Tag Archives: Animal Husbandry

March 4, 2019 · 7:06 am

New Additions

Well, that pregnant goat my husband bought last finally gave birth–and to triplets no less. Two boys and a girl as cute as can be. They are just as lovely as Chiveta–making them way better looking than the kinder boys we have running about.

One of the boys is Spot because he has yep you guessed it, a spot on the back of his neck. The other we really haven’t named, except to say Not Spot, so maybe that’s his name. We can only keep one of them anyway, so best not to get too attached. The girl we’ve decided to call Bunny, which was also the name of a lovely twin that got goat-napped a few years ago. Let’s hope that doesn’t happen again.

Meanwhile, he’s gone and bought a pregnant mare. Our horse Lady is just 2 years old and won’t be ready to breed for a while. I’m pushing my husband to wait to breed her until she is three, but she may go into heat this summer.

Anyway, back to the new horse. The guy up the hill had 4 horses which he let run semi-wild in an overgrown area. He’s decided 4 is too many so wanted to sell one. My husband immediately decided this was the horse for him. I asked him to wait until I saw it, so Sunday afternoon, he dragged me hither and yon to hunt down the horse. Eventually, she and her herd buddies were located and my husband brought her to the fence to meet me.

I estimate she’s about 10 years old, although the owner is saying she’s only 8. A lady never tells her age anyway. This is her third pregnancy and it’s quite advanced. I think she’ll have her foal before the month is out, but my husband says not yet. I also think it will be a boy. So we’ll see what happens there.

She’s a nice docile horse. My husband says she “my” horse but that’s not really true. She and Lady have decided that they can be friends. Since I’m in charge of the naming around here, she’s been christened Cookie. She’s mostly white with a salt-and-pepper mane and tail with black freckles all over her face.

My husband had to go and get her that very afternoon even though he hasn’t finished paying for her because he was concerned there wasn’t any water where she was being kept. And it’s been SO hot the past few days. He and my son led her down to our house and she drank 3 buckets of water, so she was thirsty.

Our population explosion isn’t quite finished. We are still waiting for the pregnant ewe to give birth. My husband keeps saying any day now.

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Would you like to read more about our animals?

Check out Wascally Wabbits and Zombie Babies: Animal Antics South of the Border

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Tagged as Animal Husbandry, goat triplets, goats, homesteading in Mexico, horses, Livestock, raising animals in mexico

December 21, 2018 · 7:00 am

Oh Boy! More Boys!

I haven’t been able to share many animal antics lately because not much has been going on the Flores Ranchito. That all changed towards the end of November with the arrival of Zombie’s first offsprings, the Borrego Boys, white, fuzzy twins, who are healthy and fit with the exception of some sort of weird second set of eyes (but what can you expect from a zombie/sheep hybrid).

With their birth, my husband went a little crazy and started buying up pregnant goats hither and yon. Before we knew it, we had another set of white twins, the Chivo boys.

Then La Gritona (Miss Shouter so named because of all her carrying on) gave birth very vocally one Sunday in the middle of one of my online classes. (Noise? What noise? Now, back to the difference between in, at and on.) Her little chivito is called Payaso (clown), since he’s often up to no good, knocking off the lamp, climbing the woodpile and so on.

The next set of twins were born before my husband could seal the deal of the borrega/chiva exchange with the owner. So mama and twin boys, Salt and Pepper came to live with us in December.

Fuzzy the sheep gave birth the next day to Zombeta, the first female offspring of the bunch. Fuzzy, a first-time mom, is quite the nervous Nellie. She doesn’t want to leave the corral without Zombeta, who really is too small to keep up with the herd/flock just yet, leading my husband on fun-filled romps around La Yacata in her efforts to get back to her little one. She also hollers throughout the day when Zombeta is out of sight, curled up with one of the other kids or lambs or just jumping about on the other side of the food trough.

Zombeta’s birth brought our baby population up to 8 running, frisky little fellas in under 2 weeks. But the population explosion wasn’t done yet!

The following week another little kid was born, Chiveta. Of course, this was the only goat that my husband wanted a boy birth since the mama was a Boer goat, but alas, a girl.

