Helpers

   Boy, summer is going by fast!  It's been an interesting one so far.  The weather has been pretty good.  No real problems, all the big thunder storms have gone around us, for which I'm very grateful!  We get rain from them, but no close lightning or anything.
  I've sold all the dairy kids for this year.  Sweetpea and company went to a great home.  She is being treated like the princess she thinks she is.  The other four have it pretty good, too.  I'm happy.  Now I just need to sell 10 more and I'll be set for numbers for this year.   
  I've got my hay all lined up for the coming year, so that is a big relief!  I haven't been able to take the goats out to browse very many times this week.  There is a mountain  lion in the area and the goats are very nervous when we go out.  I'd decided to give the lion a few days to move on to the rest of it's territory.  I think it has moved on now.  I took the goats out yesterday, and they were their normal selves.  Before they would stay in the open meadows in a pretty tight bunch, but yesterday they were a little more spread out and back into the trees again.


   I've started a fund raising campaign on Indiegogo.com.  Pine Needle Farm Fiber Arts Retreat Center.  I want to build a retreat center for fiber artists to come and relax, learn some new techniques from well-known teachers, and hang out with like-minded people for a week-end or a week-long workshop.  There will be informal spin-ins and other gatherings, too.  It's going to be a great place when I'm all done building it.  There will be six guest cabins that sleep 6 people each, with each one made out of a different "green" building  material, a main classroom, dining building, and a big gazebo in the middle of the complex for evening gatherings and get togethers.  There will also be a few spots to camp at, too.  There will be walking/hiking trails all over the property, with lots of natural dye materials to search for.  It will be a good place to re-connect with Nature, relax, and have a great time with other like-minded people, enjoying all that Mother Nature has to offer.
  I did kind of goof when I was writing up the campaign.  I didn't read the fine print soon enough and put a big amount to raise, thinking I could use some of it to buy the piece of property next to us to build the Center on.  I guess you are not supposed to use money raised to buy real property, so I only need about half of what I'm asking for to get this up and going.  My goal is to have the Center open and going on June 15, 2014.  A lot has to happen between now and then, and most of it costs money, so if you or anyone you know would like to contribute, I would hugely appreciate it!  Please pass the word on to all of your "fibery" friends.  Thanks!!

   I've got quite a few helpers lined up for the month of August.  I got a camper!!!  Now they can stay in that instead of in the house, and everyone can have some privacy and their "own space"  It will be much better than having people staying in here on the couch.   I am so excited to have the camper.  That opens up a whole new world for me.  I can go to fiber festivals and stay in that instead of hotels, saving me a lot of money.  I can buy more fiber! :-)  Not that I need more, I have enough going on with the cashmere, but I can't resist all the colorful rovings and new fibers out there just waiting to be spun.   There is some pretty cool stuff out there!
  Well, I hope everyone is having a good summer, despite all the wacky weather.  It seems that you are either drowning or burning.  Not much in the "just right" category this year.  

Cool rainy day

  Today was a nice cool rainy day.  A nice break from the sun and heat.  Even though we haven't had that much sun and heat, after a few days of it, I'm ready for some clouds.
  A deer got into the garden last night and ate the broccoli that was just starting to grow well.  It also ate the tips of most of the peas, the carrot tops and even had the nerve to walk up by the front porch and eat the pansies that are in the wheelbarrow planter!  There is so much food out in the woods there is no reason at all for it to come in here.  The goats get full after an hour and a half out there.  They come in looking like they are about to pop!  Oreo was actually waddling. :-)  She's an "easy keeper" anyway, so when she gets out into the good food, she really expands.  She's as wide as she is tall.

  I sold the dairy cross kids, including Sweetpea.  That was sad selling her, but she will be going to a good home where she will be treated like a little princess, which she thinks she is anyway.  I'm delivering them this week sometime.   They've already been paid for, but the people had to build some fencing before they were ready for the goats.  I'm starting to wonder, though.  When I tried to call her tonight, I got a recording that said that number was no longer in service.  Rather strange.  Hope nothing is wrong!

