Update on Hallie

A great short video showing the progress we've made with Hallie, the rescue doe we brought home in January.

Hallie came to us underweight, sickly, and appeared to have been traumatized in some way. She was literally terrified of people and not just the wild aspect I've handled many times, but flat out shaking in her hooves wide eyed horrified near humans.

I started by completely ignoring Hallie except for necessary health treatment and hoof trimming. In time I began talking to her conversationally when I was out there.

That moved to having her eat grain out of a bucket while I held it. I then moved to touching her from time to time for just a moment while she ate.

Today I caught her, squatted down, and petted her. As you can see from the video, it went quite well! She's on her way to becoming a spoiled part of K-n-S Farm. They don't call me the Goat Whisperer for nothing!

An update on the little buckling; he is indeed mine! I spoke to the awesome owner of River Bottom Ranch earlier today and it looks like I may be able to pick him up on Friday. Very excited!

I also spoke with the owner of two does I have put a deposit on and gained permission to borrow the pictures she has for my website. She is also sending me new pictures and a picture of the sire of the doeling soon.

I am just absolutely pleased with all the positive changes coming!

Customer Service

Why is it so hard to find GOOD customer service now days?

Let me use my personal example. I have internet. Until recently, it was very good, reliable internet.

Then we had that cold snap. And ever since, our internet has acted like crap. It times out, disconnects, has constant errors and is just generally acting poorly.

Which I cannot have, since I work online.

I have called the company several times to ask them to fix it. Twice they put in a "Trouble Ticket" and assured me someone would call back to go over the issue.

Did anyone ever call back?

Hell no.

So tomorrow I will be calling and really letting loose on them. I have a lot of patience with people, because it is certainly not THEIR fault my internet is not working, but this time I am going to ask for a supervisor and really get this fixed. It is imperative that my internet works, both for my peace of mind and because I work online!

Grrr.

On that same basic subject, I've applied for a "real" job. Still a work at home, but this time with permanent hours and a "real" paycheck. I've sent in my application and hope to hear back soon. Fingers crossed, as this could be our salvation.

Hallie's limp has really improved, I really got into those hooves and got them looking better and have been treating the hoof rot. Looks like we caught it before it became bad. I'm glad to see her looking even better. It does not appear that she is pregnant, so with good luck, she will be ready to breed to the lovely buck I have lined up for the end of the year.

I have a new picture of our future LGD. Isn't she cute?

New Development

There's been some new development in the whole affair with the bad breeder.

(I will be releasing the breeder's name soon enough.)

Today, someone e-mailed me about the person, having gotten my e-mail from craigslist when I posted a Buyer Beware against this breeder.

Hello, I found a post you once posted on ********* Farms about her miscarrying for several animals. I am very instrested in your views on the farm she is raising. I just recently sent in a 300 dollar check (down payment) for her "micro pig" and after receiving the check she suddenly stopped picking up my calls, my text and not responding to emails. I was told I could pick for my pig in Liberty friday the 29th..well Friday arrived and she will not give me an exact address much less a reply. Now she post poned my date to Febuary 20th I have grown very worried not only because the loss of 300 dollars but in fear to how many others this is occurring to. I thank you for your time and hope to hear to views in return.

Thank you.

Not a huge surprise, really. I did e-mail back and go over the situation, and promised to procure contact information for this person so they could go about getting their (overpriced) pig. Once we get this settled, I will probably be releasing the entire story, along with as much evidence as I have left (some was taken by the ASPCA and in the meantime has disappeared.)

An update on Hallie: She appears to have been harboring some hoof rot in a hind hoof. I caught her, cleaned it out, treated it, and hopefully it will clear up soon. I hate to see her limp, poor dear.

Thankfully she does not appear to be pregnant, so we've avoided that potential disaster.

I will be keeping you updated on this new turn of events, rest assured, and soon enough, I will bring the whole mess to light, and hopefully get the word out there.

Know Who You Buy From

No matter what you are buying, but especially when it comes to living animals, know who you are buying from!

I won't go into the whole list of "mills" out there, which includes just about any species of animals. No, today I will focus on my recent covert operation.

Some months ago, a friend contacted me. She had some goats to sell. At the time, I couldn't take them in, we were in the middle of moving and our pens were not set up yet. So I directed them to another friend I had made and knew through e-mail contact. That person bought the goats.

When the seller got back, she contacted me and told me that the buyer's goats were in poor shape, needing deworming and health care. We decided it was simply a matter of her needing a bit of help, and I and a group of breeders in the area banded together to give her advice. We thought it was all taken care of.

Fast forward a few months, and disturbing things begin popping up. There are complaints on Craigslist about the breeder, and I uncover some pretty disturbing pictures on the breeder's website and other information. Apparently she's had a lot of goats die and the ones left are in bad shape.

I contact the seller and we work out a plan to buy back the two does, all the while I am trying to get more information and get something done about the poor situation going on.

We are able to negotiate payment for one of the does, Hallie. For nearly twice what she was sold to this breeder for. The other Delanie, is "not for sale." We later find out that Delanie died.

We are told Hallie is "in milk" and kidded in December. When asked for pictures of the kid by two separate people, the breeder sends both of them pictures stolen from other websites, and not even the same pictures.

Of course this was uncovered immediately, its not hard to trace pictures back to their source. We chose not to confront her about this, in the interest of removing Hallie from the situation. We had trouble setting up a date for the pick-up, but eventually we were able to, though Hallie's registration paperwork was not avaliable.

On pickup, Hallie was underweight, coughing, with a snotty nose and hugely overgrown hooves. She's terrible pale and absolutely terrified. She doesn't defecate the entire ride (3+ hours) home, which begs to ask, how long was she without food? She is certainly not "in milk" as claimed, and she did not kid in December. It's probably she kidded between September and October. Which brings the question, why were we lied to and where were the kid(s)?

I immediately quarantine Hallie and bring the vet in. She is started on a dewormer regimen, gets a hoof trim, a copper bolus, and a course of antibiotics. Thankfully, two weeks later, she is doing quite well, gaining weight and has been introduced into the herd without too much fanfare.

I've tried in vain to get the truth about Hallie. The most I could get was that Hallie's kid died. I imagine this is the truth of the matter, though she still claims Hallie kidded in December. The paperwork as well still has not been mailed.

I personally talked to the ASPCA. I filed several reports and gave evidence. In time, they told me a warning had been given. I'm not sure if they told me this to get me off their backs, or if they actually went out there, but I do know that this breeder sold quite a lot of goats very soon afterward.

Since then, there has been evidence that several other of the goats have died. The goats, by the breeder's own admission, do not receive vaccinations, are not health tested, and many other things. Now, I'm not against someone who does research and chooses not to vaccinate, and many do not regularly test for health problems.

The point here is the ignorance, and unwillingness to learn. We tried to help this breeder, and it was cast aside. Her whole point was to have a "goat mill" and to make as much money as she can off of the poor beasts.

She has been caught in many lies. I can only hope that the recent events have opened her eyes, but in my experience, people like this never change.

Always do your research before you buy. Take a close look at websites. If someone has pictures of obviously emaciated animals on there, don't you think it's a better idea to look elsewhere?

A picture of Hallie, feeling better.