After Summer Comes Spring

Following several days of summer like weather we are back to spring like weather.  We had several days of near 80 degree temperatures with overnight temperatures only in the 60’s.  Now we are barely making it to 50 in the daytime and last night it was down in the mid-30’s.

While it was summer I got all of my early garden planted.  On Monday I planted radishes, lettuce, spinach and carrots.  On Tuesday I planted potatoes and onion sets as well as beets.  I managed to do a bit of cleanup in the yard.  Connie cleaned leaves from her flower beds and set out several plants that she recently purchased.



Our 3 peach trees are in full bloom.  The redbuds are about ready to break into full bloom as well.  The lilac bushes are leafed out with bloom buds showing on the older bush.  The little weeping willow tree is leafed out and many of the trees in the woods are beginning to leaf out.

A little over a week ago we got baby goats.  Our Zoe had twin boys.



This pix was taken this morning.  They are doing quite well.

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Sadly I Have To Report The Passing Of Annie

Annie came to us June 6th, 2005.  She belonged to a lady Darryl had gotten to know before we moved here.  Annie was an orphan, losing not only her mother but her three siblings at her birth in 1999.  She was raised for some period of time in the kitchen and became a real “people” goat.  When the lady was preparing to move from her small farm in the summer of 2005 she was seeking good homes for her animals and asked if we would like to have Annie.  We were thrilled to get her.  Although she had already raised several kids she was not a new mother when she came to Cedar Ridge.

In the nearly 5 years she was here she presented us with 13 goat babies.  On January 24, 2006 she had quads.  With a little help from us she managed to raise all four.  We still have one of her daughters from that kidding, Brownie.  The next year Annie had triplets on March 3rd, 2007.  The little buck was stillborn but we raised both of the little does.  We kept one and she is one of our current milking does, Zoe.

On March 28, 2008 Annie gave birth to two little does.  March 16th, 2009 she had twins again, a buck and a doe.  This year she again had twins, a buck and a doe.  We named them Abe and Abby.

Just exactly what was wrong we aren’t sure but Annie developed some intestinal difficulties and very quickly weakened and then died this last Sunday night.  Our immediate concern of course was for her month old babies.  With some effort they have both now, finally, begun to take a bottle.  Hopefully, we can find homes for them where they can be cared for.

Annie was quite special and will be missed by all of us here on the farm. You can read a couple of previous posts about Annie here  and here.

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Boy, Do I Ever Have A Lot Of Catching Up To Do!

Blogging hasn’t taken a high priority for the last few weeks. Upon our return from Oregon at the end of March we have been busy, busy, busy! I had put off doing any gardening or seed starting. That had to begin almost immediately after arriving back home. That went well and we have been having fresh radishes, greens, onions from the garden.

I did a couple of posts as reports on our trip and I have more to post. Bear with me, I’ll get it done.

Shortly after getting back to the farm we began getting baby goats. Zoe, the goat who refused to accept her kid last year, was the first to kid. She had a nice little doeling which we named Zaylee. A couple of days later Brownie also had a doeling. We named her Baylee. Not exactly twins but are half-sisters, from the same daddy. Their mothers are half-sisters also.


That is Zaylee on the left and Baylee on the right.

Annie waited a couple of weeks and presented us with twins, Abe and Abby. Annie is getting old and isn’t in as good a condition as in previous years. I’m not milking her, just letting her raise her babies.

I used rocks I hauled home from the old house I’ve been tearing down to level out Connie’s flower bed. (See my post on that here.) That took a few days.

When I built our deck in 2005 I used some “cull wood” from the sawmill as decking. Even though I have applied water seal a few times some of the boards were rotting. I replaced the deck floor with treated deck boards.


Here you can see some of the new boards that have been put into place. The blue/green in the lower left is one of my water tanks that are under the deck. These are used to hold some of the rain that runs off of the roof.

When we first arrived back home we were in a bit of a dry period here in South-Central Kentucky, running a deficit of about 8 inches. That has changed. Over about 4 days at the end of April we received over 3” of rain, which we really appreciated. However, the next weekend, Saturday and Sunday, May 1 and 2 we got 11 and 1/10 inches! Living on top of a ridge we had no major problems, just a bit of erosion from the gardens, etc. But, our little community suffered some major flooding. Nothing like Nashville, TN but still several homes and businesses were flooded. The city lake almost washed out. The highway was closed and several folks were evacuated as it appeared that the dam was going to wash away. So much water was coming over the concrete spillway and the earth dam was eroding on both sides. Thankfully it didn’t go but there is alot of repair work to be done.

I have spent nearly everyday the past two weeks working to complete the project of tearing down the old house and hauling home salvaged material. I’m close to being done.


This pile of boards, all 14-16 feet long, have yet to be hauled home. Darryl will use his 16’ trailer to haul them. As you can see my little truck just won’t handle material of that length.

