Dog Days of August are Almost OVER!

August has been HOT!  But then we had several days with low humidity and we so enjoyed the pleasant days.  But now back to the usual hot and muggy.
We lost our hay to the rain and humidity.  It molded in the field and we left it there, not worth paying help to bale up rotten hay.  We need to rethink the hay situation and have decided to sell the baler and purchase hay, since we have ended up purchasing hay the two years we have had the baler anyway.

We have our first load of hay, a semi trailer. Some 450 square bales of Coastal Hay. This is hay for the milkers and my goats. We will get some large bales for the cattle and sheep. Goats waste large bales because they jump on them, urinate and defecate all over it and then will not eat it. Sheep do not do this, which is good.

 Trailer full of hay.

 

Hay stacked in the barn.









We have sold our Bull Brutus, a Beef Master to buy hay.  We have 3 young heifers and 3 bred cows by him.  We do not need to feed him through the winter and now all the cows and young heifers are pastured together to save on labor with the automatic watering system in the pasture.  We will purchase another bull next year.  I personally want a pure Angus Bull.



Brutus pictured to the right.





We look forward to fall coming and the weather cooling down.  We have several does who will be kidding this fall and several more have come into season.  Fall is a noisy time for goats, lots of hooting and hollering, snorting and grunting.  The bucks are pretty stinky already.  The urine perfume can make your eyes water if one gets to close to them.  The girls think the boys are the rage in their odoriferous splendor...

Oldesouth Shell Foop, one of the Nigerian Bucks sired by The General.  He is white, but the rut of fall has him showing the urine stains of a buck.  He is mighty stinky.

Oldesouth Shell Foop in his glory of buck nasty mess.  The yellow staining is urine...  Yeah, the bucks spray urine all over their face and front.  He even has urine stains on his back.



We have two more does who will be dried up next month and one the end of August.  They have finished their 305 day lactation and have earned their milking stars.  Ariel my Nubian looks like she will hit the 2000 pound mark, which is neat.  That is 250 gallons of milk!  Ariel is 6 years old and I hope to AI her with semen from SGCH +*B Lakeshore Farms Star Status LA 91 EEE.  Photo below:






I bought his semen a couple of winters ago and now he is an elite sire and deceased!  He was the 2010 ADGA National Premier Nubain Sire!  It would be so cool to get a doe by this buck.  We shall see how our AI skills play out...  I have two other sires in the tank for Ariel down the road.  I am not into Nubians, but have had Ariel for many years and she has fed many a bottle baby goat and lamb, not to mention our family.  She is so cute getting on the milk stand, having to duck her head to get into the short, Nigerian stanchion.  She is a family member like one of our dogs.  She LAed 83, needing a fore udder and more rear udder.  She is mostly teats, but has a nice body, topline, and great feet.

My Quarter Horse Gelding Joe, he is 5 years old.  A beautiful horse, 16 hands and has not missed any meals.

We are offering my Quarter Horse Joe For Sale.  He is pure Quarter Horse, but not registered.  He is from a long line of Cattle Cutting Horses.  He is broke, 5 years old, 16 hands and about 1200 pounds.  He is a big boy.  Loads easy, stands quietly for the blacksmith to trim hooves and easy going.  He will trail ride and do what ever you ask of him.  $1500.



We also had a wind storm the middle of August which brought down a tree in the Pecan Orchard.  The Orchard is the ram pen and we counted and checked the rams to make sure they were all OK.  Thankfully no one was hurt or under the tree.  We are thankful the tree did not fall on the fence either.  Usually any branch or tree that falls, seems to end up on the fence.

 Pecan tree uprooted.

 Rams are OK and accounted for.

Trump is OK too.  He is pictured above.

September is upon us and we have just received our License to sell raw Goat Milk and Chevre Goat Cheese for animal usage.  We are milking 10 does now with several to be dried up and several more freshening for fall.  We will have Goat Milk and Cheese for the fall and winter.  We will sell off the farm by appointment for pick up.  Our number is:  334-327-9252.  We will do some delivery, depending on the quantity purchased locally.  We appreciate folks keeping their appointments out of courtesy to us and our busy schedule.  No shows will be removed from our customer list.

