Meet the Herd: Dreamer and Ebony

Yeah, I'm still working my way through the herd... Between caring for hundreds of meat chickens and getting the hang of owning dairy animals, we've been busy. So, right now I'd like to introduce you to Dreamer and Ebony. 

Everyone loves a good adoption story, no? Then you throw in some cute critters and a heart-wrenching loss and you have the makings for a Hallmark movie. 

Okay, I'll lose the sarcasm. It's just that when my sisters and I are surfing the channels, we tend to avoid that particular channel since everything so gosh-darn predictable and scripted. Mom likes it since it's easy to watch. ;) 

Anyways... I'll spare you the family drama.

Ebony was just barely old enough to separate from her mamma. Then you throw in the stress of the move, not getting enough to eat, being pushed around by the other goats, and not having someone to stand by her and comfort her. Let's just say that we had a perfect recipe for a lonely, sickly doeling who didn't have a mother to take care of her. 

In a different corner of the barn, Dreamer and her newborn were cuddled up next to a heat lamp. Dreamer kept talking to the little guy but he wouldn't respond; he could barely stand on his own two feet to nurse. He didn't have the vitality, vivaciousness, or gusto that a kid should have. His twin sister was a still-born that morning, and he could hardly cling to life. Poor Dreamer was doing her best. When the baby was in the house in the makeshift NICU, Dreamer constantly screamed for him. When she looked at you, it was almost as if she was begging you to find her baby. The little guy hung on for almost 4 days then slipped away one morning just before we woke up... 

Ebony was hungry and desperate. So she became the opportunist. If one of the mammas was nursing their babes, then Ebony would sneak in for a couple of sips before the doe figured out what was going on. When we were milking, she would hop up and try to nurse even more. 

Hmm... 

We have a mamma who needs a baby... and a baby who needs a mamma. 

But how on earth would we get Dreamer to adopt Ebony?! 

I really don't think that it was anything that we did. But as we let Ebony nurse while we held Dreamer, little missy must have started to smell like her soon-to-be-new-mom. I don't know. But it was quite the day when we found Dreamer, on her own accord, cleaning and nursing Ebony. If Ebony gets into trouble with one of the other goats, she's able to seek refuge with Dreamer, Dreamer is much quieter now that she has a baby to take care of, and we don't have to try to bottle feed a baby that's never seen a bottle before. 

We've still got a ways to go to bring Ebony back to her perky self, but as Ebony nursed, that was one less burden that we were carrying. Thank you, Lord! 

Meow

Kitty Saunter

Cat's got 'tude 

What did I say about taking any more pictures?! 

Barn Cats

There's something about a cat on the farm. Something wild yet tame. Something sweet and cuddly yet fierce. But then you meet our cats. :P They're just big love bugs who want 100% of your attention all the time, but it has to be on their terms. They could be rolling around on the gravel begging for a belly rub, but as soon as you stoop to give them what they ask, they jump away and start rolling around again. Please explain this to me... 

And then there's good 'ol Tony. He's probably old enough in cat years to be considered an elderly,  discerning sage. He may look like an overweight geezer, but you lift him up and he's all fur - thick, silky fur. I say we should sheer the dude and spin it; Dad says that when Tony finally purrs his last, we stuff him. Yeah, this cat is the stuff of legends. Everyone in the area knows who Tony is. He's orange. He's big. He's cool. He's awesome. He's half blind in one eye yet gets around like he has better than 20/20 vision. He's even decided to help with milking. Up onto the stanchion jumps Mr. Swagger, and he sits. Sometimes he'll meow as if to say, 'Excuse me, you're supposed to give me attention.' Other times he'll just sit there and rub his head against my arm and purr. If he's lucky, he gets first dibs on the milk stripping bowl. It all depends on who's milking. ;) 

Willakenzie Lavender Farm

We decided to go on an impromptu adventure to a lavender farm. The Lavender festival was going on this weekend, but the calender was booked. Once we got to Sunday afternoon, we (Oma, my mom, sisters and me) loaded up in the car for a change of pace. Lavender can do that to you - change your pace that is. ;) 

I can't decide which of these two pictures I like more. The centered subject or the off-center. Hmm...

Alice in wonderland chairs! I'm going to look into getting some for the herb garden. 

