Lost a Chicken

Well phooie.

We have been pretty well spoiled over the course of two years by having the shepherds be a nice little (big) deterrent by proxy. The wild critters know full we have all these big scary beasts SOMEWHERE on the property, just not sure where. So by and large it has worked to protect the flock of chickens and the goats. Rabbits...not so much as the rabbitry is pretty far removed from the dogs. But they have sturdy cages, so hope abounds there.

Anyway, last night the critters knew exactly where the dogs were not. Anywhere near the chicken coop. And when they find that out and you don't have the door latched...guess what happens? We were lucky to lose just one and no eggs. One hen. Not fun and not nice but at least it was only one and it wasn't the rooster. Whew. I would be out getting rooster number 4. They are usually the ones biting the bullet in protection of the girls.

I hate it when this happens. Learning by the death of an animal. Makes me cranky. Never mind it's all my fault and we sat on our laurels a bit too long. The critter in question here I think is a momma raccoon because holy moly there was not much left. I'm assuming she was trying to drag it away to feed babes because only one was taken and it was pretty much demolished against the fence. They tried like heck to pull it through but didn't make it. So they ate it through the fence. Could be a mink or a weasel to be sure...but what ever it was will not get away with this again.

Whew. Shocking sight to say the least.

Tonight the chickens will be all locked up and cozy and two of the dogs will be placed in that section of the yard because I know full well momma raccoon will come back. Easy pickings right? I would if I were her. So hopefully she makes it out alive tonight and her babes will not be motherless. Hopefully she realizes she can't get it done and doesn't even try to get in the fence.

Basil and I have issues

I love basil. One of the most useful and tasty of herbs. Easy to grow so "they" say.

My rear end. My basil hates me. I lovingly planted seeds, they all came up then died. I put them out in the sun (protected by a nice little cold frame) and they croaked. Humph.

I bought some healthy plants at the nursery. Lovely specimens. I brought them in each evening so the slugs would not be dining on them. The nights were cold. I babied the heck out of them. Then it warms up, time to go out in a lovingly tended pot with lots of natural plant goodies, worm casting from our red worms being the least of it. All of those basil plants went and croaked too.

I've come to the conclusion (after digging around in my psyche and trying to find a little zen bubble to relax and breath in so I don't lose my temper) that I was not meant to have basil for some reason. Still working on the reason part. I'm baffled. Humph.

I'm also having trouble with Rosemary. I figured that one out though. The northwest, especially the part I live in is too wet (120" plus a year) to plant the herb direct into the ground. If one has sandy well drained soil with a micro climate of a house for it to thrive near, fine. I don't happen to have that. But when I forget to get it out of pots and into the ground it lives. Put it in the ground it dies. So I learn these lessons the hard way over the course of a few years and too much money later. Damned irritating. So I got it this time. Finally. Have one plant that needed rescuing, but I'm pretty sure I got it.

To have a little fun and inject some humor into the whole thing I've decided for a short amount of time to get into minimalism. As an artist, that is terribly difficult for me to do. Usually I pack too much in, whether painting or planting. So this is my attempt at minimalism. Until I stuff some HARDY seeds in and plant bamboo stakes in as well to protect from all my doggone animals. Cats and little dogs. Just about as destructive as my four big dogs. Humph.

I'm turning into a curmudgeon. It can't be helped.





Those little dogs that seem to think it's a blast to dig and rip and tear.



Minimalist Rosemary that was rescued out of the garden.



Minimalist Parsley



Mountain Basil that died off.



Large leave basil that died off as well.

Comfrey will be planted all over the place in the front. It's just about the only thing that can't be killed by all my animals. The goats, rabbits and chickens will really benefit, so all is good that direction. So some good will come out of all this, right??

Humph.

Rabbits for Meat

I finally have all my stock lined up in such a way as to do a run once a week. With an average of 7 per liter I'm looking at about 1440 pounds of meat in a year. Not bad. Would like to see the liters larger and or survival rate higher, but this is what my numbers told me for last year. So average of 7 is my starting point.

The dogs benefit as well because I won't be buying them nearly the quantity of commercial dog food. I'm going from 5 bags of dog food for the 4 German Shepherds to just one. I'd like not to buy the one at all because I'm unhappy with commercial dog foods, period. We'll see if I can get it down to no commercial dog food.

