I am what I eat!

The farmer spends a lot of time and money trying to figure out what is best for me and the other goats to eat. Eating is a very important part of our day (OF COURSE!) and is the one thing that the farmer can have the biggest impact on. Right now it is winter and where I live the winters last for 6 months from the last day of fresh grass in the fall to the first day of new grass in the spring. This means that I spend half of the year eating dry hay and grain with no fresh food. Yuck! Couple this with the fact that I am usually pregnant during the winter and start my lactation before the snow has melted and winter is a huge draw on my bodily resources.

The farmer has been very concerned about making sure that we have lots of good stuff to eat during winter so we don't become unhealthy. When I was a kid and the farmer was new to owning goats, our diets consisted of dry hay and lots of pre-mixed, store-bought goat grain. Our pasture was confined to the small area next to the horses. We had a mineral/salt block to chew on and some plain grass to eat in that pasture.

The first thing the farmer learned that mineral/salt blocks were not useful to goats and that we need loose minerals made specifically for goats. We weren't getting enough copper, calcium, selenium, or zinc from a block. She started giving us Sweetlix Meatmaker 16:8 loose mineral for goats. At first we didn't like it but now we are used to it and eat it up! We get a dish of it in each of our goat pens. The farmer cleans and refills the dish every other day so we always have fresh loose minerals to eat (stale minerals are gross and we won't eat them!). After being on the loose minerals for one year, the farmer noticed that our coats where shinier and our kids were born stronger. No more kids born with bent ankles and too weak to stand up right away.

The next thing the farmer figured out was that goats need a calcium to phosphorus ratio of at least 2:1 in order to stay healthy. The easiest way to accomplish this is to add alfalfa pellets to our grain ration. The farmer changed our diets to give us 3 cups of alfalfa pellets to every one cup of grain. Alfalfa pellets are high in calcium and grain is high in phosphorus so they need to be fed in a 3:1 ratio in order to achieve a 2:1 calcium to phosphorus ratio. After a few months of the alfalfa pellets, the farmer noticed that our milk was no longer pink from blood in it (a common ailment of a calcium deficient goat) and that we looked healthier.

The next year, the farmer changed our grain. The grain we were getting was a sweet feed mix called "Caprine Challenger" from Blue Seal Feeds. It was yummy with lots of molasses and corn. The farmer became worried that too much molasses was not good for us because it is high in iron, which can throw off our mineral balance, and molasses and corn are used as a filler to add empty calories to otherwise inferior grain products. Also high corn  diets can cause our rumen pH to become acidic which is not good for our rumen bacteria who help us digest our food and synthesize B vitamins. The farmer did some research online and found that many people feed a homemade mixture of 50% oats, 30% wheat/barley, 10% cracked corn, 5% black oil sunflower seeds, and 5% Calf-Manna grain supplement. The farmer mixed up a batch of this and has been feeding it to us ever since. The good thing about this grain mixture is that it is less expensive ($30 a month versus $50 a month for pre-mix grain), and it encourages us to eat more of our loose minerals since it doesn't contain any added minerals. The lack of added minerals is a good and bad thing. It's good because we can decide how much minerals we want by eating our Sweetlix. Our bodies' tell us what minerals we need and we can adjust how much Sweetlix we eat based on this. It's bad though because there are no fail-safe minerals in our diets and we MUST have loose minerals available all the time or else we can become deficient. The farmer has to be extra-diligent about refilling our mineral dishes and keeping them fresh.

During these changes to our feed and minerals the farmer also changed our pasture set-up. She bought some ElectroNet fencing from Premier One Supplies and uses that to move our pasture area every three days during the summer. We, goats, take only three days to mow down one section of the netting fencing, so the farmer has to keep on top of things and move the fence every three days or else we won't have anything to eat. Sometimes the farmer puts together two or three sections of netting to give us a big pasture to graze in. We have a large main pasture area but also have many smaller areas according to how the farmer sets up the netting fence. This works great because we can spend most of the summer on fresh grass and don't have to settle for too much boring, old hay.

