Into each life, a lot of rain is falling right now.......

The rain in Spain has left and is all coming down in Tennessee. I am loathe to complain about the desperately needed water, but geez........ The goats are water-logged, my house is about to slide off it's little hill and it looks like someone opened up the Three Gorges Dam in my back yard. Yuck!!!! I am currently wracking my brain (it doesn't take long - there isn't a lot to wrack) to figure out what I'm going to construct so that my poor goats don't have to tread water ever again. Their barn flooded - there wasn't a dry square inch anywhere. My husband got the "eyes of death" cast in his direction when he suggested that I could rig up a way that they could go into the garage, saying of course, that he couldn't live with that kind of thing, but perhaps I could. (bring a goat into your house to wash her feet in your tub during the winter to treat a foot problem and hear about it for the rest of your life!) It sort of sounded f like he was saying " Well, there's a pool and a pond.....pool, pond - pond would probably be good for you." Okay - letting it go now.

Anyway....I'm determined that tomorrow, I'm going to rectify this problem - in between housework, taking care of kids and goats, going to the vet's to get training in FAMACHA, which is learning how to deworm your goats on an as needed basis rather than an every 3 months basis or whatever you're accustomed to. FAMACHA is a good thing for any number of reasons, not the least of which is medicating as needed so that the worms don't become resistant to the dewormers. This is already happening, but perhaps if more people learn, it will slow down further progression of this problem. It's amazing how we done the same thing to our animals that we've done to ourselves - medicate the crap out of everyone so no one will get really sick, while in the meantime, we are actually growing bugs/ worms/ germs , the likes of which the world has never seen. I've really had worms or deworming to be more precise, on my mind here lately because I would like to make a committment to the herbal worming - and it is a committment - but I just want to make sure it's the best thing for the goats. Herbal deworming not only demands a time committment on the caregiver's part, but also a financial committment as well. I believe that in my heart of hearts it would be worth it , but as always, money is tight and it's going to take some juggling. I am getting my information, and hopefully the herbs themselves from Molly's Herbals, as in Molly of Fias Co Farm. I think that she is a super person who is doing a lot to make information available to whoever searches for it, and she puts a tremendous amount of time in this effort, to the extent of putting her business on hold so that she can put more work into the Fias Co site. She and her husband Larry, have a herd of La Manchas, which is wonderfully photographed and detailed on her website, and she has information pertaining to any aspect of goat husbandry, milking and healthcare that you could possibly want. She also has links to make donations to her site if you are so inclined and if you visit her site, I hope you will be inclined , because she is doing a terrific job.on this site which has it all. I should warn you though, if you read her stories about her goats, just go on and have a box of tissues right there with you because the stories I've read are so moving, that I just couldn't help crying. I can't even think of the name Goldie, with out my eyes getting watery.

Molly - thanks for all that you do.