Goat’s ears come in all shapes and sizes. Some stand straight up, like in the case of Alpines. Some are so small it looks like they have no ears at all, like in the case of Lamanchas. Nubians have large pendulum ears. It’s one of the features that attracts people to them the most! Beyond being cute these ears serve a purpose. Much like elephant ears do for elephants, the Nubian’s ears keep them cool in hot climates.
On The Freckled Farm we have Nubian goats. While researching for interesting facts for this series I found out that Nubians are the most common dairy goat in the US. It makes sense to me… they are the cutest goats out there
I have had so much fun looking back at these pictures each month. It’s amazing to go back and see what we have accomplished in such a short amount of time. It gives you a new perspective. I can’t believe how quickly things have come together in the last month, especially with the garden… Thinking back it sure doesn’t feel that way, but looking at the photographs there is visual evidence that we sure have accomplished a lot!
To follow our 365 project “A Photo a day from The Freckled Farm” follow us on Instagram: Thefreckledfarm
Every single ingredient that goes into our Goat Milk Soap is carefully chosen for the highest quality and best result for our customers and our environment. That process all starts with our goats. What we feed our goats is incredibly important. It not only affects the health of the goat but the quality of the milk that we feed our children and use in our products. So when it came to what we were going to feed them, I did a great deal of research.
Our pasture, and the forage throughout it, is the most important part of our goats’ diets. Goats are foragers, not grazers. They need the roughage and they like to eat foliage that is off the ground. During the spring, summer, and most of the fall our pasture provides the goats most of their sustenance. They have pine trees, blackberry brambles, honeysuckle, and more.
Hay is the next largest portion of our goats’ diets, especially during the winter when there is not a lot of forage and essentially no grass to eat. So our hay is not something we skimp on. The hay we purchase is chemical free, although as a small farm they do not have an organic certification. The bales are kept out of the weather and have never been rained on, which is extremely important. Being in the weather destroys the nutrients of the hay and encourages the growth of mold, which can be deadly. Our goats maintain weight on a lot less since the quality of the hay is so high. Good hay goes a long way.
At first we were feeding our girls grain from a large corporate feed company. It was fine, but I knew we could do better. They didn’t have an organic or non-gmo product and I like to support local farms whenever possible. We have a local feed company that offers organic feed, but the price per 50# bag was nearly double what we were spending and that just wasn’t in the budget. Years ago, a farmer friend of ours turned us on to Sunrise Farms Feed. They offer all-natural non-gmo feed. The grain for their feed comes from small local farms. It looks and smells amazing. It’s not over processed, you can actually see all the individual ingredients. The quality is outstanding and it made a difference you could actually see! Their coats which were already healthy and beautiful looking became even more so. Our girls have such wonderful energy. I attribute at least some of that to the grain.
Grain is fed to the goats on the milk stand while they are being milked. This helps them with their milk production and keeps them occupied while we work with them. Our goats who are not in milk, the ones who are too young or the bucks, only get a very small amount of grain. It’s just enough to keep them “friendly,” as our vet would say.
Black oil sunflower seeds (BOSS) have many benefits for goats. Many goat farmers use BOSS as a supplement since the seeds are rich in fiber and protein. BOSS is also said to improve milk production and increase butterfat. It also helps improve their coat. We mix a small handful of BOSS in with everyone’s grain at feeding time.
Loose minerals round off our goats diets. It provides them with things that our soil/plants might be lacking, like copper and selenium (this is a very selenium deficient area) as well as salt.
We will continue to do whatever we can to provide our animals with the best feed possible. We want our animals to be healthy and the milk we use to be high quality!
Try out our Goat’s Milk Soap to see the end result of this healthy diet.
Another month down! April was amazing. Spring blossomed, the babies grew, the garden really started to come together… Below you will find a round up of the April photographs from our 365 project, A photo a day from The Freckled Farm. To follow our 365 project in real time follow us on Instagram (@Thefreckledfarm)
We had an amazing kidding season this past March. Three of our girls kidded a total of eight kids! Two sets of triplets and one set of twins. Four bucks and four does. Four of these kids have already been sold, although they will remain on our farm until they are weaned, one doe was retained by us, and we still have three bucks available for sale. Meet these precious kids below. If you are interested in purchasing one of our available bucks feel free to email me.
Gouda – Buck – Pure Bred Nubian – Sold to Money Pit Farms
Feta – Doe – Pure Bred Nubian – Sold to Chickenberry Farm
Buck 2 – Buck – Pure Bred Nubian – For Sale – $150
Amelia (Millie) – Doe – Pure Bred Nubian – Retained
Buck 3 – Buck – Pure Bred Nubian – For Sale – $250
Cheddar – Doe – American Nubian – Sold to Chickenberry Farm
Buck 4 – Buck – American Nubian – For Sale $150
Brie – Doe – American Nubian – Sold to Money Pit Farms
And now…. Pictures of goat kids being goat kids….
Kevin is in the middle of that goat pile:
I decided this year that I wanted to document the first day of spring on the farm. While there isn’t a lot of “spring like” things happening yet, there are little hints that spring is on it’s way. There is new life on the farm with the baby goats, the trees are starting to bud, and the daffodils, the first flower to pop up each year, are poking through the ground throughout the farm. The start of spring brings so much excitement! I can’t wait to see what this spring has in store for the farm and gardens!
Warner is our new herd sire! We purchased him early spring 2014. Before 2014 we bred our does with driveway breedings, which is where you wait until your doe goes into heat, pack her into the truck, drive her to the farm where the buck lives, let them breed, then bring the doe home. It can be difficult to tell when your doe is in heat when you don’t have a buck around, and they never go into heat when it is convenient (of course!). We felt with 4 does to breed this year that it was time to get our first herd sire!
We reserved a buck at a local farm that has very strict standards for the bucks that they sell for breeding. The others, the ones who don’t reach the standards, are sent for meat. The day we went to pick out Warner they had sent all of the other bucks off to the butcher that morning. There was only 4 bucks there for us to pick from. She walked us over to the buck pin and the boys rushed up to greet us. The moment I saw Warner I knew he was ours. I don’t even recall what the other bucks looked like. I’m not sure I even looked at them. Warner was just so handsome and sweet! He caught my eye immediately!
Warner has been a great herd sire so far. He is so sweet to the girls. I can’t wait to see what the kids he sired look like! With as beautiful as our girls are, and as handsome as Warner is, we are in for some gorgeous babies!
Eleanor is Elsie’s full sister, the goat we introduced two weeks ago who had the traumatic birth. She is the opposite of her sister in nearly every way. They may be twins, but their personality couldn’t be more different. Eleanor was born without us even knowing. Her mom didn’t make enough noise during her labor for us to hear her over the monitor, so she was already born when we went out to check on Tina. Her sister had an extremely dramatic labor. Eleanor has a sweet, calm, loving personality. She follows rules and is very easily lead. She very rarely gives us a hard time. While her sister is hard headed and will never do what you want her to. And even with all of these differences these sisters love each other and are always at each other’s side.
Eleanor’s calm personality makes you gravitate to her. She is so sweet and loves to give kisses.
Have you been following our 365 project on Instagram (@Thefreckledfarm)? We have been posting at least one photo a day from the farm. If you aren’t following us you might want to consider it… come March there will be a ton of pictures of baby goats!
Don’t have Instagram? At the end of each month we will be posting a round-up of the pictures that we posted throughout the month. Below are all the pictures from January. Enjoy!
