Tag Archives: lamancha

The Big E Goat Show 2023

Before we start, thank you to everyone who has checked in and sent well wishes, cards, baskets, etc since my (Rob’s) injury. I am recovering well, even if I do overdo it occasionally. My lung capacity is back to full strength and now its just a matter of letting the ribs finish healing. I have been hiking (5 miles this weekend) to restore some fitness.

September 29 – October 3, most of our herd of Lamanchas was at the Eastern States Exposition, aka The Big E. The Big E is essentially the New England Fair. Thursday through Saturday is all about the 4-H goat show and Sunday is an open goat show. Last year was Quinn’s first time attending the 4-H goat show and this year Amanda was old enough to attend as well. The animals move in on Thursday afternoon and the kids move their gear into the on-site (15 min away) dorms. Since Rob was recovering from the broken ribs, he camped in our travel trailer at the Big E instead of chaperoning 4-Hers in the dorm. Quinn and Amanda had 10 of our goats at the fair: 4 milkers, 2 dry yearlings, and 4 2023 kids. There were only 2 other lamanchas attending: 1 milker and 1 kid.

Thursday evening at 7pm, all the milkers get milked out as part of a milk test to see how much each doe produces in 24 hours; Thursday evening establishes the zero point for each doe. The goats are then milked again at 7am Friday and 7 pm Friday. The weight of the milk is recorded for the Friday milk outs and samples are sent off for testing. For milk outs, other 4-Hers jumped in to help get the does milked quickly. Sawfish Camellia (owned by Amanda) ended up winning the milking competition for Lamanchas producing 7.4lbs in 24hrs as a first freshener that kidded in February!

The kids have to be in the dorm at 10pm and get up at 5:30. After the Friday morning milk out, there were competitions for showmanship and fitting. Showmanship is all about how well the exhibitor has prepared. It includes handling ability, knowledge questions, and overall presentation. Fitting is all about preparation of the animal, mainly the clip job and hoof care. Showmanship and fitting competitions are conducted by age groups of the exhibitors and the breed of the animal doesn’t matter. These competitions took well into Friday afternoon.

The judge for the event was Julie Matthys, a well known Lamancha (and other breeds) breeder from Indiana under the herd Mint Leaf Lamanchas. She did a seminar with the youth on Friday afternoon covering topics such as nutrition and disease prevention. Friday evening the kids had to participate in a stations activity before the ice cream social. I think they made it back to the dorms at 10 on the nose.

Saturday morning was the breed competitions. This time, the judge was placing each class against others in the breed. Again, Quinn and Amanda recruited other CT 4-Her’s to help show since we had multiple animals in the same classes.

Around 3pm Saturday, the 4-H show ended and many of the animals departed. Later in the evening, another 200 or so goats started arriving for the Open Show on Sunday, which included a decent number of Lamanchas. Sunday was a standard ADGA show and Anna even entered the ring! Quinn and Amanda enjoyed talking with other breeders and learning details from more experienced herds.

Even though we didn’t have any huge wins in the classes, we were surprised to find out Quinn won Premier Exhibitor and Premier Breeder for Lamanchas! We assume this was based on total points and the fact that we had about half the Lamanchas in the show probably helped.

We wanted to get some nice setup/show photos of all the goats, but honestly it was so busy that things just didn’t work out. We did get a few.

We made it home at about 9:30pm on Sunday and the goats and everyone was exhausted. Breeding season is now in full swing as the does have been coming into heat. Late February to early March will be busy around the farm as we are breeding 8 does this year. At the end of long weekend, we actually came home with 1 more goat than we left with: Majenli LK Carolina joined our herd. This is doe is one that Rob fell in love with at the Big E in 2022 and when we found out she was available for sale, there was no discussion required. Carolina has already been bred to one of our bucks, Majenli LK Rip Wheeler.

Anna decided to add a goat to the herd in August. Her name is E.B Farms Sunstone Tulsi. She was a yearling milker this year. We have dried her off and she has been bred to E.B. Farms LL Regal for late Feb kids.

Sawyer Summer Update

It’s been a summer. You know how some years it doesn’t seem like things align and happen like you planned? Sh*t happens everywhere you turn? Well, this summer has been a bit like that. We tried to make the best of it. We haven’t blogged in a while, because really who wants to write about life when life gives you lemons? Anyways, here it goes, a summer update as we move into fall.

