The Wait for Fall Continues...

The short break in the weather is over and we went back to HOT.  Saturday we had some rain and now we are cooled off and it is beautiful.  I love this fall, low humidity weather.  It is in the 80s during the day and down to 55 at night, which is a bit chilly for us.  We need more rain and am gearing up for October shearing.  I am going to shear Icelandic sheep and lambs and the shetland lambs.  Already have 4 done. 

 One of our icelandic lambs is pictured to the left.  The Icelandics are sheared in the fall and the spring.  The fall fleece is the best fleece.  We make the spring fleece into felting sheets.

 Duncan, our shetland ram is pictured to the right and his fleece will be sheared next spring.  He is in his breeding pen with his ewes.  We had to cut his horns because they were pushing into his face.  He is much happier and doing great with them removed.  We tried to keep as much as we could to keep him comfortable and  him still be handsome.

We have worked the Icelandic Sheep and removed the CIDR inserts.  We put the rams out as planned.  Did not see anyone in heat, so we are not sure if it worked or not.  The Icelandics are secretive and shy with their honey mooning, so we will not know if they worked until next spring.

The Trump is pictured above and really has a nice fleece this year.

Our herd of goats are gearing up for October kidding.  Blue kidded Sept. 18th with triplets.  The bucks are For Sale and the doe is reserved.  Blue is pictured to the right with her daughter AnnaLynn who is very pregnant.  She is sired by Buddy and is bred to Mr General.

The triplets pictured to the left are Blue's kids sired by Oldesouth Black Panther.  The bucks in the fore ground are for sale.


I think the two Boer does (Hestia & Sally) will kid soon as well,  my guess is the end of October, first part of November.  Sweet Caroline and  Blue's Daughter "AnnaLynn" are bagging up too.  Thundersnow is starting to bag up (that means they are getting milk in their udders).  Butter's daughter is just beginning to bag.  UDiamond looks pregnant, but not bagging yet.  This doe has been giving me heartburn for some time, waiting for kids and dying to see what her udder will look like.  UDiamond is a Diva and struts around like a rock star.  I keep asking her when she is going to have some kids and she just parades off like a queen...

Mr Paul has cut more hay and we have round baled this cutting for the cows, horses and pastured sheep for winter.  We will plant rye grass on these pastures for winter grazing.  We want to disc up a pasture and reseed with coastal and winter wheat.  As usual, the weather has not been in favor for winter pasture.  It is ether to wet or to dry.

We need to run electric and water to the new barn.  We will trench to the barn and put both water and power lines into the same trench.  With the days getting shorter, we will need lighting shortly.

Have been pricing and looking at different milking machines for the goats.  I hope to milk 10 to 15 goats this fall and winter.  We have not decided on which one yet, but will let everyone know once we freshen several does.  Milking the small goats by hand is very difficult.  I have been breeding for larger teats and have some who are easy to milk, but the first fresheners are still pretty small.  Ariel, my Nubian is a breeze to milk with her large teats.  She will be milked by hand.  She is due to freshen in November.  We will be doing more one day milk tests and still trying to figure out the DHI.  There are several ways of doing the DHI and it is confusing.

Enough for now...

Happy Labor Day...

I hope everone has had a wonderful Holiday Weekend. What spectacular weather we have had!  It really is to bad I have had to work Friday through Labor Day!  The weather has been in the 80's, humidity not to bad and it feels like fall.  My bucks are going CRAZY with this cool spell.  They are snorting, hollaring and generally being old Billy Goats!  Love is in the air... at Oldesouth Farm.

I have sent a young Nigerian doe home with a friend of mine here near Selma.  Her name is Oldesouth Blue Freckles and she is out of Oldesouth Christmas Eve, sired by Rosasharn MR General B *S.  She had been a problem child for some time with a few health problems which have worked themselves out.  She has the signature topline and wide rear The General puts on all his kids.  Freckles has bright blue eyes and with her red spotting on a white back ground makes her stand out in a crowd. She will be another one to watch for the future.  She is pictured to the left and below, standing natural without positioning.

