything like that without getting out of balance.

We don't have a Danger Dan but we don't use air fresheners of any sort. Too many fragrance issues here to pollute the air with man made "fresh".


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> That is horrible Rachel!! Any idea what caused the illness? Anyone else praying to the porcelain god?
> I hope you get over it fast. Might need some electrolytes, can't blow everything like that without getting out of balance.
> 
> We don't have a Danger Dan but we don't use air fresheners of any sort. Too many fragrance issues here to pollute the air with man made "fresh".


Airfresheners are for the house sale prep. We don't usually use them either. Too many people who used to try to EAT them. Most of them make me sneeze. This kind on low is passable.

No, no one else is sick yet. I do have issues with nightshade family plants that I usually try to ignore and eat anyway, and my dinner was eggplant (it was good!), so I may have done this to myself, but I was starting to feel off before that too, or so my overtired memory says. I need to get healthy again soon in case they do start dropping. After things slow down I am open to Bay's apple cider vinegar trick, but I may stick with rice and yogurt. I may even break out the immodium or pepto at some point because my system has too much fun being in hyper drive once it starts and I've got to live. We're going to fly out the 4th to put up pens and stalls, back on the 7th, animals go on the 10th, then we leave formally after the movers leave on the 12th (hauling the house dogs and cats). Kind of a tight, intense, critical period we're heading into.

I am also using powerade and gatorade, but gently like everything else. I recommend powerade for the extra electrolytes it has. Not sure it makes a difference, but whatever.


----------



## Baymule

I'm sure sorry that you are sick. I hope you feel better soon.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks.
Took Pepto, was able to drink 3 powerades, muscle cramping started getting worse so I went to bed to let it sort itself out. I woke up better-less cramped and less weak, and drank another powerade. I've got a migraine coming on, but after all that I can't be surprised. I think it's safe to say I'm probably out of gut flora, but I don't really care. My first goal was hydration. The rest I can fix later.

As soon as I feel good enough the doe shed needs a shoveling after our 2-3 day north easter. vet is coming tomorrow.


----------



## Bruce

On the mend, albeit slowly. Rest as much as possible! I know that is a bit of an oxymoron with a little one and Danger Dan around. Try anyway.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thoughts like that make me grateful for Aiden. Both he and Dan are actually pretty good _generally_ but Aiden has really calmed down and matured in the last year or so.
Shaun arted with a fun pen while I was down (and destroyed the tip of the pen, but all pens go eventually...). The cooler will eventually be washed, but I get to keep the picture. I will get back to more goat stuff once I can see straight and remember what I'm doing again. Love my little animals.


----------



## Bruce

Dali, Picasso, Rembrandt, Michelangelo in the making?


----------



## rachels.haven

Nope, just dots.


----------



## Bruce

Oh, he's going to be a pointillist like Monet!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> Bay's apple cider vinegar trick


Does that include adding Jack Daniels?


----------



## rachels.haven

IDK, ask @Baymule


----------



## Bruce

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Does that include adding Jack Daniels?


It probably would if she got the "recipe" from her Grandma Wall!


----------



## Baymule

ACV and honey and Jack Daniels? Blech! Jack Black, neat please!


----------



## Mini Horses

Baymule said:


> Jack Black, neat please


Now THAT may be a Grandma Walls recipe, judging from the eggnog!   😁


----------



## Baymule

Just sniffing the bottle would knock me out these days!


----------



## rachels.haven

Still not totally better, but the herd's CVI went great.  We are ready to go on the beast front.
Making broth today out if beef bones in the pressure cooker the help keep me going while recovering. I started last night. I just have to keep cooking those bones until they go to almost a powder.


----------



## rachels.haven

So I got the opportunity to buy a new used compact buck pen. It's small and cold...very cold. There are a lot of nubian bucks in it that predate me, a pair of lamancha bucks, and a nigerian buck. My mom and I will be experimenting with AI this year, I think and I figured we'd better get started. The goat transporter says he can transport it in his rig to TN, and there was a way to ship it here, so up it comes so it can go back down.

I discovered in the walk through that the entire back pasture of the new place is fenced with old field fence, two strands of barbed wire on the bottom, one at the top and t posts. I think 5-6 strands of electric should shore it up so I can use the pasture and not have goats crushing it down rather than me stretching a whole new fence myself. Now I'm excited.

Double exciting are my hay plans.

Also, we can do milk herd shares this year if I can draw up a good enough contract.


----------



## Finnie

Glad you are starting to feel better. Definitely need your strength in the next few weeks.


----------



## Baymule

I’m excited for you !


----------



## rachels.haven

Yesterday finally we closed on the house. Tomorrow we go out on a plane for an animal prep trip. Little bit stressful.

On a different note...
I had the opportunity to buy a used semen tank that holds from someone who had accumulated 5 tanks when people sold out of AI and she wanted the semen but didn't need the tank but took the extra tank anyway. It came with a bunch of nubian semen, which I will need to get g6s tested before using on Dan's nubian goat, Spot the Galaxy. I also bought some lamancha semen and 5 dwarf straws from a very milky lined dwarf buck...so I'm adding 13 bucks to my pen. The oldest 5 nubians have about 200 straws between them and are from the 70's and 80's. The kids are fascinated by the concept of "buck juice" from bucks long gone that they get to use to use to help Spot have kids but conveniently they are terrified of the concept of liquid nitrogen. I can tell you I will be storing the tank under lock and key in the milk shop at the new place. The tank gets to Mass tonight. The goat transporter will be taking it down with the goats. There's a lot of "Longman Dusty Baron" in there. Someone over collected.

I'm attempting to arrange a load of alfalfa to be coming while we're out there. I have some skinny goats that have had doelings on them for the past 8-9 months. It's time to get them beefy again for next year.

In regards to breeding. I have 5 lamancha does, and one dwarf tenatively bred and plan to put up a dwarf breeding pen when I get there (and the tenatively bred one one will be put back in there because I don't trust Eri to be bred until she's over being BRED, and she doesn't mind the extra "fun" anyway). I have 5 lamanchas I am holding off on to add condition to, to AI, or to stagger breed with cidrs and pg600. There's one lamancha doeling, Galaxy the noober, and 3 dwarf doelings that are too small and will probably be that way until next fall. And then there's the mini saanen that's just about ready now to breed and may go in with the dwarf breeding pen when we get there (with Eri and the 2 new dwarf does)...We might be able to have a kid filled spring and fall and a milky year after that for herd shares.
Time to stress about the prep trip!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> Yesterday finally we closed on the house.


Refresh my senile memory: is that house the one you are buying (bought) in Tennessee, or is that the one you are selling (sold) in Massachusetts?


----------



## rachels.haven

Sorry, that was the Tennessee house. 
And that's not your senile memory. We have done enough house and job switching to last a long time. I am tired of the multiple house dance.


----------



## rachels.haven

One thing about New England is that you can always find someone to transport stuff for pay. Here is the new tank. It arrived an hour ago during chores. This thing sure isn't portable. More on this project later.


----------



## Bruce

That huge tank is full of goat semen? You can go into the AI business!!



rachels.haven said:


> The oldest 5 nubians have about 200 straws between them and are from the 70's and 80's


And it is still viable?? Wow.


----------



## rachels.haven

The huge tank is mostly liquid nitrogen. There are a ton of straws in it, but I don't think they take up much space. Here are the bucks I have according to the google sheets I was given. I handpicked the lamancha and dwarf. I guessed at the nubian and some of it came with the tank. It also looks like the seller included a few extra bucks. All have at least 5 straws. A few have way too many. I guess they over collected.

Nubian
CAM'S MENAGERIE HM PILGRIM
Longman’s Dusty Baron
Cam’s Menagerie HFM Firewalker
King’s Ransom Next Dance
CH Cam’s Menagerie DB Destiny
Hidden Meadows Apprentice
CH Cam’s Menagerie Count Denali
CH Cam's Menagerie HM Checkmate
GCH RANCHO HORIZON MAVERICK
SG FAITH-FARM EDEN'S TESTIMONY
Kings Ransom Flamingo Dancer

Lamancha
Here Be Goats MAI Isaac *B
Heart-MT.-Carter-Kids Sujourn
Lucky*Stars TD Johnny *B
ROCKIN-CB KTL ZORRO
CH Montage Justa Nikolea

Dwarf
BadMoonRizn Shoot 4the Moon


----------



## Bruce

Can you determine if any of them are high quality genetics?


rachels.haven said:


> The huge tank is mostly liquid nitrogen.


Um, how do you get the straws out without causing yourself major damage .... and losing all the cold?


----------



## Margali

Not done AI but have liquid nitrogen and frozen samples at work. There are special gloves and suits to protect against splashing. The semwn straws will be in some sort of holder with a handle that sticks out of liquid level assuming its like our sample holders. You pull holder out, select straw, then put holder back it.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, the straws are in goblets on canes (aka beakers on a stick). I need to get the handling and AI equipment, but basically long tweezers are used to work with the straws. There are a few more pieces of equipment involved with goat AI that I haven't gotten yet, but the opportunity to get the tank and semen arose for a very good price so I took it while it was there.

Dan announced tonight that he wants dairy bull juice in the tank. I'm not sure how he thinks we'd turn that into a cow. It's not like you put a bull straw into a doe and get him his own calf. We still only have goats...unless this is a continuation of his plan to replace my goats with his dairy cattle herd. Maybe someday he'll get his darn cow. But I like my goats.


----------



## Baymule

Jerseys are kinda small…… OK a little bigger than a goat, but get that boy a cow!


----------



## Bruce

If Dan's infatuation with having cows continues will you have space for them at the new farm?


----------



## rachels.haven

Maybe one or two of the toy minis. Hay is very cheap here, but we are only a 6 acre lot and about a third of that is people yard. I guess we'll have a tank to store bulls in. No shipper, but I hear those can be rented to get straws here. It has to be the right cow though. I'm a stickler for disease testing and temperament.


----------



## rachels.haven

Also, a cow is a fair bit bigger than a goat. I take that increase in livestock size very seriously. Those few hundred pounds are a big leap.


----------



## Baymule

Are you there yet?


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Are you there yet?


We just got back last night. Everything looks great. I got some hay, opted for softer orchard grass. The pens are up, although the big doe pen is smaller than I'd like because I ran out of time, but I will fix that probably the first week I'm there. The transporter that's taking Bailey, Mr. Tank, and the goats will be here on Wednesday and will get them there the next day. I am jealous. We will start our trek out with the barn cats and the little dogs at the latest on Saturday after the movers get done with us. My parents will be doing goat and Bailey duty until they arrive.

The whole pasture is fenced with field fencing with 2 strands of barbed wire at the bottom and one at the top so stretching fence may not need to happen yet. Instead I will focus on clearing off and running electric wire on what I have.

In person the house is spacious like DH likes (to clean? 🤔), there is a fenced in kid area that need a little work out front, and the pasture and out buildings are more than plenty for me to set up our dairy goat herd.

Time to get the little dogs back from boarding...if they'll come home. They were already having a blast before we left.

I have the new places' well house on my mind. The new place is city water, but the old well and we'll house is still there and it needs to be closed off lest Danger Dan tries to "find the bottom of the hole" and we weren't able to establish if it was covered or opened due to lack of good flashlight and how dark it was in there. BUT there are a lot of little things like that to stress over. So that will just be my first priority for later.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> there is a fenced in kid area that need a little work out front,


Is there a fence made that can contain Danger Dan??


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Is there a fence made that can contain Danger Dan??


Both boys respect electric. Neither have been shocked by it before.
I may just put up a piece of permanent plywood. Or brick it shut, since the well house is cinder block. I have time to decide.


----------



## Baymule

This is wonderful. Back among real people, not the rude (I don’t know what to call them) ok I got it! Imitation human beings! You don’t have to put up with them any more!


----------



## rachels.haven

Only for a little bit longer. As soon as the townsend house goes...
It was nice hearing the hay guy I was working with talk about running his 24/7 farm stand on the honor system and when my mom asked about theft (she works at hardware stores) he said theft of food is between them and the guy upstairs. And if they need food, then he's happy to help...Yeah, different world. I've missed it. (not everyone is that way, but it's more common)
I'm excited to sell this house and be done with up here and go back down there.  I'm so blessed to be able to move back at all and have my family happy and in the "getting there" of being in good shape again.


----------



## Finnie

rachels.haven said:


> Everything looks great.


I’m so happy for you! 🤗


----------



## rachels.haven

Bailey, Mr. Tank, and the goats left today with Blarney Heights transport. We took down the water buckets and electric goat fence. Three ducks left yesterday. The other three are going tomorrow night. Tomorrow the hired movers start. Baby has a cold so I was dead on my feet from the time I woke up for the last time and got up, but things are rolling. Tomorrow I clean the last two freezers. One was just a bonus that came with the house that we don't use much, the other is my precious chest freezer. The normal food goes to the in laws over by Boston. Any how, I'm in splatty shape and we're trying not to make dishes, so it's the start of probably a week of "eating out" as we travel out of here. Eating out sometimes means going to the grocery store and getting a pre made salad or cooked dinner, not just fast food for me, so yeah.

...Good night. Hopefully tonight I have better luck with sleep. Bad at being decisive or proactive when very tired.


I'm going to miss my ducks and I already miss my goats and cloud puppy.


----------



## Baymule

It has begun. It won’t be long and you and family will be in your new home.


----------



## rachels.haven

The goats and Bailey arrived safely and were received by my mother who is taking good care of them. Stay tuned to find out if WE get out of there as the well connected yet dumb as rocks with no boundaries neighbors or empathy call the police who declare the strip in front of our house a new no parking zone to us only so our moving truck has no where to park (and the driver does not feel comfortable turning down our narrowish driveway with his truck even if it is a loop). Pouring rain and wind at the time. I think I'd rather not talk about this too much and just try to let it become a distant memory. I wonder how else they are going to kick us on the way out today.

But the beasties are safe.

Our 6 and 8 year old got their first vaccines yesterday in preparation for a new school. No side effects this round. They are just as high energy and crazy annoying as before. The mRNA will be broken down and out of their system in 5 days at the latest if my memory of basic cellular biology holds. Man, if that messenger RNA could pass the message onto one of them to simmer down while in inside spaces...I haven't pulled it off yet


----------



## Baymule

Escape. Run. Run far far away from this place. A real home awaits.


----------



## Finnie

rachels.haven said:


> who declare the strip in front of our house a new no parking zone to us only


That just seems illegal on the part of the police.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> the police who declare the strip in front of our house a new no parking zone to us only


That is ridiculous. OK, tell the driver to park in front of the @ssh01es' property instead.



rachels.haven said:


> Man, if that messenger RNA could pass the message onto one of them to simmer down while in inside spaces...I haven't pulled it off yet


You would be rich if you could figure that one out!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Zoom in to see racing dogs on a "potty" break.

Yesterday we got here. The movers unloaded and now we have lots of work to do.

Townsend house is ready to list.

Today I pounded in a quick breeding pen for the open and in doubt dwarf and mini does and put the buck I have that is out of Dawnland Little Bee and by AMETHYST ACRES BELLE-FIORELLO (which is copy pasted because I can never remember the spelling). I'd like them to stay there for a good while.

Anyway, talk to you later. I've got a "husband sized" house to put in order and a me sized property to think about.


----------



## Bruce

Someone's dogs look very happy at the new house!


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Someone's dogs look very happy at the new house!


They appear to be. They got a morning walk with Bailey around the perimeter fence too so all the dogs should be covered. They are all a lite nuts right now though. LOTS of running around and intentionally slamming into things.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Wow!  You have a beautiful place, Miss @rachels.haven!  I'll bet that you, your DH, your 3 boys, and all of your animals will be happy there!


----------



## Baymule

Home! Unpacking! LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

Better pic of dogs. Pepper has attached herself to me so she is running back to me instead of away like the other dogs.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## Baymule

What a beautiful place! I know y'all will be so happy there!


----------



## rachels.haven

Teff hay and alfalfa hay is on the menu this winter. Teff is coming on Saturday, Alfalfa I am working on getting a set time from the local guy otherwise I will go with the higher price one from KY. Even the "expensive" alfalfa is still cheaper than grass hay in Mass.


----------



## Bruce

Looks like they have a nice barn there.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks. It's a metal pole barn. I like it.


----------



## Baymule

Home!


----------



## Finnie

rachels.haven said:


> Thanks. It's a metal pole barn. I like it.


Yay! No more falling down second floor!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

I am so happy for you and your family!  I hope that there are no busy-body neighbors around so that you and your family can live in peace.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

I hope so too. We're not actually that offensive to live next to. Our dogs are friendly and rarely bark and we try our best to always keep everything inside the fence! I guess even rarely was not acceptable back there in Townsend. My guess is they shook the 8 ball for neighbors and didn't get what they wanted. That, or maybe they were one of the parties that tried to buy the last house at the same time as us and they didn't get it and if that's the case, I can't help them there and they're welcome to try again now (apparently we were one of two identical offers with a 3rd as pretty close at the time and I will forever wonder if the next door guys wanted to split up their extended family and spread them over the two close houses). Or maybe you just need a charismatic local sponsor to live successfully and unmolested in Mass and we didn't have one. But I don't care. It's almost over there. I was notified of a showing for Saturday this morning after the house went live Wednesday. Yay for activity.

Teff hay coming tomorrow. The goats don't LOVE it, but they don't spend all day trying to pick out all the golden over mature bits so they can throw them on the ground...because there aren't any. My alfalfa contact isn't thrilled about hand (me and dh with or without him) unloading. He suggested he reduce the load and bring his tractor. I said sure but haven't heard anything for several days as far as scheduling goes and then came the holiday so I made a connection with another alfalfa person with hay 1.5 dollars more than the other guys in case. They bring a skid steer so they don't care I don't have a tractor with a hay spear. It worked out nice because the new hay person is out of town for a cattle conference and while they could schedule something while they were out they preferred to do it on Monday, so guy one has the weekend to get things scheduled before I go to guy 2. I don't want to be caught with half a hay store and all when kidding time comes. One of my little orchard lamancha does is due to kid in February and even though I think her dam was a B string doe, I know they tend to produce HARD and I'd like to be done buying alfalfa pellets.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh, forgot to add: Yesterday, Thanks giving, was baby Shaun's first birthday, so today, since he likes Dinty Moore so much I made him some lower salt Wean Stew. Tiny diced pressure cooked veggies in thicked poultry broth with tiny diced muscovy duck chunks (thanks, Dad!) anyone? Mini stew. In the mini pressure cooker. Now in ice cube trays in the freezer. Baby lunch.


----------



## farmerjan

Cannot believe that he is 1 yr old.  Seems like last month you sprung the surprise on us that you had a new addition to the family.... SO GLAD you are moved, and will keep my fingers crossed that the sale of the place in MASS will happen soon and get you totally un fettered from up there.


----------



## Baymule

I can’t believe it either! One year old! That stew sounds pretty good! Lol


----------



## rachels.haven

Teff came today from a farm 15 minutes down the road. The hay farmer says my field is fescue. I need to go pull some and examine picture but it's probably tall fescue, possibly bluegrass but I doubt it. Looks like i need to look into endophyte testing. Oh pooey. I might have some pasture improvement I'm going to need to do before turning goats out.


----------



## Bruce

My guess is the local farmer knows what is growing in the area.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> My guess is the local farmer knows what is growing in the area.


Yes, but I'd like him to be wrong, lol. But I'm sure he's right.


----------



## rachels.haven

Why is he called Danger Dan, you ask?
This was not something I expected to see crossing the kitchen floor as I came in from doing chores. I can't imagine how that could go wrong.
 ...This might have something to do why I can't get as much done as I think I should be able to and why I celebrate each of their birthdays so hard myself...









And one pic of the teff hay.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

At least this incident is ... contained?

 sorry couldn't help myself, lol.

I can't wait to see if my munchkin is as entertaining as yours. It might be awhile though, he still hasn't figured out he has hands.


----------



## rachels.haven

Larsen Poultry Ranch said:


> At least this incident is ... contained?
> 
> sorry couldn't help myself, lol.
> 
> I can't wait to see if my munchkin is as entertaining as yours. It might be awhile though, he still hasn't figured out he has hands.


No, unfortunately we couldn't put a lid on it.

Congrats on your little one. That's a sweet little stage too-short though.They're really fun and always willing to remind you not to take life too seriously.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


>



 

 for the next installment of Danger Dan Complicates Rachel's Day!


----------



## farmerjan

Bless your heart..... I would probably been committed by now,  with him..... my DS was enough of a trial.... but I was back to work when he was 6 when I got divorced.....and he was a trial to the teachers at the day care/nursery school and into kindergarten and then 1st grade.....

Nice shed/barn.... so glad you got the hay in and hope that you can figure out working around the grass/fescue.  Realize that the toxicity is way lower after the frost too, it is much more palatable to them also once the starch changes to a sugar....


----------



## rachels.haven

A balmy 75 degrees outside of Nashville, TN and the hay is finally (*almost*) all the way in. Most of the teff came in last week, the alfalfa came in today, and the teff man down the road asked if I wanted his last 20 bales and I said yes so they are coming tomorrow.
I'm going to run a hay analysis, but I'm thinking I'm done buying alfalfa pellets and the hay will carry the brunt of the protein and calcium requirements.

DH suggested we make the pasture they way we want since we intend to be here a while, so I'm looking into red river crab grass, big red clover, and lespedza. My gut says adding a reliable grass like orchard into the mix might be a good idea too if our soil parameters support it. Right now it's mostly just ideas and research...

Hay put up our of the rain and wind.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh. Wait, a few more things (tired from VERY early elementary school schedule)
I bought some quail eggs for hatching. They were out of jumbos, so I got some dual purpose breeds and next hatch will be jumbos. Eggs will go in tonight. I also got some new violets and sprung for plants this time. I had to throw most of my plants out and the violets weren't going to make it through the cold and how smashed we were in the car and I didn't have the heart to watch that happen to them (* plant coward*). The Christmas cactus and pothos that did come look horrid and there's still dirt in the car from the plants the kids snuck in (making me proud, boys).

The nitrogen tank got a fill and now I'm on the schedule and I sent off 4 straws from old, dead nubian bucks for g6s testing. I don't want to use carrier bucks here even if I have to get rid of them. Someone is selling me some straws from their nice buck and another that was tested that I can use for sure. The tank alone, however was worth the price I paid, and I also had the bonus of getting some lamancha and a dwarf buck in there. 

My AI kit has come. Later I will order cidrs and pg600 and get ready to attempt to cover a doe or two in hopes of fall kids and staggered milk production.


----------



## Baymule

Congratulations on the hay. That is quite a stack. 
I used to raise Violets. You are right, they wouldn’t have survived the trip. But at least they can be replaced now that you are home. 

Hope the testing results on the straws are to your liking.


----------



## farmerjan

Nice stack of hay.  Great feeling to have a good amount to depend on.  
Orchard grass should do okay in your area, I don't know how far south it is viable in but adds a good bulk to pastures.  Timothy won't work, likes the colder temps.  Be careful of clovers for bloat... they make a good feed but you have to be a little more careful.  We graze some alfalfa but make sure that it is dry in the afternoon when the animals get turned in,  and that they are "full" with hay before hand so they don't overeat it right off the bat.  
Check with your extension agent in your area to get a better idea of what grows good along with a soil sample so you know what you are working with.  
I wanted to cry over the violets because I really like them too.  I did treat myself to a couple that were discounted at Lowe's the other day... and 2 small pointsettas that were only $1.00 a pot.   I have to read up on them as to whether I can keep keep them for the future.  So many of these plants grown in "hot houses" don't do well after being subjected to real life.  But I have had easter lily's do good after planting in the ground..... Had a christmas cactus that survived several years... I sometimes pick up some after the holiday on clearance sales and then see if I can get them to "make it" .  
Which company is going to do your nitrogen tank?  I use Select Sire Power up here, just got my nitrogen recharge the other day.  Hope to be able to do a little AI breeding this year.  I want to maybe bring home my milk cows as they go dry in the spring... a few of them should be calving now on the dairy, and will get to be milked for another year then hopefully come home as I get back to doing things again.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today I wormed the dogs and cats with OTC pyrantel pamoate. One of the cats started puking round worms earlier last week stemming from their high risk profession and one of the dogs seeks out and eats cat feces and cat kills and it's safe to assume if one's got it they all have had exposure so for house animals around the children I'm going to knock it all back at once. Very cheap, very well received, will repeat the doses in 2-3 weeks.

Speaking of dogs, Moses is putting in an application for a career change. The middle sister in my family has anxiety and depression. A few years ago her doctor told her to get a service dog. So she did. The puppy she wound up with was extremely sweet, but nervous by nature so she couldn't go out to school with my sister and stayed home with my mother, father and youngest sister, and whatever brothers hadn't left yet at the time. That dog became my mother and younger sister's support animal, who also have anxiety and depression (too many goats for serious anxiety here, and probably been extremely blessed to be more relaxed and happy go lucky than they are). Well, a little over a week ago after owning that dog for several years some of my mother's muscovys got out, the dog broke out of her fence and took off after them (she's a fairly big dog), and those evil birds, instead of going anywhere on the acreage my parents have went straight for the road, as far from their pen as they could taking the dog with them. And the dog got hit in traffic and died in my mother's arms on the way to the vet. So all the people struggling with mental health crashed dealing with this which would be traumatic for normal people, including my middle sister out west who was SUPPOSED to have this doctor prescribed dog in the first place. So my middle sister isn't quite up to raising a puppy, so I offered to let her and Moses give it a go under the pretext that she has to do all the training. Since he was bred by Barb, he has a much more stable, calmer, laid back personality than her poor sweet dog that was nervous but loving and he stands a chance at being certified and being able to go with her to the things she struggles with in life, maybe giving her a boost. He's also potty trained and has basic house manners and obedience. If they don't click, Oh darn, I get my Mo back. If they do, Mo gets altered and gets to go to work instead of being Pepper and Bailey's favorite dog to beat on. He also gets the pampering a single dog child of a childless person will get so I doubt he will complain.

My mother and youngest sister are currently looking into getting dogs from Barb because the late dog, Emmy (not my goat), really did help them out. Emmy did her best and it was beautiful. I'm looking forward to seeing them with one of Barb's sweet, stable dogs too and seeing if they can pull off certification or if they just get comfort dogs. They did a very good job with raising Emmy with all her nervousness, I think they'll do very, very well with a doodle or poodle from Barb. I'm not sure certification will matter much as we are all outdoorsy people and taking our dogs just about everywhere is very possible if you're mostly hitting up the hardware store, tsc, and the great outdoors (other than walmart). But regardless, they need their dog and it's wonderful to know a good breeder. (I think they could probably use a couple of dogs, but I haven't said as much, that's not my business.)

Oh, and while they were grieving and angry, ducks got shot, more fencing is being put up, and baggagey stuff is being worked through. Conveniently, puppies will not be coming for a little while (although adding to fencing is a brief affair and might have been already finished, I am behind). And their house is too dang quiet. Nobody barks to let us in anymore (and I can't deny that we over here cried about that a little too).


----------



## rachels.haven

And Oh my goodness, never try to sell a house in Mass. 
Our house is still not sold and we've had so much drama with one person about it we're wondering if it's time to hire a lawyer to protect us. Uncivil, unkind, paranoid, spiteful, entitled, awful people going after us as we try to get the heck out of there. We never want to hurt or offend anyone, but apparently we did (didn't even talk to them while this was going on, this was all in their heads so we are terribly confused). Never talk to cash buyers from Harvard with no agent who love the property then turn a 180 and decide to withdraw the offer and go nuts on us. If they keep harassing us we're going to have to hire a lawyer to protect us legally in addition to the one that does our end of the sales contract in that state in order to sell a house. And we have done NOTHING to offend them. They're just rich and entitled and nuts and we look like good targets.

Regardless. Playground. With the little boy who wants to be big.




Moses getting his fluff beat.





And a couple of pretty little dwarfy goats in the sunrise after a storm.






I need more pretty goat pictures in here.


----------



## rachels.haven

Getting another load of hay. I'm going to be working on he pasture in the spring. I don't want to be caught without hay while it's getting "rebooted".


----------



## farmerjan

Oh @rachels.haven ... I feel so bad for you... but believe me there are more total A$$HOLES in Mass than in all the rest of the new england states.... Do whatever you have to, including into looking into a lawyer... but why are you having to deal with anyone?  Did you list this house with a RE agent?  If not, get the end of sale contract lawyer to suggest someone... or tell him that you will sue these crazy people if they continue to harass you..... If you decided to do a sell by owner, please just get a r.e. agent, take it on the chin for the commission and get it sold with no direct dealings with a prospective buyer,  and get gone from there.  I would not deal with someone from Mass if they were the last people on earth and I was going to die without dealing with them.  Really,  I am a born and bred N.E. Yankee and I would not deal with someone from Mass....
I wish half those arrogant A**holes would get covid and suffer and then just starve to death.  Another reason to never go back to my Yankee roots.  That whole area has gone to such extremes to think they are "better than".....  They think they are so far above the average "peon" and so much smarter and better than those that do not have the same privileged  upbringing or the same level of financial liquidity.... Rich stupid snobs that would frickin starve to death without us dumb farmers......but they can buy whatever they want....

Good luck with Mo's possible "job change".  I assume this is to help with the allergy difficulties?


----------



## Ridgetop

Just reading your back postings and got tothe listing of the goat semen.  Lucky Star is a top notch breeder in Washington State and Rocking CB is also close to her.  Those bucks might be bucks that were purchased from those 2 breeders, but you can get information on them by contacting Judy Hoy at Lucky Star.  Cindy Silva at Rockin CB will also be able to tell you about the Rockin CB buck.  Excellent breeders with fabulous animals.  We had some Lucky Star LaManchas and they were gorgeous.  All of Judy Hoy's goats are also on milk test and many are multiple *** milkers.  Good stuff there - call Judy and she can possibly tell you about some of the other LaManchas in your tank.


----------



## Ridgetop

Your place looks great and you and DH must be in 7th heaven with relief to get out of Mass, and out of that job of his.  

I am with Farmerjan - why are these people that pulled their offer on your house still even talking to you?   You had an accepted offer and then they pulled out.  If anyone should be threatening anyone it should be you threatening to sue for a contract on which they reneged.  If they keep bothering you, you need to get a restraining order.  However, if you have a real estate agent, your agent is responsible to talk to their agent.  In most states if you have an agent and they have an agent, the 2 agents talk and you only talk to your agent - kind of like attorneys.  Why on earth would *they* be threatening *you* over their cancellation of the contract?!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Playground. With the little boy who wants to be big.


Is DH training up another "Danger Dan"??



farmerjan said:


> Did you list this house with a RE agent?


And lose the 6%? But .... in this case I would since Rachel is no longer in the neighborhood. We sold our house to people in the old neighborhood that I sell eggs to. They were renting there waiting for a house to come up for sale. Only a dang fool pays a REA in that neighborhood. Don't even advertize, just tell the neighbors you are looking to sell and you will have people at the door. We still both got our own "CYA" RE lawyers.

Since the Harvard grads backed out, you get to keep the deposit. Your RE lawyer DID get a deposit, right?


----------



## rachels.haven

Ridgetop said:


> Your place looks great and you and DH must be in 7th heaven with relief to get out of Mass, and out of that job of his.
> 
> I am with Farmerjan - why are these people that pulled their offer on your house still even talking to you?   You had an accepted offer and then they pulled out.  If anyone should be threatening anyone it should be you threatening to sue for a contract on which they reneged.  If they keep bothering you, you need to get a restraining order.  However, if you have a real estate agent, your agent is responsible to talk to their agent.  In most states if you have an agent and they have an agent, the 2 agents talk and you only talk to your agent - kind of like attorneys.  Why on earth would *they* be threatening *you* over their cancellation of the contract?!





farmerjan said:


> Oh @rachels.haven ... I feel so bad for you... but believe me there are more total A$$HOLES in Mass than in all the rest of the new england states.... Do whatever you have to, including into looking into a lawyer... but why are you having to deal with anyone?  Did you list this house with a RE agent?  If not, get the end of sale contract lawyer to suggest someone... or tell him that you will sue these crazy people if they continue to harass you..... If you decided to do a sell by owner, please just get a r.e. agent, take it on the chin for the commission and get it sold with no direct dealings with a prospective buyer,  and get gone from there.  I would not deal with someone from Mass if they were the last people on earth and I was going to die without dealing with them.  Really,  I am a born and bred N.E. Yankee and I would not deal with someone from Mass....
> I wish half those arrogant A**holes would get covid and suffer and then just starve to death.  Another reason to never go back to my Yankee roots.  That whole area has gone to such extremes to think they are "better than".....  They think they are so far above the average "peon" and so much smarter and better than those that do not have the same privileged  upbringing or the same level of financial liquidity.... Rich stupid snobs that would frickin starve to death without us dumb farmers......but they can buy whatever they want....
> 
> Good luck with Mo's possible "job change".  I assume this is to help with the allergy difficulties?


Wow, that's a lot of text that comes from the "reply" button. and my T key is on the blitz again. The answer to that question is that they are very difficult people. They have been harassing our agent to try and get our contact info, and when they're not getting that they'd been trying to force her to pass on messages, and talk through her. So we got some of what happened, and even tha portion was A LOT. And now we're dealing directly with the city. Obscure law breakers that we are. It doesn't matter much but our real estate agent has apologized for even being willing to deal with them and entertain their offer. She's a very experienced realtor, but apparently this was unexpected for her too.

We may have a buyer though that I didn't know about earlier who is trying to get a construction loan and has been back 4+ times with contractors and really likes it and they DEFINITELY know what they are dealing with and have no illusions about he barn. Financing is slow, their assessor comes out in the next few days to decide if the property would have enough value if it becomes a horse boarding facility for the construction loan. Prayers and fingers crossed.  Funny how different sets of people can get the same schpeel and one group becomes a living horror show and the other gets it and wants to repurpose or rebuild to make the most of it.

I guess I'll let you know later if our ancient agricultural chicken barn qualifies as a "dangerous and uninhabitable building" worth being a complaint to the city.    (I didn't think you were supposed to inhabit agricultural buildings as there is no code for them in Mass and all...also all people that are taken through are told-and if they wanted shown-that the building has structural issues so it's not like anything was hidden?) Honestly it almost seems like the crazy, entitled affluent people from Harvard thought they could turn it into a second house quick and easy or that the barn was move in ready for people and was not solely being used for storage of mowers and garden tools and didn't listen when they were told on the tour that it wasn't fit for that and needed work. I really did not think people like this were going to be on our docket for that nice little humble property but I guess we are not immune.

But, as DH pointed out, we are doing okay. We are out of there. Now to get the other property gone cut those ties!!!


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> Honestly it almost seems like the crazy, entitled affluent people from Harvard thought they could turn it into a second house quick and easy or that the barn was move in ready for people and was not solely being used for storage of mowers and garden tools and didn't listen when they were told on the tour that it wasn't fit for that and needed work.



That is probably what they did think.  With the influx of people needing housing they may have thought that they could slap some paint in the walls and presto!  2 rentable units log with the main house.  

In our state (CA) the laws about codes and so on are being changed because the ultra libs want more houses on every lot.  (Not where they live of course, but in other neighborhoods.)  The guy at the bottom of our tiny private road has converted the old barn into a 2 story house.  Where they are going to park I don't know. Now he is building another big building in the horse corral.  Hopefully it is a shelter to take the place of the barn that he converted but I am afraid he will build it as a barn and then convert it to housing.  I don't really care but his workers are parking in the road and we can't get up our hill.  The delivery man was having to walk up with packages!  Anyone adding 750 sf to their homes were supposed to widen the road but he didn't.  Some of our lawmakers have even said that it is "immoral" for a person to only have one house on a lot and not to share with others. Sounds like this Harvard couple are like that.  They are probably hoping that you will offer to reduce the price a lot to make up for the falling down chicken house.  

If the problems with the existing outbuildings were declared at the outset, they will have no claim against you.  I would just have the realtor tell them that any offer they made has been cancelled according to the terms if the contract and that he not speak to them anymore.  After all, they don't have to buy the place!

I wouldn't worry about them anymore.  Here only adjacent property owners have the right to make complaints about the property.  Since the outbuildings are not being inhabited the city shouldn't have any complaints.  In fact, you might have the realtor put a chain and padlock on the gate so no one can get in the yard without a key.  The realtor can either put a lockbox on the front door (with your permission) or require anyone wishing to view the property to do it in person with him.  That would keep any city inspectors out of the yard.

What a pain in the neck for you though.


----------



## Baymule

How unreal that people would act like that. What a master escape y'all pulled off to get out of that sh!thole. Cesspool of imitation humanity. "Nuff said.

Moses has a career now. Anxiety is real, it can be crippling and you are an angel to share Moses with your sister. I have a sneaking hunch that it will be the best thing that has ever happened to her. I've always known that you are an outstanding woman, here is another example of the bursting at the seams love in your heart.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> Speaking of dogs, Moses is putting in an application for a career change.


I wish there were a way to express several emotions on that post.  Some of it made me happy, some made me sad, some made me so proud of you!

That is so sad about the emotional support dog that got killed in the road.  It is so thoughtful and caring that you would consider giving them Moses.  I hope whatever happens that your mother and sisters can get the assistance they need.

I am so proud of you, Miss @rachels.haven!  Here is an example of why you are among my favorite of people on this forum! 

I hope you can get rid of those jerks who are hassling you about your house, and then can get your property sold so you can finally got out of that troubled place.

Senile Texas Aggie

edited to add: Sister Teresa once said "We cannot all do great things, but we can do small things with great love."  Thank you for inspiring me.


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, thank you. I know about the multiple reactions thing. It's been a very full of feelings week or two for us in real life too. Life is good though. We seem to be keeping it more together!
I'm going to miss Moses, but he's not exactly going to be permanently gone even if it works out. He'll be in and out. (I keep telling myself)


----------



## rachels.haven

Merry Christmas, all. 2021.


----------



## farmerjan

Merry Christmas to you and your family.  I'll bet it was like a zoo on overdrive this morning at your house!!!!!!
Time to go out to the goats to have a "calm down" minute ????
🎅🤶


----------



## rachels.haven

Actually this Christmas has been pretty sedate. DH is having more eye issues as we try to get him into see a glaucoma specialist so everything kind of has a damper on it. We're thinking it's probably a medication side effect, but loosing sight is loosing sight. Then we drove to PA to see his parents, leaving the home in my parents' hands. It's probably the best environment for him to feel secure and distracted in while we wait for the big specialists to let him in to be seen. If the specialist in the Nashville area doesn't get back to us soon I may encourage him to fly out to the glaucoma center he used to go to in Michigan 3x yearly or whatever so he doesn't have to go blind at 35. The whole thing has kind of made our personal Christmas plans small. My boys are well behaved when it comes to traditions so they politely opened their presents and were good and respectful and are now trying to keep up with Grandpa.

As far as farm update goes, before we left a pack of 3 pits/pit mixes came into our yard and pasture like the field fence with barbed wire at top and bottom wasn't even there and Bailey got herself up onto the porch away from them with Pepper, while Moses went to go see if any of them were ladies...so I chased them all off with an airhorn and bearspray (possibility of red, burning dog face, anyone?). My children could have been outside or the goats could have been out in the field. We're going to try to bring in another Bailey or two if I can find some. The roaming pits will eventually get shot by someone-they already attacked a dog on a tie out that belonged to the big farming family in the area so their time is limited-but roaming dogs are an issue as are coyotes, so another LGD makes the most sense. I don't want any pits messing with the children or goats like they messed with the next door neighbor's tied out lab.

Kidding starts first to second week of Feb with Hera the lamancha and Eri the dwarf up first.

My pasture seed is arriving.

Second load of alfalfa to act as reassurance as I work on the pasture got put on hold because the hay people's mother lost heat to half her house so that's a work in progress.


----------



## farmerjan

Oh, @rachels.haven , I am so sorry that your husband is having more problems.  Prayers for your family, and hoping that your DH can find some help to preserve his sight.  

I am glad that the kids can understand and believe in the family traditions and that they can enjoy the visits with the grandparents.  And that they were good for you for the holiday.

Unfortunately for the pit/mixes, it will be the best thing for them to be destroyed.  Roaming like that is sadly a very bad thing for everyone and the animals too.  Once animals like that become semi feral; there is no redeeming them.  I hope that they are caught and dispatched quickly so that the threat is stopped.  That will not stop the coyote problem and yes, finding a partner for Bailey is probably the best route for all concerned.....I don't blame you for wanting her to have backup and better protection for the goats, and for your children.  Sadly, you may need to put those shooting lessons to use.