   I got a couple more boomerang goats back this last week.  Out of the 4 wethers I sold two years ago, they have all now come back here.    Alex and Andy are back, and now Nicolas and Maxwell are back.  Alex and Andy have really nice cashmere, I was kind of glad to get them back.  I don't remember what Nicolas and Maxwell's cashmere is like.  If it's not really nice, they are nice big goats, so they can go in the freezer with no problem.  They are also rather wild and can't be caught too easily.  Not sure what all happened to them when they weren't here, but whatever it was didn't tame them down any.  It's funny, they won't let me touch them, but they are the first ones in when I call them all in from eating out in the woods.

   I've decided to sell Speckles, one of the milk goats.  She's the nicest of the three, doesn't have any horns, and is giving me a good amount of milk.  I'm getting way too much milk, so I came to the conclusion that I really don't need three of them.  She's only 5 years old, births out her kids easily, and takes her milking job seriously.  Jumps right up on the stand and eats her grain calmly while I milk her.

   I'm debating on whether or not to sell a bunch of the cashmere goats.   I'm not selling as much cashmere as I need to and I have bills that need paying, so I'm thinking about selling a bunch.  But, I also keep getting a strong feeling that I'm going to need every hair of cashmere I can get next year, so I'm hesitant to sell very many goats. It's a delimma!
    I do have a buckling that I'm going to sell pretty soon. Flash.   He's a beautiful shade of light brown with a stout build.  I'll put his picture on here one of these days.  I'm 99.9% sure he's going to have outstanding fleece, his parents both do, and he's looking like he is going to, too.  He has a nice square build also.

 There is a bear or two out there.  I saw one as I was coming home mid-morning one day last week.  Then when I've been taking the goats out to browse, I'm seeing shredded logs and stumps all over the place.  Overturned rocks, too.  The dogs have been barking a lot at night lately.  I'm glad we have the perimeter completely fenced.  It won't keep out a serious predator, but it keeps out the curious and lazy ones.  Between the fence and Nellie, the animals are rather safe here.

  Well, that's it for now.  Have a good summer!  

Summer!

The goats are enjoying the freedom of being out in the pasture, especially this area, as you can see it's already eaten way down.  They head here first, then move out around the rest of the place.  This used to be a round pen when I had horses, and then it was just pasture, then the bus was parked here when H&C lived here, and now it's back to pasture.  I've been taking the goats out into the neighbor's places to eat, too.  Good for reducing the fire hazard out in the forest.
  We've had a lot of rain this month.  I think we are 3 inches above normal for precipitation this year now.  It's rained almost every day.  Makes for lots of food for the critters anyway.  I haven't had to water anything but the greenhouse.  I need to figure out how the best way to get the rain water off the roof into the greenhouse when it's raining so I don't have to water anything.  I have a couple of ideas, I just need to experiment and see what happens.
   The garden is still waiting for warm weather to really take off and grow.  I haven't even planted most of it yet.  Later this week it's supposed to warm up finally, then I'll plant.  The peonies are about to put on their show.  They are such pretty flowers.  The columbines are starting to bloom now.
   The grass is getting out of hand in the garden and inner yard.  The weed-whacker decided to quit working last week, and I finally got it into the repair shop today.  It won't be ready till next week, so I'm going to have a hay crop for the goats when I do get all the grass cut, it's getting so long.  It's even going to seed!
   With all this rain we are going to have a bumper crop of raspberries this year.  The apple trees all have a ton of blooms on them, too.  Apple cider, applesauce, pies, and all that good stuff this fall!!  Yum!

  The Bluebirds that nested in the eve of the house have hatched out some babies.  I can hear them yelling when their parents bring them food.  Sounds like a full nest in there.  This is the first time we have ever had bluebirds up here.  They usually like more open field areas.  I guess we are open enough for them now.  I hope they all survive.  That would be neat if next year a whole family returns!

