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Goat Manners

Goat Manners
Originally uploaded by stephhwilliams

Our little one, Seth, bit me accidentally while chewing on the sleeve of my shirt. I was sitting in the grass, trying to "teach him some manners" -- like not jumping on people or chewing on their clothes. See what it got me? It felt like a pinch but left a mark. Guess I'll need to re-teach this lesson a few more times ... perhaps while standing up.

Steph Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Lil' Chicky's Face again

Lil' Chicky's Face again
Originally uploaded by stephhwilliams

Day 3 of antibiotics. May be a lost cause.
Steph Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Just 'a Grazing

We decided to let Prada and Candyman out to play in the the big pasture too!  So now the four of them are mowing the yard ... er, I mean grazing.

Lil' Chicky Poo's Swollen Face

Lil' Chicky Poo's Swollen Face
Originally uploaded by stephhwilliams
Lil' Chicky Poo's had a swollen eye/face since the weekend. We thought it was an abcess but an attempt at draining was futile. I believe antibiotics are necessary. In case you can't tell how bad it is: the last pic is her good side, i.e. that's what she's supposed to look like.
Steph Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Running Free

Running Free
Originally uploaded by stephhwilliams

Here's a first photo of Milky and Seth in the pasture.
Steph Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Building Fences

We have a front pasture!  Today Bryan finished pulling the 4x4 cattle fencing wire around the perimeter of the front acre or so and put up the gate.  It's sort of an "L" shaped pasture that butts up against the dog fence on the side of the house and then continues all the way across the "yard" in front of the house.

Bryan's been digging post holes and cementing corner posts and twisting bracing wire and pounding T-posts for what has seemed like forever.  I was looking through our "farm photos" and I have pictures of front fence work from back in November!  We've had rain and flooding, snow and hail, and just life with "day jobs" making progress quite slow at times.

The kids and I have helped some, but let's face it, I don't have the upper body strength for that kind of manual labor.  He also had help on occassion from Pepa and from Danny (Mema's husband, sometimes referred to as Paw Dan), but really did the bulk of the work on his own.

And now the goats are in their pasture ... well, some of them.  Prada is still shacking up with Candyman -- we've been trying to breed them for a few weeks now.  So the two lovebirds have the run of the place in the back with the goat house.  But Milky and Seth (along with Max) are in the front now.  'Course they seem to be draw to the small stretch of fence that separates them from Brix and Belle.  Seth seems quite interested in them, though you'd think Milky would know better - seeing as how she was present for Prada's near death experience.  I've been so excited  as we worked toward having a pasture for the goats but when we let them free in the front they ran right back to the dogs.

So now as I sit here typing I hear constant barking right beside my bedroom window ... wonder if this is such a good idea after all?  Hmmm ... maybe I'll keep that thought to myself.  Of course, as I'm thinking that Bryan says aloud, "Belle's never gonna shut up for the rest of her life now," ending his statement with a huff of finality.  He's probably right, but as I pointed out once before ... as long as she's barking it means she's not chewing.

"I hate a flogging rooster"

That's what Ruby Thewes (Renee Zellweger's character) in Cold Mountain says to a terrified Nicole Kidman just before wringing the bird's neck.  That's also what Pepa said when Bryan told him about my recent encounters in the chicken coop.  Now I've known since shortly after we got this rooster that he wasn't all that bright, so I really shouldn't be surprised at his recent senseless behavior.  Within a few weeks of bringing him home, I dubbed him "Forrest Gump" because, at the time, though lovable, he seemed to have an even-smaller-than-a-pea brain.  For instance, he'd run up and down a path in front of the coop, trying to get in through the cage wire instead of going just a little bit more to the left to the wide-open door.  But his latest act has repeatedly proven two things:  (1) he indeed has no sense and (2) he ain't all that lovable after all.

I'm not sure if he thinks I'm one of his hens, a threat to his flock - angry that I retrieve eggs and clip wings - or if I'm just trying to impose logic or reason onto a numskull animal.  He flogs me ... present tense, continuing ... not just once, not just in certain circumstances.  No.  All. The. Time.  Every time I go into the coop or let the birds out to graze.  He even chases me down sometimes when, no lie, my back is turned.  This is not paranoia - the chicken's out to get me.  I must say, regardless of his reason, or lack thereof, for acting a fool, it really peeves me -- bringing to mind the phrase "don't bite the hand that feeds you."  I give them food, water, fresh straw to nest on; I clean out their coop and feed them scratch right from my hand - yes, he'll eat scratch from my hand, then turn around and flog me when I stand up.  I've even refused to let Belle eat him no matter how much she paces on the other side of the fence as though working up momentum for a clearing jump - and believe me, I've been tempted many times to accidentally-on-purpose unlatch that gate and turn my back.