----------



## Baymule

farmerjan said:


> Oh, @rachels.haven , I am so sorry that your husband is having more problems.  Prayers for your family, and hoping that your DH can find some help to preserve his sight.
> 
> I am glad that the kids can understand and believe in the family traditions and that they can enjoy the visits with the grandparents.  And that they were good for you for the holiday.
> 
> Unfortunately for the pit/mixes, it will be the best thing for them to be destroyed.  Roaming like that is sadly a very bad thing for everyone and the animals too.  Once animals like that become semi feral; there is no redeeming them.  I hope that they are caught and dispatched quickly so that the threat is stopped.  That will not stop the coyote problem and yes, finding a partner for Bailey is probably the best route for all concerned.....I don't blame you for wanting her to have backup and better protection for the goats, and for your children.  Sadly, you may need to put those shooting lessons to use.


X2
Roaming pit bulls are begging for a bullet. Hope that gets resolved soon. 

Prayers for your husbands eyesight. Big hugs, hope he gets in to see a specialist soon.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you both.
Yes, if they continue to roam I'd be surprised if they are still roaming when we get back. Too many beef cattle farmers in the area that want to protect their business from other people's irresponsible decisions. That, or cars.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> The roaming pits will eventually get shot by someone-they already attacked a dog on a tie out that belonged to the big farming family in the area so their time is limited-


Limited should have been the minute they attacked that poor dog. If they come around your place again I hope your rifle is in hand.

I too hope your DH can get proper help for his eyes.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

It seems that life is so often testing you.  Yet somehow you seem to always take it in stride.  Like the others have said, I hope your husband can see an eye specialist soon.  He is way too young to be having to deal with health problems!

I also agree with the others on taking care of those pit bulls.  It's too bad the pit bulls can't see set loose against the coyotes instead of other dogs.

It sounds like you still have a lot to do around your farm, but my prediction is that you will have it done in a jiffy.  I still remember how you described storing away all of that hay you bought up in the second story of the barn you had one your farm in Mass.  Then a few days later you mentioned you had a baby (Shaun).  WHAT?? Miss Rachels.haven did all of that work while 7, 8, 9 months pregnant??  WOW!!!   So you will do something like that again.    And we will all be amazed again.

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Aw, thanks @Senile_Texas_Aggie . I needed to hear that.


----------



## rachels.haven

So not a farm update, but DH got an appointment with a specialist in January. I'm half way relieved!


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> So not a farm update, but DH got an appointment with a specialist in January. I'm half way relieved!


----------



## farmerjan

Baymule said:


>


x100.  Doesn't have to be a farm update.  We care about all the members of the farm.


----------



## Bruce

Right you are Jan!!



rachels.haven said:


> I'm half way relieved!


Only half way??


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Only half way??


All the way would be taking him off the meds that are causing the cornea damage and then healing all the way. But I'm counting my blessings!


----------



## rachels.haven

Not much going on today. Quail in a rabbit cage on the patio/sun room. Kidding starts first week of feb.

Pepper and Moses, before the snow.


----------



## rachels.haven

Naughty Teenaged Pepper and ever photogenic Moses.


----------



## Baymule

They look like they are having so much fun!


----------



## rachels.haven

It was a standoff over the muddy duck toy Pepper always brings to Baby Shaun if he starts crying.

Then it got blizzardy . I think we got a good 6 inches.


----------



## farmerjan

Instant presto changeO....


----------



## Baymule

Awww Pepper tried to comfort baby Shaun by sharing his toy! That’s really sweet, muddy or not. LOL

6” of snow! Is that your normal winter? Normal winter in Lindale is 2-3” and it melts in 3 days. What we got last winter was a freak storm, 10” of snow and ice, -6F degrees and lasted for 2 weeks !


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm not sure what's normal for here. Last time I lived here over a winter I was a kid. Everyone says we get one or two good snow storms every year, but nobody quantified "good" for me.

It's not 6" of snow anymore. Despite the temperature taking a nose dive into the single digits, it looks like the ground was not sufficiently warm to keep the snow frozen. Underneath the white exterior now there is a layer of ice, or in some places mud and the snow on the driveway has melted down to less than an inch. The average now is probably more like 3" (1 inch is a dusting, 2" is grass showing but mostly covered, 3" is a small snow cap, just enough to look good...) I think it will all be gone by the end of tomorrow when we go back to the 40's and 50's. I was tempted not to break out my insulated overalls and big boots, but I did. Now it's up to 13 and rising so I'll probably wash them and hang them up for next winter (?).


----------



## Bruce

I don't think winter is over just yet Rachel! Our coldest temps are usually the last couple of weeks of Jan and the first couple of February. I assume that would be true for most of the country.


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, idk...the two different hay guys said they only get two good snow storms over the winter. That was two. So winter HAS to be over or they have to give back their hay guy licenses, right?

They didn't say anything about tornados though, and we had a few of those. I wonder what that means.


----------



## Bruce

It means you better put in a tornado shelter!!!!


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> Lol, idk...the two different hay guys said they only get two good snow storms over the winter. That was two. So winter HAS to be over or they have to give back their hay guy licenses, right?
> 
> They didn't say anything about tornados though, and we had a few of those. I wonder what that means.


Sorry, doubt they will have to give back their "hay licenses"  and from the looks of it, you will be getting more winter.  I don't think of a 3 inch snow as a good snow storm.... I think these "2 snow storms" is really more equal to 1 snow storm so far..... There is some talk about another real "winter storm" coming in mid to late January....  west to east... so you and @Mike CHS will get it before it comes to us here.... 
Hey... anything is BETTER THAN  Mass madness.  
Did the house get sold yet up there?  Sure hope so for your sake.  
How soon is DH appt?  Hoping for soon and some promising results.

I think of you everytime I see and pick up some of these "on sale" post Christmas african violets... I am getting addicted... I have a pole that was made for my mom by a friend of theirs years ago that has arms for like 20 plants... I am trying to figure out where it is so I can get it out and see if I can get it set up to have in here for these.... But in the mean time I am trying to find the other shelf sets that I had years ago in CT that hang on the window with trays for the plants to sit on... I may have to go back to the nursery in CT the next time up there and buy them again as they don't seem to have them anywhere in any of the nurserys around here... 
It is nice to see some live green in the house though.


----------



## Baymule

You put up your insulated overalls at 13F degrees?? You are a lot tougher than I am! I bring mine out at below freezing. Flannel lined blue jeans too! Hahaha!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven,

Has your husband seen his eye doctor yet?  We don't want his vision to get any worse. <gulp!>

And what's the latest on what happens to Moses?  I loved seeing the picture of him and Pepper playing with the toy.

And what about the roaming dogs?  Have they been dealt with?

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## rachels.haven

Hi all,
Sorry for the absence. We got sick with something off of vacation with symptoms remarkably like vaccinated/boosted covid. DH got his test and was negative, but he was nearly better so we may have gone in too late. I got sick first, thought i was doing better, then got sicker, and am still a little off and DH is similar, just about a week later. My brother (who went on a different vacation and we had no contact with) had a similar situation but his unvaccinated wife and baby tested positive. Brother was also vaccinated but not boosted because of a severe rare allergic reaction and he got very sick both at the 2 vaccines and this week (he's apparently severely allergic to covid). His wife and baby got even sicker but appear to be on the mend now. I think the blisters and hives on my brothers eyes and lips are starting to go away. Man, does his body hate covid(No matter how sick I am I don't envy him).

DH's appt is the 28th. I'm anxiously waiting for it.

The roaming dogs have disappeared. Thank goodness. We're working on our own defenses. The problem is, there is a puppy glut right now and the goat herder wants me to take both 3 month old boy puppies and not one and is willing to steeply discount and put on pressure to get them to new homes. So tomorrow I might wind up with two pyr/anatolian/pyr puppies to try my patience and be penned next to the goats. But we'll see. I'd prefer one. I will see if they will sell me JUST one (and not try to give me the other one free). Puppies are naughty butts and pyr and pyr cross puppies appear to be everywhere and cheap because nobody appears to neuter or spay their LGD's. At least they are all working and people don't tolerate crappy dogs here. They tend to disappear...

FarmerJan, I love me my violets too. I got a few violets and streptocarpus from rob's violet barn greenhouse and lyndon lyon greenhouse mail order, then my mom, who works for the contractors who do a big box store's plants, found out about my looking and gave me a ton of dumpster plants-not violets, because stores tend to ruin them or they don't carry them, but other things that were healthy, but timed out, and they don't do clearance. I can't say I would have bought them, and I won't be selling them, and she didn't take "too many" out and those are the rules for the dumpster plants at her work. So now I have "no space" for more orchids, spider plants, and aloes, which means at some point more will probably appear.

I have 32 quail now. I feather sexed the Egyptian Fee ones, and pulled out the genetic anomalies to keep for fun. The Rosetta ones will have to be vent sexed. I keep getting more rabbit cages. I'm up to 3 24" ones and 2 36"grow ou ones...and now the TSC 10 mintues away is now out of 24" ones because I bought them out! Oh no! They will have to try harder to stay in stock. My jumbo eggs are on the way. Good thing they need a brooder and not a cage right away. *Cheaper than a chicken coop, cheaper than a chicken coop, cheaper than a chicken coop...* And it really is.

Anyway, I sold one buck that I intended to. The other is supposed to go this weekend, but going by the weather I doubt it. One Lamancha buck should be going then too. We'll see. Then I will need some more bucks to grow out and I have my eyes on some nice ones.

More alfalfa coming either Friday or soon after as the weather permits so I can work on my little field without feeling too much pressure. I have the seed now. It seems so small compared to the land area, but I've already exceeded the amount in the seeding rate.

Anyway, I need to get going. I'm still dragging a bit and life does not wait!

Kidding is so close!!!


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm lucky I was sick. I almost got a bunch of cute little pigs to help me with extra milk.


----------



## rachels.haven

Moses is still here. I would prefer my sister to come out here to meet him, and we're working on that. I may give in if she's sure and let my parents take him to her. After watching him for 2 weeks, my parents think that if any dog will help my sister, Moses will so he will probably go soon. He's become a sweet, loving, calm, and doting old soul (and also a chow hound) that Pepper likes to beat on mercilessly. I think he'd welcome a change.

Since they're so sure he's going I found a breeder of small poodles that needed to move a litter due to another coming, that aforementioned glut of puppies, and the fact that she had had covid, and found Pepper a new baby gentleman friend. More on that later.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I think the blisters and hives on my brothers eyes and lips are starting to go away.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, he probably would have benefitted from not getting covid. Over active immune systems appear to run in the family. I guess it would be a reaction to antibodies since both the vaccines and the virus got the same response?


----------



## Ridgetop

Do you have a guardian dog now?  How are your fences?  

If the breeder insists you take 2 puppies will your current LGD (if any) help train them?  If your fences are not good, you need to be careful taking puppies.  They learn bad habits fast and with 75%Pyrenees, they will learn to roam.  Pyrs are known for that, as well as for their ability to get out of just about any fencing.

One reason Pyrs roam is their guarding style.  These are dogs that for thousands of years guarded a transhumance type of grazing.  The shepherds would move the flocks from winter grazing in the warmer valleys up into the mountains for spring and summer pastures.  Because these dogs had immense ranges to cover as the shepherds and flocks travelled, they were gradually selected for a guarding pattern that worked in the outside of the flock to protect from attack as they moved.  Once at the pastures they would clear all predators from the perimeter area.  They set their own perimeter within which they protect everything.  Their perimeter is seldom your fenced borders.  Pyrs do not want any predators within the "safety net" they decide on.  For our 1.5, then 6, acres it was the entire *100* open acres behind and around our property!  We loved our Pyrs, but the roaming outside the fenced acreage was very worrying.  

Our first Pyr we bought from a Basque shepherd in Bakersfield who had bred and raised Pyrs for years.  He would take his flock of Rambouillets into the mountains every spring after shearing.  He would stay up there with the flock of about 1000 head counting their lambs, 3 other Basque shepherds, about 10 Pyrs, and his caravan until fall sent him back to his ranch in Bakersfield.  The lambs were sold for meat.  We bought 2 subsequent Pyrs. Our last 2 were descendants of that first dog.  

One of our Pyrs would leave the yard at night and be back inside the fence in the morning. We were congratulating ourselves on finally having a Pyr that did not roam when he got hit by a car 2 miles from the house.  The police officers, who called us after reading his microchip at 2 am, said that they routinely saw him down on that road every night apparently patrolling his territory.  His sister could not be kept inside the fences either. After getting calls from several miles away on a bi-weekly basis we rehomed her to a 1000 cattle ranch.  Three years later I got a call that she had been found wandering.    The new owner had not bothered to update the microchip information.  Some Pyrs tend to stay closer to the flock than others.  Also you will find that during lambing your LGD will stick close to the barn until the smell of afterbirth is gone.

Our Pyrs were wonderful guardians, great with our friends and children, but not being able to keep them inside the fences was very stressful.  Since we no longer have 4-H children, we switched to Anatolians.  Anatolians are not for everyone, and particularly if yuo do not have good fences.  Our male is very suspicious of strangers.  His temperament is more aggressive, closer to the original Anatolian temperament.  Our bitches are more discerning and will allow strangers on the property if we are with them. Because I fear lawsuits, I insist on putting the dogs, or at least Bubba, in the barn or the kennel when strangers or workmen are around.

Other breeds will guard in different ways.  Dogs from backgrounds where the shepherds took the flocks out at dawn and returned to the village at night will tend to remain closer to the flock.  It also depends on the individual dog.  Like people each dog is different and has a slightly different inclination to guarding.  

If there are a lot of dogs available, you can afford to be choosier in selecting your puppy.  Is there a possibility you can get an older, partially trained dog?  One good thing about littermates is that they will play with each other.  Pyr littermates will accept same age dogs of the same sex which Anatolians will not.  If you have a problem with coyotes and stray dogs, it might be worthwhile to take the second puppy as a gift and train them both.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ridgetop said:


> Do you have a guardian dog now?  How are your fences?
> 
> If the breeder insists you take 2 puppies will your current LGD (if any) help train them?  If your fences are not good, you need to be careful taking puppies.  They learn bad habits fast and with 75%Pyrenees, they will learn to roam.  Pyrs are known for that, as well as for their ability to get out of just about any fencing.
> 
> One reason Pyrs roam is their guarding style.  These are dogs that for thousands of years guarded a transhumance type of grazing.  The shepherds would move the flocks from winter grazing in the warmer valleys up into the mountains for spring and summer pastures.  Because these dogs had immense ranges to cover as the shepherds and flocks travelled, they were gradually selected for a guarding pattern that worked in the outside of the flock to protect from attack as they moved.  Once at the pastures they would clear all predators from the perimeter area.  They set their own perimeter within which they protect everything.  Their perimeter is seldom your fenced borders.  Pyrs do not want any predators within the "safety net" they decide on.  For our 1.5, then 6, acres it was the entire *100* open acres behind and around our property!  We loved our Pyrs, but the roaming outside the fenced acreage was very worrying.
> 
> Our first Pyr we bought from a Basque shepherd in Bakersfield who had bred and raised Pyrs for years.  He would take his flock of Rambouillets into the mountains every spring after shearing.  He would stay up there with the flock of about 1000 head counting their lambs, 3 other Basque shepherds, about 10 Pyrs, and his caravan until fall sent him back to his ranch in Bakersfield.  The lambs were sold for meat.  We bought 2 subsequent Pyrs. Our last 2 were descendants of that first dog.
> 
> One of our Pyrs would leave the yard at night and be back inside the fence in the morning. We were congratulating ourselves on finally having a Pyr that did not roam when he got hit by a car 2 miles from the house.  The police officers, who called us after reading his microchip at 2 am, said that they routinely saw him down on that road every night apparently patrolling his territory.  His sister could not be kept inside the fences either. After getting calls from several miles away on a bi-weekly basis we rehomed her to a 1000 cattle ranch.  Three years later I got a call that she had been found wandering.    The new owner had not bothered to update the microchip information.  Some Pyrs tend to stay closer to the flock than others.  Also you will find that during lambing your LGD will stick close to the barn until the smell of afterbirth is gone.
> 
> Our Pyrs were wonderful guardians, great with our friends and children, but not being able to keep them inside the fences was very stressful.  Since we no longer have 4-H children, we switched to Anatolians.  Anatolians are not for everyone, and particularly if yuo do not have good fences.  Our male is very suspicious of strangers.  His temperament is more aggressive, closer to the original Anatolian temperament.  Our bitches are more discerning and will allow strangers on the property if we are with them. Because I fear lawsuits, I insist on putting the dogs, or at least Bubba, in the barn or the kennel when strangers or workmen are around.
> 
> Other breeds will guard in different ways.  Dogs from backgrounds where the shepherds took the flocks out at dawn and returned to the village at night will tend to remain closer to the flock.  It also depends on the individual dog.  Like people each dog is different and has a slightly different inclination to guarding.
> 
> If there are a lot of dogs available, you can afford to be choosier in selecting your puppy.  Is there a possibility you can get an older, partially trained dog?  One good thing about littermates is that they will play with each other.  Pyr littermates will accept same age dogs of the same sex which Anatolians will not.  If you have a problem with coyotes and stray dogs, it might be worthwhile to take the second puppy as a gift and train them both.


Our entire property is very sturdy field fence with 1 or two strands of barbed wire on the bottom depending on the roll of the land, and one on top. The pasture is also fenced off from the yard yard. This fence does not stop pit bulls, apparently. They act like it is not there. Come spring I will start work on running a hot wire around the top and middle for the goats. Then we'll let the goats out of the barn pens.

We have one LGD, and she is a pyr but does not roam ( knock on wood). She is either with the goats or occasionally on the porch if the pasture gate is left open. She likes to take a subordinate position in packs though, and if threats come she bands the animals (or my kids) together and stuffs them in a corner and stands between the threat and what she is guarding. She does not really patrol-maybe once a night, and she does not appear to go far. She stays with the goats. I worry the 2 puppies would be come pack bosses and lead HER in to mischief.

I am going to push hard for just one puppy. That way we won't have a little naughty pack and heaps of trouble.

I've been watching and the only adults that have become available either attack stock or go through fences and roam. Sometimes there are pyr mix with pits, lab, mastiff that people have been using, a few available with a herd dispersal, but the lab (usually lab) part scares me.

Very little Anatolian blood out there. Oddly enough, it's 99% pyr or pyr-pet mix. Someone is even breeding pyrs to poodles and claiming they are livestock guardians. That's not my problem, but boy is it ever going to be one.


----------



## rachels.haven

*editing because I am trying to make sense while up late and on a cracked phone with a mind of its own
I'm picking this herd to get puppies from because of the Anatolian in them and because upon talking to them the breeder appears to know and understand their dogs, their goats, them, and the relationship between the three groups. And they are honest about things, like they made a point of telling me at the beginning that they could be pets, but they live outside in a bar with goats.


----------



## rachels.haven

*that would be "barn". No bar hopping puppies. Time to get off before something else autocorrects wrong.
Basically, if I want an adult it either has to be a troubled/failed pyr or a pet cross. People don't part with their good LGD'S. And apparently they strongly prefer pyrs. Driving around I've seen so many great Pyrenees and zero any other kind of livestock guardian. I wonder why?


----------



## Ridgetop

That is ok.  Anatolians are *not* for everybody.  Pyrs are sweet tempered and since your children are young and will be having friends over to play with the lambs as time goes by Pyr temperament will be the best for you.  

Definitely do not get any mixed breeds that are not both LGDs.  And make sure that both parents are with livestock.  

You can always add smaller opening wire on the existing fences.  You can also attach taller posts to the fence posts you have *if *they are securely in the ground.  Then you can attach another roll of wire on to the taller posts to raise the height of your fences.  Hot wire is probably the cheapest way to go but you need to make sure that the wire stays charged.

You have a handle on everything.  Get the calmest puppy in the litter and let your adult LGD help train it.   Herding the animals into a corner then getting between them and danger is excellent LGD behavior.  It is seen when the guardian thinks it cannot take on the predators without backup.  If our dog is young or there is a heavy predator load, this is exceptionally good behavior.


----------



## rachels.haven

They are one half Anatolian, my bad. And they are very timid which is why she thought they would be best sent home together. Last of the large litter and least confident. And they are over 50 lbs at 15 weeks. They are going to need some gentle taming work. Being able to see the goats makes them a little less timid. These puppies like to sit/lay there and watch. If they can grow up and all they have the confidence to do is to be penned with the goats at night to keep things out of the pen in the dark and sit and watch the field by day that would be enough. I don't need terrifying guard dogs. Timid can be fine.


Bailey does not tolerate any crap from these two, no excessive face sniffing, no getting near the goats, no sharing space. Currently they are penned alone between the bucks and the does so they can see and watch both groups and Bailey but no one can beat up on anyone else. Time for a new adventure? (Might need to split them up at some point, I can tell)


----------



## Baymule

I think you are right, together they would get into trouble. LOL Bailey is the best girl! She will put these two in their place. She is the QUEEN!


----------



## Ridgetop

So you fell for the "get two and they will be company for each other" ploy.  HaHaHa  Actually, if they are more Pyr in temperament they might get along with each other when they mature.  If not, remember that trained adult guardians are valuable, and you will have no problem selling one of them.  Just be sure to have your bitch spayed or there will be trouble.

LGD puppies are timid seeming up to a certain age when they are big enough to defend themselves.  In the meantime, they will try other behaviors to decoy predators away from the flock.  One of these is the "play away" behavior where a young dog that is faced with several predators or a large predator will try to decoy the predator away from the flock. Once they have it far enough from the flock to no longer be a threat they will sit and watch until it goes away.  This is more usually with stray dogs.  Another trick when they are unsure about their ability to protect the herd is to round up the flock and put them in a safe and easy to defend spot, then keep them there while they guard the only approach.  

LGDs are complicated thinkers with an uncanny ability to work out problems.  Of course, along with this intelligence comes an innate belief that you are also in need of their protection.  

Have fun with them.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ridgetop said:


> So you fell for the "get two and they will be company for each other" ploy.  HaHaHa  Actually, if they are more Pyr in temperament they might get along with each other when they mature.  If not, remember that trained adult guardians are valuable, and you will have no problem selling one of them.  Just be sure to have your bitch spayed or there will be trouble.
> 
> LGD puppies are timid seeming up to a certain age when they are big enough to defend themselves.  In the meantime, they will try other behaviors to decoy predators away from the flock.  One of these is the "play away" behavior where a young dog that is faced with several predators or a large predator will try to decoy the predator away from the flock. Once they have it far enough from the flock to no longer be a threat they will sit and watch until it goes away.  This is more usually with stray dogs.  Another trick when they are unsure about their ability to protect the herd is to round up the flock and put them in a safe and easy to defend spot, then keep them there while they guard the only approach.
> 
> LGDs are complicated thinkers with an uncanny ability to work out problems.  Of course, along with this intelligence comes an innate belief that you are also in need of their protection.
> 
> Have fun with them.


Yes, there is a pyr group on FB for my area where I could rehome one as needed fairly quickly with little hassle. 

Thank you, I'll do my best.


----------



## rachels.haven

If queen Bailey stays this grumpy no teenaged pups will be getting away with anything. They'll just be getting their butts kicked.


----------



## Bruce

I think Bailey is a "watcher" given your description of her herding the flock together and staying with them. Hopefully one of the new pups will be a "patroller". My GUESS is Bailey and the pups will find their places in the guarding scheme when the pups are old enough to guard.


----------



## farmerjan

Maybe Bailey thinks you are going to get rid of her since you have 2 new ones????  She worked out so good for you, a little extra TLC to make sure she knows she belongs there and will be staying? But good that she keeps  them in their place.... Once she gets more secure that she is still "TOP DOG"  hopefully she will be more accepting of them.  
2 for 1... going to be interesting.....


----------



## rachels.haven

I think you're right, @farmerjan . She is quite jealous. She doesn't need to worry though. She doesn't pee all over and melt into a quivering lump when I try to pick her up (she laughs, because I can't pick up 130 lbs of dog), so I like her better. Plus, she is not skittish. 

(We hung out with her extra today. She tried to baby sit Shaun. He tries to walk or crawl and she just hovers over him inhaling his essence and accidentally knocking him over or stepping on his coat suit.) 

The puppies did not need us to hang out extra with them. They needed space and quiet to process everything.


----------



## rachels.haven

Now we have a lot of alfalfa hay too along with two unsocialized king sized doggo lumps. But hey, the dogo lumps try to lay with the goats through the fence, so life can't be all bad forever for them.

Next farm project is to start kidding. Then we will start pasture work as soon as it starts growing. Pictures of hay and dogo lumps later.


----------



## Bruce

The dogo lumps aren't king sized .... yet!


----------



## rachels.haven

This week Flash (dwarf) and Buggy (Lamancha) went to new herds with new live-in girlfriends. I'm looking to see if the person who put down a deposit on Ant (dwarf) is still coming this weekend. I'm starting to wonder if they will walk on their deposit. We'll see. It would be a great herd for him and them if it works out.


----------



## Ridgetop

Keep the deposit if they walk.

When we got our last Anatolian puppy, Rika snarled at her and knocked her down.  I was worried so called my LDG Guru, Erick.  He reassured me that Rik was just teaching her "manners".  Remember that the pups won't learn or take her direction if they have no respect for her.  She is not their mom, littermate, or buddy, she is their teacher and pack leader (after you).  They need to respect her rules.

Looking forward to hearing stories about when she starts allowing them to follow her on her rounds and teaches them to be guardians.  Rika continued to be the leader into the gully when investigating danger and Angel was left as rearguard unless Rika gave her the OK.  Now Rika (at 9 years old) sends Angel into the gully and stays at the top as backup.  If there is a real problem, all the dogs may be on it.  

Watching Bailey train them will be fascinating.  One word of warning though, don't discipline Bailey over her treatment of the pups until you are sure what she is doing.  I did that when Rika first snapped at Angel, and it was an error.  Erick pointed out that Rika had to establish herself as their superior so I backed off.

A whole new chapter in the LGD process is opening up for you!


----------



## Baymule

Ridgetop said:


> don't discipline Bailey over her treatment of the pups until you are sure what she is doing.  I did that when Rika first snapped at Angel, and it was an error.  Erick pointed out that Rika had to establish herself as their superior so I backed off.


This. I corrected Trip for trouncing on a Catahoula half grown pup we were "gifted". Trip looked sorrowful and stopped chewing on the pup. That pup went on to kill every chicken he could. I watched him frantically digging at the coop one day and realized his prey drive was never going to accept chickens. So I gave him away. I should have let Trip establish himself as BOSS DOG and he might have whupped that pup for killing my chickens. I was wrong.


----------



## rachels.haven

I did the right thing for once and praised her for it. She gave me a look that said, "what is this? What do you think am I? The baby sitter?" And she guarded the buck shelter from the pups until I put them away. Then she sulked for the rest of the day. She was NOT happy. I'm pretty sure she'd prefer I kicked their butts for her.

She has a problem with the bigger dominant pup mostly. He's a bit of a fire cracker. Lots going on in the attic and ready to control the other puppy to get it (and willing to try to control all the other dogs in my pack). He may be too hot for here, but we'll see. I've already got a contact for someone working a large sheep operation that wants him and will take him if I feel we are only a two LGD farm. We've got options.

One brother is a sweet, very submissive, and timid. Bailey likes him. The other is a pack leader in the making, it looks like, and he needs to be working, making decisions, and telling other critters what to do.

Bailey's response to the puppies reminds me that she's my partner (and very much a smart, thinking one) and not just another farm animal. She was disgusted with me that day.


----------



## Mini Horses

rachels.haven said:


> Bailey's response to the puppies reminds me that she's my partner (and very much a smart, thinking one) and not just another farm animal. She was disgusted with me that day.


Gotta respect that!   😁  The submissive pup may liven up once the hellion brother is gone or Bailey gets a hold of him a time or two.  🤫


----------



## Baymule

There may be a power struggle between Bailey and the bossy puppy. My female GP ruled until the male, Trip, took over. Now he submits to scrappy little Sentry. And Sentry gets mercilessly pounded on by Sheba. He puts up with it until he gets enough, then he gets serious and they tangle. Interesting how the power shift has moved around. The baddest dog is the smallest. LOL LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> There may be a power struggle between Bailey and the bossy puppy. My female GP ruled until the male, Trip, took over. Now he submits to scrappy little Sentry. And Sentry gets mercilessly pounded on by Sheba. He puts up with it until he gets enough, then he gets serious and they tangle. Interesting how the power shift has moved around. The baddest dog is the smallest. LOL LOL


I'm curious, is Sheba a LGD or a scrappy pet dog?


----------



## Baymule

Sheba is an Anatolian.






						Sheba-A Marvelous Gift
					

I was contacted by a person wishing to remain anonymous, with an offer of an Anatolian puppy. As I read the generous offer to BJ, we both burst into tears. Because of Sentry’s hip dysplasia and surgery and our decision not to put him through another surgery, this person felt bad for us. Needless...



					www.backyardherds.com


----------



## rachels.haven

I remember Sheba now. Sorry about that.
Curve ball time, 
The last illness we had where we lost our ability to taste and smell like a week ago was NOT covid. Now we have positive tests and covid officially this morning. Coughs all around, lead weight on the chest and lost ability to heat myself for me, fever for the baby, and DH staying up all night last night fretting over everyone. Dan and Aiden are coughing, grumpy, and bouncing off the walls like covid took all their inhibitions away...I guess they were young enough and their vaccines recent enough they only sort of got sick. Boosters, I guess I'm glad I got mine, because I'm only sort of limping/dragging through this. I've been hospitalized for junk like this before. Baby Shaun is already better than yesterday. I'll be keeping another eye on him tonight. Currently he's trying to poke a hole in my ankle with his thumb nail, motrin lapsed, so yes, he's doing great but in a terrible mood.

First due date in 12 days. I guess it's a good time to get this over with. Omicron is the start of the ones everyone will get. Farm stuff in maintenance mode until chores don't exhaust me. Due to this and the last illness we had I did not get the girls CDTed in time, so antitoxin for kids at disbudding, I guess.


----------



## Baymule

So sorry that the whole family is sick.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. This whole sick thing is getting a little old again!
At least the kids won't be missing school for at least the rest of the week. The district ran out of teachers and let us know this evening.


----------



## farmerjan

Local schools here have been closed the last few days due to the snow....and a few on the radio list this morning were saying virtual classes....


----------



## Mini Horses

We've had a lot of virtual this week due to high sickie numbers...students and teachers and bus drivers!  Sounds like a " sharing" event.  Now, if this coming snow is heavy as some feel, they'll be virtual next week.  Lotta mom's will be home, not at jobs.  Circle around, trickle down.   🤔🤷

Hope everyone there is feeling better!


----------



## Bruce

Sorry you all now have the nasty disease. Odd that you lost taste and smell to some other disease prior. I hadn't heard of any illnesses with that symptom before Covid.


----------



## rachels.haven

I get it sometimes with colds and sinus infections. I'm losing it again, btw. It's definitely getting old.  (illness in general). I think I'm going to try a sinus rinse like I would for a normal cold and see if that helps move the virus's effects on faster. My world smells like salt and vinegar potato chips without the chips!  (starting to feel better, btw) 24-48 bad hours then recovery time in it appears, in my case. Baby is improving too and seems just achy and tired. Kids are still grumpy, so probably achy and tired for them too. DH is busy jamming out on his piano like piano performance/comp people do, so I think he's on the mend too. He's a day behind so the respiratory stuff is still troubling him just a little but going by volume it sounds like he doesn't have a headache...


Note to myself, I started the goats on a new mineral today. Premier1 sells a goat mineral premix I'm testing out. I'm not finding what I like around here and freight on the stuff I used before is too pricey so mail order it is. 1 packet of premix, one goats not on pasture packet, 50 lbs of feeding salt.


----------



## Baymule

Glad y’all are improving. Your DH plays piano? Awesome. What’s his favorite to play?


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> I think I'm going to try a sinus rinse like I would for a normal cold and see if that helps move the virus's effects on faster.



Rx: 1 lemon, squeezed
1 tablespoon honey
3 ounces Jack Daniels Black Label

Mix together and drink. Repeat as needed.

This will either cure you or you won't care.


----------



## Baymule

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Rx: 1 lemon, squeezed
> 1 tablespoon honey
> 3 ounces Jack Daniels Black Label
> 
> Mix together and drink. Repeat as needed.
> 
> This will either cure you or you won't care.


I'd be in a coma.  I use maybe a tablespoon or two in my hot toddy!


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, oh goodness.


----------



## Bruce

Sleep off the illness!


----------



## rachels.haven

Feeling mostly better. Nasty respiratory thing.
16/26 hoof trims done. I think I'm going to need to sell a few does after kidding. Difficult feet.
Tomorrow, or the next day if I'm too sore, I'll be down to my difficult does-1 shy lamancha, 1 Dan nubian doeling, and a gang of angry dwarves. Cute and soon to be angry.


----------



## Bruce

Oh, angry dwarves sounds kind scary! Take away their swords before you engage in battle with them.


----------



## Baymule

Where’s Snow White when you need her?


----------



## rachels.haven

Alright, I think it's time to start tentatively looking for Dan's cow-maybe sometime this year. We have a fence, hay, space, time...Probably a good time to shop around with no pressure.

We have a breeder of disease tested minis and standard jersey's about 2 hours away from us. Johnes and Brucellosis free herd. Registered Probably very expensive and calves go on a first come, first served basis on FB. Not my forte.
There are also dairy calves available for between 145-300, but they are untested. Some are started and out of that delicate phase.

Dan really wants a "family cow" meaning in milk, but I'm not sure why someone would sell one of those that didn't have problems and from the people I've spoken with so far disease testing is not something they are interested in doing (if it didn't offend them). Problem is, cow diseases can hurt goats and I've got quite a little herd going that I'd kind of like to not lose to Tb, brucellosis, Johnes, or whtever I'm missing in this new species. Plus, I like our milk raw.

What would you do? Chance a dairy bottle calf? Keep looking for a disease tested adult? Wait on a pricey but safer registered calf? Look for someone willing to test their cow before sale at my expense?


----------



## rachels.haven

And if you like looking at ads, here's one I haven't contacted but that does not look very dairy. We should have milk for a bottle calf sometime next week, probably around Friday or Saturday.








						breed heifer jersey airshire - farm & garden - by owner - sale
					

Will calf March 2022



					clarksville.craigslist.org
				



and here's one for bottle calves








						Calves - farm & garden - by owner - sale
					

I have calves available at different stages. I do not sell anything less than 2 weeks old to help get them through any potential illnesses and such as I will not sell junk. These calves come from a...



					clarksville.craigslist.org
				



and here's a nurse cow with heifer calf that I can't see the teats on that they are marketing as potential for family cow.








						Nurse cow - farm & garden - by owner - sale
					

Coming 4 year old nurse cow with her 2nd calf on her side. Heifer calf was born 11/27/21. I raised 3 calves on her last year plus her own and have had a couple on her this year that’s already been...



					nashville.craigslist.org
				




This may not go anywhere for a while.


----------



## farmerjan

Okay... I looked at the 3 ads you posted.  DO NOT buy any of the bottle calves.  You are looking at calves that come from various farms, various germs.... they may do a knock down perfect job of starting them....... but nope... not what you need to start with.  You can bring in corona or rota viruses.....
The jersey/ayshire does not look very dairy as you said.... BUT.... she does look well fed.  Still... In my Opinion.... too much for an untried animal... and a big animal like that you want to be already good with being hand milked....
The jersey nurse cow is something I would be interested in.  I think you are very very RIGHT about worrying about things like Johne's......  brucellosis and TB are really not much of a concern in dairy cattle..... not 1000% eradicated... but not something that most dairy farmers even consider anymore. There has been a few cases of tb over the years, but most animals sold in this area are tested  
A simple blood test will tell about Johne's;   brucellosis and TB test can be done.... A couple of things... most cases of Johne's will show up by that age.  The cow looks to be very well fed and in good shape.  Being a willing nurse cow is a BIG plus for me.   Again, we do brucellosis vaccinating and 95% of the dairies no longer even vaccinate for it.  I just feel like it is a cheap form of "insurance"  against a nearly totally eradicated disease... and I like that they are tatooed....
The other good thing about the nurse cow... if milking a cow becomes not such a "great thing"... she will take calves so that you don't get stuck milking when you don't want to, don't have the time, or whatever.  And a couple of calves on her will pay for her feed and all... give your son some money to put in his bank account and learn about taking care of them up to a size to sell....
Registered is not a guarantee but if a herd is registered and they test for Johne's and TB, then getting an animal under 12 months, it can also be bangs vaccinated to be on the safe side.  Any liscensed vet can do it.

Can't help you too much from this distance.....


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> Okay... I looked at the 3 ads you posted.  DO NOT buy any of the bottle calves.  You are looking at calves that come from various farms, various germs.... they may do a knock down perfect job of starting them....... but nope... not what you need to start with.  You can bring in corona or rota viruses.....
> The jersey/ayshire does not look very dairy as you said.... BUT.... she does look well fed.  Still... In my Opinion.... too much for an untried animal... and a big animal like that you want to be already good with being hand milked....
> The jersey nurse cow is something I would be interested in.  I think you are very very RIGHT about worrying about things like Johne's......  brucellosis and TB are really not much of a concern in dairy cattle..... not 1000% eradicated... but not something that most dairy farmers even consider anymore. There has been a few cases of tb over the years, but most animals sold in this area are tested
> A simple blood test will tell about Johne's;   brucellosis and TB test can be done.... A couple of things... most cases of Johne's will show up by that age.  The cow looks to be very well fed and in good shape.  Being a willing nurse cow is a BIG plus for me.   Again, we do brucellosis vaccinating and 95% of the dairies no longer even vaccinate for it.  I just feel like it is a cheap form of "insurance"  against a nearly totally eradicated disease... and I like that they are tatooed....
> The other good thing about the nurse cow... if milking a cow becomes not such a "great thing"... she will take calves so that you don't get stuck milking when you don't want to, don't have the time, or whatever.  And a couple of calves on her will pay for her feed and all... give your son some money to put in his bank account and learn about taking care of them up to a size to sell....
> Registered is not a guarantee but if a herd is registered and they test for Johne's and TB, then getting an animal under 12 months, it can also be bangs vaccinated to be on the safe side.  Any liscensed vet can do it.
> 
> Can't help you too much from this distance.....


That's wonderful, @farmerjan . Thank you for the advice of a cattlewoman. If we did go with the registered herd, the breeder is a vet, so I could probably request blackleg it if it wasn't already done. I guess I will go on stewing and keep these things in mind. Maybe the perfect animal will come up and someday Dan will wake up to his cow (which I will be taking care of because he's young).


----------



## farmerjan

Blackleg is something anyone can do.... it is over the counter.  Bangs=brucellosis... for females 4-12 months of age.


----------



## rachels.haven

I thought about this cow, but she's even more expensive and not bred at the age of 3, which makes me leery. I can spend $300 on a goat that is three and wasn't able to be bred and risk it (she'd due next Friday), but that's a lot of hay right there.








						Jersey Heifer - farm & garden - by owner - sale
					

3yr old jersey heifer. 4H fair cow. super tame and halter broke $1400 would like her to go to milking farm



					nashville.craigslist.org


----------



## farmerjan

There is a good chance she would breed... but.... too much money for an open heifer.  

Plus, then you would need a stanchion/head catch to be able to get her in to get her bred A I ..... and catching her in heat could be a problem.... 
Honestly, if you are so set on a cow right now, I would go look at the one with her heifer calf by her side... and if the the cow was running with the beef cattle, there is a good chance she could have gotten bred back even if it would be a little less than a 12 month calving interval.  It sorta looked to me like they were just not wanting to keep raising calves on her... really,  she is worth 7-800 here and her calf is worth another 150-200 so close to the value of what they are asking.  And you could see what her teats looked like, and sample hand milking her.....get an idea of her disposition...


----------



## Mini Horses

I like the nurse cow!!!   Tame, good weight and a pretty gal.  Looks to be in a good place and loved.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm not dead set yet. I do want to figure out which ones are and aren't a good idea though, so we're getting closer. It's a large animal and a large step, so we'll need to be "getting there" for a while before I'm comfortable with it.
(I'm not afraid of cows. I've "befriended" and talked into being sort of friendly several Angus type cows/steers as a little kid at friends houses. (They are kind of goobery pushy slobbery hard heads.) They're just not a low impact animal, so you don't just run out and buy one or two on a whim like a hamster.)

Dan may have to wait another birthday or two before I'm fully comfy. The kid still only weighs as much as a sack of grain.


----------



## rachels.haven

I also kind of like that nurse cow though. Cow and a heifer calf


----------



## rachels.haven

Last night I did not pay the barn, now garage cats a can of fancy feast each and close them up because it was snowing/raining so I figured they'd come in on their own. I guess they thought the fancy feast hunting was bleak and I needed help or maybe because it was so close but not in my boots it was a threat but this morning there was a mouse by my boots. Daily fancy feast it is, I guess. No mice in the boots.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh, and 3 days until Eri's due date.


