The New Goat House!!!

Oh my goodness!! I am so excited. Dave a.k.a Red Green made me a goat house.

You have to admit, it is an original. And it cost a total of 14$!!! Everybody wants to get rid of all those old satellite dishes and the farmer up the road had that feeder in the field that he wasn't using. He even brought it down for us. Then it only cost for the bolts to put it together.

Now it will need a coat of paint to stop it from rusting more, but other than that, it's perfect for a day shelter for the goats.

The weather here is so unpredictable. They can say sunshine for the next 3 days and that afternoon it will downpour. I hated leaving the goats outside while I wasn't here to bring them back inside in case it rained, but I had no choice. Now they have a place to go to eat and have a lick of salt without being in the rain.

I'm sooo excited!! Can you tell! :)

Lisa

Ducks, clotheslines and Victoria Day weekend.

The following picture is now off limits for me. I have been told by my hubby to not use it for awhile. Oh I miss it. But it falls off it's track at the other end and when that happens Dave has to climb on top of the barn and then put a ladder on the roof of the barn to reach the wheel and the clothes that have gotten stuck up there. Not the most ideal situation. I don't really want my hubby breaking his neck for a few clothes.

Well Otis went to the big pasture up the road last week. Dave actually walked him there. A friend of ours actually stopped and said, "Aren't you supposed to walk your dog? Not your cow?" Dave said, "I don't have a dog, so the calf will do."

Otis actually found a friend in the pasture. That night we went to visit him and he actually made friends with a larger Holstein in the pasture. It was kinda cute, since all the rest of the cattle were what I call meat cattle and a few Jerseys. But there was only one other Holstein in the bunch and they became friends. I wonder if cattle are prejudice? Ha ha.

Pretty soon people are going to start calling me the crazy cat lady. We have a new addition to our cat family. It's not by choice. She kinda adopted us. This pretty stray has been eating the barn cat's cat food for months now and she's decided to become a bit friendlier. Well really it's amazing what a determined 9 year old and a couple of bags of cat treats can accomplish. So that means we now have 5 cats. Ugh.

Dave went to the cattle sale a few weeks ago and sold the twins. Sniff, sniff...But we cannot keep them all. I didn't get much for them either. Bummer. 66$ for 2 twin goats. Not good.

But while Dave was there he thought that he'd surprise us with a treat. So please meet our 3 new ducks. Or as I call them, "Supper for the wild minks". One has a bum leg, but you can't get with 20 feet of them. They are really petrified of humans. Hmmmm.... I wonder if a few bags of cat treats and a determined 9 year old would work on them?

In Canada this past weekend was Victoria Day weekend. It was a gorgeous weekend. I was off work!!!YIPPEE for me! J. and I did some gardening.

Well I have so much to blog, but it's going to have to wait for another post. I am having so many problems with blogger that it's now an extreme pain to blog.

I cannot move my photos around on my post, so I have to save everything, open a new post, copy and paste the body of the post to the new post, then copy and paste the photos to the exact spot I want them in the new post. So I'm doing all my work twice. NOT FUN!!!! It's almost as bad as trying to make cheese! Which I'm trying to do again tonight. Yes, I am a sucker for punishment.

Have a blessed Evening

Lisa

Cheese Making 101

Ok, I have milk coming out of the ying yang so I decided to try my hand at cheese making again.

So here it goes.....

Rule number 1

Don't call me!!! I can't make cheese worth *%$%!@#!~!!!! (that's the closest I'll ever get to swearing)

Rule number 2

If you call me for advice on cheese making, this is the advice that I'll give you.

"Get in your car and drive to the nearest supermarket! It's cheaper, easier and faster. AND you'll actually get cheese!"

That's all I have to say about that.

Lisa

Wharf Cats

One of the Mamas

I thought that I'd blog about something that is close to my heart.

Living in Nova Scotia, close to the ocean is just wonderful. I tried living away from the ocean a long time ago, but I missed it so much I moved back. I do live inland, but it takes a total of a 3 minute drive and I'm on the beach.

That said, there are bad things here also. Wharf cats. There are hundreds of wharves in the area and some people think that it's just fine to dump unwanted cats and kittens on the wharf. They think that they'll have all sorts of food to eat. Rats, mice, fish etc.... This is just a cruel practice. People are getting more responsible for their pets, but some people are still down right mean.

