Kidding season has finally come to an end. Don't remember the exact numbers, but I believe it was close to 40 kids on the ground by the time it was all said and done. We've only been to one dairy show and one Boer show so far this year. Had 2 goats each get a leg at the dairy show. Then at the Boer show and took a true 50/50 (Boer/Nubian cross) and took first in her class and 2nd in the division in % class. Not bad going against a lot of percentages that are really full blood. Leaving on Friday to head to Harrisburg, PA for 8 days to the National ADGA show. Should be fun. My daughter is taking some kids, a couple yearlings, and one milker, but she has hook up with 3 or 4 of the best breeders in the country to help show their goats. Should be a good learning experience for her, get her some money, and help her get her name out there for recognition. I'm taking the truck with camper and Monica is taking the Suburban with stock trailer. 400 miles each direction. Staying at the farm expo center. No water or sewer hook-ups, so this could be interesting. Have pumps and tanks so that I can pump both fresh and gray water to where I need it to be.
From a barn standpoint. We got an 8x10 metal shed from mom. We glued 1 1/2" Styrofoam to the ceiling and put OSB on the walls. These both help with heat and keeping them from tearing it up. We have our wethers and young bucks in this barn. We also got a deal on 20 12' cattle panels + a gate. This allowed us to expand the does' pasture area bit. Since it is now hot, we are back to having to run fans in the barn. Nice thing is, since the electric is finished we don't have extension cords running everywhere. The other thing that is nice, since the concrete was poured in April, it has helped keep the barn a bit cleaner. We've had a couple automatic waterers for a couple years but we had to run water hoses. These were a pain to keep them from leaking. This winter we found automatic waters on sale at TSC. We got enough to put one in every stall - even though the stalls aren't used much this time of year. Now what has made it super nice, I was able to run PEX plumbing to all of them. No more water hoses running through the aisle and leaking connections. Each water has its own valve and can be shut of and removed from the system with a swivel connection so that it can be drained, replaced, or whatever. I've also got a connection built into so that I can blow it out with air come this winter. I was worried about heat building up in the water line since it is in the ceiling, but it seems like there is enough water moving that it actually stays pretty cool.
Still haven't been able to start the walls for the storage area and milk room because of both time and money. Maybe after the fair we can. Have to at least get the one wall built so that we can get the stall "back". Had to take the one side of the stall down to pour the concrete.