More and more babies!

More babies are coming along every day now!  Shellie was the first with the triplets and now we have six more.  We still have one goat past her due date so any day now.  Things have been crazy (like every spring...), so I don't have too many pictures downloaded yet to show off.

But speaking of showing off, I thought I would at least post a picture of the proud Papa of about half the goatlings this year.  The last two years, we've bred to Valentino but finally decided we needed some new blood in the works, so along came Cinnamon!  He was a bit of a beast and spent much of his time on the roof of the barn!

And speaking of being a beast...Willa spent much of the weekend pestering the new garden guineas.  She loved to make them squawk and send up their alarm call! 

In other news...ok, you're going to think we are crazy.  Here goes.  We had a "sighting" at the farm.  It might as well have been an alien spaceship for all the incredulity.  A large, 100 poundish, spotted cat jumped out of the creek bed and walked slowly across the road to the neighbor's property.  Yeah....we are talking jaguar or leopard.  My brother, who saw it, is leaning towards jaguar.  He is probably the only person I would believe who came to me with reports of a jaguar wandering around the farm.  Apparently it was well fed, so we are assuming escaped pet or zoo critter.  We even have a zoo 10 miles away but they claim to have never had a spotted cat in their collection (establishing deniability for liability reasons!?  :P).  So....could this have been on the farm?!?!?

Just "Kidding" Around

The first of this spring’s kids finally arrived last week! Shelli gave birth to triplets – Beatrice, Baxter, and Bartholomew…can you tell that we have a “B” theme this year? Despite the first kid coming out in the wrong position, the birth went well and the kids are growing like weeds. Unlike some other baby animals (I'm thinking puppies), goat kids are incredibly cute the instant they are born. They were all wagging their tails and investigating their surroundings in a matter of minutes. Here are some photos!

Hello Again from Sand Holler!

While there has been a long absence of blog posts, there has certainly been no shortage of news at Sand Holler Farm! Between baby Willa, a full-time job, the holidays, and the constant demands of the farm, Marissa was in need of some reinforcements to keep the blog updated. That’s where I come in! My name is Jessica and my husband, Alex, and I moved out to the farm this past October. We were brought in to relieve Dale of the animal chores on the weekends (I guess he deserves SOME time off) and to make CSA deliveries. We’re excited to be a part of Sand Holler and I’m happy to be taking on some new responsibilities, including this blog!

Here is a brief update of farm happenings from the past few months:

We got one new four-legged addition this fall. Kitten, a lamb, was born on Alex and I’s first night here. Talk about a good omen! You can hardly call her a lamb anymore, although she is still very attached to Cat, her mama.

Harvest House and "Pre-Freeze" Garden

The biggest change on the farm has to be the completion of the “Harvest House”, the charming new focal point of the garden. This multi-purpose building has a generous area to wash and sort produce, storage for garden tools, and a small apartment for interns and WWOOF volunteers. With the winter providing limited produce, however, the work space has largely been used for sewing row covers to protect our crops during freezes. Our latest WWOOF volunteers, August and Marion, have proved themselves to be masters of the sewing machine and all of our rows are now sporting new, easily-deployed covers. The design is a vast improvement from last year’s and we are all very grateful to be able to “button up” the garden in a matter of minutes!

The garden is all tucked in and ready to brave another cold night!

Envelopes of seeds have been steadily arriving in the mail, bringing with them excitement for spring planting. While the garden has an abundance of kale, collards, and mustard, I think we are all ready for something besides greens! The garden is looking great thanks to the many helping hands we’ve had over the past few months, including Evan, Nicole, Austin, Keely, (another) Jessica, and, as always, Dale. Talk about Community Supported Agriculture! Cold hardy crops, such as beets, carrots, and lettuces have already been planted and should be ready for harvest soon.

Two of the goats have found new homes. Dandelion and Miranda have both been sold to families that have started home dairies. Five of the six remaining does have been bred and will start kidding in April. Here’s hoping for a less eventful kidding than last year!

Five out of six...

We bred six goats this year (hopefully...our seventh goat is looking a bit pregnant but I swear she wasn't exposed to a buck!). Out of those six goats, FIVE of them had problems kidding. It's made us question all of our management practices. But each one has had a different issue so we are having a hard time pinning it on anything like nutrition, parasites or diseases. Hopefully it's just a fluke year and this is our last kidding problem for a long time.

Miranda is one of two does we kept from last year, along with her littermate Matilda. They were the only does out of the 7 kids. Matilda was rejected from the first day by her mother Savannah, so she never knew she was a goat. We HAD to keep Matilda since we were her family but she did also bond with her sister Miranda, so we HAD to keep her too! When they went off to get bred (the buck we have here, Val, is their father) Miranda was the only one to come into heat so Matilda came back unbred...supposedly.