----------



## farmerjan

Hey, they are doing their best to take care of things... great for the cats.  Less vermin, less disease, less wasted grain....

One other thing to think about as you look.   Granted most 4-H and FFA and other type of show animals ought to be tame and halter broke.... BUT.... many are somewhat spoiled and in my experience a "too tame" one is one of the worst ones for breaking for things like hand milking.  Especially since they are often older when they get bred and calve.  "Pets" are too bratty and spoiled and often are a real trial to get to teach to "be a  cow"..... hear that alot on the dairies where the kids have raised a heifer and then she goes into the milking string.... after her show days are over.... 
Not all of them... and I wouldn't rule one out... but something to consider.  Animals also will get totally used to the person that raised them... and they might tolerate something you consider totally unacceptable.... And waiting on that first calf until they are 3 is just not the best.....

Wasn't your husband due to have that eye dr appt the end of Jan?????? Any news???

Did the house in Mass ever get sold?  You had those other people looking at it after the crazies.....been hoping it was sold and you were done will all ties to the insane people up there...

That nurse cow looks like she could have some dutch belted in her... most jerseys if crossed with a holstein don't have that wide amount of white...


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> Hey, they are doing their best to take care of things... great for the cats.  Less vermin, less disease, less wasted grain....
> 
> One other thing to think about as you look.   Granted most 4-H and FFA and other type of show animals ought to be tame and halter broke.... BUT.... many are somewhat spoiled and in my experience a "too tame" one is one of the worst ones for breaking for things like hand milking.  Especially since they are often older when they get bred and calve.  "Pets" are too bratty and spoiled and often are a real trial to get to teach to "be a  cow"..... hear that alot on the dairies where the kids have raised a heifer and then she goes into the milking string.... after her show days are over....
> Not all of them... and I wouldn't rule one out... but something to consider.  Animals also will get totally used to the person that raised them... and they might tolerate something you consider totally unacceptable.... And waiting on that first calf until they are 3 is just not the best.....
> 
> Wasn't your husband due to have that eye dr appt the end of Jan?????? Any news???
> 
> Did the house in Mass ever get sold?  You had those other people looking at it after the crazies.....been hoping it was sold and you were done will all ties to the insane people up there...
> 
> That nurse cow looks like she could have some dutch belted in her... most jerseys if crossed with a holstein don't have that wide amount of white...


Our closing date on our Mass house is Feb 10th. After the last thing that went down I won't believe it until it's gone. 

The eye appt happened yesterday. It was very encouraging (someone was a BIG ball of nerves a few days leading up to and the ride there understandably). They decided to take him off the eye med that had a side effect of messing up corneas and loss of visual acuity. They're adding a beta blocker drops. They DONT want to keep his eye pressure in the single digits, which is wonderful. 13-15 milimeters of mercury is fine, which is where it is currently. The eyes fight a reduction more than that and it can damage them (Mass docotor derps didn't seem to realize that) And the doctor took lots of time and discussed things and listened at length with DH while I waited in the car. Surgery in the future will probably happen, but not yet because those procedures can cause issues in and of themselves and his state does not warrant it yet. DH is a very "interesting" glaucoma patient and they are happy to have him and not just a liability. Being willing to discuss and listen should make it more likely he'll be able to keep his sight longer. He'll be back in 2 months or sooner if there are any concerns.
Amazon wants their programmer to keep his sight so insurance should cover much of everything and the rest the pay will cover. I feel so blessed on that.

Sorry I forgot to update on that. I'm still absorbing it myself. Cow research was how I chose to move on.


----------



## farmerjan

SO VERY HAPPY for the results of DH's eye doctor appt.  Sounds like they have a "clue" about things and are really wanting to help and work with his concerns.  I am so glad for you.  
Don't want to jinx the Mass closing..... but I am going to cross one set of fingers for it to go off quietly.....and FINALLY...

 We were far enough inland to not get affected much by this last storm... and it was a cold front from the west that actually gave us about 2-3 inches of snow and turned it bitter cold again.  15 this morning, wind chills in the single digits... and it is already down to 12 with temps forecast to go into the single digits.  Are you cold there too????  I bet you are glad that you are not up north anymore either.... not with what they were getting in snow.....


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> SO VERY HAPPY for the results of DH's eye doctor appt.  Sounds like they have a "clue" about things and are really wanting to help and work with his concerns.  I am so glad for you.
> Don't want to jinx the Mass closing..... but I am going to cross one set of fingers for it to go off quietly.....and FINALLY...
> 
> We were far enough inland to not get affected much by this last storm... and it was a cold front from the west that actually gave us about 2-3 inches of snow and turned it bitter cold again.  15 this morning, wind chills in the single digits... and it is already down to 12 with temps forecast to go into the single digits.  Are you cold there too????  I bet you are glad that you are not up north anymore either.... not with what they were getting in snow.....


I was wondering how you were faring with this storm system I keep hearing is rolling through. No, we are blessed not to be cold. 20-30's at night, 40-60 by day this week. Somehow we're not getting what you are and I figured you were fairly close by in terms of weather. The worst I see is that on the 2nd we're supoosed to be between 17-34 but everything else is downright balmy comparatively (although they do change forecast fairly often). IF temps were going to take a dive or it was going to snow I'd say it would be on the day my two does go into labor this week whenever that will be.


----------



## Ridgetop

I like the nurse cow idea.  When Dan is old enough to be in 4-H he can do a replacement heifer project using the nurse cow to rase a bottle registered dairy calf.  Or yoi can get a couple of dairy bull clvesand raise them for baby beef or to sell.

I did notice that the Craigslist ad showed it had been posted for 30 days or more.  Maybe they would negotiate on the price, if they want to get rid of her.  And I would check to see what breed was the sire of the heifer calf.  She looks black, but it might just be shadow in the barn.

On another point though, if you have dairy goats already why do you want to milk a cow? That is a lot of milk.  With heavy milking dairy goats, you can get about 1 gallon daily each.  A cow will give 4-6 gallons daily (or more) and cost a lot more to feed.


----------



## Mini Horses

Ridgetop said:


> On another point though, if you have dairy goats already why do you want to milk a cow? That is a lot of milk. With heavy milking dairy goats, you can get about 1 gallon daily each. A cow will give 4-6 gallons daily (or more) and cost a lot more to feed.
> [/QUOTE
> 
> Which is WHY I have goats, not a cow.....😁
> 
> But I believe the cow is because DS Dan wants a cow......right?


----------



## rachels.haven

I don't want a cow. Once we get going we're swimming in milk already with goats. Mini Horses us correct. Dan and I had a discussion last night and we decided for economic reasons we should wait until/if we have herd share customers before revisiting the cow issue. For now.


----------



## Baymule

That is great news about your husband's eye exam. Finally, a doctor that listens and talks some sense. He seems to be very caring about his patient. 

Not going to mention that other house in that other place........

So the cats want Fancy Feast or else! haha, feed us or you get a dead mouse in your boots. I think I'd be shaking out my boots from now on before putting them on!


----------



## Ridgetop

How old is Dan?


----------



## rachels.haven

Seven in the first week of March. He's got plenty of time to keep lusting after all the cattle he sees on the roadside. He wants to run a cow dairy, but first he wants me to move my goats out of his pasture, lol.


----------



## farmerjan

I think a few years before a "Dan owned cow" is imminent... I was thinking he was nearer to 10..... Yeah, just do some looking.  I thought you were more "ready" for a cow.  With the little one, you really don't have the time to devote to a cow  on top of the goats and all.


----------



## Legamin

rachels.haven said:


> Hi out there! Normally I don't really care to share much and would much rather hear about others' adventures, but I'm having a lapse of normal judgement, so I think I'm going to start my thread. I've kept yard birds of various forms for a long time, but just started keeping rabbits, and when writing up pedigrees you need a rabbitry name, so this year when I decided to start breeding rabbits in earnest we became Firebird Gardens. We are very much not a farm, unfortunately. We live in a suburb of Detroit, on an acre that I've filled with fruit trees and vines and bushes and a large, fenced in vegetable garden, and every year the lady muscovy stuff our yard with more ducklings than I want to count. I typically put male ducklings in the freezer by 16 weeks and the female ducklings get sold to others who have had losses the previous winter or who are just getting started. The beef duck is great, but I really love my drake Elvis, and Cocoa is not so bad a character, just a little chubby and lazy. The girls are pinchy and huffy and all obsessed with eggs to the point of having little personality, so they typically don't get names, but I definitely know who they are. This year I kept 5 females back. Two are solid chocolate to go with my drake Cocoa, and two are cream pied, one is lavender pied. Elvis carries dilute genes, so his ducklings wind up fun and surprising colors.
> 
> We also breed red English Orpington chickens. They are currently mostly preoccupied laying eggs and fighting with the pilgrim geese through the fence, so there's not much to talk about them right now. They're a great meat and egg breed for this far north, although I admit, I always make sure they have at least 10 hours of light and food and water always in the shed so they stay fat and lay all year after molt. This is my first year lighting the shed. For the last few years the hens got skinny in the winter, so I'd worm them and just pray they'd make it. This year I decided to try lengthening the days with a single puck LED so they'd have more time to eat and drink, and lo and behold, my birds stayed nice and fat, and after molt, they resumed laying at a decent rate. We also have a 4 gallon horizontal chicken nipple bucket with an aquarium heater in it so they never go without clean water, ducks or no ducks. That whole setup is sitting in a stainless steel stock feed pan, so said ducks don't turn my shed into a slop house and frostbite heaven when they get bored.
> 
> My mini rexes came into the picture two years ago when I decided I wanted something that actually let me hold it. And I'm allergic to cats, and minorly allergic to dogs, so something else was going to have to fill the void. I got a broken black doe with fantastic fur quality from my Mom, turned her into a sort of house pet (I despise frozen water bottle and crock season that much). Later I bred her to one of my mom's very nice bucks, and got the black doe (we call her Apple) I currently have. Much later I got a very nice breeding pair of red mini rexes from my Mother, who needed the cage space.
> 
> At the moment, both of my does live indoors. Kits raised inside with my two preschoolers running around wind up pretty much bombproof and are very handleable for showing (how do you not constantly hold baby rabbits that live in the house?) so the does will probably stay in for now, at least until the weather warms.
> 
> My bucks, I'm not sure what I will do with them. Right now they are in due to winter, but I'd like to have an outdoor setup later, at least in the garage. Probably going to build a cage rack and tuck it away back with the rest of my animal stuff. My red buck, who the kids have named Benjamin Buck Bunny (oops, didn't name him fast enough) will not potty train, so he's going back to a wire cage, which I don't normally like looking at in my house, but this is an exception in the name of sanitation. He's sweet and loves the kids and to be handled, but potties absolutely everywhere in his cage EXCEPT for his litter box no matter where you move it, so in the name of sanitation, I think he needs to be housed like a proper rabbit, not whatever it is I've turned the females into. My other buck is a tiny black otter (Beaman Buck Bunny, also lost that naming war) and he does potty train, but does not enjoy people. Both bucks are upstairs in my front room due to some husband related de-contstruction that was going on last night in my basement where I was housing them for the winter away from the does. We have bunnies due the first few days of February, and man, I've missed that. I grew up with parents breeding meat rabbits, so there were always babies around (and they just in the last 8 years or so switched to mini rex). My kids are terrified of bald baby bunnies because they're not cute like ducklings or chicks when they "hatch". The kids also think rabbits lay eggs, and for now I think I'll leave it that way.
> 
> We have geese too. They are pilgrims, and I might be selling them when I get to the end of my patience with them if my mom doesn't want them. This fighting with all other birds thing is really not fun for them. They deserve to be walking the yard, picking at what's left of our grass, and instead the breeding season has rendered them pen birds. This is our first year with them, and normally the yard is fairly peaceful right now, but the geese want to fight through the fence and the chickens are loving it ALL DAY LONG (what's the deal with those dense, crotchety, war-mongering, ridiculously fluffy hens?!). Honestly, if the chickens weren't the ones making the eggs my family prefers I'd probably just have my muscovy duckers and I definitely wouldn't have the geese.
> 
> I'm thinking of adding a pair of dairy goats to our mix. Our township allows it, I can build a decent sized shed for them, and I've got plenty of time to care for them every day, but I've got an entire fence line of 30 foot trees to clear all by myself so I can replace the old field fencing and put up a goat pen to keep the goats out of my fruit trees. The husband is not yet on board with the goats, so hiring to do the clearing is not in the budget. Last year I did about 20 feet of it, which came out to be about a dozen large sumac trees to burn (yes, I CAN do it!). This year I might get a chainsaw, but for now I'm using a bow saw and a hatchet.  Unfortunately we only burned 2/3 of the wood before the snow came and now we have one of our hundreds of groundhogs living under the pile. I'm probably going to enlarge our burn pit and just move the pile into it and burn it one of these days when I get a chance. I wish I could clear faster, but I can't take down trees with kids in the yard, so last fall I used their TV time to do trees every day, and I'd do one or two per day, saw them up into light enough pieces, and drag them back to the pile for stacking. The kids are no longer into TV, so we'll see what happens this year. I might have to be a weekend warrior and make DH watch them. Maybe I'll negotiate for some budget and get some help. It won't be cheap, is the main problem. It's hard work, the property is very long, and felling trees makes lots and lots of burn wood. I'm definitely rounding up what I've already done because those trees are trying to return with a vengeance, as sumac trees tend to do.
> 
> Well, that's that right now. I'll get pictures of everything later. My two year old broke the camera as his major accomplishment this week and we're not smart phone users, so I either get to use my kindle's camera, which comes out grainy, or maybe try to turn my laptop webcam into a camera somehow, which I'm less optimistic about. I think I'll just get a new camera...but that takes time, and I just used up all of my "I feel like being on the computer" time for today already.
> 
> So hi out there, if anyone reads this! And sorry for the lack of photos.


I enjoyed the tour of you suburban garden immensely!  The idea of a suburban ‘Hidden Garden’ in the Detroit area stimulates the imagination!  My own family came from not too far away in a tiny town called Bluffton (Ohio) and my visits proved it’s idillic nature exactly as my grandmother had recounted to us over and over on cold Winter night reminiscence.  Thank you for sharing.  It gave me the urge to add Mallard ducks to our menagerie!  I remember the creamy large green eggs and the lovely duck diners that we had.  Similar to your experience I am old enough now to remember when we lived on the outskirts of Lajolla, CA. outside of San Diego some 20 minutes from the Pacific Ocean beach.  Back then it was remote enough that a part-time nurse/full time police flat foot who built houses on the weekends could afford 3 acres of beautifully partially wooded grassy hillside with a ’million dollar view’…we had no idea just how poor we were.  We raised and ate our own produce and animals and walked over a mile to school as small children knowing nothing of the great city that lay beyond. 
Your acre in suburbia sounds positively magical!  We are of course thinking about adding ducks but I probably need to do some research to make sure I am ready for them.  Hmmmmmm,,,,,roast duck…..green eggs and lamb!


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss (Mr ?) @Legamin,

You are in for a real treat reading Miss @rachels.haven journal!  

Senile Texas Aggie


----------



## Ridgetop

farmerjan said:


> I think a few years before a "Dan owned cow" is imminent... I was thinking he was nearer to 10..... Yeah, just do some looking. I thought you were more "ready" for a cow. With the little one, you really don't have the time to devote to a cow on top of the goats and all.


Same here!  Large livestock in 4-H starting age is 9 by January 1.  Can't show large livestock before that age in most fairs - check the state fair rules.  

With all your goat milk he can start with a veal calf for the Fair.  Dairy bull calf - try to get a black one (Holstein cow crossed with Angus bull for low birth weight and best weight gain). Make sure it gets colostrum and then just feed it on goat milk.  Top weight is 300 lbs.  He can learn to show it in halter with a show stick, and sell it for $$.  Save up and possibly do replacement heifers eventually.  

He needs to learn to milk the goats now.  Not too young for that.


----------



## Legamin

rachels.haven said:


> Thanks. He's currently getting beat up by his brooder mate over the hens, but he's eventually going to get it all to himself.
> 
> Here's a very dignified picture of my red mini Rex buck who just goes to mush when handled and therefore will not pose. HE'S now my avatar.View attachment 42905
> 
> He's really very cute and petite looking normally when he's not limp.View attachment 42906
> But he's only willing to do that running around, and that's no good. I'm working on it. The kids let him out here. Rabbits with unpredictable restroom habits are not normally allowed to do this.
> View attachment 42907


Absolutely diner!….er…..DARLING!…(I meant darling….sort of..). If rabbits produced more meat for the effort of keeping and preparing them it would be a great temptation!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> No, we are blessed not to be cold.


And blessed not to be in the MA house this weekend! You really didn't want to deal with 2' of snow, right?


----------



## rachels.haven

Dan doesn't want a veal calf. He says he wants a whole cow family. And then they can make baby cows and he can sell a bull and get a new bull and make MORE baby cows basically until he has a cow empire. I told him "no bull. Just bull juice". (also, good luck Ai-ing them as a 6, going on 7 year old). He wants to replace my goat goat army with a cow army because cow milk is apparently superior. 

I think our 4 acre pasture could support 1 maybe two cow calf pairs...

But on the one hand, it's annoying he's trying to serve my goats their eviction notice. On the other he's talking and reading about farm animals rather than video games or other things. He's just got a lot to learn and I need to pick the time he's going to do it.

(and the goats will not be evicted, a milk cow at some point will be a compromise, right?)


----------



## rachels.haven

The kid also needs a course in very basic economics, cow maintenance numbers, and cow selling.


----------



## Legamin

rachels.haven said:


> Dan doesn't want a veal calf. He says he wants a whole cow family. And then they can make baby cows and he can sell a bull and get a new bull and make MORE baby cows basically until he has a cow empire. I told him "no bull. Just bull juice". (also, good luck Ai-ing them as a 6, going on 7 year old). He wants to replace my goat goat army with a cow army because cow milk is apparently superior.
> 
> I think our 4 acre pasture could support 1 maybe two cow calf pairs...
> 
> But on the one hand, it's annoying he's trying to serve my goats their eviction notice. On the other he's talking and reading about farm animals rather than video games or other things. He's just got a lot to learn and I need to pick the time he's going to do it.
> 
> (and the goats will not be evicted, a milk cow at some point will be a compromise, right?)


Have to agree to disagree on the milk.  I have always love goat milk and as I’ve gotten older the cow’s milk does ‘things’ to me that are not always best done in a crowded room….getting older has it’s drawbacks…


----------



## Legamin

rachels.haven said:


> Dan doesn't want a veal calf. He says he wants a whole cow family. And then they can make baby cows and he can sell a bull and get a new bull and make MORE baby cows basically until he has a cow empire. I told him "no bull. Just bull juice". (also, good luck Ai-ing them as a 6, going on 7 year old). He wants to replace my goat goat army with a cow army because cow milk is apparently superior.
> 
> I think our 4 acre pasture could support 1 maybe two cow calf pairs...
> 
> But on the one hand, it's annoying he's trying to serve my goats their eviction notice. On the other he's talking and reading about farm animals rather than video games or other things. He's just got a lot to learn and I need to pick the time he's going to do it.
> 
> (and the goats will not be evicted, a milk cow at some point will be a compromise, right?)


I have been amazed at the expense of shifting from goats and sheep to a specific breed of sheep.  If you have things squared away with your goat army I think you’re smart to just make the compromise.  My wife…who cried when I came home with three animals instead of two that first day…who said “I never wanted animals!” Now loves to come out and help with the sheep and has been scheming to open up the unused barn with a herd of goats!  I asked her who she was and what she did with my wife!?  I definitely need the UTV if we are going back a half mile to feed and care for goats everyday!


----------



## Baymule

Legamin said:


> I have been amazed at the expense of shifting from goats and sheep to a specific breed of sheep.  If you have things squared away with your goat army I think you’re smart to just make the compromise.  My wife…who cried when I came home with three animals instead of two that first day…who said “I never wanted animals!” Now loves to come out and help with the sheep and has been scheming to open up the unused barn with a herd of goats!  I asked her who she was and what she did with my wife!?  I definitely need the UTV if we are going back a half mile to feed and care for goats everyday!



My husband was a city boy. He supported my madness even though he didn’t understand it. He would feed and care for my horses during the winter because I got home from work after dark. We lived i town, I built a chicken coop in the back yard, he thought I was nuts. I put a garden in the front yard, he thought I had lost my mind. But he sure enjoyed the proceeds from my crazy! When we retired to the farm, he enthusiastically joined me in slaughtering chickens. I’d didn’t kill them or clean them, but he was a chicken pick in’ champion! He grew to love the sheep and lambs and would help me when I ran them through the chute for shots, feet trim, fecal testing and so on. He was for whatever made me happy and I dragged him into farm life. He loved it. 

So if your wife has gone from a crying spell from 3 animals to wanting her own goat herd, you are most fortunate! Celebrate with a gift of a trio for your wife! There’s nothing like hitching a ride on the Crazy Train! It’s never boring!


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> The kid also needs a course in very basic economics, cow maintenance numbers, and cow selling.


Take him to cattle auctions and let him talk to buyers and sellers. You might make some good contacts that lead to the cow of Dan’s dreams!


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Is there a 4H or FFA group in the area he could join?


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> The kid also needs a course in very basic economics, cow maintenance numbers, and cow selling.


I think Jan could impart some knowledge in his head. 

4 acres isn't going to provide winter feed, where is he going to get the money to buy it?


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Take him to cattle auctions and let him talk to buyers and sellers. You might make some good contacts that lead to the cow of Dan’s dreams!


I'd be afraid we'd just skip straight to the "cow of Dan's dreams" part. Good idea though.

In all honesty though, he is a good boy, very handy, and very mature about projects and the way things work. He discovered he's good with a hammer this week and has been building and painting all the Lowes kids craft kits he can find. He loves his electronic circuitry kits and taking all the household things apart and putting them back together and making them work (after he breaks them technically...usually). If I wait until the time is right he WILL be able to take care of his cow and eventually run a tiny cow herd.


----------



## Baymule

This small family dairy is close to me. They went up north to buy their first cows. They ran the milk business on the farm for some years, then opened a store.





__





						The Waldo Way Dairy Farm | 395 County Road 2482, Mineola, Texas 75773
					

The Waldo Way



					thewaldoway.com


----------



## Legamin

Baymule said:


> My husband was a city boy. He supported my madness even though he didn’t understand it. He would feed and care for my horses during the winter because I got home from work after dark. We lived i town, I built a chicken coop in the back yard, he thought I was nuts. I put a garden in the front yard, he thought I had lost my mind. But he sure enjoyed the proceeds from my crazy! When we retired to the farm, he enthusiastically joined me in slaughtering chickens. I’d didn’t kill them or clean them, but he was a chicken pick in’ champion! He grew to love the sheep and lambs and would help me when I ran them through the chute for shots, feet trim, fecal testing and so on. He was for whatever made me happy and I dragged him into farm life. He loved it.
> 
> So if your wife has gone from a crying spell from 3 animals to wanting her own goat herd, you are most fortunate! Celebrate with a gift of a trio for your wife! There’s nothing like hitching a ride on the Crazy Train! It’s never boring!


Cheers to the crazy among us!  We just celebrated 40 years!  I dragged my family all over the world during my career and retiring to a farm was my wife’s dream…My plans were to travel constantly and own nothing…I love the farm and now we both love the animals.  It is perhaps the furthest from either of our dreams but is such a BLAST!


----------



## Baymule

Legamin said:


> Cheers to the crazy among us!  We just celebrated 40 years!  I dragged my family all over the world during my career and retiring to a farm was my wife’s dream…My plans were to travel constantly and own nothing…I love the farm and now we both love the animals.  It is perhaps the furthest from either of our dreams but is such a BLAST!



BJ and I were so happy on our farm, we told each other that we were on vacation. Leaving for a few days was ok, but we were so glad to get back home. Travel the world? Nah, we were already living our dream.


----------



## rachels.haven

Larsen Poultry Ranch said:


> Is there a 4H or FFA group in the area he could join?


We will probably look into that at some point. There has to be.


----------



## Legamin

Bruce said:


> I think Jan could impart some knowledge in his head.
> 
> 4 acres isn't going to provide winter feed, where is he going to get the money to buy it?


In our valley we just got a painful lesson in economics this last Summer.  The current ‘administration’ (whoever is running the Federal government…) closed Federal lands (MILLIONS of acres of Federal pasture lands that have been used for four generations to raise hay for this region of the USA.  2020 hay price - $80-$120 tonne.  This last year 2021 with the land and irrigation closures (sold Washington water rights to California at a loss) destroyed four generations of farming families that primarily had a 110 year old agreement with the Federal Gov’t for grazing and growing.   Hay 2021 - $400-$900 per tonne.  Hundreds of MILLIONS in infrastructure, homes..etc. all abandoned…forced foreclosures by the Federal Government without notice.  This Administration hates the American farmer.  This ended the hopes, dreams and businesses of many small farmers. But this also means that hundreds of 4H student and FFA members cannot afford to raise an animal this year. Most of the kids participating in 4H don’t have land or money and just barely got by raising an animal by working odd jobs for hay and keeping an animal in the backyard.  The ‘Field of Dreams’ for hundreds of young people was turned under and scorched with the fire of a vindictive and spiteful government that believes Americans growing our own food is wrong and that we should import from other countries who are poorer than ourselves…Globalism..  it has been destructive.  Our children are wondering why their own government would do such a thing that crushed their dreams of a farming future!
Keeping a cow is a reality check in economics.  A young person will dump 1 tonne of hay every two weeks through the cow pen…per cow…shovel it back out and have to find a place to put it.  40lbs of hay, 35 gallons of fresh water and lots of work per day WAS possible last year but it’s not economically feasible this year.
Many of us locally have seen the issue grow critical and have stepped up.  We already own the animals, we already grow and buy the hay, we already have to deal with the poop.  Many of us have opened our barns, marked one animal per kid and they have to come daily and be responsible for that animal after school.  At the end of the season when the animal is ‘finished’ we help them get it to auction and charge out the food and direct expenses from their profits and let the kid keep the balance.  I do sheep and only allow one student per year currently.  But if we all do our parts, these kids can experience what it is like to work hard and produce a finished product to market. We can work with them an put up a white board in the barn to keep track of expenses.  And they can still learn the trade without their family having to be full fledged farmers or even landowners. 
Look around yourselves.  Most of us are getting old…not older…OLD.  If we don’t train the youth and get them excited about the possible profit and lifestyle of farming…If we don’t start setting them up for a future of becoming a farmer…even working out a sale of our farm to a young adult over the final 10-20 years of our lives to get them grounded in the business…give them a chance.  These kids will not have a chance without out help.  Most of us have to face the fact that our own kids will never take over the farm.  They don’t want this hard work lifestyle.  But there are plenty of good kids that DO want to work, that love animals and have a smart head for business.  Don’t just give it away….get a lawyer and be smart about it.  Have a WATERTIGHT CONTRACT That PROTECTS YOUR OWNERSHIP AND FUTURE!  But give these kids a chance!  If there are going to be future farmers…it’s up to us!


----------



## Baymule

Wow. I had no idea, sure don't hear about THAT on the news! Utter destroying the lives of American farmers. My thoughts on that are not fit for a family forum. 

I'm glad that people around there are stepping up for the kids. It shows what kind of person you are, that you participate in letting a kid keep a sheep on your place, and being a mentor.


----------



## Mini Horses

What federal land was closed?


----------



## rachels.haven

Hi, just stopping in.
I started some more Myshire quail eggs-jumbos this time. Ordered some more feed garbage cans. Apparently metal cans are hard to come by. What _does_ everyone else put their feed in? Contemplating getting some jmf jumbo quail eggs from a different source for some genetic diversity...

We're supposed to get up to 2" of ice today as it slips below freezing and it's been typhooning all day. I think I know when those two does are going to kid...probably at the same time.

... nothing yet.  I guess the weather isn't bad enough.


----------



## farmerjan

Know that feeling... the cows wait until it is MINUS temps or we have a small blizzard raging... 
Ours is all rain, the cold stayed well west of us.  Problem is the ground is frozen finally, so it is water/mush on the top right now as it is melting all the snow... Went from white and icy hard snow to mostly melted off and water starting to run along the sides.  Ground is too hard for me to push the rain gauge spike in so won't know how much we get.... Still, better than another foot of snow....


----------



## Baymule

I already have plenty of metal garbage cans. Got 3 metal barrels with locking lids too, got them from the feed store.


----------



## rachels.haven

What a relief, I got my kidding dates wrong. The dates are the 19th and 22nd.


----------



## Ridgetop

Dan may change his mind about a cow when he is 9 and in 4-H.  For the same feed bill, he can have a herd of goats with the $$ premiums to match in breeding shows at the Fair compared to one cow.  

DS3 raised 2 replacement heifers and really enjoyed them.  He showed them at the Fair as well.  But the premiums he earned on his goat herd paid his allowance for the year.  He had Nubians, his brother DS2 had LaManchas.  Over the year we also had some Swiss and DS1 had Toggenburgs.  Got rid of the Toggs pronto because their milk was nasty.  The Swiss went next because we loved our Nubians' and LaManchas' milk better.  The LaManchas would bite the Nubians' ears!  We didn't make cheese, but DS3 separated the cream and made the best ice cream ever!

4 acres is really not enough to support 2 cow/calf pairs.


----------



## Bruce

Ridgetop said:


> The LaManchas would bite the Nubians' ears!


Because to the nearly earless LaManchas, those things hanging off the Nubians heads clearly were cancerous growths that needed to be removed.

However, I'm still of the opinion that goats should have REAL ears!


----------



## Mini Horses

While discussing goats, milking, etc with a couple old gentlemen, the question of goat vs cow came up.  Thinking about it on way home the economics surfaced, after all, the love of either animal is there and we're talking money.

You can feed 4 full sized dairy goats for about same as one cow.   5 months to kid vs almost a year for the heifer.  Most goats twin.  At a year I could have 8 kids to sell, milk gabatch, rebred does and one calf.   No doubt I can get an easy 1200$ for those kids, maybe 200 for a bottle calf.    Stagger kidding, milk all year.   More kids very soon.  Consider that.

Yeah, goats can supply you more, faster.  😁


----------



## farmerjan

Agree on the economics on the goats pretty much across the line.... Need real good fences for the goats compared to the cows.....Cow would supply enough milk to feed at least one or 2 more calves so 3 calves as opposed to one... but you do have to buy the calves....goat kids definitely worth more at the small size....plus you could have enough milk for some pigs but imagaine that you would also with the goat milk...
The biggest thing.... YOU GOTTA LIKE GOATS...... they are much more "prima donna's" by everyone's posts... most cows are not and can take the elements alot better.... 
But again, you gotta like goats.....and have the fencing to keep them in and have some sort of guardians for them.... most cows can take care of themselves and their calves pretty much... coyotes and dogs won't bother a calf much after a few days... and cows are usually very protective..they will go after dogs and coyotes if they are harassing a calf whereas a goat or ewe would not.... the black buzzards we have some trouble with can just as easily go after a kid or a lamb as a baby calf and a cow will usually fight them off.....and they are not as vulnerable near as long because the kids and lambs are just smaller.....
I agree that the goats are a better economic investment and the turnover is faster... but I also like steak and real hamburger.  Lamb burger just has a different taste to me and I am sure that goat burger is the same.  I put ground lamb burger in lasagna to help disguise the taste... I like a lamb chop on occasion but not alot.  Of course, you can sell all the kids and buy a butcher size bovine instead.....


----------



## Mini Horses

Agree...and I love good beef plus cow butter!  🤫😊   Really just a $ turn comparison for those who have less land and want dairy plus a touch of payback.   I'm always tempted for a nice jersey or even a Dexter.   🤣  No bulls!!


----------



## Ridgetop

Got to fit the animals to your wallet and needs, also the amount of work you need to do for each.  DS1 decided early on that he didn't want goats because he hated milking and went into sheep instead.  Differences are what makes life fun!

BYW, when DS1 was 7 years old he wanted a pig and built a "pig pen" in the back yard of our first house with scrap lumber.  It was so small it would not have held a mini pig, maybe big enough for a rabbit!  But he enjoyed nailing it together.


----------



## rachels.haven

The anatolian/pyr cross LGD puppy Bailey can't stand left to go try out life in a sheep herd. Hopefully all goes well and he doesn't need to come back. All he wants is to be with his stock and doesn't want or need you, and that was exactly what they were looking for-and they have an existing pack of LGD's, one pyr and one anatolian. I'm going to give the remaining brother some time, and me some time to fix the fence in one place then I am going to turn him out to be with Bailey at least during the day. 

It appears Atlas and Bailey got in a skirmish when they were penned together at night and he got bit on the chest so Bailey has been out. Atlas really wants Bailey's dog food-I mean REALLY and Bailey has been on a diet to keep her weight down so I could imagine if one of them even THOUGH there was a kibble left she would 100% bite him for it, fictional kibble or otherwise. So they are split up for now and she will never be fed in he pen again. Food is that dog's breaking point-always has been, always will be. I will be keeping them totally separate for a while (just in case it wasn't over kibble, and maybe Atlas the 8+ foot tall goat buck decided Bailey looked like a good humping target or something and THAT was why he got bit, because he's tried it before). For all I know he stepped on her or something. I'd like her to teach the puppy in the pen at some point but this complicates things.


----------



## rachels.haven

I am pleased to announce that as of this afternoon we finally do not own property in Massachusetts. I wasn't willing to believe it until it was done but it's done now.


----------



## Bruce




----------



## Baymule

What a huge relief that must be! Awesome, now take a deep breath, y'all are DONE with that place!


----------



## farmerjan

I am SOOOOO HAPPY and OVERJOYED for you and your family !!!! Done with the total insanity of Mass..... and the idiots that were "neighbors".


----------



## Finnie

rachels.haven said:


> I am pleased to announce that as of this afternoon we finally do not own property in Massachusetts. I wasn't willing to believe it until it was done but it's done now.


Now THAT is something to celebrate!! 🎉  🎊 💃🏻


----------



## Ridgetop




----------



## rachels.haven

LGD puppy only answers to Mr. Wiggles (not going into who's fault that is)...sooooo....Mr. Wiggles it is? Currently his rear half looks like it was cut off another larger dog, his feet are bigger than my hands, and if I "carry" him I lift up his front half while his back legs tippie toe along on the ground while I drag him. Currently he's mad at me because I dragged him into a pen to feed him his breakfast. He is a very submissive, speedy, causes no problems, just wants to stick to his goats kind of dog. He's hard to feed because Bailey wants to eat all his food and while he'll put on a show for it, she will WIN. So I get to chase him all over creation and carry him to a pen where he will eat then I can let him out. Sure would love it if he took himself because he's much heavier than a bag of feed.

 A day or two after his brother left I decided to just let him out and he's doing fine.

After selling Mr. Buggy the lamancha I brought home another one to breed to Atlas's daughters. We are still trying to bring in a buckling or two from Lucky*Stars farm and bloodlines this spring, but I couldn't pass this one up. He's smaller than Atlas, but he has a very, very nice pedigree for a lamancha. His name is Manzinita VD Piper. His sire is Kastdemur and his dam has a pedigree loaded with great herdnames and beautiful udders so I think he'll be a good buck to use this year so I can let the bucklings we hopefully bring in grow up properly without distractions that come with breeding. (already had one buckling fall through from one breeder because he came out with a defect and needed to be wethered for it, so I guess I'd better cross my fingers, but now we'll be okay either way)

Atlas is on the left and has the belt, Piper on the right, duking it out. Chami colored kids it is, I guess. Piper is still rutting and is missing a gut so I guess I need to hit up the feed store and get him some of that 14% protein, 6% fat horse feed and start getting him fattened up.


----------



## rachels.haven

Soo....I brought home some ugly goats today. One pregnant american guinea goat doe and a baby kunekune buck. They're goats, HONEST. Just get your eyes checked. American Kune hog-goats.
The little one fit through the electric large stock net so we (my angel father and Aiden) had to do some speedy pig wrangling and replaced one net with chicken net (knew it would be good for something) and now it's spicy hot. I'm ironically enough keeping them next to the smokehouse. It has a pig sculpture on the door.

*NO MILK DOWN THE DRAIN THIS YEAR *(please?)*.*


----------



## farmerjan

BOY oh BOY.... have you gone "hog wild" since you moved to the southern tier....
 Talk about becoming a real southerner (again)......


----------



## Bruce

Oh yes, they certainly look like goats! 

(humor her, I think she's lost it and may be dangerous if crossed)


----------



## Mini Horses

I had some of those "goats" once.  🤣. Very tasty.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

rachels.haven said:


> speedy pig wrangling


Ummmm....goat wrangling!   Good luck with your new, very unique goats!


----------



## rachels.haven

They're not very big pigs. I'm concerned I'm going to have to save over a sow or two from the big pigs impending litter to avoid killing them with too much unsold milk. It just occured to me this morning that it's possible to do that via scouring. Big, Iowa style, "danger, beware of the pig" signs on pen, commercial style hogs from my childhood are just too much monster for me to want to have them around though. I'm sticking to under 200 lbs average. 

People around here really like Julianas, kunes, and agh crosses and straight and they're not for pets. I think it may be for home butchery purposes, but I discovered I had options this weekend.


----------



## Mini Horses

The AGHs I had were nice pigs...personality and meat.  I am trying to not get more but, it's just on that back burner calling my name!  Some available just 8 miles away.  🙄. Summer, garden, goats kidding, grass to cut...all add to feeding them out.  Mine loved fresh grass cuttings.  I cut with bagger and dumped to them.   The size was nice.  See where I'm heading?  Meat was delish.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

Miss @rachels.haven, you really had me going for a moment calling them "ugly goats"!


----------



## rachels.haven

Mini Horses said:


> The AGHs I had were nice pigs...personality and meat.  I am trying to not get more but, it's just on that back burner calling my name!  Some available just 8 miles away.  🙄. Summer, garden, goats kidding, grass to cut...all add to feeding them out.  Mine loved fresh grass cuttings.  I cut with bagger and dumped to them.   The size was nice.  See where I'm heading?  Meat was delish.


This sow has impressed me so far. I see what you mean. She's not skittish, not mean, not greedy. The pig farmer said just keep her fed, watered, and sheltered and she will be satisfied and happy to stay put and that about sums up her personality. I love it so far. The speedy kunekune piglet is funny and cute, but dang, that thing is skittish.


Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Miss @rachels.haven, you really had me going for a moment calling them "ugly goats"!


Lol, Senile_Texas_Aggie, for goats, they are VERY ugly.


----------



## rachels.haven

The pig man was right. Happy pigs don't do a lot. They are also very quiet. (at the moment)


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> I'm sticking to under 200 lbs average.


I think that is a wise decision.


----------



## rachels.haven

Twin doelings for Erudite. Lamancha Hera has lost her ligaments (as far as I can tell, she's kind of fat) and should go tonight or tomorrow. I feel bad for pulling Eri's girls and making them bottle babies, but I have no Mothers' and Babies suites right now in my flooded barn and Eri teaches all her kids to avoid people like she does.


----------



## Baymule

Can you use a leash on your puppy? I have to put Ringo up or he will eat the dogs food. At 245 pounds, he wins, they lose. 

Your barn is flooded? Nooooo


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Can you use a leash on your puppy? I have to put Ringo up or he will eat the dogs food. At 245 pounds, he wins, they lose.
> 
> Your barn is flooded? Nooooo


Leashing the puppy is a good idea. I forgot about that. All my other dogs follow me without any of us really thinking about it and for the most part listen. Meanwhile I was just thinking about how I didn't know what to do with Mr. Giant, White, and Flighty and we hadnt been making as much progress as I'd like de-flighting him and had regressed. If I let him out he does his best to be half a pasture away as much as possible lately and feeding that is difficult (thank you, Bailey). Catching that is even less fun. He thinks he's a wild goat. Should have been a bottle baby.


----------



## rachels.haven

And yes the barn is flooded, but not the buck and doe pens. Just everything else. Too much rain, I guess. We have a gravel deficiency.


----------



## farmerjan

WOW you have gotten some rain..... we are getting it today;  it is very wet out there and COLD.... 72 yesterday and nice sunny day after early morning showers... started raining last night sometime after we got done feeding at 10:30 p.m. while it was warm and "drier" so we could get in and out of gates..... down to 33 this morning and never got above 34 all day on the recording thermometer.  COLD and WET and downright miserable all day.....


----------



## farmerjan

Cute new babies.... and yes, making them more people friendly is definitely more desirable....


