OUTDOOR WEDNESDAY/ UPDATE ON THE GOATS!

 

 

Well, I needed this day, sponsored by Susan at southern daydreamer.blogspot.com.  Thanks Susan.

It has been a while since I have posted anything about the goats, dogs, cats, ducks and last but not least, Mr. Tom T and Mrs. Hen.   I realize for some of you, this is not your cup of tea, but this is what I started out to do.  I was  going to write about my life on the Bar H and I have gotten side tracked into other things.  I love the Special Days and have a great time doing my tablescapes and will never stop, but my goats and animals are a big part of my life.

TODAY IS THE DAY!

We have about 45 goats and I hope we can take about 20+ to market in November.   We need to rebuild our herd with new goats and we will do this in the Spring.  I don’t want a large number of goats to carry thru the winter.  We have decided to develop a herd of about 15 to 20 nannies and 1 Billy.  This will be easier to handle and we will sell off and try to keep the herd at this number.

    We purchased a 3,000 pound feeder…yep 3,000 pounds and we have ordered a bag of feed that weighs 1300 pounds to start with.  Since Roy works one week on and one off, there needs to be feed for the goats all the time, I can’t carry those 50lb. bags out there one by one.

 

 

My three little ones I raised are doing wonderful and growing everyday. They still try to nibble on us when we go out in the pasture.

Pilgrim and Mary are doing their job out in the pasture and I need to clip Mary.  During the summer months she swims in the pond and then while still wet lays down on the dirt and her fur gets all matted.   They are beautiful dogs and they take very good care of our goats.

 

 

We have had a tremendous amount of rain, but the grass is not coming back as fast as we would like, so the goats are eating close to the ground, which causes worms.  I have only had a few cases and hope they are clear now.

As I have said before, many people think you just turn them lose and they eat anything.  Not true.  Out in West Texas where they have large herds of 2oo or more, they can do this because they don’t have much rain, so worms are not a big problem for them and they round them up maybe a couple times a year unless of course they are raising very expensive pure breed ones and then  they take more care.

We have a lady about 30 or 40 miles from us that raises Kiko goats and she milks them everyday.  I hope to visit her real soon, we would like to have some Kiko goats.  They are very hardy.

I just saw an advertisement  for a new movie coming out called Men Who Stare at Goats, and it has some famous actors in it.  I am anxious to see what it is about.  The preview shows a man and a goat staring at each other until finally the goat falls over!!!!!!  Strange.

All the other dogs are great, they are very spoiled, but right now I am glad they want to stay in the house, we have had in the surrounding area about 5 break –ins and a couple of rapes of  ladies living alone.  My dogs will bark at anything that moves in the yard at night and I would hope that someone would not try to come in the house.  I also have an alarm system and several guns.

Cats are the same…they all go in and out all day.  I am the door keeper.

 

 

 

 

The ducks were  coming to  the  house every  morn  just before dawn and eating  the food in the turkey’s bowl and then waiting  loudly for me to go to the pond with them for more food.  They were also making a mess on the concrete.  For some unknown reason, they just stopped as quickly as they had started.      Thank  goodness.

Speaking of our newest addition, Mr. Tom and Ms. Hen are still here.  They are roosting at night on top of the Hot Tub, which is in a little building of its own, so that requires the water hose about every three to four days.   Ms. Hen has  hurt one of  her feet and is limping .  Not sure what happened.   Mr. Tom is getting amorous again, he is starting to strut around and fan his feathers.  What a sight to see.

 

 

We have a large area of concrete in front of the house, tool barn and the garage.   It   is quite a sight to see a couple of dogs, three or more cats lying out there and the turkeys walking around.

Well, this is the latest on the crazy animals that live with the Purple Goat Lady and Roy.

My friend Karen has fed them several times for us lately and she says the cats are spoiled……what can I say…..all my animals have trained me well.   Roy just shakes his head. 

Some may say how can she put up with all those animals, but although there are days when I get upset with them, I wouldn’t trade them for anything.