These pictures were taken by Kerri Dutreil and emailed to me.  She is enjoying Freckles and has a couple other goats from Oldesouth, Reba & Sequoia who are rotten girls.  We are working on a competive show string for 2011 and this young doe may be one of the contenders.

I am still working out the details on bringing two new young sires into our Nigerian Herd.  I can not say who they are until everything is finalized and they arrive at the farm.  I really need a couple of nice bucks to breed to my General daughters and then line breed from there.  Both new bucks will have to have MEGA milk in their pedigrees and Conformation.  Both bucks are stared and I love ARMCH moms.  I hope to have an entire herd of ARMCH goats in the future.  That is our goal... 

What is an ARMCH?  This is actually two awards given to both bucks and does who earn their conformation Championship and Advanced Registry Program requirements (MILK).  These does participate in DHIR (Dairy Herd Improvement Registry), which is a lactation usually of 305 days.  This is with the American Goat Society.  A doe can earn both her AR and a star title *D.  The star means the doe has met the minimum requirements with milk or butterfat during any 305 day or less lactation.  It is a measure of both milk production and conformational excellence.  Bucks earn the AR titles through their daughters and inherit their stars from their moms.  Of course the conformation MCH is earned by the buck.

We have already put the Cheviots into their breeding pen with a young ram from Washington State.  His name is Victor and he is tiny.  Even smaller then Mini Long Tail.  He came from the Washington State Herd of tiny Mini Cheviots.  I bought two rams last year and one did not survive.  Victor did and he is ready for the girls.  We will leave him with the 7 ewes.  The ewes, 4 new ones from Missouri, our 2 original ewes from Mississippi and Mini Long tail from Washington State.  We will switch out rams the third week of October with Goober.  He is back up and will take care of anyone missed by Victor.  We are working to refine the Cheviots a bit and Victor is the ram man to do it.

We have gathered the Icelandics and inserted Vaginal CIDR Sheep Inserts.  They are progesterone inserts, kind of like tampons that stay in the sheep for 5 days to bring them into heat sooner.  This is a new product, from New Zealand, for bringing sheep into estrus out of season.  We want our Icelandics to lamb about a month sooner then usual.  If we can get the Icelandics to lamb in Febuary in the south, they will be weaned by May and shipped to their new farms before the heat and parasites hit.  Moms can be milked until June & dried up to ready themselves for the stress of summer, especally if we have a summer like this year.  The picture to the left is the bag of inserts.  The picture to the right is the doo hickie to insert them with.  You have to have both or I am not sure how one would get them in.  It was quick and easy.  We inserted 10 CIDR in 10 ewes yesterday evening and will remove them 5 days later, which is Saturday, then we will put the first ram with the group.  We are going to use Snow Man.  He is a beautiful huge, white ram, just turned 2 years.  His snow white fleece is so soft and thick.  I will be shearing him the beginning of October.  He carries spots and we are hoping for some spotted sheep.  Mid October we will switch out with The Trump and Clean up ram will be Saxon.  We pull the rams the end of December. This is an experiment and do not know if it will work or mess up the ewes and get no lambs.  We will keep everyone posted.  It would be nice to get all 10 ewes to lamb within a few days of each other as well.  We have 3 Icelandic ewes who are yearlings and will be bred for the first time this fall.  They will not be induced.  The CIDR is for ewes who have lambed in the past, not for virgin ewes.

I will be going to TN to pick up another Shetland ram.  I need to get some new and better pictures of the Shetland herd.  They are nicer then the current pictures.  The new ram will be white to add more genetics and give folks a choice to have a ram and ewe lamb who are not related.  I do not have any white Shetlands, so this will add some variety.

I am off today writting this blog and of course the heat is back and we are hot, hot, hot again.  But it will not be long before cooler weather will arrive.