Let’s start back with the last weekend of July when Quinn and Amanda participated in the Windham County 4-H fair. It was a very small fair compared to New London County, which is our home county. The New London County 4-H fair was moved to the second weekend in August, due to a popular local fair changing their dates. This is an ongoing conflict for us with our annual trip to Fryeburg ME and the Pinetree Endurance Ride. The kids are deciding on changing counties, moving clubs and/or going independent. Attending another county’s fair makes them miss out on club challenges and other participation at the fair, such as being a superintendent of an event or species show. They are also not eligible to compete in Premier Showmanship, even if they win top showman for their project animal. It turns out Quinn and Amanda had the only goats at the Windham 4-H Fair. The judge still gave them decent ring time and practice for their showmanship, even though they were only competing with each other. Phaylene won best senior doe (duh) and Pepper was best junior doe. Quinn and Amanda enjoyed entering the obstacle course challenge with two of the goats. A massive storm swept in Saturday night and the goat barn flooded, so Rob brought the goats home to stay dry.

In the week between the 4-H fair and leaving for Pine tree, we lost two animals on the farm. Amanda’s 8 year old Rhinelander rabbit Pretty Paw and our barn cat Barbie. Barbie had developed a massive tumor, and was getting really skinny so we decided it was time.

The following weekend we packed up and headed out to the Pinetree endurance ride. Our friend Sonja came up on Saturday and stayed over at our place for the night. The next morning we loaded Amira and Mojo and headed for Fryeburg. About an hour out from the fairgrounds Sonja started having some engine trouble with her truck. We sent the kids and horses on to camp (Quinn was driving the horse trailer). It turns out Sonja’s aux fuel tank was low on fuel and was sucking air each time she went up a hill. Rob stayed with Sonja and we drove on to camp on her main fuel tank. Excitement before the ride even started! We got camp set up and all was well.

Monday we went tubing, it was cold, like low 60s, the river was high due to all the recent rains and then it started raining while we were still on the water. A lot. We were frozen by the time the tubing shuttle got us back to the car. We were quite thankful for nice hot showers in camp.

Liz and Ken made it to camp that evening, just in time for the torrential rains to continue. We stalled the horses and Amira was not happy (understatement), we had to literally close her in with the dutch doors shut and she kept spinning in circles. We had vetted in to ride Tuesday, but decided not to in the morning, because the rain was cold, Amira had not been drinking well, and we didn’t want to feel like the previous day and have wet saddles for the rest of the week. I know, we are fair weather riders…

On Wednesday we got up and sent Alex on Mojo and Quinn on Amira out on trail in the 25. The trail was wet and slick. They made it to the vet check and vetted through. Unfortunately at the finish check back at camp, Amira was lame. She had a cramp on her hind left leg in her inside groin area. We worked on her for an hour, but she was still off. So, Quinn did not get a completion. It became clear, in the next 24 hours that she had a tendon sheath injury to her left hind based on the swelling that built up.

We planned to send Amanda out on Mojo Thursday morning, however, Mojo was lame when he was checked before the start. It appeared to be in his shoulder. It’s been 5 weeks of rest and he is still not quite right so we are investing in more diagnostics to see what we can figure out. Since we didn’t have any horses to ride, the family spent time volunteering at the away hold and with vet checks or anywhere we were needed.

On Friday, Amanda got a catch ride offer from our friend Jenn Jacobson. Jenn’s young Arab, Haley, had already done 2 days of LDs and Jenn wanted her to go out for a 3rd. Amanda rode with Mary Palumbo as a sponsor. Unfortunately, at the end of the ride, Haley was lame with the same symptoms as Amira 2 days prior and they also didn’t get a completion. Haley did recover after a couple of days, so we are glad that wasn’t a bigger problem for her.

Ken and Liz have a tradition of blowing bubbles with the grandkids and any bystanders get sucked in to participate as well.

In late August, goats went to the Brooklyn Fair. Quinn didn’t attend this show due to orientation at Eastern Connecticut State University. Rob and Amanda showed 10 of the goats in the 1 day event and came home with a decent amount of premium money.

Labor Day weekend meant camping with goats at the Haddam Neck Fair. There were over 80 goats at the fair and I believe 39 of them were Lamanchas. Quinn spent a fair amount of time studying for college classes, while Amanda enjoyed hanging out in the pens, teaching the public about the goats.

Rob’s company, Sonalysts, had their 50th anniversary party in September. We got all dressed up for an evening out.

This past weekend, the Connecticut Valley Driving Club put on a driving demonstration at the Berlin Fair. The agenda included introductions of the various horses and ponies, some background on their breeds, discussions about different carts and carriages, how to harness, and of course, driving demonstrations. The space being used was between the tractor pulls and an amphitheater, so it was quite loud. The event was being held on the go cart track which has a clay track and grass inner circle. Rob and Amanda were driving Huey when the nearby concert stage reved up and spooked Huey. He bolted across the field and as he hit the clay, Huey crashed and Rob was thrown from the cart onto the track.

Amanda was able to jump while still on the grass; she is bruised but otherwise ok. Huey bolted out of the area but was caught with some assistance from the rest of the club. He was stiff afterwards but not injured.

