Boerrancher

[Beekeeper]

Does anyone know what happened to him?
He used to post regulary but hasn't been on in a long time!


Jim

[waksupi]

Joe was online last Saturday. Also saw him in chat recently, I believe. Must not have anything to say at the time!

[cajun shooter]

Last time he stayed away he said that the Goats were taking up a lot of his time.

[jsizemore]

Last time he stayed away he said that the Goats were taking up a lot of his time.

I used to have 60-100 head that I looked after. They get into and on and through everything. A mature Boer doe will go 140-200lbs and if she decides to eat something outside the fence it's gonna happen. She'll put her front hooves on the top of the fence and work it down till she can step over it. Then multiply that times a 100. Shots, worming, feeding, birthing, etc, etc and I hope I never see another goat unless it's on a plate or at somebodyelse's farm.

[Mk42gunner]

...I hope I never see another goat unless it's on a plate or at somebodyelse's farm.

Funny, I think the same way and we only had a couple of meat goat kids, when I was a kid.

My brother and I had the job of staking them out in the pasture near the blackberry briars, every day.

Robert

[Bret4207]

Bah! We're still trying to rebuild our goat herd after some severe coyote depredation. They aren't that bad. Just gotta work around their intellect, such as it is. Once a goat knows what you ex[ect they tend to be pretty biddable, for us at least.

Now sheep OTOH, sheep are just plain hard to work with. A goat is like a deer, a sheep is half cow, half pig and half brain dead, hysterical ninny! Fast enough so you can't catch them on foot, strong enough to really hurt you, with flight instinct that never lets up, and yet roll them on their back and they simply give up and let the coyote eat them. We just had one crush it's own windpipe or break it's neck in a stanchion! Nothing like having 175 lbs of sheep just die on you for no good reason.

Don't even get me started on cows. God never made an animal dumber than a cow except the domestic turkey. Now there's stupid- the domestic turkey. You have to put dimes in their waterers to get them to learn to drink, you need to put chicks in with the so they'll imitate them and not starve to death. They'll eat their bedding instead of food and never know the difference. Every time you eat that Butterball remember somebody put a lot of work into it.

[dale2242]

He was in chat last night....dale

[cajun shooter]

Bret, I bet we could go into farming together as I love the St.Lawrence area. Raise sheep,goats, turkeys and have a few horses to take care of on the side. Ha!! Ha!! I laugh every time I hear someone saying I'm getting my first horse. I tell them to get ready for a bunch of work and you will spend more for up keep than you did to buy it. Clean out the stall and put fresh clean wood chips down only to have relive themselves as soon as they walk in. All types of animal raising regardless of the type is a full time job. Even trying to have as little as 8 chickens for eggs is unreal. The Coon and possum seem to like them as in the last year we have lost over 16 chickens and killed over 35 coon and a like number of possum. A stray dog just got 4 of my new chicks just a week ago.

[Matt_G]

...a sheep is half cow, half pig and half brain dead, hysterical ninny!
Hmmm, and all this time I thought that was a Pelosi... :bigsmyl2:

[Mumblypeg]

Hmmm, and all this time I thought that was a Pelosi... :bigsmyl2:

Nope... she's all bitc#.

[GabbyM]

Bah! We're still trying to rebuild our goat herd after some severe coyote depredation. They aren't that bad. Just gotta work around their intellect, such as it is. Once a goat knows what you ex[ect they tend to be pretty biddable, for us at least.

Now sheep OTOH, sheep are just plain hard to work with. A goat is like a deer, a sheep is half cow, half pig and half brain dead, hysterical ninny! Fast enough so you can't catch them on foot, strong enough to really hurt you, with flight instinct that never lets up, and yet roll them on their back and they simply give up and let the coyote eat them. We just had one crush it's own windpipe or break it's neck in a stanchion! Nothing like having 175 lbs of sheep just die on you for no good reason.

Don't even get me started on cows. God never made an animal dumber than a cow except the domestic turkey. Now there's stupid- the domestic turkey. You have to put dimes in their waterers to get them to learn to drink, you need to put chicks in with the so they'll imitate them and not starve to death. They'll eat their bedding instead of food and never know the difference. Every time you eat that Butterball remember somebody put a lot of work into it.

Well now Bret I've hence forth thought you were a gentleman hobby farmer. Sounds like you may have actually gotten poo on your shoe before.

