ELeVan ~ Honaker Farm Journal

[elevan]

You'd never be able to ride this one. She's over 20 years old and has never been broke to ride. It's not for lack of trying though. We had professionals give up on her. I fractured my hip when I was 16 because of that dang horse.

 

[Dreaming Of Goats]

You'd never be able to ride this one. She's over 20 years old and has never been broke to ride. It's not for lack of trying though. We had professionals give up on her. I fractured my hip when I was 16 because of that dang horse.

oh wow!!!! At least she has a nice home to retire to

 

[elevan]

Tonight when I went out to close the chickens in, my eye caught a speck of white out by the pond. It was pretty much dark at this time. Since the ducks are black and grey I thought I'd better go look. I'm really glad I did, as it was Darling one of our polish chickens. She was just settled down out in the open ready to sleep. Crazy girl! She must have gotten confused when darkness fell tonight (it got dark pretty quick). I picked her up and carried her to the coop.

DH is off work the next 2 days so I've got some projects lined up

I think we've gone as long as we should without bedding down the barn for the goats. We'll lime the floors and lay down some shavings topped by some straw.

We also need to prepare the old chicken and turkey coops to be able to house goats for the winter. So they'll need a good cleaning and some fresh bedding. We should be able to get Snickers and Lilly separated for breeding tomorrow, I think. They'll be housed in the old turkey coop. Diva and Kingston will be housed in the old chicken coop but it needs a temporary fence put up before they can go into it. Once Kingston and Diva move into their quarters then I'll be able to move the rest of the group into their winter housing situations.

We also need to prepare for a hay delivery.

And the guinea fowl is back on the menu for tomorrow

 

[elevan]

Making some breeding plans...does will be placed with bucks over late fall - winter. This hand breeding isn't working as I had hoped...so we're going to go back to pasture breeding. I'm gonna split the herd into 4 groups....3 breeding groups and 1 non-breeding group.

Group 1: Non-breeding
Miss Diva - she is too young and too small to breed yet.
Kingston - wether
Rocky - wether


Group 2: Breeding Pygmy
Speedy - buck
Goldie - never freshened on our farm
Elsie - 4 yrs old and never freshened


Group 3: Breeding F1 Pygerian
Ranger - buck
Daisy - If she doesn't kid early Dec
Maggie - yearling 1st timer


Group 4: Breeding - Is he ready?
Snickers - buck
Lilly - If she doesn't kid mid Nov.

Bringing this plan back into play. Group 4 should be together on 11/16.

 

[redtailgal]

Well, its good to see someone has their ducks in a row, lol.

I am still trying to get re-organized.

 

[Squirrelgirl88]

Well, its good to see someone has their ducks in a row, lol.

She may have her ducks in a row, but her Polish is missing, and her guineas are loose!



Sorry, couldn't resist.

 

[daisychick]

 

[jodief100]

Well, its good to see someone has their ducks in a row, lol.

I am still trying to get re-organized.

Same here. I haven't got any ducks to get in a row but the chickens are all lined up. I think I am missing a guinea. I haven't had the chance to count but Snowey (LGD) has guinea feathers in her nest. She has a cave under the hay rack she likes to sleep in and hide in during thunder storms.

 

[elevan]

Well, its good to see someone has their ducks in a row, lol.

I am still trying to get re-organized.

Same here. I haven't got any ducks to get in a row but the chickens are all lined up. I think I am missing a guinea. I haven't had the chance to count but Snowey (LGD) has guinea feathers in her nest. She has a cave under the hay rack she likes to sleep in and hide in during thunder storms.

My guineas are shedding tons of feathers right now, I'm surprised they aren't naked by now. Hopefully it's just shed feathers and your LGD didn't have a snack.

 

[elevan]

A minor tragedy struck our small farm last night. We check on our quail trio every afternoon. DH wondered why they were so quiet this morning and when he got to their cage he found out why. All 3 lay dead on the cage floor missing their legs and beaks!

The cage had not been breeched and it is 1/2" hardware cloth all around. Only guess is a coon was able to get a finger or 2 in and pull through their legs as they often slept on the cage floor even though they had a platform to sleep on. What a horrible death!

We're very upset as these were our breeders

DH buried 2 of them and the third we kept to use as bait for a trap. We hope to catch the culprit tonight.


On a better note we were able to get the first goat breeding pen set up and Snickers and Lilly are there now. Timing on this was perfect as she started showing signs of heat this morning and had been teasing Snickers at the fence.