I'm sorry

I'm so sorry little one.

It was a disgusting, cold, rainy day. I sledged through it as usual, bringing the irritated goats their hay and alfafa pellets.

You were laying with the two junior doelings. I didn't think twice of it. I checked the juniors, as they've been feeling poorly on and off lately. I gave them their morning dose of nutri-drench to keep their spirits up, gave everyone a pat, and went inside.

I came out to check on everyone and found you down, legs stiff, unresponsive. My heart was in my stomach as I rushed you inside. Your temperature was so low I couldn't get a read on it.

Desperate, I put you in a plastic bag up to your head and submerged you into hot water, trying to get your temperature up. I got you out and put you under a heater and a heatpad, rubbing you and praying.

I was too late. You passed away while I held you and cried.

I'm so sorry for not noticing you weren't feeling well that morning. I'm so sorry that something was amiss and you had to go.

It broke my heart to lose you on my wedding anniversary. You were my first bottle-baby and while you had your problems, little escape artist and loudmouth, you had your irresistible charms.

Today was almost worse, when you weren't there to greet me at the door, smug again in your ability to escape "fort knox" the goat pen.

I'm so sorry, and I miss you.

Possible Buckling Addition

Wow! Look at this little stunner!

These were the pictures e-mailed to me by the wonderful breeder at River Bottom Ranch. I am doing some work for her in exchange for a buckling from her milk lines.

So far, this is the only buckling born at her ranch and he is just absolutely gorgeous.

He was born on Valentine's Day and so far she is calling him Mr Blue.

My eyes just about popped out of my head when I saw him, I tell you. She had teased me earlier, telling me she had a blue-eyed buckling born, the likes of which she had never seen before. And then proceeded to lose her camera!

Needless to say I was on the edge of my seat waiting for these, and it was worth the wait!


This little boy is from awesome milk lines. Perhaps not champion quality but far better than my own. He will add awesome improvement on his daughters, and his color and beautiful blue eyes will help make sure his sons find awesome pet homes.

I am not 100% certain if she is going to allow me to take this fellow as my payment for the work I've done, but I'm hoping this is the case! Why else would she send me these stunning pictures, after all, right?

As you can imagine, I can hardly wait to make this fellow part of the herd. And he'll be ready to try out his new job with my younger does early next year I'm hoping.

With luck, I will be adding a second buck shortly after, so I can have two clear bloodlines to breed too.




I had quite the adventure tonight as well. My friend and neighbor raises goats as well, a few Nigerians and some larger breed Nubian does and Nubian mixes. My favorite doe from her herd decided to kid somewhere in three acres of briar and thorn vine, and leave the kid behind!

Needless to say I headed over there, around 9PM at night, and got some flashlights and helped her husband search for the baby or babies. After about an hour, he finally called to me that he found it!

I was very relieved and we came back to the house to reunite the mother and kid. My friend was ecstatic to see that it was a beautiful little chamois doeling. Just a beautiful little creature that looked like a little rabbit hiding in the woods. And so they christened her "Bunny."

A suitable name, in my opinion.


And a final tidbit for tonight: The aforementioned bottle-baby of K-n-S Farm has officially been renamed.

Her new name?

K-n-S Farm Ninja.

Don't you laugh! This little monster can and has found a mysterious way of getting out of the pen, despite my best efforts. Perhaps she levitates over it. She gets out in the morning whenever she feels I've slept long enough, and runs to the front porch to yell at my window, demanding I get up and feed everyone.

She also has perfected the wall jump. She runs as fast as she can, leaps onto the wall, springs off, and lands perfectly. Quite a sight to see. So her new name is Ninja.

Weather

Sorry I didn't post for a couple of days!

Today's post should be pretty good, hopefully. I dunno, it might be boring. I guess it's up to you!

Let's start with today.

The weather! It sucks! Good ol "bi-polar" Texas. We had nice weather, then rain, then a day of nice weather, and now rain again. Ugh! I hate it! The goats hate it! The dogs hate it!

My roof still leaks, so it just makes me angry when it rains over and over again. It turns our road to slush and then the morons in their trucks tear it up worse. Plus its cold. Which means we have to run the heaters. Which means our electric bill will jump.

Yuck.

On a positive note, today we decided to try shopping at Albertson's instead of HEB.

WOW!

We literally saved $62.58! We spent about $68 dollars and got almost twice the worth of meat and groceries. The meat savings and specials were AMAZING!

Now I admit, the prices on other things were a bit high, but that's fine with me. I'll get my meat at Albertson's and get everything else at HEB. Win!

We also stopped by Big Lots and Ross'. We got snacks at Big Lots for really cheap, and got Steven some nice shoes at Ross' for a good price. He goes through shoes so fast. It's crazy. But these are really nice boots and should last a little longer than his normal shoes.

I hope!

Yesterday Baby decided to teach herself a new trick. I had been teaching her to stand on her high legs for fun, as she's very attention driven and it was cute. Well, she decided it wasn't quite fun enough and started leaping from the log into my arms. It's quite amusing. Check out the video I put together!

Too cute, am I right? I'm sure I'll end up regretting teaching her such a trick, but I've spoiled her. I guess that's why I've avoided bottle-babies until now!

I think Rudy settled on her last breeding, not for sure yet, but if she did I'm glad. She didn't settle when she was supposed too last year with Buckly, so I let her visit with a neighbor's buck, and I think she may have taken now. If not, she'll get another chance at the end of the year when I lease Chestnut for the entire herd.