----------



## Ramblin Farms

Do you


rachels.haven said:


> Yesterday finally we closed on the house. Tomorrow we go out on a plane for an animal prep trip. Little bit stressful.
> 
> On a different note...
> I had the opportunity to buy a used semen tank that holds from someone who had accumulated 5 tanks when people sold out of AI and she wanted the semen but didn't need the tank but took the extra tank anyway. It came with a bunch of nubian semen, which I will need to get g6s tested before using on Dan's nubian goat, Spot the Galaxy. I also bought some lamancha semen and 5 dwarf straws from a very milky lined dwarf buck...so I'm adding 13 bucks to my pen. The oldest 5 nubians have about 200 straws between them and are from the 70's and 80's. The kids are fascinated by the concept of "buck juice" from bucks long gone that they get to use to use to help Spot have kids but conveniently they are terrified of the concept of liquid nitrogen. I can tell you I will be storing the tank under lock and key in the milk shop at the new place. The tank gets to Mass tonight. The goat transporter will be taking it down with the goats. There's a lot of "Longman Dusty Baron" in there. Someone over collected.
> 
> I'm attempting to arrange a load of alfalfa to be coming while we're out there. I have some skinny goats that have had doelings on them for the past 8-9 months. It's time to get them beefy again for next year.
> 
> In regards to breeding. I have 5 lamancha does, and one dwarf tenatively bred and plan to put up a dwarf breeding pen when I get there (and the tenatively bred one one will be put back in there because I don't trust Eri to be bred until she's over being BRED, and she doesn't mind the extra "fun" anyway). I have 5 lamanchas I am holding off on to add condition to, to AI, or to stagger breed with cidrs and pg600. There's one lamancha doeling, Galaxy the noober, and 3 dwarf doelings that are too small and will probably be that way until next fall. And then there's the mini saanen that's just about ready now to breed and may go in with the dwarf breeding pen when we get there (with Eri and the 2 new dwarf does)...We might be able to have a kid filled spring and fall and a milky year after that for herd shares.
> Time to stress about the prep trip!


 Still have them extra tank with the nubian semen for sale


----------



## Ramblin Farms

Ramblin Farms said:


> Do you
> 
> Still have the extra tank with the nubian semen for sale


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Can you install french drains to help route the water away from the barn?


----------



## Mini Horses

Larsen Poultry Ranch said:


> Can you install french drains to help route the water away from the barn?



My thoughts, also.  I have property with slight, slow drop to rear as you do.  A carport I use for shade in summer and hay shelter in winter, out in a pasture...can get puddled with heavy rains.  In my case, I made a shallow ditch to catch and redirect the excess. Since it wasn't a drive area, I didn't have to go full french work😊.   But that may be an option for you.

Animals just hop over mine...


----------



## rachels.haven

Ramblin Farms said:


> Do you
> 
> Still have them extra tank with the nubian semen for sale


I don't, but I know someone who might still have one if you don't mind connecting with them over FB.


----------



## rachels.haven

Larsen Poultry Ranch said:


> Can you install french drains to help route the water away from the barn?





Mini Horses said:


> My thoughts, also.  I have property with slight, slow drop to rear as you do.  A carport I use for shade in summer and hay shelter in winter, out in a pasture...can get puddled with heavy rains.  In my case, I made a shallow ditch to catch and redirect the excess. Since it wasn't a drive area, I didn't have to go full french work😊.   But that may be an option for you.
> 
> Animals just hop over mine...


The bad news is that the barn already had a drainage system that looks a lot like french drains already. It may be old though. We still need to do something else as well. Maybe a ditch, maybe raising the barn ground level with a gravel pad and stall mats. It's not rebuilding a barn, at least.





Buck, buck, doe twins for Hera in the early morning. She didn't know what to do with them so the herd cleaned them off. Doe at the bottom .


----------



## rachels.haven

One Hera rear udder, only a few days fresh. Now she's up over 4 lbs per milking and the congestion on the right side has subsided. Her foreudder is nice too. It's very nicely blended. She's still rumpy from kidding here.







I also did some of this.



And I listed this bred doe...



And this one in the middle because I'm bringing in a special lamancha buckling and need funds.




And also Lace because we are at the time in our yearly cycle of our love-hate relationship where she and I both hate each other. Goat hormones. Pretty sure she's going to give me another single buck if she stays so she'd better get on out so she can give someone else a doe. She is a month until due.

And now I'm just going to bottle feed goats and get over this stomach bug.


----------



## rachels.haven

7 year old Eri can't be left out. She's up to a little over 2 lbs per milking or 4 lbs per day.


----------



## Baymule

Nice udder on Hera. That’s a lot of milk. 

Lace is still around? I thought you’d have got rid of that witch by now. LOL. No time like NOW.


----------



## rachels.haven

No. She didn't sell. I kind of wonder if her breeder had a "reputation" for badly behaved dam raised brats up north and trying to sell her with her herdname in the ad resulted in her staying. She also goes through phases where she loves me, then a few months later she will randomly decide to hate me and all humanity for months. After she kids she will become a very cheap, listed goat or a processor goat. *Promise*


----------



## Baymule

Some animals are such a PIA, no matter what they are worth, they aren’t worth keeping around.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'd say they're not worth much $ if they are Pita animals. I'm telling myself she'll be very, very inexpensive after kidding.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> I'd say they're not worth much $ if they are Pita animals. I'm telling myself she'll be very, very inexpensive after kidding.


Auction maybe? I don't like selling culls or problems to a face to face buyer, even with full disclosure. Auction is buyer beware.


----------



## rachels.haven

Wow. I'm wanting to add a nigerian dwarf buck to my buck pen with both a nice dairy udder history (hand milk able, tight, sound) and good production. Apparently it's nearly impossible to get even good bucks within 6 hours drive like that unless you are on milk testing and will help them make their herd look good. They'd rather make them wethers. And with the baby and the moving and setting up I am too busy to milk test this season.
And it's even more impossible to get them from herds disease screened for CAE, Johnes AND CL. The state does not provide free cl testing like it does for CAE and Johnes and I suspect many of the herds here are positive. I brought in 2 does from one of these "clean tested" herds and tested them a month later and one of them came back as suspect so she went back and I'll be retesting the other when I draw blood on my bucks to send in (they don't want her back-she's shy, so if Ms. Negative turns into Ms.suspect this time she'd go to auction)
But you just can't get bucks with those criteria apparently. I have to join the lofty club of the dwarf milk testing and be okay with CL. So I guess the semen tank was a good idea and I guess I'd better cross my fingers I can get good at it.

 Contacting someone for a buckling they have advertised, getting their sales spheel, you tell them you'd like him, then after the fact they ask you if you milk test and then they tell you that their public ad was not meant for you and non-milk testers need not apply and you are second rate, if they sell to you you get what's left and not your choice for often a higher price is frustrating-very dwarf breederish. How the heck are normal people supposed to improve their herds if the genetics that can improve them are inaccessible and out of reach for them? No wonder Nigerian dwarves have been improving so slowly as a breed.

I have options though. If I discovered I just couldn't do AI I could probably do a road trip back to Rosasharn farm, or to an aquaintence I have in Mass who has Old mountain farm goats that I'm allowed to pay full price and buy one of her otherwise future wethers. and those are totally regularly screened for CL too. Whoopie.

Not much else going on here. Just milking and bottle feeding and getting ready to spray to kill the fescue.

I have pictures to put up, but I need to use my phone.


----------



## rachels.haven

Oh, one odd thing that did happen. One of my quail hens had been laying 2 eggs per day several days a week for the last several weeks. I wasn't sure which one but I got to find out which one on Sunday. I had assumed she was laying them hours apart, but Sunday it became apparent they were coming at the same time and the two eggs had somehow gotten stuck and she'd ripped her vent off  Like big open hole, chunk of vent, two smaller bloody eggs, blood in the droppings pan, dead quail. What a horrible way to die, but yet another illustration why egg birds should only lay one egg per day max. This strain I'm breeding is not a meat strain and has been bred to be one of the highest producing strains the hatchery carries...I think I'm going to wait a good long time before hatching any eggs to help weed out issues like this from my gene pool. Then maybe I might cross some of them to something else to help temper this, I hope.

My jumbo chicks are growing great and almost sexable and we have another batch of jumbo (and jumbo manchurian) eggs from a different source going into lockdown on Friday/Saturday. If my Rosetta/Tibetians give me issues we will probably just do the jumbo line from this one source and sell or eggpen the rest and not keep them going.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

I'm sorry you lost a bird, that's never a pleasant thing to find. Hopefully the rest aren't such over achievers.


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> We are still trying to bring in a buckling or two from Lucky*Stars farm and bloodlines this spring,


We had several Lucky Star LaManchas and bred along those bloodlines.  Gorgeous does and with spectacular udders. DS2's buck, Magnet, threw gorgeous type and lovely udders. Lucky Star did some breeding in conjunction with a breeder in northern California in Napa and we got a buck from them a year or so later.  Naguchi was beautiful too but he was a fabulous udder buck - threw fantastic udders!  Also threw small birth weight kids so we used him on first fresheners.  Magnet's kids were larger at birth.  Both bucks were out of star dams and sires.  We loved the Lucky Star bloodlines.  If I ever get more goats I will reserve and buy a trio from Judy Hoy and take a trip to visit relatives in Washington state to pick them up.  Love their LaManchas.  Kastdemur was always known for their beautiful Nubians.  Interesting that they now have LaManchas.  Their Nubians were high production too since they had a large dairy and cheese business.

Milk test is not overly difficult if you are already keeping weight records of milk production.  You do need to try for a 10 month lactation, but if there is a tester in your area, or another breeder that wants to do milk test, your have several options.  You can both take the 1 day ADGA tester training and both become testers and do each other's herds, or have a friend take the training and have her test both your herds.  A fellow goat project mom became our tester.  We both took the training and she would come and do the testing.  If the breeder knows you and that you plan to do testing, they will probably keep you on their list for a stud buck.



rachels.haven said:


> I have options though. If I discovered I just couldn't do AI


You need to take the classes but it is not easy to do successfully,  However since you have your tank, you can arrange to have your bucks collected.  Usually several breeders will get together to share the collection expenses and do it at one location.  It is an excellent experience for any children in 4-H that are older.  DS2 was 13 or 14 and we collected several bucks over the years.  He also attended AI classes with me.  He was super into his LaMancha breeding program.


----------



## rachels.haven

I've wanted animals from Judi since I started lamanchas. I'm finally blowing the cash to purchase and ship one, and then getting a buck from someone who did the trio from Judi thing, like you'd want to do @Ridgetop .
Ironically, the lucky*stars lines in her pedigree is a big reason why Lace was purchased. She has some of Judi's animals not far back in her pedigree (she also has a pinecone up her goat bum)


----------



## Ridgetop

The best way to have sweet natured milkers is to bottle feed all kids.  The kids think you are their mom, the does think you are their kids, 
For drinking we loved the Nubian milk though - so rich it would actually get a cream coating on top after 24 hours that you could skim off!    We used a mechanical separator sometimes and my sons would make ice cream!


----------



## rachels.haven

Last night it snowed. So I walked the does up to be fed and milked in a blizzard. The pigs were less than impressed. This morning they seemed cold, so they got two new haybales added to their beds, 2 animal crackers in the mouth each, and breakfast in bed.

Waiting on baby pigs and baby goats. Next goat due date is Tuesday.


----------



## farmerjan

Your poor animals are so neglected and are taken care of so poorly


----------



## rachels.haven

Freakin' animal cracker deficiency... It's a real problem. They probably think they've got me properly trained. (*if we stay "asleep" she'll come and put pizza and cookies right in our mouths" -pigs probably)
I'm enjoying the pigs. Apparently if you keep them pampered and fed they don't make noise above the level of a snort, they stay put, and they don't challenge or test the fences.


----------



## rachels.haven

This weekend Lace went home to live with a family of a horse farrier and their dairy herd. They seem to be able to handle her no problem. Despite not having the best dairy goat temperament, I guess she's not a horse.

This weekend Noober the nubian buck went home with a family to breed their nubian and nubian cross does. * eyes closed and chanting, not breeding nubians* and definitely not breeding Noober to his sister.

Woodland Haven Ellie, Emmie's daughter, kidded triplet does last night. She's a yearling milker, so the first one was hard to get out, and the second two positioned with only heads out so I had to put my hand in and trace along the kid's shoulder down to the curled over leg, and pull one out so the kid could pass through the pelvis before it got so stuck we were in trouble. I've never had to go in that deep, so now I'm fretting if Ellie is going to be alright. Ellie so far has a perfect FF udder, perfect orifices, warm soft butter udder texture, and short but usable teats so she's a keeper and it looks like I can breed Emmie again to Atlas without worrying too much about perpetuating her cone teats, tough udder texture, and smaller orifices. This little doe has a dream udder, and it appears Atlas was able to cancel the frustrating part of my favorite pet Lamancha's genes out.

My newer lamancha buck that I was going to use to breed Atlas' daughters to jumped the cattle panel fence from a standstill to try to be with Ellie while I was putting her in the kidding stall (he hurt his leg mildly and I immediately put him back-negative feedback for you!). He is Kastdemur's Vandal x Kickapoo Valley All About Emu, both of which have outstanding udders and conformation, but a fence jumper will not do. I may use him to breed my open lamancha does after I cidr and pg600 them then sell him on asap. That way we do not get to the temptation of dwarf does while in rut. I could totally run an electric wire around the top of the pen, but from what I saw it would not help because the goat has to be touching the ground to get shocked and he just bunny hopped over, all four feet at once (how he hurt his leg). If he'd put his nose over first he'd have gotten shocked and it would have worked, but he didn't do that. He's too short to do that. Clearly large, fat, and happy bucks are the way to go assuming Atlas doesn't accidentally push over the fence.

Mallow (lamancha) is due tomorrow. She is the second to last lamancha to kid out this year. The next one is another smaller (110lbs at breeding) Atlas daughter next month.
I go to pick up my Lucky*Stars buckling at the airport on Wednesday.

The kids are on spring break. Baby has a cold. We're all trying to sleep in. Oh, and my inlaws are intown.

Oh, and Lacey and Buttah, a little orchard mother daughter pair, are being picked up as exposed does this Friday (may kidding). While their production is very high, they both could use more udder attachment in every way possible and Buttah needs bigger orifices. I told the guy as much, but he's okay with all that. He's going to start his lamancha herd with them. They both have outstanding builds and are in good flesh now.

I'm trying to pick specific dam lines to work with, so narrowing the herd focus and selling bred does that are not my favorite is what I'm telling myself to do. Life is short and all and I'm past the "I JUST NEED SOME DOES" stage of herd growth in the lamancha department. I have some nice does and some nice bucks and I'd like some nice kids from them 

Still working on some dwarf issues, but I'll start going through them when they kid. We're definitely pulling those kids because ND on their own dam raised have a high rate of being unfriendly and "witchy" to quote another breeder I've met. All the nigerian dwarf kids left are sired by Dawnland Oberon. I'd like to keep all the does as replacement and herd growth because of his outstanding genetics. Then I get to decide if I breed them to my buck with a Valley's Edge ancestor who stayed (potential buyer abandoned deposit and Ant is still here) or put some local kids in quarantine from herds that have only been tested for CAE and Johnes.


----------



## Senile_Texas_Aggie

rachels.haven said:


> after I cidr and pg600 them



Huh?  (Sorry, my Texas Aggie I/Q is getting in the way...)


----------



## rachels.haven

Senile_Texas_Aggie said:


> Huh?  (Sorry, my Texas Aggie I/Q is getting in the way...)


Cidrs are a device you put in your doe to make their cycle pause for about two weeks. Then they get a (small) shot of lute or pg600 after you remove the cidr and it jump starts them cycling, twice, I think, even in the off-season. Most goats are seasonal breeders. Cidrs and a hormone shot is a way you can breed the seasonal standard goats for fall kids. And also so we can use the potentially free spirited buck without him being in full on nutty rut. I'd like to try it, although I was going to do it for AI, but if I get around to it I'll do the protocol for some classy kids via live cover too.

Usually Cidrs are for sheep.


----------



## farmerjan

We use alot of cidrs and shot protocols in cattle too.  Gets the beef cows cycling better and then they all calve in a shorter time frame (window) so that all the calves are closer in age and size for selling uniform groups... and dairy farmers use them so that they can get cows in heat close together and breed a group AI  and also for using cows to be "surrogates" carrying embryo's from more desirable matings.


----------



## Bruce

STA, clearly you and I are not part of the "in" crowd. We don't know the lingo!!!!


----------



## Baymule

Your pigs sure look happy, all cozy in their hay. Anybody buying your goats is getting a good deal. You breed for the best goat you can produce and even if it is one you don't want, it is still a mighty nice goat.


----------



## rachels.haven

Okay, so to recap, 
Lace is sold
Buttah is sold
Lacey is sold
Noober is sold
and this guy came to Nashville from Lucky Stars farm in Washington.





We have had six lamancha kids born(4 does, 2 bucks) and two dwarves (2 does).

And Mallow is STILL PREGNANT. She looks like she ate one of the dwarves that she hates so much.




That's right, Mallow. We KNOW about your dwarf munching secrets.


----------



## rachels.haven

The new buckling's name is Lucky Star's LL Pete.
Happy Pepper says, "HI".



She's been a bit of a trip lately so I took her off the puppy food with 30% protein and took her down to 26% and suddenly she's calmer and less pushy. She might require a further step and adult dog food soon because she is not entirely a puppy anymore. She's also been having issues with prey drive and trying to kill cats and be-bopping little animals as they hippity hoppity on by, but we're still trying (she's always gone after the cats a bit but lately it's been GAME ON and the other dogs don't care). She's amazing on a leash though! It's just that when she sees potential prey  it results in a battle every time where I get to remind her that all the animals belong to ME and are not her squeak toys and she "gets" to lay down and ignore them or else. The big goats want to pat her flat and into the ground with their heads so she doesn't dare mess with them. I kind of wish the cats could do that. I wonder if my girl will ever be reliable with small animals without constant supervision. She's already gotten one of Aiden's cats. It ran off and was gone for over a week and now has a permanent kink in it's back and atrophied hips (I feel bad about my son's cat too).
My mom went down to Barbara's earlier and wound up with a couple of Pepper's half siblings from an older litter as extra bonus dogs to help sell so Mom loaned me the one that was coping the worst with living in a litter long term. If I have to move Pepper onto a cat/baby goat free home my little shadow puppy will be bought and will stay (I suspect mom thinks I will fail, but you never know, maybe I'll succeed). I don't have pictures of her but she's a wonderful sweet little thing. I can't say enough nice things about Barb's dogs. I wish I could get Pepper's small animal issues mended though.

We also had the last batch of quail for a while hatch. Now all that's left is to grow them out and clean the incubator.
So I've had the highs of kidding and selling goats this week, and the lows of dealing with a now fairly well behaved dog minus small animal issues. Also quail hatching and having to host inlaws for a week. It's another week at our place.


----------



## farmerjan

She is BIG !!!!!!! 
Congrats on the new addition.  Looks like the travel went well.  Hope he settles in with no problems.  
How are things in general there for your family?  Aside from the rain and wet in the barn. 
DH's eyesight still holding?  
The baby isn't a baby anymore... 1 1/2 yrs old now?  The older boys doing good in school?  
Dogs all settled in?  
I love reading your journal.


----------



## farmerjan

Just saw your latest post.... especially about Pepper.... HMMM.


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> She is BIG !!!!!!!
> Congrats on the new addition.  Looks like the travel went well.  Hope he settles in with no problems.
> How are things in general there for your family?  Aside from the rain and wet in the barn.
> DH's eyesight still holding?
> The baby isn't a baby anymore... 1 1/2 yrs old now?  The older boys doing good in school?
> Dogs all settled in?
> I love reading your journal.


Aw, thanks. It's like visiting with someone, reading their journal. I like reading your journal too. It's nice to see where everyone's at and what they're up to every few days.
We're doing really well actually. DH's eyesight has stabilized and the visual acuity issues he'd been having actually improved a bit. We're still working on getting the mix of meds just right as far as cost/benefit goes.
No, the baby is not a baby anymore. He started pointing today and says a few little words. Lots of walking and running around. Climbing.  Toddler stuff. 
The dogs are doing great. Moses is off in Utah (I think) with my sister, excelling as a emotional support dog. I believe she's going to put him through service dog training and get him some sort of credentials. 
Bailey is settled in nicely and owns the pasture. Her new companion is still skittish and I'm not unpenning him from beside the goats until he's had his rabies shot and neuter in case he decides one day to just leave. At least he won't be making more skittish puppies and won't get and spread rabies. I don't think I can undo the damage not being socialized and handled and staying with his litter until he was older has done, and for all I know his parents were skittish too. As long as I can take care of him and he stays he'll be fine here.
I have a black and white male poodle puppy, Nolan who is a hoot. And Pepper, of course, and Millie who is on loan for her "unwinding". Nolan and Millie are BFF's and very happy, but every dog is pretty much as happy as they can be at the moment. Bailey is jealous of the pigs and all their food still, so I guess she would still complain. She sulks when I feed anything but her, lol. Because if she can see it, it's hers. She's a pyr, lol.
Tennessee has been pretty great to us so far. It's even greening up (which means it's almost time to wipe out the pasture, I guess, then onto the new). In a way I wish we'd gotten here sooner!


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> Just saw your latest post.... especially about Pepper.... HMMM.


I'll be working on her. She might wind up only pottying on a tether for a while instead of free breaks. IDK what can be done about prey drive in dogs. I feel like once they start losing their minds over little critters they don't stop, but if she can be stopped I'll figure out how.


----------



## Baymule

Prey drive is hard to deal with. Some can never deal with it. For Trip, my male GP, it comes and goes. He goes off the rails on poultry from time to time, the latest causalities were two old black sex link hens that just roamed around, there in Lindale. I'd had them for about a year and a half, then he decided to eat them. He likewise ate my guineas and before them, my muscovy ducks. He will alert on newborn lambs, for which reason he NEVER is allowed in with ewes and lambs. Older lambs he is fine with, newborns are too much like rabbits and he catches and eats rabbits too. Sigh......... He jumps fences like they aren't even there, for that reason he is now in a small horse panel pen, to keep him off the highway. I'm looking for my farm, so I can get settled in with dogs and sheep. Would like to have horses again, we'll see. At nearly 8 years old, he's not going anywhere, he may be nutty, but he's my nutty dog. 

I'm glad that Tennessee is working out so good for you and your family. And Mallow! She looks like she swallowed a whale!


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Your pigs sure look happy, all cozy in their hay. Anybody buying your goats is getting a good deal. You breed for the best goat you can produce and even if it is one you don't want, it is still a mighty nice goat.


Aw, thank you baymule. I just saw this. I appreciate it.

Had a lapse in judgement and Bailey got lioned today. She seems really happy about it despite how ugly it turned out (she wouldn't hold still and her undercoat is thin in places, go figure, plus I'm apparently bad at shaving pyrs). I guess I wouldn't want to wear 6" of sweater 24/7 my whole life either.


----------



## rachels.haven

I should have left a tail fluff.


----------



## Mini Horses

Yes.  You should have...😁


----------



## Baymule

Sometimes all I can see of Trip is that big white tail like a banner, telling me where he is and what he is doing. 

Bailey looks like she is admiring her new style.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Sometimes all I can see of Trip is that big white tail like a banner, telling me where he is and what he is doing.
> 
> Bailey looks like she is admiring her new style.


She's actually guarding what's left of giant milk bones from the poodle pack. Dan gave her like 8 bones because he hates haircuts and he decided she did a good job on hers. I like your interpretation better


----------



## rachels.haven

Idk what the deal is with the whole goats having misshapen pupils nonsense. They always look plenty round to me.

This doe's little 4 week old buckling (background) got his equipment all the way out today and peed on his face this evening.  umm...time to separate does and bucks from that litter. Apparently he didn't read the thing that said they can't do that until 6-8 weeks.  Kids these days... 

Atlas doesn't say hi. Too busy working on his manly figure this morning. It wasn't _his_ son misbehaving after all.


----------



## rachels.haven

Omgees, don't zoom in on that pic too much. It's more obvious in the pictures before it on my phone but in the background both Hera bucklings are at it. They'd better cut it out or I'm going to find some pants to put on them for at least 4 more weeks. We've got to follow the rules here. Blond boy has someone wanting him, other buckling may wind up a processing wether for the freezer, but we'll see.

Where are my tutus of shame?


----------



## rachels.haven

My pig has become a low rider. Uh...hope she's pregnant and goes soon.


----------



## Baymule

The nice thing about sheep is that rams don't pee on their faces!


----------



## rachels.haven

Yesterday on day 158 Mallow kidded a buckling almost 11 pounds...and an 8 pound doe and buckling too. Now she's on a rampage to kill all dwarf goats and yearlings to make up for the last 3 months of landshipping it and she doesn't care if I'm in the way. She's almost gotten me a couple of times too. She was like this before she was a kid bus too, so in the spirit of not keeping goats that don't get along here, she will be listed as soon as we don't need her milk. (I'm also not smitten with her udder, feet, or production) Meanwhile I need to stay on my toes to not get my knees broken.
Sweet with people, spicy with smaller goats, that's Mallow.


----------



## farmerjan

Those are big kids for triplets aren't they?   Sorry she has an attitude like that, but some are just PAINS.... in capital letters!!!! Yep, you do what you have to... and obviously she is not the favorite, so better to find her a home that meets her "specifications"....


----------



## Baymule

What a Diva! My sheep-not! Posts like yours just make me like my laid back sheep even more. LOL LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes @farmerjan , those kids are very good sizes for triplets.


Not an animal post, but last night Baby Shaun informed me that he has future aspirations not to be "Baby" and he's trying out something more along the lines of...



Spoiler: ...





 ..."Naughty" or at least busy. He is definitely wanting to be two lately. So yes, the baby is more of a toddler now, very busy, and in that picture covered in baby goat spit after letting the babies suck his ears and hair and hands, then wandering off in the shop to find stick like objects to poke doe berries with, then instead of going to sleep in bed after brushing his teeth he found a chocolate one of the boys lost and got it everywhere including on me while I was tuning him out...so he's probably going to be going through a "busy", messy, disaster stage along with being moody if his mind is not read right. Keeping up with his brothers' records.



...but he's cute, so we'll keep him. 😉


----------



## Baymule

I love it when kids get messy and dirty. They have so much fun!  Your toddler is adorable!


----------



## rachels.haven

Thanks! 
Me too.Dirty is a healthy, occupied child's natural state. Then we rinse and repeat


----------



## Baymule

My girlie two littlest granddaughters love to get coated in mud. Once when we were cleaning out the 300 gallon horse tank, they laid in the mud and "swam" in the green water, sand, horse manure, interesting mix. They had a blast, got squirted with the water hose and had some good ol' dirty/clean fun.


----------



## farmerjan

What so many people don't realize in the,  "clean is healthy" world many live in, is that getting exposed to all those "terrible germs" is what makes a kids immune system stronger also.  It is a "prepping for lifetime" challenge to the immune systems that might be the best way to fight off other diseases down the road.  But, most all of us on here  already "get it"....


----------



## Baymule

Daughter said her girls got too quiet. She went outside and found out why. 

Sometimes muddy kids can be kinda cute!


----------



## Mini Horses

🤣. At least warm enough to hose them down good before coming inside.  🤗


----------



## farmerjan

What a mess... yet when you think about it, what are they hurting?  And it sure looks like they were having fun....Bless their hearts. Kids and clothes wash.....


----------



## Finnie

In that first photo, it’s really clever how she made shoulder straps, made herself a mud jumper dress.


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> Sometimes muddy kids can be kinda cute!


Cheaper than a spa mud treatment!


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Daughter said her girls got too quiet. She went outside and found out why.
> 
> Sometimes muddy kids can be kinda cute!
> 
> View attachment 90284
> 
> View attachment 90285


They're only kids once! And not for long, is the way I feel. Also...if they don't do it in front of you, they will do it behind your back anyway.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

Today Baby Shaun discovered the stock animal of his dreams. It is sturdy, doesn't make much noise, doesn't scratch or bite, isn't covered with too much fur or feathers, and is soft, chubby, and warm. He got to be in love for about 5 minutes while I showed DH, then I talked to Shaun about the baby pig needing to go back to mommy pig to nurse, and he agreed, then we put the little sow back. No tantrum from my little guy and he got to carry the pigger out and watch me set it down with mommy pig.
My lowrider pig had 4 piglets(1 boar and 3 females) + one she laid on(female). I've seen only one afterbirth so I guess there could be more. They are too fun for the toddler. I know they won't stay that way, but for today neither pig mom nor piglets mind. Might be time to separate the kune boarling I bought. He's nursing too. Off to TSC for a doghouse I guess.
Meanwhile, here's a pic of a yearling that's due on Saturday and I'm not even sure if she's pregnant or just precocious. She's not very big. She has an itty, bitty handful sized udder.









Also stinking Mad Mallow is out producing everyone by almost double despite her fleshy udder. Darn it, Mad Mallow. Goats never make it easy...so much baby goat food.


----------



## Baymule

Shaun and the piglet is precious! How adorable, your kids are growing up like other kids can only dream about.


----------



## farmerjan

He sure looked intrigued with the piglet.  Glad that the sow is easy going about it too.  How are the other boys liking the piglets?  
Yeah, the one you want to get rid of, or is a pain to work with, is always the one that will "out perform"......
Did you get that cold wave through there?   It was down to 20 this morning... just plain COLD the past few days with the wind especially....


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> He sure looked intrigued with the piglet.  Glad that the sow is easy going about it too.  How are the other boys liking the piglets?
> Yeah, the one you want to get rid of, or is a pain to work with, is always the one that will "out perform"......
> Did you get that cold wave through there?   It was down to 20 this morning... just plain COLD the past few days with the wind especially....


We had a cold wave yesterday, but it only got into the 30's, then 50's during the day. It made everyone grumpy. We are wimps now.

The sow had 9 piglets over the course of the whole day. The boarling kept rolling her over so she'd crush them and he'd get all the milk and together they messed up her nest, so we caught his fat, ripped 90 lbs self and "hard weaned" him and gave him an electric fence and a dogloo and I built her a better nest to keep the piglets in and not under her. 5 of the piglets are still alive, one that I saved from under her and convinced not to die (this also made me grumpy). If the boarling irritates me like this again, especially when I'm tired he'll be coming to dinner and we'll get another American Guinea Hog, but a boar.

Shaun likes pigs too much, and he's as loud as the boarling when we take them away. This is going to be complicated, as cute as it is.

Oh yeah, and piglets bite.


----------



## Mini Horses

And they have sharp little teeth!!   🙄😂


----------



## farmerjan

Sows should have a spot where they can farrow with no other interruptions.  Didn't think to mention to you that she needed to be by herself.  And with the young boar wanting to nurse you are going to have some problems in the future.  When you get one that won't quit, they need to go.


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> Sows should have a spot where they can farrow with no other interruptions.  Didn't think to mention to you that she needed to be by herself.  And with the young boar wanting to nurse you are going to have some problems in the future.  When you get one that won't quit, they need to go.


Yeah, I'm annoyed enough at him to process and eat him at this point. He's only 10 weeks old but he'd going through no trauma with the break up and he just killed 4 nice looking gilts to feed his fat face. And previous to this point he was unwilling to stay in any fence if he was not with another pig, which caused a while heap of trouble (or fun for my oldest as he has ALL the pig chasing energy and stamina).
I also might be starting to wonder if he's actually a "kunekune" or a production hog cross because he is getting big mighty fast and definitely doesn't have a scrunched up nose.


----------



## Ridgetop

Love the pix of the LaManchas.  Congrats on your Lucky star buckling.  Judy Hoy has beautiful animals with exceptional milk yields.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> Yeah, I'm annoyed enough at him to process and eat him at this point. He's only 10 weeks old but he'd going through no trauma with the break up and he just killed 4 nice looking gilts to feed his fat face. And previous to this point he was unwilling to stay in any fence if he was not with another pig, which caused a while heap of trouble (or fun for my oldest as he has ALL the pig chasing energy and stamina).
> I also might be starting to wonder if he's actually a "kunekune" or a production hog cross because he is getting big mighty fast and definitely doesn't have a scrunched up nose.


Maybe somebody didn’t know one pig from another. He sounds like a real PITA.


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm contemplating overseeding my pasture and liming and fertilzing rather than rounding it up and replanting. The fescue is not strong and there is a lot of bare ground and clover already. Not 80%, but if it gets hot, won't the fescue go dormant and if it's already loosing the war and not doing great could it loose the upper hand and get smothered?


----------



## Baymule

@Mike CHS has fescue in his pastures. 

In Texas, the heat cooks it by end of May. I planted Kentucky 32, a non endophyte variety. The sheep loved it.


----------



## Ridgetop

Baymule said:


> Maybe somebody didn’t know one pig from another. He sounds like a real PITA.


Doesn't PITA - Doesn't that stand for Pork in Tasty Adobo (sauce)?


----------



## rachels.haven

Ridgetop said:


> Doesn't PITA - Doesn't that stand for Pork in Tasty Adobo (sauce)?


And in a flat pocket bread to boot. That's why they call it pita bread.


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> And in a flat pocket bread to boot. That's why they call it pita bread.


----------



## rachels.haven

Never leave it to goats to avoid the toxic stuff. Okay, I bought my sprayer. Next week I'll be going out and committing some...Herbicide.


----------



## Baymule

What toxic stuff?


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> What toxic stuff?


Endophyte fescue is moderately toxic for goats, and mine most definitely (probably) is. It can do weird things to udders and kidding as well as the usual extremities ciruclation stuff. Chances are some, if not the majority of my goats would probably seek out and gorge on fescue rather than anything else I plant because they're goats and if you give them an option they will do the opposite of what you want. And ideally I'd like them not to eat it until a couple of frosts hit it (it's TOUGH as nails in the cold, emerald forever!)

So I'll be using the short duration roundup on it to hopefully kill back at least a good portion of it so the things I plant will be able to take hold and take over. I'll probably leave the vegetation near the ditches to hold the clay in too. I don't want our pasture to become a giant gully. It makes me sad, but I would like to start off on the right food pasture-wise.


----------



## farmerjan

Fescue toxicity will also cause breeding problems, abortion, and some will not cycle.  HOWEVER, endophyte infected fescue is also very UNPALATABLE since the starches do not taste good.  After a frost the starches change to sugars and it makes a good grass for extending the grazing into the fall and winter.  Now, understand I really despise it.... but it has a place.  Our cattle will not eat it if they have other choices.  We do make quite a bit of hay that has fescue in it.  Once it is cut and dried and made into hay it is not a problem.  It is not as "tasty" as orchard grass or other grasses, but it makes decent hay for winter.  

I agree with you wanting to try to decrease the amount in the pasture with making preferable forage more available to them.  Letting the pastures grow up some so they don't want to eat the more mature stemmy stuff which is the fescue will help too. But you don't want it to go to seed so it is a 2 edged sword....  It does not do real good in the heat so it will grow like gangbusters in the spring and then again in late summer to grow for fall ..... But except for using the herbicide as you are planning to, there is no other good way to get rid of it. 
I sympathize, we deal with it here all the time too....


----------



## Baymule

I planted non endophyte fescue in Lindale. The sheep loved it and it died back in spring.


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> Fescue toxicity will also cause breeding problems, abortion, and some will not cycle.  HOWEVER, endophyte infected fescue is also very UNPALATABLE since the starches do not taste good.  After a frost the starches change to sugars and it makes a good grass for extending the grazing into the fall and winter.  Now, understand I really despise it.... but it has a place.  Our cattle will not eat it if they have other choices.  We do make quite a bit of hay that has fescue in it.  Once it is cut and dried and made into hay it is not a problem.  It is not as "tasty" as orchard grass or other grasses, but it makes decent hay for winter.
> 
> I agree with you wanting to try to decrease the amount in the pasture with making preferable forage more available to them.  Letting the pastures grow up some so they don't want to eat the more mature stemmy stuff which is the fescue will help too. But you don't want it to go to seed so it is a 2 edged sword....  It does not do real good in the heat so it will grow like gangbusters in the spring and then again in late summer to grow for fall ..... But except for using the herbicide as you are planning to, there is no other good way to get rid of it.
> I sympathize, we deal with it here all the time too....


Thanks, I wish someone would let the goats know they're supposed to not like it. They currently want to go to town every time I turn my back on the way to milking because it's lush and green and growing like crazy and all they've had all winter has been dry hay. They are prime toxicity candidates.
Nothing to it but to do it, I guess.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> I planted non endophyte fescue in Lindale. The sheep loved it and it died back in spring.


I'd be afraid to plant the non endophyte stuff without killing off and resting the place, but I bet they loved it. My caravan of milked goaties keeps taking snack break detours.and I have to go catch them and drag them to the gate. Apparently toxic is fun!


----------



## farmerjan

They aren't going to get a toxic amount in short period of times.  Plus the real early growth in the spring will not cause the problems that are listed... it would take several hours/days of just eating that and nothing else, like their normal hay etc, before they would have any real effects.  Sneaking some snacks is not going to be a big problem.....


----------



## Mini Horses

What you spray MAY be a bigger problem.  Roundup !   I had a worker spray it near a fence line -- against all orders not to!!!!!!! -- two mares ready to foal within week, put heads thru wooden fence and ate.  Dead foals aborted within 48 hrs.  😩  Be careful.


----------



## farmerjan

Yes, you have to make sure you keep any livestock from eating anything that has been sprayed.  When we renovate any fields, it is a 2-4 year process and no animals are within any "reaching distance" of those fields during anytime of the renovations.  Be careful of what you spray and how soon the animals have any access at all.


----------



## rachels.haven

Absolutely!
We don't have any animals bordering us, but we area also going to stay back from the property line.


----------



## Ridgetop

What is the name of the herbicide that Farmerjan sprays her pastures to get rid f the dangerous weeds?  The stuff is ok for the cattle to eat after spraying?


----------



## Mini Horses

Maybe Grazon?  There are others.   There are herbicides that kill broadleaf, ignores grass.  Roundup kills everything.  They want to kill the fescue grass.

So these that kill broadleaf are ones that also make hay from there not good garden mulch as it leaches out.   If you get clover an some weed, it's most likely untreated. 😊. I havent used anything for such in almost 20 yrs.  My goats love weeds! 🤣


----------



## rachels.haven

*goat owners planting weeds for goats* 
I wish there was a pesticide that only killed non-broadleaf plants, specifically fescue, but if there is I don't know about it.


----------



## rachels.haven

I also need to take out some Johnson grass and daffodils. The brome I think I can lime and fertilize out...but I'm sure the goats would try that too.


----------



## rachels.haven

I was comparing Riker the puppy we have outside to our experience with Badger and it dawned on me that Badger was severely behind the curve in his ability to think things through and reason as a Pyr should and for a LGD he was very, very slow and definitely cognitively impaired. If I were more experienced I would have noticed something wrong right away and wouldn't have been surprised when he started deciding that random objects needed to be "killed" as threats and then moved into living things...
I also think his breeder KNEW she had canine epilepsy in her litter and in the parents and she knew that she was selling puppies that had it and could become dangerous and that was why she reacted the way she did. It wasn't a very good scam, but it was a bit of one and the main thing I did wrong was not have more experience to recognize things as they were happening in the first place. 
I probably should have put him down much earlier.
Pyr puppies are uncomfortably stubborn, but extremely intelligent and I don't think Badger could hold onto a thought long enough for that. 
Riker doesn't want to do things unless the world conforms to his perception of reality (he "gets" to anyway). He definitely remembers all the yesterday's. Badger did everything like it was always the first day of his life. Poor dog. He would never have been able to be an LGD and the desire to act on his own (scrambled) thoughts like PYRs do made him very dangerous.


----------



## Baymule

NOOOOOO not the daffodils! Dig them up and send them to MEEEE!!!!!!!


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> I was comparing Riker the puppy we have outside to our experience with Badger and it dawned on me that Badger was severely behind the curve in his ability to think things through and reason as a Pyr should and for a LGD he was very, very slow and definitely cognitively impaired. If I were more experienced I would have noticed something wrong right away and wouldn't have been surprised when he started deciding that random objects needed to be "killed" as threats and then moved into living things...
> I also think his breeder KNEW she had canine epilepsy in her litter and in the parents and she knew that she was selling puppies that had it and could become dangerous and that was why she reacted the way she did. It wasn't a very good scam, but it was a bit of one and the main thing I did wrong was not have more experience to recognize things as they were happening in the first place.
> I probably should have put him down much earlier.
> Pyr puppies are uncomfortably stubborn, but extremely intelligent and I don't think Badger could hold onto a thought long enough for that.
> Riker doesn't want to do things unless the world conforms to his perception of reality (he "gets" to anyway). He definitely remembers all the yesterday's. Badger did everything like it was always the first day of his life. Poor dog. He would never have been able to be an LGD and the desire to act on his own (scrambled) thoughts like PYRs do made him very dangerous.


Now you have the hard won experience and are able to look at a dog a little differently. That woman should not be allowed to even have a dog, much less sell puppies to unsuspecting people. For you, it was a terrible experience but on the other side of that, it gave you valuable insight and powers of observation that otherwise you would not have. Even out of bad, can come good.


