Behinds and Betweens: Life, Death and Dinner

Winter cold and snow continue. It's now 2009 and we're faced with making some important decisions about our farm. In this photo, Vanda wears a red goat coat, made especially to keep goats a bit warmer. In our case, we decided we might be able to increase Vanda's winter milk output if we could keep her warmer. For the most part it works, although the people who make these coats don't seem to have goats like ours. We've got these wire gates and for the goats, it's like a scratching post from heaven, they've rubbed against them so often they bow out at the bottom. This makes short work of the cute little connectors on the coat. However duct tape has found one more place to win converts and boy howdy it sure works...we just taped the coat on! But that wasn't the decision I refer to above. In the photo on the far right is Nemo, you can see he has grown to be a pretty big goat. He was still sweet, but things had changed from when he was our first born on the farm; so little and cute. Now almost 2 years on, he was eating a lot of hay and he had started realizing the power in his size. We could hear Vanda bellowing at him when he would pester her again and again, pushing her around or just wanting to play. Vanda clearly didn't think it was cute anymore and she had her two girls to raise. We now had six goats to feed. Neenia was pregnant and Vanda soon to be, if they each had two kids that would mean we'd be at 10 goats and the future was starting to look untenable. What were we going to do?

The Really Big Snew of 2008

It started out as light snow, a couple of inches, but day-by-day it began to build until after a couple of weeks we had 3 feet and temperatures down to 9 degrees Farenheit...pretty cold for us here on the west side of the Cascades. Ice built up, we had six foot icicles hanging off the roof and we were carrying warm water to the goats twice a day. We have one 4 wheel drive truck, so we could get out, but my car was buried under a huge mound of snow and when I tried to dig it out it seemed insurmountable... and in fact it was. As things warmed up a bit more, unbeknowst to us, the car began to leak. There was a pool of water collecting in the bottom of the driver's side, filling it until anybody sitting in the back seat would have had wet feet too. And no matter how often we used buckets to drain it out and soak up the remainder with towels, it always came back. Three weeks turned into a month and a half before we could get it towed and discovered our entire instrument panel had been wiped out from too much water. Yikes! I didn't mention that one morning we woke to a big woosh outside our window. Running downstairs, I found that the entire front porch had been decimated by all that snow and ice on the roof. Normally I love it when it snows, but when it came down again in mid January, I couldn't find my typical snow enthusiasm...it had vanished, at least for this winter season. Maybe next year!

The "Girls" Settle In

Jewel and Fern, 4 months old in these photos taken in Fall of 2008 begin to settle in to the routine. They are taking their place and making their presence felt! Just like human kids of 6 - 9 years old, they're a bit awkward, still learning the ropes and wide-eyed with a special kind of wonder filled innocence. Discovering new foods, tasty rhody (even though I tell them it's poisonous to goats!) - okay, they say... just a taste, as I push them away from the plants each time. Finding new likes and dislikes; Jewel doesn't like that molasses herbal wormer I add into thier grains once a week...she wrinkles her nose and tries to find some of it that's not tainted! Yes, they are finding their place in our small herd. 'The girls' are big enough now to challenge Pepper, our pygmy and getting more bold about pushing her away from the feeder or any interesting food. Pepper seems less and less excited about her role as 'auntie' and seems to resign herself to being at the bottom of the goat pile, for now.

A riot of color; in the company of trees

It's the in-between time, that time when one season makes it's shift into the next, and it takes my breath away. There's always a sense of excitement in the air, full of promise and hope as everything changes form. The autumn. Yes, on one hand you can say that everything is dying, but it's so much more. The shedding of form, of what's visible now moves toward entropy, chaos and transformation into the unseen. And yet, life quivers as it moves to earth and we begin our own descent into ourselves, moving deeper within, in harmony with the seasons. Here at the farm, that means riotous colors descending into earth tones, the baring of most trees and the thinning out of greenery as everything prepares for winter.

Where's Poppa?

Fern and Jewel, born to Vanda, are from the Zederkamm line. This photo shows their Poppa, T& B's Wyatt; also sire of our Neenia. A handsome, multi-colored buck, his spotted tendencies have shown up in Neenia's kids - see " " for pics.

After Surgery, Twins!

Surgery? Imagine caring for goats on a big piece of land with a bum hip. On June 9, 2008, I sailed through surgery and got a new hip, and thankfully my life back. Thanks to modern medicine and some very supportive friends and loved ones. And not far after on June 26th came two sweet doelings, Jewel and Fern. Hobbling down with my crutches and camera, Gordon and I watched them being born. What a thrill! Jewel has that big diamond like spot on her head, Fern's spot looked like a fern frond, art imitates life imitates art.

Misty-Eyed Who?

Merry Christmas from Misty-Eyed Goat Farm 2007. My brother took this photo for our christmas card, with Vanda and Neenia (in her favorite spot up off the ground away from the queen), Gordon and I in the barn. We debated about what we wanted to call our mini-farm. Gordon was telling his good friend Bruce about a certain look in Vanda's eyes...he called it Misty-Eyed, and that's how we often feel about our goats, so the name stuck.

