Notes from the Barnyard

Tansy’s girl, Alice, was not nursing both sides.  Her udder looked painful and about to explode on one side.  I finally caught her and got that side milked out.  Now Alice is nursing both sides, and Tansy looks much more comfortable.

Tansy

I have Margarita up north in case she does have her babies before I’m done working.

Margarita

I am also keeping an eye on Penelope.  I asked her when she was due, and she just gave me a coy Mona Lisa smile.  So I have no idea when she’s going to kid.

Penelope

It cracks me up at how Freddie and Frodo have bonded.  They are always together.  You can definitely see the father-son resemblance.

Freddie and Frodo

Chiffon looks like she could kid any second.  I will say, she had her triplets a week early last year, and it’s looking like there might be a repeat.

Chiffon

Astra and Perdita were snuggled together the other evening when it was cold on Saturday.  So far, Perdita hasn’t gotten stuck in the fence again.  I hope that holds.

Perdita and Astra

Rosie was trying to figure out how to reach all those maple leaves that are finally on the trees.

Rosie

Bratty Flora kept her horn apparatus on for less than two days.  I hope she has learned her lesson.

Flora

I’m not holding my breath though.

Oopsie! I Was Wrong

When I did my Thursday evening check of the goats, I counted all ten kids.

Bridget

I found Flora with her fresh horn apparatus on.  Because Wednesday evening, she was stuck in the fence again.

Flora

Perdita was there with her horn apparatus hanging from a single strand of duct tape.  But she was not in a fence!

Perdita

Then I couldn’t find Purl.  Seriously.  I looked everywhere. Then I saw her clear down by the ditch.  I yelled down to remind her that the last goat is the one who gets eaten by the coyote.

Purl (she just hopped down when I took the picture)

Then I heard her talk.  That’s when everything flashed through my mind and I ran down to the ditch to see her oopsie baby.

Purl and her little Benji buck

She is one of the three girls I didn’t see come into heat when I put them in with the bucks to make June babies.

Venus was another.

Venus and Cody

That leaves Margarita.  So we might be having another oopsie baby in the near future.  Who knows?  Apparently, not me.

Margarita

Anyhow, Purl did awesome.

Although, I do think she should have had him farther from the edge of the ditch.

I hauled him up to the Love Shack and she did a great job of following him.

They will stay in there for a day or two before moving up north.  Anyhow, I was wrong. We don’t have fourteen girls to have kids in June.  I don’t have a clue what’s going on.  I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.

More of the Aftermath

When I let the goats out on the back half of the Back Forty, I decided I better do a check of the fences.  I mean besides the one that I know was just flattened.

Not worried about this one for now; I just have to have it fixed before our genealogy trip.

I already shared that the neighbor’s farming practices included ripping out the waterways and planting by tilling highly erodable hills which allows everything to just wash.  Luckily they didn’t till under the corn stalks from last fall because that would have made it ten times worse.

The darker lines in the soil outside my pasture are where there used to be waterways. The grass slows the water and stops the cornstalks from slamming into my fences. But they want to plant it and make more money instead of stopping erosion.

Anyhow, not only is the tile intake on the north side of my farm completely covered in their silt, but the one in the middle of the bottom is also completely covered.  There’s supposed to be a burm to help hold the water back but it is completely covered in silt and corn stalks.  Hopefully, when things dry out (after planting), my nephew can bring his new backhoe and help find the intake and repair this damage.

I went back to the fence to check it out, and it looks like there’s a new foot deep gap of lost soil.  I’ll have to fix this, or the goats will be out of my pasture.

They did actually start coming that direction.

But the ground was too soggy, and they decided to go eat elsewhere.  I have a few days to get it fixed.

I did check the intake on the south side of the pasture, and it was still open.  Although, we kind of missed where it needs to be.  The water largely bypasses it and has cut a ditch through that burm.  Erosion is really hard to reduce when you do things correctly, and when the neighbors don’t care, it. makes it even harder.

Anyhow, I’ll get off my high horse about conservation and just enjoy watching happy goats on the pasture.

Penelope and Maisie

Ostara

Victoria

Perdita (still sporting her second horn apparatus)

Until the next time their horrible farming practices totally mess with my pasture.