As I have mentioned before we heat with wood. The wood stove we have been using for the last couple of winters is a cook stove with a large fire box. When we quit having to have heat Connie hated to go back to cooking on our gas range. She said if I had told her 10 years ago that she would be cooking on a wood cook stove, and further, enjoying it she would have thought them crazy. With the big fire box it just isn’t practical to cook on our Bakers Choice in the warmer months. We discussed moving the stove onto the screened front porch for the summer but that is a pretty big job and still takes more wood to get the stove up to cooking temps. We decided to look for a smaller and less expensive wood cook stove that we could put on the porch. That would become in essence a summer kitchen.

After doing some searching on line I discovered on ebay what we were looking for. The individual/business had 3 different stoves available, all new. One was pretty plain, one just like it with chrome trim and the third one had a slightly larger fire box and a water reservoir. The third one was the one we bid on and bought. The stove is much lighter in weight, is not air-tight and isn’t the quality of the Bakers Choice but is a good little stove. We are enjoying it. Connie is learning how to use the oven as it doesn’t heat quite the same as the one we have in the kitchen.


Hopefully, this brings you somewhat up-to-date. I’ll try to stay a bit more current and I’ll strive to finish my reports on “our big adventure.”

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My Little Girls Are Gone

If you have ever had goats you know how hard it is to let go of any of them.  My little goat kids are now over 6 months old.  I should have gotten rid of some of them before now but I kept wrestling with myself, trying to talk myself into keeping Annie’s daughter (A.G.).  Brownie’s little girl (B.G.) was a beautiful little goat as well but A.G. was just a gorgeous little doeling.  However, I finally made the decision to sell the girls and ran an ad on Craigslist. 

A lady called and wanted both of them, so they will still have each other.  They also will have other goats to make friends with.  The lady could tell that I was having a hard time parting with them and she sent me an e-mail to let me know that they are doing fine.

This is what she had to say, in part.   “Anyway, the one you liked so much....I haven't named them yet......she got a ride on the 4-wheeler sitting in my lap.  I think she enjoyed it as she was in no hurry to get up.  The other one was running along behind us calling her head off!!  Anyway, thought you'd like to know how they were doing :)”  I got quite a chuckle picturing this in my mind.  I feel sure they will get good care.

Here are a couple of pictures taken just before they left here.

This is A.G.  Isn’t she a beauty?

B.G. is spotted much like her dad.

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Good Fresh Goat Milk

With three goats producing milk we currently have plenty of good fresh goat milk.  Annie and Brownie both have twin kids that would take all of their milk if we allowed them to do so.  In order to get some of the milk we pen up the kids each evening and milk the mothers each morning. The kids get all of the milk the mothers produce during the day.  If we have plenty of milk ahead we may skip the evening “pen up.”

Below are some photos of the “business end” of our three goats just prior to milking time this morning.

This is Annie.  I don’t believe she is giving as much as she did a couple of years ago when she was giving about 2 gallons of milk a day.  For a goat that is quite good.

Brownie, shown here, is Annie’s daughter that was born three years ago, one of four kids.  She freshened for the first time when she was just one year old.  She had one buck kid that year and one buck kid last year.  This year she had twins, a buck and a doe.

Zoe is our first freshener.  She is also Annie’s daughter from two years ago.  She is doing quite well for a first freshener.

The bucket is almost full.

Five quarts of fresh milk.  We drink quite a bit and use some in cooking.  We have also being making yogurt and cream cheese.  Before long we need to make a freezer of ice cream.  We generally can find some others nearby to help us eat it.

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New Kids on the Farm

As I stated in an earlier post, one knows spring has arrived when the baby goats begin arriving.  Our three goats all had their babies this month.  The first to kid was our young goat, Zoe, a first freshener.  She had twins, however, the first one was stillborn and for some reason the “mothering instinct” just never kicked in and Zoe would not accept the second baby.  We were able to hold it up to nurse several times and then gave it to a lady who wished to raise it on the bottle.

Our “old” goat, Annie, also had twins and they were by far the largest ones born.  We were happy she had only two as 3 years ago she had quads.  She managed to raise them all with a bit of help from us and some goat milk replacer.  The last to kid was Brownie and she also presented us with twins.  Her previous 2 kiddings she had had only a single baby.

All 4 of the remaining babies are doing great.  Yesterday Darryl and I disbudded all 4 and “banded” the 2 little males.  The banding does make the little kids quite uncomfortable for a few hours but they are up and bouncing around today and you would never know they had gone through such and experience.

Here are a few photos of some of the new kids.  Just like a lot of other kids it is hard to get them to hold still long enough to get a good picture.

   

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New Year??

Everywhere one turned someone was saying “Happy New Year!”  Am I the only one who shakes their head and wonders, “What, a new year beginning in the middle of winter?”  Does this look like the beginning of anything?  (No, this wasn’t taken today but many are experiencing this and worse.)  Even the children here on the farm know when a new year is beginning.  It is when: New life is breaking forth everywhere.  Trees are budding
out.  The daffodils are popping out of the ground and are breaking into bloom.  New baby lambs and baby goat kids are being born.  The redbud trees are in full bloom.  And, just when is all of that?  It isn’t January 1st!  Try springtime!

It must have been the same people who came up with this mid-winter start for a year that came up with starting a new day in the middle of the night.

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