----------



## farmerjan

We have daffodils growing in nearly every pasture we have.  Have no problems with the cattle or with DS's sheep.  Unless they are starving, few animals will eat the leaves... it is not considered a problem around here.  
Johnson grass is only a problem if stressed.  The cows love it and we don't restrict it in the pastures.  It grows fast and if over 18 inches, does not cause a problem.  We don't have alot of it in the pastures.  Horse people do not want it in the hay so that is why we are trying to get it out of the fields that we make into hay....it is very prolific and spreads fast.  One natural way of killing it is to use White vinegar at the highest acidity you can find... pour directly on the plant ...... it does not do good in acidic soil conditions.


----------



## rachels.haven

Interesting on the Johnson grass and daffodils. I love hearing that things may not be an issue.


----------



## Bruce

farmerjan said:


> We have daffodils growing in nearly every pasture we have.


That is just weird! Daffodils don't spread by seed do they? Aren't they usually found around homes where people planted bulbs?


----------



## Ridgetop

Baymule said:


> NOOOOOO not the daffodils! Dig them up and send them to MEEEE!!!!!!!


Absolutely!  Dig up the bulbs and transplant near the house!  Or in pots until you have time to make them a daffodil bed!  Daffodils are soooo beautiful and smell so good. And the bulbs are expensive!  Don't kill them!


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> That is just weird! Daffodils don't spread by seed do they? Aren't they usually found around homes where people planted bulbs?


It's possible someone planted them in the back corner of the property because they burried animals there.
It's also possible you get them when you stand in a field and close your eyes and chant, "I don't want daffodils, I don't want daffodils, I don't want daffodils" and poof, you have daffodils.


----------



## Baymule

Or because decades ago, there was an old home place and all that now survives is the daffodils.


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> It's possible someone planted them in the back corner of the property because they burried animals there.
> It's also possible you get them when you stand in a field and close your eyes and chant, "I don't want daffodils, I don't want daffodils, I don't want daffodils" and poof, you have daffodils.


----------



## farmerjan

There are daffodils all along the roadsides here... guess people planted them?   You'll find them in the middle of the lawns... just anywhere someone decided they wanted them.  Yes they can produce seeds, but the seed head is large and does not get "blown" to a new spot and it takes several years for them to grow and then bloom.  Not to say that they haven't been distributed by some animals or say a tractor mowing over the patch after they have finished blooming and the leaves die off and the bulbs go dormant.  But they are all over around here...


----------



## rachels.haven

Huh. I "bounced" the yearling that I wasn't sure was pregnant and felt what feels like a hard kid.  So I guess we're on day 154 for her? I sure hope it's triplets or twins for her too not a kid that's too big like a giant single buck.
My mini saanen hits day 150 on Thursday. She's got a load on her bus. Then there are only three dwarf goats left that are *probably* pregnant and we will be done May 10th with the very last one.
Mad Mallow is not as bad as she was post kidding but still a beast and a trouble maker. Her udder is still not my favorite, but we are chugging along as we need her milk. Just don't let her walk anywhere by herself with other goats around. She tries to go to war every time.
My sprayer is coming this week, and as long as I can get it put together as soon as we have a dry day or two I'll go get some concentrate and spray my emerald field dead. That seed really needs to get put in the ground.


----------



## rachels.haven

The ligaments on the mini saanen appear gone/almost all soft tonight. Great. The overdue yearling appears to be almost gone too. Three am kiddings I may not be able to attend due to bad planning.
I'm a little grumpy because one of my yearlings that freshened that I was so proud of began sucking herself this week. She went from a half gallon 2x daily to a pint, and holding back for herself too. AND she's good at getting off taped teats. Anyway, I wasn't sure at first. Then tonight while she was waiting for her turn on the stand she cocked a leg and emptied one side almost completely-loudly slurped it all gone, no shame. Then she did the other side. So she's either going to need to be sold for cheap or taken to auction.  Her udder is so perfect.
I may try some bitter apple spray before I throw in the towel, but I hear goats like it so I'm not too hopeful.


----------



## rachels.haven

SO MANY CULLS!


----------



## farmerjan

Try a "dog collar" that they use to stop dogs from licking/biting etc wounds and such.  Make it tight where she cannot get it off...Big and wide so she can't reach around it????
They make an "anti-suck" weaning ring for calves and have ones for putting in a cows nose... a "nose flap" that has spikes that stick out so when a calf... or a sucking cow, tries to suck another cow... they get poked with the spikes ( not real sharp but would be uncomfortable for an animal to get poked with them) and kick at whatever is trying to suck them.  You can't very well put it in a does' nose.... is there anything else made for stopping sucking????


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

What about a halter with a bit so she can't close her lips enough to get suction? Or would that impede drinking water too?


----------



## Mini Horses

A muzzle?   BUT goats are notorious at manipulation of devices.  😁


----------



## rachels.haven

I think a dog cone collar on backwards is an option I'll try to find today and also a sheep tube. I'm concerned she's long enough in the neck the e collar won't work and sheep tubes appear to try not to cover too terribly much down there but I'd rather try it than to flat out sell her.
I might also try a "goat bra" and see if I can break her. A teat cover is a teat cover.
I think the reason weaning rings are not common in goats is that goats may be able to figure them out (or there's just not enough money in them to make them come over here from overseas, might be more likely) and I'm not sure how to rig a halter to prevent suction yet still allow for eating and drinking.
I guess I'll try and figure this out.
No new babies yet, but two does without ligaments out there waiting impatiently for breakfast.
Side note, if you type in "goat bra" in Google...well, that's not something I ever wanted. Does not float my boat, sorry Google.

A goat bra from Amazon is coming. Cheap, may not work, but willing to try. Lamb tubes are for up to 100 pounds but they are spandex, so I may try them anyway. This is starting to sound kinky...Then a bondage-i mean Elizabethan dog collar- should be at TSC or I can drive into Springfield as soon as my two does aren't on the verge of popping.

...now, to go back to bed and chore late (I milked and bottle fed pretty late last night) or get it all done on schedule and be done?

The problem with goats is the main thing you can and should always count on with them is that they are horribly intelligently self destructive and food driven. This self nursing activity checks all those boxes.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Then tonight while she was waiting for her turn on the stand she cocked a leg and emptied one side almost completely-loudly slurped it all gone, no shame.


I was going to suggest the cone of shame but I see that has been done. Maybe a nice spiky tutu


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Goat bra?  Spandex body suit?


----------



## rachels.haven

I feel like pants would also work, but that could get...complicated fast. Goats aren't built for them.
Unfortunately I came down with a stomach bug shortly after that post, making things more interesting.

Iris, the mini saanen, has progressed to the stage where she is laying down and waiting for hard contractions, which means my pepto had better keep working because I need to keep checking on her. The yearling lamancha looks like she's going to be the type of doe that walks around eating through the whole thing then *worst poop ever* then they walk away and leave baby on the ground. Like Hera did earlier at like 4 am this season. Aw well.
Speaking of Hera, her doeling developed a very swollen front foot joint. I started spraying it with iodine hoping to dry it out in case it was a skin or hoof infection gone wrong. Unfortunately it looks like she has a major joint infection. After I sprayed it today it burst, so I put on the gloves and cleaned it out and sprayed it with more iodine (rotten bone smell). She's got a large pocket and hole up into essentially her hand and wrist joint. Highly doubtful this is CL. As soon as I stop having fun with this illness she's going to need a vet to look at it and help us pick an antibiotic. I'm not sure what her prognosis will be. I'm surprised. This doeling is 6 weeks old. It took a while for the swelling to show up if joint ill.

Unfortunately we're down to three piglets also this morning. Mom keeps squishing them one by one. And one of the three is not growing and it's not from a lack of milk. It looks like two boars and one gilt left going by how many holes they have on the rear end.


----------



## rachels.haven

Single giant buck with his elbows out for the lamancha FF Woodland Haven Elsa(another Atlas daughter). I really thought that one would be a vet call. After all the trauma she violently rejected him, but I don't blame her and that makes pulling for bottle feeding really easy.
The mini saanen appears to have decided not to go right now, which is nice, because there was a lot of unnecessary vomiting during that hard pull and on the way back to the house.


----------



## Baymule

Get some apple cider vinegar and mix half and half with honey. Put about 1/8 cup in a small glass, add cold water. Sip on it. It will kill the “bad” bacteria that is making you run at both ends and leave the good bacteria alone. ACV is nature’s disinfectant. Your problem should be much better in about 30 minutes to an hour. ACV will even take out food poisoning.


----------



## farmerjan

So sorry you are sick.  Mine was just a very bad cold and no stomach problems except for the sinus drip making me cough to where I would nearly gag... It is taking a week + to run it's course, but at least I can function.  I feel so bad for you.  Try @Baymule remedy....


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Get some apple cider vinegar and mix half and half with honey. Put about 1/8 cup in a small glass, add cold water. Sip on it. It will kill the “bad” bacteria that is making you run at both ends and leave the good bacteria alone. ACV is nature’s disinfectant. Your problem should be much better in about 30 minutes to an hour. ACV will even take out food poisoning.


That's great, because that's what I have. I'll do it.


Well, the day is over. 3 goat kids were born today. A 10 lbs single 6 days over due is a little much for a small first freshener. She wasn't as wide as Mallow. I think next time I might want to see if I can find a vet to let me have some lute for induction after day 153 or something. A week matters.
Iris's kids-one black buck, the other is a doe a giant moonspot. I think I might keep her to help prove her dad. Not that I need an F1 back cross to nigerian mini saanen/sable who is a giant moonspot.


----------



## Baymule

Congratulations on the kids. Being sick didn’t help. Hope the ACV works for you.


----------



## rachels.haven

I had my mom over to help with chores last night. She recommended implementing as close to a commercial system for farrowing pigs in the future as we can and as makes sense. People develop those systems for reasons and pigs just squash piglets. That's why they have lots.
But once they get going we can raise them however we want.
I think she might be right on that. I'm sure there are good mothers and bad mothers, but a pig only has to have a piglet or two make it to maturity to have reproduced "successfully". They produce a lot of potential dead piglets. I guess I'll be working on that.
My pig is nice though. She's very polite and quiet about asking for food when hungry and still doesn't mind her greedy, fat little piglets picked up. I guess I'll tinker a little on this.

I called a vet who is a sheep farmer about the doeling's foot. He didn't come out and said we'd have to get in line to be seen eventually, maybe, if there was time, someday. He also says he suspects "contagious hoof rot" which doesn't make sense because she's dry and it made her joint swell first before the swelling went down her foot and ruptured out the bottom between the digits. Then I asked about getting a scheduled farm call for one of my other does who has a bump on her neck so I could get it cultured and ensure not CL and have not heard anything back. I think it might be an unspoken existing clients only clinic right now. That doe has had two negative screening tests for the big three in the last year including the last big herd wide one for me a month ago, so I doubt it, but I'd like the bump to be a)gone, and b)definitely negative, not just probably negative. It doesn't grow, shrink, burst or anything and I noticed it shortly after I'd got her. I also worry that it's a swollen lymph node that could indicate cancer or something else deeper wrong so if I went in to collect pus from it, which there may or may not be I'd just make her uncomfortable and open her up to infection. But whatever. I've got a clinic about 20 minutes from me that thinks it's a royal pain to do livestock but they have a stock vet and a stock chute yard system pen thing...right next to where they put deceased pets while they wait for pickup and the place is gross. If I get desperate I'll put my 200lbs doe in my van and take it to their filthy place where we will probably contract CL and bring it home to share.

Dude, I think this is a farm call issue. I must be feeling better.

Oh, I sold the rest of the teff hay. The goats must like the flavor of it because they did eat it, but they don't eat it to get full and they'd started losing condition on it earlier. I was using it for bedding and to stuff the bottoms of their baskets (like easter grass) so I sent it to live with someone who would feed it to chubby ponies instead, as it probably should have been in the first place. The boys are mad at me because now they have nothing to jump on next to the shop. We kind of owe them a playhouse/play shed.


----------



## Ridgetop

Is it possible that the doe kid got something in her foot that caused an infection?  I would put her on penicillin which you have probably already done, and keep draining the abscess and washing it out with iodine.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ridgetop said:


> Is it possible that the doe kid got something in her foot that caused an infection?  I would put her on penicillin which you have probably already done, and keep draining the abscess and washing it out with iodine.


yes, it absolutely is. I've been using Teff hay/straw as bedding for them. It has little seeds with a little filament that gets caught up and weaves it's way into everything and makes us all itchy. I'd be willing to bet that's what it was. And while I haven't done penicillin yet (which we will not be allowed to have next year!) I have been flushing and washing with chlorhexadine and iodine and it is shrinking and going away. She can walk on it again. The toes are just a little wider spread than the other feet.
This is her (before issue starting, I think)


----------



## rachels.haven

Actually, front foot closest already appears a little bigger than the other. I think it was just starting to get puffy then.


----------



## Baymule

I need to establish a vet relationship. As a non client, trying to get a vet to even talk to me was a no go. I need to get the dogs shots, that would be a start…..


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> I need to establish a vet relationship. As a non client, trying to get a vet to even talk to me was a no go. I need to get the dogs shots, that would be a start…..


I know, it's so hard. It's like, "TAKE MY MONEY, PLEASE!" Starting next year or so the majority of people are just going to need Rx's written. I hope you find one close to your new place.
Through other people here I've already run into one vet that won't even write rx's for Bose or even overcharge them for syringes of it, nevermind asking for anything else, especially not a whole bottle and the vet breeds oodles of Nigerian goats for the pet market (you can bet THEY get their Bose).
Finding a good vet is a beast.


----------



## Baymule

The livestock vets here at least know a little about sheep, 4-H and FFA show lambs only. Better than nothing I guess.


----------



## Baymule

Hey, did that ACV and honey help you?


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Hey, did that ACV and honey help you?


No, I didn't have any left of the real ACV with the mother in it. I wasn't sure it would do anything otherwise.
I did discover the movers moved my fish sauce while    It didn't break. I guess they didn't consider it a liquid that they said they wouldn't move.
I'll be getting new, real ACV next trip to the grocery store.


----------



## Ridgetop

Beautiful doe kid.  Who are her parents?


----------



## rachels.haven

Rustic Wood's Black Tie Affair x Little Orchard CD Hera.
I think she's staying even though I can't find a picture of the sire's dam's fore udder. Daddy gave her a deeper, wider chest so she's not too tubey, mommy gave her length and levelness (when she's not sucking a bottle). Mommy also has a perfect udder. I'm looking forward to future Hera kids.


----------



## rachels.haven

Why on earth would goats actively seek out fescue grass over clover and other normally highly palatable weeds? I'm confused 🤔


----------



## Mini Horses

Goats LIKE tough, strange and "we don't want you to eat this"!!   A whole pasture of great stuff and they deleaf a crappy tree -- or my darned apple tree, elderberries, etc! 😡

I know you just forgot.....they just gave you a reminder.  🤗


----------



## farmerjan

Early growth is more palatable.  One other thing, this may be more to their liking due to the grass and  hay they were eating in Mass. also.  There is no accounting for their preferences... but once they all kid, I see no reason for them to have much problem with it. They won't abort if they have kidded... and maybe it is not as much fescue as you think...  Clover is an iffy thing... and they can bloat on it so maybe they instinctively  are eating what they feel comfortable with.  Again, I am no goat expert...
Right now our cows are eating every green sprig they can find... and with the constant swing in temps, anything that is growing is fair game....


----------



## Baymule

I planted non endophyte fescue in Lindale. It was a short season because it died in the heat, but the sheep loved it. It made a good graze and gave me an early spring pasture for them.


----------



## rachels.haven

We're down to 2 pregnant momma's left to kid.
Lucky the dwarf goat surprise freshened with a single doe on Saturday right on time...surprise because she didn't bag up. I thought I'd gotten the name of the goat wrong in my calendar, but the kid is here. I didn't get to see the birth because I wasn't watching for it. Mom had just as saggy of an udder after kidding as she did the morning before. And then I milked her...2/3 cup of milk. I figured kid got some, but baby appears to be still developing a suckle reflex and the next morning after emptying mom again she still only had 2/3 cup of milk. She's a newer goat to me, bought before we left and not a FF and a bit of a brat on the stand and hates milking...this doesn't look great for her long term tenure in our milking herd. But now we have a daughter from an outstanding buck from her to retain, I guess and plenty of milk and colostrum in the freezer. Poo.

I got a new buck and he was delivered on Saturday too. His name is Bella Notte Winston Quinn. I'll be breeding my Oberon daughters to him.


----------



## rachels.haven

Mini saanen, Iris and Iris kids. The black one is a buck.


----------



## rachels.haven

One shaved male poodle and two girls waiting for a new 10 blade(Bailey's coat wrecked the blade so I shaved Nolan in a...50    ) He is a bathing gremlin who hates washing but loves puddles and mud so off the hair comes and now bathing will be less of an ordeal. I still have to get to the bath part. I'm kind of sick of his routine so I may be getting a muzzle. It's not like I'm bathing him in battery acid... It's mud season here and the girls, who actually like their baths, will be done too, but less short. And they will all be bathed and brushed and smell nice until the next potty break.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ellie babies.


----------



## rachels.haven

And a whole lot of bottle feeding going on.


----------



## rachels.haven

Photo dump.


----------



## rachels.haven

10 lbs single buck to a FF that was very hard to get out and had his elbows out. He's a bit of a potato. 🍠 🥔 And is bigger now.


----------



## rachels.haven

I found my traveling livestock vet, btw. Pro disease testing and willing to write Rx to keep me stocked up if I need them. I feel so blessed. Hopefully I won't see him much. Everyone is in good health.
Even Dan's Nubian with a massive salivary cyst  (reason why I called him in). He looked at Hera's lump and said it was not on a lymph node and was in the skin and looked like a tumor. We could cut it out and send it in, but that would open her up to flies and infection right now and not in her best interest so we leave it as long as it doesn't change or need to come off.
All that around the time I and we were sick and I didn't want to post.
Now if you will excuse me, I have a baby goat running around the house again.


----------



## Baymule

Great news about a vet willing to work with you, make farm calls and write prescriptions for you. Not to mention that he seems to know small livestock. Bonus! 

I always enjoy your pictures. They tell the story of a very busy lady, all her goats and her boys. Only thing missing was a sentence or two about your husband. LOL.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Great news about a vet willing to work with you, make farm calls and write prescriptions for you. Not to mention that he seems to know small livestock. Bonus!
> 
> I always enjoy your pictures. They tell the story of a very busy lady, all her goats and her boys. Only thing missing was a sentence or two about your husband. LOL.



When we're not spinning from kid after kid getting the stomach flu (not food poisoning, I was wrong) DH is working on braising a steel road bike frame from scratch, sometimes late into the night. He also wants me to keep all the male goats for yummy goat meat but also doesn't want me to spend 2 hours 2x daily bottle feeding because when DH vs the children, DH wins but just barely. Poor sweet, mild mannered husband. DH also had a birthday in the last few days. 
Work is going well for him, eyes are looking good and they may take him off a set of drops because his pressure is so, so low.

My sprayer is here. Shaun is not helping me put it together. He loves trucks and as far as he's concerned the pull behind sprayer says "truck" all over it.

Oh, I found someone to fix the fence-a big name company in the area. It was EXPENSIVE, but now we have a place in our fence that will probably survive the apocalypse (or a herd of cows).

I need to work on that barn ground level and sprayer...


----------



## Baymule

That is super good news about your DH’s eyes! I’m willing to bet changing jobs, location, management to a much happier work place and home had a lot to do with the fantastic improvement. That is really great. 

I’ve never had goat meat. I guess I should try it. I know goats go for more money at auction than sheep do, maybe I shouldn’t try goat meat. It might send me off in another direction. Hahaha


----------



## farmerjan

Love the pictures.  Your "little one" looks like he is having a ball with the lamb bottles... lots of help I bet  .  And the boys with the painted turtle...
So very happy about the improvement in your DH's eyes.... Agree with @Baymule  that the change of job places, less stress and aggravation at home all combined to make life better for him, and all of you.  

Can't make much in the way of comments on the goats, but they seem to be doing good with the change and look pretty good.  The udder on that one is very nice....
So glad also that you have found a vet that you are on the same page with.  It really helps to find one that "gets it" without wanting to charge you through the wazoo, understanding that you are a good caretaker but that you are not so far over the hump with them being pets to the point of being second children..... that is really great.  A good vet can tell if you are reasonable and smart livestock person...


----------



## rachels.haven

The sprayer is put together with baby's help. I got sunburned at the park. Mr. Pennsylvania Dutch Ancestry (DH)'s comment was. " I didn't know you can get sunburned when it's cloudy..."
Thanks, buddy. I so can. Not our kids though, all thanks to their dad. Some people have all the luck.


----------



## Bruce

Yes you can! And those "tanning rays" can cause cancer in later years regardless of cloudy skies or not. Don't forget the suntan lotion on the whole family.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Yes you can! And those "tanning rays" can cause cancer in later years regardless of cloudy skies or not. Don't forget the suntan lotion on the whole family.


That's the truth.


----------



## rachels.haven

Huh. I noticed last night that compared to the AGH boar piglet, Mr. "kunekune" is lacking...somethings. Soooo...he's either a crypt-orchid or a barrow because he is packing little or no peanuts and lacks that characteristic boar double butt unlike Mr. AGH that is tinier than a foot ball. Sooo...looks like the "kune" is coming to dinner. Maybe an extended family bbq if he has no taint.


----------



## rachels.haven

For reference...





						Of Boar Balls & Cryptorchids | Sugar Mountain Farm
					






					sugarmtnfarm.com
				



The orange boarling is flat back there.


----------



## Baymule

We’ll darn. At least he can feed the family.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> We’ll darn. At least he can feed the family.


I know, he could have at least had the decency to have the other set of equipment. It's too bad. The seller probably knew he was ball-less or retained because piglets look like boars fast. My guinea hog boar is still cute though and he is definitely packing peanuts. I might be doing a little inbreeding, just maybe. Other than where I got them I can't find nicer, more conformationally correct pigs. I could also call the pig/sheep farmer again. I went in to visit them tonight and gave mom a big full body scratch (ie, checked for more lice to spray), then I ticked the heavy little boar until he fell over so I picked him up and gave him a squeeze(checked for lice behind ears and armpits and bum), then gave the gilt a similar squish too. Not sure I mentioned I found mom was heavily infested with lice so I sprayed her, the bedding and got the piglets a week ago. I believe I need to spray them again soon. Very calm, laid back, cute roundy pigs. They don't need lice. Mom hog wanted more scratches.

After mowing for the first time yesterday and today DH says the front "yard" is too big on our new house. He wishes the pasture were bigger (I love him). He also says I can put the guinea hogs in the little orchard to do the grass so I ordered some more electric fence net, permanent this time and I need to build a fort for them in all the time I don't have so they can get to work before we need to mow again.


----------



## Baymule

I got some feeder pigs once that had lice. I gave them apple flavored ivermectin horse wormer in bread "pillows". I took the crust off, put an appropriate amount of ivermectin on the bread, folded it over and smooshed the sides to seal it. Toss over the fence, pigs gobbled it up and problem solved. Repeated it several more times, 10 days apart, and they were gone.


----------



## rachels.haven

That sounds much easier than permethrin spray baths. Do you recall what does per pound you gave?


----------



## farmerjan

You can use the same dosage by weight as for the cattle or horses... people too use the same weight dosage.  Ivermectin is very forgiving and it is hard to overdose unless you do something like 100 x the amount.


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> That sounds much easier than permethrin spray baths. Do you recall what does per pound you gave?


It has a pound increments of I think 50 pounds on the applicator. Kinda hard to measure out in small doses, but like @farmerjan siad, a little too much won’t hurt.


----------



## rachels.haven

The pasture is sprayed. I took the john Deere lawn mower and hitched the tow behind sprayer to it and sprayed the whole thing with Roundup and not nearly enough blue dye. I guess we get to see if the grass dies now. 

The bottle says I can replant in three days but it can take up to a week to die. I think I will wait a week. It's about to rain for a week again anyway. I'd like to plant again right after the rain stops.


----------



## Bruce

Maybe get out there and spread some fertilizer before the rain? Give the seeds a good start when you spread that?


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Maybe get out there and spread some fertilizer before the rain? Give the seeds a good start when you spread that?


I could do that. I think it needs lime too.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here, 2-3 days later is my Roundup sprayed pasture. Foreground in both pics is unsprayed. Reviews of people who are actually happy with it spray double strength and still have to re apply for a complete kill. Majority of the 5 stars are rants against Monsanto and thyroid cancer. 

Looks like I'm hitting up TSC for the generic and getting more blue dye.


----------



## rachels.haven

Directions say that for lawn replacement in a week if green spots remain to re apply. Well, at day three I see a massive green spot. I'd take a spotty kill as success, but this was a flop.


----------



## Finnie

I don’t know, Rachel. Give it a few more days. You might be surprised.

I think on a few more days, you will be seeing a lot of dead areas that won’t need to be resprayed.


----------



## rachels.haven

I hope so. That would be wonderful. If I can reduce the fescue to 40% I'd be happy with that. Maybe I'll hold off grabbing the roundup. It's only 10 minutes away.


----------



## rachels.haven

Last night we had another dwarf kid born and the kids would not go to bed so milking got pushed back late. When I stepped out on the porch with the milk stuff the dogs were waiting at the gate (Bailey likes to wait for the opportunity to steal goat food that she is never allowed now). From the back of the pasture comes a very deep, blood curdling "aye, WOOOOOOOOOOO.... aye, aye, aye. And both dogs take off and book it to the back fence way faster than it makes sense for 100 lbs and 130lbs dogs to be able to go and raise Cain like they have a funeral planned and they found a donor for the body. Wow. The coyote kept teasing them but no coyotes were coming in. The dogs kept sweeping the fence lines and were out on edge even when the howling stopped. Very big working dogs last night.

Coyotes here do not sound like the wooooooo howling/barking/shrieking ones we had in New England. They yip and howl. Not sure if they can bark like a dog at all.


----------



## Baymule

Good dogs!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> And both dogs take off and book it to the back fence way faster than it makes sense for 100 lbs and 130lbs dogs to be able to go


They are amazingly fast. Hard to believe when you see them laying around during the day. Look like they are half dead and would take half an hour to get up but nope, 1/4 second is all they need.


----------



## Baymule

And they can go from zero in a dead snoring sleep to top speed in less than a second. It’s phenomenal to see. 

Today a cow bird tried to light on the ground with the grazing sheep. Cow birds walk among cow herds and other livestock to catch and eat the insects stirred up by the livestock movement. Not today! Not with the sheep! The Anatolians, eyes glued to the threatening intruder chased the hapless bird, keeping it from landing. Smart bird. It moved on.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bad news if you're a grass here.
This morning.





Now.



I left some green patches on the right on purpose. They are mostly clover and a nice soft grass that looks like orchard. I'd like more I'd that in the pasture.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

This is not a kune. Especially now that he's growing bigger.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## Baymule

Love the pictures. You are happy .


----------



## Finnie

I love the pictures too. Tennessee seems so much nicer than Massachusetts!


----------



## rachels.haven

Pasture seed is spread. So is my phone. Don't ride the mower and carry a phone in the back pocket of lady jeans. No new pictures for a little while. I can always go through my old ones on google photos, but still not great.
The rest of the week is hot and dry and then the rain starts for several days again. I'm counting on dew until then. We get quite a lot of it.


----------



## rachels.haven

Somehow my phone fell out of my pocket and slid under the lawn mower seat where the safety feature springs are. Score. I also drew blood for buck biosecurity testing with the vet's help. We were done with them in half an hour including set up and take down.


----------



## Baymule

I carry my phone in my front pocket. If phone wont fit in front pocket, I don't buy those jeans.


----------



## farmerjan

Love my OLD flip phone... fits in the jeans front pocket with ease.  Hate the idea that it needs to be replaced this year... 3 G....


----------



## rachels.haven

I won't tell you what my non flip phone looks like. I miss those tough little flip phones that don't crack.
Due to flies and a lack of ventilation in the shop I decided I was done with quail this week. Also, these batches have been very violent with each other.  The new project on the list after the buck run is to buy a shed and stick it here.





10 or so foot of chain link should keep those birdies in, right ( if the bottom is made solid)

I'm still waiting on my last doe to kid-a shy ff doe-but she went into a pen in the barn and I turned the others out. Hopefully they go after that line of trees on the ridge or clean the fence line. Idk though. They like feeders full of Alfalfa. 

Bottle babies have been going. Numbers going down. Milking, milking, milking...


----------



## rachels.haven

My parents are excited to and have been taking the quail, but this week my dad started having an itchy throat followed by a cough and it got worse and worse to the point it was bad so he went in...and has COVID. So now their household is locked down and everything is on hold.

I can talk goats with the mother though. She likes Nubians (too much ears).

It's probably going to be a rough ride. Dad's immunocompromised after his chemo. I'm worried. His doctor likes to stay involved with COVID patients though so hopefully...


----------



## Baymule

I hope your Dad does ok with the covid. Keep a close eye on him that he doesn't go into pneumonia.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you, we're crossing our fingers. It's looking like he'll probably be getting the z pacs and antivirals right off (assuming supply and policy still let them).


----------



## rachels.haven

...I'm never getting my tank back. I guess it's probably too tall for the bucks anyway.








Also, a few minutes before the crime DH also decided the goats needed wifi. They approve. The does are excited about all the potential cooking shows they can watch (don't ask about what the bucks want to watch).


----------



## Baymule

Goat barn or man cave?


----------



## rachels.haven

Goat barn. We want the $30 spy cams back in the barn so I can check goats from my bed on my phone. Wifi is step one.
He also wouldn't mind working outside occasionally...but not in the same pasture as the goats. They're not good programmers.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Goat barn or man cave?


I thought about this a little more. So the shop where I milk IS actually becoming Mark's bike shop too. It was also wified yesterday. The quail are being evicted to my Dad, who was thrilled to have them and we will get eggs from until i can get a coop.  Mark is building a bike from scratch out of tubes right now and is just about finished. He's wanted to start doing it for years (see, all that space was good for something!) The flies and manure pans in there make it a really unpleasant spot for me, him, and any goat kids I have in there.

Today upon inspection I discovered that there are giant crabgrass seedlings coming up all over the pasture despite it being dry, which is GREAT because a big part of the mix I broadcast seeded was red river crabgrass. Yay, SOMETHING is growing! Apparently I can grow crabgrass!

DH read up on fescue and goats last night and now he wants me to kill and reseed the rest of it around the barn. Odd that he would have an opinion, but now I don't feel like a stinker for what I've done.

The last pregnant doe is in a pen stall loosing her ligaments. Then we will be done. Next year I think I may go ahead and sync the does and get them done in Jan or Feb. The flies right now are too much and prolonged kidding and bottle feeding is not my favorite. Plus, it's getting hot and that makes kids grow slower.


----------



## rachels.haven

Kidding season is officially over. Buck doe twins for Daisy. Yes, DH wants me to sync the does next year. We've also discussed direction for our breeding programs. 
One of my kids has been having trouble with anxiety at night and causing everyone else to go down a quality of life bracket or two and if "_____ ain't happy, ain't nobody happy" and it's not mamma because mamma's moods have never been very good at controlling anything. We've decided to formally cut the dwarves because when we're miserable, me going out and milking little tiny goats with attitude that make around a quart per milking as "great!" milkers and milk that nobody likes but me does not make sense (some exceed that for a while). I'd rather milk big, calm, sweet does that make upwards of half a gallon per milking with nice long teats and good size orifices and don't have an attitude while suffering through the fun ____ is putting us through over the course of his childhood over and over again. So for family reasons I'm selling off my dwarves, this time for real. 
A buck or two might stay to make minis for small FF's. I'm also wanting to keep my mini saanen and her doe because they are quite impressive and lack the characteristics of dwarves, but we'll see. If I decide against her I think I know a breeder that will want her and her moon spotted daughter in a heartbeat.
So Molly has sold, my AGSxADGA doelings have sold, the two AGS does have sold, new guy Winston has sold pending disease screening results, Oberon has sold pending disease testing results, Dignity and shy doe called Daisy are sold pending pickup now that Daisy has freshened.  That leaves me with the two Eri daughters and the Daisy daughter that was born last night to be sold. I guess I'll fill out their registration paperwork and hope they sell. Antonio is still listed...if he doesn't sell he'll be one of my mini makers with "Mirikoza Little Bean" and the red buckling born last night.

It's easier on my hands anyway. And it's not really an ending. It's more of a beginning of being able to focus on what I really enjoy, you know, in between being so sleep deprived I can't think and all. Dwarves are a show, pet, and ornamental breed anyway, I've had drilled into me over and over again over the course of this whole thing. I can try to make them milkers with the few other people that are doing it too, but it won't be fun. Plus, dwarf breeders are weird, up tight, and tend to be snobby. I don't have time for that.


----------



## Mini Horses

Dwarves are cute...BUT...if I am spending time milking, make it worthwhile!  Only full sized here.😊.  I'd rather find "something to do" with excess milk than only get a 1/2 pint for my time and $$.  You've made a good choice.


----------



## Baymule

Sorry that you are going through family drama. It only takes one person in the family to go off track to take everybody else along for the miserable ride. Hope it gets worked out.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Sorry that you are going through family drama. It only takes one person in the family to go off track to take everybody else along for the miserable ride. Hope it gets worked out.


Thank you, that's the truth.


----------



## rachels.haven

Let's play a new game. Let's play, "2 day old nigerian goats with neurological signs and refusal to eat". So my fb buddies are saying it's goat polio. What do you think? They get episodes of this and are head pressing, walking in circles...it's great.





Last litter of nigierans.
I may make this it's own thread.


----------



## rachels.haven

Mr. Oberon is un-sold. His uphill stance puts him at least an inch over height for an ND. Oh well, fantastic udders, great body capacity, high production...sounds like a great mini making buck.

My two ND kids in question have begun recovering again. Idk what that was, but it took a lot of shots and tube feeding to get through. Disbudding should be done for them Monday or Tuesday, then I am done.

I'm thinking of bringing in a Saanen doeling next spring. The husband and kids likes the milk of our mini so much... probably means we will be more serious about making minis or getting into the tank as I've heard scary things about saanen bucks. They aren't cuddly, marshmallow lamancha bucks or tiny menace Nigerians.

I'm thinking that if I'm going to be trying to breed F1 minis of anything due to prior experience with ND bucks being too short to get tab A into slot B for kid making, I may want to get a sheep AV and do some fresh AI's for it. Over height is still very short.


----------



## Mini Horses

My Saanen buck, Romeo, was a lover! Not mean, came when called.  He was, however, the best and most determined fence climber I have EVER had.   . That is why I sold that big boy.  He loved people 😊. Not all climb...when he went over the cattle panel, I was done.  I had tried hot wire but, had box too close and he learned to unplug it.  Caught him!   But I love my Saanen girls!.

As to height differences in breeding....with my mini horses I used a ramp.  Hand bred with mare tied and stallion on lead line.  They learned real fast.  Of course, not the pee thing but. Otherwise very similar....only takes a pallet with a cut out to back doe into.  Heck, a shallow hole and pile of dirt works.  . Even walk doe into a narrow alley first.....you get the picture.🙄


----------



## rachels.haven

With cool temperatures and some rainfall to soften the clay the bigger buck pen is now half finished.


----------



## rachels.haven

I put down a little more barseem and lespedeza this afternoon with the lawn tractor and spreader with Dan driving. He had a bad day at school and needed a pick me up (his brother got all the end of the year achievement awards). He was thrilled. He says he wants to practice for having a tractor when he has cows (as in, plural) . 🤦‍♀️


----------



## farmerjan

Your child is going to have cows one way or another!!!  As soon as he is old enough, 4-H or FFA is in his horizon... tell him he has to learn how to show a goat and how to train it and teach it to walk and all, then can graduate to a calf... give him something to be positive about looking forward to... and maybe set an age limit if they don't already have one for the club....


----------



## rachels.haven

Now that the seed is all in I've decided I'm going to build an 8x8 chicken coop....after my buck pen build.
There is one available by a company that's 8x10 and $3K, free delivery and leveling and I have most of that from selling goats off, but that's hay money and I don't want to blow it there.
yjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk,, (shared by baby Shaun)


----------



## farmerjan

If the one that is available there is decent, that is not a bad price considering the cost of lumber right now.  You would be hard pressed to get one built for that... and this one is ready to go... set up and all.  Not trying to tell you what to do... And another thing.. if it is delivered and set up... god forbid you ever wanted to move it... it would be able to be moved since it is all "put together" for being moved to start with. 
How are the little goat kids doing?


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> If the one that is available there is decent, that is not a bad price considering the cost of lumber right now.  You would be hard pressed to get one built for that... and this one is ready to go... set up and all.  Not trying to tell you what to do... And another thing.. if it is delivered and set up... god forbid you ever wanted to move it... it would be able to be moved since it is all "put together" for being moved to start with.
> How are the little goat kids doing?


I'll keep thinking about it. Dh probably wouldn't mind looking out his window at a coop that isn't so...Rachel-style. 

The goat kids bounced back and after a bad 36 or so hours where I was sure they'd just be dead next time I looked they are now feistier than any other of the kids so far this year. Idk what that all was back there. They got lots of vitamin b complex, a dose of selenium, and lots of tube feeding. Who knows what actually helped.


----------



## rachels.haven

More vit b complex to the little black ND doeling today. She's started up star gazing and calling out as if in pain again-the precursor to the seizures. The buckling appears to be fine, but now I'm worried.


----------



## Baymule

I hope the little doe gets better.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you. Me too. It looks like she's not making vitamin b very well. She was better for the rest of the day after the shot.


----------



## rachels.haven

Dan woke up at 5 am yesterday and quietly went on a rampage getting into and getting out everything in the kitchen before finally settling on trying to make himself a platter of cookies with his newfound reading skills and a handwritten cook book he scrounged up and promptly destroyed (MINE). Mark is busy with his bike build and baby Shaun has not been letting me put him down (probably because Dan brought home yet another cold that now baby and I have too), so I pushed all that mess into a cubby hole under the bed in the room of my mind to deal with later. This morning I'm realizing I need to deal with the ramifications of the Dan-page for sanitation's sake(I keep finding more layers of mess) so I took the tray of Dan peppermint patty, kit Kat, and peanut butter cup cookies (we didn't have chips but he found the candy stash and gave it a chop and put it in) and a spatula out to Ma Hog's pen and sat there scraping cookie mess and handfeeding her and her piglets cookies until they were gone. I didn't take pictures because they got a little enthusiastic so I needed both hands to make sure they took turns and nobody ate them all and got Dan induced diabetes or chocolate poisoning, but now it's time to de mess the kitchen (he made real cookie dough under supervision this morning so there is a double mess). Not one of my glory moments, but I figure I should record it here. Fb would not appreciate tales of me sitting barefoot in the pig pen in the rain feeding small black pigs cookie pieces after my son destroyed my home again because I did not get up at 5 am...sigh. I'm glad the pigs liked them.

Offending Dan cookies. He had me put them in the oven for the right amount of time but there was too much fat in the candy so it all melted and oozed particularly in the middle where the candy piled together.

yes, he totally got into trouble, not that he cares. Try telling a cow it's grounded. That's about the reaction I get from that 7 year old.






It's gloomy and rainy. That's about my mood.

Dh also said they tasted really good. *Lol*


----------



## rachels.haven

Dan, btw is not the reason I almost completely de dwarfed. He's like that because his brother is very difficult especially when offended, wronged, or just angry. Or sleep deprived. When Aiden ain't happy, ain't nobody happy...and he's got a nasty temper he's going to have to learn to "temper". He's also very anxious when off. But everybody loves him. He's a socialite and very nice to his friends and teachers. But he's learning not to take it out on his family. He's a pill.


----------



## rachels.haven

I CAUGHT RIKER! Since letting the goats out he decided he was a wild dog and refused to be caught. I just got him eating regularly again. This afternoon I caught him kind of chasing the goats away from the back of the pasture and trying to keep them up by the barn (Bailey says it's fine back there, it's just him being up tight) so I used a poodle like a Judas goat and tricked him into being caught. I'm afraid he's going out on a tether from now on, after a nail trim and probably a soresto collar change. I may keep him in a pen or tether for a while so he can gain some weight too. I'm disappointed how he refuses to eat or let you get close if at liberty. If that attitude is permanent I may have to call up Gore farms and see if they want him like his brother. I can't keep dogs I have to trick to catch and take care of. Non aggressive is priority but I don't like feral behavior.


----------



## Baymule

You need a vacation. No kids, no husband, no animals, just you. Only problem with that is you’d come home to a pile of rubble where your house once stood, topped with gooey cookie dough.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> You need a vacation. No kids, no husband, no animals, just you. Only problem with that is you’d come home to a pile of rubble where your house once stood, topped with gooey cookie dough.