The matter was at its worst, a few weeks ago, leading me to ponder how hard it could be to wring a chicken's neck and salivating on the idea of farm-fresh chicken-n-dumplings.  It started with me getting in a fight with the rooster and ended with me getting an x-ray.  So I guess the rooster won that round.  He started in on me and wouldn't quit despite my yelling and advancing toward him - picture a puffed-up chest and "you wanna piece of me" attitude.  I'd had enough, so I reared back on one foot and swung away with the other - dead-set on planting the sole of my boot upside the rooster's noggin.  Well, it's a small target.  I missed and bent my not-so-sure-footed foot sideways so that the leg that had been holding me up was now resting on the ball of my ankle against the concrete coop floor.  Even through boot, that wasn't comfortable.  So I limped on my pride and one good foot back to the house.  The next morning I had to stop by the doctor's office for a blood pressure check and, since I now get special ultra conservative treatment (a whole other story), they weren't taking any chances on me - sending me directly to hospital radiology to be certain I didn't chip a bone.  Turned out there was no chip, just likely a bruise on the bone and definitely one on my ego, which took several days of anger, Advil and hobbling around to finally fade away.  For the time being, rooster had gotten a reprieve.

Last night, the stay of execution ended, and I got my first "taste" of wringing a rooster's neck.  It ain't fun that's for sure and there wasn't any sense of satisfaction once the deed was done.  Honestly, it was like the death scene in a B movie - just when you think dude's dead, he grabs your leg and gasps one more time.  Who knows how long I sat there fingers gripped tightly around a lifeless neck waiting for one last flailing.  And, yes, we did have chicken for dinner, but it was flash frozen instead of farm-fresh - just something about that flailing didn't seem all that appetizing to me.

We Have Chicks!

No, not from the eggs I was so excited about in the last post.  Nope, I bought these chicks.  21 of them to be exact.  That'll teach Bryan to send me off on my own to the flea market for farm animals!

I'd been "chatting" with a lady in a Yahoo! Group and on the phone about checking out the chickens she had for sale and we decided to meet up at the local flea market this past Saturday morning.  I'd done my homework and, based on the size of our current chicken coop, I figured we could easily add half a dozen or so hens to the flock without overcrowding being an issue.  Bryan seemed okay with this idea but chose to stay at home to "work on the fence" while I went shopping for some chickens at 7 a.m. on a Saturday.

When I met up with this new chicken lady (well, she's not really a chicken lady since she's trying to "get out of chickens" and narrow the focus of her farm but aneeywayyy...), I looked around at the chickens she had out on display but didn't see any that fit the description of the ones we'd talked about.  See, when we were talking, I wasn't thinking chicks.  Guess I should have but I didn't.  No matter though, once I saw the chicks, which were hiding out in a brooder box in the back seat of her truck (to stay warm), I became a chick momma.  I brought home 18 Rhode Island Red chicks and 3 cross-breeds of some sort.

So now our garage (which I just started parking in this week - finally!) smells like chickens (or rather like chicken pee and poop) because these little ones are 2 weeks old, still have to be under a heat lamp and separated from the older flock.  Over the next month or so, we'll be watching them to see signs of which are roosters and which are hens (though I'm convinced one of the cross-breeds is definitely a rooster (read: stubborn rooster)).  Of course, this means we're going to need at least one other coop - 'cause you can't have two roosters together - or I suppose you can but it won't be pretty.

I'm pretty sure I recall Bryan's initial response being something along the lines of "what were you thinking???"  I'll tell you what I was thinking: I had to drag my "not-a-morning-person" butt out of bed, drive in the dreary cold with no coat because I forgot (not his fault, but still), go by myself to a place I'd never been before hunting for a lady I'd never seen before and, well, look ...

Need I say more?

I'm supposed to be going this weekend to Oklahoma to pick up another goat (a Nigerian Dwarf buck, so we can breed him with Milky and Prada), but I think Bryan's having second thoughts about me going alone.  He mumbled something about me coming home with a truck load of goats and suggested Bryanna go with me.  That's fine, she and I can make a mother-daughter trip out of it ... 'course it could just mean double (or triple or quadruple) trouble.  Hmm, I wonder if we'll get a discount on multiple goats...

We Have Had Have Eggs!