Yeah, I shot a honey bee. ;)

A Huge Relieved Sigh

An alternate title for this should be 'Meet the Herd: Oliver'... but it didn't really fit... 

When we brought our buck home, we finally got a good look at the little guy (and boy, howdy, is he little for a 13 month old buck). He was bony and losing hair. He also had a boil, bubble, abscess, whatever-you-want-to-call-it on his cheek. Since it wasn't on his jaw bone, a friend of ours didn't think that it was CL. A couple days later it burst without our knowing it. 

So we sent off a little vial of blood to the lab to be checked for CL. Just to be sure. An ounce of prevention... If it was CL, we didn't want the other goats to be anywhere that the buck had been. After a week of waiting, the tests came back negative. 

Then, a week and a half ago, he got another one. It was bigger, it was rounder, it was more swollen, and it was on his jaw bone...

We interrupt this post for random factoids: 

CL stands for 'Caseous Lymphadentitis.' Translation - it's a ruminant infection that ends up in the lymph nodes and then creates abscesses in those areas (jaw bone, shoulder, rump, etc...). The microbes that spread CL from animal to animal are released when the abscess ruptures. We had three different locations that the first abscess could have burst. 

And now back to your regularly scheduled post...

Long story short - Mom and Dad spent 4 hours of Mom's birthday at the vet. When she (the vet) lanced the abscess, she said that it was about a day away from exploding (rupturing is a nice way of saying it) and that it was highly suspicious for CL. So the abscess material was sent off to the lab. Apparently the puss test is more accurate than the blood test. Mom was about ready to throw in the towel and put the little guy down. Dad wasn't quite ready to raise the white flag just yet. The vet made the point, "Would you be okay with putting Oliver down only to find out that the test comes back negative?" Okay, we'll cross that bridge after we get the results... 

In order to lance the abscess, the vet trimmed up little Oliver's beard. But only half of it. So he was a lopsided Chinese wise man until we decided that he should get an even haircut. I won't humiliate the guy by posting pictures of how pathetic he looked after his 'spa' day at the vet's.

We waited. And waited. All the while, treating the buck like a biohazard. Only one person goes in to care for him. That person cannot work with the other goats. The clothes that the person wore had to be cleaned asap and kept separate from the rest of the laundry. The special person also has a special pair of shoes that can only be used in Oliver's pen. There is a shovel that can only be used in Oliver's stall and the bedding material cannot go to the compost pile - if we took it out then it's to be burned. 

For a week we toiled, all the while holding our breath hoping that it wasn't CL. If it was, our little goat adventure would be done, and the cow just might have to come home... We hardly had even a glimmer of hope while waiting. Dad decided that he should dig out a deep hole in the back of the property since we had the neighbor's excavator. Wouldn't want to be digging a 6-8 foot deep hole with a spade. Finally, we had to call the vet, "Have you gotten those test results by any chance? No? Do you know when those will come in? You'll give them a call in the morning? Okay. Question for you - how often do you see a CL blood test come back negative and the culture come back positive? Oh really... That's interesting. Well, we'll have to look into that. Thank you!" So... What did the vet tech say?! I didn't find out until later...

The fated phone call finally arrived. Should we answer it or let them leave a message? Inhale, exhale, repeat. Hmm... Here, run and give the phone to Mom! :cue drum roll: We're CL negative!!! :D :D :D

But what caused those boils on his face? One of our does was getting bumps on her side now too... Well, the vet tech's sister-in-law had similar problems and dealing with the same conundrum that we were.

Lo-and-behold, there were thistles in the alfalfa.

You read that right. Thistles. We reached in to their feed and got ourselves stuck with the nasties too. We've been running around in circles and bending over backwards, and it's thistles. They had lodged their spiny little stickers into the goat's cheek, or in our doe's case, she was sleeping in the alfalfa - hence the scabs and bumps... oh the little stinker. 

Looking back on the last couple of weeks, the verse in Proverbs where it talks about how God will make foolishness of man's wisdom pretty much sums it all up. Yeah, we've learned that one first hand. :P

Until next time!
~*SG*~

Meet the Herd: Lizzy

 Ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to introduce you to Miss Lizzy. As in Lizzy Bennet. Although she's more of a Jane Bennet personality... She's quite shy, but as she's gotten to know us better, she's started to open up. It's really just been in the past week or so, she'll tiptoe up behind you and start rubbing against your leg. In the last couple of days, she's even let us pet her and pick her up. I think that her Master Pip's flamboyant personality is starting to rub off on her. You really can't be giving Lizzy attention without Pip right there next to you letting you know who the attention's supposed to go to. Sorry, sir, you're not the only one here vying for some affection.