Turkeys oh . I never had my money on them thankfully. Amish tried it back in the early seventies. Around here we had the Ostrich bubble. None of my money either. Loaded some but none of the ones that ended up dead were at my hand. Owner cut in after we gave up. I have very limited experience in loading stock trailers. But I recon an Ostrich is about the most stubborn creature in the world to load. I was there to drive the truck. First time I ever dealt with ostrich. Hope it's the last. Can't recall just what those birds were worth but it was thousands of dollars each back twenty some years ago. Thing about an ostrich is if you get into a fight with one they win every time. They have multiple venues of attack. Oh my. Things were going along just peachy then one bird decided he didn't want to take the walk. In hind sight birds are flock animals. So when one decides not to go they all fight. Can't recall how many birds we were trying to stuff into a bull rack but It was a flock load. When things got exciting I retreated. Remember I'm just the truck driver at the time not a bird herder. Farmers wife ran over to me to place a clean towel on my gashing wound. At this point I was sharp enough to note she had a large bag full of medical supplies IE combat medic. I'm a bit slow sometimes but within a few seconds I realized why my rookie tail didn't know any better than to turn down this load. No matter. Still being in my mid thirties and slow to mature I acted like a nineteen year old. After the Wife / Medic got a plaster on the wound I dived back in. Not intending to get all up in the action to push them in the box. I thought I'd stand a line off to the side. Well when an ostrich decides he's going in your direction guess what. Yep you loose that fight. It's like they could go around but they prefer to run your tail down to stomp you a few times just for effect. You get feet, pecking beaks, wings, chests and whatever all in the half second it takes them to mow you down. I didn't get hurt but the wife / medic rushed over to tell me I needed to stand back and let the boys handle this. Obviously not to impressed with my ostrich herding skills. Probably in fear of a hospital bill. After those devil birds got into the truck there were three dead ostriches and the county ambulance was there for the bird herders. I took a ride in to get a few stitches. The men who actually loaded the birds were in much worse shape. Not serious but at that time three ostriches were worth about what I made in a year. Industry was still in the breeder selling stage and hapless want to be ostrich herders didn't have a clue what they were buying into.

So if you were wondering why there isn't that healthy choice ostrich burger on your local grill menu now you know.

[Bret4207]

Hmmm, and all this time I thought that was a Pelosi... :bigsmyl2:

Lets not be insulting sheep! They produce a wondrous fiber, fine meat, milk and manure. All Pelosi produces is the fertilizer.

[Bret4207]

Well now Bret I've hence forth thought you were a gentleman hobby farmer. Sounds like you may have actually gotten poo on your shoe before.



Poo on my shoes? Heck, my shoes, my pants, my shirt, my hat my hands, face, in my mouth and it's embedded in my 'stache. Yeah. I'm a little out of the hobby stage...

[Bret4207]

Bret, I bet we could go into farming together as I love the St.Lawrence area. Raise sheep,goats, turkeys and have a few horses to take care of on the side. Ha!! Ha!! I laugh every time I hear someone saying I'm getting my first horse. I tell them to get ready for a bunch of work and you will spend more for up keep than you did to buy it. Clean out the stall and put fresh clean wood chips down only to have relive themselves as soon as they walk in. All types of animal raising regardless of the type is a full time job. Even trying to have as little as 8 chickens for eggs is unreal. The Coon and possum seem to like them as in the last year we have lost over 16 chickens and killed over 35 coon and a like number of possum. A stray dog just got 4 of my new chicks just a week ago.

Yeah, it's got it's downsides and expense. But if this system goes belly up I can feed my kids for a long time on our excess.

Our problem is coyotes. Man do they love lamb.

[Beekeeper]

Shame on you Brett,
You got all them cast boolits and still got coyotes?
Man you just ain't working hard enough.

Jim

[Uncle R.]

Our problem is coyotes. Man do they love lamb.

Bret:
My brother raises "free range" chickens and he keeps a couple of llamas in the fenced pasture. He says they're better than guard dogs - very protective and will fight like heck against predators.
I can't say for sure - got no personal experience - but lil' brother's convinced that having those llamas has saved him a lot of chickens.
I did see once with my own eyes an incident where the neighbor's dog slipped under that pasture fence. When that dog appeared all of the chickens headed north - but one of the llamas just as quickly went south and it looked to me like she had death in her eyes. <GRIN> That dog went back under the fence awful quickly. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see coyotes treated the same.
Uncle R.

[home in oz]

You cant even use Pelosi's fertilizer on your garden, either.

[Moonie]

Shame on you Brett,
You got all them cast boolits and still got coyotes?
Man you just ain't working hard enough.