We have eggs! Woohoo! I've been very anxious, since before Christmas, for our hens to start laying. When we got them in early October, we were told that they'd just started molting. So I started counting the weeks to when we should start getting eggs from them. When we got back home from our New Years' trip, there was a pretty brown egg laying in the nest. The next morning, there was another. I was so excited. I jumped up and down ... really. Bryan laughed at me. Then, the next day - no egg. And the next. And the next. Nothing. I must admit, I was a little bummed. But this morning, one of the hens had left me a present in the nest and this afternoon there was another! Yippee! Now, we'll see if I'm still jumping tomorrow.

Ode (sort of) to Cookie

"Cookie"

December 28, 2009 - January 6, 2010

We brought "Cookie" home with us from Bryan's mom's house in Alabama this past weekend.  A tiny little pygmy kid, she was just born on December 28, 2009.  On the trip home, we named her "Cookie" because the contrast between her ears and her body coat looked like an oreo cookie.   

Once we got home, we put her in the goat pen with Milky, Prada and Max.  She didn't miss a beat, hopping through one of the holes on the cattle fence panel and taking home.  We tried to chase her down, each coming at her from a different direction, until she did the unthinkable.  She ran straight for the creek and jumped right in.  We couldn't believe it.  It was like 30 degrees outside and that was completely dry!  She swam for a minute and then started failing.  Bryan jumped in (oooh, the hell he caught from his dad over that later).  He got her out and stripped out of his wet clothes down to his undies.  While he got himself to the house and back to a normal body temperature, I brought Cookie to the house to make sure she was warm and dry before nightfall.  I was a little nervous about leaving her out for the night but we shut all three of the goats up in the goat house and they snuggled together.  The next day, Bryan spent the better part of the day, in snowfall, tying chicken wire around the outside bottom of the goat pen.

Because we took her away from her mom before she was weaned, I've been bottle feeding her kid milk replacement 3-4 times a day.  Or at least I've been attempting to.  The first few times, she fought so much I don't think she got more than a drop.  Finally, though, she seemed to be getting some and even seemed to enjoy me holding her; she'd lean into me, resting her head on my chest while I squatted in the goat house to feed her.  Cookie also started eating a little hay and straw and even wiggled her head into the food bowl to get some grain.  No wonder Prada head-butted her.  We were thinking that she was too little to be eating the grain or hay but didn't think it could really hurt anything.


Surprisingly, we think she bonded more with Max (the Anatolian) than she did with Milky and Prada (the Nigerians).  At first, she followed Milky around a bit and we thought she might even try to feed, which would have been futile since Milky's dried up right now.  She pretty much stayed away from Prada, though, probably because Prada rammed her every chance she got.  We're starting to think Prada's going to be "herd mama."  The other night, though, Cookie started rooting around at Max ... and he just rolled over and let her do it!

Last night, she sat in my lap and drank from the bottle of kid milk; when I put her down, she followed me around for a bit.  This morning, when I went out to feed her, I found her lying in the corner of the pen, cold and stiff.  I'm not sure if the cold got her; if it was the stress of the move; if it was related to her polar bear swim; or if she had some sort of digestive blockage, perhaps from eating grain too early.  Truth is, I'll probably never know.

Tonight we're in for more freezing temperatures, so I spent the early evening doing some shift work around the farm.  The dogs are in the garage and the goats (Max fits in this category) are in the workshop.  Man, we need a barn!

Today, I didn't much enjoy being Farmer Steph, and I'm certain they'll be more days like this; this is life on a farm.  But tomorrow is a new day and I look forward to being greeted by some warm noses (Milky and Prada give Eskimo kisses in exchange for animal crackers! Hey, I'm not above bribery.)

The Farm Expansion a/k/a Biting Off More Than You Can Chew

I grimaced when I first wrote the last word of the title to this post ... read on, you'll understand.  Warning: this post has pictures which may not be for the faint at heart; proceed at your own risk.

Within a week (or maybe 2, honestly, who can keep up?) of getting the chickens, we must have thought things were a little boring down on the farm. We took Brock to the state fair for his birthday and by the end of that weekend (and the end of the fair) we were the proud owners (parents) of two Nigerian dwarf dairy goats. Since then, I've learned all sorts of fascinating tidbits, including how to milk and wean a goat, and how to care for one following multiple vicious dog attacks (by one of our own!), which ... wait for it ... involves purple-stained skin, and a hook and fishing line.

When we first got Milky and Prada, we didn't have our "official" goat area so we put up two cattle panels in one corner of the fenced area around the pond, where Belle and Brix live, to make a square contained area for the goats.