Rob was taken by ambulance to a trauma center with 4 broken ribs and a collapsed left lung. They put in a chest tube for the collapsed lung and to drain fluid build up from the broken ribs. He also has a severely bruised hip. He spent 3 nights in the hospital. He is back at home, but it will be 6-8 weeks for full recovery.

Our immediate plans include an end of the 4-H year trip with the goats to the Big E next weekend. Amira looks sound, but still has a bump on her tendon where the fluid accumulated so she will get another ultrasound to check things out. Mojo will get some diagnostics to figure out why is still lame and a path forward, hopefully to soundness. Fiona is doing well, walk-trot in the arena and about 50 miles of walking on the trails. Not having friends for her to go out with lately has put a damper on trail riding. Huey will rest for a week, get some trail walks by hand in the forest next week, and we will evaluate whether we put him back to work or not. We definitely want to rule out any pain reasons for the wreck last weekend.

The goats will all get bred next month, fingers crossed, for late Feb-March babies. We have a few changes happening to the goat herd, but that will be another post. Maybe after the big E. Stay tuned.

Kidding Season 2023 has begun

Sawfish Camellia started off our kidding season today with a super easy delivery of twin does. She was due yesterday and based on how big her udder got earlier this week, we actually expected her to deliver about 36-48 hours earlier. Amanda didn’t have school on Friday, so she set up a hammock in the barn Thursday night and did hourly checks on Camellia (Camellia is her goat). Unfortunately, the temperatures were in the 20s last night so she had to sleep inside.

Amanda sleeping in the barn on kid-watch

Throughout the day, we were checking on Camellia every hour. Around 1, Amanda came into the house and announced she saw discharge and kidding was imminent. She went back to the barn and called the house almost immediately to announce “there were feet “I see feet!” 15 mins later we had twin does at 7.1 and 7.2 lbs.

This year, we have shifted to all bottle babies. That means we are pulling the kids at birth and they are coming into the house for a few days before moving into a kid pen. We made this choice because the bottle babies are just always friendlier and easier to handle. It also means kids we are selling can leave earlier.

This year’s name theme is cars. The baby with a lot of white on her face is Sawfish AS Mercedes (barn name Merce) and the black and brown faced doe is Sawfish AS Porsche. The AS in their names is for Amanda Sawyer since they are in her herd.

This morning, Anna snapped a picture of Camellia’s udder while she was on the stand. Once Camellia kidded, we hand milked her for the colostrum for her babies. I honestly don’t think we have ever had a first freshener that was as easy to hand milk so fast after kidding. In the first 5 hours she has given us 2 quarts of colostrum and didn’t kick the milking bucket even once. Let’s hope that continues!

We have 2 more first fresheners due over the next two weeks. We will be retaining one of either Mercedes or Porsche and the other will be available for purchase.

Introducing E.B. Farms LL Regal!

It’s kidding season and some of our does will kid soon, however, the first kid of the season arrived today from Exponential Blessings Farm in MD! E.B. Farms LL Regal was purchased to breed to the does we have kept out of Yoshi next fall. We don’t plan to allow outside breeding to Regal for this year.

Regal has a great pedigree that we are sure will help improve our herd.

The human kids are enjoying having a bottle baby in the house.

Let’s show goats! In a tropical storm!

This weekend was the North Stonington fair. In 2012, we showed goats for the first time at that fair. After 6 summers without goats, we made our return to the fair scene and the goat barn with our Lamanchas. And it rained. A lot. I saw estimates that we had between 3.5-4″ of rain in just over 24 hours, but let’s not jump ahead too much.

Last fall, we rebuilt our herd of Lamanchas and had 5 does that kidded this spring. We have already sold some goats, but at this point we have 3 does in milk, 2 dry yearlings, and 5 baby doelings (plus a buck and his wether companion). Quinn and Amanda wanted to show goats and this was their first time back in the ring. Another one of the girls from the 4-H club, Kaylin, leased some goats as a 4-H project. The three of them have been working hard at getting the goats ready – clipping, studying, handling, etc. Thursday afternoon, we loaded up the trailer with goats and headed to the North Stonington fairgrounds. We got the pens set up and the kids did finishing touches on clipping and cleaned up udders on the goats. After that, they headed out as a group to ride the fair rides and eat some dinner. Fair food!

Everything was going well, but there was this little rainstorm coming through. Let’s call it, Elsa. Elsa was a tropical storm as it passed through the area. It started raining overnight Thursday to Friday, and it kept raining. A lot. The fairgrounds were already pretty saturated from rain over the previous week. The area where the travel trailers were parked was a bog. You couldn’t get to the trailers without rubber boots. But we took care of the animals and retreated to the trailer for some food and hanging out until the rain subsided.