Needless to say, I think that this pretty girl has quite the potential for being a wonderful milk goat.

A little sassy, are we?

Just another day

If I were to pick a theme song for life right now, it would be 'Just Another Day in Paradise' by Phil Vassar.

...

I'll wait a minute while you pull that up. It's a good song.

...

Have you listened to it yet? Okay. You may continue reading.

It usually starts the day before - when you come in at 9 pm from evening chores exhausted. Switch out laundry, finish cleaning the kitchen, get ready for bed, and plop down on the couch just in time for the 10 o'clock news. You can't even stay awake to catch tomorrow's weather.

The alarm clock goes off in the middle of a dream, shattering the creative juices that you had going. Oy. Just 15 more minutes? No, because 15 will turn into 60 really quick, and there's critters waiting on you.

Mom and I head off to the neighbor's to milk the cows, leaving the rest of the posse to tackle the chicken chores, but the crew is still in bed. While Mom and I are gone, chaos apparently ensues. A certain someone ate almost an entire flat of berries on an empty stomach and quickly paid the price (keep in mind, Mom isn't home at this time), leaving a sick kid to be tended by ever sympathetic siblings who can fill any situation with plenty of drama. Another someone didn't eat breakfast in time and suffered from a cliff drop of blood sugar levels (for those of you who don't know what that feels like, you're fortunate to not be dealing with hypoglycemia). 2 down. 2 to go. But the survivors have sickies to take care of and chickens to wrangle. Just after they finished cleaning up the mess from bowl-bowing child #1, Mom and I come home from milking the cows (which took a little longer than normal on this particular morning). We were greeted by my brother saying, "Perfect timing!"

Tappa the mornin' to ya too, laddie!

As we got a vivid, dramatic retelling of the morning's events, Mom and I nibbled on some cashews, sipped a green smoothie, checked on the couch potatoes and headed out to milk the goats. There is one downside to the goats warming up to you - they really warm up to you. As in, they are, quite literally all over you, eating your shirt and jumping on the half finished milking stand. Yes, goats can be compared to Labrador retrievers. Maybe it's time to create some order to the routine because letting all the goats in the area that we're milking isn't working. And I'm beginning to think that Pip should be renamed Tom Sawyer. He's a charmer and a trouble maker. When he knows that you're on to him, he looks at you ever so innocently, cocks his head and rubs up against you. You're a suck-up, you know that?

With that said, we need to head over the other side of town to take the milk machine/vacuum pump thing-y in to be tuned up and fixed. Engines should not sound like that or be spewing a gummy, milky, oily mixture. We all have guesses as to what's going on, we'll see what the verdict is.

And the day's not done yet. ;)

I know it's just a season of life, we're having a huge learning curve with these animals, we've had the perfect storm of animal retention and situations that are out of our control. We're just trying to stay on the ride and enjoy it along the way.

Until next time! I think I need a nap.
~*SG*~

Meet the Herd: Mazy and her doeling

Mazy

To continue on with the 'Meet the Herd' series...

Meet Mazy. She's a queen bee if I ever saw one. She's the leader of the pack, and probably the most eager be off of the stanchion come milking time. If we get out there early enough in the morning and before the baby nurses, we could probably get quite a bit of milk from her, but we're not morning people. ;) So Little Miss gets most of it.

If Mazy is queen, that makes her little girl a princess, and she knows it. She has makeup around her eyes and fancy little feet. Mazy's baby has been called many things over the course of several weeks. Names don't seem to stick or match her spunky little attitude. We've called her Tinker Bell, Twinkle Toes, Nellie, Elle, Priscilla, Alice, Punk... Did I get everything? I'm probably missing a couple of names in there. Not much can keep this little girl contained - she thinks that she's part ninja.  

Mazy and her little girl. Yeah, Little Miss usually does this.

Meet the Herd: Pip

I haven't fallen off the face of the earth. I promise; I'm still here - just running around trying to keep up with everything going on. I'm coming to the conclusion that you cannot have an active social life and a full fledged farm. You burn the candle at both ends. The two just can't coincide while maintaining your sanity. But that begs the question: Why did you get into dairy animals in the first place if you wanted to keep your sanity? I plead the fifth. 

