On milk, homeopathy, and herbs

Sanuba, bless her pea-pickin' little heart, is up to a quart a day of milk--and what wonderful milk it is! Sanuba, as her name implies, is Saanen/Nubian cross.  My other milker is a full Saanen, and though Bea gives delicious milk, it's low in fat. Sanuba's milk, on the other hand, is rich and full of butterfat.  I can actually skim it right off the top the next morning. Yum!

Buckling, Sanuba and Emily

Sanuba's doeing is already gone, sold at a week old, and her buckling is happily playing outside with the others, dodging horses' feet, investigating geese, and generally taking life as it comes. 


I'm milking Snub (Sanuba) three times a day, not because she has such a huge quantity of milk, but because we're still battling congested udder. I've been working with Glen Dupree, a homeopathic vet in Louisiana, to resolve this, and we're definitely making progress.  From one teaspoon of milk, painfully (for me) extracted, she has increased steadily to a little more than a quart today.  Her buckling is getting all he wants, as well, and I'm sure he's consuming at least a quart or more a day.  This has been a long road for both of us.  I've been massaging her udder at every milking, applying hot and cold packs twice a day, giving her herbs, Ester C, and homeopathic remedies as directed, and though she's much softer and more pliable than before, we still have a way to go.

Today I got some udder salve and herbs from Fir Meadow to add to the protocol. I like Kat Drohval's products, and my goats eat them readily.  Her BWW Wormer is great. In combination with GISoother, it's kept my goats from being plagued by parasites.  The GI Soother targets Haemonchus contortus, a particularly nasty worm that Beatrice contracted from the sheep that was here when she got here.

Emily

Emily has already started to bag up a bit.  I thought her due date was May 30, but I'm thinking perhaps she actually had a false heat?  No wonder my goats keep me crazy!  They won't even let me know when the buck is no longer of interest!  At any rate, after Snub's surprise pregnancy, I'm going to be prepared for both a May 9 due date and a May 30th.  I hope she has bucklings so I don't have to pull the kids. CAE positive does do take some management, no doubt about it.

Leah

Leah is also bagging up, but the earliest date for her would be May 29th. Let's see now--I bred her because I wasn't sure anyone else had been bred, is that right?  From now on, I will not assume that no one's been bred, even if they're tail wagging to beat the band, batting their eyelashes seductively at the buck, and blatting their heads off--or even if they're just plain not interested when they see the buck.  Perhaps, after all, they just want a little privacy.  What a learning experience this has been!