We will also take reservations for Lambs.  We will have several Icelandic and Shetland lambs for slaughter this fall.  The sheep did well over the summer in spite of the heat.

Steam Bath Anyone?

Humidity is 100%, temperature 99, heat index off the chart!  Welcome to Alabama!  The entire country is hot, with record breaking temps everywhere.  So I guess we can not complain because we get this every year.  It has rained almost daily, the last month and it is getting annoying.



We are trying to harvest hay and need 3 dry days to cut, dry and get it baled.  We have our window and cut a couple of fields yesterday and hopefully will bale it Thursday evening.  Hopefully Mr Paul will adjust the baler will make nice 50 pound bales and not 100 pound like last year!

We have dried off three of our does on DHIR who have earned their milking stars in ADGA, AGS, and NDGA.  The three does are, Oldesouth Blue Alexa, LTE Chelone (our favorite Brat), and Lil Hill Farm Sweet Caroline.  They are in the Honey Moon pen with *B Lost Valley PG Superb *S for next years kid crop and milking.

Oldesouth Blue Alexa *D, (*M, DAR+ pending)

Brat was promised she would not be milked again after getting her star.  So it will be up to her if she wants to come into the DIVA pen and be milked next year.  The milkers are fed twice a day, special, yummy feed and treated like the DIVA's they are.  Most of the girls hate leaving to go into the dry girl's pen, which is also the DIET and Drying off pen.  The extra weight put on to get the higher production, quickly comes off to get the girls ready for the breeding season.  There is lots of Protest from the FAT GIRL pen.

Oldesouth Farm was show cased on a TV show.  Time Well Spent is a TV show on AgTV, put on by the Alabama Coop.  Tim Allen came out to film our goats and sheep.  It was fun and hopefully we will talk Tim into coming back for fall Sheep Shearing of the Icelandics.  The link to watch the program is:  http://vimeo.com/26274829 .

We are taking reservations for 2012 kids, see our Breeding Schedule at:  http://www.oldesouth.citymax.com/breedingschedule.html

We will also have some fall kiddings.  We have had several does exposed to *B Lost Valley PG Superb *S.  Several of these does are older Brush Creek Does.  I will have their info shortly.  Because they were pasture bred, it is difficult to predict kidding dates.  I usually wait for kids to hit the ground before listing.  I will get a preliminary sheet with does and their pedigrees for everyone's consideration.  I would like to put these does on DHIR but some are 7 to 9 years old.  If a doe is not milked to their potential when young, sometimes they do not reach their potential.  Thier bodied produce what is needed, they kick off the kids and go on with drying off. We will see how they freshen.

The photo to the right is Sage.

Brush Creek Charlies Angel is a lovely older doe.  Her topline and build is ideal, photo below. 

Will be drying off two more does next after the next milk test, Oldesouth Blue Annalynn and Oldesouth FLA Amber Blue.  Both have made their stars, but I wanted them to milk a few more pounds of milk for good measure.  That will be 5 does stared so far.  My one Nubian Ariel is close to 2000 pounds of milk.  I want to take her to the full 305 days to see if we can get there.

Got to go...

Summer is here to stay!

Hot, you bet!  With 105 & 115 heat index almost daily, it really has to get Hot to notice. 

It trys to rain almost daily, but mostly just a lot of Huffing and Puffing kind of Thunder.  I guess it is heat Thunder.  Here and there we get some rain.

The Crape Myrtles are exploding with flowers so heavy they can just hold them up.  They are SO beautiful and my favorite tree.  You can totally neglect them and cut

them down to nothing and they come back like a weed.  No pampering or fertilizer and look at them!

This one is growing on the side of my home.  It is spectacular.

Deep Red Crape Myrtles.

The Crape Myrtle's to the right are pink and white.



My sister and her grown kids came to visit over the Fourth of July Holiday, along with my Son Tim.  We had a great time.  Tim and Mike both had birthdays so we had to have a birthday bash for them as well.  Of course everyone wanted to come to the farm and Mike learned to milk a goat.  We used my Nubian Ariel as the test subject below. 