We have made reservations for Dr Doug Halbrook to make his annual trip to the farm to draw blood on everyone (goats) for CAE.  We may do Cl this year because we did Johne's last year, but that is yet to be determined.  We want to test some sheep for OPP as well.  I have tested some of the Shetlands and they were negative and will test the Cheviots this year.  We will have everyone tested eventually and then will close the herd and only test incoming new rams.  I do not think anyone in Alabama tests their sheep, but we are upscale and want folks to know our herds are clean.

The Cheviots are mini baby faced little sheep.  Their wool is medium and they are sheared once a year.  The little baby ram to the left is Madeline's ram lamb and he is For Sale on the Sheep page.   He has grown into a really nice ram.

The picture below are the three lambs we had this year.  Two were twin ewes out of Sunshine and the ram lamb.  They are playing on an old hay bale.  They are really cute lambs.

We are working out a schedule for some fall Goat Shows and have sanctioned the Nigerian Dwarf Goats at the National Alabama Fair in Montgomery this year.  They had not been sanctioned in the past and now they are.  We hope to make this a major deep south show for the Nigerians in the future.

Enough for now...

Ready for the Dog Days to End...

It is still HOT, but a bit cooler today.  In the high eightys with humidity due to the recent rain.  Our turkeys are doing great.  They have made it to their free-range freedome and are now ranging on the front pasture.  The picture to the right is Tom, he is about 4 months old and is very friendly.  He likes to display when we come to the farm and waits calmly for me to bring him some grain.  We really are enjoying the turkeys and do not know if they will be Thanksgiving dinner or not...


We finally were able to separate out the two steers to wean last weekend.  They are 6 months old and we put them with our yearling heifer Beyonce.  Beyonce is a daughter of Christy and she is sired by a really nice black angus bull.  We bought the cows and they were pregnant with the two steers by the same bull. 

I believe in gentle weaning.  We wean by putting the babies in a field next to their moms.  They can see each other, touch and chat with each other, but they can not nurse their moms.  Moms are less stressed as well because they can see their calves.  There is very little hollaring and stress to either calves or mom.   Moms of course swell up with milk and will have to dry off.  But that is part of the weaning process.  We can feed some grain to the calves to help with their weaning.  Beyonce is big sister to both.  The calves and moms are pictured below.

Beyonce was named after the beautiful black singer, Beyonce of Destiny's Child.  She is beautiful and when she is 16 months, she will be joining the regular herd and honey mooning with Brutus.

We plan on raising up the steers and selling them as home grown beef.  We will raise them between 800 and 1000 pounds (a year to a year & 1/2 if age) and sell them for $1.25 per pound live.  We will transport them to Reed's in Clanton for processing.  Our Clients will pay the processing fee and pick up their beef. 

 We are currently taking reservations for whole or halfs.  We will raise the calves on pasture with Corn and Soy Bean Hull pellets to finish them out and they will be great eatting.  We are taking reservations now.  Call us at 334-327-9252.

The steer above is Christy's calf, full bother to Beyonce.  He is half Angus and half Shorthorn mix.

The steer to the left is Beauty's steer calf who is half Angus and half Angus/Beefmaster mix.  Both steers are going to prime out quite well for home grown beef.

The picture to the right is Beyonce and the two weaned steer calves.  The short one is Christy's calf, Beyonce's brother and the taller one is Beauty's steer calf.

We have been enjoying the steer we had processed in July.  We have eatten more steaks then we have eatten in a long time.  The quality of home grown beef has no comparison to the hormone grown junk in the store.  I plan on doing a blog about beef cattle implants to inform people as to what they are getting in the store.  The Veterinary supply catalogs have 2 pages of different types and brands.  We refuse to use them and our beef is not raised in confinement and handled gently.

Since we are on the beef subject, I must show a recent picture of Brutus.  The photo makes him look blue.  A unique effect due to his black coat, the shade and lighting.  We will see how his calves look before long.  Daisy is pregnant by him and both Beauty and Christy are bred back to him.

Brutus is a Beef Master Bull, almost 3 years old.  He has been on just pasture all summer and looks great.

