It's been a while since I've posted a blog. There are a few reasons for this. One is that I have been freakishly busy with all my new goat responsibilities. You would not believe how much longer my chores take me now that I have bottle babies! It went from taking 10 minutes in the mornings before work to feed and water the goats to 45 minutes to an hour by the time I wash all my milking stuff and get it around (heaven forbid I should do this before hand), gather all the feed dishes, segregate Harmony and her babies in one stall, Tierra's girls in the other, and lock Tierra in the main part of the barn while I feed the other lunatics and then go in and milk Tierra, pour the milk directly into bottles, then go feed the warm milk to her babies. Because Tierra does many things, but nursing her own children is not one of them. As we all know. Then of course I still have to feed and water the chickens and let them out for the day. So now I'm setting my alarm for 6 a.m. so I can have the privilege of getting my chores done before I have to run off to work. And then I get to do it all over again just before I go to bed and am tired and just want to curl up in bed with a good book. Am I complaining? Maybe a little. Perhaps I'd feel differently if I were swimming in goat milk and able to get a little cheese action going on up in this place. But as it is, not only are the babies drinking it all but I'm having to supplement with milk replacer because she's only giving me enough for 2 and I have 3 hungry mouths to feed. The time has come that I could start separating Harmony's babies from her at night and milking her once a day in the mornings, but honestly... I cannot bear to sign up for one more responsibility right now that might further lengthen my chores.
I said I haven't posted lately for a few reasons, didn't I? Well, I received an email recently from somebody I know saying that they would like me to remove them from the blog update because they "cannot keep up" and to have a nice life. !!! So then of course I was left wondering if I'm driving people nuts with my blogging and have felt a little weird about posting since then. But honestly, if she didn't want to read them she could have done many things, including a) not read them or b) block the update emails and nobody would have ever been the wiser. Oh, well.
On a happier note, all the babies are doing fabulously and I've been letting them spend as much supervised time outside as possible. I'm not comfortable letting them come and go as they please yet for fear a hawk will try to snatch them. Here are some pictures of all my little ones (Ayden included) running amok outside.
Yes, Tierra is indeed wearing a blue rubber boot on her left leg. She's got a nasty spot on one of her hooves and I've trimmed it back and medicated it with Hoof n' Heel and she was still marinating when this picture was taken. She was not at ALL happy about the arrangement, but I'm tired of seeing her limp about. We'll see if that clears it up. Her belly is still rather low and floppy, but at least her teats are swinging clear of the ground now, which makes milking much less interesting. This other picture is a pretty typical attempt at getting a decent picture of Poe and Mumble. They are so bloody fast that I could fill and entire web page with blurry action shots that don't turn out because they're moving at warp speed. In this one you can see Poe has just gone airborne.
Some exciting stuff has happened recently. For one, I have decided to go into the egg business in a big way. I've been selling my eggs for $3/dozen and have had more people wanting to buy them than I've been able to provide for. We've been getting anywhere from 10-13 eggs per day, and thats from only 14 hens so I've been very happy with their production. Today I found the type of chicks I'm going to order to get started producing mass amounts of free range brown eggs. Here is a link to what our new chickens will be, Red Star Sex Link. I'm thinking of getting about 50 to start out with. They're called sex link because when they hatch the boys are yellow and the girls red so you can easily sex them. I also bought an incubator today to hatch out some chicks from my current chickens so I can continue the blue and green eggs also. It should be interesting as to what those will look like because I have both a Silver Laced Wyandotte rooster and an Ameracauna, so the eggs will produce either purebred Wyandottes, purebred Ameracaunas, or a funky hybrid of the two. Maybe the eggs from that hybrid will be brown and green swirled. ;) We're going to start our first batch of eggs to incubate this Sunday so that they will hatch on a Saturday three weeks from then so all three of us can be home to witness it. I'm going to try to time the arrival of my Red Star chicks with the hatching so I can house all the babies together. Unfortunately, any way you slice it these baby chicks will not be producing any eggs for 5 months, though. *sigh*
Today I took baby goats to Ayden's preschool, and you can imagine the hit that was. I took Mumble and Poe because I thought they'd be fun to watch bounce around, and Gypsy so they could see the size difference and those adorable floppy ears. Hindsight being 20/20, next time I will only take bottle babies if I have the choice. When I let Mumble and Poe out, they ran off to the side and cried for their mother the whole time. Gypsy, on the other hand, came stumbling out of the box and ambled directly over to the 40 some-odd toddlers lined up in anticipation. She was like, "Oh! People! I LOVE people!" The above picture was taken about 5 seconds after I opened the door to the carrier (You can see Ayden on the far right). I was able to catch Poe who was then more than happy to let little hands fondle her and stroke her, but Mumble protested and hollered for the duration, even after one of the teachers scooped him up for his rounds of merry-making.
I think the kids' favorite part was when Poe decided to show them her latest trick, mounting her brother. I guess she got tired of him doing it to her all the time and she's decided to give him a piece of his own medicine. Yes, he's been humping his sister since they were about 24 hours old. Crazy goats. Here's a picture of Poe doing her impersonation of Mumble. She doesn't care that she doesn't have the correct equipment.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
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16 comments:
Oh phoooey on the person not wanting to read your Blog or get updates! (btw, how does one sign up for your Blog updates? Sign ME up! please)
The photos of the little ones enjoying your goats were beautiful. How nice of you to bring them to share with the kids.
