2026 Fall update
Busy, busy fall getting ready for winter. Goats are bred, rabbits are bred, hay is stacked, Dave has a new blanket.
9/18/20264 min read
Fall is starting to make its way to us, and the cooler weather has brought one of our favorite shifts of the year. Summer production starts winding down, breeding season gets underway, winter feed gets stacked, and suddenly we're planning several months ahead for all the new arrivals.
Goat Breeding Season Is Looking Very Promising
Our goat breeding season is nearly wrapped up, and so far things are looking very promising for an early January through February kidding season!
All of the does we planned to breed have now been bred, with the exception of Maude and Trixie. Trixie is sitting this season out to give her more time to grow, while Maude will be milked through the winter rather than bred this year.
Even better, none of the bred does have come back into heat so far. It's still too early to count kids before they're born, but that's exactly what we want to see!
With breeding behind us, the next big transition will be drying off the pregnant milkers. We're looking at late October through early November to begin drying everyone off except Maude. That will give the girls a good rest before kidding while Maude keeps a little milk flowing through the winter.
Winter feed is coming together, too. We recently got our load of perennial peanut hay, and it is gorgeous.
Despite the name, perennial peanut hay isn't the waste vines left over from the peanut industry. Perennial peanut is a perennial legume grown specifically as livestock forage and is often compared with alfalfa. I think I actually like it better.
It's incredibly leafy, the stems are much finer than a lot of the alfalfa we've bought, and almost nothing gets left behind in the feeders. The goats, horses, and rabbits all love it.
Our current supply should carry us until at least December, and just in time, the roofing supplies arrived for our next farm project: expanding the hay-storage area. More animals means more hay, and having enough covered space to keep a larger supply dry and protected has become increasingly important.
Between bred does, winter hay, and more room to store it, we're getting closer and closer to being ready for kidding season.
The Rabbitry Is Back in Business
Cooler temperatures also mean rabbit breeding season has started again.
Our rabbits get a substantial break during the hottest part of the year. Once temperatures become comfortable again, we can put them back to work through fall, winter, and spring.
Not every doe was ready for our first breeding, and that's perfectly fine. Enough were ready that we should still have a solid first freezer crop on the way. Our gorgeous pair of Giant Chinchillas were ready! We're so looking forward to kits from them.
Rather than breeding everyone at once, we're planning staggered breeding rounds throughout the cooler season. That should give us a more manageable flow of litters instead of one enormous wave of rabbits all at once, while also letting us adjust the schedule as we go. We are aiming to fill the freezer this year, so we are planning to breed as often as we safely can.
We'll be watching each doe's condition closely throughout the season. Does maintaining good condition can continue on schedule, while anyone who needs additional recovery time gets a break. Our warm climate gives them a long summer vacation, so winter is when the rabbitry can really get busy.
And Then There's Sigyn...
Sigyn is getting huuuuge.
And gorgeous. She's really nicely put together.
She's doing wonderful around all of the livestock and continuing to settle beautifully into her role here. She's also incredibly sweet and gentle with her children. She absolutely loves them, and despite how enormous she's becoming, she's pretty careful with them, aside from zoomies.
There's still plenty of puppy in there, but we're very happy with how she's developing and how naturally she's becoming part of everyday farm life.
Getting Ready for Winter
The roofing supplies aren't the only sign that we're thinking ahead to colder weather.
Dave got his winter blanket fitted and ready to go. Our horses don't live in blankets all winter, we prefer to let their natural winter coats do their job. But we like having blankets fitted and ready for those miserable combinations of cold rain or cold wind, or simply for the days when one of the horses makes it clear that they're feeling the cold.
Dave is now officially prepared whenever he decides he'd like to wear his, the other two already have theirs.
We're not exactly heading into a quiet season.
The goats are bred. The rabbits are bred. Hay is stacked. The hay shed is getting bigger. The milkers will soon begin their winter break, and before we know it, we'll be back in the kidding stall welcoming the first babies of 2027.
For now, though, we're enjoying the cooler weather and checking things off the winter prep list one project at a time.
January will be here before we know it.
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