Some people say, "If you want to get rid of them, just poison them or shoot them." I don't think so. That's just nasty and they populate so fast that when one dies, there's another five to take that ones place. Plus if the male cats are gone and can't defend their territory, other males will come and take over. The cycle starts all over again.

Several years ago my uncle retired from his job. He noticed all these feral cats on the wharf. These poor things were starving, stunted and inbred. Some were fullgrown, but looked like kittens, with short legs. He began feeding them and building little houses for them. He told my mother, who in turn started telling other people. Then it just snowballed from there. There is now a Clare Feral Cat society.

www.petfinder.com/shelters/ns42.html

A very scared cat

They raise funds to buy food for the cats, build more shelters, buy live traps, get the females spayed etc... They need the live traps to catch the females to bring them to the vet.

Another Mama protecting her brood.

When they find kittens that are weaned, they take them away and get them adopted out. Most of these cats are now actually semi-tame. You can't pick them up, but they will let you pet them. Some are still extremely wild.

Mama going for food.

J. and I went to visit the cats. We checked the houses and we found 2 litters of kittens. They were just a few days old and extremely cute. I took a few photos, but we didn't stay long because it was freezing out and starting to rain. We'll go check on them again next week.

J. checking the condos

Cuties!!

Well I have to go. It's been a long day at work and I have goats calling my name for feed.

Have a Blessed Day.

Lisa

Sick goats and fishing time!

We had a sick goat on our hands this week. I mean really sick, like -have-to-call-the-vet-but-don't-really-want-to-because-it's-going-cost-a-fortune-sick!

It all started Saturday morning when I checked on the little darlings. I noticed that Esme's hind legs and tail were soaked. I looked around and noticed a large wet spot on the floor, it didn't look like diarrhea but you never know with goats.. I figured she just ate too much grass and had diarrhea. I left her in the barn for the day and didn't think much more about it.

Sunday morning when I checked on the critters I noticed spots of blood on the floor. I looked at her bum and noticed blood coming out of her vagina. Now was the time to panic! But she was acting normal, eating normal and I checked her temp and that was normal. I was completely confused. So Dave and I gave her a shot of Pen-G (penicillin) as a precaution. Needless to say, she was not amused to have a needle in the back of her leg. I still kept her in for the day and kept a close eye on her. What I was afraid of also, "was it contagious?"

Monday I called the vet in Middleton, since they specialize in goats. They were baffled. We talked for awhile trying to figure out what was the problem, but to no avail. The only thing they could figure out was maybe she had a varicose vein in her vaginal wall that had busted and it was bleeding. It would rectify itself. They had never seen it in goats, only in horses, but anything is possible. So she told me to deworm her and give her the Pen-G for a few more days and keep a close eye on her. Then 5 minutes later the vet called me back and said, "I was thinking more about this and even though this usually just happens in Oct or Nov, Esme might be having a pseudo-pregnancy. She's young and confused so she might have thought that she was pregnant. They usually have alot of mucous that discharges when they think they should give birth then have bleeding for a few days."

So my goat thinks she was preggers! What next. I checked her tonight and no blood. Completely clean. Hopefully it stays that way.

My first catch of the season!

So the rest of the week involved fishing for the first time this season. We all went to a river not far from our house. We each caught a pickeral. We are a catch and release kinda family, so off they went back into the river.

J. very excited!

Monday afternoon I cleaned out the greenhouse again and planted my tomatoes. I'm hoping it won't get too cold at night. It's been pretty hot the last few weeks.

My clean greenhouse. I gave up on the middle part.

The blackflies are out with a vengeance. They are hungry and plentiful. The mosquitoes shouldn't be too far off. Shudder...

Father and son

Sunday I actually had a few minutes (very few) to sit in my favourite spot.

My favourite chair. It might look strange but it's ohhh so comfortable.

It's been so dry that our little pond is going dry and my poor little tadpoles are getting a smaller, very smaller little pool.

Tadpoles. Little fish in a very little pond and getting smaller by the minute.

Since it's spring our very plentiful poplar trees are leaving little cling-ons everywhere. You can't get rid of the darn things! And they stain the clothes also. The cats are not happy with them either. Febe has some all over her beard and Shadow has some all over his butt. The photo doesn't do Shadow's cling-ons justice.

Shadow and the clingons!

