Thursday, March 9, 2017

Kidding Season

Wow. I'm such a slacker on this blog. We're about 2 months into kidding season. The does are really spread out this year(not planned!) and we'll only have a total of 14 fresh(also not planned!) 
Much to my disappointment, Special & Poppy did not settle. Special was bred 3 times, but blood test came back open. Not really sure why she didn't settle, but it was a bad breeding season all around, most FFs took at least 2 breedings to settle. Poppy gets a pass since she's 10 years old, but I'm still really bummed that breeding didn't take. It was a repeat breeding, that produced Gypsy in 2016. 
We lost Adonis back in January. We believe he had a respiratory virus, and as cold as it was he was unable to continue fighting it. Adonis will be greatly missed here, he had a huge impact on my herd and has produced some absolutely gorgeous kids. I'll be looking into bringing back a son of his in a few years. Della and Gypsy got the same virus, and we came close to losing both. Thankfully they did recover, but Della was apparently too sick to carry a healthy pregnancy and miscarried. 
Current kidding count is 9--6 does; 3 bucks

Tansy kicked off kidding season in January with twin doelings Deja Vu & Black Sabbath. They are Adonis's, so Sabbath is retained. Deja has been reserved. Iris had triplets, 2d, 1b, all are sold. Oreo had a very handsome single buckling, Merry Oaks Last Rebel. He was an Adonis son, and was just as stunning as last year's bucks from this breeding. Sadly, we lost him to tetanus. Lily had buck/doe twins. I am very pleased with Lily's udder as well as her production. Her kids are Adonis's(50% Alpine/Nubian--Experimental) so the doe is retained. Twist had tiny a single doeling, who weighed in at only 4.5 lbs. Twist is a second freshener and her udder looks even better this year! Her doeling, Merry Oaks Heart of Gold, is retained. Next up is CallMeTheBreeze. She's not technically due until March 17, but looks as though she'll go in the next day or so. She is bred to Taxman, all kids are reserved or retained.
Merry Oaks Last Rebel

Merry Oaks Black Sabbath

Merry Oaks Deja Vu

Merry Oaks Heart of Gold

Thursday, December 1, 2016

December already?!

Wow! Has it really been 3 1/2 months since I've posted!?!
I guess we've been pretty busy since breeding season started! We've had had a crazy breeding season, and some trouble getting the younger does to settle. Sadly, I lost one of my favorite herdsires this year, Cherry Glen Gentry Google. We have only one kid out of him, SaturdayNiteSpecial. I think he may have bred a doe shortly before he died, we'll see in a few weeks. Most of the older does are bred to Adonis, and most of the younger ones to Taxman. Since we lost Google, we've bred a few of the girls to friend's bucks, some to Taxman's sire, Willie, and one to Busy-B&D L Lucinda's Luke.

We had a good end to our show season at the NC State Fair, back in October. All of our does did well, Gypsy was Reserve Jr. Champion in the Open show, and Breeze was Reserve Jr. Champion in Youth.

Hard to believe it's December already! First kids are due in just 5 weeks! Iris(Nigerian) is due Jan. 5 and Tansy is due a few days after. 


I believe we have 15 does bred, still trying to get Bam to settle, and waiting on a Nigerian buck to bred Loretta to. I also might breed Reb's daughter from this year, and freshen her in June.
I'll be sending blood in soon to confirm breedings for most of the does. I have a growing suspicion that my Nubian doe, Lily is bred. She must have been in heat the day Adonis jumped the fence. Oh well, I didn't really want grade kids, but I'd rather not lute her this late. She's probably due sometime in January. Which of course is going to drive me crazy, not having a due date for her.

These are the does I have bred for 2017, in the order that they were bred.
Tansy~
My old girl, she'll be 11 next year! Bred to Adonis
Iris~Bred to Orion
Poppy~Also bred to Adonis. Can't wait to see these kids!! 
Oreo~Adonis
Twist(Taxman)
Della(Taxman)
Breeze(Taxman)
Empress(Adonis)
Clematis~
Google bred Clematis in November, praying she settles and gives me a doe kid! If not she'll be bred to Willie or Adonis
Dove(Taxman)
Gypsy(Willie)
Special(Willie)
Dancer(Taxman)





Friday, August 19, 2016

It's that time of year again...

It's breeding season!
The bucks are in full rut, and the does are cycling like crazy.
Tansy and Iris are bred, Tansy is due January 5th, and Iris is due January 8th.
Breeding plans are finalized, and reservations are open for 2017 kids.
View our website for more info, and contact me to reserve a kid.

Monday, August 8, 2016

This is me a lot of the time lately...

Trying to get breeding plans finalized, and decide what I want to do this fall!! 
I keep changing my mind, and going back and forth about my breeding plans, but I think I finally figured out what I want, how many I want to freshen and which does I'm selling and which kids I'll be freshening, and which ones I'll keep dry etc.
It's about time too, the bucks are definitely starting to stink and notice the does next door to them. Hopefully we should have does going into heat in the next couple of weeks.

We had planned to try and show at the NC Mtn State Fair this year, but we have a very busy fall, and we missed the entry deadline. We'll try next year!

The NC State Fair is also creeping up on us...Entries opened up August 1st. I'm nearly done with mine. The plan is to get them all done before we start school and welcome a new baby.

Well be showing 20 does at the State Fair, which pushed us to buy a new trailer. We've had our old blue 2 horse for a couple years now, and after the Spring Show this year we decided we needed a new one. It's a slant load, and I really don't like the design. It would be fine for horses, but it fitting all our goats and stuff in it was extremely difficult. 
We started looking for a new one, and found one this past week. It was exactly what we were looking for, 4 horse straight load, can be easily divided, has a tack and living are up front, gooseneck, reasonably priced and in much better condition than our old one. We're going to get the old one cleaned up and sell it, hopefully someone can use it!

I'll be posting our breeding plans soon. Right now I have 12-13 Alpines on the breeding list and we'll have some for sale after the State Fair.