One sheep is still preggers but it will be a few months until she’s ready to give birth. I’d say we have our hands full as it is though, don’t you think?

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Do you want to read more about our animal adventures?

Check out more stories in Wascally Wabbits and Zombie Babies,

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Tagged as Animal Husbandry, homesteading, homesteading in Mexico, raising animals, raising goats, raising sheep

June 19, 2018 · 12:00 pm

Lady’s Arrival

My husband got it in his head that he wasn’t complete without a horse. Our last horse, Buttercup, had been traded for some of the sheep we currently have. Instead of making this purchase on his own, like he did with Alto, he decided to talk to my son and me about this possibility. The next day, he drove me to Jacales to see the horse he was thinking of buying. She was lovely but too thin for her height, which was considerable. The owner couldn’t say exactly how old she was, but she still had her baby beard, so we are estimating that she is under a year old.We took Zombie girl and a new sheep my husband had traded one of the black boy twins for to the market in Purandaro to sell. We also took Mary but she didn’t weigh enough for her to be worth selling, so we brought her home again.My husband asked two different guys with trucks that have high rails how much they would charge to go and get this horse in Jacales. One said $300 and the other said $400. Both were overpriced for the distance. Our own truck, which would get there and back on $200 pesos of gas, doesn’t have high sides and there was a risk the horse might jump out on the way and get injured.

My husband decided to investigate a road that runs from La Ordena to El Moral as a possible way to bring the horse to our house without being on such a large road since he was considering bringing it home with my son leading her on the motorcycle.

I’m always up for an adventure, so we were off to La Ordena. We asked an elderly lady with her umbrella if we were on the right road. Her eyebrows went sky-high. Yes, this was the road, but she wouldn’t say if it were passable even by moto. On we went. Just as we came to a fork in the road, we encountered a small herd of bulls. We pulled to the left crossroad and got out of their way. We had red shirts on and all. Well, my husband had on a red shirt, mine was sorta purple but I’m not sure what sort of color spectrum bulls have and wasn’t taking any chances.After they passed, we headed down this road that although rough, was still drivable until suddenly it wasn’t. Going just a little further was a mistake and we headed back the way we came in the blistering heat and no floppy hat for me. Halfway back, we ran into another cattle herd, a bit larger this time. My husband turned the moto around and we backtracked until we found some bushes we could hide in. You may laugh, but my husband has a healthy fear of bulls, having grown up in rural areas. While he felt confident that if he were charged, he could climb a mesquite tree, he wasn’t so sure about my mesquite climbing abilities.We hid there for about 10 minutes until we were sure the coast was clear. My husband decided that he would not be bringing his new horse this way after all.

While we were waiting for my check to be deposited since the sheep sale was short of the $8000 asking price, I asked my husband what name he thought he’d give her. We’ve had Black Beauty, Spirit, Shadow, Joey, Alto and Buttercup to date. I suggested Lady. His response was “Black Lady, like Michone” (from the Walking Dead.) Umm, no. That’s not what I had in mind at ALL! I offered a few other suggestions, but Black Lady stuck.

Early Friday morning, he headed to get the guia (permit) to move the horse. Every year, my husband, who has a registered brand, adds an imaginary horse to his patente (registration). This new horse could, therefore, be registered as one of those horses without a problem since she came without papers or brand.

In the end, he decided to pay someone with a properly railed truck to bring Lady home. He cleared out Joey’s old stall and escorted his new pride and joy in. She seems to really like it with us but gets nervy when we out of sight while she is tied outside. Since the rainy season is fast approaching, we hope she’ll be able to fill out some on all the lush greenery found in La Yacata for those few months. I’m not sure exactly how my husband plans on feeding her in the dry season, so we’ll see how it goes. For now, he picks up an armful of freshly cut alfalfa every two days from a truck that cruises around town for $120 pesos per week. He also gets a full back of corn leaves in exchange for a costal (feed bag) and 5 pesos from the guy who sells elotes (corn on the cob) from the back of his truck in town. Then we still have some dried alfalfa bales and a few dried corn bales which should keep Lady and the sheep happy until the heavens open up.