the goat farmer's almanac

Kidding season ended late this year when Zillah's 3-year old, Tsilah, kidded 2 does on June2. One was stillborn with an oddly cork-screwed neck, the other one perfectly normal. I left the kid on her dam as we had neither the time nor inclination to bottle raise a single kid this late in the year.

An August-like heat wave settled in the following Thursday. Fortunately, we'd just installed a new waterer for the does before it hit so I wasn't too concerned about keeping them hydrated. All the same, hot weather is hard on goats as it is for any other livestock.

Sunday, Tsilah's now six day old kid wandered into the metal sided shed we use for the bucks and from which I'd removed Eleazar the day before because of the heat. I don't know how long she'd been in there but she was barely able to stand when we found her and her temp was 108. We put her in front of a fan and spritzed her with water until her temperature was down to a near normal 102. She drank water and suckled her dam. We left her for the night.

Monday morning, the kid was totally wasted -- limp as a dishrag. I was able to hold her up to Tsilah's teat and she drank a little. I left for work figuring for sure she'd be dead when I returned. I left work early dreading the whole trip home the thought of finding a dead kid. Turns out, the kid was still alive when I arrived home. So, I brought her in out of the heat and into our air-conditioned kitchen and called Doc Carmen. He told me to mix up 2 teaspoons of baking soda in about a half cup of water and drench her with about 20 cc then call him back in 15 minutes. Sure enough, within 15 minutes the kid stood up and even managed to stumble out of the box I'd put her in!

Turns out she had a case of heat-induced "floppy kid syndrome" which is a severe case of acidosis easily remedied by soda bicarbonate. After a couple of days in the house and a course of oral antiobiotics the kid was back to 100% by the end of week.

This is the first case of FKS in my nearly 14 years as a goatherd. Thankfully, we have Doc Carmen!

A recent Business Week features another special report on how big financial institutions mine gold from those in poverty. The Ugly Side of Microlending details how Mexican banks are busting peasants' kneecaps over loans averaging $257 at interest rates upwards of 100%. It's a nice companion piece to their report on the poverty business from a few months back.

For a week every October a nice hotel in a nice American city is overrun by 300 or so dairy goat farmers and a few of the industry's choicest animals. This year's site of the 2007 American Dairy Association Convention was the Marriot in Fort Collins Colorado.

In terms of boosting the local economy, an ADGA gathering is not on par with, say, a Shriner's convention but hotel staffs always seem to get a kick out of having their grand ball room turned into a stable for the Spotlight Sale -- an auction of some of the finest dairy goat kids in the country. My favorite this year was a little buck named South Fork Chalupa Bravo who carries some of the same bloodlines that are in our herd and would have make a super addtion. He went for $2,000. If I could have afforded the 1st class airplane ticket for him back to Maryland, I would have bid him up.

I'm always impressed with the tireless efforts of ADGA people toward improving the dairy goat industry on all levels -- from the educational sessions on veterninary care to the dawn-to-dusk Board and Committee meetings. My first ADGA convention was in Syracuse, New York in 1995 and the one this year was my sixth. Next year's convention is in Sonoma County California, the epicenter of goat dairy-dom. I can hardly wait!

I refuse to celebrate them as "the greatest generation" because in doing so we are celebrating courage and sacrifice in the cause of war. And we are miseducating the young to believe that military heroism is the noblest form of heroism, when it should be remembered only as the tragic accompaniment of horrendous policies driven by power and profit. Indeed, the current infatuation with World War II prepares us-innocently on the part of some, deliberately on the part of others-for more war, more military adventures, more attempts to emulate the military heroes of the past.

Howard Zinn, The Greatest Generation?

As Zinn points out, the “greatest generation” is a dangerous cultural construct . For me, it's also personal having experienced firsthand the greatest generation in the personage of my Dad; a sullen, festering boil of resentment whose main avocation was falling off his bar stool at the American Legion Hall. Who knows, Dad and his greatest generation buddies at the Legion might have been the same emotional cripples without their war experiences but I'm pretty sure it didn't help. At his mother's funeral, my Dad's twin brother felt obliged -- probably out of embarrassment -- to explain to me why he couldn't cry: he'd seen "too many dead people in the war."

I watched an episode of The War the other night expecting a big dose of Greatest Generation hagiography but got instead some surprising glimpses of the real deal. Many of those interviewed about their war experiences expressed a disconcerting moral numbness typified by the reminisces of a bomber pilot who confessed to feeling sick before each bombing run knowing he was off to kill innocents. But, once he was in his plane and off the ground it became a job, a job he had to do.

People of my parents' generation were not a whole lot different than any other generation: most of them ordinary folks helpless, powerless or unwilling to buck the rules of life's big game. So, they end up doing their jobs as though firebombing Hamburg was no different than bolting fenders on the assembly line. Dad never considered himself a hero and treating him and his buddies as if they were marble war statues was the last thing they needed or wanted. Helping them regain and maintain their humanity might have helped.

From our trip to Anne's last weekend, here's a few shots of Fallingwater and the Chiluly installation at the Phipps Conservatory . And, a few brief words on each ....

"Does this seem like a house built in 1936?" was the first question our guide asked as we entered the living room at Fallingwater. "Well, yes, it does" was my immediate thought although most of our tour group didn't agree. Two questions kept coming to mind as we walked in and around this magnificant building. Did Wright -- or his engineers -- make the most of currently available technology? And, what would the house look like if built today? I've not a real clue as to the first except for a notion that there must have been better alternatives to the heavily reinforced concrete used in the cantilevered terraces. There's no doubt Wright's ideas could be more completely realized with today's construction technologies. For example, current plastics eliminate the need for the heavy metal framing used in the window framing thus better enabling the sightlines Wright desired in his "cornerless" window framing schemes.

I enjoy botanical gardens such as the Phipps because as with any biosphere they are places of infinite and sublime discovery. Chiluly's pieces at the Phipps worked best for me when I had to discover them buried in the ecospace such as this Ikebana or when they stood on their own, such as the float boat, as if in a retail display. What didn't work were those rooms where the plants were overwhelmed by the glass. Witness the Cobalt Fiori room where the lovely and subtle Bismark palms and curry plants are mere back drop for a kitschy display of alien shapes and colors reminiscent of a fifties sci-fi movie set.

On another level, judging from the number of them he's done, these Chiluly installations must be a windfall for botanical gardens. The Phipps was packed on our Saturday afternoon visit as if it were a Matisse exhibit at the Modern. More power to them all!

Labels: Fallingwater Chiluy Phipps Conservatory