Good luck on the egg business. I think it's great that you've made your business goals and are going to make your farm earn some money, so you can enjoy your animals even more.
Sounds like raising goats, especially the babies is lots of work. And working full-time makes it seem that the farm work is just another job.
Take care of yourself and try to be 'in the moment' when you're with your animals. It will seem more fun and less stressful that way. Kind of like yoga before going to your job and a peaceful traditonal routine before bed.
Best wishes to you. Remember that babies grow quickly....even more so with goat babies.
Oh, I almost forgot!
I have awarded you the Excellent Blogger Award. Please stop by my site to pick up your big E: http://laughingorcaranch.blogspot.com !!
Phooey! is a good comment. I like it. Besides, doesn't one have to 'sign up' to get updates? Well, you know what they say, 'You can't please all of the people all of the time'. We goats don't even try. I do, however, think that 'twinville', should be placed in the 'very nice person' category.
Triple phooey! Obviously NOT a goat person. I love your posts. They take me back to a time when my son was little. Like today's. Reminds me of the time my son's kindergarten came to our place on a field trip. They had read Three Billy Goats Gruff and I had three new baby bucks. I gave them goat's milk and crackers with soft goat chees. I saw the teacher pour it out behind her back.
I just had a neighbor mention the Red Star/Black Star to me. He said you can't beat them for egg production. That's what he has and he provides eggs for local restaurants.
The babies are wonderful. Keep up the good work.
We enjoy reading your blog. Your mom sent us your way;) Our ten year old daughter is going to be showing a dairy goat for 4-H this summer. We are learning alot from your posts. Thanks! Keep them coming cause we need all the help we can get HA!
Twinville,
Well, to sign up for the email updates is easy. At the top right of my blog page above my picture there is a white box that says something like "sign up for email updates." Just enter your email address and click the button and you will receive an email confirming you want to be added to the google group. When you do, you will receive an email each time i post a new blog. :) btw, i finally got a chance to check out your blog today and instead of doing all the things i had planned (work on farm web site, trim goat hooves, clean out chicken coop, clean kitchen) i spent like 3 hours reading all your posts. ;)
I personally love your updates! It is so fun to read all about the babies. What type of incubator did you get? I'm interested in getting one soon.
Aaaahhh! Thank you Marigold. And you are a very sweet goat.
Thanks for the tip on signing up for your Blog updates! I'm in!
Oh, and I'm glad you enjoyed reading my Blog, but I'm also apologetic that I am such a bad influence on your time! hehe
Take comfort in knowing that you're not alone because I find myself esconced in blog reading quite often. ack!
Your blog is one of my favorites!
Marigold,
I totally agree and Twinville has officially been placed on the nice person list. ;)
Christy,
I got one of the still air Styrofoam jobbers from my feed store. it holds 49 chicken eggs. I'm going to have chickens coming out of my ears! I'll be posting a blog probably Sunday when we set it up and I'll have details. :)
You people don't know what you're missing not being me. I get this blog straight from this beauty's lips. Every update with real inflections, smiles, frowns, laughing, crying, peacefulness...I then read the blog and think how lucky i am that i get it in a way that not many of you ever will, and yet i am so thankful that you get it's greatness in some form. sigh. it's so good.
Hey, SlamTheCellarDoor! Ha! You are a bit prejudiced. We know this. :)
Quadruple, HOOEY, POOHEY!!!! I look so forward to reading your blog everyday. I have learned so much from your experiences. I am sorry I have not commented since November. We have just been trying to survive the winter. You were so kind to send me a link to look for chicken breeds to chose from for my flock. I still have not ordered any I just don't know when we will be ready or them. I am thinking it will be some time in the summer. But maybe with the summer weather it will be easier to keep the baby chicks warm enough. I have finalized my seed order. I really hope to be able to sell some produce at the farmers markets around here this summer. Maybe some baskets, etc. too. And next summer some extra eggs. Just have to prepare the land where the garden will be. Might not be as big as I want it to be this year.
But things have been going slow around here. We have a well and drinkable water now but still depend on the generator for electricity and heat in the camper. And of my hubby fell and broke his wrist again! Last time was in August and then last week. He had surgery yesterday. But, if the weather stays decent this week we should get a drain field cleared and the septic put in and then the basement excavated and then the wall guys will come and I will have a shelter when the spring storms hit! Yay!!! And when we get the basement they will hook us up to electricity!! I guess if he has to have a broken wrist this is the best time. These are jobs he really has to have someone else do anyway.
I am going to look into that new chicken breed you are getting also and those babies are so adorably cute. It makes me rethink the possibility of having goats.
Keep writing!
i love your blog too! don't let the turkeys get you down ;oP
those baby goats keep me coming back for more! sorry i still haven't done my 'tagged' thing but i had just been tagged a few weeks earlier and couldn't think up any more fascinating facts about myself so soon... keep up the good work!
Wonderful photos as always. I love reading about your goats, and other animals. I wish I had the land to be able to take in farm type animals- ::sigh:: someday.
I love all the colors!! Our billy is too dominant, no matter who the mom, they all look like boer goats. :-( Hopefully our fainting billy will breed some later this year - that should give me some pretty colors! We did have a Lamancha "show her genes" a bit - tiny ears. Floppy like a boer, but tiny, tiny. Adorable!
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