What did you do with your flock today?

[Shetland lover]

Arizona's a weird place...summers actually too hot to grow much of anything. Some stuff does well over summer with the right conditions. But fall, winter and spring are doable. If you get cool season stuff growing well in the fall, you can grow and harvest it all the way through til next summer. Cold sensitive stuff is harder... tomatoes, melons etc only grow in spring and fall so you have to pick super short season varieties to get a harvest.

Male goats are a hoot. They pee all over their own faces to be sexy for the girls . All the boys we've had over the years loved to greet us by rearing up like their going to headbutt us. We'd reach out and greet them back with a little slap between the horns and it'd make them so happy. They'd drop down, wag their tails and ask for scritches once they got their greeting. And male goats have the most amazing strut when they're feeling sexy...lol. A lot of people mistake the males greeting as aggression...they just want to say hi though.

Peeing over your own face? Now THAT is a talent! . My cat once got his own diahoea on the back of his ear. I thought that was quite impressive.

 

[FBMcrazy8]

Peeing over your own face? Now THAT is a talent! . My cat once got his own diahoea on the back of his ear. I thought that was quite impressive.

I used to work at one of the daycare centers on post and we had a kid who had diarrhea that went all the way up her back and into her hair. Now mind you her diaper was just changed and she was doing tummy time. AND there was hardly NOTHING in her diaper. That one still amazes me. I haven’t ever seen that happen since….

 

[ChicksnMore]

I’m glad you said that. Cause his dad though wasn’t looking for a greeting. But knowing this information will for sure help when he gets older. When we went to get him the only one to headbutt me was a pregnant girl. I’m not sure how far along she was but it was obvious. It wasn’t very hard either. More like a nudge to like say…hello I’m here…

Ya...dad sounded po'd. We never separated the girls and boys, and we never took the babies away til they were naturally weaned. 8-10 weeks is the earliest you can take them away from the mom's...left alone they nurse a lot longer and it keeps mom from getting pregnant again to give her rest time. We milked them too and just accepted getting less milk then if we got rid of the babies fast.

I've seen sweet baby boys grow up with bad behavior from people responding poorly to their greeting too. If you get scared or aggressive in response it confuses them. A relaxed, casual light smack and your saying hi family.

 

[Shetland lover]

I’m sorry that is just too funny!!! I’m sorry you lost her and so early! If you have pictures I would love to see them.

And no, you can’t ever be prepared. Even when you think you are, you aren’t. Even my grandma had a rough time after my grandpa passed away. It seemed to set off her dementia. She hadn’t any problems prior to him passing and then all of a sudden it hit her hard, within a year after he passed she was so bad she had to be put into a nursing home. And the way she talked she was at piece with it, I think she was trying to make us feel better when really it crushed her.

That sounds exactly how it was with my nana and grandad. Although, in hindsight, we think my nana was showing early signs in the months before my grandad passed but that he was keeping her straight and covering up for her too. It's the cruellest disease, dementia.

I'll look for some more photos but here's a couple I found  sfter she'd been trimmed. I do love my Shetland girls.

 

[Shetland lover]

Today Stanley did his first little dance for the ladies! Unfortunately for him, I don't think anyone was that impressed...

 

[FBMcrazy8]

Ya...dad sounded po'd. We never separated the girls and boys, and we never took the babies away til they were naturally weaned. 8-10 weeks is the earliest you can take them away from the mom's...left alone they nurse a lot longer and it keeps mom from getting pregnant again to give her rest time. We milked them too and just accepted getting less milk then if we got rid of the babies fast.

I've seen sweet baby boys grow up with bad behavior from people responding poorly to their greeting too. If you get scared or aggressive in response it confuses them. A relaxed, casual light smack and your saying hi family.

Thank you! There isn’t much info on goats online like there is chickens. I have been doing research for months now. I haven’t found anything about their behavior like that. And honestly the best place to learn is to come to places like this.

This little guy is 9 weeks. I am assuming she had them weaned by 8 weeks as her ad stated 8 and when we went there she said they just turned 9. I’m guessing that they may have separated him to keep them from having more babies…I’m not sure. There was 3 girls when I went into the pen to get YupYup. One was for sure pregnant and I’m guessing the other 2 just had the babies they sold. We aren’t planning on separating our boy but I don’t want to say we won’t as any occasion may rise where I may need to.

