Saturday, January 4, 2014

Bella Had Triplets

Most evenings I go to bed early and wake up early.  This time of year the sun surfaces around 7am.  No matter what time of year it is and what time the sun comes up, my day officially begins before the sun even rises.  Then when it does rise, the chickens need to be fed and let out of the coop, the cats need to be fed, in addition to a number of other morning ranch jobs.  When the sun rises, it doesn’t matter if it is below freezing outside or a warm beautiful sunny summer day, there are animals to be tended too.
   
Yesterday was no different.  After getting up and working for a few hours, I decided to return to bed before the sun rose.  The sun had already made its appearance when Rick opened my bedroom door and yelled, “GET UP, WE HAVE BABIES!!!”  I was instantly fully awake and out of bed.  Rick was correct.  He had looked out the living room window and spotted babies. By the time I was dressed he had already put on his jacket, gone out to check on the new arrivals, let the rest of the herd out to graze so they would leave Bella and her Babies alone, and returned to the house to report she had triplets.  I grabbed the camera, the bowl of chicken food which I handed to Rick who let the chickens out of the coop, and then I too headed to the goat shelter to view the newest members of the herd.
 
 
Bella (proud momma) with her son, Coal.
   


The girls
 

 
Cocoa (doe)


 
Pepper (doe)


 
Coal (buck)

Friday, January 3, 2014

Happy New Year

Happy New Year
  
It is hard to believe but 2013 is now history and 2014 has arrived.  This past year has been one of much activity.  Rick spent most of the year on construction.  A few of his larger projects included a 2nd goat shelter, and a chicken coop.  A few of the smaller projects included a milking stall and milking stand, retrofitting a dog kennel into a baby chick home, and many household repairs.  I spent the year gardening and learning how to preserve the bounty by drying and canning, and milking a goat and learning how to make cheese and other items with the milk. We also spent several months caring for children whose parents weren’t able too, helping folks in town with home repairs, donating food to a few families in need, and driving elderly friends and neighbors to doctor appointments and the auto body shop to have deer damaged vehicles repaired, etc..
  
Both Rick and I wish we had accomplished a lot more than we did.  Our To Do List seems to grow faster then we can cross off each item as completed.  We accomplished a lot in 2013 but there is a lot more that needs to be done.  We have all of 2014 to continue working on that list.
    
On January 1, 2013 six goats and two cats called this place home.  One fact of ranch life, even if all we are talking about is a small hobby farm, is if you breed animals then you either have to harvest them for food or sell them.  No matter how much one may love the animals that are born, there is a limit to how many can be kept. That fact is even truer when it comes to boys.  We started off the year with one buck and three wethers (castrated bucks).  Then in March Lawn Mower gave birth to twin bucks.  By the end of July all but one wether had been sold.  Sport, our special needs Boer wether, has a home here for life as he is truly a pet.  But the rest of the boys had to go.  Bambi kidded a doe, who we named Susanna. 
   
In 2012 our herd was formed by ranchers giving us abandoned kids.  This is meat goat country and so most of the kids we were given were Boer and/or Spanish goats.  Bambi was the exception.  A friend had found her in the middle of the road and eventually she was given to us.  Bambi is a mixture of diary breeds and a small breed (possibly pygmy or Nigerian Dwarf).  I learned to milk a goat on Bambi.  The problem with meat goats is their main purpose in life is food, which of course ends their life.  Bottle feeding a kid creates a love affair with cuteness which makes it really tough later on when a decision has to be made.  Keep the kid as a pet which costs money in feeding and caring for it, sell the kid, or butcher the kid and eat it. It is very tough to kill, butcher, and eat someone you have fallen in love with.  As we were pondering this dilemma, I started learning how to make cheese and other dairy products.  There is a market for such products and a decision was made that we would be better off with dairy goats.  There are already large ranches of meat goats all around us so competing with them is not a sound financial decision and having to butcher the goats ourselves is not something we are ready to do emotionally.  But dairy goats are different.  At least the females have a purpose in life other then winding up on a dinner plate.  So once we sold off all the goats we needed to sell, we went dairy goat shopping.  It didn’t take long to find two Nubian does to bring home.
    

Goats have not been our only focus this year.  Last May a box of baby chicks arrived in the mail.  When I look at that tiny box now, it amazes me that 14 chicks could even fit in there.  Within a few weeks they were too big to fit in that box and today they are grown up and laying eggs.  A few weeks after the chicks arrived, a friend in town gave us her entire flock of mature chickens.  Most were hens but two roosters were included in the batch. 
   
In April we were given a dog that had been dumped out here but sadly we realized that she is not a country dog.  We named her Sweet Pea and though we really tried hard to find a way for her to fit in here, we finally had to face facts; Sweet Pea was a liability. Since she loves to chase goats and chewed through everything and figured out how to get under fences, we had no choice but to keep her chained 24/7. Keeping her just wasn’t fair to her.  She is now living in a loving home in San Antonio.  But we still wanted a dog. Not a pet, but a livestock guardian dog.  After a lot of searching we located a breeder of Great Pyrenees puppies and brought two cute fluff balls home.  A couple weeks ago we took them to the vet for their (16 weeks old) checkup and rabies shot and each pup weighed around 45 pounds.  We named them Abraham and Sara.  As livestock guardian dogs, they live outside with the goats and chickens.
   
We may have started out the year with six goats (only three lived here a year ago) and two cats, but we ended the year with six goats, two cats, two puppies, 22 hens, and two roosters. 
   
It is now 2014 and as everyone knows time does not stand still. Bella will be kidding sometime during the next few days.  She has a history of having twins, so that is what we are expecting.  Two of our goats (Lawn Mower and Belle) are spending a few weeks hanging out with Fred on a friend’s ranch.  So we hope to have more kids this summer.  Both Bella and Belle are Nubians, a dairy breed, so we will have milk for our own use and plan on working towards creating a product we can sell.  We also plan on ordering more chicks.  We are gathering enough eggs now for us and several families but with more chickens we hope to start selling eggs to bring in a little cash.
    
Since this is a non-profit ministry, we are dependent on tax donations.  Realistically, chronically ill people simply do not have the financial means to contribute towards this work. Sadly though we are always trying to share with others the work that is being done out here, often healthy folks simply forget or do not understand and therefore rarely donate.  A few have sent in donations, but not many.  Some folks have supported this ministry by installing the Good Search toolbar onto their computer and regularly use it, and though that yearly check is extremely helpful and valued, it simply is not enough to cover all of our expenses.  So some of what is produced on the ranch must be used to generate an income so that we can continue with the mission of helping the homeless chronically ill. 
  
In closing, goodbye 2013 and hello 2014.  I pray that when we look back at 2014 we can say it was a great year.

 
 
Bella was with several bucks last summer but clearly she waited tell the very last day to become pregnant. We are expecting babies any day now.