The last thing the farmer has done recently to change our diets is to stop giving alfalfa pellets and start giving a chopped alfalfa silage product, called Chaffhaye. It comes in 50 lb. plastic bags that can be stored for up to two years. It's pure alfalfa with a little molasses (a very little bit!) and a some yeast culture mixed in to make it ferment. The fermentation helps to preserve the alfalfa for storage and makes it easier to digest because the yeasts have already started to break it down. At first we didn't like it because it smelled sweet and tasted funny. But after a few days we developed a taste for it and now can't get enough! We pound on the gates and make a raucous until the farmer gives us our daily Chaffhaye ration. She feeds us about 2 lbs. of Chaffhaye per goat per day. The farmer started using it because it costs about the same as alfalfa pellets but is a much better product. Being roughly chopped alfalfa, instead of alfalfa dust like the pellets, Chaffhaye has a much higher digestible fiber content. This is very good for goats because we need lots of long-stem fiber each day to keep us healthy.

Currently my daily diet is: 3 cups homemade grain mix of oats, wheat, barley, corn, sunflower seeds and Calf-Manna; 2 lbs. Chaffhaye; 1 flake of grassy hay; Sweetlix Meatmaker 16:8 (as much as I can eat); baking soda (just for the winter to keep my rumen pH neutral or slightly basic); and fresh water. This diet is split between two feedings per day.

I think I am looking good this winter. Normally my fur gets dry and sticks up during the winter, giving me a "hoof stuck in light socket" look. This year my fur is shiny and laying flat. I am pregnant right now and hope to keep up my good condition through having kids and making milk.

I think we might be up for a new diet change soon. I have seen the farmer Googling "fodder systems" and how to grow seeds for us to eat. I will report back on any changes, should the farmer get some new crazy ideas in her head!

A very goaty weekend!

Did anyone see the Super Bowl commercial with the goat? How great was that?! Did you happen to notice that goat bares a striking resemblance to yours' truly? Along with Crumpet, I should be in the running for TMFGITW!

There was a lot of goaty stuff going on this weekend besides the most watched sporting event in the world giving goats their due. Some of it was good, some was not so good.

Not good - The farmer has been helping her friend's goat, Glory, through pregnancy. Her owners are new to goat birthing and have been very excited to have baby goats on the way. Glory got really big last week and her udder filled all the way up. The farmer saw her on Tuesday and guessed she couldn't have long to go before kidding. Glory is of undetermined age and probably quite old according to the fact that she has started losing her front teeth. This is a bad sign for a pregnant goat. Glory stopped eating on Saturday and wouldn't get up. This is a really bad sign for an old, pregnant goat. The farmer's friend called the farmer and she tried to offer what help she could. Glory went into labor yesterday. Three kids were born. This is a really, really bad sign for an old, pregnant goat. Three was too many for her to support and she passed away. Two of the kids didn't make it either. One kid lived. Luckily the farmer's friend has powdered colostrum and milk replacer on hand to get the kid started. The farmer is going today to drop off some frozen cow colostrum to feed the kid. The bright spot in all this sadness is that many times no kids survive this sort of complicated birth, along with the mom passing away. Let's all hope this little kid sticks with us and lives a long and productive life.

Good - The farmer's other friends who owns my half-sister and one of Pepper's daughters had the farmer over on Saturday to visit. Both of those goats are pregnant and going to kid in March. They are looking great and have grown into beautiful young does. Their owner is very excited and getting ready for kidding and milking. The farmer hopes there's been enough kidding drama in the neighborhood for this year and that these two have no complications.

Great - Someone came to visit the farm yesterday who wants to get goats this summer. She talked to the farmer a bunch and is excited to add goats to her herd of four sheep.

Greatest - Two other people have contacted the farmer looking to get goats this summer. It's great to see more people getting into goats! Goats are the new backyard chickens!

At least it ain't a sheep.....

The farmer came home yesterday with a new goat. I think she has lost her mind. It is a Boer meat goat. What is she thinking?

Here I meeting Miss Ruby for the first time. She's two years old and probably knocked up, according to her previous owner.

I was not impressed by her. This is my disgusted face. If you ever want to know what a disgusted goat looks like, this is it.

The #1 Rule of Goats

You'd think the farmer would know better by now. She's only been raising goats for 10 years and yet she continues to act all surprised when we don't follow her carefully laid plans. I think someone needs to mention to her that our number one rule as goats is that every time you post something online about what your plans are for us, we will read it and do the opposite. You would think someone would have clued her in on that by now. She may not have internet access at the house and has to do all her online stuff in town and she may wonder how we always know what she has posted. Goats don't need iPads or smartphones to keep updated on the farmer's public blog and profiles. The farmer is quite good and muttering her plans to us as she does chores and we are quite good at interpreting the sparkle in her eyes as she gives one of us extra attention as a plan in the making.