Let me ask you about the milking. Did you drink it or make yogurt out of it? Or did you do soaps and things like that? I’m just wondering what all everyone does with the milk. I know there are a lot of possibilities but when I do get a girl I kinda wanna have a game plan for as much as possible.

 

[FBMcrazy8]

That sounds exactly how it was with my nana and grandad. Although, in hindsight, we think my nana was showing early signs in the months before my grandad passed but that he was keeping her straight and covering up for her too. It's the cruellest disease, dementia.

I'll look for some more photos but here's a couple I found  sfter she'd been trimmed. I do love my Shetland girls.

Oh she is so cute!!! At first I thought maybe mine was an Ameraucana but she didn’t finish coloring out. But she has the beard and muff and even the leg color for it. But that’s ok, I love her anyway.

I don’t think my grandpa was covering for her. He was really sick. He had black lung, testicular cancer, and of course his age. My grandpa would be 109 this year. He lived a great life and died in such a horrible way. Wish I could have kept him around longer. But I named my 2 year old after him, well part of his name. And yes, dementia is cruel.

 

[FBMcrazy8]

Well YupYup got his very first vaccine today. And it didn’t go very well. He started crying and our Rottie ran over to him and started licking his face. And she WOULD NOT leave him alone. She even jumped on our couch and started licking his head and just giving him so much love. He just wanted to cuddle after that. His next shot will be in 2 weeks. Which should be interesting since he will be 2 weeks bigger . I wish this lady would have vaccinated him when he was supposed to so I didn’t have to do it with him being bigger and not so used to us. Oh well, gotta put my girl undies on and just do it. Won’t have to until another year. But he started eating really good this afternoon and drinking! I’m just so happy with this!

Chickens gave me 7 eggs today! Such good girls! I gave a dozen to my mom and a dozen to my sister and I still have close to 5 dozen eggs. I’m thinking I might be making some cookies and other homemade dough. Might make everyone a loaf of bread for Christmas. Of course cookies will be there too but I love making bread and everyone seems to like my bread. Just a joy to cook for people!

 

[ChicksnMore]

Thank you! There isn’t much info on goats online like there is chickens. I have been doing research for months now. I haven’t found anything about their behavior like that. And honestly the best place to learn is to come to places like this.

This little guy is 9 weeks. I am assuming she had them weaned by 8 weeks as her ad stated 8 and when we went there she said they just turned 9. I’m guessing that they may have separated him to keep them from having more babies…I’m not sure. There was 3 girls when I went into the pen to get YupYup. One was for sure pregnant and I’m guessing the other 2 just had the babies they sold. We aren’t planning on separating our boy but I don’t want to say we won’t as any occasion may rise where I may need to.

Let me ask you about the milking. Did you drink it or make yogurt out of it? Or did you do soaps and things like that? I’m just wondering what all everyone does with the milk. I know there are a lot of possibilities but when I do get a girl I kinda wanna have a game plan for as much as possible.

I was lucky enough to have a distant neighbor that raised goats. Her babies got two days with their mom for the colostrum and then they were sold cheap to another distant neighbor who raised them for butcher. She kept her boys separate too. She was a wealth of information and her girls were so so sweet.

The behavior stuffs just from watching and interacting with them. Our young boys would go headbutt crazy for a while but it's all play. We had a lot of kid visitors back then and I could see how the boys responded to different people's reactions. Goats are great...confuse them and they headbutt more . Our old boys that we raised ourselves were very mellow and only reared to greet. They were fun little eating machines. They love love love to eat everything...lol.

I made cheese out of the milk . I made lots of farmers cheese and mozzarella. Tried a few others too but those were my family's favorites. The farmers cheese is so easy to make and mozzarella is fun to make.

 

[Gammas Bearded Babies]

Lizzie used the nesting boxes this morning!!! I literally had to do a double take! Never seen her even in them much less use em to lay her egg! Then she hopped out n sang her song!
Go Lizzie!!!
Daisy is broody...I've moved her grumpy booty again and again but she ain't budging. So I sat her on the roost bar! Her being a Satin she never roosts...so we'll see of she hops down n goes back to her spot in the coop or not!

To ferment fee with sourdough discard or not....this is something I ran across and wanted yalls input! Have ya ever done this? I've read few articles bout it...what yall think?
https://www.pantrymama.com/how-to-feed-sourdough-discard-to-chickens/