Jim

Reminds me of the line "You aren't doing it right"

[Bret4207]

Bret:
My brother raises "free range" chickens and he keeps a couple of llamas in the fenced pasture. He says they're better than guard dogs - very protective and will fight like heck against predators.
I can't say for sure - got no personal experience - but lil' brother's convinced that having those llamas has saved him a lot of chickens.
I did see once with my own eyes an incident where the neighbor's dog slipped under that pasture fence. When that dog appeared all of the chickens headed north - but one of the llamas just as quickly went south and it looked to me like she had death in her eyes. <GRIN> That dog went back under the fence awful quickly. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see coyotes treated the same.
Uncle R.

Yeah, about those llamas- we got one. She hates the sheep almost as much as she hates me. They never tell you the llama is just a fuzzy camel. We're hoping she bonds with the sheep over winter.

[Uncle R.]

Yeah, about those llamas- we got one. She hates the sheep almost as much as she hates me. They never tell you the llama is just a fuzzy camel. We're hoping she bonds with the sheep over winter.

Fuzzy camel?
Well - yeah, I suppose that might be a good description.
<GRIN>
Lil' brother did mention that llamas are supposed to be very intelligent but can be kind of - er - temperamental, and he counseled me to be very careful around his and treat 'em with respect. They like him okay and will eat treats out of his hand but I'm pretty near a stranger to 'em and at best I'd say they tolerate me. If I approach slowly making friendly talk (like I would a approach a horse) they back away - and if I had to describe the look in their eyes I'd call it suspicion. They seem to pretty much ignore the chickens but of course I can't say how they would be in regards to sheep.

[BD]

I never had much stock, just a couple of sheep and a few pigs. But I did learn over time that there's 'sheep", and then there's sheep. The polled dorsets we started with were dumber than a box of rocks and any coyote, bear or dog could take one, if they hadn't gotten into clover an died of bloat first. We got some Scottish blackface after that and they could hold their own with anything. I had a ram that used to bust out most every Saturday night and spend a night or two in the woods. He survived just fine every time, and after a day out he'd come to a grain can every time. Even the ewes could kick the **** out of a dog. I think the American commercial breeds have had the all the fight and brains bred out of them.

If you want to spend some money to see something pretty funny, try using that portable plastic electric fence to section off your stock. When a moose grazes through and gets that electric fence tied up in his rack, the circus has come to town! We had some friends from Boston camped down below the sheep one night who almost got run down during one of those shows. They slept in the house after that.

BD

[DLCTEX]

A few years ago I had to go into Oklahoma (It was unavoidable and I only went a little ways:mrgreen:) and driving on I 40 I saw a whitetail buck and two does running all out across the fields with a Llama in hot pursuit.

[sundog]

DLCTEX, much better sport than letting dawgs run'em...

...and a lot easier on the dawgs...

[Bret4207]

Fuzzy camel?
Well - yeah, I suppose that might be a good description.
<GRIN>
Lil' brother did mention that llamas are supposed to be very intelligent but can be kind of - er - temperamental, and he counseled me to be very careful around his and treat 'em with respect. They like him okay and will eat treats out of his hand but I'm pretty near a stranger to 'em and at best I'd say they tolerate me. If I approach slowly making friendly talk (like I would a approach a horse) they back away - and if I had to describe the look in their eyes I'd call it suspicion. They seem to pretty much ignore the chickens but of course I can't say how they would be in regards to sheep.

No really, they are Camelids. I think that's the name anyway. Just a South American version of a Camel. Same personality too. Strange critters, they don't lick their young or touch them much for instance. In fact, they don't really lick anything because their tongue is fixed more or less, doesn't move around like ours or a horses. They kind of like to be sort of in sight of people, but don't seem crazy about being closer than 15 feet or so.

I remember reading a book one time and the line that sticks is, "It was his favorite camel, which is to say, he didn't hate it quite as much as the other camels." Lotta truth in there.

[MtGun44]

I had to laugh out loud at Bret's comment on turkeys!

I am nearly certain that God never made a stupider animal than a domestic turkey. I worked
on a chicken farm and they are pretty impressivly stupid, but the turkey is the definite
winner in the brain-dead contest.

On second thought, man has screwed up the original design of the wild turkey.

It takes hours to explain how stupid they are to somebody that has never raised any.

Never had my own cows but worked summers at a feed lot operation and that was enough
to learn that a cow is dead stupid but big enough to REALLY hurt you, mostly by accident but
a few were just crazy or mean. Either way, they can mess you up although they are mostly
harmless. Stay away from bulls that are having a 'discussion'. Seeing how easily a cranky
steer can toss a person out of a corral with 7 ft fence is a good learning experience.

Lots of llamas or alpacas out near Lamar CO when we drive thru. Do they raise them for
the wool or for meat? Never been around them, but have run across goats and llamas as
pack animals in the WInd River range in Wyoming. Goatpacking is strange.


DLCtex - now that is SERIOUSLY weird!

Bill