This morning as Mom went out to milk, she saw Miranda was in labor. She quickly delivered a little girl! Miranda hadn't been very big so Mom was sure that was it (you'd think after all the surprises we've had, we would not be sure of anything anymore!). But another pair of hooves appeared. It looked like the baby was upside down - the bottom of the hooves were up. But Dale quickly realized that the next body part to come out was a butt and not a nose! Miranda was a champ and delivered the breach birth with no assistance. But things weren't right.

The little buck had severely contracted tendons - like Lilly but in all four legs and far worse. There was no way he could stand and the same cramped space he was in had also caused deformities of his head. His breathing was labored, his eyes were rolled in the back of his head, his tongue was lolling. Fortunately, Dale is made of sterner stuff than us wussy vegetarians and he did the only humane thing possible for the struggling buck. It was sad, but yet another part of farming life.

Miranda and the little girl, Dahlia, are doing just fine. Matilda never left Miranda's side during the birthing process and I'm sure she'll be a good auntie!

Sping Baby Update

With all the troubles on the farm this spring, I just wanted to update everyone on all the wonderful successes!

Chicory, the little premature goatling born to Rabbit whose triplet siblings were stillborn, is a complete toot. It took him over a week to assure us he was going to live. I guess that makes sense - that would have been his original due date, so his development must have finally caught up with the fact that he was outside instead of inside momma. He is a lean little scraper and loves to torment all the other goatlings. When feeding time comes, he is always willing to throw you for a loop. He either sprints right over and downs his milk without needing help...or he decides that a little game of chase is what's called for before having a civilized meal. You just never know with that guy.

Tiger Lily, our bow legged munchkin from Shelli, has made leaps and bounds of improvement. It was quite nerve wracking when her contracted tendons began to stretch, but her muscles weren't yet strong enough to hold her up. It appeared she was getting worse for a number of days. And then...she was just simply better. Woke up one morning and you could no longer pick her out of the crowd by her stance! She still has a funny little gait and tends to hop like a bunny when she wants to move somewhere quickly, but she is getting better and stronger every day. Whew.

Dandelion, the HUGE boy from Maxie who was passing blood on the second day of his life, is simply still a beast. He picked up on the bottle feedings faster than any of the other goats and has just not skipped a beat since his miraculous recovery. You really would never know anything had ever been wrong with him!

We are still brooding some 60 baby poultry. After the initial heavy losses, we have kept the others healthy and strong. We do have one chick that is a bit wobbly on the legs but I think she'll be fine, or perhaps we are just going to have a replacement yard chicken who spends her time around the house instead of foraging far and wide with the flock. I'm sure we won't mind that! And the ducklings are HUGE. I can't believe how fast they grow.

But the young poultry has once again suffered the consequences of tenacious raccoons. The ducks have a fully wire enclosed pen to spend the night, safe from predators...or so we thought. But apparently a raccoon was able to sneak up on them and grabbed one through the wire before she woke up and was able to run. But we quickly solved the problem by putting a layer of tiny mesh around the bottom 2 feet of the enclosure so no naughty hands can be thrust through the openings. I hate lessons like that. But the coons had the taste of a fresh meal so they have probably been back checking the defenses each night. All was safe for a few days. Then they discovered that they could dig under the chick brooder house - which we thought would be ok since the entire floor is wire mesh with several inches of dirt over it. But the coon kept digging until all the dirt from the floor fell through. And then must have just waited until a hapless chick or two wandered too close and pulled them through the wire. ARG! More security has been added and hopefully we've got the place locked down now!

And of course Ace and Mac, the spring lambs, are doing great. They have grown enormously but have unfortunately picked up more of their mother's traits than their uncle Linden's. They are skittish and we plan on working on that in the weeks to come. I still want to milk the sheep, so I will be giving the little boys a bottle every once in awhile. That's what made Linden the friendliest sheep on the block!

We still have more babies to come. Savannah and Elise are due this weekend. They are both absurdly huge and I fear they are going to have triplets! Hopefully they just have big twins, or at least all the triplets have had plenty of room to grow in there. And Miranda, our youngest bred doe, is due in May. And then the spring baby season will finally be over!

Got Goat Milk?

It's here, it's here! Our girls are finally producing more milk than the little babes can consume...which means WE get to drink the extra! Oh how I've missed that delicious creamy taste. It's just so different than processed store bought milk.

