February 2010 Archives

Both Belle and Serafina are verra verra preggers. Because I let the bucks run with the does all the time, I have no idea when they got that way.

Goats have a 5 month gestation period. Angoras are seasonal breeders - pretty much, they can get preggers from September through January. That's a long time to try to figure out when these two goaties got knocked up.

Serafina is a bitch. She is getting a little less bitchy than when I first got her, but she will not let me check her to see if she is 'bagging up' - which means her body is getting ready to produce milk for her kid and her udders start growing. Generally, when they start bagging up, that means they are nearing the time for kidding.

Belle doesn't mind me checking her, but she is very funny about it. She acts like I have cold hands or something when I check her udders and hunches up funny. Belle's udders are kinda squishy at this point, and growing, but I hope she is still some time away from kidding, but darn, I could be wrong!

My friend, Robin, had 2 of her milk goats kid last month - she knew they were pregnant, but did not expect them so soon, and Robin has been raising goats a lot longer than I have! So, every morning, I go out, I call Belle and Serafina and check to be sure they have not already dropped their kids.

I'm honestly not too concerned about Serafina - this will be her 5th delivery (she is 6 years old). Belle, though - well, this will be her first, and she is a smaller goat than Serafina. Right now, she looks almost as wide as she is long.

I have all the kidding supplies ready. Non-latex gloves if she needs help getting the kid out - the iodine for dipping the umbilical cord in, and nutridrench for goats to give the does a good boost of energy after they give birth. (among other, emergency kind of things). I still need to build a mama/kid temporary stall where they can bond to each other for a couple of days before letting them out with the herd at large.

I will take pictures as soon as the new arrivals get here. Stay tuned!

This is a photo of Darling from last July. She likes to sit on the steering wheel of our Polaris Ranger until I start it up and then she flies off.

Darling has decided that she will not sleep with the other chickens this winter. No, she has made herself quite at home in the feed room in the barn. She perches atop an old, no longer hooked up, water heater in the corner of the room at night, and in the morning, when I enter the feed room to get the chicken feed, goat feed and horse feed set up for the critters, she flies to my shoulder and "talks" to me while I'm working.

What she really wants is the entire barrel of chickenfeed to herself, so after I load up a couple of pails with feed I will distribute to various feeders outside, she flies into the large barrel of feed and helps herself.

For an hour or so.

You would think that Darling would get fat. I know if I ate that much in relationship to my size, I'd be humongouser than I currently am!

Darling spends part of her day in the Rabbit Room, too. That is where my 6 French Angora rabbits are housed.

She hops around the cages, fussing, and when I go in there to feed the bunnies, she usually hops on my shoulder and supervises.

Sebrights are very friendly little chickens. If you have ever thought of getting a chicken as a pet of sorts, you can't go wrong with Sebrights.

I'm not sure if I ever mentioned this here, but last November, I drove over to Herbal Maid Fiber Farm in Rosebud, Missouri and purchased 6 French Angora Rabbits. 4 does and 2 bucks. They each have their own 30x30 cage, and the cages are stacked 3 high.

I have the rabbit cages set up in the old milking room in the barn. I discovered that cleaning those cages was pretty difficult because my wheelbarrow does not go through the doors from the milking room to the larger barn area, so I had to either push the wheelbarrow through the goat pasture and through the door to the outside, or carry the 30x30 litter pans to the narrower inside doors and try to tip them just right so I could empty them into the wheelbarrow parked outside the door. It was a pain either way.

So, I looked for some kind of a wheelbarrow that would go through the inside doors, and I found one -

And it works well. (And if you want one, please get it by clicking on that link and I will get a gift card from Amazon!) The bunny's cages are being cleaned much more often because it is so much easier with that dump cart.

As for the Goats - Oh, my, they are such naughty, naughty goats! I looked out the garage door a little while ago, and there were goats in places where goats are not supposed to be! They were all out and hanging with the chickens. Buffy and Gunner and Kiki were all sitting on the hill keeping an eye on them, so they were safe, but as soon as I walked out the door, the goats all looked at me, and started sidling into the barn and then back through the gate that they had managed to open.

This is actually quite gratifying. Back when we first had the goats, if they got out, chances were that Serafina and Morgan would take off like the wind. We had quite a time finding them once, they were gone for days. Apparently, they all seem to realize that this is home now.

I might even try taking them out and letting them graze in back without a fence, if they will stay close. They will come running when I call them if they think I have treats for them. Maybe i don't have to build a bunch of fences for them.

Update: Here is are a couple of photos of the goats in escape mode: That's Horus!

and, Miss Maggie:

Yes, Maggie is quite tiny. She is the goat we almost lost last November - she spent Thanksgiving night in the kitchen, and I was terrified that when I got up in the morning, she would be dead. But, she is a very tough little doeling, and is now running around, jumping and playing like all the other goats!