This ugly part of the old barn used to be the pig pen. Needless to say it is full of nice composted pig poop! Lots of it. So we (Dave) are going to clean it up and it's going to become my pumpkin patch for my giant pumpkins!! Imagine the big pumpkins that will evolve from that poop! Ohhhhh yeaaaah.

The pumpkin patch in the making.

When you think you've seen everything on a farm, you see something else that makes you go "hmmmmm". A few days ago I went into the chicken coop to gather the eggs. The two roosters had kicked out the hens and were sleeping together in the nest. No, no don't even go there.

Well have a blessed day!

Lisa

The slow week

My forsythia and magnolia bushes

This blog should be entitled...The Last Two Weeks in Photos.

It started with a beautiful rainbow. Isn't this picture so inspirational with the Irving propane truck in the foreground. tee hee

I thought the rainbow would show up better.

Well once again its the case of "never say never". Words have alot of calories. That's why I don't seem to be able to lose any weight. I keep eating my words. Sigh....

I always said that we would never, ever get a trampoline for J. Well, Dave found a near new trampoline in the local paper for next to nothing. Sooooo here it is. We are having a blast with it.

J. and the trampoline

The weather is holding out. It's been just beautiful. Some days are a bit chilly, but mostly sunny. The problem like I mentioned in my last post is that we are not getting any amounts of rain. Not good. By now my garden has a few inches of water between the rows. At the moment, it's almost dust. Not good. But my garlic is doing wonderful.

The Garlic

My rhubard almost didn't make it. Dave didn't realize it was there and tilled the garden. Uh oh! This is all I have left of it.

The rhubard on it's last legs

Febe and the exploding udder.

The goats are doing well. They all go outside together now. Esme is terrorizing Cindi Lou. Febe is terrorizing Esme, but most of the time protecting Cindi Lou. My dilemma now is should I get rid of Esme or Febe. I was going to get rid of Febe since she's not very nice with J. But.....she gets along with everyone except Esme. Esme on the other hand doesn't get along with Febe or Cindi Lou. Even J. would rather me get rid of Esme than Febe. His opinion is....

"Mum, Febe is a good mother and milker, you don't know what you're going to get with Esme. I like Esme, but you sometimes have to think about the big picture. I can always stay out of Febe's way. But she is getting nicer to me."

My child is wise beyond his 9 years.

We are going to band one of the boys. It's a buck year. Everyone has had bucklings. Not a good thing. It's hard to sell them. I really hate to think that they would go for meat, but.....

Cindi Lou, Mike and Art

Last night I seperated Mike and Arthur from their mom, so I can get some milk in the morning. It didn't go so well. There was whole lot of blatting going on. But this morning everyone seemed happy and I had 2 litres of milk! Which I am drinking now. Ahhh! It's so good.

I have been trying to take photos of the kids, but it's hard to take a nice photo of flying objects! I love this photo. Look at Mike's legs. He is just flying. (ignore the junk in the background).

The Wild goat rodeo

Cindi Lou had little scabs all over her body. We have no clue why. I even called the vet and they have no clue why. So I've treated her with Cy-Lence and everyone else for that matter in case it's a case of lice or mites. It seems like it's doing better. It's against my religion to drink, but these goats are working hard to drive me to it!

Cindi Lou Who

Otis is doing well. He likes to stick his tongue out at us. He's going to the big pasture up the road in a few weeks. His hair loss is doing better. We treated him with Cy-Lence and it seems like it did the trick. We have a different problem now. Dave got the farmer up the road to come and castrate him because we were told that he hadn't been pinched where we got him. So Herbie, the farmer came to do it (and he's done it many, many times.) He can't find "them" to pinch "them". Hmmm....strange.

Otis

The following photo is the perfect reason why you should plant your veggies in the greenhouse within a few days of cleaning it out. Not cleaning out your greenhouse and waiting a few weeks to plant your veggies!

My Evil Greenhouse!

This is called doing your work twice!!! I swear.. I'll never learn. I thought I was getting a jump on the year. I guess not!

Most of the pigs are gone. Only one left. He was supposed to leave at the same time as the others, but the guy's car broke down on the way, so he's coming Tuesday. If he stays here any longer Dave is charging him boarding fees which is normal.

J. feeding the piglets

Two of our young chickens have died yesterday and today. One from being picked to death and the other, we aren't sure why. Chickens are evil things. I hope we don't lose anymore. The two we did lose were pullets. Crud.

Last week was Stampede Day at our place. Who needs the Calgary Stampede when you have goats!