If she doesn't take? Well, I guess nothing will happen as she's hubby's goat. He picked her out and named her. So I guess she'll continue to be placed with the bucks and stay, burning hay. If it was any other goat (with the exception of Hallie, our rescue doe) she'd be gone to a good pet home, but alas, it's hubby's goat.

And it does help she's a gentle little sweetheart with a goofy personality.

The rest of the herd is doing well. Poor little Isis is such a tiny little thing, she's nearly the same size as the four-five week old babies! She's going to be our smallest doe I think, probably even smaller than Rudy.

I have my eye on two gorgeous does; a black and white blue eyed doe and her kid, a roan buckskin with blue eyes. The owner very kindly agreed to hold them for me until the doe weans her other two kids. By then I'll have my tax money and I had promised myself some new does. And I have always wanted the black and white blue eyed combo! Really looking forward to her!

The same with the goat(s) I will get for my work on River Bottom Ranch's website. I can't wait to take a trip out there.

There's been some issues on the online game I play, a few things that have really thrown me off my "groove" but hopefully it will settle in soon. I don't like it when things become rough.

No word back on the nice job I applied for. I suppose I didn't make the cut. A shame, because it would have been a huge help. I guess I'll just keep on doing the ChaCha until the company screws the cash paid guides enough that I quit.

By then I'm thinking my brother will be working, and can contribute to the house. We were going to take him to get his license tomorrow but since the weather is disgusting we're postponing it a bit.

I think that's it for now.

Talk to you guys soon.

Thoughtful

Just a basic update on the usuals.

No more information about the bad breeder as of right. I'm waiting to hear back from the person trying to get her deposit back for the pig. We'll see what happens here shortly in the future.

The internet company sure took me on a round ride. Recently we upgraded to a higher service. Well we started having problems, as outlined in earlier blogs, and it took me around six phone calls to get it worked out. I finally had to go three supervisors up and demand answers.

The end result was we were knocked back down to our recent status, as apparently we are "too far" to get the higher service. Sure would have been nice if they had told us this when we upgraded. It was a huge ordeal and I made it very clear that we were NOT happy with the service they had been providing, especially customer service.

Then they tried to convince me to upgrade to television along with my internet and phone.

Ugh.

Cocci treatment is going well, Baby's slight diarrhea seems to have cleared up and none of the others ever showed any signs. Baby prefers to spit her medicine out (I have to put it in her bottle) but the rest, including Hope's two boys and the two weanling does, will drink the stuff straight out of the cup if I let them. Little strange weirdos.

I am really seeing an improvement in Rudy and Hope from the copper bolus I administered in December. Their coats are shinier, hooves have improved, and there is a definite drop in parasite load, not only using the FAMANCHA system but via veterinary fecals. I am really pleased, and thankful for my friend who sold me a few capsules of copasure to try it out. I plan on bolusing every six months, as well as continuing to have free choice mineral available from them.

So far we've not had a problem with Selenium, but our pregnant females do get a Selenium boost shortly before kidding.

I've learned I can put just about anything in a marshmallow, and my goats will eat it. Even Hallie, our wild rescue doe, took copper when it was folded into a marshmallow. Granted, I had to shove it into the back of her mouth while she was in the milk stand.

Baby is learning about hay and grain. I'm not sure if she is actually eating either, or just picking it up and mouthing it before dropping it, but her milk consumption has dropped a little. She continues to grow and is larger than Hope's twins, despite being a day younger.

To change the subject once again.

Anyone who knows me in the online world knows that I delight in gossip, but keep myself out of "drama" the best I can. Recently, the person who left our online game (see an earlier blog) has joined another game. Which I'm completely fine with, people have the free will to do whatever they please. What got me was that another friend, the leader of this game, actually laughed at us because we had posted a short blurb wishing the first friend well and hoping she would return to our game someday (when she first left).

How rude is that? And childish I might add. Goes to show you how true some "friends" can really be.

I'm not letting it bother me, because it's a ridiculous thing to be bothered over. I was just thoughtful, and it reminded me to always keep a wary eye on those you deem "friends." Even if you bend over backwards for someone trying to help them, it doesn't mean they appreciate the gesture.

A Future Guardian

Sorry, but no post on the whole goat scandal I recently delt with. I am trying to worm a bit more information out of the person in question, so I'll have to wait a bit longer. But no fear! It's coming soon.

Instead, tonight I'll introduce my future Livestock Guardian. She was born recently here, to a Great Pyrenees dam and a Great Pyrenees/Anatolian sire, both excellent guard animals.

Without further adieu:

Isn't she just a gorgeous little thing? She'll, with work and luck, grow into K-n-S Farm's Guardian, caretaker of the herd and watchdog. We really look forward to having her here and working with her, and having some peace of mind when it comes to the herd and their safety.

How many of you use LGs? Are they canine or equine or other? Have you had good or bad experiences with them?

I've used a donkey before, way back in the day when we had meat goats. He was mean and grouchy and hated everyone. Not the best experience!

In other news, our current bottle-baby, Baby (I know, real original right?), has discovered that she can leap out of the fence. How you ask? Well, we have cattle panel, and on all of them except one, the entire panel is covered with wire with smaller openings, to prevent escapes. On one panel, it only goes partway up. Well miss smarty pants learned to leap right over that part and out of the hole in the panel.

Too clever for her own good. She's turning into a right spoiled little thing, something I've tried to avoid but seem to be failing at! She's our first bottle baby, we've avoided them in the past but she was too cute to pass up, especially when my favorite doe failed to give me a doeling to keep for the second year in a row.

Baby stays outside with the other goats, but does get a little house time after being fed in the evenings.

I look forward to having her grown up and running about the house...sort of.

Keep checking back for more!