   I have a couple of different helpers coming from HelpX now.  One couple is coming in mid-July and one is coming mid-August.  Now if I could just get someone here the first parts of July and August, that would be great.  There is so much to do around here, it's almost overwhelming.  Not quite, but almost.

   I've tweaked the dehairing process and prices again.  It is just too slow of a process to be able to make any money at.  That is why there are so few mills that dehair cashmere.  If I were to even  come close to making a profit, I would have to charge at least $6 an ounce.  That would be way too expensive for the growers to pay and be able to make any profit on the sale of their cashmere after they get it back.  So I think the only way the cashmere business in this country is going to go anywhere is to have a few people go in together and get a dehairing machine, and just do whoever buys into the machine's cashmere.  If little groups in all the regions did this, then the mills around the country could spin it up fairly fast and the American Cashmere grower would be able to have a good business and make a decent profit.  Give the foreign cashmere a run for it's money.   The machine is not hard to run.  It's a very slow process, so one has to have patience, but it's interesting to put it into the machine and then see how it looks coming out the other end.  It helps to have a window to look out of, too. :-)
  I also do not know why anyone shears their goats.  It might save time on the harvesting end, but you lose any advantage there during the dehairing process.  It takes way longer to run through the machine, and the yield is so low compared to combed, I see no advantage to shearing.  Since you pay on the incoming weight, and at least 60% of that weight is guard hair, which gets thrown away in the process, it's like you are just throwing money down the drain.  Plus, if you have to pay someone to do the shearing, you are really losing money.
  I know I've only been doing this dehairing thing for about a year and a half, but I've seen a lot of cashmere in that time, both combed and shorn, and the combed is the way better deal.  It's got a better return, it's faster to dehair, and there isn't so much waste.
  Well, that's my humble opinion on it, anyway.  :-)  
  Happy Summer!!      

It's raining finally!

       It finally rained today!  Now the forest will grow and the goats can get out to eat by the week-end.  They ate the yard down fairly fast!  If the deer would stay out of our property and stay out in the forest service land, it would be even better.  I don't know why they have to come in here, when there is far more grass and food out in the woods.  I guess they feel safe in here.  I think one deer eats as much as two goats do.
     

     I have 69 goats now, counting both the dairy and cashmeres.  The kids are way too cute.   Here's Flash when he was about a week old.   Then there's Otis jumping onto the rock and promptly sliding off the other side.  Between the hollow log and the rock, the kids keep themselves entertained pretty good.

   
   The garden is is starting to grow.  I've got carrots, beets, lettuce, radishes and garlic planted so far.  This week the spinach and broccoli will go in.  I have some salad greens and peas growing the the greenhouse this year.  So far, I've had two salads.   The asparagus is up and I'm eating that almost every night.  A great way to fix it is to saute' it in a mixture of coconut oil and butter with a little onion and when it's tender sprinkle some goat cheese on and a splash of soy sauce,  Yum!!  I also have cooked a chicken breast, chopped up, with it, and put it over the salad greens.  That was really good!


  Now that my interns have moved on to their next adventure, I'm looking for someone else to come along that would like to learn about cashmere goats, and the off-grid lifestyle.  We have 20 acres, gardens, goats, and chickens.  It would be nice to have a couple again.  I'll share the food we grow here with you, (lots of goat milk, etc,) but we don't have any guest quarters yet, you would have to have an RV of some kind.  There is a good flat spot to park in that is private, yet close enough to walk up to easily.  If you want to take a working vacation for a couple of weeks, and don't mind a little bit of somewhat hard work, you are welcome to come for a visit.
  The things I need help with are cleaning the pens, gathering firewood for next winter, and some gardening.  I need to spend more time in the dehairing room and working with the cashmere fiber, so I need someone to get these other things done.  
  We are only two hours away from Glacier National Park, one of the most beautiful places on earth.  It is a good day trip from here if you leave early in the morning and don't get back till almost dark. ( I've done it many times)  We live out in the middle of the mountains, with one other neighbor that is close by, up a forest service road that's in pretty good shape.  We're 45 minutes, or 21 miles,  from Kalispell, and the Flathead Valley.  There is lots of wildlife up here to see, too.    
  My husband is working back east till this fall, at least, so I'm trying to do everything by myself, and it just might get to be a little overwhelming.  I do not want anyone who uses drugs of any kind, or drinks alcoholic beverages in excess.  A nice, responsible couple in good physical shape that is not afraid of working outdoors, and that likes goats, would be perfect.  Kind of like  H&C were! :-)  And, if you know anything about solar hot water installations, that would be really great!
  