I needed to get Cindi Lou out of the pasture to feed her. So I just opened the gate a bit and Febe stuck her nose through. I grabbed her collar, but at the same time Esme tried to sneak out also. So I grabbed her collar too. (do you see where this is going?) For a split second I had control of the situation. Then my foot got caught in a tree root. There I go being dragged around for a few seconds (felt like minutes) on the ground by two goats before I realize...."Let go, stupid dummy!" All this time, Dave and a visitor are watching me thinking..."What is she doing?"

Never a dull moment.

Yesterday J. and I painted the barn, well one side of it. Then we ran out of paint. Then he painted his tree fort.

Tomorrow I have the entire day planned..

-get chicken feed

-do banking

-clean sheet day

-clean (and I mean scrub on my knees kinda clean) the kitchen floor

-paint the french door in the kitchen

-clean the goat pen

-make supper so we can eat for 4:30 so we can go to drum lessons

-go fishing with J. after school.

Phew... I think that's it! Dave asked what I was going to do in the afternoon after I've done this list.

Today was a good sermon at church. We had Calvin Smith from CMI come and explain creationism and how is pertains to regular everyday life instead of evolution, which we don't beleive in. www.creation.com

My Magnolia Tree

Well I think that's it for this post. Have a blessed day!

Lisa

Spring goats

Well, where to start.

Me and the kids. All four of them!

All is well. Febe kidded last Thursday. She gave birth to identical twin boys!! Not so happy. But the Lord gives us, what the Lord gives us. We've decided that we are going to keep one and breed it to Cindi Lou Who and Esme. Maybe even Whisper.

We had the problem of trying to name the bucklings. Dave wanted to name them "This One" and "That One". I found it cute but I really didn't want to name them that. At work we have two older guys working with us. They are always pulling pranks and acting foolish. Sooooooo..... I want you to meet.. "This one Arthur" and "That one Mike". Their official names will have Spring Peeper in front of their names.

This One Arthur and That One Mike

I'm kinda worried for them. I don't find that they are eating much. But they are looking healthy. They are getting bigger and playing and frolicking. It's just that Febe's udder is humunga bunga!! I had to milk her yesterday and I milked over 2 litres!!! and I wasn't even done. But they must be finding milk somewhere's.

I got home from an Epicure party a few hours ago and I noticed that the neighbour had a chimney fire going. The fire dept is still there. The strange thing was that she had no fire in the furnace. She just had the oil furnace going. Not good. I'll have to ask Dave what went on. He's in the fire dept.

April 14

Well I had to milk Febe again tonight. They are favouring one side. I got 2 litres on just one side. The poor girl was in misery. I called my goat lady and she said that I should milk her morning and night to keep her even and they'll have enough throughout the day and night.

Cindi Lou Who having lunch

Cindi Lou went to school Monday. She did well and the kids loved her. They even got to feed her. She was so tired when I left that she fell asleep in my arms on the way to the car. But she's becoming a little minx. She's jumping on the milking stand now, while we aren't there, then grabbing things off the upper shelves. She is growing like a weed. She's eating some grain now, but she won't drink out of the bucket so she's still on the bottle. I had to put a bale of hay on the milking stand to stop her from jumping up.

Tonight (April 15) I milked Febe and she hardly had any on both sides, so they must be keeping her even. That's good. But she's got a sore on her head. I think she goes under the feeder to clean up after them and she rubs her head. I hope that's all it is. I'm telling ya, these goats are going to drive me to drink. And I don't drink! This morning I had so much on my mind, I got to work and I thought, "Oh Crud!! I left Febe on the milking stand!" So I call our neighbour in a panic and he went to check. No, I hadn't left her on the stand. I need to get back in the groove of things. Is there ever a groove?

Monday we treated ourselves to lobster. It was good! We had enough for 2 meals. At 4.75$ a pound, that's pretty good. It was actually cheaper than eating in a restaurant.

YUM!!

The chicks have been moved to a larger place. I think they doubled in size overnight. Otis is doing well. His fur stopped coming out. He's off the bottle (that sounds strange) and drinking water. Soon he'll be going to the big pasture up the road.

This coming Saturday is pig day! Everyone is coming to get their piggies. That'll be nice. We are keeping 2 for ourselves for meat this fall.

Ok, it's enough. I have to publish this post. It's been sitting around long enough.

Have a blessed day!

Lisa