Have to show a cute picture of a Boer Kid and a couple of Boer Mixed kids having a king of the mountain session going on in the hay wagon.  The young Boer billy was holding his own for awhile.

One more picture of Athena's 100% Boer Kids sired by The Rock.  Two Buck kids, pictured at a week of age.  They are meaty, little tanks.  They are offered FOR SALE with the Boer Group.  See the Goat Sales page on our website at:  http://www.oldesouth.citymax.com/, or call us at:  334-327-9252. 

Dog days of August...

Yes, it is still Hot, 115 heat index and we were crazy enough to hay last weekend.  But we must hay and do the best we can.  We cut the hay Thursday and let it dry until Sunday and baled around 10 am, took a break at 230 because it was sooo HOT! Then came back at 630 pm and finished picking up hay and stacking it in the trailer.


PJ was in the Tractor with the AC running while he baled the hay.  It has been real dry and the hay cured perfectly.

The picture to the right is the old New Holland square baler putting out the bales.  This is an old but good baler.  It can make really large bales or whatever size you want.  I prefer bales 50 to 60 pounds.  These were a bit large and we will adjust for smaller ones when we bale the other fields.  We cut and baled two fields.  One field had sheep on it all winter and it was the thickest hay on the farm.  The sheep manure did the grass good.  The other field had cows on it all winter and it was good, but not nearly as thick as the sheep field.

There is nothing nicer then the smell of fresh cut hay and seeing the bales out in a field before picking them up.  They look even better once put under cover.

Kyle & Ken are Mr Paul's grandsons from Ill.  They have come down south for a couple of weeks to visit and wanted to help with hay.  The heat was pretty tough on them, but they worked hard and we got the hay put up.

Grizzly thinks he is a big farm dog and was with us every step of the way.  He is a bit hot and ready to take a break in the shade.

I also took a quick trip to South Carolina this past weekend to pick up a couple of nice goats to help improve our milking herd of Nigerian Dwarf Dairy Goats.  The picture to the right is NC Promisedland SIA Sunra, sired by NC Promisedland SS Sam I am *S, her dam is GCH ARMCH NC Promisedland Sunni-Beau-No 3*D AR 2063.  This doe has one leg of her championship, ADGA GCh doe as a first freshener.  She is pictured dry and we plan to breed her to Mr General for early 2011 kids.

We were also able to purchase a yearling doe, NC Promisedland PayOff.  She is pictured below.  She is sired by NC Promisedland Paypal *S, her dam is NC Promisedland SS Peepshow 2*M 2*D,VG 87.  This is a very nice yearling and we plan on breeding her to Oldesouth Mr Marine.  We are slowly adding new bloodlines to our herd to produce more milk and be competitive in the show ring.

We are committed to producing some of the best milking Nigerians in the south.  We will be offering some adult does as family milkers shortly.  We will be reducing our herd to make room for new stock and up coming young does sired by Mr General who will be freshening this fall.  Keep an eye on the sales page as we post adults and new kids.

We are offering both Little Tot's Estate Olde Bubba For Sale and Oldesouth Loud Politician For Sale.  Both are proven bucks we have used for some time now.  We need to bring in new blood lines and offer these boys to new homes.  Take advantage of our Herd Reduction Sale and pick up some nice bucks.

Farm Adventure...

We have been very hot, humid and a good thing , dry.  I prefer dry over the wet horrible summer we had last year.  Parasites have not been to bad and the goat herd and sheep flock are holding their own.

Our new puppy, Lucy is doing well and fitting into the grove of the farm.  She is half Anatolian and half Pyrenees.  She is shorter haired with a wide broad head.  She likes to sit in the water trough and is usually muddy.  She is good with chickens, goats, sheep, but does want to mess with those cats.  Even when she gets slapped by a paw full of claws.  Have had to fuss at her several times to leave the cat alone, she is not a toy. 