Her latest failed attempt at planning came when she put me in with the buck for a few days a while back. The farmer didn't see me get bred but I knew something was up when she started examining my backside very carefully and taking pictures of my whoo-ha. I would have been okay with the visual exams but once she pulled the camera out I knew I had to do something. I knew the farmer was thinking that I was pregnant and that she was going to be posting my goaty-bits on Goatbook for all the world to see. I decided that it was time for a little shake up in the farmer's world. For maximum impact I waited until the farmer was muttering out loud about how I was pregnant and she could get rid of the buck because his job was done and blah, blah baby goats, blah. I came into a roaring heat the day the farmer started talking about future baby goat names.

I stood at the gate and carried on like a mad-goat. I ran to the buck pen and pawed at the gate. The farmer stood dumbly in the farmyard scratching her head and wondering why I was acting so funny. She checked me for a fever and examined my eyelids for anemia. She felt me up for tumors and looked for lice.

"Lucy, there must be a reason you're acting so strange this early in your pregnancy" she said.

"BAAAAAAAA!!" I wailed as I ran out of the barn and to the buck pen.

"I hope you don't have the start of bloat" the farmer wondered.

"BAAAA! BAAA! BAAAAAAA!!" I cried as I stood nose to nose with the buck.

"Well, if you want to be in the buck pen, I will put you in there. I don't think it will hurt for you to be in there since you are already pregnant" the farmer mused as she let me in with the buck.

"BAAAA!!!" I agreed as the buck bred me repeatedly.

About this time it must have dawned on the farmer that I was not pregnant because she just stood speechless watching me and the buck have a good time. "Speechless" is not a description often used in regards to the farmer which is why I think the message I was sending had hit loud and clear. She was also speechless because I think she had just realize that we had pulled the mohair over her eyes yet again and ruined another perfectly planned plan.

So next time you see the farmer please remind her that us goats don't appreciate planning and plans. And we really don't appreciate our whoo-has being posted on the interwebs!

And so it goes....

Well, you can probably guess what I have been up to. I have been doing the same thing I do every fall -- trying to avoid the bucks. The farmer has the crazy notion that I enjoy this sort of thing and that I should get pregnant every year. I have the crazy notion that I would rather not. At least, I have that notion on days 1 - 18. I can't really vouch for days 19 - 21 because I am not in my right mind with all the buck chasing I feel compelled to do. And so it goes, over and over, every year. I go into heat, I get knocked up, I squirt out a few kids (typically twin bucks), I get milked for 10 months, I get dried off, etc. Ah, the never ending joys of being a dairy goat...

 

Even though I was bred only 6 days ago, the farmer is already sure I might be pregnant. She has decided that she can smell when I am pregnant. Sounds totally cuckoo, right?! It might not be entirely nuts. My mom and I emit a very distinct, fruity smell when we are pregnant. The farmer has tried to narrow down why we smell like that. She has tested us for ketosis and other sorts of ailments that can cause a goat to smell weird when preggers. We aren't sick when we smell funny, we're just pregnant. I started smelling funny yesterday so uh-oh, I guess I am pregnant.

Daisy came into heat today and I saw the farmer looking longingly at her. Daisy is only 7 months old but she is built like a brick goat-house so you would assume she is much older. She's almost my height and is definitely much bigger than the petite Primrose (who is also 7 months old). Oh well, I guess that's what you get for being a Saanen. They are such over-achievers! The farmer is trying to decide whether or not to throw caution to the wind and breed Daisy this fall instead of waiting until next year. Normally the goats get to mature to 1 1/2 years old before breeding. This is because the farmer wants us to be fully mature before breeding. Daisy is huge-mongous so the farmer is toying with the idea of breeding her now.