The first milk we were able to 'steal' this year was from Rabbit. She didn't settle last year (her breeding didn't take) so this was out first chance to see what she was made of! For some reason, I was completely apprehensive. Rabbit is a weird goat. Rabbit isn't even her real name - it's Evie, but I'm not sure anyone has called her that since the day we brought her home. She was a skittish clown last year and jumped about thus giving her the nickname. She is a bit funny shaped and has markings on her face that makes it look like she is always snarling at you! And I kept saying "Ok, I'm about to drink Rabbit Milk for the first time!" and it just sounded wrong. But since she was the first to kid, her milk had the best chance of being sweet. The colostrum, or first milk, leaves a bitter aftertaste and can be present in the milk for some weeks after kidding. Anyway, I finally downed some Rabbit Milk. And it was good!

When all of the does freshen, we will literally be swimming in milk. We expect about 40 gallons of milk a week during their peak production! 40 gallons. Has it sunk in yet? 40 gallons. We are going to be busy little cheese makers this year!

Maxie's turn...

Sunday evening, we noticed that Maxie, on day 155 of her gestation (normal goat gestation being 145 to 155 days!) was acting more of a twit than normal. She is herd queen and doesn't let anyone forget that. But that night, she was actually preventing the other goats from entering the barn at all. So after evening graining, we separated her into the kidding stall. Even if she wasn't going to give birth that night, we weren't sure if anyone would survive in the barn with her! In fact, the kidding stall gate didn't survive her behavior and had to be modified before we felt that she was truly secure in there! I set my alarm for every 2 hours and drifted off to bed. Mom had already crashed on the couch so I figured she was down for the count and I'd be the nightwatchman.

10:00 PM: (yes, I went to bed before 10...) Maxie looks annoyed in her 'prison'. Nothing seems to be happening and I think she might have given me the finger as I left the goat pen.

12:00 AM: Maxie looks more annoyed. She's facing me so I can't see if there's any action going on so I enter the stall. She proceeds to lick me ALL OVER. This is what moms do to the babies when they are first born. I realize that kidding must be close - and sure enough she is starting to have a bit of a discharge. I turn the heat lamp on, set my alarm for 1:00 AM and stumble back to the house. It could be hours still and I'm way too tired to camp out with her.

12:59 AM: "There's a baby, GET UP!" Huh? Mom apparently woke up and went to check on Maxie and saw a brand new baby, minutes after being born, in the stall. I'm not even dressed before my own alarm goes off!

It's below freezing out and the baby, like all baby goats, is soaking wet. I'm sure that Maxie can handle it herself, but I figure I'll help since I'm there. The two of us work to get the HUGE baby dried off. Turns out, he's almost 10 pounds - 50% larger than any other babies born yet! Mom can barely cram him into the grain scoop we used to weigh them! Since Maxie wasn't all that big, both Mom and I decide she is having a single one. Just around the time the boy is actually standing for more than a few seconds, Maxie's head suddenly jerks up and her eyes get a little glassy. She turns around and almost literally drops another baby with a single push into my lap. I take the hint and get the sac and the vast majority of the goo off before Maxie starts up her own cleaning routine. It's a little girl, "only" 6.5 lbs (normal sized that is!).



We went to bed happy knowing we finally had a normal kidding for the season. The first two were just flukes. All seemed well for an entire day. Well...Tuesday morning, the big boy had scours - runny poop. Not too abnormal, but his seemed pretty bad. And then it just got worse. I won't horrify you with the picture that I took, but I had to record the event somehow. His poop went from normal yellow baby goat poop colored (albeit runny) to probably 90% blood. And he passed a huge 'thing' which appeared to be a blood clot.

Ok, so now we have a baby dying from something and maybe it's contagious. Frantic searches online, rereading all our goat books, calls to the vet, posts on goat forums. All signs point to an unhappy outcome...but they are leading us in different directions to even get there! The vet says give this, the online goat experts say that will kill the kid for sure. The books say do that, the vet says that will kill the kid for sure. In hindsight, I'm actually somewhat glad for the rampant confusion we were faced with.

After the first horrible bowel movement, he had one other bloody one. And then...well, things just got better. One more runny poop - no blood, just runny. And then everything was normal. He's up and playing, nursing, acting completely fine. We went ahead and gave him a dose of grapeseed oil extract (big concentration of antioxidants and used for all sorts of stressful goat ailments) to be on the safe side. Next morning, you would never know anything had ever been wrong with him.

So I'm glad for the paralyzing confusion. Perhaps the antidiarrheal the vet suggested would have killed him. Pulling him from nursing on his mom like the books suggested may have done him in. And most certainly, 'culling' him for necropsy to see what was causing the bleeding like suggested by online goat experts would have been the end! We were at such a loss for what to do that the hours we spent agonizing over it just gave the little guy time to get better on his own. Whew.

