So Proud of My Little Girl

I am so proud of what I hope is the last bottle baby this year. I've been bottle feeding goats since February and I am so over it! Little Ms. Coral was born about six weeks ago, she is the last baby of our prized herd sire, Big Red, who passed away in March. Coral was a twin, but for some reason her mother didn't want to take care of her babies and I lost the other kid. Their dam cleaned them up after she had them, but left them and wouldn't have anything else to do with them. I moved the family to the barn and held the mother so the kids could get colostrum, then I started them on a bottle. Their mother kept them clean, let them sleep with her, and did everything a good mother should do except let them nurse. I've always heard that a mother animal knows when something is wrong with her kids and won't take care of them, but I was certain these two girls were healthy. Unfortunately I was wrong about the paint doeling, she had a seizure while I was feeding her one night, she came out of it, finished her bottle and seemed fine, but the next morning she was dead.

Now, back to why I'm proud of Coral...for the past two weeks I've been trying to get her interested in grain. She never tried to eat with her mother, I have them together in the barn, but I still bottle feed, so I wasn't sure how I was going to get her to start eating. Everyday I would pry her mouth open and put a little grain in and she would spit most of it out like I was trying to poison her or something, but today my work paid off!!! I always let her roam around outside while I'm feeding my mare and colt and her mother. She likes to explore, chase the kittens, and pick a little grass. Today I left the lid of the feed barrel and when I came out of the barn, there was Coral chowing down!!! I was so happy I nearly jumped for joy!!! The teenage boy that I hired to help me was watching her so he thought he would be helpful and went and got her a scoop of feed out, but she wouldn't have anything to do with it. She went right back and started eating out of the barrel. Apparently it's HER WAY OR NO WAY!!! Guess that's just the way we red heads are.

Co Op Must Love Me

I'm pretty sure my local co op must love me. I feel like I'm keeping their doors open. Of course I know I'm not their sole source of income, but dang it, when I give them half my paycheck every week, it sure feel like I am!

I normally make four or five trips there every week because there's always something I've forgotten or run out of unexpectedly. Well, I stopped by the other morning because I was running low on horse feed and I needed to get a bag or two to get me through until the weekend which is when I normally stock up. I went in, they always greet me by my first name or "the goat lady" so I guess you could say we're on pretty friendly terms...lol. Anyway, Glenna, one of the ladies who works the front counter asked me what I needed that day and I said, "just a bag of horse feed today." She said $8.10.....I nearly fainted. $8.10!!!!! for one 50lb bag of horse feed that not more than a year ago I was paying $5.25 for! I noticed it had been going up a few cents every week, but that price was almost a dollar more per bag. I gained my composure, paid her, and proceeded to the back where my ticket is printed out for the guys to pull my feed and load it. The nice young fella got the dolly and was loading my feed and as he passed by me, I said, "you're gonna have to push me out on that thang cause I still ain't recovered from the price." He laughed and said, "hop on." I tell ya, I just about took him up on it.

Moving onto the weekend when I buy my big load of feed, I left Co Op feeling like I had donated a kidney. Goat feed is now $10.92/50lbs with rumensin or $11.42/50lbs without rumensin. I just don't understand why medicated feed would be cheaper, but I'm assuming it's because my goats hate it, therefore, I have to buy the more expensive bag. All in all, I gave Co Op $160 in one day! My husband says I'm crazy and that I should sell some of the animals, but as long as I can, I'm holding on. I have my goat herd down to 19 goats and two more are for sell. The horse population, however has increased to 7!!! Horses aren't worth the feed you feed them these days, you can't hardly give one away, but I love 'em and I'll keep mine.

I think I see a lot of part time jobs along with my full time job in my future :(

Almost the End of This Goat Lady

My local Co Op started calling me The Goat Lady, I'd walk in and someone would be asking them about goats and the next thing I'd hear was, "there's The Goat Lady, you need to talk to her." I felt privileged for them to refer to me with this nickname and I started using it myself. I even use it as a signature at the end of my text message, but then I started seeing others using the same name. I didn't get mad or jealous, I just felt that maybe "we" were part of a unique group....The Goat Ladies!



Recently though, it was almost the end for this goat lady. The temperatures here in East Tennessee have been almost unbearable. We've had more rain than we need in my opinion and the humidity has to compare with the heat from the surface of the sun. On top of all this, the goats have been plagued with barber pole worm, hoof scald, and hoof rot. The heat and humidity have been so bad that the goats just want to lay around in the shade, therefore they quit browsing and eating the grasses in their small pasture and the weeds have taken over. The weeds then hold in moisture (thank you again humidity) and then when the goats walk through them that moisture stays between their toes and causes the hoof problems, and we all know this is the perfect environment for worms to continually hatch out and infest the goats.

It's just been a rough year. I've lost more goats this summer than I've lost in the entire 11 years I've owned goats! I finally decided enough was enough and that it was time to sell out. Thank God I came to my senses before it was too late. There's no way I could live without goats. If I wasn't The Goat Lady, then who would I be? I did, however, downsize my small herd. I went from 32 goats, down to 22 and I plan on selling two more goats. If there's anyway possible, I plan on keeping the herd numbers at 20 from now on, but there will be times when that's not possible. I have does ready to kid anytime, and more does due in the fall, but of course the kids can be sold to get the numbers back down.

Things are still a little rough, but this Goat Lady has decided to stick around. In a few months, the heat will relinquish, the rains will stop, and we'll all be complaining about how cold it is how we'd love to have rain instead of snow. It's just the way things in East TN go, the weather is always mind boggling.


My hat after feeding, notice the one area not soaked from sweat