This happens every year around here. The farmer says all summer that she is only going to breed one or two goats. She'll squawk to anyone who will listen the advantages of having less babies to deal with in the spring and less goats to milk each year. She'll tell you that next year will be the big year for traveling and vacations. That she is going to have the least amount of animals on the farm so she has more time to spend off the farm. That she is going to take it easy because it's not worth all the work. She'll extoll on the virtues of not flooding the market with unwanted kid goats and how it is pious and worthy to be a responsible breeder and not overproduce. Well, then fall comes along and all of us girls go into heat, and the farmer losses it and starts breeding every goat in sight! Last year she bred three goats after vowing to only breed two. The year before she bred four does just for fun because she couldn't stop. This year she has sworn up and down that I would be the only goat bred because Gloria is too old, and Prim and Daisy are too young. The plan would be to breed me this year and then breed only Prim and Daisy from then on because she wants to keep the CAE negative goats as the only breeders once they are old enough for breeding. But I have seen her eyeing up Daisy and wandering through Craigslist looking at all the breeding age does for sale. Fall is far from over and breeding season has a lot of time left to it. God help us all!

Fall is coming!

This picture is from June. We don't have tall green grass like this anymore. The leaves are starting to turn colors on some of the stressed trees and I came into heat last week so I know that fall is coming. I wasn't quite ready to come into heat so I made sure that everyone knew it. I used my best "heat voice" to tell the girls to stay out of my way and to let the boys know to get ready for me. The farmer says I will be the only one getting bred this fall. Gloria is too old to breed anymore. She had a great set of triplets this year so it's time to end on a very high note. The other girls, Prim and Daisy, aren't yet a year old so they get to hang out until next fall before the get to go courting in the buck pen. Figaro is a wether which means he doesn't have an opinion on any of this whole breeding mess. That just leaves me as the available one. I don't mind it much. Being bred means I get extra food during the winter and lots of grain on the milk stand come next spring and summer.

The farmer has disgraced the goat barn by housing a group of smelly meat chickens in one of the pens. They weren't so bad at first but now they are 8 weeks old and very messy and there's 10 roosters in the pen! At first there was only one rooster. It was a Polish/Toulban/Frizzle cross rooster that the farmer got from her neighbor. It was supposed to be a hen and was supposed to live with two other chicks that came with it. Unfortunately the two chicks got loose from the hutch they were in and disappeared, leaving just the one. Then the one chick turned into a rooster. The farmer tried to put him out with the older laying chickens but they didn't like him one bit so they pecked all his top-knot feathers out and all the feathers off his tail. He was sad and bald and spent a lot of time in the corner of the chicken pen trying to hide from the big birds. The farmer took him out and put him in the hutch to live by himself. When the meat chicks arrived he was allowed to live with them as long as he didn't try to pick any fights. No fights have broken out but this rooster has taught the 9 meat roosters how to crow so the barn is a cacophony of noisy crowing. The Polish rooster has a normal sounding crow. It's loud and clear. The meat roosters, on the other hand, sound like they are getting strangled when they crow. One good crow followed by nine strangle crows is getting kind of annoying. Oh well, the farmer assures us that all of the meat chickens will be gone on September 15 when the chicken processing equipment rental is available. Depending on how the Polish rooster acts in the next few weeks will decide if he is included on the meat bird list on the 15th. He better stay on the straight and narrow if I were him!

Frothy Bloat!

My mom gave the farmer a scare last night. Everything was going normally for doing chores. The farmer put Gloria (my mom) on the milk stand and put the milk machine on. She was acting normal and eating her grain. Halfway through milking, Gloria peed on the milk stand. The farmer went to scold her for making a mess and saw that she has large gobs of slimy goo coming out of her mouth and nose. Frothy bloat! The farmer whipped Gloria off of the milk stand and started walking her to help move some of the frothy gas out of her stomach. She walked and walked up and down the farm to keep Gloria moving. Gloria spit out gobs of goo and snot. The farmer had to stop every so often to wipe the slime from Gloria's nose so she could breath. The farmer got her hubby to walk the goat while she went to the house and got 1 cup of peanut oil and some baking soda. She gave this to Gloria to try to break the surface tension of the froth so it would stop building up in the rumen. Gloria kept burping and spitting up slime for a while. She started to puff up and get very large. The farmer was worried that she wouldn't be able to stop the gas from expanding and it would hurt Gloria. After a lot of walking and massaging Gloria stopped spitting up goo and her stomach went back to normal size. She is fine today and is eating normally. Hooray for the farmer who saved the day!