I have had a hard time with the Nubian baby goats. They were wormed with Valbazen, which did not work and then with a triple dose of Ivermectin drench, which only worked marginally. The two wormers are of a different class, one being the 'white' wormers and the other being the 'mectin' class. Neither were effective. So I sent away for Molly's herbal wormer program. The program consists of two parts, a once in two month wormer with wormwood and a maintenance wormer for in-between, once a week. No, this is not an inexpensive alternative to chemical womers, which are very expensive too, but look at the photo. While the chemical wormers barely had any effect on the worms and the anemia resulting from a high worm load caused death, the herbal wormer caused an immediate expulsion of worms visible in the stool. The wormer does not work like a chemical wormer, killing the worms, but rather it causes the host to be inhospitable and the worms expel themselves. Then it is up to the chickens to find the worms in the stool and pick through and eat them up so the cycle does not perpetuate itself. Ideally, after worming the animals should be moved to clean ground, and a new pen entirely, but in my world, there are only so many pens and so many shelters and that is not a reality. The best I can offer is a good barn cleaning, which did happen, and since the temperatures are so mild right now, the barn is closed until needed. The goats do have a three sided shelter filled with clean bedding, so they are not left without a home. 

Along with the herbal wormer, I included a lot of granulated garlic. This also helps to encourage the worms to get out of town. To make the powder palatable and edible, I mixed it with the granulated garlic and sugar beet pulp covered with molasses. The sweet pulp encourage the goats and sheep to eat up all the wormer and I even sprinkled a few oats in the mix, just to encourage the more reluctant ones. Ideallly, each individual animal should be fed a proper dosage and that works well with only a few animals, but there are 50 sheep and 20 goats, so it is not easily done. 

I am extremely pleased with the result of the herbal wormer. The treatment needs to happen for three days and then then the second formula happens once a week for the other 7 weeks. Diligence will be the key factor in eradicating the worms. Molly's herbal wormer is a patented formula, so the ingredients are not available. I think any number of worming herbs ground to a powder and mixed together will produce a similar result. For now, I ordered a ten month supply with the intent of getting rid of the worms in the sheep and goats. The other animals can use this program too, but getting dogs to eat it might not be so easy. I did give some to the chickens, however; they were not interested in it. It is there if they would like it though. I might add it to the oyster shell, which they consume in copious quantities to encourage them to eat it. 

Worm resistance is a growing problem for ruminants and their keepers. Years ago, there were no chemical wormers and the misuse of them, routinely worming twice a year wether the animals required it or not, and under dosing causes the worms to become resistant and then the chemicals no longer work. This is what happened with the Nubians. My own animals have been on a different herbal program which was working for this farm. The Nubians were stressed and the adult does were already anemic when they arrived, so I suspect the problem was brought to the farm. For every problem there is a solution. I strongly encourage farmers to investigate herbs for the eradication of worms. Resistance is not a problem then and the animals are not subjected to chemicals which stay in the meat and milk. 

It is a universal problem. Natural is the only way to make it disappear, but constant diligence is the key. I see it work firsthand and encourage all to give it a try. 

Sarah the goat gets my goat. She is a typical spoiled goat that was bottle fed as a kid and does not realize her boundaries with humans. All the other goats stay in the fence, but Sarah jumps out because she can. The other goats can, or at least some of them can now, because Sarah broke the fence in three different places. There is a livestock panel over the worst part and another panel will go up tomorrow, but she will come out because she only likes the premium hay saved for rationing, not the regular hay that everyone else gets. 
Sarah would make the most ideal pet goat for a family with only the need for a few goats. She can be tethered with a collar. She is so friendly and loving, too, always curious and wanting to be near the humans. She does love treats and would bust through chicken wire to get at grain when she can, so she, like the rest of the ruminants on the farm, are not fed grain. It is not good for them anyhow. Sarah is quite pregnant. She did not sell last year, nor did her little Pygmy/Alpine cross doeling. I am hoping that some one would take the whole family; Sarah and her last year's doeling and their kids. Ideally, that would be a great start to a little goat herd. Sarah is a purebred Alpine dairy goat our of super milking and show lines. She is not trained to milk, but I am quite sure she would not mind standing on a stantion if she got fed the whole time. 

