rachels.haven's Journal

[rachels.haven]

I like his bone - although that might be his heavier coat. Still very dairy even with heavier bone.

Yeah, it's been two months since I shaved him naked. He could not keep cool. The Yak Factor is strong with this one. Yak feet and legs too and now he's getting ripped for rut.

 

[Baymule]

I’m so used to seeing shaved, svelte goats, that when I see a hairy one, it looks like a different species.

 

[Ridgetop]

Usually only the Swiss breeds get that hairy during the winter. Nubians and LaManchas usually carry thinner coats, jist getting hairy around the belly, udder, mane on bucks, and legs.

 

[rachels.haven]

The Lamancha standard says they should have short, sleek coats, but they are shown and appraised shaved typically so it's really anything goes. They should probably take that part out of the standard unless they make us show our goats natural like Guernseys and dinging us for it. A lot of the older, heartier types have THICK yak coats. I like them hairy better but I won't select one way or another unless they start enforcing it because other points of conformation and production are more important to me. The bone and width while maintaining length of body and good udder/production is what this buck has. His feet are decent too, which some old style lamanchas do not have.

Most of my does have short coats. It seems to be more dominant. Convenient for the breed standard. I guess convenient for me since I'm not going to discriminate against the fuzzies.

 

[HomeOnTheRange]

I’m so used to seeing shaved, ..., that when I see a hairy one, it looks like a different species.

I feel the same way!

 

[rachels.haven]

*Frustrated*
Today we worked on the electric fence to take the current up from 1.4. It didn't go so well. Feeling less like an engineer and more like...crazy.
We tried to take all the current out of the low tensile wires and put it only in the poly wire so we could shrink the pasture, decrease the load, and up the voltage. The lead and ground wire have now been replaced by us. I installed a loooooooong copper ground rod and chained it into the existing ground rod with new wire specifically for the purpose and removed all the other wires from previous fence workers. We cut off all the connections between the low tensile wires and attached the one under gate wire to the poly wire too.

End result is that the top low tensile wire STILLLLLLLLLL (yes, I'm that confused and frustrated) carries a charge of 4k volts. It's connected to ONLY the posts. No jumper wires and no errant polywire are touching it. The wires that aren't supposed to be live and are stapled to posts carry a charge of 1.4k volts. The tension wire carries a charge. The welded wire on the gate that I installed carries a charge of 1.4k volts (touches no wires of any kind). The middle wire carries a charge of 3 volts. And the poly wire I attached with knob insulators and the electric net we used to cut the pasture in third carry a charge of 4-5. This is why I was getting shocked while filling the water trough and when I touch the gate especially in the rain. Why oh why would the posts in the front of the pasture be electrified and carry a charge if no live wires are supposedly touching them? And wire that had no live wires touching it carry that much charge?

Disconnected from anything the Energizer puts out 9k volts. That would hold them if the voltage would stay in the wires.

I think where I'm at now puts my goats safely enough contained because they're not fence testers and they are used to electric, but clearly there are factors here I'm not taking into account and there's always that risk.

So now I've got a migraine from working in the sun all day, and I may have accidently broken something in my hand when I tried to put on a big fake scary, dramatic display to put the fear of (Rachel) in Riker's heart when he tried to hog the grain and scatter the goats when I was moving them...but I worked on the buck solar electric net fence this morning and brought their fence up into 6-7k volts, so that's done. And the doe pen is probably fine enough and smaller. And fewer variables but clearly not few enough. Riker will stay in and like I said my goats just want to eat alfalfa, chew cud, and have enough room to do a little walking but mostly stay by their shelter.


We signed a contract with a very experienced woven wire fence company to put in woven wire and they say the date is sometime in September. I wish it was yesterday.

This means the whole top wire around the pasture side of our property including the over grown bit is still energized because I can't figure out why the insulated top wire and posts are carrying charge.

Maybe I'll check it tomorrow and everything will make sense again.

I told Mark this fence did not make sense the way it worked. Today we quantified that together.

Crazy, crazy, crazy fence. Clearly I'm being blessed that the goats are still contained because this whole thing is not making sense logically. If I were made of money and time I'd get more electric net, but I'm so not right now, so I'm looking forward to September!

 

[Mini Horses]

As another electrified wire nut case....I've had some strange issues. One was a little black insulator, nailed to post that held the wire fence up and a spot of damage on the plastic insulator that allowed the wire wrapped around it to send a jolt to the nail that was touching the wire fence behind it. Yeah, look beyond ..... Easiest fix was pulling the dead black snake off a wire

 

[farmerjan]

Question.... are there any high electric wires running across the property??? Like transmission lines of any kind???? They will actually electrify the air enough for it to settle on/in wire fencing... Had a dairy that ran one strand of high tensile fence... no electric on it... and it would give you a real buzz from the electric transmission overhead lines...
If that is a possibility, any fence you build can carry a charge on it even with wood posts sunk in the ground... Just a remote possibility.
Otherwise, there is some sort of hidden attachement... a buried wire that the years of neglect to the fences has been totally buried in the ground, and is picking up a charge out of the ground....an old T-post that might be "grounded" and it is carrying some charge...
If the fences are totally replaced... use wood posts... it will add to the cost.... BEFORE you actually have them tear out old fence... SHOW this fence builder what you are seeing... maybe they have some idea.... OR call your extension agent and see if they have an agent that come out and check it out... WE pay their salary... let them earn it....

 

[farmerjan]

As @Mini Horses said... could very well be a faulty insulator somewhere, that is allowing the charge to travel.... stranger things have happened.

 

[rachels.haven]

Went back out with fresh eyes and found one place I tied into the fence with polywire that I hadn't cut. That reduced the top wire to .5 to 2, varying. The middle wire is a mystery. It's still 4. I suspect someone did something shifty at some point to the first two posts by the gate and had enough power going through the fence so it worked without insulators. There's remnants of very thin wire pressed into the posts with pieces going to every strand. I'm going to talk to the people we're hiring to do our fence and ask why the fence is like this and what we can do about the conductivity/bleeding. This fence has seen things.