The Young Folks enjoyed feeding the not so little bottle baby lambs.  Kayla, Mike and Tim are hard at work feeding the greedy little darlings.

 My son Tim is riding Big Man, one of the old horses with my niece Jennifer helping out.  They are pictured to the left.

The Photo to the right is my son Tim riding Big Man.

Another photo of the group feeding the starving little bottle babies.  Micky is looking to see if there is any left for him...

My niece Jennifer has the Love for horses she inherited from me.  It was to bad Joe would not let them catch him.  He is a beautiful horse and rides very well.  I would have got him if they had asked.



So Far the lambs are doing well in the heat and I have to picture a few of my favorites.

 Valarie spotted Icelandic daughter.

 Cover Girl again.
















Havvah's Ram lamb, an Icelandic  below.

Of course we will end with THE GRIZZLY.  He is my Jack Russel Terror who is the man of the farm and protector of all...

Hot Hot Hot!!!

It has been sooo HOT!  105, 100, 108 degrees every day for a couple of weeks.  It is not even summer yet.  What is the summer going to be like!

We just got back from a show in Georgia over the weekend and we did well.  Arlene came along to help and between the two of us we showed 9 does.  We decided to leave the stinkers (bucks) home and show more juniors.  In spite of the heat we enjoyed ourselves.

We tried to get a photo shoot of Diamond and she was getting a bit tired of the whole thing.  The photo to the left you can see the, "Come On, enough now..."

Diamond won her 2 to 3 year old class of does in milk and it was a very large class.  Then she went in for the Grand Champion and Reserve Champion doe and she won Grand Champion!  Then she went back into the ring one more time against a nice Champion Doe and won Best of Breed.  Diamond came home with both AGS and ADGA Legs towards her championship.  She has 2 more legs before she is an offical champion.

Our little Oldesouth Alabama Summer is a first freshener.  She placed first in her class of yearling milkers.  It was a large, very competititve class and we were thrilled with the win.  She went back into the ring for the Grand, but did not make the cut.  We were happy with her first place finish.

Our other goats placed in the upper part of the classes, but it is all a blur as to who did what.  First place is what we remember the most.

Still tired from all the showing this weekend, I am going to make this one short and sweet.

Spring is over and summer takes the stage...

We have enjoyed the cooler weather and the sheep loved it.  But now we are back to reality with the 90 plus summer heat & humidity which will only get hotter over the summer.  I am soooo thankful for the completion of our milking parlor and having a haven to cool off.  We have no trouble getting the girls to come in to be milked.  They enjoy the brief coolness as well.

SunRa (above) enjoying the cool milking parlor, says Hi! 

We did Linear Appraisals this weekend on our goat herd,  Everyone was done who was ADGA registered and in milk.   We did have to scratch Annie Oakley, Butter, and a couple of others who were dry. 

This was our first Appraisal, but I studied the information and felt ready and informed on how it worked.  Our Appraiser was excellent.  There is a rule as to not mention who the Appraiser is so we will honor that and not go there.  I was very impressed in the knowledge and the " Hey, look at this, can you see what I am talking about", educational session.  Worth every penny and the time to check every tattoo and make sure everyone matched their papers and the tattoos were readable (we did this a week ahead of time, which took the entire day).  You do not want to be embarrassed, if your tattoo does not match the paper work or if the Appraiser can not read the faded tattoo on 7 year old Ariel.

The Appraiser wanted the does in milk to give them a fair and honest evaluation, which I appreciated.  Anyone dry was excluded.  We did a bunch of young stock as well to see how the appraisal fit with my own evaluation of the young stock.  We were very close to my surprise.  I hang on to young stock and grow them out because I am not sure who will be the next it girl or boy.  Now I feel more confident in my evaluations.  Maybe I am not so dumb after all...  We had 24 adult goats and 16 young stock appraised.  I wanted to know where we were and where we need to go with the young stock & our herd.  A total of 40 goats were appraised.