But Sarah rubs me the wrong way. I do not like her getting out to help herself to the premium hay. She paws it and selects only the best tidbits, stepping on the rest and soiling it as she poops and pees while munching. Tomorrow I am going to wrap what is left of that bale with netting. The problem is that there is a different bale of similar hay a little further away, which Sarah will find. She was even in the duck pen eating the ducks' grain, the other day. Robbie the border collie sends her sailing over the fence back home when he notices her out. She has taught her daughter to jump the fence and seek for better food too. In a way, Sarah is the smartest of the bunch, but she is a thorn in my side. If she does not sell this year, I am going to put her in an electric fence forever. Or, I say I will. Last winter I had to keep her in the 7 foot high dog kennel all winter to keep her where she shouldn't be. Some days I think she is the coolest little goatie ever, but generally, I wish some one else owned her. She is due in two weeks. A week after that when I know her little ones are strong and she is well, off she goes, I hope. Can't wait, but at the same time, I know I will miss her. 

The Fat Ewe Farm has over 100 animals. Last year was a bumper crop for lambs with all but one ewe with twins, and most of the goats with twins, one set of triplets and one set of quads. One of the quads did not thrive, but the rest of the lambs and kids were healthy and strong. Some of the lambs will have lambs this summer because a tiny Babydoll Southdown ram was in to breed the Babydolls and was interested in a few of the early born or more mature ewe lambs. So this year, the ewes will have lambs and the lambs will have lambs and does will have kids and the kids will have kids. Then culling must be done.

Culling is done for two purposes. When an animal is unwanted for any reason, it are sent to the auction. Often a meat buyer will take those animals provided it is not sick and occasionally a farmer will pick the animal up too. Animals that do not fit the breeding program are not kept. On The Fat Ewe Farm, the most important traits for the ewes are that they are hardy and thrive on grass forage alone, they are worm resistant and also they lamb without aid and produce more than one baby. That pretty much fits most of the animals now, as this is the third year for the farm.

And the males, well, only a few are sold for breeding. The rest are food, sad as it seems. I cried when my last year lambs were killed and butchered because I saw them being born and raised them and knew them. Though I thanked them for their lives and honoured them, their loss was deeply felt. But what does one do? There are seven dogs to feed. Currently meat scraps and bones are purchased for them more economically than killing a lamb to feed them, but when an animal is butchered on the farm, then the scraps are utilized as well.

This summer will mean that some sheep, even Dora, who was one of my first three lambs, will have to go. Dora has never had a baby in the three years she has been here. She is a pet, yes, but this is a farm, not a zoo (though some might argue that point). I will try hard to find Dora a home, though who will want a barren ewe for a pet? See the problem? Then there is Little Johnny, the first ever lamb born here. His mother was bred when she arrived and lambed shortly after. He is a four horned Jacob and is quiet and very tame and friendly, but I cannot use him for breeding because he is related to every Jacob ewe here. What do I do with him? Lawn ornament? How many pets can I keep without going broke?

I am sure there will be much deliberation when the time comes to say goodbye to the animals here, but if they produce babies like last year, there will soon be 200 , not 100. For one person, it is not feasible, sigh. I wish.

The Nigerian Dwarf doe and the French Alpine are dairy goats. Their little doelings are being weaned, and the result is that the udders of these dairy ladies are hard and likely painful. So, I helped them out a little. I would like to milk the goats and have a stantion, but it is winter now, or almost, and I do not think milking in the frozen cold would be much fun.
Sarah, the Alpine, was not wanting to have much to do with milking. She is ultra tame, and does not run away, so it is easy to catch her, but the moment I touched her udder, she kicked at me with her back leg and tried to run. I leaned her into the fence and held her there with my weight and proceeded to milk her out just a little, just enough to take the majority of the pressure from her udder. Once it was not so hard, I let her go, milk covering my shoe. It was likely not much more than an ounce from each teat that I milked, but once I started she relaxed. I do not think it would be difficult to train her to milk. Next kidding, when the weather is warm, I will milk share with her kid.

Daphne, the Nigerian Dwarf, is fairly tame too, and she stood to be milked after a little coaxing. Again, I only relieved the pressure for her. This should prevent mastitis. Ideally, it would be better to gradually wean the babies, that is allow them to drink twice a day, then after a week, once a day, then every two days and so on, but that is a tremendous effort to catch the babies when they do not want to leave the mothers, or vice versa, and the crying starts all over again. All at once weaning is a little harder on the pairs for a few days, then they quickly adjust and go on with their business. After three weeks, or possibly four, the does should be dry and the babies could be returned to the mothers. The mothers will then no longer stand to let the babies nurse, usually. If they are not completely dried up, then there is the possibility that the milk could return, so it is better to ensure that the does are dry, even if it is a month's time.

