Black Mesa Ranch
Snowflake, Arizona, USA
Artisan Cheese
Nubian Goats
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Updated!
6/07: We have revamped our Ranch Workshop Packages!
In addition to our one and three-day cheese making and goat management workshops learn about our free open- house days and lodging accommodations.
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Award Winning Artisan Goat Cheeses
4 Awards 2005 ADGA National Competition
3 Awards 2004 ADGA National Competition
2 Awards 2005 ADGA National Competition
2 Awards 2004 ADGA National Competition
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Click here to read the online version of Kathryn's booklet
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This site last updated:
March 29, 2008
© 2000-2008 Black Mesa Ranch Inc. All Rights Reserved
Arizona Grown!
"The BMR Family"
6/1/01:
Did a bit of gardening today including planting another bed of about 30 zucchini seeds. Today was goat Angel’s first possible kidding date from her second time in with the buck. She is not really showing any signs of imminence, aside from getting HUGE!
6/2/01:
A slaughter day. Today we butchered the last 15 from our first batch chickens that we are not going to keep. The process went smoothly leaving us with 10 (eventual) laying hens and one rooster. He’s a goofy-looking “mop-topped” Polish Crested bird with an attitude and a somewhat abbreviated crow that sounds like he forgets what he’s doing halfway through.
Home-grown chicken! Mmmm GOOD!
6/3/01:
Worked in the Orchard: irrigated, treated many of the plants and trees with an insecticide for caterpillars and aphids and supplemented the newer plantings with B-1. Also did some gardening in the veggie plot and filled the water tank up at the well.
6/4/01:
Weather continues to be warm with highs in the mid to upper 90’s. Our thermometer is not working properly and while it shows the high’s to be over 100 degrees F. we know that’s not right. Our best guess is that it is showing 8 to 10 degrees high. The thermometer said 85 today and it felt great.
Rabbit Chesney delivered 9 dead kits this morning. It’s the first sign that any of the rabbits have been even slightly paying attention to any of our breeding efforts. Both Reba and Sage have been pulling hair and making nests but no babies are anywhere to be found.
6/5/01:
K went into town today for a visit to the dentist and to do some “run-around”.
Goat Trudy has been giving us fits with her mysterious and varying ailments so K brought a stool sample in to the vet to have checked. Trudy has been acting odd, her coat has been fading and looking duller, her milk production has dropped off and her droppings have been getting more and more loose. We have wormed her, treated her for coccidiosis (but we are still not sure if it could be that), her CDT shots are current and there is nothing unusual in her diet so we don’t know what to check next. The vet took one look at the sample and said, “It’s not coccidia for sure”. And left it at that. At least we didn’t get charged.
6/8/01:
We ordered 50 Cornish Rock cockerels from Welp Hatchery today. They will be hatched on 6/19 and will arrive here on the 21st.
We also got word finally from the AZ dept of Water Resources about the status of our request for an extension on building the reservoir dam on the big Hay Hollow Draw here on the property. Our request for the transfer of the Right and a one-year extension in which to do the work has been granted. This gives us until the first part of June 2002 to get the work done and send them proof of the work and usage. If we can figure out just where the best place is to put the dam it will give us a good-sized retention tank for some of the massive amounts of run-off water that comes through the property in the wash that we will be able to use for stock watering and irrigation. It should be quite a project.
Our friends from Tucson, Martha and Glenda, came up for a 2-day visit. They brought up a big car-load of “big city” shopping they had dome for us. It was very good to see them again. We even got to take a hike up the mesa with them.
Visiting friends with Kathryn (right) on the top of the mesa
Resting on the trail
We have now given up on any of the rabbits having any babies from this round of breeding and figure that we were dealing with multiple false-pregnancies. As very much “newbies” to rabbits we’re not sure what the problem is but we suspect that there may be some residual stress from the move and in getting used to their new accommodations to deal with. The heat is also another possibility; they tend to not do too well with litters in hot weather and the buck Paul might be having some temporary sterility problems despite our use of the misting system and giving them ice bottles daily as needed. We will resume the breeding program next week. We put up a shade cloth wind screen on the fence on part of the veggie garden today.
6/9/01:
Took a nice walk and took pictures of the long-abandoned hand-dug well Kathryn discovered down by the big wash.
Old hand-dug well
6/10/01:
Goat Angel is looking VERY ready to give birth. She has been restless and there is a slight discharge from her backside. We spent the day with her once M&G left to return to Tucson after a very nice weekend visit.
