I used to have ten Rhode Island Red hens, a Rhode Island Red rooster, ten Barred Rock hens, and a Barred Rock rooster. A raccoon started visiting and took most of the hens. Both roosters got mean and landed in the crock pot. So for a while I was down to four Rhode Island Red hens, one Barred Rock hen, and no full grown roosters. 

Then I got chicks. Nine Barred Rock pullets (female chicks) and two cockerels (male chicks). 
They lived in our mudroom for several weeks. By the end of that time, we were quite tired of the space in the mudroom being taken up by chicks. I was hesitant to put them out, however, because the hens we already had weren't too pleased. The first night I tried to put them out was a disaster. I had the chicks lined up on the roost and ready for bed. I let the hens in and stood back with satisfaction to watch-- Little Red Hen rushed in, at the head of the small flock as always, and started flinging chicks off the roost. The other hens followed suit. 

The chicks were hustled back into their nice warm mudroom to spend the night in peace. 

I tried again every night for the next three nights. Each time, the hens behaved a little bit better until I decided to leave them all night. I was very relieved about that. For a while it looked like we were going to have chicks in our mudroom forever!

Next year I plan to get some Rhode Island Red chicks from a breeder that has a line that goes broody-- sit on their eggs, that is. Sadly, that quality has been bred out of the chickens from commercial hatcheries.

This is a young chick:

This is what they look like now:

Jane, Chicken Keeper

Our first few goats were Alpines. We got our very first two in mid July of this year. Their names are Sweet Gum and Ebony. Ebony is my buck. He was born on March 9, and Sweet Gum, Eb's companion wether, was born two days after that on the 11th. Sadly, Sweet Gum died just recently, on November 12. We got these two from Merry Oaks Family Farm, in New Hill, NC. 

Our next two goats, Jenny and Honey (short for Honeysuckle), who are also Alpines, we got from a place that was getting out of goats up in Virginia, about two weeks after we got the bucks. Jenny is a first freshener, and was born on March 20, 2013. She kidded with twins on May 14 of this year. Honey was one of the twins. 

When we lost Sweet Gum, we were all of a sudden looking for a companion goat. I decided that we would get any breed of goat, just so long as it was a wether and very nearby. I contacted Pinnacle Hills Goat Farm, a farm less than thirty minutes from ours, and they said they had a wether for sale. They also said he was very attached to his sister, please consider getting her, too, and they sent a pic. Well, I think it was the pic that made us willing to get them both. Thus Pinky and Binky came to live at our farm and we got another breed of goat, Nigerian dwarves. Pinky and Binky were born on May 5th of this year.

I think it's going to be really good to have Nigerians, because, unlike all other breeds of goats, they can be bred all year round. (Other goats can only be bred in the fall.) Since you have to stop milking a goat for the last two months of her pregnancy, some farms (Merry Oaks, and soon us) have two breeds and stagger breeding, so there will not be a space in the late winter/early spring when you are all of a sudden without milk. Pinky will be ready to breed in the spring, so she will provide next winter's milk. 

Here are some pictures of the newest goats and some of the others, too. 

Binky's on the left and Pinky on the right:

Binky on top and Pinky on bottom:

Jenny (left) and Honey (right):

Ebony:

 

Ebony compared to Binky (Eb is only two months older):

Binky:

Pinky (She's in the house in these pics because the other does wouldn't let her in the barn with them during the rain, and I found her all wet and cold, so we brought her in to warm her up and dry her off. I think Max stood up for Pinky and taught the does a lesson, because when I went to feed everybody this rainy morning, Jenny, Honey, Pinky, and Max were all together inside the barn! What happened, I have no idea.):

Here is a pic of the late Sweet Gum, he was such a good boy:

And then we have Max, my Great Pyrenees pup, who was born on June 22:

Written by Suzanne, Green T Homestead Goatherd Extraordinaire, a contributor to this blog, and all around great girl