Silene was a sleeper doe who I liked and had a daughter out of years ago.  The daughter was very dairy and freshened with an udder to die for.  But she was not friendly and got sick one day.  I had to work out of town that day as a relief Pharmacist and had a hard time catching her.  Got her into a stall and gave her some Pepto and went to work.  Fourteen hours later when I got home, she was dead.  So I called the breeder and asked her to rebred Silene to the same buck for me and I would buy all her daughters.  Well, she had bucks and more bucks.  Finally she said, why don't you just buy her and breed her to one of your bucks.  So I did.  She went a few years without being bred and I bred her to Oldesouth Shell Foop, A LTE Olde Butter son, sired by The General.  She freshened with a high, tight udder for being 6 years old, twins, a buck and a doe.  The Buck has blue eyes like his mom and the doe brown.  I liked Silene, but did not realize she was an Excellent doe, scoring 90 on her linear appraisal.

Blue eyed Silene is pictured to the left.

Silene's rear udder.

Silene's side udder.

Busy as ever, we have shorn sheep the first weekend of May.  Below are photo's of how to shear on a stand.   I hope this helps others to shear on the stand.  The stand is the way to go unless you are a macho person who has the back and athletic ump to shear the old way.  When a stand it used, no matter if the ewe is pregnant or not, it is gentle for you and the sheep.  Do not have to worry about setting a pregnant ewe on her butt, squashing her triplets in the womb.  No worries, no trauma.

 The photo to the right is myself beginning to shear a Shetland ewe.  We start by shearing straight up the back, from the tail.

I get a lot of grief over my farmer jeans.  But I love all the pockets for putting stuff in and my phone fits in the front chest pocket.  Can also tuck bottles in the front and side.  Love them...

 Then you shear from back to front on each side.  I am using the Oster Judge Shears.  Oster does not make Clippers like they used to.  These died by the end of the day, yeah, $300 clippers are junk!  I do not recommend them.  The Premier One 4000 clippers are lighter and easier to use and finished the day.

 When you are shearing for no second cuts, for your hand spinning clients, make one pass and do not go back over the ewe.  This way you will not have short pieces of wool, we call second cuts.  We hate second cuts, they mess up the roving for hand spinners.  Once the wool is off, then go back and clean up uneven areas to make the sheep nice and smooth.

 Justin is learning to shear and has just gone down the back for the first pass on a yearling Icelandic ewe.  He is using the Premier One 4000 Clippers.

 Justin is now shearing the wool off from tail to head.  This young Icelandic has a felted fleece and it is coming off easily like a rug.  Spring fleece in the Icelandic is not prime.  The fall fleece in the Icelandic Sheep is the Prime wool.

Justin is cleaning up the ewe and then we will pull her head out of the neck chain to clean up around her head for a nice smooth clip.

Moms are much cooler now.  The photo to the right is a Mini Cheviot clipped with her lamb sneaking a snack.  The little spotted ewe in the fore ground is an Shetland/Icelandic mix.  She was nipping on this Cheviot as well when Mom was not paying attention...

 These two lambs below are a couple of my bottle babies.  I do love my bottle babies.  The Horned, Badger Faced Icelandic is on the left.  Her name is Angelina.  She is one of my favorite colors.  Her mother Angie is older and I pulled one of the lambs to hand raise.  Her sister is a lovely gray.

My little Monkey Faced girl is a polled gray Shetland lamb.  Her name is Baby Girl.  She is a sweet and spoiled little darling.  It is difficult to take photos of bottle babies because they are up your behind and do not get far enough away to get a good shot of.  Everywhere one goes, the gang of baby lambs follows.  We have 4 this year and they graze out with the group, but come a running to get their bottle when we are sighted.

Had to include a shot of Justin enjoying my Quarter Horse Joe.  Joe is a fat lazy boy, my kind of horse.  He is from a long line of cutting horses.  Justin hopes to train Joe to cut cattle. 

Last, but not least is Mommy Turkey.  She is a Royal Palm turkey and she has hatched out 10 baby turkeys.  What a good Mom!  She has done very well with out our intervention.  So far out of the 10, 6 are now 3 weeks old and going strong.  She puts them up in the barn at night, tucking them to bed under her wings.  She takes them out in the morning and you can see them grazing in the field.  Turkey's are not so dumb after all.