The rain ended Friday afternoon, and all the exhibitors started emerging from their hiding places. Due to all the rain and standing water, the fair didn’t officially open on Friday evening. After some back and forth, the fair board did decide to allow the youth goat show to go forward on Friday evening since all the goats and exhibitors were already present. So, at 6:30 pm Friday, the youth show started with 60+ goats.

The show didn’t end until about 9:30 and by the time the kids were done with chores, everyone was ready for a shower and some sleep. As I started to fall asleep, another big storm hit the fairgrounds and dumped another inch or so of water on the already saturated grounds. We woke up Saturday to find that our canopy was destroyed overnight, but the weather was clear. The show on Saturday included ~160 goats. It took all day.

At the end of the day on Saturday, we headed home with a trailer full of tired goats and 3 4-Hers who had a great time working together. They showed all our goats and helped others show Alpines, Nubians, Oberhaslis, and others. On the way home, they were talking about the next show, making an FAQ for the stalls (“why don’t your goats have any ears?”), and in general looking forward to the next show.

Goats are a lot of work and cost a lot money. But watching the kids work together, take responsibility for the animals, build their confidence the in show ring and speaking to the public makes it all worth it.

Baby Goats!

For the first time since 2015, we have baby goats on the farm. Yesterday night, 2 of our does kidded, giving us 4 buck kids and 1 doe kid. Both does and all 5 kids are doing well. We have 2 more does due in the next few days and then 1 more due in May. All of the kids are sired by Idikka Yoshi. I’m very pleased with his contribution to these kids and I see improvements on each doe in the kids.

Rainbow (Longvu Log Over the Rainbow) surprised us by going into labor first and dropping both her buck kids in under 30 minutes. The first one was 10lb and the second was 9.3lb. Rainbow has a nice length of body and milked for 18 months on her first freshening.

Tulsi was known to be carrying at least triplets, so we were pleased that she was showing signs of imminent labor 4 days before her due date. She was a little slower building to delivery, but eventually provided buck kid #1 at 6.3lb, buck kid #2 at 7.2lb, and doe kid at 6.5lb. Tulsi is registered Native on Appearance, so her kids are considered Experimental in the American Dairy Goat Association (ADGA) registry.

Introducing Quinn

After a 5 year hiatus, we have decided to get back into goats (it was mostly Rob’s idea). Lamanchas were our preference and we have started gathering our new herd of Lamanchas. In this picture is Tulsi, a 4 year old doe in milk we purchased last weekend with her kid from this year. Tulsi is currently giving us a little over 2 quarts of milk per day with her kid still nursing.

Milking Tulsi is Quinn, or as they were formerly known, Vicki. A few weeks ago they decided to change their name to Quinn. While we haven’t processed the full court name change yet, it will likely happen in the future.

Bottle Baby Video

Today at work, a friend said I should add some video of the goat kids to our site.  This year we are doing things a little different with the goat kids: we are planning to raise them all as bottle babies.  We have chosen to do this because we have always found the bottle baby kids to be so much easier to handle and more docile as they grow up.  So, Sawyer Farm’s Milky Way and Sawyer Farm’s Caramel who were born on Monday, are living in a dog crate in the office.  It’s not that they couldn’t live in the barn, but rather, Anna likes the convenience of not going out to the barn in the middle of the night to give them bottles.

Of course, goats that live inside, get to wander around the house for exercise.  It has become a routine that they follow the people into the kitchen to get their bottles.  They love to run and hop around.  Unfortunately, all the antics were complete by the time I started the video and both kids were getting down to the business of drinking milk.

Watch the video on YouTube!

Lamancha babies

Last night, Anna went to bed as I stayed up working on some things (ok, I was on Facebook).  Around 11, I was ready for bed, but first went to the barn to check on West View Swan’s Saffron, one of our Lamancha does, who was in the kidding stall for the night since she was already 2 days overdue.  I discovered she was in labor.

I headed back in and woke Anna to tell her I was getting more warm clothes and heading back out to the barn since Saffron was in labor.  She thought I should get a couple of hours of rest first and then go out around 1.  I didn’t think so.  As she drifted off to sleep, I headed back to the barn.  When I arrived, the first kid was already on the ground.  She was a long legged doeling that looks a lot like her sire, Blue-Ridge Apache and weighed in at 6.6lbs.  Her brother followed not too long after and weighed in at 6.9lbs, and has the look of his mother.  Both started with wobbly legs, but by this afternoon, they were getting around a little better, so we took them out for some quick photos.

Introducing Sawyer Farm’s Sassafras (dark colored doe) and Sawyer Farm’s Birch (light colored buck).

Turbo, our Sheltie, was watching over the photo shoot.  After we finished, he went back in the barn and hopped up on a bale of hay to take a break.