This photo doesn't do this beautiful hay justice. It's deeper green than this faded image.


A closer look at the alfalfa hay.

Now this is Good Hay

Today I drove to the feed store where I always buy my orchard Timothy grass hay. I waited to get more until I was completely and totally out of my stash. The girls seem to have, for the most part, lost their interest in their hay over the last few weeks. I still give them fresh hay every day, but it doesn’t look like they are eating any of it, so I end up throwing it all on their bedding. When I pulled up to the feed store I discovered that the business had closed. No signs in the window telling where they might have moved to; that nice lady that helps me every time I’ve ever been there during the last six months failed to mention during my last visit that they were closing up shop.

I thought of a farmer who sells alfalfa hay – I bought one of those gigantic round bales from him last winter (the goats didn’t seem too keen on it though, so I never bought from him again); when I drove by his farm on the way to the auction a couple of weeks ago, I noticed that he had small square bales in his barn. After my disappointing trip to the feed store, I gave the farmer at Ed-Lyn Farms a call to see if he had any of those small bales available, and he said he did for $3.50 a bale. Said the quality was “okay… might have dried out a bit too much”, but I really had no choice; I know of no other place to buy hay except Global Ag, and I know theirs is just too stemmy. Off I go to Ed-Lyn Farms to get my alfalfa hay, not sure if the goats would even eat it. After arriving Mr. Ed said that he had some newly-available bales that were better that he had set aside for a regular customer who no longer needed it since she moved her horses to a new location. These were more expensive at $4 a bale. I asked to take a look at them and just one look-see was all I needed to know that I had to have them. They looked like a nice deep green with lots of leaves on them. Smelled really good too. I bought ten bales (and took home two barn kittens to boot) and gave a bale to the girls in the pasture as soon as I got home to see what their response would be. They devoured it! They absolutely loved it. I took away the alfalfa pellets that I was offering free choice since they now have the hay. They had been going to town on the pellets too, but I am happier seeing them get alfalfa hay since it’s in a more natural form. I’ve got plenty of storage room, so I am going to call Mr. Ed to see how many more of those bales I can get my hands on. I must have more. My earlier confusion about how “good hay” looks is now gone. I know what good hay looks like! And it’s beautiful.

Approaching Breeding Season

Now is the time to start looking ahead to breeding season for my two older goats, Ginger and Clover. They are both large enough and old enough to breed, and August through January are supposed to be a dairy goat's natural time to go into "estrus". I plan to take Ginger back to the breeder where we bought her; they have 10 bucks for me to choose from. I can take her there, and board her until the deed is done. Can you believe that it's $2.50 a day to board her?! Each doe bought from them gets one free breeding! So the only cost involved really is boarding. I'm hoping that it'll be clear to me when she begins to go into heat, and Scott says that I can just drop her by at any time. Clover will most likely be sent to her original home as well. This is the only place at all that I know of with Toggenburgs. Her breeder has only one buck... Clover's own dad. While this sort of mating doesn't go over well in the human mind, this practice is safe and quite common in the goat world. The Nubians are only three months old now, and are nowhere near being ready to breed, so they may likely be bred next fall. I am glad that by then I will have a greater understanding of what I'm doing; so I am thankful for that.