Livin' the Dream - or the Nightmare

As much as I share about our projects and successes, I like to throw in some of our more relevant failures in hopes that you can learn something from our mistakes/stupidity.  It's all a part of keepin' it real, right?

Let me just say this before you read on: no animals died.  I hope to never have to post about that, unless it has to do with processing chickens!

Mistake #1: When you get goats, someone always warns you that they are escape artists, but you never think your goats would dare escape!  That was until Akea spotted Sugar, the one-year-old female, making her way toward the house on Saturday evening.  Perhaps she was hoping to join us for dinner?   I caught her fairly easily with the dog collar I had bought that day, but not before she had spotted her reflection in the sliding glass door at the back of the house.  She stopped, backed up, and then promptly began rearing, ready to charge "the other goat!"  Tragedy was averted, and as I walked her back, I wondered how on earth she could have gotten out of the electric fencing.  But after returning her to her family, the way of escape became clear, as she promptly gave it a go again.  Akea had to drag her out from under the shed.

She escaped under this shed, as the portable electric fence had stopped at either edge of it.  I promptly re-positioned the fencing to run in front of the shed.

And just to give you an idea of her size, here she is with Akea, who is seven.  Yeah - she's the incredible shrinking goat.

Mistake #2:  Since Byron has had some other responsibilities lately, I've been moving the cows to fresh pasture frequently.  He usually has everything set up for me, but this time, he told me that I had to move some loose fencing outside of their pasture, which I did...but apparently left it within easy bovine reach.  You know that saying about the grass being greener on the other side of the fence?  Let's just say that the expensive portable electric fencing is chewier on the other side of the fence:

I'm shamelessly linking up with the Homestead Barn Hop #60.  Because I don't want it to happen to you!

Kids for the Kids

After our nasty bout with poison ivy last year, Byron started asking around about getting a goat.  Our friend, Don, has a friend, Fred, who raises goats, and Byron had spoken to him a couple times about getting one goat as a living weed whacker.  We knew it would probably be a male, and that was fine.  However, on Monday Fred called Byron and told him he had a family of goats that needed a good home.  Not only did he want to give us the goats, this family of four included three females!

These Nigerian Dwarf goats are great with (human) kids, and thus far my own two have spent hours hugging and feeding their new companions.  Fred also has an unrelated male he's willing to give us for breeding, which means I maybe need to start researching milking goats! 

Any advice out there on raising and/or milking goats?  We have a bit of a learning curve to overcome, but are enjoying them in the meantime.

At Fred's place, meeting the goats.

Cinnamon, the "Mommy" goat.

Sugar, her one-year-old daughter.

Merry, a twin born right after Christmas.

John, her twin brother.