(We quickly replaced the bright yellow rope that seemed to take lightyears to wrap and unwrap with bungee straps, but I don't have a pic of that.)  Anyway, this square set-up seemed to work well for awhile.  The goats love to explore though, so we started letting them come out of the square and roam the yard around the pond.  We still have stakes and tie-downs for the dogs from before the fence was complete; so we'd just chain up the dogs for awhile and let the goats have free reign. 

One Saturday afternoon, just as Ben went down for a nap and I was planning to take one myself, I heard Bryan start screaming "Noooooo." I ran outside to find him cradling Prada and carrying her to the back porch.  After I got Milky safely stowed back in the square, I joined the tragedy on the porch.  Turned out that Belle had snapped her leash, I guess from pulling so hard, and chased down Prada, essentially body slamming her to the ground.  Once we checked her over, we determined that she had two small open wounds (from Belle's teeth no doubt!) - one on her jaw line and one on her front shoulder.  We brought her into the garage and, after a trip to gather supplies, Bryan cleaned her wounds and doctored her up good.  He'd gone to the co-op and got some Blue Lotion, which is applied with a lid brush, sort of like the ones in Rubber Cement, but with what looked more like a cotton ball than a paint brush, and is really more of a purple than blue color, and stains your skin and clothing like nobody's business.  All told, I think I lost three good shirts to that stuff and had purple fingers at work for days.

More than anything, Prada seemed in shock.  The wounds themselves, in hindsight now, weren't all that bad, but as a first attack on our first baby goat, it was horrific.  And to see her seemingly so weak and dazed, it was pitiful.  The next day though, it appeared that she was getting back to normal, and I naively thought the worst was over. 

The very next Saturday, while Bryan was at the hospital for a special work day, I spent the early morning outside with all the animals.  After cleaning out the chicken coop and letting them graze for awhile, I chained up the dogs and let Milky and Prada out of the square to explore.  This time, I stayed out there with them though, staying near to Belle and making her sit or lay the whole time.  After about 20 uneventful minutes, I put Milky and Prada back in the square and let the dogs free.  Feeling quite satisfied with myself and all that I'd accomplished bright and early on a Saturday morning (note: I am not a morning person), I came in the house and sat down on the couch to fold some laundry while the kids watched TV.  Wasn't I being so productive?

Suddenly I heard screaming and screeching, but strangely no barking, and ran out to see Belle and Brix getting Prada through the cattle panel.  Apparently she got too close to the fence and Belle stuck her head through one of the holes and grabbed Prada's back leg.  They were trying to pull her through the hole!

When I got to her, barefoot in the mud mind you, I thought she was dead for sure.  Her back right leg was torn and chewed from her knee joint all the way up to almost her bottom, and her shoulder wound was skinned and fresh, I think by being pulled through the fence hole.

I didn't know what to do but hold pressure on everything and try to get Bryan home from work.  Meanwhile, Bryanna was "starving to death," Ben wanted to come out in the 50 degree weather in nothing but a diaper to "play with Prada," and I didn't want to know what Brock was doing.  

The "dustbowl fella" (i.e., Johnny, who lives down the street, the dirt and gravel way, at the 4-way stop and says the way people drive through there it's like he lives in a dustbowl) happened to come by with his grandson, who is in Brock's class at school, and he helped me look Prada over while I tried to get a hold of Bryan.  Johnny raises oxen, so his presence and opinion that she wasn't "done for" was reassuring to me.

Bryan came home as quickly as he could and then decided he needed to make another run for supplies; it seemed the blue-lotion-that's-really-purple wasn't going to be enough this time around.  We're learning that having a de facto farm means becoming a de facto vet; I've lost count of the number of vets that say "we don't see goats."

With me holding Prada down, Bryan went to work shaving the area around her shoulder wound, cleaning it through and through and stiched her up, with a hook and fishing line (and days later when we were finally able to have her looked at by a vet, he complimented Bryan's sewing job, go figure).  Her back leg was so torn up, though, we couldn't figure out what was supposed to go where, whether anything needed to be cut off or pushed back in, or what part of remaining skin connected to any other part.  Ultimately, we just cleaned it as good as we could, put antiseptic on it and bandaged her up.

She hung out in the little teepee Bryan built for their shelter for most of the time over the next several days, coming out to get a little food and water here and there.  I kept worrying she'd just give up on us until the vet we saw told me that "goats are funny." He said some goats will get a little sick and just give up, while others are fighters and "darn near impossible to do in." 

 

Over the following weeks, we could see improvement and healing happening.

Now, about 2 months after the second attack, the hair on her shoulder has grown back thick and full and she hops and jumps around like she's never had a bum leg.  Yep, our Prada's a fighter.