All the lambs are weaned and have some of them in the Pecan Orchard under a  tree.  The last of the lambs are all sired by Trump and he throws mostly Moorit (brown) lambs.  A lot of them were solid morrit and just one or two gray morrit.  The picture to the right are a couple of lambs, the ewe (left) is out of a yearling and the ram (right) is out of Valarie.
With the heat indexes in the 105 to 110 range, I have the lambs in the shade until it cools down a bit.

Had a bit of an adventure when I opened a chicken coup door to find a snake looking at me. I jumped back, and saw the color and knew it was not one of the green snakes we had seen in the past and it had a color pattern & was brown & gray.  Well, I ran to the feed room for my shovel collection and called to Mr Paul to get the shepard's crook.  I thought it was a Cotton Mouth... but any snake is guilty of being poisenous until proven otherwise and that is usually post mortem.  Needless to say, the shovel is my weapon of choice, long handles, wide surface are for chopping and the added broad blade in case of a strike.  The picture to the left is the severed head, yes it is gross, but I am trying to educate everyone on what these things look like.  The head had a bit of a shine to it and is trianglular in shape.  I had seen the snake before, but it dissapeared before I could get my shovel.  The right picture shows the shape more. I opened its mouth to see the fangs and they were there, about 1/2 inch, looked like fine hyperdermic needles.  After removing the head, we buried it so kids and animals could not play with it and come in contact with any venium.  I am told a dead snake can cause problems if someone or a puppy was poked with the fang.  The picture above and to the left is the body with the color pattern.  We estimate it at being 3 foot long or a bit under.  It is on top of a medium dog house.

Snow Man, one of our Icelandic rams was watching the ordeal with the snake.  Last summer he was bit by a snake under the chin and swelled up like a basket ball.  We almost lost him and it took a month for him to recover.  I am sure he was happy to see us finally catch that guy... Snow man has recovered and we hope to use him for breeding this fall.  He is long, wide and has the beefy butt we like.  Had to take off the horns though, grew to close to his head.  He carries spots and we want his build and spots this year.  Will breed him to the ewes with the best horns and Havvah.

More later...  Oh, do not worry Ken, the boys were not at the farm when Mr Paul and I took care of the snake.  Mr Paul's grandsons are visiting from Ill..  Mr Paul did fuss at young Ken to not wear flip flops out at the farm and he is wearing shoes now...  Especally after seeing the snake...  Don't worry, the hospital carries  Antivenin.  We deal with several snake bites every summer.  Antivenin covers rattle snake and cotton mouth snakes, all the viper group.

WOW!! The Sauna Summer Continues...

We have named this year, Sauna Summer, due to the humidity and heat.  I am just now getting used to the heat and we are out early and late to care for critters.  We take lots of water and work in the shade and wear our straw hats.  It is dangerous hot.  I have the AC in the house on 80 so we do not have such a hot, cold difference.  The 80 degrees seems cold when you come in soaking wet and cool down.

The picture to the left is Blue with Ariel's collar and bell.  For some reason, Blue liked Ariel's bell and collar and took it from Ariel.  Ariel is a Nubian and the collar is loose around her neck.  Blue used her horns to take the collar and bell & work it off Ariel.  She is a pretty smart critter and is the herd queen.  She wears it proudly like she is wearing a diamond.  She makes it clang and struts her stuff, even though it is to big, she does not care.  We will eventually get her a smaller collar and attach the bell to it.  But for now, it is a conversation piece....

I have had some folks emailing me wondering how Earl was doing.  He is doing great and to the right is a picture I took of him yesterday.  We have had him for about 2 weeks and he has gained quite a bit of weight.  He is a cute little guy.  We will be neutering him shortly and he will be going in with our young heifer after he is neutered and Barbacue goes to the processor.  Earl is a mini Jersey that we aquired.  He was a bottle baby and is very tame.  His cute factor is very strong and he will more then likely end up a pet...