Miss Neenia Arrives

Neenia, named after a character from J. R.R. Tolkein's "Silmarillion" came to us from Zederkamm Farm. For some reason I don't have many photos of Neenia that first year. She arrived at 5 months of age and became Nemo's companion while he weaned himself of mom's milk. It was quite upsetting for her (and me vicariously) because she was met with goat intimidation tactics immediately as Vanda and Pepper tried to tell her in no uncertain terms that she was NOT WANTED. This consisted of staring her down with scary and angry looks, butting at her gate again and again so much that Vanda's head was bleeding from this tactic. This is the side of goats I'm not yet comfortable with, but I'm sure it's a survival tactic for goat herds in the wild. As a result she cried a lot and was generally miserable, in my attempt to comfort her we became bonded. Eventually they got used to her presence, she and Nemo became buddies and she settled in.

Nemo's First Summer

Nemo was such a delight. Discovering the thrills of being a kid vicariously reminded us of being kids ourselves and since Nemo was an only 'kid' he was very secure, well fed and even tempered. He had everything he needed. He scampered and leaped, twisted and ran. Pepper became his best buddy to butt with and life was good...until he had to be weaned! My goodness he really did not want to give up milk or his momma. And so we brought home Neenia.

Our First Kid: Nemo Arrives

In great anticipation I nervously prepared every last recommended item for goat kid delivery, and came home one afternoon just about 15 minutes after it was all done. I fussed and cooed and did all sorts of silly mothering type things, but it was a done deal and I was just catching up. Nemo was the sweetest momma's boy and lucky little guy, he got all that milk to himself. We were in awe at the wonders of birth and nature and since we don't have children of our own...our first kid.

The Day After the Really Big Snew:

We counted over 25 trees down on our property with countless branches and debris all flotsam and jetsom everywhere. We are so thankful that not one of those trees created any harm and today we are making good use of the wood in our fireplace, in our garden and elsewhere. And the goats were just fine! But let's get back to the goats! Luckly before the big storm we had taken Vanda to do a tango with Romeo. Romeo is a lovely buck who lives at Pat Showalter's Zederkamm farm. The very place where Kinder goats began. http://www.kinderzed.com/goats1.htm and so she was expecting!

Old Man Winter Works His Magic:

There's not much browse for goats in winter, but we had an overgrown patch of blackberries and the leaves lasted for a long time. The goats loved to go out with us and it was a chance to take a deep breath of fresh air and just be. Soon we were in for a winter's treat, although some might say...trouble! The big wind storm of 2006 came in about 1:00 a.m. Huddled under the strongest part of our house until four in the morning, Gordon and I said many a prayer for our house, our barn and outbuildings as chaos and falling trees, branches and more were crashing outside. We took a small step back into the time of our ancestors when the power was out for nine days. Even with a small generator we ran for about 2 hours a day to keep our water pumped and freezers cool. it was amazing how busy we were just taking care of daily necessities like hauling wood for the woodstove, cooking on the woodstove and cleaning up after ourselves. The day power returned was a great relief, but I sure do appreciate the lives and times of pioneers in a way I never have before.

Farmer's Hours:

That first fall with the goats was fun and challenging. We thought we were really being challenged by having to milk once a day. Now we know that was easy street. I made lots of kefir, Gordon had enough milk for coffee and cereal and we relished the new experience of taking the goats out for walks and enjoying fresh from the goat milk products.

Got Livestock?

Gordon mentioned more than a few times that he wanted to have goats. I grumbled and thought one more thing to take care of was too much, but one day working at a local CSA, I was asked by a co-worker whether I might want some goats. "Well....I know my husband wants goats" I say. So sure enough within days we were putting up fence around our barn with our new friend Lucy who was so interested in selling her goats she helped us put the fence up! Soon Vanda, a Kinder goat and her lady-in waiting, Pepper, a dignified pygmy goat arrived. We had one lesson on milking and then, gulp, it was up to us...or should I say me. Somehow I got the hang of it a bit sooner than Gordon and soon we were in milk.

The Magic of the Land:

We have two creeks, one on each side of our rectangular piece of heaven; a pond, a douglas fir forest and an old growth forest, plus about 1.5 acres of open meadow. Scads of native plants including salmon berries, black berries - both native and not, many red huckleberries growing out of stumps that were logged in the thirties and reed canary grass...incidentally all very much relished by our goats. On occasion, I like to take the goats on a walk through the old growth part of the land. There is a nice path to walk on and plenty of yummy treats for them, sword, lady and deer fern, elderberry and oso berry, downed doug and hemlock branches for munching in winter with those ubiquitous salmon berries lining the path.

Our Dream:

We moved to our 15 acre mostly wooded property in East King County in April of 2005. This was a realization of our dream come early. Saving and planning for an eventual move to a rural area, Gordon sent me an e-mail one day with a link to an interesting property. He suggested I check it out and then said somewhat casually, "We wouldn't go look at it though". "What?" I replied, "You aren't going to dangle that in front of me and then not go look at it." So we went, and fell in love with the land, and soon it was ours. We spent a joyously relaxed and sensual summer that first year, exploring the land, flora and fauna and the wonderful quiet. A new roof and all manor of repairs plus working kept us busy. Then, in the fall of 2006 along came our first real venture into farming; Goats! These weren't any old goats, this was a Kinder goat named Vanda and her companion, a pygmy goat named Pepper. We had no idea what we were getting or getting into then, but many a story has started that way.