Goat-Keeping Report!

Dear Emma (and other readers of this blog who have doubted the existence of "The Great Goat Adventure!"),

Thank you for reminding me recently that my last post was May 16th.  Ouch! A whole three months ago!  This summer has been fast and furious.  In fact, it seems that most days I spent more time out-and-about than actually on the farm.  But summer is coming to a close and I am reevaluating my priorities.  Goat-keeping reminds me that life isn't all "out there."  There is so much beauty and fun to be had "right here."  I truly enjoy my animals and pursuing an agrarian lifestyle.  It is important to me to enjoy yummy goats milk, observe playful goat antics, and work hard to provide my goats a clean, healthy environment.  And so, despite the lack of blog posts, I whole-heartly march on with this goat adventure!

Last time I posted, my little goat kids looked like this...

Frisky bundles of energy!

All of the disbudding scabs came off of the kids.  Overall, I was very pleased with the results of my DIY disbudding!  Hillbilly and Hurray are completely clean.  Howdy, Hilarious, and Holster ended up with very minimal scurs.  All of them were better than the vet did last year, so I call it a success!

The goats had a little adventure at the beginning of the summer (of which I have no pictures to document, sorry!).  We left for a week-long vacation at the end of May and had plans for friends to come do the morning/evening chores.  We left at 5am and I admired the beautiful clear sky as I told my goats "goodbye."  That evening we were notified that our community was experiencing record flooding!  (Something like 22 inches or so?)  I was unsettled because I wanted to be able to care for the goats and know that they were okay, but thankfully they were all fine after the rough storm passed!  Their pen is up on a hill so they didn't experience any harm.  However, we had just hauled a whole trailer full of hay to our hay/cow barn.  The water backed up at the creek and flooded the whole lower field and up over the whole barn!  All of the hay floated away!  Bummer!  We had purchased the hay from a friend who graciously sold us their next cutting several weeks later.  I am thankful!

Also, our garden did fairly well at the beginning of the summer before it got stifling hot.  We got some yummy onions, squash, tomatoes, and cucumbers.  

I was able to sell Holster (Charlotte's buckling) at the beginning of the summer.  I am still trying to sell the bucks.  It has been hard to downsize the herd.  And the longer I keep the kids, the more I like them!  

I have also been reluctant to wean the doelings.  I have the bucklings (Howdy and Hillbilly) penned up by themselves and I do not have another area to keep the girls separate from their mamas right now. It actually makes the chores much easier because the doelings drink quite a bit of milk so I don't have to worry about finding ways to use 3 gallons of milk a day!  Usually, we get about a quart or two daily from all three goats which is plenty for our family!

Hilarious gets to eat with Charlotte (her mama) during the evening!  Each milking doe is getting equal alfalfa pellets, beet pulp, and grain (a cup of each) at night.  In the morning they get 2 quarts of grain.  

Always ready to climb and explore!

Edna has been growing quite the beard!

I forgot to get a good picture of Hurray (Edna's doeling) and the bucklings last night when I was snapping photos and now it is storming out!  I'll have to get a better picture soon!  She is really changing colors right now and turning quite black.  Hurray has a really sweet disposition and I am often accused of showing favoritism towards her!  

I was disappointed when I realized that she has four teats (goats are only supposed to have two!).  I did some research and it is debatable if she should be bred or not.  I am still deciding what to do with her...

It has been amazing to watch the affects of restored copper levels for Elly May!  What used to be an orange/brown coat has now returned to jet black!  She is also so silky now!

(See how rough and shaggy she looked this Spring?)

Elly May's udder has also returned to normal.  After I weaned her buckling, all of the pimples on her udder seemed to clear up.  Maybe he was just being too rough on her!  Being a first freshener, Elly May has had to learn her manners on the milking stand.  Every morning is a race to get her milked before she eats all of her grain!

Thank you for following my goat blog!  This goat adventure is great!

The Goat Adventure Goes On!

Hello Again Blog!

I regret that I have not updated this blog more frequently the past few weeks.  But, the great goat adventure goes on!  

The rowdy kids are getting bigger by the day!

From left to right: Howdy, Hillbilly, and Hurray!

They are good at climbing and jumping and having fun!

This little guy was even limping around a few days because he had played too rough...

Yay!  I am done with disbudding for the year!  The kid's scabs are starting to come off and time will tell if I did it correctly.  I took a picture of everything in my "disbudding kit:"

1) Rhinehart disbudding iron

2) Beard trimmers to shave the hair around the horn bud (I smuggled these out of the haircutting kit that we keep in the kitchen).

3) Two gloves (please note, they do not have to match!)

4) Steel brush (sometimes hair sticks to the end of the disbudding iron and it causes a small flame, so the brush is great for cleaning off the end of the disbudding iron while it is still hot).

5) A piece of wood to test if the iron is hot enough.

6) An old towel to place the kid on during the process.

Hilarious was my last goat to disbud!

I burned until I saw two amber rings around the buds.  I did not have to do the figure 8 shape around her buds as doelings have smaller horn buds.

She didn't enjoy the process, but thankfully it was over quickly!

The milk if flowing freely around here!  Hilarious and Holster enjoy a drink!

They are so cute to watch nurse at the same time.  They bend and arch and wiggle and push to find their coveted milk spigot!

The people are even getting some milk too!  The kids are separated from their mamas at night and the does get milked every morning.

Here is the first jar of milk that Elly May gave us!

Sadly, the milk supply for humans has been a bit interrupted by what I think is a staph infection.  Both Charlotte and Elly May got big, pussy "pimples" on their udders.  (I chose not to keep the milk since it could have been contaminated).  I have been treating the udders every night by spraying Chlorhexidine on them and also rubbing Nu-Stock on the affected areas.  Although they are not 100% clear, everyone is doing much better and I am back to keeping everyone's milk!

