Ashley saves the day!!!!

Oh my goodness. We have to give Tobi, the goat, 2 shots a day for 10 days. So just who is going to do that?????? We tried, I held and Vince poked. The first one went all over my shirt, the second went in the fur. We never tried a third cause we were both about to have a nervous breakdown. I'm not sure Tobi knew what to think except may that we were nuts and he just wanted out.

So Vince called a wonderful young lady that we've know for some time. She has horses and has experience in "giving shots." She came over the next morning and gave us lessons. She actually made it look easy. She is so calm and she just poked it in like a pro. Okay so we're set right.

Next day comes, I hold Vince pokes and get it. Nice!!!! That evening comes, I hold Vince pokes and pokes and misses, we give up. Next morning we try again and manage to get it, we were so excited, Tobi is still thinking we're nuts. We did go get some smaller needles to try. The ones we got from the vet are huge and this goat is tiny and has practically no lose skin to poke in the first place. Hopefully they will be a little easier. I tried the poking but I just couldn't do it. It's like putting a needle into leather.

I sure do love Ashley. She's my hero and I'm sure Tobi wishes she were here more often but in the mean time we will just keep on trying and hopefully we'll either get better at it or we'll keep the goats so healthy they won't need any more shots.

They are here!!!!!

We finally picked up our goats. They are adorable, except for the big head pieces where they were dis budded. We decided to get them this week instead of next basically because we were so excited. We decided on names that were different than what they were at the breeders. We named the girl Basil, the boy with the white tail is Doc, after Doc Holiday. The other boy with the pretty spots is Tobi, a Nigerian name meaning God is good!!!

Basil was the only one still living with mama so she is not very happy right now. She actually screams MMMAAAAAAAAA!!!! Today she's starting to get a little hoarse. The boys are taking it all in stride. Tobi is very gentle and almost seems to go into a trance when you scratch his neck. Doc wants to nibble everything but he stops too when you scratch him. I brushed them this morning and they stood perfectly still the whole time.

We put them in the chicken hospital overnight. Both chickens are back with the flock now. Flophead avoided it as long as she could. But she had to go. The goats seemed to settle down when it got dark. Hopefully they slept all night. I know I did because I was exhausted from listening to Basil.

Jenny was here so she helped me get set up and take care of them the first day. That was a good thing. Broch is here too but we haven't introduced any of the dogs to the goats yet. I think we'll wait awhile on that.

We made them a nice hang out area under the deck but it seems they prefer the steps. I think it's because they see us disappear up them so that's where they stay to wait for us. I think we are all going to have fun. Our Little Man bucky boy comes in the middle of June hopefully we be moved by then.

Oh yea the move, I'll have to explain all that later. It's another story.

Chocolate mama duck

Yeah!!!! She finally hatched her eggs. Poor thing sat there forever it seems like. We'd check on her every time we went out and finally we saw her walking across the pasture with her little fuzzy duckies. Vince checked the nest and found 14 hatched out eggs and 6 that didn't hatch. They are sooooo cute. As she walks them across the grass she slides her beak in the grass showing them how to find food. Then when she got to the fence she kept gesturing with her beak for them to go forward. They all went through then she climbed through. When the mama ducks swim with their babies they will swim out in front then turn around and swim backward almost like they are counting heads and making sure everyone is there. It's really fascinating to watch how they "teach" their babies and take care for them. Eewe then a day or so later we went out to the farm and there was a big old black snake with his head down in her nesting hole. Ucky!!!! He slithered away but not before Vince gave him a backache with a timber. Gross!!!! Yea I know black snakes are good snakes but a snake is a snake and I will just kill the mice some other way.

Goats goats and more goats!!!!

Okay so we have the Little Man coming mid June and we had to find him a little buddy. Fortunately the lady we are purchasing from is in the know and sent us to someone nearby that had just what we needed. Ha, we went to buy one and came away with three. For some reason Vince asked to see the little doe that was there (that's her pic w/me) well of course he thought she was adorable and so did I. So if we get a buddy for the buck and we get a doe well for obvious reasons we don't want to put the doe and the buck in the same pen at least not in the long run so we "have" to have a buddy for the doe. So the two little ones in the other pic are babies we took the bigger one on the left and another the same size (not pictured) that has a little white tip on the end of his constantly wagging tail. These are all still nursing mama but should be weaned by the end of May.
As we drove away we said "what just happened?" I think it's goat fever and it's definitely contagious so if you don't want goats just stay away from them.

It's a boy!!!

He will be here soon!!! He's so cute, don't you think. We still have to find him a buddy though. We made the mistake of getting only one last time we had goats and she cried and cried until we went back and got her brother. That was a great day, she was so happy.

This boy will be our first Little Man and he's going to have a very happy home. I get the feeling he's going to be spoiled to the max. We have to get his house ready. He was disbudded today so I'm sure he's resting. He currently lives in Jacksonville, NC. We should be able to get him around the middle or end of June.

We are making a lot of changes soon. I'll write more on that later. I think my daughter and her husband think maybe we've lost our minds but it's all just another adventure!!!!

Update on the sick chicken

Well actually there are two chickens in the "Chicki-atric Wing" hehehe!!! The day after I put number one in there I noticed a chicken sitting under a cedar tree and acting very strange. So I put her in there too. I thought Number One needed a friend anyway so why not. Well Number One hasn't coughed for a week now. And she eats like a pig!!!!! I think she's well on the way to recovery. Number two actually took longer to perk up and during that time I made a discovery of sorts. While they were all together I had been making them "Gatorade for Chickens" water. It helps to perk them up a big in hot weather. As I was going to refill their waterer one day I noticed all the chickens combs were pinkish instead of their usual bright red and one even had a sort of white drip line on it. That's when I realized I had been making the water from the kitchen faucet instead of the outside faucet. We have a water filter on the house that uses salt and although the salesman assured us there is no salt residue I've lost almost every houseplant I've had since we got the system. We have the outside faucet bypassed the system. Poor chickens I was dehydrating them. Chickens need a tiny amount of salt but are sensitive to too much.
So all in all Number One and Number Two are doing great, bathing in the dirt, doing the chicken scratch and being totally spoiled. They are finished with their antibiotic and I need to confine them another week to let it get out of their system. Then comes the fun of reintroducing them to the flock. There has already been "fighting through the fence."
The excitement never ends!!!!

Soo Cute!!!!

Matt and Jenny came this weekend so we went up to the farm to check things out. There is a chocolate and white mama duck sitting faithfully on her nest of eggs in back of the barn. I suspected a while back there was one that had a nest in the tall grass on the other side of the pond and I think I was correct. We saw the whole duck family out for a swim. Matt, Jenny and Vince went out to the pond to get a closer picture, not me (I fear the water) and I'm not sure they were able to count them but Vince says there has to be a dozen. The other day, mama was swimming backward as though she was trying to coax them along. They look like little cotton balls floating on the water.
And of course since Jenny took the pictures she and Matt did a self portrait. I think it's a tradition they have which is kinda cool.