Always Fence to Fix

The nice weather and snow melting away means the goats have started going back out to pasture.

Even my old ladies left the Love Shack and lounged out in the front pasture for a while.

Clover, Lily, Cupid, Harley, and Pistol

Saturday morning, I looked out the window and once again saw my goats in the no-man’s land at the bottom of my farm.  Seriously?

image from last fall when they were naughty

After doing major reworking of the barn, so my moms could have another section for them and the kids, I got the rest of the herd back where they belong.

Caroline

They might look all innocent just basking in the sun, but they were just waiting for the opportune moment to sneak back down the hill and get out again.

Luckily, my nephew came out and set several posts across the ditch.  I believe the goats went around my snow fence (this was after I tied it back up).

Then I went into town and got the Ranger.  It was nice to have it out again, even if it was to haul panels down to fix the fence.

I really didn’t think I’d make it if I tried carrying the panels from the barnyard.

I got a bit creative, and managed to get it blocked.

Hopefully, this will work for a while.

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Everyday Things

While we’re waiting, along with checking goats numerous times around the clock, I still have all my everyday things to do.  Part of that is wondering if I should try to move more goats into the garage with rain in the forecast for Tuesday through Thursday.

Cutie

The warmer weather means my back door in the chicken room is thawed, and I could put Athena and Hera over there with everyone else if I need to.

Gidget and Hera

I’m a bit worried about the back cattle lean-to though because all the rain and melting snow runs through it.  It is likely to become a muddy mess.  They do have a fair amount of space that will stay clean, but I might have to figure out something else.  I’m just not sure what.

Myson, Casey, LilyAnn and in back Maybeline, Buster, Vinnie, and Stormy

Then there’s the maintenance of my panels that I have separating everyone.  This one was completely undone.

I have to keep my panels in place or I’d have everyone mixed together.  I don’t want that.  It’s a lot harder to check and keep my pregnant girls where I want them to kid when they are all mixed together.  Besides, some big wether keeps thinking he wants his mommy, but his mom needs to focus on the new babies coming.

Moose

I also got new salt/mineral blocks put out.  They melt so quickly in this wet, snowy weather.

Stormy (and a LilyAnn butt)

I am still feeding full hay.  Over the weekend, I ran out of hay on the bottom. I had to start throwing it from above.  At least, I’m not worried about running out.

Astra

There’s still a lot up above.

No babies yet, but if I get busy and can’t get blog posts up you can follow along on the farm FB page for almost real time updates.

Freshly Bedded

My nephew brought a big round cornstalk bale to bed the back part of the barn.

Moose, Casey, and Margarita

It is a challenge.  This space is a bit tricky to maneuver with a tractor and bale, but he finally got it done.  I don’t know how.

We had to chip the big sliding door free from being frozen to the ground, so we could open it farther.  It was really an ordeal.

It did, however, make everyone happy.

Casey (in back) and Margarita (in front)

Myson checking it out

Next summer, I think we’re going to try to remove the first section of fence to make a wider gate area.  If we’re really good, we’ll redo the fence along the lane and make it wider and so the goats can keep the scrub brush and trees eaten from the west side of the barn too.

We’ll see how ambitious we are though.