Omgees, Baymule, I love you! You know just what to say.


----------



## Baymule

What the heck is going on with Riker? He’s gone wild? I get it on a five thousand acre sheep ranch with little to no contact, but not on a farm like yours. Especially when I know your animals are lavished with love and attention! Tether him to Dangerous Dan. It will either calm them both down or Dangerous Dan will teach Riker how to make cookies.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ooo, Dan loooooves Riker, much to Riker's dismay. 
Riker was shy from the start. I don't think he was handled much before he came here at about 4 months. We gentled him and got him used to handling then let him out of his pen. When I united him and the goats he decided people were not for him and yes, he went wild. Now he is tied and ready to be dragged into the house to decorate the floor in there with his cowering self. Nothing bad happened to him. I'm not sure why he's decided to hate us. I feed him (wether or not takes it) and have never mistreated him. It's not great. He's great with coyotes though. He turns into a scary dog. And the does love him. I caught them cuddling him by force while he was tied out there. They had stepped on his line and cuddled up on him.


----------



## rachels.haven

Basically goats are his passion and he does not need or want us anywhere near him, which is too bad. Because we're business partners here.


----------



## Baymule

Ok time to go back to square one. Tether him to YOU. 24-7 He goes everywhere you go. It is a commitment of around 3 months. When you absolutely cannot take him with you, put him in a large dog crate in the house. Do not take him off leash for 3 months. Rewire his brain. There is a FB group Fairie something, look them up. Some of their stuff is far out there, but some is good training. They start pups out tethered to owner, in the house, getting the basics down. There is a lot of good reading on there. Read their training manual before asking questions or they trash you pretty hard. Haven’t looked at their page in a very long time, don’t know if they still post. Leaving in a little while, be back tomorrow, I’ll see if I can find them tomorrow night. 

I inadvertently used this on Sentry, after his hip dysplasia surgery. I kept him in a crate in the house, only taking him out on a leash, even in the house. Where I went, he went. It was some intensive therapy for several months while he healed. He came out of that the damned finest dog I’ve ever had. My skeletal train wreck of a dog is freaking awesome.


----------



## rachels.haven

...so Riker has a massive underbite. His top jaw ends way before his bottom jaw. That is why he always looks sulky or surly and why his tongue is always flicking out and possibly why he refuses to eat anything but canned food and dog food soup. And shredded chicken from Baby Shaun. My mother checked when she met him today because that's what she does.


----------



## Baymule

You got to be kidding me. That poor dog.


----------



## Baymule

Facebook
					






					www.facebook.com
				




They have moved to Mighty Network at $2.99 per month. 

With an underbite like that, you may want to take him back to the breeder. He will always be a problem dog. I can handle some weirdness, and I can handle physical problems that can be repaired or dealt with, but you got weirdness and an unfixable and untreatable physical problems going on here. You have some decisions to make. 

You can give it your best shot and go through the training all over again and just know that he will always be on a special diet. Then, maybe just accept that he is going to be weird. He is a great guardian, get him neutered so that he doesn't pass on his genetics, and let him guard. You wanted a good guard dog, you got a good guard dog, he's just a screwball. 

If you are prepared to put him on a soft food diet and can deal with the physical problem, then tackle the weirdness problem. An intensive 3 month training program of close contact with the family and see where it goes. It might turn out great, he might go back to feral. 

I guess the question is, which is more valuable to you? His great guardian instincts or family friendly? If you can't make him family friendly, be prepared to doctor his food, knock him out, so the vet can make a house call and give him his shots, etc.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> __
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Facebook
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.facebook.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> They have moved to Mighty Network at $2.99 per month.
> 
> With an underbite like that, you may want to take him back to the breeder. He will always be a problem dog. I can handle some weirdness, and I can handle physical problems that can be repaired or dealt with, but you got weirdness and an unfixable and untreatable physical problems going on here. You have some decisions to make.
> 
> You can give it your best shot and go through the training all over again and just know that he will always be on a special diet. Then, maybe just accept that he is going to be weird. He is a great guardian, get him neutered so that he doesn't pass on his genetics, and let him guard. You wanted a good guard dog, you got a good guard dog, he's just a screwball.
> 
> If you are prepared to put him on a soft food diet and can deal with the physical problem, then tackle the weirdness problem. An intensive 3 month training program of close contact with the family and see where it goes. It might turn out great, he might go back to feral.
> 
> I guess the question is, which is more valuable to you? His great guardian instincts or family friendly? If you can't make him family friendly, be prepared to doctor his food, knock him out, so the vet can make a house call and give him his shots, etc.


He may be pittering out. I'm going to take him to the vet tomorrow or so if they'll let me come. He's refusing all food beyond a few pieces of shredded chicken I shoved in. Now he will take no more. His energy level is gone. I looked in his mouth all the way back and none of his teeth line up at all-he can't even close his mouth. His top teeth are about a full inch behind his bottom teeth. I think he's in a lot of pain somewhere and if it's not something simple like worms that treating will improve his quality of life rather than subject him to a miserable treatment plan with maybe an outcome of only a semi normal, semi comfortable life I may get him put down. He's lying on our kitchen floor looking like he wishes he could die already. This is a dog that has been on monthly prevention and high quality food and all the vet care that is typical.

I forgot that taking him back was an option. A refund would be kind of silly at this point. His neuter cost more than his purchase price. But I guess if they could take over his care or lack there of it would be nice. Dan is sad. Mark is also sad. They like Riker.


----------



## Baymule

It doesn’t sound good. I’m so sorry. Give Riker a pat from me. We sure do get some ‘effed up dogs. At least mine was fixable. 

I don’t blame you one bit if it comes down to putting Riker down. A peaceful drift off and never wake up is better than a miserable life of trying to fix what sounds terribly broken. 

Will you take the boys? It will break their heart, but it would also teach them to put Riker’s comfort and feelings ahead of theirs. It may help them to be stroking his fur and telling him all about the rainbow bridge where dogs run and play and there is no pain. It might be better than bringing a dead dog home to bury. They could be part of the whole goodbye process. 

And yes, I cry miserably when I put mine down, but I sure feel like they need to know that I’m there. Then it’s home and a honored burial.

ETA I don’t mean to sound so pessimistic. It would be wonderful if the vet can give Riker a good life, I don’t have all the information on him, hoping for the best for him.


----------



## rachels.haven

It will be my mess. I'll figure it out when I get there. What I'd like to hear is that we're not there yet and it's a simple fix like getting some fluids and getting him back on his feet. Maybe he requires regular extra supervision and pampering? Today has not been encouraging though. We have a big house. I would not mind an over sized house dog or even an lgd that only spends part time outside. Gee, I hope they have time for us tomorrow.


----------



## Baymule

I hope you can get an appointment tomorrow!


----------



## farmerjan

Here's hoping for an appt and then to at least know better what you are dealing with.  He might also be "mourning" that you have tied him up and taken him away from his goats....
So sorry that you are dealing with this.   Maybe he has a bad tooth too and that is causing him to not eat...


----------



## rachels.haven

Maybe. He was doing this in the field too. I could only get him to eat every few days and he'd act scared of the food/eating. I figured it was something I was doing like getting too close or mixing water vs milk, wrong container, but in retrospect...probably not.

Mom came over this evening and we drenched him with water until he was willing to drink. He is still acting crampy and not eating, but he drank. He got a little color back in his eyelids. He's not dead white.


----------



## rachels.haven

Riker was taken to the vet today to wait for a gap in the schedule. After getting the rehydration treatment last night he was eventually willing to eat a little piece of pork rib and snuck in half a tin of cat food when we put him in the basement. Very shaky today. I'm not sure what his prognosis is considering his symptoms are not acute like just eating something stupid would be, but I guess we'll find out (lots of $$$ down the road, I'm sure).

And the photos on my journal are going to stop for a bit now. I cracked my phone something like 8 months ago and after all that has happened it just finally decided to refuse to touchscreen so it's done. Those things are so expensive and breakable...So no photos until I suck it up and get a new one.


----------



## rachels.haven

Rain is forecasted Thursday. I'm considering picking up a few bags of pasture fertilizer from TSC and putting them down right before the storm. I would not mind collecting samples and getting soil tests done but life won't quite give me a chance at the moment.


----------



## Baymule

Some cell phone shops can put new glass on front. Not the company stores, but little independents.


----------



## rachels.haven

Vet says Riker has pneumonia probably stemming from allergies. We'll treat that and see if he recovers.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Poor guy - hope he comes out of it!


----------



## Finnie

What did the vet say about his teeth being misaligned ?


----------



## rachels.haven

Finnie said:


> What did the vet say about his teeth being misaligned ?


The vet didn't say anything about it. I'm not real impressed by this vet. 
I feed Riker a can of purina pure instinct grain free food mixed into his dry food with water to make it more appealing And it's just canned chicken and pork offal with vitamins mixed in and I brought a can and asked if they could please get him to eat it while he was in their care because he hadn't eaten in several days. I DID get a tongue lashing for feeding that. (PEAs and pea protein in dog food especially grain free diets, according to the FDA is what causes that, not ALL grain free diets or mixers and that food is definitely pea free).  And they offered him NOTHING while he was there. And he still hasn't eaten more than a lick of food. But I am out $600.

 We don't have a lot of choices for vets unless I want to drive for hours. Nashville and the metro area kind of creates this uncrossable ring of accidents and traffic jams preventing you from getting anywhere so I am stuck in this area.


----------



## Baymule

Poor dog. I hope he eats something for you. What’s wrong with peas for dogs? Green peas or southern peas? Or all peas?


----------



## rachels.haven

The FDA was investigating a link between feeding food with peas/lentils and induced cardio myapathy and found there to be one there if I recall correctly. Grain free food, especially dry grain free food, almost always has peas/lentils in it to bump the protein and replace the carbs. It's fairly common. Even Purina non-grain free does. So the word in the veterinary community is to not feed food with lentils/peas. So no beans for Fido?

Here's a link to the documentation on the FDA investigation.








						FDA Investigates Potential Link Between Diet & Heart Disease in Dogs
					

Latest update on the FDA’s investigation into reports of dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) in dogs eating certain pet foods.




					www.fda.gov
				




I remember when this blew up in the veterinary world and was frustrated that the technician didn't know/didn't bother to check the ingredients list on the can of food that she said she "checked the label" on before berating me for feeding my sick dog something to get him to eat that did not even have the questionable component. And then let my dog go hungry and offer him nothing when I asked her to offer him what I gave him as soon as he had anti nausea meds onboard and it was safe.

That aside, I think beans are good for just about any other critter though.

Riker ate a hotdog and a half today at lunch and drank some water. That's an improvement. Not bad for calorie count either.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Scrambled eggs and rice got my sick dog to eat when nothing else would...   Oh, and chicken - home canned chicken.  I sure hope you can pull him out of this!  He's lucky to have you.


----------



## Baymule

So the "healthy" dog food is causing heart problems in dogs. Pay a premium price for grain free and your dog gets sick. That is just wrong. No peas or potatoes. I didn't know peas and potatoes could cause problems like that. Thanks for the link to that article. 

I vote for chicken and rice too! Maybe it will tempt Riker into eating.


----------



## murphysranch

I'm on Cattle Dog #5 right now. He throws up cooked potatoes. The 15.5 yr old CD who passed in Oct, threw up cooked carrots. Other than those two items, they all have loved raw and cooked veggies. Esp red bells.

Yes, as the old ones get older, I have to make chicken breast (big ones) with white rice and some well soaked kibble. Otherwise their stomachs don't tolerate anything well.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yeah, no peas or sweet potatoes.

Yesterday Riker got a pound of hamburger cooked up in addition to his hot dog and a half. Today he ate half of his dry food/canned food mix. I like that.

I stumbled into this cow ad. She's probably too far for me to get brought up here on any transport with price of diesel (3 hours), but I actually like the looks of the ad, and the guy sent a video of milking. This would be a time I wish I had my own truck and trailer to get goofy Dan himself a middle aged cow and be done with it. It would be fun. Anyway, do you think she's priced correctly in the offchance any transporters are still running at a reasonable rate despite gas price? (some like to make each person with an animal on board pay for the entire trip themselves so the trip pays several times over rather than just splitting the cost with a nice profit and they pack the trailer with little regard to sanitation...yeah, I know what they're doing there, and those are the ones happy to keep running right now)








						Jersey - farm & garden - by owner - sale
					

Brevi, is a 5 year old Jersey. She has recently tested negative for Johnes and BVD. Calved in May 2021, she has been machine milked since calving. She is grass and hay fed, 1/2 scoop of alfalfa at...



					nwga.craigslist.org


----------



## farmerjan

Hate to tell you but 8 lbs a day is barely a gallon.  She has been milking for over a year already, not yet bred back??? NO NO NO....Even on grass only my beef cows make more than that when they are fresh.  BUT..... THE BIG RED FLAG... she is open for a year already.  Maybe they didn't want to breed her sooner... but the longer you let a cow go without being bred, it is often harder to get her bred back.  They might get her bred on the first breeding...... BUT, have they tried to breed her and she hasn't settled yet.  
Great disposition is one thing... sorry, she is not a candidate in my book for any good reason...


----------



## Baymule

Only 3 milking quarters. 

Find another cow. 

I’m really happy that Riker is eating.


----------



## rachels.haven

A-okay. I will find another cow...in a slow, unmotivated way. A bottle calf from a disease tested herd would be nice. Could fit in the van that way. Maybe some day. Still doesn't feel right yet.


----------



## rachels.haven

Here's something interesting I stumbled into the other day. Apparently I have the semen tank and a lot of the nubian straws from a herd called "Cam's Menagerie". They bred registered goats from 1986-2016. They liked a buck named "Longman's Dusty Baron" which is why I have a LOT of straws from him (born 1983). If Dan's noober doe ever gets big enough he will probably be the buck I play with first for AI and he is supposedly no slouch. There's a guy going after me for the contents of Cam's tank. I'm not sure I want to sell him any outside of any g6s abnormal carriers (free) and maybe 10 of Dusty Baron. I bought those straws for a purpose and I hadn't listed anything but the carriers. Apparently I unintentionally own a bunch of pieces of nubian history.


----------



## Baymule

Sounds like you made yourself a heck of a deal and didn’t realize just how good it really is! Whoop!


----------



## rachels.haven

Last night at about 3 I woke up (windows open, 1/2 the ac out) to a large coalition of the tennessee mini coyotes in multiple groups along the fencline having a yipping, chirping, howling party. Bailey was going bananas running from the goats to the various fences barking and couldn't do it all so I made the decision to release Riker with her to help rather than have her killed like the LGD teen down the road or lose goats. The little coyotes cut out when I came outside-I guess they were already close enough to see me. Riker said "hi" then they both ran off barking. They didn't bark for long before everything quieted down and no more coyotes and one died. I guess the locals have discovered my goats and that I don't have scary cows and donkey armies and that goats look snack sized.

Unfortunately the next morning Riker made it apparent that he was happy to go straight back to keeping 100' between me and him at all times. He's in control. I can't touch him. This made giving him his antibiotic, which he still has a week left of, difficult. I spiked his food and tensely waited for him to eat it with Bailey (the hard working wanna-be pig) locked up. Eventually he did. Then he made the mistake of going into one of the cattle panel barn stalls to lay in the mud where I closed him in, caught him, and dragged him home and tied him back out (no ac, I don't want the dogs in the house that is 85 degrees, 75% humidity with little to no wind). That dog is a pill. Unfortunately I think we need him. If I wanted to turn him loose in a group of hundreds of sheep and have no interaction with him for months at a time (or ever) he'd be a great dog, however right now he's a pain in the butkin and will be living on a line until his meds are finished at least and may be tied out to "work" or bark with Bailey by night and back inside by day until he gets his issues worked out. Screwy in the head. I wonder if I should find him a replacement. I feel like his distrust of us is going to do him in and we're not really rural still. We're in the middle of wheat, horse, and cattle fields, but we're 10 minutes from walmart, lowes, restaurant options...great location, but not a great place for a working feral dog to live. That being said, I don't really want to raise another puppy and it appears not all of them will work with Bailey. She HATED Riker's brother. So for now I guess I'll keep thinking it all over and we'll keep showering that dog with treats and everyone's affection and hope something works. If he lays on the floor in the house and not or under on the cool porch there is always someone petting or feeding him something in here. You'd think SOMETHING would hit his stupid brain and convince it we're not bad things.

Oh, I got a replacement refurbished phone. I may go find a screen repair place to see if I can get the camera and front fixed on the broken one in time for me to break a phone since this one I didn't ruin all of and keep my rotating cast of abused electronics...rotating until they truly don't work. I need to take a picture of the pasture. It's greening up and showing that I seeded it very heavily. I've found nightshade coming up that appears to have already been there, but the baby grass seems happy and ready to take over. As much as I want to exercise my rights as a person who doesn't live in mass (illegal to buy or spread fertilizer there unless you pay the state, get approval, and pay for a lot of credit hours and take a class from them) I don't think it's ready to be fertilized yet. Too many are just seedlings with not much root. I don't want to burn anything.

AC man comes tomorrow. Maybe life will look up.
I will be going down to a bottle manufacturer's place to pick up an order of bottles for holding herdshare milk. Then I might be able to open shop (under contract). There's a lot of demand and I'm feeding a lot of dogs and pigs milk that could be paying for hay and grain.

I wonder why Bailey had to pick the screwy dog? At least he's neutered, I guess...


----------



## rachels.haven

My ultra shy dog barks through the window if the house dogs are inside eating something he wants...or if his dinner is late and he's hungry. IDK what to do with him. He likes to come over to kids and boop them with his nose, but only on a tie out. Off lead he's a run away like they are trying to eat him. Mr. Screwy dog.


----------



## Baymule

He just wants to work. But if he gets out, it could turn out bad for him, besides how would you ever get him back home. What about his mouth/teeth? Has the vet said anything about that?


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> He just wants to work. But if he gets out, it could turn out bad for him, besides how would you ever get him back home. What about his mouth/teeth? Has the vet said anything about that?


And that's great because the goats LOVE him. I tied him out in the barn last night to help with barking and they had all migrated from their favorite sleeping places to ones all around him by the end of milking time and he was SO happy. The vet said nothing about his teeth. I don't think vets like LGD's around here. It is more like an overlap of half an inch rather than an inch, but I think he's going to be getting milk and kibble instead of just dry kibble for the rest of his life and I'm not sure how well he can bite or crunch into things if he wants to. But he is young. I hope they straighten out. I'm also going to start looking for another vet since no one is having emergencies any more.


----------



## Baymule

You may just have to let Riker be Riker. It doesn’t sound like you have a lot of options.


----------



## rachels.haven

...just as soon as he finishes his antibiotics if possible. 5 more days.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## Mini Horses

Will he come to the boys and just not you?


----------



## rachels.haven

Nope, he doesn't come to anybody. He's sweet on the kids (especially Dan) while on the tie out cable and in the house though.


----------



## rachels.haven

My Garden this year. Not bare anymore. Needs more clover and lespedeza up here. I need to get the goats off the extra tasty stuff while it grows and I'm planning on doing that in the fall when they are penned in the barn for breeding season. Some is still coming up but the goats like to swiffer the clover and legumes up like candy.
Found out the AC/heat pump system we have is old and failing and needs to be replaced. The tech recharged it, but it's leaking badly in a lot of places and will probably only last somewhere between a few days and a few weeks before the coolant leaks out and "breaks" again. He says it's not great and was not very happy about it.  The salesman will probably quite us a small car to replace the whole thing, he said (clearly he's not the salesman). 
Poo. I'm glad we got the charge up in the meantime, I guess. We were all getting heat sick.


----------



## Bruce

Sorry about the AC unit, yeah that will be expensive. If you have to replace it can you use heat pumps instead? Heat and cool from the same unit.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Sorry about the AC unit, yeah that will be expensive. If you have to replace it can you use heat pumps instead? Heat and cool from the same unit.


That's what we had and we'd like to get it again with a few adjustments to follow DH's future solar plans (rapidly becoming more future due to present situation, lol)


----------



## Baymule

My son had to put in a new 3 1/2 ton unit, inside and outside unit, just a couple of months ago. There is never a good time for the AC to go out.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> My son had to put in a new 3 1/2 ton unit, inside and outside unit, just a couple of months ago. There is never a good time for the AC to go out.


You said it. Heading to the 100's next week.
The guy just left and it is indeed a small car's price. Not as much as the technician said it would be, but not far off. That's what savings are for, I suppose. We kind of need AC and heat. New ultra efficient heating/cooling heat pump system heading our way early to late next week. Even the low end ones would still be a small car, so we figured we should get the one that will last the longest and keep the bills low, which was what we wanted before he showed up anyway. The salesman just walked us through the catalogs of their brands and told us the price on everything rather than pushing anything and he definitely got his sale.


----------



## Baymule

Son called a small family run company, offered cash and got a discount.


----------



## rachels.haven

Wonderful when that happens. There's one big company here that dominates. I feel bad for the little guys, but after living in Mass we're a little timid to use anyone my parents and siblings in the area don't have experience with. No discount for us, although they are fixing another problem for free we brought up so we're being taken care of. Good enough for me.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Even the low end ones would still be a small car, so we figured we should get the one that will last the longest and keep the bills low, which was what we wanted before he showed up anyway.


Good plan. You don't want to have to replace it again anytime soon and the price of electricity will only go up over time making the cheaper one cost more.


----------



## rachels.haven

We're still using gas unfortunately, but the alternatives aren't great. Anyway...

On Saturday we changed the gates to three black Tater wired filled in gates to keep baby Shaun, poodles, and baby goats where they are supposed to be. Shaun likes to slip out the door, run to the red cattle gates, slip right through, and book it either for the electric pig fence, the big tall water trough, or to go pet every single goat (Summer is crotchety with kids and treats them like goat kids) and my nerves have had it. I'll list the old ones cheap in the next few weeks and see if anyone would like to use them.


----------



## farmerjan

Don't list them too cheap.  The new cheap gates at TSC are over $150 now.  Sure wish I was close, I'd come buy them as we can ALWAYS use gates.  We buy the heavy duty galvanized BULL gates.... usually 7 bar and they ran in the $200 and up range... can't imagine that they are under $250 now.... Get back some of what you have put into the new ones....


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> Don't list them too cheap.  The new cheap gates at TSC are over $150 now.  Sure wish I was close, I'd come buy them as we can ALWAYS use gates.  We buy the heavy duty galvanized BULL gates.... usually 7 bar and they ran in the $200 and up range... can't imagine that they are under $250 now.... Get back some of what you have put into the new ones....


Jan, I'd give them to you if you were close enough. They will cost us money to get rid of if they don't sell regardless of whether or not they have years left in them-not lots of money, but enough money and hassle I'd just be glad to see them used and not ours. But you're not close and gas is HIGH so even a free gate would not be a cheap gate.


----------



## rachels.haven

Btw, if anyone is redoing pasture in my area anytime soon I highly HIGHLY recommend Red River Crabgrass ( with something interspersed that grows well in the early and late season because of the nature of the beast). It's basically giant, lush, thick, tall crabgrass and the goats go CRAZY for it-it's supposedly very high protein too. They've grazed it down to 4" up by the barn but in the back it's about 3 feet tall and growing like crazy on basically dew. We've had maybe 3 storms since it was broadcast spread. Other than the black and silver nightshade that was already there coming up here and there the pasture is fantastic. The goats are going to be unhappy when I take them off in the late summer/early fall for the crabgrass to reseed. I got pics this morning on my phone. Too bad I can't get it as goat worthy hay.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

The orchard, lespedeza, clover, and vetch I planted are coming up too, but the crabgrass is taking off right now. TN is a good place for it apparently.


----------



## rachels.haven

Blueberry 🫐 picking with grandpa



Dog art while I was in the bathroom. I took the markers. 



Dan found more markers and "shared" them. Naughty.


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

...of course now I'll forever worry that what I think is one thing coming up is another weed, but I think we're doing okay.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Dog art while I was in the bathroom. I took the markers.


 



rachels.haven said:


> Dan found more markers and "shared" them. Naughty.


Dan, a danger to himself and everyone else!


----------



## murphysranch

Such great photos! I love them all and snickered at the kid with marker mouth!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Rats, Johnsongrass. Hmm...


----------



## rachels.haven

Soo...I may have made an investment to help my parents who are only 10ish minutes away milk the goats while we are away. Hand milking is not something you can just jump into on the scale I do it. I think I'm going to use it and hand strip to ease hand numbness I sometimes get. The goats seem to like using it. Fast shipping. I ordered on Monday and it arrived Wednesday from Capralite.

We also picked up a large order of half gallon jugs and we're finalizing our herdshares contracts.


----------



## rachels.haven

So the grass I "recommended" and photographed at least in the back of the property is Johnson grass. It could have been there mixed into the fescue or it could have been in my seed. No matter now. It looks like I'll need to mow the back. The goats will roach it out of existence in the front. I'll be taking them off it before frost anyway.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Soo...I may have made an investment


Looks like "may" is a misnomer .... unless you have it on a 10 day free trial


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Looks like "may" is a misnomer .... unless you have it on a 10 day free trial


No, I did. And it was a very premeditated purchase. It's kick in the gut expensive but we need it.


----------



## Mini Horses

rachels.haven said:


> It's kick in the gut expensive


That's a good way to put it!!    so true, too. 👍

I've considered putting my girls "to work"....like you, herd shares.  Need a contract.  Then there's the storage. Containers. Pick ups. Etc.   I have a few customers but, you need regulars AND to be home, etc.  Yeah, those machines make a huge difference in time and handling!  Kudos to you.  Where'd you find a contract source?


----------



## rachels.haven

Mini Horses said:


> That's a good way to put it!!    so true, too. 👍
> 
> I've considered putting my girls "to work"....like you, herd shares.  Need a contract.  Then there's the storage. Containers. Pick ups. Etc.   I have a few customers but, you need regulars AND to be home, etc.  Yeah, those machines make a huge difference in time and handling!  Kudos to you.  Where'd you find a contract source?


I've looked at other herds' contracts around the state. Raw milk is a thing here. Some have patrons pay a monthly fee that covers all the milk all at once and pick up their milk on the same day each week and others have a buy in fee and then they buy milk as they go. I'm considering doing the latter, but i may need to do the assigning a day of the week thing to keep my fridge not overflowing or totally empty.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> but i may need to do the assigning a day of the week thing to keep my fridge not overflowing or totally empty.


I would think so! I sure wouldn't want the "already a week old" milk of a plan where everyone picked up the same day.


----------



## rachels.haven

I was more thinking of being just plain out. I don't keep milk more than 4 days typically. We've got pigs.


----------



## Mini Horses

Another thing....I put my milk in glass or stainless.  Fast to freezer a couple hours. Then frig.  Tight lid going to freezer, those white ones you can buy.  It forms some seal.  I label date and doe.   I've purposely kept quarts unopened to test.  I've had milk as much as 2 wks that was fresh tasting when opened and kept good taste for several days drinkability.   As said. Milk gets used!  Chickens, cats, dogs, pigs, bottle kids....goes pretty fast.  Then you drink more. Make cheese, etc.  😊

Goats are very giving animals.  🤣


----------



## farmerjan

There are 2 websites that might help with the whole milk share and contracts etc.  RealMilk.com and FTCLDF.com..... stands for farm to consumer legal defense fund.  I haven't been on them lately but they used to list every state, the current regulations and what "slides under the radar" like milk shares here in Va.... Also has some sample forms for milk share OR herd share contracts.  There is a difference... a milk share is a "share" of a particular animal... a herd share is a share of overall production.... 
Understand that there is liability and that you need to make sure that there is insurance to cover you regardless.... Too many people who have decided to "become country people"  don't understand the whole animal, milk production, and responsibility of BOTH PARTIES.  You could be just fine with people that get the whole milking, animals, farming thing... but all it takes is 1 JERK..... 
I am not trying to put a damper on your ideas... it was my thoughts to do that when I "hit retirement" age and cut back or quit testing.  Then the ankle and the knees have really made me rethink it all... plus the possible loss of the "nurse cow pasture"..... next year.... I had all those heifers ready to calve that I farmed out to the dairy... I have a 300 gallon stainless milk tank that was going to be mounted on a trailer, alot of things I had planned... I would still do some milk shares with a friendly cow that I could hand milk... but right now it is not in the closeup future.  
You just need to make sure you are covered if by some OUTSIDE FREAK chance someone would get sick from some milk.... even if they were at fault... that you wouldn't put your house/property/"farm" in jeopardy .     DS carries nearly 2 million liability on his farm policy at the off chance someone gets hurt while they are helping... paid or unpaid....and all paid help are "under the table"... 

Just some things to think about... A dairy farmer "sells eggs from his hens" and "gives away" milk if someone wants it.... the "EGG MONEY" goes in the can in the little building where he has the fridge with the eggs and the milk is in the milk tank in the barn.... owner has to bring their own container also....Eggs have always been very expensive to produce....


----------



## Mini Horses

farmerjan said:


> dairy farmer "sells eggs from his hens" and "gives away" milk if someone wants it.... the "EGG MONEY" goes in the can in the little building where he has the fridge with the eggs and the milk is in the milk tank in the barn.... owner has to bring their own container also....Eggs have always been very expensive to produce....


.     When I sell my milk to soapers or animal people, I tell them that I do not want  to know DH is named Fido!! 🤣.  Jars have "not for human consumption" label attached.  But I really, really sell to people I screen and know pretty well.  My soapers DO have websites and go to markets, etc.   Use both websites you mention.  So far VA isn't trying to be involved with "shares" but mainly due to lack of personnel and no "incidents".   For most, the buyers and sellers are aware of challenges for this market.  Still need extreme caution for something going sour. (pun intended).😊


----------



## Bruce

Mini Horses said:


> As said. Milk gets used! Chickens, cats, dogs, pigs, bottle kids....goes pretty fast. Then you drink more.


And your cholesterol goes up


----------



## rachels.haven

The other option I have available is to do "pet milk". I need a $50 license and to report all sales to the state. Also to label the milk "not for human consumption"...right after I take it out of the lineup that we drink. I think that would be less concerning from a liability standpoint.

I really only keep milk so briefly for space concerns. I'm getting 3 gallons per day after baby goat feeding. We only drink about a gallon per day. Our fridge is a frustrating narrow one and I'm not supposed to fill it all the way up with milk and all.


----------



## Baymule

You need a goat milk only refrigerator!


----------



## rachels.haven

I lied. Apparently Riker will come up to one of us. Not helpful.


----------



## Bruce

I guess if you want Riker to come to you, you have to bring the toddler along 
They generally aren't very useful at that age, you have it good!


----------



## Baymule

rachels.haven said:


> I lied. Apparently Riker will come up to one of us. Not helpful.
> View attachment 92226


I snorted my water out my nose!


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> I lied. Apparently Riker will come up to one of us. Not helpful.
> View attachment 92226


Riker likes humans that are more his size... and non-threatening... 
Your little one is just TOO CUTE...


----------



## rachels.haven

No rain now in several weeks. Very dry.

But I did get a little more genetic variation for the pig pig pen. Love them.
Going to need a trailer next year to take little big hogs to the processor.









dh also left town. So I bought a buckling and had him brought up! He's got more genetics they mesh with my other bucks. And he's cute and pretty...and milky. Plus, who can say no to a white/cream buck.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> dh also left town. So I bought a buckling


 

Do you think he'll notice?


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Do you think he'll notice?


No, of course not. 
JK, I told him...after the fact. Lamancha bucks get up to 250 lbs. I think he'd notice eventually. Big. White. Male. Goat. Rut and all.


----------



## rachels.haven

The best way to kill off nightshade is to drought. It's all turning yellow and withering whatever stage it's in. No ripe berries so far. I'll need to check over by the spring in the back of the pasture.


----------



## Baymule

Pull it up and put in trash. Wear gloves. I react to the sap.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Pull it up and put in trash. Wear gloves. I react to the sap.


Me too. Very painful and achy for the rest of the day too. Sometimes random antihistamine reactions as well to the wild stuff. I will have to figure out my dress code for going to war with it.


----------



## rachels.haven

Out of town at the moment, but I'm reporting that at last check up as we were leaving a lot of my pasture grass that I planted is starting to look gray and dry out. And our area is starting to have little fires everywhere. Kind of dry.


----------



## Baymule

Dry is bad. We are under a burn ban.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, us too but still lots of little fires. July 4th is coming. So far the fire departments have been staying on top of it. I'm impressed. We'll probably be fine.


----------



## Bruce

I hope so, are fireworks legal there?


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> I hope so, are fireworks legal there?


 I wish I were home. I'd take pics. Every major street corner has a fireworks stand. If they weren't legal I think the mid south would rise again. People are already setting them off. 

As for us, unless we get a big drenching, not even sparklers.

If the fire departments don't manage to squelch all the fires and a large wildfire starts, those big tents and trailers...will be very interesting. 🤔


----------



## Bruce

I fear for the fires that will happen if any of those fireworks are the type that are launched, too much chance for a misfire and the explosion happening in dry areas.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> I fear for the fires that will happen if any of those fireworks are the type that are launched, too much chance for a misfire and the explosion happening in dry areas.


Yes, personally I think the town I'm in and the neighboring ones should "reschedule" July 4th until after the next drenching.

Seriously, all the grass that isn't Johnson grass is crispy and dry and the wheat stubble (and our house is made of logs...)


----------



## Bruce




----------



## rachels.haven

We will probably be okay. The fire departments seem to enjoy keeping things under control.


----------



## Ridgetop

Main problem with wildfires is when the wind blows strong.  The fire department can't control the fire in the wind gusts.  Also, wildfires actually make their own wind - like the little candle driven Christmas carousels.  The excessive heat from the fires causes updrafts.  Fire here in Southern CA is so common you would think we would be used to it, but for over 30 years I have kept a pair of binoculars ready to hand to insect any sign or scent of smoke.  I have been known to run outside with my binoculars when the neighbors have a BBQ!  LOL 

Even with our sheep keeping everything grazed to the ground fire scares me more than earthquakes.


----------



## murphysranch

Me too, Ridge.


----------



## Baymule

We are under a burn ban.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> We are under a burn ban.


Us too. Residents are calling for a fireworks ban.


----------



## Bruce

Fortunately we aren't in drought at all this year.


----------



## murphysranch

Fires popped up all over the West coast these last few days. I'm glad you're on a burn ban, Bay.


----------



## Mike CHS

We just got added to the burn ban here and I'm amazed they waited this long.  We have had less than an inch of rain for all of June.


----------



## rachels.haven

Mike CHS said:


> We just got added to the burn ban here and I'm amazed they waited this long.  We have had less than an inch of rain for all of June.


I'm glad your added to the burn ban but I can't "love" that with the heart eyes and all. We all need water. I'm hoping for the next few days. 5 acres of wheat just burned yesterday because it was ignited by farm equipment in our county in addition to the structure fires they keep having. It's got to stop.
I hope your pastures and sheep are doing okay. I think someone said you had fescue in your pasture mix and all the fescue down where we were was not happy when we left, I'm bracing myself for seeing it a week later with still no water. It's going to look like tinder and not livestock food.


----------



## Mike CHS

We do have some fescue in a couple of our paddocks but they both get some afternoon shade so are doing ok so far.   We took our numbers down so we are only running a total of 26 head now so the grass is holding up so far.


----------



## rachels.haven

We got home from our trip. Everything survived July 4th and we got two brief and heavy rain showers, but the county is still under a burn ban because they say it wasn't enough. 
DH, Dan, and Shaun got sick from something we got while out of town. DH is still sick. If I get time I want to go finish my bigger buck pen. Then work on a pig pen and closing the goats out of the future chicken yard. IDK how high to set the bar today with a sickness in the house so we'll just have to see.


----------



## farmerjan

Sorry that the trip wound up with sickness.  Sure hope DH gets to feeling better soon.  We sure don't bounce back as fast as the kids,  as we get a few more years on us.  
Glad you at least got a little rain.  We are in a pocket where it mostly goes around except for a 10 drop shower.  Nothing in the radar now today....
Do what you can and it will get done eventually.


----------



## Baymule

Glad everything was ok when y’all got back. Sorry y’all got sick, hope your DH is better soon!


----------



## rachels.haven

Here comes a heat wave. Time for some armchair gardening.
One place's crabgrass variety comparison.


----------



## rachels.haven

Buck pen is 3/4 walls done. I even splurged and bought a gate so we can minimize the chance of more stitches on these rough cut cattle panels (son#1 already gashed himself open hopping a fence).

So I just made a 4 gallon batch of mozzarella. Now I have a lot of fresh cheese...now what? 

I think I need to build a cheese cave fridge. I like not having a time limit to eat things.


----------



## rachels.haven

And while I'm still thinking about this journal here is a pic for tax. The brown is fescue, green is cultivated crabgrass (with weeds). The Johnsongrass is down the hill and a bit wrapped around the treeline that does a diagonal of the pasture surrounding the drainage creek and spring down there. Lawn is crabgrass/fescue mix.





Here's Summer on the day they brought a digger in to put in a waterline and drive for development next door   she wants me to make the noise stop. That is how they look at you when they want something. Right in the eyes.


----------



## rachels.haven

Giant rr crabgrass going to seed with it's wild cousin beneath.





Lamanchas get jealous if you do something and they can't play too. Here's new doe, Shay/Dot (jury is out on the matter), trying on my ear protection so she can build a pen for her brother too.


----------



## rachels.haven

Her brother, waiting on his new pen. (They are more Lucky*Stars blood)




A goat that sits in the mud with the LGD's to keep cool.

And a passion flower.


----------



## Baymule

A goat that sits in the mud with the LGD's. 

Passion flower leaves make a sedative tea.

Crab grass makes good grazing. My horses loved it and so do the sheep.


----------



## farmerjan

I have a few 1st calf heifers that would lay in the dirtiest, deepest muddiest crappy places... if I was a calf I swear I would starve before I sucked on those filthy teats....


----------



## Baymule

A little dirt with dinner? Either that or die! 

With the ferocious heat we’ve been having, cows wade out in the ponds to cool off. Or maybe they are doing their own test wash?


----------



## Mini Horses

Ahhh...cheese making!   I'm there but waiting on cultures to arrive so I can expand choices.  👍.  Looking at 7 gal now, hope they deliver before weekend! 🙄😳😲

I'm trying cheddar this year.   Have a wine cooler frig that I'm hoping will work as a cave.🤣.  Of course, the wax shipped first...🤷...at least it's here!  Have you tried cheddar?   Mozz will be another.  I'm pretty done with ricotta I usually stock.  Fun work.

With your new milking equipment you prob have a large stainless tank...?  Is that an issue to handle and transfer milk to other containers?  Those can get heavy.  I have one that's 3.5 gal. Still haven't used that, just smaller 1/2 gal & gal.  Still deciding it's use.


----------



## rachels.haven

DH sided with Farmer Jan and we bought a shed that someone had passed on and had it delivered today. Their smallest shed was not very small...so I guess we may have to work up to lots of chickens? Or maybe a row of cages for brooding chicks?
After I finish the buck pen, the pig accommodations are next, and the chickens set up will follow including fencing the goats out of the fenced in area. So fall maybe.



I plan to enclose and bisect the garden area with an alley to the door, put chicken doors on either side of the coop (and ventilation and a tad more roof strapping), build auto waterers and shade structures...all that is subject to change though.


----------



## rachels.haven

Mini Horses said:


> Ahhh...cheese making!   I'm there but waiting on cultures to arrive so I can expand choices.  👍.  Looking at 7 gal now, hope they deliver before weekend! 🙄😳😲
> 
> I'm trying cheddar this year.   Have a wine cooler frig that I'm hoping will work as a cave.🤣.  Of course, the wax shipped first...🤷...at least it's here!  Have you tried cheddar?   Mozz will be another.  I'm pretty done with ricotta I usually stock.  Fun work.
> 
> With your new milking equipment you prob have a large stainless tank...?  Is that an issue to handle and transfer milk to other containers?  Those can get heavy.  I have one that's 3.5 gal. Still haven't used that, just smaller 1/2 gal & gal.  Still deciding it's use.


Ooo, you're out of culture? I was out of suplies too earlier doing the same thing except for me it was rennet. The offending milk got turned into too much farmers cheese.
I also have a 3.5 gallon milker bucket with a handle on the bottom too and I use inline filters so the milk goes from the milker straight into jars-my "bulk tanks". And it does get heavy, although not hay bale heavy. It's not too bad

I will need to work on a better solution before next freshening when we have more than an older dwarf goat and 2 FF in milk with two does who refused to stay dry. We're pretty far from full production mode. I'm dreading upgrading to a bigger 6 gallon bucket for the heaviness issue (or a 5 gallon milk tote to dump into?).


----------



## Mini Horses

😁🤗. Thanks!   Cultures arrived today!   and rennet.     So will make some kind of cheese(s) this weekend!!   It will be my first venture into some of them.  Cheese press has been waiting almost 3 yrs now!

