It's Thursday Already??

Wow has this been a busy week.  Although admittedly there are things that I have been putting off and now I’m having to run around trying to get them done.  My poor seedlings have been screaming to get planted into some real soil and I’ve only managed to get about a third of them into the raised beds.  I’d like to put the eggplant, some peppers, tomatoes and new berries into the berry garden, but we still have to put up the rails and wire.  There’s no way I’m going to plant seedlings that I’ve pampered for the past eight-plus weeks into a garden where the baby goats are known to roam around. 

And then there’s the fact that every single farm animal seems to have some sort of ailment, attitude problem or just being uncooperative.  Sickly goats, egg-bound hen (just wait for that blog post) and Nugget still only has one “nugget”.

Annette’s fever has gone down, although she’s still not 100%.  She’s had five straight days of probiotics and she still has five more days of antibiotic injections to go and I’m afraid before it’s over she’ll never want to get on the milk stand again (that’s where I give her the injection). 

Two of Nettie’s doelings have had scours the past two or three days, although it’s starting to clear up.  Not sure why all three didn’t have it.  Maybe they got into some goat-unfriendly patch of weeds or they’ve just been eating too many fresh greens too quickly.  I did see at least one of them snacking in the chicken feed pan which includes all of our leftovers.  Probably not “Goat-Mom Approved” foodstuffs.  They also got two doses of probiotics.

Nettie’s eyelid color hasn’t really improved at all.  I’ve wormed her with two different types of wormer and have been giving her Red Cell for four weeks now and I was hoping to see some improvement.  I’ve also been giving her Vitamin B injections.  Ideally she’d be getting Fortified B Vitamins, but the morons at the FDA have made some stink about Vitamin B and are not allowing the manufacturers to make anymore.  Everyone is out of it and there is no telling when, if ever, they will be able to get any. 

So I finally had a fecal done on Nettie and Annette.  Why is it that when you’re out with the goats they poop every fifteen seconds, but when you need to get a fresh sample from them they suddenly become constipated?  I was following goat butts with a zippy bag for what seemed like eternity before they cooperated.  I initially collected samples for Nettie, Annette, Ishtar and Cloud, but after finding out the tests were going to be $16 a pop (or should I say a “poop”?) I decided that the most important ones would be for Nettie and Annette.  Note to self: Buy microscope and learn to do fecal tests.

Annette came back “clean”.  Nettie’s sample had five pinworm eggs in it.  The vet said that it wasn’t anything to worry about as long as she gets wormed for them soon, so I’ll be going back to the feed store to get some wormer specifically for pinworms.  I was kind’a relieved that neither of the samples came back with a heavy worm load, but it still is making me wonder why Nettie is still looking anemic.  I’ve also started giving Nettie grain three times a day with a top dressing of rice bran and BOSS (black oil sunflower seeds) in hopes that she’ll start to put some weight back on.  I’ve also debated drying her up once here kids are weaned or sold.  I’ll miss the extra milk, but I’d rather see her put her energy into gaining weight instead of producing milk. 

Besides, I’ll still have Annette, Ishtar and Cloud for milk.  Well, I will have milk eventually.  I haven’t been milking Annette because she’s on the antibiotics, Ishtar isn’t due to kid for another eleven days and Cloud’s kidding date is another month after Ishtar’s. 

Got Milk?  Well, sort of, not really, eventually………..