Sunday

Busy day!

Finally some sun again! So it made a good day for the farm!

Boss had Linnea and Bonnie in mind-neither one suitable for Willow, so I headed over to the wether pen and picked out Jackson, Lincoln, and Jasper as possibles for her. I brought Jackson right over, and Willow just loves him. He is a giant, and the joke at the farm is that he was raised on poptarts-he came back to the farm from another household. He was raised with rowdy kids (poptarts) and is very gentle for Willow.

I took on Linnea, very cautiously. She nearly broke my kneecap last year, so today I kept my distance, but actually, she was very good. She only tried to get me once. I got two big bags of fiber off her, and Willow combed a ton off Jackson, too. Then I brought the other two wethers over, but Willow said Lincoln wasn't releasing, and she didn't want to deal with Jasper's long guard hair, so she chose to hang with the new babies.

That's right, the babies have started arriving at the farm! Last week Coretta dropped a set of twins, both does, and Bonnie had a single buck. Then Dancer had twins, one of each, two days later.

I released Lincoln and cleaned Jasper up, and then moved on to Bonnie. I opened the pen after I chained Bonnie. She wasn't releasing much fiber, and then her buckling darted out of the stall and she started flipping out, so I released her. Dancer's babies were napping, and since she was the only goat not out in the field, I collared her and cleaned her up. She kept trying to get me, so I had to hold a horn in one hand and comb with the other.

In the meantime, Coretta and Bonnie had moved out of the barn, and Willow was hanging with them and the three kids. Bonnie has her hooves full with that little buck!!! He was romping with the little doelings, and Bonnie was having a fit!!! He would run and she would go after him with buggy eyes. Then Corretta's black kid was trying to nurse and Bonnie butted her because she thought it was her little black buck!

Finally we went to Prescott and I combed Duke. He was being very jumpy-finally I had one of the weekend boys hold him, and Boss worked on his neck while I wailed away with the slicker.

I found some pussywillows in full bloom as we were leaving, and they joined the vase of forced forsythia on the kitchen table when we finally arrived home.

I have been looking for at least one more goose for our lonesome gander. I found a couple of female pilgrim geese down in New York, but the price and the shipping is steep. We could get eight goslings for a better price from Metzer. Hmmmm-I don't really want a big flock of geese, so Lucifer might have to content himself with the chickens for company for awhile....