The pictures below are of some our crew. We have 11 breeding females (doe's) and 3 breeding bucks. Only three of the doe's are without liters currently, two of those are pregnant (we hope) We just moved a liter through yesterday, they are out in the cooler and hopefully we will have some smoked rabbit on Monday or Tuesday. The most amazing meat I've ever had! ...mmmm mmmm mmmm! I cut all the meat from the bones and throw the bones into two large crockpots for stock and to get the bones softened down real nice to grind up for the dogs. Included here are also two other dishes I've prepared: Braised Rosemary Rabbit and Apple Pepper Rabbit. Incredible! :-)




This liter was the largest we've had yet. 12 born, 11 survived. We will be keeping a female from this group to try and replicate the propensity for larger liters.



Momma Rosy and her 8 kits.




A new little nest of babes, about 2 weeks old.



Though we have two water bottles per cage, they still feel the need to bunch in and get squashed. Really funny and sweet little babes.




Braised Rosemary Chicken in a Cast Iron Dutch Oven



Apple Pepper Rabbit, ready for the oven.

Because I haven't posted anything new on my dogs I thought I'd share just a wee bit of the goings on around here. Big dogs playing and stretching (exciting I know) and the wee one investigating new baby goat. Just a little fun on the farm.



Steve checking out our little buddy JJ in Dad's lap.



Wolfgang, looking scary early in the morning. He is the most wolfish looking of our crew.



Wolfgang, Sasha and Diego watching the goats being let out for some browse. Watching with intent even. :-)



Cheyenne at the back taking off to pick up a bigger stick (log) and Wolfgang getting ready to wrestle Dad Diego as he stretches.



Everyone in the fray of play - can't get in to visit goats so might as well get the energy out somewhere :-)




And last but not least...a little of what our poor little Steve was subjected to. Same day as the photo above of Steve snuggling with baby JJ. A friend of mine likened it to "Chihuahua or Squeaky Door?" Fun!

More new babies

Sandy and JJ Jackson - 5 hours old


First real nap they've had since being born. Exhausting!


Joel loving up his new boy JJ Jackson


Sandy and JJ Jackson at about an hour old.

Miss Lily Sassy Pants Ornery Goat had her babies too! On March 21st as a matter of fact, but I'm running behind and by the seat of my pants as usual o.O

Anyhoo...here are our newest members of the herd, Sandy and JJ Jackson. Lily has not accepted JJ Jackson, the black one. When we came out to the barn at 5 AM to check on Lily they had both been born already. She was laying down cleaning the lighter one, Sandy but the black one was wondering around toward the top crying with all his birth goo still on him. My husband was horrified we might lose him because it was cold and brought him into the house to dry him up real quick. Turns out we probably should not have done that. We SHOULD have put him to momma so she could recognize she had him and get him cleaned up. If a goat doesn't do that then they don't really realize they just had a baby. Silly I know. Don't ever let anyone convince you that goats are as smart as dogs. They most assuredly are not.

So miss Lily has not taken to her second boy. He did get his first 4 days of colostrum because I forced the issue but he has since been moved out of the main barn for his protection. More on that in the next post. In the mean time, here are the new pictures and video!

The last video has my rooster adding to the dialog!

New Babies!

It's been a while since I've posted. What's new right? Well new babies is what's new! We had our first set born on the 16th of March and the second set on the 21st of March.

This first set are a boy and a girl, both of whom we will be keeping. Cassie the little brown one is the girl and the white one, Shane. Shane will be our new buck so we can continue in the milk after having to dispatch our sweet boy Jack. Sad day. But anyway, he was a good boy and gave us four new babies.

Here are the first two and momma Amelia. Our daughter Heather is in little goat heaven! Note Amelia still has the birth goo, the babies are just one hour old here!

Learning the hard way

Well. I guess I'm going to have to admit that I really did learn the hard way. Darn it. I HATE having to learn the hard way. But I guess the upside to this is that I at least learned. And perhaps anyone at all who is thinking about goats might read this and realize they might not have to learn the hard way. Like I did.

What the heck am I talking about you ask???

Yes, goats. Bucks in particular. We are probably going to have to dispatch our yearling buck. He will not stay out of the girls pen. That is where we made our mistake. We did not realize that we should have separated him out from the start. We got the three goats, two doelings and buckling when they were 2 weeks old. He was adorable. He is still sweet but not so adorable anymore.

I'm not happy about this at all.

But we will try again with another buck and probably a wether to keep him company so we can still have milk and babies next year. These will start out separated from the starting gate.

I'm definitely sad this evening. :-(

Do not ever, ever run your young bucks with your does and think you can separate them at a later date. We did it because we felt sorry for the buck. We figured it would all work itself out in the end. Nope. Goats are herd animals. They need companionship and will go to great lengths or die to get it.

This sucks. :-( We did our sweet boy Jack a great diservice.