More posts coming soon!

Goats Growing Up

The little goat kids are growing fast!  Enjoy an update from the goat pen!

Weight update:

Hillbilly: 11.6 pounds

Hurray: 6.8 pounds

Howdy: 9.2 pounds

Hilarious: 8 pounds

Holster: 8 pounds

Floppy Ear Update:

Hilarious was rightly named!  Her floppy ears make her look like a puppy!

They are slowly beginning to pop up!  

Just a few more days and no one will ever know her ears were floppy!

Exploration Update:

The kids are discovering new things every day.  It is so funny to watch them explore the confines of their little pen!  Yesterday Hillbilly jumped in the water trough!  I think he decided it was wet.  Haha! They have also discovered that tires are fun to walk around or hide inside.  They have learned that it is fun to hop, dance, jump, 

Edna's Twins: Howdy (L) and Hurray (R)

Charlotte's Twins: Hilarious (L) and Holster (R)

  

Elly May's Kid: Hillbilly (center!)

Disbudding Update:

All of the goats are disbudded except for Hilarious!  It gets so much easier with practice.  However, I still "worry" that they might get scurs.  But then I remember that even the vet didn't get it perfect.  I know I did the best job I could!

Holster!  He looks a lot like Charlotte!  He is also a screamer...He yelled and yelled when I sat him on the towel (before I even got out the hair trimmers or disbudding iron!).  He was quite the drama king!

Little horn buds!

All finished!  It wasn't that bad!

Rewind Part 2...{Howdy's Disbudding}

Saturday, April 9, 2016:

Since I am doing the disbudding job myself this year, I am choosing to disbud based on the appearance of the horn nub and not the age of the kid or availability of the vet.  In general, the horns of bucklings develop faster than the horns of doelings.  I personally think the development of the horn can also depend on the kids' sire's genetics.  Edna and Elly May's bucklings were both born with well-developed horn nubs, while Charlotte's kids (whose sire is different from the other kids) have horn buds that are barely able to be felt.  

At about 36 hours old, Howdy's horn nubs felt ready.  I decided I should probably disbud him then.  I shaved around the horn nubs, but I couldn't see the little "ridges" that grow toward the nose.  Then I started to second-guess if he was too little.  I looked up some information in my goat reference books and decided it couldn't hurt to wait a day if I felt it was too early.  So I put him back in the goat pen...

Saturday morning I knew I couldn't wait another day.  He was now about 2 1/2 days old and a lot stronger than the day before.  I held him between my legs and he dejectedly put his chin on the ground.  Poor goat!

I felt much more confident this time.  And much more patient.  I placed the iron on his little head for short amounts of time, rotating the pressure around the nub.  Once it was amber-colored around the horn, I burned off the "cap" of the horn.  During the whole process I took my time and remembered to breathe.  Time will tell if he develops scurs, but I felt glad it was over!

Nice rings around the horns...

All done!

Howdy didn't seem bothered after the disbudding but happily played in the goat pen as if nothing had happened!

Disbudding Drama

I would like to think of myself as confident, courageous, and prepared when it comes to disbudding, but that ideal self-image didn't quite match my pounding heart, churning stomach, and shaking arms this morning!

All along I have been resolved about disbudding the kids.  Although you can read strong arguments on both sides of the disbud/don't disbud debate, it is the commonly accepted practice in the dairy goat world.  Since I am seeking to raise dairy goats, my goat kids must be disbudded.

The vet has disbudded the goat kids for me the past few years.  But I was never completely satisfied with the way he did it (not to mention that he charged a pretty penny!).  So, it was time to learn to do it myself.

I purchased a disbudding iron from a friend who no longer needed it.  Then, I watched lots of YouTube videos on how to disbud.  I must say the first video I clicked on I had to mute the sound and turn away from the screen.  I almost lost hope that I could do this myself!  But after watching a half-dozen or so I began to get the idea of how it works.  I also conferred with my go-to goat keeping books!  Last night I went to bed resolving that I would disbud little Hillbilly in the morning!

This morning was crisp and cool.  I was determined to do what I knew must be done, even though the thought of disbudding made (and still makes) me cringe.

Here is Hillbilly enjoying the beautiful morning (and getting a kiss from his mama!)

I heated up the disbudding iron.  It gets close to 1000 degrees!  Yikes!

I knew it was hot enough when I touched it to a piece of wood and it made a dark burned circle.

While I was waiting for the iron to heat up, I shaved around Hillbilly's horns so I could see them better.

The purpose of disbudding is not to burn the horn bud off, but to sever the nerves so the horn doesn't grow.  Bucks horns are very challenging to disbud and they often get scurs (partial bits of horn that grow back).  After doing some research about Alpine bucks in particular, their horns have a small ridge that grows down toward their  nose.  If the nerves to this ridge are not severed as well, they will grow horns!

I quickly did what I had to do.

Then, it was all over.  The ring around the horn must be amber-colored to know that it "took."  I did a "figure 8" type burn to try to get those persistent, horn-growing ridges!  This isn't necessary when disbudding does.

Hillbilly was soon returned to Elly May.  He is now sleeping and nursing and acting like a normal 3-day-old buckling!

I sure didn't enjoy that experience...I felt shaken up for a while.  But, the 15 seconds of awful disbudding is worth it in the long run to not have horned goats!  And now that I have done it once, hopefully it will be easier next time!

P.S. I am still waiting on Edna to kid.  She is 3 days over due now and looking HUGE!  Hopefully soon!  Stay tuned!