Barbacue the steer (above) has missed no meals and has an appointment in a couple of weeks to go to the processor.  He is on pasture and getting corn mixed with soybean hull pellets once a day.  He is prime to say the least.  We have been raising him up, since a calf for this moment and we can not wait for the home grown beef he will provide.  No hormones, pastured freely, no cruel handling, corn fed, he will provide for us and our family after having a wonderful, but short life.  His girl friend is a heifer calf and Earl will be her buddy when Barbacue leaves.  We have two more calves out in the field with there moms who will be weaned shortly.  Both are steers and one will be sold and the other raised up for next years beef supply.  There is nothing better then home grown beef.

PJ came to the farm Sunday to help work the ewes.  We work them every 3 weeks during the heat of the summer.  We check for worms and give BoSe injections as needed and check hooves as well.

This is the work area in the shade under the new barn.  The shoot is a Billy Goat Gruff shoot I traded some goats for awhile back.  It has come in very handy and really saves your back.

The picture to the right is PJ getting the sheep up to ready them into the shoot.  He squeezes them in with the cow panel to push into the shoot.

This is the shoot in action.  The sheep goes into the ramp and has a door that closes behind them.  Then they go into the shoot and their head is secured in the head gate.  Then the sides can be opened on both sides to trim hooves, give shots, even shear.  We do have to remember before the next working to replace the springs on the head gate.  They are wore out and do not always close as they should.

After the sheep are worked, they go into a waiting area where they get some hay and a bit of grain and wait for the rest of the herd to be done.  There was a nice breeze today and it was not to bad working the flock.  We love the new barn and it has come in really handy for several needs.  After everyone is finished, we open the gate and with a bucket, the herd follows me back to their pasture.

The ewes are done for another 3 weeks and we are off to other things that need to be done.  The above set up will be really nice for the fall shearing of the Icelandics.  We will be able to put them up if it rains and shear come rain or shine.

Enough for now...

July is here...

We have been sooo hot, but did have a couple of days around the 4th which were low in humidity and were great.  We have had some rain as well and need to cut some more hay.

We finally got the turkey hut done and transfered the turkeys to it.

We have 5 Broad Breasted Turkeys who are about 3 months old now.  The Turkey hut is a trampolene which was given to me and we removed the netting around the top and put wire around the bottom frame.  It makes a perfect pen for them.  We did put a tarp over the top, because it is not water proof.  We used the netting that keeps kids from falling off as shade cloth on the west side.  It can be moved daily for the turkeys to get fresh grass.

We think we have 3 toms and 2 hens, but still are not sure what is what with them.  This is an expermental turkey project to see how it goes.

This little fella to the right is Earl.  He is a yearling Jersey Bull calf.  He was not in the best of conditions and was given to us.  Not sure what to do with him, we brought him home for some good feed and see where his temperment was. Earl was a bottle baby calf raised for a pet to a little girl.  He is very tame, but has grown up enough to be large enough to cause problems.  His horns are a problem to and can cause damage to a person without meaning to.

 

The pictures show the sharp horns which may seem small, but are very sharp and can hurt one easily.  The story we had about Earl was he butted the girl in play and knocked her down.  Thank goodness she was not hurt, but the incident scared them.  This calf should have been dehorned as a young calf and castrated when he was a month old, especally if he was to be kept as a pet.

I took him the Marion Clinic to Dr Doug Halbrook and he dehorned Earl.  We plan on castrating him once he recovers from the dehorning and puts on a bit more weight.

Earl is not real happy in the photo, but he is safe now and we do not need to worry about him hurting us by rubbing his head on us and catching a horn on us.

We will keep fly spray on him and watch the wounds closely for any infection or problems.  He is eatting well and is a bit sore.  We had wormed him a couple of days ago and gave him a cattle 7 in one vaccine with tetnus.  Now it is just a matter of time for him to heal up and get to know he is in a good home.

We think he is a mini Jersey becasue he is so small and once he is made into a steer, we will offer him for sale to a petting zoo or some type of simular home.  He is very friendly and leads and loves to be scatched.  His cute factor is pretty strong and there is no way I could butcher the little guy.  We will find him a nice pet home.