M&G get to play on the tractor
As evening approached we decided to spend the night out in the goat pen to be with her as it is her first freshening to watch for any problems. We brought a couple of reclining lawn chairs and sleeping bags in after dinner and made camp.
6/11/01:
Angel kids!
UGH! Not a good night’s sleep in the goat pen. I always thought that goats slept at night. HA!
Understandably, Angel was unsettled. She paced around a lot and had great difficulty finding a comfortable position in which to lay down and we would often open our eyes to see her inches from our noses just staring at us. Maybe her “antsy-ness” was contagious because NOBODY did much sleeping. Little goat Nutmeg was the worst. She thought the greatest game was to take great running leaps onto our chairs periodically. She’s now about 50 lbs and no twinkle-toes. She even managed to break my chair by jumping on the foot-end of the recliner, snapping the joint very nicely so I ended up only semi-reclined for the rest of the night. We also had to contend with the night’s chill air in trying to sleep. Even though the days are getting into the 90’s the overnight lows are in the mid-50’s. Brrrrrrrrrrr (but nice).
All of our diligence was for naught. As the sun rose Angel was still not in labor but continued to look near to it although she was still eating well. I went off to do a couple of chores (filled the water tank etc) while K stayed with the goats. The Propane guy delivered to both our LPG tanks.
K noticed a couple of early contractions from Angel at around 10AM and brought her into the Birthing Stall where she wandered around and nibbled at some food. I came back around 10:30 but there had only been maybe 2 more small-contractions. Just before 11AM she fussed a bit, lay down and had one hard contraction and her water broke. Almost immediately we see a little hoof emerge followed by a tiny nose. Oh-Oh! Where’s the other hoof? Goats are best born with their two front hoofs first and their snouts resting between them. The missing leg could be tangled up inside or could be twisted back causing both the mother and kid much stress and discomfort. K gently pressed the showing parts back in and found the errant hoof, and straightened it all out. Only a moment or two later we were holding a bouncing little 7.1# buck boy who we dubbed “Paco”. Paco was named after a favored Tucson Mexican restaurant of ours since he is chevron (goat meat) bound for the freezer in 6 months or so, once there is a little more meat on him. We get his mouth and nose cleared but before we can even get much cleaned off we see a second bubble appearing from Angel. TWINS! This time a little girl pops out, bag intact and we work quickly to clear her breathing and clean off the both of them. As we’re cleaning up Paco we hear an approaching vehicle. It is our solar guy coming to trouble-shoot our system which has been acting “glitch-y”. Not able to stop we tell them to come into the barn while we finish up. The two little kids are soon up and wobbling around and Angel is doing well. She’s a little bit torn from Paco’s big head but is alert and eating the warm molasses-bran mash and warm molasses water we’ve offered her. The little 5.6# doe now named Anise (pronounced “A – Niece”) seems tiny and weak next to her brother and we are concerned about a possible underbite problem we think we notice, but she’s alert and takes the colostrum replacer we have provided until we can get Angel milked. We notice that both of their little baby sets of teeth seem to still be encased in the mouth gum material, which we had not seen when Nutmeg had been born a few months ago. The solar guys are suitable “awed” by the cuties and nice enough not to make a big deal of my blood and goat gore, “ectoplasm” –soaked pants while we work on checking out the solar equipment. The kids were almost immediately brought into the house where they will live for the next 10-14 days to minimize the bonding with their mother, which will simplify keeping them together later without them wanting to drink directly from her. We will pasteurize all their milk to lessen the chance of any CAE transference to them (IF the mother has it).
6/12/01:
We’ve renamed Paco, he’s now “Ancho” (a type of chile pepper). The darned little guy is just too cute, and what a stud-ly fellow he is too. Placed an order with Caprine Supply Company for a variety of goat-oriented supplies including a book on Pack Goats. I’m hoping to be able to come up with a decent (exc)use for us to keep him and with all the walks we take it might be fun to have a goat toting the water etc. We’ll see.
We really don’t want 5 goats we think so now we are discussing selling Anise. She’s purebred Nubian (even though there are no “papers”) and her line is from some good milkers so we might be able to get a decent price. On the other hand of she does have a jaw problem she might have trouble eating properly and she would not be a good choice for anybody’s breeding program. Her mother Angel has a slightly prominent lower jaw but it is hardly noticeable and certainly does not affect her eating ability. I guess we’ll just wait and see how things work out. We worm treated Trudy, Angel and Nutmeg today and trimmed Angel’s hoofs.