   Well, it's time to go out and feed everyone, water the greenhouse and get things all shut down for the night.  One thing about having the greenhouse, it needs watering even if it's raining out.  I"m going to have to figure out an irrigation system to get run-off from the roof inside and watering things when it's raining.

Springtime in MT

What a beautiful day we had today!  I spent most of it weeding and landscaping the gardens and yard.  Tomorrow it's back to dehairing my cashmere.  It's looking like I won't be able to get all of mine done before the outside cashmere starts coming in. I've got 36 fleeces to do.   But, I'll get enough done to fill the CSA orders and a little more, then do others, then go back to mine.
  I have 69 total goats now.  11 dairy and crosses, and 58 cashmeres.  The kids are all doing great.  I'm only keeping two of the boys bucks, the rest are getting "wetherized".  One of them is white with a silver dollar sized spot on his neck, and the other is a pretty shade of brown with some neat looking facial markings.  Both are nice square bodied kids.  The white one is really stout.  He's a chunk.  He'll make good meat babies, along with the fiber.  His parents both have outstanding fleece, so he should, too.  The brown one isn't quite as stocky, but he has nice conformation and is just cute. :-)  He comes from parents with great fiber, too.  When I get decent pictures of them, I'll put them on here.
   The baby chickens had their first day out in the big world today.  They weren't quite sure what to do at first, but by the end of the day, they were having a grand old time out there.  They are big enough now that I don't have to worry too much about a raven or hawk picking them off anymore.  I'm so used to the Jersey Black Giant chickens we used to have, that these are looking a bit strange.  They are Silver Laced Wyandottes, with two Golden Wyandottes in there as well.  The golden ones are really pretty!  I might have to get a couple more of them.  It's nice to have something besides black in the poultry department around here.  I'll be ordering turkeys again here pretty soon.  I have a few people that want me to raise them a turkey or two, plus we want some for ourselves, too.  I'm going to get some Naragansett ones this time.  They are a heritage breed that gets to a medium size from what I've read about them.  Somewhere around the 18 to 25 lb range.  I might keep a breeding pair and let them raise a hatch or two.  

  My daffodils are blooming nicely, and the tulips are about to start.  There are over 100 buds in the tulip garden again.  It's going to be pretty!   I'm going to start planting the vegetable garden this coming week.  We had a couple of really good frosts this last week, so I'm glad I hadn't planted anything yet.  I got the beds all ready to go.  One nice thing about raised beds is they don't take long to get ready for the new season.  The Square Foot Gardening method really works good, too.  It's surprising how much food you can grow in a small space using that method.

  Well, Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers out there.  Have a great day!

It's May already!

Here is Zindy Lou with her first kid.  She's a very nervous mom and is always checking on him and calling out to him if she is more than 10 feet away.  I named him Drizzle.  It was lightly raining at the time I first saw him.  I went out in the morning to check on her and here he was, up and dry and nursing.  I had been worried she would have trouble having him since this was her first, but obviously she had no problems.  Thank heavens!  I was hoping for a gray kid, since she's the only gray goat I have, but he's solid black, not a white hair on him.