The Boer/Pygmy goat does not seem to have any difficulty with weaning, neither calling for her baby, or with a hard udder and her baby is adjusting to being on her own quite well. The three little doelings cuddle together in their hoop house and keep one another company.

Sarah, the Alpine is for sale, along with her doeling, and the Boer/Pygmy and her Pygmy with 25% Boer doeling is as well. As much as I like the goats, I cannot keep them all and these two do not quite fit my next idea of breeding Pygora goats for their fiber. It will likely be after kidding that they will find new homes. At least I have had a little practice milking and will have Daphne to milk share with next kidding.

It is time to wean the baby goats. They cry like babies, really they do. If you did not know it was an animal, you would swear a baby was crying. The smaller goats with the higher voices are pathetic to listen to. It makes me want to pick them up and cuddle them, so I do. Raven, the little boy, Weezie's twin, is in with the Flemish Giant buck in a hoop house. They will stay together for the winter. The rabbit will build himself a nicely sculpted winter den, but at the moment, the buckling is tiny enough to fit right in the house. So, those two will be good company.

The little doelings were just weaned the day before yesterday. They busted through the shelter by pushing the chicken wire hard enough to make a hole and then climbing out. A bale of straw has stopped them for the time being. They too have some straw, but they will be returned to the does in three weeks, long enough to have the mothers' milk dry up. The babies and moms will recognize each other for the rest of their lives. It is not uncommon for a doe and her grown doelings to cuddle together years after they are all mature.

The poor little girls are so stressed and so are some of the moms. The Alpine does not seem to mind one way or the other. I milked a little from her to release the pressure. She did not like it one bit so I turned her upside down and milked her on her side, just enough to soften the udder. She is the only one who had a very hard udder which can result in mastitis, though not generally. The other moms seem to be adapted well. This is also a good chance for me to spend some time with the doelings. The only one being kept is the little white one, named Daria, Daphne's baby. Daphne is a beautiful Nigerian Dwarf and her babies, without exception so far, are superior breeding stock, no matter which billy she was bred to. Her last year's doeling will be bred this year, hopefully, to produce an exquisite little one or two, just like her mother. In the meantime, the pathetic cries of babies are heard all around the farm, sigh.

Little goaties are very personable animals. They are curious by nature, robust and full of life and fun, but they are not easy to look after. Goats, more than any domesticated livestock, are unhappy kept in pens. Their nature is that of a browser, not a grazer, and they eat above the grass level usually, given a choice. When forced to eat grass, they pick at the leaves, trample a whole lot and once they stomp on it, they will NOT eat it plus they eat only the leaves off the grass stems, wasting a great deal of hay. Weeds are better to feed them, and twigs and branches. 

Sarah is a young purebred full sized goat, an Alpine. She is beautiful and extremely people oriented because she was bottle fed from birth. I got Sarah as a trade for some wool and was so pleased with the little girl, but in no time at all, I also became frustrated with her. She is quite an escape artist and climbs fences, climbs in the feeders and basically gets herself in a great deal of trouble. The goats at the Fat Ewe Farm are not generally fed grain because ruminants do better on grass and forage and would not naturally eat grain. As a matter of fact, if they ate a lot of grain and were not used to it, the bloating from the ration could and does kill them. Sheep are worse with that issue. Ask me how I learned. 

Sarah was not only bottle fed, but grain fed. She learned that humans who carry buckets have good things inside and they, of course, are all for her. Being larger than the other goats, she pushes them aside, but she is not top goat. The other goats, though half her size, butt her out of the way to get what they want. Sarah does not seem to mind. She just gets something else. At first, Sarah was so frustrating, going through chicken wire to get the duck's feed, breaking through tarps and always getting out, that she was going to be sold or given away. But since she was a gift, Sarah stayed and although she is a pain in the butt, she is loved and has earned her place at the farm. Silly goatie.