Back to the original topic. ;)

You haven't met our herd yet! We've had the goats for how long now, and I haven't made the proper introductions. Shame on me.

Most of the goats that we have already came with names, but the ones that we do get to name seem to have a literary theme. Leave it to a homeschooling family to give there dairy goat herd names from books.

Let me introduce you to Pip. Donning his smart black boots and showing off on his favorite perch, the straw bale. Actually, he likes anything that he can jump on, show off, and be higher up than everyone else in the room. The little goober will climb anything. He's our little wether and what a little heart stealer he is. Oh my... he's such a love bug! He certainly knows how to warm your heart; he's so sweet and affectionate. He was one of the first goats that warmed up to us, and now we can't keep him away from us. You can usually find him waiting for us at the gate now. If you walk into their stall, he's the first one to saunter up to you and firmly plant his little front toes into your thigh (I have bruises to prove it). You try to sneak out of the stall, and he's right there behind you trying to get through (honestly, I think that he's just an opportunist who wants to get out). If you sit down on a straw bale or a bucket, and he's the one to hop up onto your lap and start nibbling at your shirt. (Side note: to break the stereotype of goats - they don't eat everything. Did I just ruin your childhood? Sorry. Let me clarify. They like to taste things, but they won't eat it most times.) This little dude is inquisitive, curious, friendly and trouble waiting to happen.

I'll post more about the new additions as I have time. ;)

Until next time,
~*SG*~

Scwu Dwiver

I tend to jump into something without knowing what I'm getting into. (Sound like something else that we're doing?) I'll have a general idea of what I'm doing, and I'll dive in head first. Trial by fire. Flying by the seat of my pants. Yep, that seems to sum up most of my attempts at projects. 

I mean, really, how hard would it be to build a roost for your chickens? 

- 2x2's? Check. 

- Battery operated screw driver in a lovely shade of yellow to make the job easier? Check. 

- Another one to have the hole maker attached? Check again. 

- Screws long enough to go through your wood? Check (after I realized that 1 1/2" screws will not go all the way through 2x2s...). 

- An ensurer of a right angle? Why would I need that? I'm making a roost; not furniture. 

- Pencil? Yep.

- Measuring tape? You betcha! New motto in life is going to be 'Measure twice; cut once'

- Table saw? Umm... Could I use a hand saw instead?

- Assistant? All possible helpers are making dinner. I think I'll let them have their fun.

Wow, these are technical terms. 

Before I go into the rest of the story, you need to understand my relationship with power tools. The most I can handle by myself is probably a staple gun. And even then, that isn't really a 'power' tool, and it doesn't have the 'kick' that the electric tools have. I can also yield at paint brush, but that usually ends up all over the place. I can use some hand tools. I seem to be able to manage those. They behave at least... 

Ahem. Onto the woodworking. 

I found some scrap 2x2's in my dad's collection in the shed, measured out the space, and went to town with the hand saw (proving, once again, that I'm a lefty in a right-handed world... someone needs to redesign those hand grips). First lesson of the day - hand saws do not make a very straight cuts... For a project perfectionist like me, this isn't cool... but I'm still not going to use the table saw yet. Wood cut to the supposedly, approximate length, I packed up the tools that I thought that I'd need. I watch Dad do this sort of stuff all the time; I should be able to do this, right? I got the wood all laid out where I wanted it to go, drilled the holes, picked up a screw, started to put the screw in, and... The screw drivers kept jumping and slipping. The screw head started to strip... Lesson learned - Make sure that you're drill bit is big enough for the screws that you grabbed. Next, make sure that you have the right driver bit. Even after these slight adjustments were made, I still can't get the screws to go in straight. Well, one cannot go about making horrific sounds like that Dewalt without someone coming to see 'how it's going.' Well, help came to the rescue after the 'check up,' and my sister and I finished the roost. 

Being the project perfectionist that I am, I don't think that I could show you pictures - it is quite a pitiful thing. There isn't a single right angle or level spot on that sucker. Maybe it's a good thing that I'm not in carpentry or the construction business. But it serves its purpose - the chickens aren't sleeping on the floor anymore.