Anyway, I ended up canceling half of my order as it was causing undue stress in my husband as he had no idea where to put all these chickens. I jump into everything with no thought about the repercussions of what Im doing, I just know Rye will take care of it. And he does. He came home one day several years ago to 2 rabbits in his house that we needed pens for that night. He delivered. He's come home to goats, chicks, bunnies and an array of other things that strike our (girls and I ) fancy and he just quietly and calmly takes care of the lodging, fencing, pens, and feeders for all of them. He can build anything out of anything. Every single building, fence, and feeder on our farm he has built from repurposed materials. As a builder he has a lot of opportunity to salvage wood that is going to the dump and all our out buildings and coops are made out of material that was headed to the dump and one time.
Make no mistake, I am the crazy goat lady but he is the real farmer. He is behind the scenes doing all the heavy lifting with never so much as one complaint. This is because he LOVES it and secretly he is a true farmer. He loves animals, he loves building, he loves thinking of new clever ways to build a feeder or a fence and most of all he loves his wife and kids and what makes us happy, makes him happy. I think he's just happy that more fences and out buildings are what makes his wife happy and not fancy shoes or purses. I think we could say that behind every good goat lady is an even better farmer. Although he doesn't like to admit it, he's as much a farmer as me. Heres proof. Shh, don't tell him I did this.
Anyway, Im shocked at how uninformed people are about animals before they jump in. I don't know if its because I grew up on a large farm with many animals and have a basic knowledge of their care or if people are just getting weirder. For example, Rye was building a coop for 2 ladies a few years ago. They were both lawyers from CA and had moved here to build their homestead together and raise goats and chickens. When they were having him build it, they wanted a mating room and a birthing room in the coop. When Rye questioned this they informed him that the rooster and chicken would likely want a nice quiet room with low lighting (i am not even kidding) where they could go and have their date. And it would only make sense to have a birthing room where the chickens could go into to birth their eggs. He had to keep a straight face while informing them that roosters could care less where they breed the chicken. In fact, they usually like to do it right in front of kids so that the kids run screaming into the house yelling that the rooster is attacking the hens.
He also had to inform them that they would lay their eggs in their nesting boxes and be perfectly content popping an egg out of their vent in front of other chickens. These chickens, no sense of modesty!! They were also ordering a rooster for every chicken and of the same variety. They thought that they would become partners for life only with another mate of the same breed. He assured them one rooster would easily service 12 hens and he wouldn't care what breed they were and that you didn't want 12 rooster running around together anyway or you would have had cock fights all the day long. They were a little saddened to realize that most animals and especially chickens are not monogamous. After a few years of living up in the mountains I wonder how they are doing now? I bet they've learned a lot and can really laugh at themselves. They still keep in touch with Rye and are so amazed at how handy he is at everything. I call him their husband as he's the man around their place. We hear from them less and less now though so we think they might be getting it all figured out. Good for them!
Its the same with goats, I've had people come here to buy goats and they don't even know the difference between a whether and billy. They look very shocked when I tell them the whethers have been castrated and I even had one lady ask me how you milk them once they are castrated? I had one guy ask me when I was selling him a unbred yearling, how you get the milk out. He couldn't see where it was? I informed them that they have to get bred and have a baby before you can 'get the milk out.'
I can't figure out how people go through life so uniformed about the basics of livestock. This is just common sense. I mean you can't just 'get the milk' out of humans either without the proper steps like pregnancy and birth. And I think maybe they need to add some basic animal knowledge classes into the schools. Our kids can tell you detailed informative facts about the history of evolution and rattle off a list of all the endangered animals but they can't tell you how to get milk out of an animal? hmm.
One time a few years ago I picked up a book about backyard goats and chickens or something along those lines. I was blown away that there needed to be a book written on this stuff. It was just basic human animal knowledge that I though anyone would have! It made for some humorous reading but left me feeling a little sad about the ignorance of humans in the animal world. No wonder we have PETA and all sorts of things, people have no real understanding of livestock and the processes of nature. They only see or hear what they want to hear without ever actually being involved in all the nuances and processes of raising livestock. I love that there is more and more a trend for people to get into the backyard farming. Chickens are the new craze and goats aren't far behind. But they do need to become more informed before purchasing a goat and thinking they can just milk it at any given time when the urge strikes. I wish it were that easy.
I know this goes both ways and there many things I haven't experienced about city life even though I spent a few years living in Minneapolis and a few years living in Denver. But for example, I had never been in a taxi in in my life until our recent trip to Vegas. But I certainly knew how one worked. And Ive never been on a subway, or a ship, or an island, or on the ocean. So I am obviously a little sheltered too, but I have faith I could do any of those things with no problems. I think. Well maybe not, we saw how amazing I was at flying. snort. So maybe Im being a hypocrite here. Oh well.
Heres some pictures of our outbuildings. I took these this week after a snowfall when I was out doing morning chores. It was a beautiful morning.