The dog houses that the miniature goats prefer are a sunken city now. With the wasted hay and 4 feet of snow, the small igloo dome is barely visible. The hay and snow have frozen the houses to the ground. In the summer, they can easily be taken apart, separating the bottom from the top, and cleaned out, then disinfected and rinsed with the hose. In winter, at least this winter, they are inaccessible. The one facing the opposite of the other two clogs over with hay that is tramped downhill and the door way gets plugged. One day, there were 3 little goaties in  there and they didn't know how to get out. The hay and snow gets dislodged with the claw end of the hammer daily to keep the doorways usable. 

Celia goat was hoping for a treat and hopped up on one of the bigger houses, that do not look so big now, but would easily house a large German Shepherd size dog, when in full view. Two, and sometimes three, Pygmy or Nigerian goats crowd together to keep each other warm. They do not prefer the bigger shelter unless it is full. The sheep helped generate some heat and block the wind as well, but they are going back to their pen at the end of the month. They were visiting the goats, along with their ram, for breeding. Celia has what appears to be cashmere. Any goat can have a soft downy undercoat that can be combed out. Her neck, in particular, is showing that very thick down, so under the guard hairs on the rest of her body, it is likely the same. I will have to put her on the milk stand with a bucket of field peas and comb her when she starts to shed. 

In the meantime, we are thankful spring is around the corner. If winter lasted much longer, goat city would be another Atlantis, lost and gone forever. 

Please, could you put something in my bowl? 
Jade found this bowl in the chicken run and carried around to the house, then sat with it. When I came outside, she picked it up and looked at me. So darn cute!

The rams rammed through the fence between them and the goats. On the goat's side, for 2 months, there are three sheep, two Jacob females and one Jacob ram. The rams on one side of the fence would ram the ram on the other side of the fence. Finally, they broke the fence, but did not bother going through the hole; they jumped over like it was not there. The rams are Shetland, Barbados and Shetland, Icelandic crosses. All of those breeds are small and very athletic. Once they jumped over, I gave up on the fence and now they are together until the remainder of the month when the ewes will go back to the ewe flock and the rams will once again be housed together. With no ewes around, they ram each other from time to time, but usually not very seriously. Silly teenage boys!

The puppies fell asleep in the sunshine as I was trying to think of a remedy for the ram and goat situation. I decided to see how they cohabit for a day, and if there is no problem, they can stay until the month's end, when the ewes are separated anyhow. Jade fell asleep on the top of the snow mound. The Maremmas have such thick fur with a downy undercoat that they do not suffer from the cold. Even though the temperature was -15 and the wind was blowing, she preferred to be in the snow for her nap. 

The frost free water faucet was frozen. I tried to thaw it with a hair dryer, a nice black hair dryer from TONI&GUY with bling on it, and still it remained frozen after 5 minutes, so I gave up and got water from the house. That is a chore in outside clothes. 

The Saxony duck family, three hens and one drake, had a bath in the toboggan and then settled down on some fresh grass hay I gave them. They ate all the dandelions out of the hay first and then quite a bit of the grass and some clover. All animals on the farm are fed hay and they eat it, even the pigs and cats!

Sarah, is a beautiful pure bred Alpine doeling that I acquired last year in a trade for some wool. I named her after the lady who gave her to me, Sarah, who is a beautiful young mother and farmer. Sarah the goat, was bottle fed and grain fed, two methods that create a very tame and friendly animal, but also create problems. There is nowhere that Sarah will not go to get at grain. I was feeding the pigs, next to the the llamas and Sarah climbed out of the fence into the llama's side, but could not quite get into the pig fence. I worry about her though, since the llamas have full run of the quarter. Since it is winter, they stay put, but in the summer, they go everywhere. I sure hope they would protect little Sarah if she jumps into their side. 

And that was today on the farm. Whew!


Hello Moab, 
Animals are amazing and I am privileged to live and work with them. I have a laundry sink in the farmhouse porch from which I must get water when the outside faucet is not functioning, as in the past 2 days. The humidity was 92%. When it is cold and humid the frost creeps. That is when it is most difficult and must be watched for frozen lines and pipes, as in when the septic froze last week, ten feet deep. The porch is not heated, but the door to the farmhouse is open, so it is not freezing in there, since that is where the red worm composters live in winter (in their box). I must bring the buckets inside and fill them at the sink, then lift them out and carry them to the  toboggan. The sink has a reduced water flow faucet for water saving,and filling takes a while. When wearing all in one insulated coveralls, hat and gloves, it takes only a moment to overheat, so I go stand outside or play ball with Robbie. The time extends the water part of the chores by double. Good luck with the session today and I counted 12.