Right after my last post we ended up getting a Great Pyrenees puppy that was born and raised (all ten weeks, LOL) on a goat farm. He’s our third and final hope for having an LGD work out for us. He’s actually pretty well behaved for a puppy and he’s kind of dumb but in a cute way which I guess puppies are. I’ve never been much for puppies but he’s kind of cool I guess.
He’s Fly Guy the Brave 
They said Pyrenees… 
But maybe there’s Karakachan too!
On Halloween (fine, that’s an October update, but oh well) I dressed as Snow White and did an unprofessional photo shoot with my Pixel phone which decided it was low on space and quit saving pictures about 7 pictures in to our 20 minute shoot. I’m sure the best ones are gone but here’s one mediocre one. I practically AM Snow White so I don’t mind wearing the costume again some time and trying again, especially after having deleted 1,800 photos the next day to free up space.
Snow White and Her Naughty Goats
Yesterday sealed up breeding season on our farm for 2020 with the exception of the ewes which hopefully will go into heat next month but I’m not getting too hopeful about that yet. They’re on the young side and it’s safe to breed them but I guess they usually end up only having one lamb when they conceive at under a year old. If they don’t go into heat next month we may have to wait b/c summer babies in Texas don’t do well with the parasites, but if we wait that means the ram lambs can’t be butchered any time soon and I don’t think they’re tender/juicy if you wait too long on them. As it is they have an appointment at the butcher in January and I’m quite excited for a lamb birthday dinner but again, I’ll just have to wait and see.
Going back to October again, we did send our two “meat goats” to the butcher (really they were dairy goats but we planned for them to be meat pretty much from the start because they were bitey and very loud). Christine had a harder time with it than I did, not really because I’m a monster (hey, I think of it as practical) but because our chores are divided in such a way that she cares for the bucks, rams, and chickens and I care for the does, llamas, pigs, and puppy. So she spent much more time with the boys than I did. I won’t say it was easy to drive away from the butcher’s but I will say that they were respectful and kind there and when we picked up the meat five days later it was a remarkably large amount considering dairy goats are thin and they were only 8 months old.
Now, keep in mind that I’d never had goat meat before so I didn’t know what to expect but people like my ex told me it “smells gross at the Indian restaurants” (should I really listen to a vegetarian, LOL). We made tacos out of the ground meat the first night. It was FABULOUS. I mean, honestly it tasted just like beef which is delicious in my book. No bucky/goaty taste (they were wethered so they didn’t have the male hormones but you never know), very good quality. We were a little worried since we don’t feed our male goats ANY grain that it wouldn’t taste good b/c grain supposedly makes meat sweeter but that would have been unnecessary! It couldn’t have been better. The second night we had loin chops, the most tender and juicy goodness! We also had steak which was delicious as well. And I made bone broth that was rich and full of collagen. VERY pleased. We got 25 pounds of meat per goat in various cuts (the goats weighed about 80 lbs each). Actually, we did a video on this here if you want to see all the things we got.
Well, that was a tangent! Regarding goat breeding, we have three due in February, two in March, and two in April (as long as everyone took–knock on wood for us! We know the first few did because they haven’t gone into heat but I’ll be so upset if the last one didn’t as it was my new doe, Lady, the full size LaMancha, and her kids are the ones I’m most excited about!).
So it will be a busy spring with hopefully lots of opportunities for goat yoga. AND if it’s not crazy enough that the plan is milking 7 goats and 2 ewes (almost twice what we’ve ever milked at once previously) I have decided to sign up for milk testing which is apparently quite a big thing to do with my time or lack thereof. It’s basically milking twice in one day every 30 days (that’s how I’m doing it, at least) to send in and then you get reports back about how much butterfat, etc is in the milk. If you get a good quantity and butterfat level then your goat earns a milk star, which goes on their papers and is something people get excited about. I personally am mostly interested in the butterfat levels since I make cheese and it will help me decide which goats to keep breeding and which to sell or retire. So that is SUPER exciting.
Our goals for the winter are buying a milk machine (I’m saving up–gosh they are expensive, but I cannot imagine milking 9 animals twice a day by hand), building another indoor enclosure for the goat kids, changing up the milk room so it’s usable again by ME and not just goats LOL, and of course just keeping everyone healthy and comfortable.
Speaking of which, we had a cough go through our herd, interestingly enough affecting only goats that we did not raise here on our farm. Our goats born and raised here did not get sick at all. Fascinating! We took care of their coughs with vitamin C, colloidal silver, and a product called Herbiotics made by Fir Meadow. Everyone is well again.
Oh, very exciting news! I made it to a cat show last weekend! It was the first one happening in my area post-Covid and it was SO wonderful to see old friends and get to hold some Devons I hadn’t met. I’d post a picture but my mask is controversial so I’ll just leave it to the imagination. Picture it–happiness, friends, and cats.
The one last piece of news is that we had someone contact us who has an off-grid tiny home and wrote to see about living here. She came out and toured and then came back again to camp out and see how she liked it here. She has a background in permaculture and she has the magical ability to grow food. <3 I hope she ends up staying!