Panic

Woke up at 4:30 this morning in a panic. Why? I woke up thinking about the date and that Christmas is on Friday. Then I remembered that the goats were scheduled to have their kids sometime around Christmas. As early as this week or as late as the next week or two we could have, if averages hold, 14 kids on the ground in a matter of days or a couple weeks.

Since our return from Disney, I've been sick, so I've not made it to the barns yet (my father-in-law has handled everything and really doesn't need my "help," to be honest). What I don't know: 1) are the pens bedded down sufficiently for the mama goats, 2) do we have ear tags and bands for "castration" of the males, 3) what do we do with kids!!!!! Honestly, I've not felt this under-prepared for something since I took the GREs about 15 years ago...or maybe it was when I became a dad for the first time...or maybe a dad for the third time. So, I'm realizing that I'm as under-prepared to manage a goat kids as I am my own. Well I need to relax because, afterall, almost all of the does have had kids already so they know what to do, right? Right?!!

Chicken Carnage

I received a dire report from my father-in-law yesterday: 9 hens had been killed and at least 2 more looked like they might not make it. Why? Raccoons had apparently found a way into the hen house. My schedule didn't permit me to help, but my father-in-law proceeded to shore up the area he was sure that they had gotten in through and he dispatched of the remains of the dead hens.

By my count, just under half of our hens were destroyed in this vicious attack with 2 or more having uncertain futures. I hope to have a better accounting of our situation this weekend. But that, my friends, is certainly a financial loss considering these hens should lay about 180 eggs each during 2010. Quick math goes something like 1,800 eggs lost divided by 12 (dozen) equals 150 dozen x $2.00/dozen = $300 lost. Well, I wouldn't have got that new car with that amount of money, but that's the chicken business I guess.

While we were away

While at Disney World, our part of Iowa had a blizzard. My poor brother-in-law couldn't get to the animals very well. The water tank froze in the goat barn. Drifts and white-out conditions prevented him from getting to the barn for a full day. The chickens and doelings all did fine, as did the other goats, but these were nervous times. In particular, the 7 does are due to have kids during the next couple weeks. We feared they might have their kids during the storm and what a headache that would be! We were fortunate; no kids yet!

Pre-trip scramble

We took our family to Disney World the first full week of December. We had heard a winter storm could occur during that time so we needed to move our 7 pregnant goats to better accommodations. To say the least, we were under prepared.

I'm learning that hungry goats are easy to move. My father-in-law skipped a feeding the night before we moved the goats so they would eagerly follow our buckets. After getting past their initial fear of walking into the electric fence, which we had disabled, they attacked the buckets we held in our hands. We crossed the gravel road and led them straight into their new holding area; the East end of the family's barn.

We moved a feeder into the area, a water tank, and filled racks with hay. After showing my brother-in-law what he needed to do within this area and with the remaining hens (more below) and 4 doelings, we headed to Disney.

The weekend before we left for Disney we culled our roosters. In total we have 23 chickens culled. Now we're probably not going to end up eating the first 2 or 3 because I have zero confidence that I cleaned them enough. The first bird I killed I tried to pluck it's feathers and clean. After 6 hours fighting weather conditions, etc., I had one bird done. One!

Though I froze it I'm not sure I'm confident enough in my work to eat that one. Because of the enormous time required, we decided to skin the chickens instead of plucking feathers. This was tremendously faster. Over the course of a few days I got much better at it and am much happier with the end product. Looking forward to eating those later chickens!