The ranch

Things have been changing around the Wilhoit Ranch the past week to ten days.  We had an incident almost three weeks ago with our racehorse, Blue, and our doesn't-play-well-with-others riding horse, Woody.  Woody kicked the daylights out of Blue and Blue never recovered.  Literally.  It was a sad event because she was such a sweetie, but she is no longer suffering, thankfully.  She was finally ready to start racing for real too.  I guess she'll be running on a track of gold instead.  For now, we are out of the racing business. 

The pigs have been relocated for the timebeing.  It's breeding time for them and they are with Mr. Strawberry.  And guess what?  Ruby has issues...she is a stress ball.  Seriously.  She cannot seem to handle the stress of the whole breeding process.  She turns purple, stiffens up, sits down, etc...so she was artificially inseminated.  Exciting news, I know.  Now we wait to see if Yadi and Ruby have successfully been bred and then the real fun begins.  Heard this week there would be a pork/bacon shortage next year.  You know how the media can be, but maybe this could work in our favor....Yeah, right!

The goats are adorable to look at and funny, but they're sort of driving us nuts.  As winter is approaching, we're thinking it may be time for them to find a new home.  Here's the thing, the wether, Whitie, is useless, literally.  He is 'fixed' so he cannot be used for breeding.  Brownie, the buck, who could be used for breeding is sort of small, and we could get a doe and have her bred by him.  However, we're not so sure we want to be taking care of baby goats and piglets in the freezing cold weather this winter.  We have a hard enough time keeping one newborn species alive in extreme circumstances, let alone two. 

One night last week when Madolyn and I got home from town, Jay and Lane were playing basketball...and so were the goats and Hank.  It was so funny.  I tried to get pictures but they didn't turn out too well.  Brownie kept going after the ball and headbutting it.  (He likes to headbutt Hank too.  Hank doesn't get it.  Poor guy.)  Those goats like to be right in the middle of the action unless they're hungry, and honestly, they're always hungry.

Last Thursday, I got home from work and was in the process of unloading my truck.  (That was the day I had went to Sam's for supplies.)  I left my back door open, and when we came outside to retrieve the rest of the stuff, the goats had gotten in the truck and had the hot dog buns strewn across the concrete pad.  Fortunately, they didn't have enough time to actually open the bags and the buns weren't ruined.  Then, after shutting the door to the truck and going inside, Lane came out and discovered the goats trying to get in the truck...can you say scratch-scratch!  Fortunately, again, they were caught in time and no major damage was done to my paint job, but honestly, you can't leave them alone for a minute.  They are so nosey.

Saturday, I worked all morning on my porch, washed windows, washed the railing, washed the siding, swept, knocked down cobwebs, etc.  Later that morning when I was cleaning inside, I heard a noise on the porch, looked outside and those doggone goats were looking in the window, standing on the railing, nosing up to the front door glass, etc.  I had just planted small mums in my railing flower boxes and added a pumpkin in each...they were discovered.  All the blooms were off the mums in one box.  I ran outside in a rampage and, nicely, told Jay the goats were ruining all my work!  I kindly escorted them to their pen...Brownie headbutted me three times.  We may not be friends anymore, I'm not sure.  I think they're wearing out their welcome.

So the Wilhoit Ranch is undergoing some changes, some good, some not-so-good.  We will adjust.  When I found out about Ruby's anxiety and stress issues, I told Jay that we seem to be better at controlling the animal population than increasing it.  Maybe that is our role, who knows.  I guess we'll keep trying.

Goats anyone?