Three kiddings down, all with 'incidents', and three more to go. Come on ladies, we need some easy days!

House Goat

If you have goats, it's bound to happen. Eventually, one of them will end up in the house. We've had ourselves a house goat for two nights now.

On Thursday, Mom headed out to the barn to check on Maxie and Shelli. Their due dates had passed and anticipation was high. Sure enough, there was Shelli in the barn with a fresh baby goat! A tiny little girl, practically the same size as Chicory when he was born. Shelli was as big as a house, so she knew more were coming. After a short wait, a second one, a boy, arrived on the scene. He was much bigger than the little girl but still didn't seem to account for Shelli's absurd proportions. While at work, I was trying to answer a few of Mom's questions with internet searches while she and Dale watched the birthing process. I read her the directions on how to "bounce" a goat to see if there were any more babies in there. Mom confirmed that all she could feel was soft squishy goat guts and no hard knobby baby bodies, so we decided that two just might be it.

About 5 minutes later, my office phone rang again. Another girl and a big one! Wow, last year we only had singles and twins and so far this year both have had triplets. What did we put in the feed?!?!

But after a few hours it was obvious that that first little girl was "off". Mom described it as her legs being bowed and she was weak. More research, more questions and more apprehension. I had a few ideas, but my suggestion was simply to call the vet. Well, the little one was whisked off to the vet before they closed and came home with the diagnosis of "contracted tendons". She was just a wee babe crammed into a tight space with two hogs and wasn't able to stretch her legs. So she just needs some time to get loosened up. Since she really couldn't walk and she wasn't able to nurse without someone holding Shelli, she came into the house.

We've been splinting her legs at night and letting her walk and stretch them during the day. She has improved tremendously in the two days since she arrived. She can stamp and clomp around the house and makes the most absurdly cute noises. The cats aren't so sure she should be allowed in the house and the dog doesn't know why she won't play. But all in all, it's been fun to have a house goat!

Meet Tiger Lily!

A hard night at the farm

I haven't gotten the blog setup quite right to allow for multiple authors, so I'm posting on Mom's behalf:

Some days are best remembered instead of experienced. Yesterday was one of those - better in the telling than in the doing.

Rabbit, a first freshener and due to kid next week, showed signs of early labor around dinnertime so I put her in the birthing area of the barn and Dale, Loretta and I pulled up chairs to watch. Over the next two hours she progressed from mild agitation to straining but the process looked different from any other goat labor I had experienced. It was hard to qualify what was different and everything seemed to be okay so I ambled between house and barn with snacks and advice and even slight disinterest. Then at 8:30, as the temperature was dropping and the coyotes were tuning up Rabbit expelled a tiny stillborn doe. She looked normal and weighed in at 5 pounds, but she never took a breath. The birth had been odd with the baby presenting the crown of its head first instead of hooves, and the little body had been pushed out in one big whoosh of fluid. Rabbit nickered to it and cleaned it up but as soon as she turned her back to clean herself I wrapped the doeling in a towel and took her away. Rabbit got a handful of raisins and warm molasses water and went back to pushing. 20 minutes later another tiny form was suddenly spit out like a watermelon seed and flopped to the ground. This time I grabbed the lifeless form by its back legs and turned it upside down and shook it a few times until it sputtered. Dale and I helped clean the little buck up but Rabbit let us know that she was perfectly capable of taking care of that job. Dale and I sat back to wait for the expulsion of the afterbirth, the buckling to stand, and the first attempts to suckle. An hour later the kid still was not standing, no progress on the afterbirth and Rabbit was munching hay and wishing we would go away. We tried to get the kid up on his feet but he was too weak and getting cold. Warm towels, hot water in drink bottles and brisk rubbing didn’t seem to have much effect. So we waited. And waited. After 4 hours we felt things were getting critical so Dale tubed the kid and we got 2 oz of life-saving colostrum into his tummy. He warmed up and went to sleep. So we decided to call it a day and about midnight shuffled back to our houses.

