New Farm babies!! More pics of the kids today! (pic heavy)

[tiffanyg2]

Love the pictures of all your animals! Especially the goats~ and I would never consider eating one

 

[flowergirl60]

I wish I lived on a farm. Your babies a adorable.

 

[BCBunnies]

That is horrible I'm glad we know the neighbors around here and that I've already bribed most of them with homemade blueberry jam.

Once we start getting eggs I'll be sending some extras to neighbors as well. The turkeys and some of the rabbits and any extra roos will be for meat too. As far as the goats I want to breed the girls when they are older and use the resulting kids for show and meat. Of course that's at least a year away at this point but I don't mind the wait I'm so glad to have goats again.

 

[mother o' chicks72]

Who would want to eat a goat!?

 

[debilorrah]

mother o' chicks72 :

Who would want to eat a goat!?

There are breeds that are raised for meat and milk. It is ot uncommon at all to eat goat meat.​

 

[BCBunnies]

Quote:
There are breeds that are raised for meat and milk. It is not uncommon at all to eat goat meat.

Yep Boers are meat goats I've actually processed out my high school show market whethers (castrated males) when they can no longer show which is after 1 year of age. They can get quite large even at such a relatively young age the last whethers we processed out were 185lbs for one of three triplets I raised from my own doe and 250lbs+ (scale didn't go over 250 and he bottomed it out) for a New Zealand Boer whether we bought at 6 months old as a buck. Had to have a vet surgically alter him at that point. It was like a cross in taste between deer meat and beef and because they were whethers they didn't have any of the gamey taste that wild killed deer can. We also had a high percentage of marbling in the meat due to additives in their diet and proper excersize. And for the size of land that we have goats are the better choice than raising cattle here as they would have to be fed out quite alot and be cost prohibitive though I may add one smaller dairy cow later on.

Thank you guys for all the compliments and responses I've definately got my work cut out for me taming the "kids" down they haven't exactly had too many positive associations with people yet (ear tagging ang worming) And I've chosen to leave the horns intact but will take tips off with trimming regularly as they grow.

 

[glenolam]

Very cute indeed!

And, actually, goat meat isn't that bad. I have dairy goats but have tried goat sausage.

I saw you mentioned you were bottle feeding the kids who have been dam raised for 2 months and was wondering why. If they're at least 8 weeks old they don't necessarily need to be given milk any more - you can add powdered milk to their grain if you'd like, but at 8 weeks old they're big enough to switch to water and hay/grain.

 

[BCBunnies]

Just giving them a little extra boost especially the little girl since she's so small they aren't to fond of getting caught to be fed but they will suck down the milk once I have the bottle in front of them. They aren't taking too much at a time but at least I know they are getting some extra nutrition in them. They all seem to be doing well I'm just holding out a little bit longer to worm them again. The previous owner said he wormed them and since I didn't want too much to be put through them at one time and cause too many to die off so I'm waiting 10 days from the day he told me to repeat treatment. Will post more pictures as I have time to get them and put them up.

 

[BCBunnies]

Here are pics from today of Belle and her two fellow kids.

My bigger Doe in front with the buckling in the middle and little Belle in the back. I think I'll fix the ears on the larger doe when she's tamed down a bit more anyone with experience on correcting bent ears or on how well they do just leaving them like this?

This doe just happens to naturally pose for show I hope my son will be old enough to be able to show this year cuz she sure does set up nice all on her own.

This is the little buckling he's the one that is most wary of humans, guess he heard us talk about banding him.

He has a bit shorter back but thicker stature than the does he'll make a nice buck or whether to sell when he's older.

Someone loves their feed alot she's usually sleeping next to the feed pan eating when I head out to check on them.

"Yes I'm eating will you stop taking pictures and let me finish my dinner already lady?" This is a better shot of her folded ears though I wish her previous owner had taken care of them when she was first born.

And this is little Belle she always comes up to the feed pan first and eats while the other two stand in the back. Once they see she isn't being eaten they come on up to eat. She was laying down to chew cud after she had her fill from the bucket Belle is such a sweet little thing.

 

[BCBunnies]

Have the baby bunnies out tonight socializing them while surfing web pages. This first little guy/gal seems to love the pics on BYC and hops over from my shoulder to the screen.

I may get my fiancee to help grab a picture of the babies playing with the laptop cuz they are just too cute. We also have a friend over and she's helping so we can handle 2 at a time with each of us taking 1 to socialize some more. I've been handling them in the cage picking them up and petting them and such but this is their first time out of the cage for more than just a minute or two. Of course they love it so much and are having fun getting spoiled rotten.

Have a bit of bad news too though my Cal buck I bought recently "seemed" to be drinking from his water bottle but after we got home for the day we found out he hadn't touched his water bottle at all. I feel horrible that I wasn't able to be here with him to help him.

I immediately checked the doe that I bought from the same place and she had drank some from the bottle but had spilled most of it on the ground around her hutch.

I pulled her inside and put her in the bathtub cooled her ears off and put a bowl of water out for her which she dove into. I'll never assume that they will drink out of bottles again I just didn't think about it because I've never had it happen before.

R.I.P. Charlie I'm sorry that we weren't here to help you when you needed us.