Enough for now, I hope you enjoyed the visit...

April is already past...

We have been very busy getting the Milking Parlor set up and finally going.  It took a bit of time to train the girls to the new space as well.  They have to step up three times to get onto the milking stand.  Ariel, my one large goat (Nubian) had the roughest time.  She is long and has to step up just right with her head down to get into the stanchion.  The milk stand has a stanchion for small goats and Ariel has adapted to it.  I do have a taller stanchion, but it is to tall for my yearling nigerians to reach the feed bucket.  Ariel then has to come off the stand, swing around to come down the step ups.  She has been doing great, but was a bit scared at first.  She is up pretty high for me to milk standing up.  It took some apple flavored treats to convince her she was not going to be eaten.

 Clean room is pictured left.

 Milking area with machine.  The goats enter from the right and step up 3 levels to the stand.  They are then the perfect height to clean and milk while standing in comfort.

 UDiamond is pictured to the left showing the Milking Parlor in action.


The small goats got into the routine quickly because they like to climb on things anyway.  So the higher the better for the little Diva's.  Everyone comes into the Parlor one at a time except, of course Brat.  Yeah, we are still putting up with her.  She is last and after you go out to get her, she runs into the parlor and jumps up where she is suppose to go.  Always has to be a Drama Queen & act stupid.

So far we have 3 goats who have qualified for stars with several others very close.  Of course nothing is official until the lactation ends and the results are submitted and approved by the Goat Associations. Even Ariel is close and milking quite well.  Her last test was 8.1 pounds.  She is a Nubian now, not a Nigerian.  My top Nigerian is UDiamond who milked 4.1 pounds on her last test as a first freshener.  Alexa's sister Babette, who I need to get a good photo of, milked 4 pounds on her first test, raising triplet sons sired by Fairlea Jean Louis *S.

The photo to the right is Oldesouth Babette.  She is not clipped, but her udder can be seen fairly well.  She has a lovely fore udder too.  She is pictured at the Goat & Sheep Expo in March where she was on display with her triplet sons.



We attended a couple of Goat Shows.  One in South Carolina at Teena's Farm and another at Carrolton, Ga.  We were so busy showing, I did not get but a few decent pictures.  Arlene and I showed.  Our young Jr Buck, Lost Valley PG Superb *S won Grand Champion Jr buck in one show and Reserve Champion Jr Buck in the other show.  Sunra took 2 first places and we had several 2nd, 3rds, etc with some stiff competition.  UDiamond took 3rd and 2nds in both shows, with her class being one of the largest.  Each show we attend, we get better at presenting our goats and move up the line.

I guess I was having an off day and my photo's were blurry and had to dump most of them.  Oldesouth Sweet Mocha is pictured in her Jr Doe class.  Look at her beautiful topline and dairy character.  The photo above shows how wide she is in the rear as well.

We are preparing for sheep shearing this up coming weekend.  We hope to get most of them done.  We shear on a stand and I do it.  I tried hiring a pro, or so he called himself.  He did not do an acceptable job and cut off a teat and cut a penis on one of my rams.  Of course he tried to blame his incompetence on my sheep.  Sorry my sheep have teats and male genitals that were in your way...  NOT!  Why can I shear the entire herd and everyone was still in tact when it was over?  It does not take that much time to be careful and do a good job.  The Icelandic's especally must be smoothly shorn with no chunks left to felt and ruin the new fleece coming up underneath.  The photo below is what a group of yearling Cheviots looked like after that IDIOT was done with them.  Not only were they cut up, but look at the chunks of wool left... (a picture is worth a thousand words...)

We were lucky to be missed by the Tornado's that hit Tuskaloosa, Alabama.  We are thankful and are praying for the folks who have lost loved ones and property.  It was terrifying to watch the Tornado live on the news as it was hitting Tuskaloosa with the weather woman frantic for people to take cover.  We were at the hospital monitoring the news while working to make sure our patients were safe if we needed to move folks to interior areas.