About the Farm
Welcome, All. Where do I begin?!? Well, I always wanted to own a farm. A place where I could raise/sell livestock and grow my own feed for them. So that is my ultimate goal. What type of livestock and purpose on the land has changed from time to time, but my main goal has always stayed the same... "Land, Shannon!" (From the movie, Far and Away 1992 with Nicole Kidman and Tom Cruise)
In 2007, my husband and I married. He was on board with my dream. We needed enough land for our horses. We found a nice place with two acres. It wasn't what we had planned for, but it was what we could afford. They say if you have a dream start by writing it down. I wanted to own a farm, so I would need a farm name. We came up with Painted Valley Farm. I didn't want a farm name with a certain animal and product in it. This way my dream could mold and fit my acreage at any given time. The painted part was from my horse. Which was a Quarter Horse Paint.
So let me show you something crazy. God works in mysterious ways. My dream place is a farm, which we already established. My husband's dream place is a Cape Cod-style house with four or five acres, up against State Game Lands. In 2012, we were buying hay off this guy, who was selling his house. He would keep asking us to come to take a look at it and how great it would be for us. We were not looking to buy a house. We only had our current home for five years. There was no way we could get another place this soon. Well. think again! He finally got us to come to take a look at his place. And guess what it was? A Cape Cod-style house with four acres, up against State Game Lands. Wait! What!! Yep, my husband's dream place just sitting there pretty as could be. It sat between two farms!!!! A beef cattle farm to its left and 70 plus acres farm to its right. The farm to its right had an empty horse barn that we could use and its pasture. Plus, they make hay every year!!! Win, Win. So, to make this long story a little shorter. We were able to sell our current house within two months and buy this one.
You could say "beauty is in the eye of the beholder." Our new home did have pasture and fences but needed some help to get it back into shape. Multifloral was smothering the pastures. The fences haven't been used in years. It was a bit of a mess. But we know its potential and the beauty that was hiding underneath.
We were able to get the fences back into working order relatively quickly. The multiflora and brush were another thing. Removing it was painstakingly slow. I knew goats could help make this clean-up a lot easier. After talking with my husband, we went to a local boar goat farm and bought two does. They were wonderful. They ate that stuff like it was candy. They loved it. Over time my pastures were looking like pastures again.
As time went on. We were in need of more goats. I wanted a multipurpose animal. I like the idea of having to rely on outside goods, the better. So I was looking at all different varies and breeds. Icelandic Sheep was one of them. But sheep are more grazers than brush eaters. I wasn’t interested in a dairy animal. I wasn’t really ready or wanting to commit to that volume of milk. Plus, we would not use that much milk on a daily basis. My husband suggested fainting goats. He thought is was hilarious the way they “fainted”. I read that the fainting goats were easier to keep in a fenced-in area. This was due to the fact, they don’t like to climb the fence. I was having trouble keeping the past goats on the pasture. I had to chain them like dogs. Which wasn’t fun. They would get the chain all wrapped up around roots, saplings, etc. This didn’t allow us to go away for the weekend on a short camping trip. So a goat that would mind the fence, sounded too good to be true. After doing a little more research on the breed. We bought our first Myotonic goats Blane and Annie in the Spring of 2020. I was hooked. They didn't climb the fences like other goats. They don’t “faint” all the time like video clips make it out to be. I’m not one to try to make them faint. But when they do, it is funny. One time our little herd fainted, due to a nest of baby bunnies. The bunnies started squeaking and the goats went down.
Currently, I have four does and one wether (castrated male) and buckling. Planning to have kids in the late spring of 2023.