I'm working 2 FF and 2 olders...way more milk than I need.  Do sell some to a couple soapers.  And I have so many 1/2 gal jars!! 😁 My tank has some handles on the side.  But balance can be an issue with dumping into another vessel for anyone, milk is heavy, sloshing and all.  We need a food grade pump!!  

Like you, several more girls I'm not milking this year.   We're addicted.


----------



## Baymule

Y’all ain’t addicted, y’all are afflicted. LOL in later stages of the disease, your eyes roll uncontrollably, your body shakes and tremors and you drool copious amounts.


----------



## rachels.haven

Dan wants this cow. Clearly teaching kids to read is a bad thing.








						Reg. White Dexter Cow - farm & garden - by owner - sale
					

DFF Buttercup #010526- registered White Dexter , DOB 9/28/19. Red Tipped White Cow, Heterozygous Polled, A2/A2, Non Chondro, Non PHA, Negative BLV, BVD, Johnes. Buttercups grand sire is the...



					bgky.craigslist.org


----------



## Mini Horses

Well he has good taste!  Look at that girl.....I'd like to have her myself. 👍🤣


----------



## Ridgetop

Lucky Star has gorgeous dairy LaManchas for years and all on milk test with mutigenerational milk stars!  Great choice!  I know where to come for LaManchas when we get to Texas IF we decide we need a milk goat.  With relatives in Seattle and California we can certainly bring some Lucky Star animals in later too.  But dairy has become too much work for us with no small children for whom to provide milk.  Probably will just stick with our White Dorpers.    Love the black and tan color pattern on Lucky Star animals.


----------



## rachels.haven

Aww, thanks.
I've been surprised. Several people in the area are bringing them down. It sounds like the word is getting out. If you or anyone ever did want to play with them they are spreading in the south.


----------



## Baymule

She is beautiful!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Clearly teaching kids to read is a bad thing.


Now that he can read you can teach him about money


----------



## Baymule

Bruce said:


> Now that he can read you can teach him about money


Looks to me that he already knows, spend it on a cow!


----------



## Bruce

Sadly he's a bit too young to earn his own.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, and cow transport is a bit beyond our van. So he told me he guesses I should buy a truck and trailer so he could go get his cow. So now this Dan plan is getting pricy, lol.


----------



## Baymule

You need a truck and trailer!


----------



## Ridgetop

Even for goats because we know oiw they multiply!


----------



## Bruce

Well you and DH COULD use a truck and livestock trailer for purposes other than retrieving just one cow. The boy has all the answers!


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, like when the kids are fighting on road trips and won't stop we can put them in the bed instead and they can caterwaul and yell at eachother into the wind!

In all mostly seriousness, I will need a truck, but I'm not sure I'll feel like buying a $3k cow afterwards. Buying vehicles is a bit of a wallet sucker punch that kind of makes you done for a while, lol. A truck would be REALLY handy when doing garbage and feed runs. And I intend to take wethers to the processor at some point. More than 4 small ones like last time! and pigs if they are too tricky to do at home.

The buck pen fence is done (rain storm assisted). Back to a heat wave for us. Now I need to decide if the pen needs a hay rack for easy feeding and a water trough like the does or not. I'll decide tomorrow (today, since I didn't post this at time of writing). I'm so relieved! I wasn't sure if I was going to get it done before rut. The adult buck I have that will probably be a one season wonder and move on because he likes to beat up on his "friends" and it should only get worse as rut approaches (and not molest them, he likes crushing other goats into the fence or ground and hearing them scream and crushing them harder until their screams fade and THEN he lets up, so yes, he's gonna go, hopefully to a pen full of all standard bucks that are bigger than him since he's a SMALL adult lamancha). They need all the room they can get for now.

I also put a dehumidifier in the shop recently because it's always musty and too humid in there.


----------



## Ridgetop

Our bucks were all penned together and occasionally indulged in homosexual (Capra sexual?) behavior.  My sons thought this was hysterically funny.  They were never dominant with other bucks or does to the point you are describing so I think you should definitely sell him on.

Glad the fence is in.  Fenceline feeders really make it easy to feed and having a refillable watter source in drought times is necessary.  Moving right along!


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> Buying vehicles is a bit of a wallet sucker punch that kind of makes you done for a while


That cow is a LOT cheaper than a truck  As far as garbage and feed runs, lots of cars can tow a small trailer. Both our Prius Prime and the Leaf are spec'd for 1,500 pounds.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ridgetop said:


> Our bucks were all penned together and occasionally indulged in homosexual (Capra sexual?) behavior.  My sons thought this was hysterically funny.  They were never dominant with other bucks or does to the point you are describing so I think you should definitely sell him on.
> 
> Glad the fence is in.  Fenceline feeders really make it easy to feed and having a refillable watter source in drought times is necessary.  Moving right along!



Around here we call it "Pan-sexual" as in this guy.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_(god)#:~:text=In_ancient_Greek_religion_and,as_a_faun_or_satyr.?wprov=sfla1

And not the pan of frying or french bread. And I expect them to do that. Lots more than occasionally. A buck bunny party.

I've had does do that ramming and crushing behavior and they also got moved on. It seemed to be a screw loose in the dominance sector of their intellect and they did it a lot in relative to valued resources. I didn't think bucks did it too. (You learn something new every day, I guess.) My buck pen is usually rolling in resources so no need for competition for ANYTHING. He just does it with no rhyme or reason. So yes, I'm going to use him and send him on.

** for clarity. I had a 2 year old yelling at me to get my rear in gear and take him to see the world in the car and not just sit in the driveway and run the AC.


----------



## rachels.haven

My last post was confusing. Sorry. Edited.


----------



## rachels.haven

About an hour and a half ago Hera, my Little Orchard lamancha, decided to take out the "garden area" side of the parimeter fence, which is chainlink, so I had to go get the poly wire out of the garage and posts I'd bought for the purpose earlier and put up a DONT TOUCH ME fence so I would not have goats all over my property and on the porch and in the toxic front bushes. Hera is a fence wrecking hippo. With a beautiful udder.
So the chicken run should be goat proof now, and will be chicken proof later.


----------



## Ridgetop

They learn so quickly.  Our first 2 Nubian milkers were calm and docile star milkers.  They did not break fences, but quickly learned how to undo the gate latches.  I would send DS2, 5, and DS3, 3, to put them back in their pen.  The goats were easy to catch and walked along with the boys who were the same size as they were.  LOL


----------



## rachels.haven

Ridgetop said:


> They learn so quickly.  Our first 2 Nubian milkers were calm and docile star milkers.  They did not break fences, but quickly learned how to undo the gate latches.  I would send DS2, 5, and DS3, 3, to put them back in their pen.  The goats were easy to catch and walked along with the boys who were the same size as they were.  LOL


Stories like that make me love goats. Ours have tried doorknobs. Thankfully they were the round kind and not the lever kind or I'd have to find a way to *clip* those shut too.
Hera's fence breaking skills date back to her old home. She and her huge sister would break and crush fences (they didn't tell me about that before I bought her but I SURE found out as soon as they were out of the electric fence). Then because they're goats they never forget it. Stinkers.


----------



## rachels.haven

The kids got a bigger swimming today and I think I'll get a filter for it. TSC discovered they were out of the 100 gallon tubs after my order was placed so when they went to "free delivery" (TSC quarterly reward thing) a 100 gal one to me that I ordered online they sent me a150 gallon instead so I'm taking the kids one and they get the bigger new one and bucks get their old one. 

The Lowe's 10 minutes away is out of cinder blocks so that project is going to have to wait until restock. I make safety stairs in the tank and stairs out of the tank incase a goat falls in or can't reach. I may go farther out for them but 10 minutes pretty quickly goes to 40++ with the traffic towards Nashville so I may finish the other aspects of the project first and only consider it if they are still out.

I've also decided to hotwire the top of the buck fence before release. Last night went well enough I feel just confident enough to try.

It's so hot! 🥵 (97*)


----------



## rachels.haven

It did not want to get cool tonight. 92* at a late 9:30 milking. 86 in the shop with 55% humidity, thanks to the dehumidifier. Poor hot goats.


----------



## Mini Horses

Heat lowers milk production....not that either of us need more.  But it's not fun milking in sweltering heat.   And woowee, trough water heats faster than the HW tank. 😲. My trees are popular and fans in barns.  Dropped into low 80s here last night      I keep telling myself. It's summer!


----------



## farmerjan

It got down to 71 last night which is warm for this area.  Cloudy, humid, got a little shower early and it didn't help the humidity.  Supposed to get up in the mid 90's here, that is very warm for this area.


----------



## Ridgetop

Humidity may be the curse that drives us back to California if we can't get used to it.    105 degrees here feels like 105 degrees.  105 degrees in Texas feels like 120 degrees.  Still considering putting in some kind of pool in Yantis for summer.  Lake Fork has ginormous fish, not swimming there, ponds have liver fluke and cow muck on bottom, not swimming there.  Actually, I don't like swimming anywhere I can't see the bottom.  We used to swim across the Colorado River near Needles where it is very wide and deep, but with all the boat and jet ski traffic now I wouldn't try it anymore.
Anyone hear about the 8' Great White that washed up on the beach in Long Island? Found by a walker.  Crime, homelessness, drugs, and now the sharks are trying to come ashore!  Go New York!


----------



## Baymule

@Ridgetop you forgot alligators!


----------



## Baymule

Oh, we have a prehistoric fish called alligator gar. They can get over 6’ long. At that size they are quite old.


----------



## Baymule

Do t let the humidity scare you. You will sweat a lot. Sweating flushes out toxins of your body. Sweating is healthy for you.


----------



## rachels.haven

Clips et c on the buck pen for top hotwire. Energizer arrived and charging. Ready to pound ground rod, run the wire, and mount the energizer. The 100 gallon stock trough is in place. Time to finish up then hunt cinder blocks for those stock trough stairs.


----------



## rachels.haven

The bigger buck pen is done(6+ by 6 panels) and hot to keep Mr Fence Hopping Meanie Buck in (assuming he ever tries again after he hurt his leg last time, he seemed a lite crushed at the time). Now for those cinder blocks.

Sold some milk.
The Guinea Hog Man was one buyer. He didn't tell me earlier but he says some people have difficulty keeping their pigs in the pen. That hasn't been my experience. We had one piglet that for a few weeks after arrival it kept getting out then wanted back in so we'd just pick it up and put it back and it would stay(3 times). Now everyone stays even when a certain goat that likes biting hot electric fences eats the lead wire and kills the fence...
Thank you, derpy goat. Her name means "freedom". I guess she thinks the pigs need freedom too.


----------



## Mini Horses

Hot wire on a buck pen is on my list for sometime in next few days, before new one comes home.  Just in case.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today I castrated a 6 week old runty, while footed guinea hog boar that I didn't want to use for breeding. It was...
1) A "great" bonding experience with my dad?
(Jk, we're both traumatized and a little more deaf, I'm sure)
2) necessary, and will be done in the first week next time.
And yes, the spotted boar is cryptorchid. He did not have visible double butt until about a month ago and now he is too late to do. That apparently is one of the forms in pigs. We'll be taking our chance with boar taint on him, but not the little guy. I did it right, but man, I can't help but wonder if I traumatized the pig to death. I mean, he was walking around after, but I took his equipment...


----------



## Mini Horses

My AGH boars were butchered about 6 wks after breeding the girls.  No taint...happily.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

rachels.haven said:


> We'll be taking our chance with boar taint on him,


We've butchered lots of AGH boars around here.  Everything from roasters to full grown breeding boars.  Never so much as a hint of taint.  It can happen in certain lines of AGH (so I've heard) but not terribly common...


----------



## rachels.haven

The big spotted guy is a mutt. He was supposed to be kunekune. He's got waddles and is under 100 lbs...so...kune? w/long nose and mane/crest and bad attitdue. I only castrated the little AGH I didn't want to breed, but if I could restrain Mr. Spots I would totally do him. He's a little dangerous. Hope he's tasty. The little newly barrow is doing great. I'll remember the lack of taint thing later. The AGH farmer I got the sow from said to cut them. I'll have to find out what exactly is strictly necessary later.

Anyway, went to Clarksville for cinderblocks and for my husbands endless quest to get a hot sam's club hotdog (cafe is always closed, lol). We got a tennessee typhoon, the blocks, and firehouse subs/a salad. Lots of driving for $10 of blocks but we got them.

There is a road going in on the other side of the fence behind the shop and down our whole property line. They're draining the property too. Looks like we're getting a housing development right as the market starts declining.


----------



## Bruce

Dang! Move many many hundreds of miles out to the country only to have the suburb move in next door. What are the odds they complain about the nearby farms.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

Make sure you move the pig pen closer to that side, so they get a nice welcome to the country smell.


----------



## rachels.haven

Larsen Poultry Ranch said:


> Make sure you move the pig pen closer to that side, so they get a nice welcome to the country smell.


Conveniently (unfortunately?) it's already there. And anyone who moves in will get a 1st row ticket to the all male caprine birds and bees every rut (and sometimes times in between).



Bruce said:


> Dang! Move many many hundreds of miles out to the country only to have the suburb move in next door. What are the odds they complain about the nearby farms.


When he works for a major online retailer, development follows him.
Although this time is a little annoying. His whole team left Nashville to other parts of the country and the entire team went remote. Majority of the team went back to Seattle. Yet STILL the city swells and spills over.
The world does not need more McMansions and exurbs out in the pastures and crop fields. They need high density housing next to shopping centers, places of work, and schools. But that doesn't look good or make maximum tax revenue, so mcmansions it is.
We're going to stick it out as long as possible. We are STILL agriculturally zoned.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> We are STILL agriculturally zoned.


Hopefully that will stay the same after all those house go in.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Hopefully that will stay the same after all those house go in.


We asked city hall if our neighbors could rezone us before we moved in. They acted like they'd never heard that one before and that we were crazy...so I don't think they can.


----------



## rachels.haven

Manzinita Farm VD Piper
He's not a big buck, but he thinks he's big enough. Here he is in his pre-rut glory. Rut is definitely coming. He's been a lot better behaved with the juniors and dwarves since getting the bigger pen.


----------



## rachels.haven

The Junior does have been making their own breeding plans.
(she picks that one.)




PUH-LEASE!!!


----------



## rachels.haven

Riker being himself with his tongue sticking out.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> We asked city hall if our neighbors could rezone us before we moved in. They acted like they'd never heard that one before and that we were crazy...so I don't think they can.


The neighbors can't but the city can. There a millions of acres of houses on what used to be agricultural land. Granted it doesn't have to be imminent. The farm we lived at when I was born 66 years ago was in a totally ag area. It was owned by my grandfather whose farm was down the road and bordering the parallel road. Across from his house was a dairy. Now it is all cheek by jowl housing and there is a freeway 1/3 mile from where the house was. There is still some ag in the area. That happened about 50 years ago when I was in high school. We moved from the farm to the city when I wa 2 and a half. Dad didn't really want to be a full time long term farmer like his father.

This, as best I remember, is approximately the "used to be my grandfather's 2 farms", our house was upper left, his lower right.


----------



## farmerjan

You may very well be able to be grandfathered in as ag as long as you ALWAYS have ag animals on the place.  They cannot force you to change the designation without something like eminent domain taking the land.  You could fight it to the end and a good lawyer would be able to keep it in ag designation.  Now, that said... if there are developments all around, it would make being ag very difficult as far as if you were a farmer that had to be taking equipment from one area to another on a roadway.... it might make having the animals and noise and smell guidelines a big issue....
A neighbor had land in ag when it was originally part of a farm and was sold in parcels.  He then went to every rezoning meeting to make sure they could not push through going into a residential zoning.  He actually got a "waiver" or something and then they grandfathered it because it never got changed... they have to keep farm animals on the land there and as long as there are, it will not lose the grandfathered status.  I don't know all the details... and every state is different... but Tenn is a pretty conservative "red state" and they are not anti-ag.  Still, putting in a development next door is concerning.  Put a row of screening trees along that fence line so that you do not have to look at the development, and they CANNOT look at what you are doing... a little insurance against nosy neighbors too.


----------



## rachels.haven

Dh reminded me that he called the woman in charge of rezoning before we moved in and asked if the town or neighbors or other people could rezone us and THAT was what she thought was crazy and the answer is no. Only we can rezone us (they may also be able to rezone when property is sold based on what I was seeing while house hunting, but I'm not sure and I think sellers may just be doing that to try to attract developers to pay them millions instead of hundreds of thousands). Our property is approved to be rezoned if we wish, but obviously as long as we remain this is a(small) agriculture property.


----------



## Larsen Poultry Ranch

You may want to make sure you have no trespassing signs up, and maybe ask your insurance provider regarding situations where a trespasser is injured or causes injury or damage while trespassing. City people can be stupid and entitled and you want yourself protected in case a situation arises.

I agree with the tree screen too.


----------



## WyoLiving

Here in Wisconsin, you do not have to have No Trespassing Signs up for someone to be arrested for trespassing.  But we have them up anyway.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes, at least from what I've read, TN is like Wisconsin. If you are on a property without the owner's permission you are committing a crime and they do not have to confront you first. Back to normalcy. We may still post signs.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today the bucks got their hay feeder put in their pen and the does got ALL the basket feeders and they all got topped off.
Out of all the 21 bale bundles we got last year one nasty, baled wet, 100+lbs/bale bundle and today I got all but 5 moved out into the garden area. Also the Fat Boy AGH has a dog house waiting for him now. I need to get his pen up. His fence will be wired up to the garden area.

Inlaws in town. I should find a goat to buy. I always seem to do that when they're here. That or delivering goat kids.


----------



## rachels.haven

Cidrs in. Pull day is the 11th for the 6 standards and the 16th for Eri the dwarf due to shorter average gestation length to put them all kidding around the target date of January 8th. Going to be a heck of a day if they all go on time, but that tends not to happen...plus, kidding is one of the things that is hardest on the family because I'm outside for hours. Best to get it over within the 14 day window of that (goats can go a week early or a week late typically and disregard due dates).


----------



## rachels.haven

I also coppered and began giving a course of replamin, as well as making sure every adult doe had a microchip. Onto babies and bucks at some point.
Emmi the lamancha and Iris the mini saanen are on the docket to milk through and not be bred this year.


----------



## rachels.haven

Nasty hay all moved out of the camper port (why would I want a huge camper anyway? **instant hay port**)

Back to hot 🥵 weather


----------



## rachels.haven

I had to pull a cidr on one of the young lamancha does in milk. She wound up covered in what I assume was pee all down her udder and leg and it was getting steadily worse and I did not want her to go the full 11 days. So if she cycles I'll breed her, and if not, we'll get her a date at first natural heat. Her mother also has a little staining yet I didn't do them anywhere near the same time so I think there may be something different about them internally. The dam, so far is taking it better so she keeps hers for now.

Riker came to me and put his head against my hand while I wasn't paying attention yesterday and showed me that he had some very tight mats causing him some pain behind his ears. He then let me go get my stuff to cut them out and get rid of them. Our truce didn't last and he went back to don't touch me afterward, but he doesn't have matting anymore. He got a quick once over and his coat is doing fine with the no care schedule he's imposing.


----------



## farmerjan

Riker knows that you are a part of his circle.  He also just feels that he doesn't need you on a constant basis.  He will ask for help when he needs it, other than that, let him alone to do his job.  Just his way, I guess you can either accept that and work with him, or do something different. 
 I admire that you are accepting who/what he is and working with him... LGD's seem to be very independent and in many cases it seems to be a good thing.  Be glad he stays put, doesn't want to roam, and does the job you have him for.  I think he will be more tolerant as time goes on and you don't "crowd his space".  But he will most likely always be a "hands off unless I ask you" kind of dog.


----------



## farmerjan

Are you in any of the area that got so much of the rain/weather lately?


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> Are you in any of the area that got so much of the rain/weather lately?


No, we missed that, thank goodness. The weather is very localized here. The next town over can get pounded with sheets of rain for hours and we get nothing or vise versa and the flooding with all the death is about 4 hours away. For some reason Kentucky is always the place that nature wants to kill people and even though we're only about 15 minutes from the border, our area on this side of the border seems to always do okay **knock on wood very hard**
...soo don't live in Kentucky, I guess?
It's really beautiful there though. Feels like the midwest.


----------



## Baymule

Riker has it figured out. When there is a problem, see the boss lady. Otherwise he doesn’t feel the need to bother you.


----------



## rachels.haven

We left Thursday for the Reelfoot Lake cabins for an end of summer celebration vacation weekend as part of the proper care and feeding of husbands regimen. I've been taking breaks watching the kids staring at the lake wishing for a fishing. DH picked this location for his last break this summer to let me fish, kids willing, but the kids...are having fun being tourists and we have to prevent accidental swimming lessons instead when we are back at the lake. Yesterday was spent at a children's museum with a tractor show (and a bbq food truck with friend oreos). This is my favorite picture so far. There was only one real tantrum that day and it was from the oldest, which is bad, but could be worse. 
Fried Oreos and an attempted tantrum from the youngest because he was hot, tired, and done. He's trying to make it so I can't take his brothers' picture by squishing them with his massive toddler bulk. He was simply not massive enough and just contributed to the general ambiance instead. He wants you to know that fried oreos and powdered sugar in general look like a stupid idea. Apparently powdered sugar is toddler repellent.


----------



## farmerjan

WOW they are really growing up... especially the little "chubs"....


----------



## Ridgetop

OHG!  Sooo big already!  DDIL1 was just texting that DGS2 turned 11 and how could she make them stop growing!  LOL

So much fun raising them!  Enjoy!


----------



## rachels.haven

Funny thing is the chunky toddler really looks like this. Tot faces are so squishy. That was quite a pose.


----------



## farmerjan

He still has that "innocent devil " look to him.... SOOOO cute... and the other pic did make him look all "squishy" .  The other boys are really getting some definement to them.  Is "dangerous Dan" getting to a point of channeling his drive to do constructive  things?   Yeah, I know, he wants  a cow.... cows??? You know maybe a calf for him to get started with would be a good thing.  A heifer so that if she works out she can be a foundation for a herd in the future... if she doesn't work out too good, she can be sold for breeding or put in the freezer....more options than a steer...cattle are expensive pets if they don't do anything to earn their keep....
I admire your energy and guess that way back when I must have had that kind of energy too...


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> He still has that "innocent devil " look to him.... SOOOO cute... and the other pic did make him look all "squishy" .  The other boys are really getting some definement to them.  Is "dangerous Dan" getting to a point of channeling his drive to do constructive  things?   Yeah, I know, he wants  a cow.... cows??? You know maybe a calf for him to get started with would be a good thing.  A heifer so that if she works out she can be a foundation for a herd in the future... if she doesn't work out too good, she can be sold for breeding or put in the freezer....more options than a steer...cattle are expensive pets if they don't do anything to earn their keep....
> I admire your energy and guess that way back when I must have had that kind of energy too...


Thanks. Dan lately puts his energy into begging for armies of cows, a truck and trailer (can't imagine what he is planning to do with those...) and ROLLER SKATING, thank goodness. I finally got him hooked on something semi non-dangerous and lately he lives in skates.
he still takes things apart like crazy(today, a fishing reel, what a mess), but skating helps. 

He's getting close to when I want to get him a cow, but he's still a bit small. I'm thinking maybe 10 depending on how he grows? 12 would be even better.


----------



## farmerjan

YAY,  for the roller skating....


----------



## Ridgetop

*Of course* he needs a truck and trailer - it's for the army of cows!!!  Dangerous Dan knows his stuff, you can't raise armies of cows without transport!  Lack of ability to reach the pedals, or a license, has never stopped dangerous young men before!


----------



## rachels.haven

You know, I don't think he's thought that far ahead. That's what makes him so "dangerous".


----------



## Bruce

Act first, think later. Not a winning combination!


----------



## Ridgetop

It won't be the first time in a boy's life!  But it can lead to a lot of funny family stories!


----------



## rachels.haven

Baby Shaun is showing a bit of a technical inclination lately and everything is getting taken apart and all bottles and containers are being opened and left everywhere like he's got itchy hands and just can't help himself, so I've been a bit busy. But before I go put the jetted back together (yes, we have one, no, we don't use it much, thank goodness) I think I'd better update here.

Cidrs came out today. 1.5 ml of pg600 went in (less than a full dose because lamanchas can be sensitive). A 4-5 month old yearling lamancha doeling is in heat declaring her undying love for all the bucks at once, making things lively. Let's see if we can get all our does bred and kidding mid to late January next year. Things are gonna get funky today. I'm looking forward to getting as much of it out of their systems at once this year. I changed my mind and cidr'ed a doe I was going to just milk through that last freshened 2021. I think I'd like to have her in ful milk with a more even udder and keep her in milk another 2 years. So in 10 days we will have another to breed. I have a little under 12 hours to decide if I will breed or milk this year's FF through to let them grow themselves while milking rather than growing kids. That would be Iris the mini saanen who I could only breed to my dwarf buck Oberon for a repeat of last year and 33% saanen kids-a little small- and Elsa, Summer the lamancha's daughter. I think Elsa could use it. She was the FF that had a 10-12 lbs single buckling and I'd like to not do that again so maybe she could grow for me and have normal sized twins next round? . Iris could go either way, but again, no good buck for her here.

Apparently there are fewer than 300 registered mini saanens out there and I own 2 of them so I was asked if I wanted to help with some mdga mini saanen stuff. I feel a little under qualified. I guess I'd better get qualified. I have had a goal to bring in a saanen and give her nice dwarf buck breedings and get some nice mini saanens on the ground. Now I guess I have even more of a reason? Mini saanens are many times better than ND in just about every dairy way and about the same size as a large ND but with long legs. There really should be more of them and fewer non-dairy dwarf goats.


----------



## rachels.haven

The cidr party is rolling along.
Someone on our church fb page had a young Anatolian puppy dumped in their yard today and they are trying to place for free. Anyone want half a a cup of trouble and a whole lot of who knows what?


----------



## Ridgetop

What a shame to dump a puppy, and an Anatolian at that!  That is a breed that you really want to know any problems in the parents before committing to.  A dumped puppy is also usually a crossbreed which makes it even harder to figure out what it will do.


----------



## Baymule

Anatolians can look like black mouth cur dogs and vice versa. Cross breeds can get all mixed up. Good luck on placing this puppy. I hate dog dumpers.


----------



## Ridgetop

City people like to dump litters of unwanted puppies or dogs in the country because they see farmers having several dogs.  They think those tender-hearted farmers will take in their nuisance dogs.  What they don't realize is that coyotes will take most of the young dogs while older dogs that are roaming will get shot. 

People with no heart and less brains who abandon their pets:  Just take your dogs and cats that you don't want any more to a rescue agency or have them humanely put down.  Save them from suffering starvation, being a meal, or bullet wounds!


----------



## rachels.haven

Around here nobody neuters their LGS's. And then they wander. And nobody seems to connect the dots or maybe care. Also they keep males and females together in the same pasture and they make copious puppies so they can list them on CL for $200 each and then they don't sell so they dump them. He could be a cross. I'm just glad he's not my problem. When Riker started testing the fence trying to get to the house dogs I got him neutered and it stopped.


----------



## Baymule

If you don’t have QUALITY dogs, spay and neuter. Even if you do, if you aren’t going to place the puppies in good homes, do t breed them. 

In the pasture next to sons house  are horses. An uncut long yearling is breeding the mares. There is a black and white stud behind their house, I guess they fancy themselves breeders, I only see idiots. There is what looks to be a 2 year old filly still sucking momma. They are skinny all winter, only gaining weight when the grass comes in. 

Irresponsible breeding isn’t only dogs. 
What a shame.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hi,
Popping in.
Remember how I had a doeling with an abscess between her toes this year? Well, it wasn't an abscess. It was essentially a really large blocked pore-a zit. Goats and sheep have a sebaceous gland called the interdigital sinus there that goes down each toe and has an opening in the middle. If they get a grass seed lodged in the opening, guess what happens? Yep. And yuck. Not CL. And not infectious hoof rot in a dry kid pen, as a sheep vet told me over the phone and refused to come out for this year. I did not even know that was there. Now I do.

sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2314853515000311#fig1

No need to flip out. Just treat-like the one or two times it will ever happen in your lifetime.


----------



## farmerjan

That's an interesting piece of information.  Glad that is all it is and that it could be worked on and remedied.


----------



## Baymule

A pimple between sheep/goat toes!


----------



## rachels.haven

Alright, I've owned every breed on my bucket list now. Also, Dan is in love. Today we brought home the last pair of does from a lamancha breeder that is selling off her saanen herd (and most of her lamanchas, but we don't need more temptation, right?) and replacing them with stinking dwarves because they sell for more and eat less hay (boo). So now we own two February saanen doe kids, who are in the barn acclimating. After unloading from their trailer they right laid down in our air conditioned car on towels and a tarp and made no noise outside of Dan's heart goat mumbling to him once and were happy. And it was like 2 hours and for part of the time I forgot I had goats in the car. The family excluding me went in for arby's at the truck stop, then we slogged home through nashville weekend traffic, then I had to prepare a stall for them in the barn-it took a while.
This year for them is for growing so they can support an extended lactation. Next year we may make some mini saanens. These two are strictly here for mini saanens and milk and to be enjoyed. Not more Dan saanens, right?




One girl has her dry leg and wound up getting a second one because her breeder was asked to bring her for show numbers but it doesn't count (unfortunately for her). Next year I have a goal to go to two shows with a goat or two. Not sure it will be these two. I'd also like to milk test.

Also, I've come to terms with keeping a few of my dwarves that I just could not sell. So I decided to up the quality of the Nigerian buck pen and add two more bucks on par with Oberon's quality. So two more nigerian bucklings who might just be the right color to make mini saanens when they are bigger. Consider my remaining dwarves my project animals. The two new boys are Mini Land Ranch BK Aster (Amethyst Acres Beau-Khaleel x Amethyst Acres Z Giulianna), and Mini Land Ranch A Phlox (Golden Dawn Z Armageddon x Sugar Moon VIC Beau-Kaye) and we are going to use them and Dawnland BF Oberon over and over again until we can't anymore to see if we can produce nigerian dwarf goats with almost standard goat production, good conformation, and actually good teats.
...And also most of all mini saanens, because we love those, (and because they are better than ND and the world needs more of them). For flexibility's sake, white or cream/light gold might be the best color for our dwarf herd.


----------



## Mini Horses

I love my Saanens!   Have a lot of white goats here.😁 Great milk, excellent production, easy going attitude.  With that I also have Saanen X Nubian.....more good milk.  Way to go!! 👍


----------



## Ridgetop

Might as well show the doeling with the leg once she is in milk.  See if you can finish her.


----------



## Bruce

rachels.haven said:


> So two more nigerian bucklings who might just be the right color to make mini saanens when they are bigger.


I'm confused, how can crossing a Nigerian with a Saanen create a Saanen, mini or otherwise?


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> I'm confused, how can crossing a Nigerian with a Saanen create a Saanen, mini or otherwise?


Dwarf+any dairy breed = mini whatever breed. You register them then slowly, slowly work up to "purebred" in something like 6 generations while selecting for characteristics of the dairy breed in smaller form-including almost standard production and will to milk. I kind of love our mini saanen. She is an f3.


----------



## Bruce

Goats must have some weird genetics if the only thing the offspring get from the Nigerians is small size!


----------



## Baymule

Dan is in love with them? Does this mean that he no longer wants a cow?


----------



## Mini Horses

Baymule said:


> Dan is in love with them? Does this mean that he no longer wants a cow?


🤣. You should be so lucky!



Bruce said:


> weird genetics if the only thing the offspring get from the Nigerians is small size!


Of course, it's not the only but,  a place to start...size....and that seems to be a prominent feature in a mating with full sized dairy and ND.  Takes several generations to perfect.  Plus, they are dairy, so that is a genetic to continue and consider when cross breeding.  A Saanen is very dominant in their traits for color, dairy, temperament, physical appearance such as body type, ears, head shape, etc.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Dan is in love with them? Does this mean that he no longer wants a cow?


We do not speak of cows. Hopefully a cow sized goat is big enough.


----------



## Baymule

Will Dan be out there doing the milking?


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Will Dan be out there doing the milking?


Dan loves to milk, but school gets in the way. We'll see. I wouldn't be surprised.


----------



## rachels.haven

160 bales of orchard came in today and are in cover under the milk shop wing. We'll get another 140 in before we are done getting grass hay. Sometime after frost when they're done cutting our alfalfa person will bring us a load for the camper port. Then we will be ready to rest the pasture for winter (which won't be occurring until November here, and I always forget October, but who needs October anyway?)


----------



## rachels.haven

310 bales of alfalfa came in today. Still waiting for my grass hay producer to finish rolling his hay to bring the other trailer with the 140 (so he can have the rest of the cash I took out for the hay, right?). But we are ready for winter with or without it. The rest is frosting on the cake.

Today's high is 84, low is 60. Not very wintery or even fally-ish, but the brief coolness is welcome. Our first frost date is usually the last week in October on average. I wonder if we'll make it.

Apparently the kids I breed are winning their classes in shows in their areas and more than a few new owners are very happy with them. I guess I don't totally botch up breeding.

It's a mellow day today. The almost two year old baby randomly decided to spike a fever of at least 103 last night in the wee hours of the morning. He doesn't act sick and I'm sure he'll be fine, but it kind of takes the gas out of your tank the next day.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hay, hay, hay.


----------



## rachels.haven

Goofy looking teeny bopper man dog.




Still struggling to get good photos of Ms Millie the black abstract poodle other than the above.


----------



## farmerjan

rachels.haven said:


> Hay, hay, hay.
> View attachment 93402
> 
> View attachment 93404View attachment 93403


----------



## rachels.haven

Early this morning while DS#1 was keeping us awake from 1 am to 5 as is his stupid habit, Riker started quiet barking incessently. Being totally fried as I was (darn son is making this a regular thing) I ignored it. Riker also barks all night at his food bowl if you feed him in the evening and it's something he doesn't think he likes.
This morning after dropping the kids off at school at 6:30 am I came home and caught Riker escorting two piglets back to the hog pen. Which is not right. So i come over to the fence and what do I see (other than a piglet grunt, grunt, grunting up to the fence to say, "hi,feed me). This is what I see.



 This is a problem. As the sow is not in heat, so Mr. Nasty Not Kune Boar felt he needed to breed SOMETHING so he was molesting all the piglets through the electro net, out of the pen, upsetting Riker, but they really wanted to be in, so they'd come back, so they'd go back under. I've let the pen get weedy, which doesn't help, but they still oink and squeak when they touch it. Mr. Nasty is still trying to nurse, btw, but the sow is dry. She's raised two small litters, one not being hers, so her body decided she was done. I also think the piglets I brought in lost interest.


----------



## rachels.haven

So after putting away the goats I turn off the fence, pull a few posts, and call my good pigs out from under it. They needed a little grain to come more than half way out. This is the barrow. He still does not like me for some reason. I can't imagine why. He may also not be pure AGH because his face is also long and narrow and his build is longer, taller, and lighter. He will be a dinner pigger. Someday.




There was a lot of Mr. nasty pig smacking and poking with a step in post. Apparently he really wants to get me and is willing to stomp and chompf, and charge me though the fence so he got hit with a purple plastic post a bunch of times. He will be dispatched as soon as the flies are gone. Right now he's not afraid of me. Just of the post. Apparently I need to kick him in the balls again (we've had "words" before).


----------



## rachels.haven

I did the "trail of pig food" thing and got them in the goats old pen. I tripped over them a lot on the way. The guinea hogs seem to like people, and back scratches, and maybe like tripping you, I'm not sure. I guess I need a new setup for the goats for when frost comes and turns the johnson grass toxic with cyanide.
This is before I got the barrow in.


----------



## rachels.haven

Meanwhile, Mr. Surly Nasty Boar got some pen work done to his pen. I took off half of it, cleaned the net, moved the netting inward so it's on bare ground, and made it ripping hot again. 
I wish I could have castrated this pig when he was younger, but he had retained testicles until he was over 100lbs. There was nothing to cut.





Mr. McNasty getting ready to get shocked.


----------



## rachels.haven

Then I gave the pigs mud, becuase until about 10 they have no shade there. It's not hot, but sun is sun. 







Moral of the story is we will only have our guinea hogs. And new boars will only be used if and only if they have the right attitude and build and look true to breed.

Oh, and the frustrating part of it is after all the tripping and pig scratching and pushing into the pen the city that supplies our water is cutting us off at some point for the day for maintenance. Here you can also see the road and the fence line the goats studiously cleaned off.

The sooner my Not Kune gets dispatched the better as far as I'm concerned.


----------



## Bruce

Isn't DS#1 Danger Dan? Is he not old enough to know better than to wake the house all night? And how does he get to school awake if he's been up since 1 AM??



rachels.haven said:


> He still does not like me for some reason. I can't imagine why. He may also not be pure AGH because his face is also long and narrow and his build is longer, taller, and lighter. He will be a dinner pigger. Someday.


The last part may explain the first


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Isn't DS#1 Danger Dan? Is he not old enough to know better than to wake the house all night? And how does he get to school awake if he's been up since 1 AM??
> 
> 
> The last part may explain the first


I'm also responsible for deballing that poor pig.

Dan is my middle child. Aiden is my number 1 and he has been the most challenging one to date STILL. He's probably going to wind up on sleeping meds to get through this and possibly anti anxiety meds for the next month or two until he can get through this phase. He is extremely bright, extremely determined in whatever he does, and has an iron will. If he can't understand and/or feel like everything is under control he has issues and always has. He's going to be a force to be reckoned when older with provided get him to adulthood (and provided he doesn't become a disney super villain).

Baby Shaun is technically inclined like Dan and me. Neither Dan nor Shaun share Aiden's extremes. I do worry about the emotional toll on Dan having to deal with Aiden though. Shaun too as he becomes more aware of our somewhat lopsided family dynamics right now.

My husband is like a very, very mellow and low key version of Aiden. Aiden gets just the intensity from me. I did not have anxiety or insomnia as a kid, but I had intensity to spare. It's a rough combination he's inherited.


----------



## Baymule

Pig adventures! That boar will be tasty. Keep him away from the girls so no hormones are getting him stirred up, and take him to slaughter. Animals with bad attitudes don’t last long here!


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Pig adventures! That boar will be tasty. Keep him away from the girls so no hormones are getting him stirred up, and take him to slaughter. Animals with bad attitudes don’t last long here!


We are going to do him tomorrow. Not ideal, but he's looking and acting too much like a wild boar to want to keep around.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bailey is not pig safe and it looks like I won't be free ranging my guinea hogs for snake patrol. She is food aggressive and when she sees them rooting she thinks the pigs are eating some exquisite treasure she doesn't have so she starts lunging, snarling, and barking and trying to go through the guinea hog pen to get it and pull pieces out and she eats it! (they are doing through fallen hay compost in their pen). The guinea hogs don't speak dog, so when she does that they all gather around and grunt excitedly at her and try to touch her with their noses...I think we're going to need to put them back behind an electric fence. We have a language gap. (Riker doesn't care about pigs except that he wants them in the pen and he gets very concerned if they get upset which sounds like it might get scary if Bailey gets her way with the pigs.


----------



## Baymule

I gave that a like because I’ve had some wacko dog personalities. Darn good dogs, just wacko. The wacko part makes you appreciate the other part that isn’t wacko, even more.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> I gave that a like because I’ve had some wacko dog personalities. Darn good dogs, just wacko. The wacko part makes you appreciate the other part that isn’t wacko, even more.


I'm beginning to think wacko just goes with the LGD territory. They've got a lot of instincts but they are always thinking and it clashes and sometimes makes a crazy mess. 

We're keeping Bailey obviously.


----------



## Baymule

Bailey is a super great guardian. Just a little quirky about pigs. 

I miss my psycho @itch Paris. 13 years of screwball dog sure left a hole in my heart.