At 12:45, just as sleep seemed to be within my grasp, the alarm clock starting flashing, beeps and buzzers went off and the washing machine came to a grinding halt. Then all was silent. Great - I would have to restart the wash in the morning and reset all the clocks. Then I looked outside and realized that the barn light we had left on was out and the ruby red glow of the heat lamps keeping all our baby poultry alive was gone - the world was completely dark. The computer that collects our weather station data had gone on battery backup so the light from the monitor allowed me to collect flashlights, get my dirty clothes back on and find a jacket since it was now below 40 degrees. I started over to Dale’s cottage only to be met by him on his way to get me. We came inside and started trying to groggily figure out what to do next. The phones were dead and we don’t have cell service at the farm. So we piled into my car and drove half a mile down the road to a little rise where we got a signal. The countryside was as dark as the inside of a cave - not a light twinkling anywhere except in the sky. So Dale and I, two worn out and disgusted “farmers” sitting huddled in a car on the side of a dark country road in the middle of the night were trying to find a phone number so we could complain about our plight. Thanks to my trusty iPhone I found a number for Bluebonnet Electric Coop and called it only to find that it had been disconnected. Doesn’t anybody update their websites??? Finally I found a number to report power outages only to give my name and address to a robot, who politely thanked me for my call and hung up. Click. GRRRRR.

Back home we started a fire and began filling metal buckets with ashes and hot embers. We were determined to keep our chicks, ducklings and keets alive. The cats were very amused that we were up so late and doing such interesting things. The thought of escaping to wild night adventures crossed their minds but they hadn’t gotten in their 20 hours of sleep for the day yet, so just went on thinking about it. Dale ferried the buckets to the various birds and I accompanied him out once to check the ducks. He looked over at the birthing area and exclaimed “another one was just born!” Sure enough, Rabbit had birthed another dead doeling, larger than the others, but she didn’t look right, and she was bright orange, even her little hooves. Dale and I just looked at each other thinking “what next”? That’s when the smoke alarms in the house went off. I had left the fire unattended and the spark screen open and all I could think was that if the house were on fire I would just fling myself inside and be done with it. The fire was quietly dancing in the grate but the alarms were screeching discordantly and the cats were all prick-eared and wide-eyed. Soon all was quiet again and Dale and I decided yet again that we had done everything we could and we deserved to go to bed. I sat down on the couch to collect my thoughts and fell fast asleep. Until 3:45 am when the electricity came back on causing lights to flash and beeps and clicks and alarms to sound. I awoke to the cats staring at me like I was purposely torturing them and would I please stop because they needed their beauty sleep - or else. I turned off lights, crawled into bed and actually got 3 hours of sleep before chores started this morning. Now why did I want to live on this farm???

Going outside and seeing the glorious sunrise, hearing an early morning chorus of coyotes in the distance and a stunning orchestra of bird calls, the sheep baahing in the back pasture, Percy crowing like he knew it was the best day of his life and watching the cats frolicking in the dewy grass I remembered - this is why I love the farm!

Rabbit is doing well but seems confused - just like always. The buckling is stronger but still not a normal frisky kid. The chicks, ducks and keets have recovered from our mothering. The cats have had their fun and are now are napping. All is well. Please let this day be terribly boring!!!

I just wanted to add that goat gestation is typically 150 days. Kids born 5 days early are surely going to survive. Kids born 10 days early surely won't. Rabbit went into labor 7 days early. But we are all rooting for little Chicory!

French Alpine Goats

One of the wonderful benefits of being a small producer is getting to choose a heritage breed animal or a rare heirloom vegetable and not having to worry about the "general public" wanting run of the mill products. Because of this, we weren't pressured into getting a cow in order to delve into dairy products. Instead, we could go with our family's much loved ruminant, the goat! After much research and even more time spent looking for good stock, we settled on a herd of French Alpine Goats.

Goats are one of the oldest domesticated animals, with archeological evidence that they have been tended by humans for 10,000 years. Goats quickly found their way to the New World as well. A 1630 census of Jamestown lists goats as their most valuable asset. It was during this time that Swiss breeds were brought to the US. So they are true pilgrims! It wasn't until the 1920s that the first official "French Alpines" were imported to the US and these form the core of the gene pool that was mixed with the existing Swiss breeds and has now created the pure bred herds we see today.

More people worldwide consume goat milk than the milk from any other animal. The milk is different from cow's milk but in subtle ways. Goat milk lacks beta carotene which means it is perfectly white. For instance, butter has the typical yellow color from beta carotene found in cow's milk - goat milk butter is pure white. Additionally, goat milk is naturally homogenized. This means that very little, if any, cream will rise to the top of the milk. The fat stays in solution. And probably the most pronounced difference is the presence of capric, caprylic and caproic acid. These acids are what gives "goaty" products their flavor. If handled delicately and properly, goat milk does not have any different flavor, but once it has been heated, stirred and aged into cheeses, the acids break up and the product acquires that flavor that people either love or hate!

We are quite happy with our ever-expanding herd of Alpines. They provide endless entertainment and wonderful dairy products. They truly are a precious asset to the farm!

Maxie takes a look around after being let out of the barn in the morning before anyone else steps outside. Herd Queen is a rough job you know!