The Buck Stops Here!

We have been waiting for November since we bought our young goats. November is the perfect month for our breeding program. A large portion of our crop of kids will be for our freezer and in order to grow them as economically as possible, we need them to be born in early spring and grow all summer on lush green browse. We will then harvest in the fall. Going with the natural order of almost all life on the planet will give us healthier animals and better growth. This is our thinking although we haven't read that anywhere. It just makes sense. Consequently, getting the buck to the farm at the right time is a big deal. So, today we will drive to Augusta with the stock trailer (formerly referred to as the horse trailer when we only had horses) and pick up the buck.

This is supposed to be a pretty good buck although he is going to appear to be a bag of bones we have been forewarned. He has spent the summer with a herd of a couple hundred Amish does and the fall with his owners large herd. Since breeding is more important than food to a buck, it is easy to imagine a pretty stringy looking animal. Well, it is hard for me to feel too sorry for him. Turns out if your lucky enough to be the biggest, best looking buck in the herd and you get chosen to be kept as breeding stock, life is pretty darn good if you can remember to eat once in awhile.

So, we're excited. Kris thought we should brush the does and make them look good before he arrives. It won't surprise me if I smell perfume in the goat barn today. I can tell you this is definitely their natural breeding season and they have been giving all the signs which I will spare you in the interest of keeping the G rating on my blog. We have to keep the buck for two complete heat cycles and that is at least 45 days. By that time, everything we own will smell like goat. The does give off little oder. Bucks on the other hand are a different story. They splash on the only cologne available by peeing on their faces for maximum olfactory attractiveness and standing in a doe's urine stream to assess the finer points of her readiness for courtship. All you have to do is walk through the herd and you too can have a pretty potent, hormonally charged scent. (You walk through the mall wearing that fragrance and you will turn a lot of heads from people who normally wouldn't give you a second glance.)

Not going anywhere is the easiest solution to the smell problem since it is a lingering contagious sort of scent. It should make Christmas interesting for gift recipients since many of the gifts will be made here on the farm and will act as air freshener as well as their original use. We are going to sequester clothes for Christmas before the buck arrives today and if that works, we may be invited inside to the various Christmas day activities. If not, we will just bundle up and stay outside on the deck and look through the windows. We are thinking by next summer, most of the smell will have dissapated and are looking forward to a fuller social calendar.

(That reminds me, we should call the daycare and point out a little advance notice for their visits, might prevent a lot uncomfortalbe explanations and years of trauma counselling.)

So, we are excited for the next phase of animal husbandry to begin and looking forward to seeing another goat farm today. Kris admitted she had butterflies from the excitement of it. I'm going to guess this may give way to another feeling when she gets a wiff of the buck.