----------



## rachels.haven

This weekend the rest of the winter hay came in. I think we're ready.
(I also earned myself a wasp sting from the sleepy southern wasps we have here when I turned up a pallet they were trying to make a new nest under. I'm allergic to wasps so random hives and swelling until the body deals with the venom and damage...oh well, at least it's not anaphylaxis shock )

We also processed Mr. Not Kune. He was Soo not a Kune.
I brought out food to get him to the fence for shooting, but we didn't need it. He came over charging, ready to fight, so my dad shot him in the eye with his brand new shot gun(I don't remember the gauge or ammo used but I will probably be target practicing on it at some point so I will be reminded). Then I turned off the fence and dad and I went in and sliced him to bleed out (pig skin and hair is TOUGH, as is the boar shield). Then we each grabbed a rear leg to drag him out of the pen and pasture, which was where we ran into a problem. He would not move. Turns out he was not 150 lbs. At 7-8 months of age on a pound and a half of feed per day he had grown to some weight in excess of 200. Not very Kune. So we used the small hock hanging hooks I found in the barn and we built a yoke so we could pull him a little more efficiently and we slowly pulled him out of the pen. Then we had to get him hung on the rack we built...for a pig half his weight. So i got the extra pulley from my hay loft pulley project in Groton that came in a pack of two and we grabbed DH, Mark off his plumbing project and between the three of us with a lot of straining we got him hung up there. (Darn, the rack is still up, I should have gotten a pic of that for the post). With a fan blowing on us we skinned and skinned and skinned, and removed the head and eventually gutted (nerve wracking after the size and all that skinning effort). Then we had to cut up the carcass to bring it and all our things in for butchering and packing and chilling. (I saved fat and lief lard)
After exhausted Dad left we cooked a piece to try. I think it's boar taint free. Either that or there's only a very, very little stink bug smell.
So in new freezer locker #2 we have the meat all packed and ready to be split between the parents house and ours if he approves of it.
Pasole for dinner tonight. Pictured above are the surviving guinea hogs. The next dinner pig is the one right next to the ones side facing you and he is growing much slower, and much more normal. He may be a late winter pig.

I'd better start the pressure cooker making the pork broth.

And lest you think I outlasted my dad, I woke up in the night needing lots of motrin due to hours on the knife skinning that hog and swelling in the leg. Dad says he also hit the pain killers last night but is feeling great this morning. I think I'm doing okay too.

Mr. Not Kune was bigger than mom hog. I can't believe we did that. But nobody got hurt and the boar did not escape and hurt anyone or anything on a rampage. I think we will stick to breeding our own hogs from now on so I can know what they actually are. Registered hogs might also be an idea (although papers can be falsified no problem as the Nigerian Dwarf breeders have taught us).


----------



## Baymule

Good for you and your Dad! Home grown pork is the best. Do you have a meat grinder? If not, be sure to get the sausage stuffer tubes too, when you get one. You can home smoke the bacon too. Get the big 2 gallon zip loc bags, season the slabs up, one per bag, turn in the refrigerator daily, then slow smoke over low heat. Chill and slice. 

Great job on slaughtering the pig! Do y'all have a tractor? It's easier to snatch a pig out of the pen with a tractor, then chain/hang from the front end loader. 

On my Wilbur thread, I made breakfast sausage links without casings. It worked really good, my granddaughters loved them, so did we. 






						Baymule's 500 Pound Boar!
					

We have just about wiped out Wilbur. Still have a freezer shelf stacked full of pork chops. No pan sausage left. Got tired of pork shoulder and ham steaks, so I thawed them out, had 52 pounds. Been making sausage and stuffing it, BJ is smoking it. Dang! It sure smells good!



					www.backyardherds.com
				




We raised 3 hogs one year and did the slaughtering ourselves. I took pictures and wrote details, it might help you. 






						Feeder Pigs 2017
					

Monday, February 20th, we bought 3 Red Wattle pigs, 4 months old for $75 each. I found them on Craigslist and we jumped on them quick. Just weaned piglets were listed for $65 to $100! We plan on keeping them probably 3 months and taking them to slaughter. We offered 2 to neighbors and they...



					www.backyardherds.com


----------



## rachels.haven

No, no tractor. I'm afraid of the maintenance and would like to get a truck and trailer first so I can take a tractor places if needed.
The goal with the pigs was to butcher them before they got over 100 lbs so we could deal with it ourselves, and treat them like overly large rabbits but this mixed breed guy did not follow the plan in just about any way.
Talking to my dad yesterday he did really enjoy the experience and would do it again. Mr. Barrow will probably go around New Years then at whatever size he's at.


----------



## Baymule

A tractor will be a huge help. Be sure to get a big enough horse power to pick up the round bales. Look at the different manufacturers, sometimes they offer package deals that can include a trailer. Every once in awhile they offer zero interest.


----------



## Baymule

Kubota L4701 Tractor Package Deal | Coleman Tractor Company
					

Our Kubota L4701 Tractor Package is perfect for several applications. Get a little bit of everything you need and a trailer to pull it all down the road.




					colemantractor.com
				




If your road/driveway is good, I'd drop the box blade and get a disc.


----------



## farmerjan

Kubota often offers these type of package deals.  I looked at one and was pricing it without the belly mower, a smaller bush hog instead, and the backhoe with the trailer... There is a dealer 20 minutes from here.  But we have alot of equipment and some is too big for me to run... DS can run everything and I hope that I can get some of the stuff done this year if he will actually do it... instead of always having to beg to get things done.... but fencing is more important to me right now.... making decisions of where to best spend money for the "return"... service would be convenient and that was a consideration.  
I think @Mini Horses has one and now she has a neighbor mechanic to call since her DS is like mine... always too busy, or something, to do things when they need doing...


----------



## WyoLiving

We have a Kubota tractor that has a cab and a little LS Tractor. Love them both.  The Kubota is pretty expensive to have repaired - getting to be like a John Deere, I think you pay more just because of the color.


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> A tractor will be a huge help. Be sure to get a big enough horse power to pick up the round bales. Look at the different manufacturers, sometimes they offer package deals that can include a trailer. Every once in awhile they offer zero interest.


Usually zero interest for x months is in place of a price discount. If you need to borrow to buy a tractor find out what the cash price is and what a loan would cost at a bank or credit union in case it can save you money versus the dealer/manufacturer's loan. Often there are discounts if you buy a few implements with the tractor. Of course we are talking new sales from a dealer here.

Also, engine HP is NOT the only thing to consider though often that is what people quote when the talk tractors.

Compare Front End Loader lift capacity (Bay's comment). For instance my Compact Mahindra 1533 will lift 1,650 pounds (per specs) to max height at the pins (which of course is not where the weight is so scale back!), a 37 HP Kubota L3902 only 1,131 pounds. Consider PTO HP as well. My 35 HP Mahindra has only 26 PTO HP so I had to get a 5' flail rather than a 6'.  But the Kubota has 30+ PTO HP, it will run a 6' flail of the type I have. The Mahindra 3 point will lift 2,646 at the link arms, the Kubota 1,985. 

And, as you'll always read on tractorbynet.com, a really good dealer is important.


----------



## SageHill

Love our Kubota. Front scoop, box blade/grader, & fork lift. had the mower but it's too hilly here to use it so we sold it.


----------



## WyoLiving

We got our LS tractor as a package deal.  Tractor, front end loader, undermount mower deck and backhoe all in a package deal.  And we added on a front mount snowblower attachment.  DH added a light bar package this spring to help with snow-blowing before sunrise and after sunset - which is when we are home during the winter.
And, it seems that my DH believes that a tractor is as good as the number of attachments that you have for it.  We have front forks, back blade, roto-tiller, box blade, disk, and plow.  I think I am missing some ...
I know he wants to get a brush hog one day, and a thumb for the backhoe on the Kubota.


----------



## Baymule

WyoLiving said:


> We got our LS tractor as a package deal.  Tractor, front end loader, undermount mower deck and backhoe all in a package deal.  And we added on a front mount snowblower attachment.  DH added a light bar package this spring to help with snow-blowing before sunrise and after sunset - which is when we are home during the winter.
> And, it seems that my DH believes that a tractor is as good as the number of attachments that you have for it.  We have front forks, back blade, roto-tiller, box blade, disk, and plow.  I think I am missing some ...
> I know he wants to get a brush hog one day, and a thumb for the backhoe on the Kubota.



Oh, he NEEDS a grapple!!!


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm beginning to feed hay as of today-orchard grass only in case the grass pasture starts looking less appealing than grass hay. It's very dry again. So dry, in fact, that neighbor two miles down the road caught their round baler on fire and now their field is alight and the wind is whipping and the fire spreading. We'll probably be fine, but it's THAT level of dry again. People also burning down the tobacco smoking barns. We got rain at some point in the last week, but it was like...a "decorative" amount. Like fancy dew. The leaves are turning brown and just dropping off the trees before they can turn yellow. The trees say they are done with waiting to regroup their resources and hoping for rain.
It's suddenly cool now. Sept 22nd the temps went down to 70's during the day, 40-50's at night from 90's during the day and 80-70's at night.
Except for one doe that was bred recently, all does large enough are bred. I opted not to try to milk through. I'll be breeding dwarf FF's and the 33% standard mini saanen, and just maybe the standard saanen girls in November, Decemberish, probably not October. Wow, we're just about out of year already.

I'm bringing in a new Nigerian dwarf doe investment out of the line Erudite is from. She should actually milk too and she will get crossed into my "actually milk" dwarves. (I also brought in two bucks from that other line earlier) Nobody here will like them because they are on the larger side of the dwarf standard as far as kid sales go, but I'd rather have no dwarves than does you have to udder up for days if you wanted to show (forget being productive dairy animals). Those are not dairy goats. I need something to make minis from too, I tell myself.

Erudite has been short cycling every 5-7 days and not settling so I called my vet and we are going to do a hard reset on her with a cidr, estrumate, and pg600. Eri is 8, going on 9, but I'd like one more litter if possible, then to keep her in milk as long as I can. I'd love to be on milk test too to record it, but the verification test supervisor issue is still there.

Our first order of chicks come next week.

I hope Barb is doing okay with the hurricane. I hear it's quite a storm.


----------



## SageHill

rachels.haven said:


> I'm beginning to feed hay as of today-orchard grass only in case the grass pasture starts looking less appealing than grass hay. It's very dry again. So dry, in fact, that neighbor two miles down the road caught their round baler on fire and now their field is alight and the wind is whipping and the fire spreading. We'll probably be fine, but it's THAT level of dry again.


Yikes on the dryness.  Totally get that - here we don't have fall we have fire season. Hope the fire is out soon and that your neighbor doesn't lose too much of the field.


----------



## Baymule

Ive been texting Barb, they are ok, the storm didn't hit them.


----------



## frustratedearthmother

Baymule said:


> Ive been texting Barb, they are ok, the storm didn't hit them.


Great news - thanks for the update!


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> Oh, he NEEDS a grapple!!!


I'm sure he does and since there are already hydraulics for the front snowblower, only need to pay for the grapple.


----------



## rachels.haven

Hi,
It frosted Sunday morning, so the goats are locked in the barn due to cyanide formation in Johnson grass.
Then later that day DH took us on a vacation to stay in a cabin in Nathan Bedford Forrest State Park and we left my mother as Goat Master. Great. So I didn't get to go re-designing and perfecting my goat containment system yet. I hope it wasn't too hard or annoying for her. The big killing frost is coming later next week, I think.
One more full day, then we head home on Thursday.
Dryoff for the does needs to be November 12thish. I'll start November 1st. They have to be tired. We've been milking since February/March.
My almost 90 year old grandfather is getting re-married. I may get dragged out again for his wedding, but the goats will be dry then. His wife died almost 2 years ago in November. Sounds like the loneliness got to be too much. Grandpa is a very active guy who is still very much an engineer that likes to tinker and fish and usually keeps himself busy keeping to himself. I'm surprised.
I would not mind being done leaving town over and over.


----------



## rachels.haven

Riker says, "Hi. Lasth night it freethed. The goats are locked up, but they are okay. See? More walking with goats later though. One week after hard frotht. Now I harath Bailey full time. Heh. Heh. Very seriouth joke." (Riker is never silly)


----------



## farmerjan

WOW, Riker is allowing you to touch him and all that now?  Wonderful.


----------



## Baymule

Yay for Riker! Is he finding out that ear rubs and scratches are a good thing? 

I have some serious barn envy, just so you know. Sez the Baymule going into winter with a cow panel and tarp hoop hut and 3 small metal Quonset huts.


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> WOW, Riker is allowing you to touch him and all that now?  Wonderful.


Sort of. If I bring the toddler into the pasture and sit on the ground he can't restrain himself and tries to lick and lick and lick that kid. Other than that I still can't catch him myself. I use my kids to catch that dog except when I get lucky and he  allows it. I was loosening his collar here.



Baymule said:


> Yay for Riker! Is he finding out that ear rubs and scratches are a good thing?
> 
> I have some serious barn envy, just so you know. Sez the Baymule going into winter with a cow panel and tarp hoop hut and 3 small metal Quonset huts.


Oh Baymule, I hope it turns out okay for you this year and you get your pole barn or bigger shelters soon and that this winter is mild down south.


----------



## Baymule

I’m going to fortify the cow panel hoop shelter with pallets to help break the wind. I’ll put them on the sides and back. I didn’t get to it before surgery, but it’s on my radar. Hoop shelter went up for more shade in the summer heat. 

Thanks. I hope we have a mild winter too. This is my set up, two night pens. One for Ringo and his girlfriend, one for the ewes. Big field behind the pens. It’s kinda bare bones, but the best I could do for now. The sheep actually like their little Quonset huts. I guess they have to, it’s all they’ve got. It’s right across the driveway from the house, at least location is convenient for me.


----------



## Baymule

There’s a cow panel hoop with tarp over the round bale too!


----------



## rachels.haven

Looks like a very secure setup. Perfect for breaking in a new piece of property. I wonder if the sheep like the huts because there is just enough space and no extra so they can feel like they are hiding and safe. I'm glad it's working for you and them. Shelter for animals is so hard when you're moving and settling in. So much up in the air and then you hit the ground running and you can't keep up with the move stuff AND building stuff and things. The last couple of places I found myself wishing we could just fast forward to "settled in" and the animals housed to my satisfaction. I hope you reach that soon.


----------



## SageHill

In England they have similar Quonset huts - but they are in the pig pastures. (true)
and now a joke...
Maybe your sheep think they are in "hog heaven" -  sometimes I just can't help that off center sense of humor.


----------



## farmerjan

The type hoop houses that @Baymule  has are actually used alot as  huts for pastured pig operations.  Make good farrowing huts and good shelters for pigs.  They also are heavier so the pigs/hogs can't tear them up like some other stuff.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today I'm beginning the foray into registered guinea hogs. There's a guy 15 minutes away who began his pig adventure this year too and he brought me one of his boars and a sow from a lady he was trading pigs with...so he can have another semi related bloodline NOT 2 hours away. A little pricy and there's no market for registered stock, but if I like something and I want more of it there's a better chance I can reproduce it and add similar animals by following the pedigrees. These pigs are a lot like mom hog and her two offspring from my first batch. I think mom hog is probably pure bred yet unregistered. The barrow and his sisters from my second batch are not friendly and may wind up feeder pigs. Yay, eatie dogs!

Also, it got legit cold this morning. (And my shop flooded through the garage door because we got rain finally)



Feeding dry yearlings.



When recluse spiders take LMAO a little too seriously. The main spider in our cabin is...the brown recluse. Yay. They want to bite and so do their little pieces when you smash them. Smash with a tool quickly and concisely.


----------



## Baymule

Congratulations on the new pigs, I’m sure they will get friendly. Food is a motivator. 

Flooded the shop? Bummer. Can y’all divert the water away from the door?  Trench, ditch, concrete short wall? 

Spiders in the house? Call the exterminator!


----------



## rachels.haven

Exterminator is on the list for next fall. They come in late and I may have missed our boat this year. Our exterior walls are all full of nooks and crannies for them, in and out and there's no way we could get them all. I did not know about these guys and was unprepared, but i'm ready now.  I may still get someone to come out when the chicks are out of the house so nothing hurts them. We've been brooding naked necks and production chicks and they're almost ready to go outside.

The shop, at least at this point, is manageable. I installed a dehumidifier earlier and the puddle is just a damp spot on the concrete now. The thing is doing it's job. I'll work on the trench later. I may have clogged it.

Life is all in all pretty good. After all we've been through I can handle a little flooding and a little army of spiders. (Still dealing with son#1's anxiety issues, but his pediatrician has sent him to Vanderbilt to see a specialist or two so we should someday work through it)


----------



## Mini Horses

I almost bought a few young AGHs yesterday but, stopped myself!!  

The ones I had a few yrs back were amazing!  They had a large field area, with huts and a big carport for shelters.  When it came close to farrowing, one used a hut and piled hay/straw unbelievably.  The other made a cave under the carport with branches, straw, weeds, leaves....a real masterpiece!  I was quite impressed.  

Excellent mom's and adorable babes. 🤗. I had raised mom's from babies so they were tame and belly rub lovers.  Those will tame.  I started with scratches when feeding.


----------



## rachels.haven

Mini Horses said:


> I almost bought a few young AGHs yesterday but, stopped myself!!
> 
> The ones I had a few yrs back were amazing!  They had a large field area, with huts and a big carport for shelters.  When it came close to farrowing, one used a hut and piled hay/straw unbelievably.  The other made a cave under the carport with branches, straw, weeds, leaves....a real masterpiece!  I was quite impressed.
> 
> Excellent mom's and adorable babes. 🤗. I had raised mom's from babies so they were tame and belly rub lovers.  Those will tame.  I started with scratches when feeding.


That's a great idea!

I am hereby enabling you to get more AGH.

My dad wants to drive two hours and pick up a Mieshan/Kune cross gilt for crossbreeding purposes (they're in with the purebred moms and MAN, are they cool looking), but other than that, we're going to be AGH all the way. I really love these things.


----------



## Bruce

Baymule said:


> Spiders in the house? Call the exterminator!


Not just spiders, DANGEROUS POISONOUS SPIDERS!


----------



## Ridgetop

Baymule said:


> Bailey is a super great guardian. Just a little quirky about pigs.


Not all LGDs will guard or tolerate hogs.  Many consider hogs as predators.  Which in the southern states is what hogs are.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ridgetop said:


> Not all LGDs will guard or tolerate hogs.  Many consider hogs as predators.  Which in the southern states is what hogs are.


I wish she were thinking she was guarding. Unfortunately it's mainly whenever they shuffle and root too close to the fence, then she goes crazy on them, biting, barking, and snarling through the panel, sometimes making contact and ripping at their ears...then when they get back she puts her face or foot in and pulls out whatever they were snuffling and eats it-poo, rocks, mud. She's become very food aggressive as she's gotten older to the point she will try to go from pushy to escalate towards going crazy on me if I don't stop trimming completely and really enforce things while I'm trimming hooves even if she's on the other side of a fence (see, I'm not completely dense, never get in the way of a big dog with a one track food mind). This last time I've decided it will be better to just put her away out of sight and earshot when I trim. I'm probably going to have to lock her up when I feed and when all the goats are scarfing right after the hay feeders being topped off with new hay too. The other day she tried to prevent the goats from eating hay and she will 100% eat things she's not supposed to eat like oodles of alfalfa pellets and beet pulp pellets until she gets the runs just so she can prevent the goats from getting any. I'm not sure mouthfuls of hay will go through okay. If she keeps up I'd think it could cause an impaction/gut obstruction, or bloat.
And this dog is still fat and getting plenty to eat-less fat than before because her belly isn't below her knees and she can walk for more than five minutes at a time but she still has a droopy belly, good luck finding her ribs, neck fatter than her head so collars are kind of a loss, kushy, kushy, kushy. Not a starving dog. She just seems to think she just has to eat ALL of everyone else's food to the point it's stupid.

So she's a little crotchety and screwy. Other than that, great dog, as long as there's no food involved. I'm guessing it's age related, (although she's only 6-7?).

On the other hand, Riker's been picking up weight and growing in hair great though since I switched his food to Inuckshuck Marine/Purina Sensitive Skin and Stomach and started soaking it (insert complaint of choice about price here, any of them will do...). I'm feeding him as much as he'll eat now, separated far from the above dog of course. And suddenly he's MUCH taller and longer than Bailey. He still thinks he's a small dog though and I wouldn't mind if he put on another 50 pounds of weight and width but I'm not worried about him anymore diet-wise. He'd better not be allergic to birds though because he's moved onto flat out hunting and eating them as if he's a giant cat.

LGD's appear to be a little odd.

Yes, no pigs for Bailey.


----------



## Baymule

I’m laughing! Bailey is such a screwball! She reminds me of my Paris, another screwball. Bailey is more than food aggressive. She is flat out food insane! I’m laughing, picturing Bailey going into total meltdown over goats eating and she’s not. 

Riker sounds like he’s making progress, that’s good news about his food allergies. I had a dog that ate birds. He’d leap in the air and snap them up. Riker is catching his own dog treats!


----------



## rachels.haven

This morning I woke up after an all night morning (still going on) to one of my project saanen doelings in heat so after chores I went and got my box and attempted my first AI. She was just past standing with all signs saying it was the right time and everything went textbook and was very easy on all parties involved. The doe enjoyed extra breakfast and didn't mind anything as long as I didn't try to put her back with the dwarf buck that couldn't reach her and as a result was being very rough and mean/frustrated. Any resulting kids will be DNAed, but I think I'm going to get some more straws. I have plenty of lamancha, but I'd like more dwarf straws, and Dan's nubian is still here and her buckling counterpart may wind up at some point sold since he only has one doe to breed. He's sweet though, so as long as he stays that way and can settle her he can take up space and hay in the buck pen for now.

bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb            cccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccccnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

And Shaun says today's he is two.Thankfully he did not help and is instead enjoying leftover blackeyed peas and turnip greens from Thanksgiving.


----------



## farmerjan

Congrats on the AI breeding.  Although I have done hundreds of cows over the years, I would not have the slightest clue how to do a goat... I am sure you do not go in like to do a cow.... 

2... can't believe the youngest is that old already... I remember when you "sprung it on us" that you had a 3rd child..... 
Hope you had a nice Thanksgiving... think of all that you have gone through in the past couple years... bet you are so thankful to be away from the crazy Mass nuts..... how are the 2 older boys doing?  Dangerous Dan still his "wound up self" ?  Aiden ???  How is your husbands' sight situation?  
I know you are flat out busy with the growing up family but miss your frequent posts.


----------



## Baymule

Second to congratulate you on the AI breeding! And I miss your posts too.


----------



## Finnie

Happy birthday, Shaun!


----------



## Bruce

Happy belated birthday Shaun!!


----------



## rachels.haven

I'm sorry about going missing. Life has mostly slowed down so there's not much to write about.
The loss of visual acuity Mark had been experiencing dissipated like clouds after a rain over the course of a few weeks after changing meds. He was on a generic (as per insurance's iron will) of a medication called Travaprost and Travaprost has much more of a preservative in it that causes basically clouding and yellowing of the eye. Kind of a cruel joke to take people going blind from glaucoma and try to force them to take a med that makes them go blind from a preservative chewing up their eyes. We now pay out of pocket for name brand and it's not cheap-grossly overpriced-but it's worth it. I'd sell the goats before letting that man suffer like that. He passed his driver's test and I'm considerably less concerned about him driving at night (that's still my wifely duty though, as per my decree).

Dan has 0% slowed down and still seems to take apart and/or break apart everything he touches and is into everything. And still wants a cow. I'll let you know if that ever changes. He also brings home all the sicknesses. He and his classmates must be running around licking doorknobs or something.

Aiden is going to a neurologist this week for his issues. Or we will all start having issues.

Today I worked 11 of the does on a new trimming stand I got. I took blood by my self (DH asked me to fire him as the yearly goat holder and he had me get the stand), did feet, bose, cdt, and I forgot to bolus everybody. We seem to be doing okay though. Only a few have showed signs of copper deficiency on our current mineral and soil, and they were treated as needed. Dan's nubian is a pill. She should kid this year. yay. More working with Spot the Noober, aka, the 200 lbs sack of lead that will bite your back and butt when she's not laying on the ground to avoid going anywhere. 12 more does to do tomorrow and I'll ship the samples monday.

I'm certifying to do OS40 this week for the does that do kid.

Eri, the 8 year old ND goat did not settle this year, poor dear. I'm giving up.

I did get a few more special dwarves for my master plans. Very selectively picked dwarves, and so far I am not disappointed in their temperament.

I'm so happy the no longer baby, now toddler is 2! We're on the path for a little more emotional independence. He hasn't gotten the hang of talking yet, but "says" the words without closing his mouth. Not sure what the deal is with that, but he's getting out enough everyone understands him, which might be why his talking has only progressed that far. Thank you for the birthday wishes! My parents had us all go out to pizza ranch to celebrate his and his aunt's respective day apart birthdays today and he enjoyed the outing by jumping up and down in the booth the whole time, playing over the seat with Grandma and Grandpa, who just enjoy being quietly silly.

We are building pig forts so they can live in their new electric fenced pens and not in my goat barn. I'm also probably going to be adding a mieshan/kune cross gilt to our pen as an experiment. The moms are cool looking. Worst case, if she grows up skittish or mean she will be a fancy feeder pig. The two registered AGH pigs I got had their papers arrive and are friendliying up. Mr. 37 is skittish, but for a boar that's probably okay. My unregistered guy is up for sale even though is temperament and legs are superior and he's everything I think an AGH should be except he's going to be related to 2/3 of our AGH sows. Honestly you can work with that boar barefoot and in shorts if you want to, he's so calm and laid back (and not too food driven yet fat on air). I hope someone buys him. I'd like all my pigs to be like him, just not that inbred. 

Kidding starts around January 9th, so hold on!


----------



## Baymule

That is wonderful news on your husband’s sight. Insurance companies hate people. I’ve reached that conclusion through wrangling with their indifference, throughout my life. Car, home, life, but the worst is health. Too bad that the insurance won’t cover the medication that actually works. But at least y’all figured out the side effects and got the right medication for Mark. 

A cow. Maybe the doe kidding will take Dan’s mind off a cow-somewhat. 

A new trimming stand will sure help with working the goats. I got my sheep working equipment here a couple of weeks ago from my sons house, then Thanksgiving, with 9 people coming to spend the weekend and a few more for the day, but Cousin Covid showed up and I had to cancel everything. Thanksgiving sucked. Covid only lasted a couple of days but I had to do the responsible thing and quarantine myself for what basically amounted to a head cold. Anyway, I’m hoping to get it set up soon and start working sheep. Poor sheep haven’t been properly worked in over a year. A few have terrible feet. I have a milking stanchion that they hate. I think it’s the open expanded metal. I’ll have to ponder on that, sure makes trimming feet easier. 

Your pig journey should be rewarding. Never had AGH, but everyone who goes, loves them.


----------



## farmerjan

I am so very glad to read about your husbands sight getting better by getting him the medication he needs.  That is so great.  
God Bless Dan with his cow obsession.... 
Hope that things get worked out with Aiden's attention issues.... 

@Baymule , sheep do not like any footing that is not solid beneath them.  If nothing else, cut a piece of plywood to use on top of the metal grating in the milking stand. Or get a stall mat, like for horse trailers, and put it on there.  It will give them better traction also.


----------



## Finnie

Wonderful news about the better eye medication!


----------



## Baymule

@farmerjan  the sheep really don’t like see through flooring. I’ve been rolling it in my head on building a wood stanchion. They can step off the sides of the milking stanchion I have. I’m thinking of solid sides with drop down hinges. I have to get my equipment set up and get started on my sheep.


----------



## Bruce

Can the doctor prescribe the brand name drug specifically with a note to the insurance company that the generic was causing health problems, specifically the kind of problem the drug is being taken for? 

I had to have my doctor prescribe a drug as capsules because the insurance company wouldn't pay for the SAME DRUG as pills. Makes no freaking sense.

I know the companies want to go the cheapest route possible but from what I've seen in the paperwork I get there are tiers of drugs, higher tiers cost more, but the insurance company could pay at least part of the brand name drug and you would pay less than out of pocket retail.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Can the doctor prescribe the brand name drug specifically with a note to the insurance company that the generic was causing health problems, specifically the kind of problem the drug is being taken for?
> 
> I had to have my doctor prescribe a drug as capsules because the insurance company wouldn't pay for the SAME DRUG as pills. Makes no freaking sense.
> 
> I know the companies want to go the cheapest route possible but from what I've seen in the paperwork I get there are tiers of drugs, higher tiers cost more, but the insurance company could pay at least part of the brand name drug and you would pay less than out of pocket retail.


We tried that. Insurance company decided we needed multiple letters approving him for the generic over and over and over. We also had the doctor call them himself. No dice.


----------



## Baymule

Insurance-necessary evil.


----------



## rachels.haven

Baymule said:


> Insurance-necessary evil.


Protection money.


----------



## rachels.haven

Today one of my lamancha bucklings decided we needed to spend some time with the vet. So he opted to get Goat Polio. Here's some footage. He's currently still shaky on his feet, but he's up and eating and is hopefully on the mend many pokes later (and many more to go).













Sorry about the breathing in the first one. Not a fun surprise.


----------



## rachels.haven

We mostly only have nice bucks now. One of the lamancha bucklings I brought in turned into a courter of people and I got tired of trimming his hooves, cleaning hay feeders or water troughs et c with him blubbering, courting, pawing and trying to jump me...so I sold him to someone getting started in lamanchas with full disclosure for 12 giant pumpkins. They are already lining up $100 stud servicing because his pedigree is so nice. And I don't care because life is too short for crappy male goat behavior. 
The nubian head butts randomly if he can get behind you (or another goat, or the hay feeder, or a post, or the gate...), so he may be going soon too but he's so dense I'm still trying to get my head around it...
I miss having a big, dignified, older standard buck around. I almost bought one, but his biosecurity testing wouldn't get back in time for transport. He sold to the next person the day I backed out of the sale he was so nice.
Sad, but I don't want to bring anything in.

I've been advised by other people who own lucky*star's bucks to get my buck collected. The genetics are good enough I'll probably be using them again and again over a long, long time and people always want to buy them if you advertise apparently. Maybe someday soon I can get Sweet Pete and the dwarf bucks I brought in this year collected so I can put straws in the tank.


----------



## Baymule

Poor little buck. I hope he makes a full recovery.


----------



## SageHill

EEGADS -- poor guy. Never a dull moment - and that's one heck of a moment. Hope it ends well.


----------



## rachels.haven

Yes! This morning this is how he was.






Still wobbly, but vast improvements. If he keeps it up with no surprise swan dives he'll be okay.


----------



## Bruce

Dare I ask how a goat gets polio? And (thankfully) only one goat gets it?

I'm glad he's looking better.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Dare I ask how a goat gets polio? And (thankfully) only one goat gets it?
> 
> I'm glad he's looking better.


Disruption of the rumen causes it. Goats make thiamine as they ruminate. Goat polio is thiamine deficiency. Causes brain swelling. I dumped the alfalfa feeder to clean it out after a few days of rain and for some reason Kai and the other youngest bucks decided to have a nasty hay eating contest and I guess he "won" and got sick. Idk if anyone else will get anything but it's not contagious. The doofy thing is that they had a full feeder of fresh, dry, not rotted hay 5 feet from the hay feeder cleanings, but no. They had to be tidy and eat everything on the ground. More evidence goats shouldn't "clean it up" when it comes to hay and feed on the ground. The feeder is in their shelter now....


----------



## Baymule

Any other time, goats would run from dirty hay, screaming their lungs out.


----------



## farmerjan

Wow, looks much improved.  Didn't know anything about "goat polio"..... interesting.


----------



## rachels.haven

Soggy day. We're sick again, so let's just tell story in pictures.








That pool was dumped the night before and not refilled by the hose


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

The day before, also in the rain.


----------



## farmerjan

Wow, so sorry you have gotten so much rain at this time of the year....
Are those japanese beetle grubs?


----------



## rachels.haven




----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> Wow, so sorry you have gotten so much rain at this time of the year....
> Are those japanese beetle grubs?


Idk. I should look it up. They are Muscovy food now. It's ducks eat free day.


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> Wow, so sorry you have gotten so much rain at this time of the year....
> Are those japanese beetle grubs?


It looks like they may be, except these did not have the legs half way down their bodies, just the grabby front ones. Maybe a younger stage?


----------



## SageHill

rachels.haven said:


> View attachment 94911
> View attachment 94912
> 
> View attachment 94913
> 
> View attachment 94914


Happy chooks! Fresh grubs!


----------



## SageHill

SageHill said:


> Happy chooks! Fresh grubs!


I gave mine 2 pans of them - but I dug them out of the garden. No rain here. You got a ton of rain - we would’ve washed into the ocean with that much. 
Hope everyone feels better soon.


----------



## Baymule

I’m sorry y’all are sick. Being sick and having farm chores is no fun. Being sick and doing farm chores in flooding rain is just a PITA.


----------



## rachels.haven

Thank you all. Personally I am not sick yet (don't know why other than just blessed, I've had a surplus of exposure). But with all the running around fussing over every one I may as well be at this point. We're getting by though, gosh darn it!
The weather plans on raining for two more days straight then letting us have a few more dry ones. Welcome to the TN rainy season. I actually think this is more normal, but the dry conditions we had this year were not. There is a rainy and dry season, but there should be more rain than there was this summer. I kind of hope we get enough. Everything is doing okay here.



The unregistered boar that is pending pickup and the only pig lower than him on the pecking order (the barrow). In some grass hay that came baled into our alfalfa hay that looks suspiciously like johnson that my hay lady assured me was orchard, lol. And the grass half is very dusty, so the pigs get it. I might be looking for another hay supplier over that one, but we'll see. Sometimes Johnsongrass is deadly toxic and you need to be mindful of that when feeding, and NOT assuming it's orchard grass.


----------



## farmerjan

Orchard grass is very grassy looking.  Johnson grass is much wider blades... think more along the lines of immature corn leaves... more stalky.....it is very obvious in the orchard grass hay we make at one place... We have had to spray for it a couple of times as it is along one edge of the field along the road and it creeps into the field.... mostly we roll the outside 2 windrows (which is 4 mown rows since I rake 2 together) to feed to the cattle and then have more pure orchard grass to sq bale.  It could be immature johnson grass ... not enough "closeup" in the picture for me to make an educated guess.  Unless the johnson grass was severely drought stressed, it won't hurt the goats.... but again, I know you were somewhat dry this year so don't know.


----------



## rachels.haven

farmerjan said:


> Orchard grass is very grassy looking.  Johnson grass is much wider blades... think more along the lines of immature corn leaves... more stalky.....it is very obvious in the orchard grass hay we make at one place... We have had to spray for it a couple of times as it is along one edge of the field along the road and it creeps into the field.... mostly we roll the outside 2 windrows (which is 4 mown rows since I rake 2 together) to feed to the cattle and then have more pure orchard grass to sq bale.  It could be immature johnson grass ... not enough "closeup" in the picture for me to make an educated guess.  Unless the johnson grass was severely drought stressed, it won't hurt the goats.... but again, I know you were somewhat dry this year so don't know.


It's leafy with Johnsongrass seed heads. I wish it were orchard. I may not have minded it if it were baled at the right time and not a little moldy...but it's still only a small portion of the hay, so the jury is still out o if we'll go with them next year. They have a skid steer and can bring 300-600 bales at a time, which is around what we need so I've used these people twice now. It was also a terrible year for anything but Johnson and crabgrass so I may try one more year with them if no promising leads come up on their own.


----------



## Finnie

rachels.haven said:


> The day before, also in the rain.
> View attachment 94915
> 
> View attachment 94919
> View attachment 94920
> 
> View attachment 94916
> View attachment 94921
> 
> View attachment 94917
> 
> View attachment 94918


I see rabbit cages! Are you getting back into rabbits?


----------



## rachels.haven

Finnie said:


> I see rabbit cages! Are you getting back into rabbits?


No, those were for the quail. I never got them retrofitted though. I found a friend that lives on what they process including their rabbit and the row cages will be going there. The 9 hole monster rabbit condo will be going to my dad. I didnt like having quail attracting flies that live and breed in the milk room, so we're going chicken and duck again. That's the end of that adventure and I'm okay with that.


----------



## Baymule

Very kind of you to give cages to the friend that eats what they raise. I’m sure your DD is happy with the giant cage too!


----------



## rachels.haven

Merry Christmas!
Out of town co-eisiting with inlaws, but the cold is everywhere. My animals have heated waterers, shelter, and lots of food under the care of my plans and my mom and dad. It got down to -9 in Springfield, and -10 on the road where we were driving.

Sixteen days until kidding. Looks like the highs will be back in the 60's...lol.


----------



## Finnie

Merry Christmas, Rachel! 🎄


----------



## farmerjan

Merry Christmas from the COLD and ICY mountains of VA.... -3 this morning... only got up to 17 today ans till breezy so the sun didn't feel warm....
Have as nice a Christmas as possible with the in-laws and kids... and come on back home.... "down south", as soon as you can...


----------



## Baymule

Hope your Christmas Day was a good one. It’s warming up, be safe driving home!


----------



## rachels.haven

This dirty trough was empty and waiting to be cleaned out last night. Thanks, Rain.





Jack cheese all done.





Dropping.


----------



## rachels.haven

A bucky, hopefully pregnant doe.












Hi! I still have three lamanchas due on the 9th. It's raining again. The poor winter wheat took a sub zero hit over Christmas and the fields aren't very green anymore and able to enjoy the rain, but maybe the ground water will benefit. It's rained every day since we got back to one degree or another, and it's warm. Go figure. That's why we grow winter wheat here, I guess.

I had to de duck because the geese decided to get killy on them. And I need the geese to repel hawks and the chronically offended geese do not bother much with the chickens so it was a no brainer. I guess I can trick out the coop for just chickens now. The geese don't get locked in and stay out of the coop. Time for a small automatic chicken door and chicken specific waterers and feeders in there with a dish or two and a pool outside for the honkers. I'd like to invest in some roll out nest boxes at some point, I think.
We got sick a bunch again, curtailing productivity, but we'll get back on it again.

Dipping into the cheese fridge now. The jack cheese is pretty good.


----------



## rachels.haven

Btw, I learned how to watermark stuff and use it to cover goat bums so DH won't complain, lol. Those pics are from my fb page. My local area is also having scammer issues, so it's probably past time for the watermark. 😐


----------



## rachels.haven

I also added two Nubian does with very nice pedigrees. I wanted to make sure all Nubians we're like Dan's pain in the butt, Spot the Galaxy. They are better than her. They will stay. I wish Dan would negotiate on Spot with me. 

They are kind of slight and may have been freshened last year a little on the small side-one was 100 lbs, one was 120 when they arrived. I'd like to see them both over 120 if possible before I breed them again. Mom could not keep milking over the ice and cold snap while I was gone, so they will be getting a dry year, not a milk through. I'm just glad mom was able to slide into my place every day and take care of things at all.

My AI doe came into heat at about 36 days.  Darn. Guess that pregnancy wasn't viable. Next time I'm keeping mouth shut until 60 days.


----------



## Mini Horses

Gotta say, the dog has a very disgusted look on his face 😁. I would too, looking at the water, etc.  I think you need to watermark that trough . Yeah, protect that.....


----------



## rachels.haven

Lol, no, that one's probably safe. Plus, Riker might want to use that somewhere himself. He and his massive underbite want to apply to work somewhere drier and colder...never mind that it hit 73 degrees today. Poor Riker.


----------



## Bruce

Cheese and goats look good, mud not so much.


----------



## rachels.haven

Bruce said:


> Cheese and goats look good, mud not so much.


It might be muddy, but it's been in the 50's, 60's, and 70's since we got back. This is the first morning we frosted since the big cold and blizzard here. I'll take it.


----------



## farmerjan

The cold is headed east from you direction... back to 20's and 30's at night and 40's days... tonight is supposed to drop to low 30's.... last night was 44 lowest temp.  And we were lucky for the wet to stay west of here and some traveled more  to the south and east... but even what came over was very sparse... sprinkles barely.


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> Goat polio is thiamine deficiency.


I was going to suggest you give large doses of thiamine.  We had an older Nubian doe die from this and later found out about lack of thiamine causing this.  The vet thought she might have tetanus and was treatig her with antibiotics instead of thiamine.


----------



## Ridgetop

rachels.haven said:


> I've been advised by other people who own lucky*star's bucks to get my buck collected. The genetics are good enough I'll probably be using them again and again over a long, long time and people always want to buy them if you advertise apparently.


Definitely have him collected and stored.  We had several Lucky Star bucks and does, as well as semen in our tank from a dead buck that was known for high milk yield and beautiful offspring.  Sadly the tank failed.   But Lucky Star is the premium breeder no doubt about it.  If we ever decided to go into dairy goats again, I would buy Lucky Star does and bucks to start off a herd.


----------



## rachels.haven

Ridgetop said:


> Definitely have him collected and stored.  We had several Lucky Star bucks and does, as well as semen in our tank from a dead buck that was known for high milk yield and beautiful offspring.  Sadly the tank failed.   But Lucky Star is the premium breeder no doubt about it.  If we ever decided to go into dairy goats again, I would buy Lucky Star does and bucks to start off a herd.


I don't know if I included this info, but recently I became aware that a lot of good dairy goat breeders are using "Triple W genetics" for collections. Turns out they live 20 minutes down the road from me, and while they don't sell dairy goat semen, I can make an appointment with them and they will collect and process semen from my bucks and leave me with straws in the tank for not too much and apparently they are high quality, So as soon as I decide who I'll be collecting, I'll make an appointment for around the start of rut before they start traveling and hopefully that will be that.


----------



## rachels.haven

This week's forecast while I still wait for baby goats. Not too shabby.


----------