  There are 28 kids all together now.  They are more entertaining than TV!  I have some nice colors out there, too.  I was wanting more black kids so I'd have the various colors, and now there are 7 of them.  They are getting hard to tell apart.  Two of them are solid black with no white hairs at all.  Both boys.  One is going to be a little leggier than the other, so that will be how I tell them apart.  That, and putting different colored collars on them.
  There is a good range of shades of brown out there, too.  So far the girl/boy ratio is even.  That is unusual.  Most years I have an abundance of boys.  Especially with this many, but not this year.  I'm glad!

   The interns leave this week-end!  They've been here for 8 months now.  I think they've experienced just about every aspect of goat raising and farming.  From breeding, to kidding, to having to put a couple of them down, to butchering one, to harvesting the cashmere fiber, even milking them.  I think they now know a whole lot more about goats than when they arrived. :-)  They also learned how to butcher chickens.  A well-rounded venture into the world of goats and homesteading.  I'm going to miss them!  Now they are on to their next adventure en route to their own place some day.  I wish them well!  Heidi is on her way to becoming the best Special Ed teacher out there, and Colin is a wonderful carpenter and worker.  They have both been a huge help around here.  They made surviving winter around here much easier this last year.  I'm pretty sure I got the better end of the deal, too.  A remodeled kitchen, a closed in combing room for the goats, all the roofs vertical again after the 2010-11 winter made them all lean.  A new dehairing room door, lots of help with fencing, pen cleaning (especially pen cleaning!), flower beds weeded, a whole lot of clean-up out in the woods/pastures picking up sticks and thinning out the trees, the ability to do a little traveling without worrying about this place.  That was especially nice!  It was so nice to have help around here!  People that actually like the goats and have respect for them.  Thanks you guys!!!  It's been great!

  I'm waiting for the last two does to have their kids, then kidding will be over for this year.  I'm starting to think the one doe isn't pregnant anymore.  There is no milk in her udder, and no bulge in her side at all, at least not enough to be a kid, I don't think.  We'll see by the end of next week.  The other doe is definitely pregnant, though.  Hope the boy/girl ratio stays even!
  Well, that's it for now...
 

 

Kids are everywhere!

Only Six more does to kid, and this kidding season will be over with!  This has been the most challenging one I've ever had in the 11 years I've had goats.  There are 20 kids out there now.  12 cashmere and 8 dairy crosses.  Lost three kids, two were aborted, and one was too big to come of the doe, so we took her to the vet and they couldn't get it out either, so they cut it's head off and pulled out the pieces.  ick.  Glad it was a boy and not a girl.  Then the poor doe was so traumatized by the whole ordeal, plus an overdose of oxytocin that kept her having contractions for 24 hours, she died the next night.  Poor April.  There wasn't anything I could do to stop the dang contractions.  I called the vet a couple of times and they said they would fade away and quit.  Well, they didn't.  They wore her out and she died.  Lost my highest cashmere yielding doe!  I got 6.2 ounces of dehaired fiber off of her fleece from last year.  Glad I got this year's combed off before this ordeal.  That's a picture of April above, having a discussion with Sophie.  At least she has one daughter out there that has just as nice of cashmere as April did.  Just not quite as much.

  April was also the orneriest goat out there, so I don't think anyone is really missing her that much, except maybe her daughter Oreo, who just had a kid and doesn't have grandma to babysit like she used to. :-)

  I've also had to really pull hard to get a couple of the kids out.  They did come out in good order, though.  The boy/girl ratio is even, too.  So there are good things in with the not so good.

  On the dairy side, I'm dealing with a bad case of mastitis, which I've never had before, either.   What a year!  At least I'm learning a lot, and so are H&C.  They are getting to experience just about everything, both good and bad, to do with raising goats.  I do have a really good looking kid crop, though.  Some of the best I've had come yet.  I think I have a replacement cashmere buck in there, too.  He's a cream colored one, so that will be a nice contrast to the two black bucks I have now.  He's a very solid nice looking kid!  We'll see what he looks like as he gets older.

  I'll be getting some good pictures of all the kids on the computer one of these days.  They are on the camera, I just haven't taken the time to get them on here, yet.  One of these days.....