Munching thistles on an evening walk (yum!)
6/14/01:
Started in breeding the rabbits again today with Chesney. She seemed very willing and able with the buck so we hope she catches and does better this time. Her losing all of her last litter was apparently not all that uncommon for first-time breedings.
We had to re-disbud Nutmeg today. She had some pretty good-little horns starting despite our best efforts before. None of us were happy campers about having to do this but, as with last time she got over it quicker than we did. It’s amazing how a handful of sunflower seeds can make a goat’s day go so much better (wish it were so easy for us!). We also wormed the little goat twins today. Oh yes… the little goat buck has yet another official name as of today. We are now going to call him “Ordoño” (also a type of chile pepper). This is final and the very last name we will give him (so we say now).
6/15/01:
We have been having on-going problems with getting the rabbits to use their new high-tech (OK maybe not exactly high tech, but new-fangled) waterers. They are large capacity and of a newer design that let us easily fill them from the top without removing them from the cages but they have a tiny metal rod sticking out from the business end where the rabbits drink from instead of the traditional roller ball. These rabbits are just not being able to figure them out. They have been used to drinking from bowls but seem to be able to use the roller-type waterer just fine but when we put the newer ones in they haven’t a clue what to do. I have written to several rabbit related chat groups online and even to the company that makes the waterers. The general consensus was that nobody’s ever had problems before and they can’t believe it. We did get a nice response from the owner of the waterer company but his info was not of much use. The online folks had a couple of suggestions (stick a piece of hay in it to make it drip all the time and get them used to it, to basically jamming their little faces into it) some of which we’ve tried but as of now only 2 of the 5 are getting it. We’re now trying to put molasses on the tips to see if they are interested and doing a lot of hand jiggling of the rod so they can see how it works. These are some thick rabbits.
6/16/01:
Filled the water tank today and watered the orchard. Continued with our attempted breeding of the rabbits. Lucy and Reba have been most uncooperative. They have been aggressive against the buck and do everything in their power to keep him from them.
6/17/01:
Bred Sage and as a nice change she was willing and able to conduct the business at hand with the buck. I’m starting to think that if the buck and doe don’t “hit it off” in the first few seconds, it just ain’t gonna happen at all.
6/20/01:
Ordoño and Anise (right)
Ordoño and Anise will spend their first night out in the goat habitat with the rest of their kin tonight. They have spent the last 10 days living in the house and as fun as it has been it will be nice to get some of the rolls of paper towels (which are EVERYWHERE) put away. We have been working on socializing them with the rest of the herd and everybody seems to be getting along OK. Our hope is that these 10 days away from their mother with us bottle feeding them will have broken the bond to the point where they don’t even consider her a potential source of food, and that she won’t allow them to nurse even if they want. This allows us to control the amount of milk they get carefully and gives us the chance to pasteurize the milk before they get it. We drink all our milk raw, but it’s important to give the little guys pasteurized in order to help avoid certain diseases being transferred to them.
We have continued to try and breed the rabbits Reba and Lucy but to no avail. They are just being so uncooperative I fear for Paul’s (the buck) safety. I have taken to holding the does for him and have attempted about everything I can think of to get them to hold still and raise up those little tails for him. Not interested at all. Where exactly did that expression about “breeding like rabbits” come from anyway?
6/21/01:
53 Cornish-Rock-cross meat chicks arrive!
Watered the orchard today and planted some replacement blackberries up there that arrived yesterday from Gurney’s for some missing ones from the last order. The order of 50 Cornish Rock cockerels arrived in good health this morning (actually 53 showed up). We have their brooder set up in the guest bathroom this time (easier to clean than the bedroom we used last time and BOY can those little guys make a dusty mess!).
6/22/01:
Filled the water tank today.
½ (30) of the Cotoneasters (koe-toe-nee-ass’-ters) arrived from Gurney’s today. They will form the windbreak for the vegetable garden along the west and south sides.
We banded (elastricator castration) little Ordoño (we also now call him ‘Doño for short but that doesn’t count as another name, really). We followed all the instructions carefully and it looks like we did a good job, having never done it before. He was not particularly comfortable for the first hour but seemed much better after that. Still a bit of a stiff-legged gate but better. We also gave him and Anise their CDT shots today.
6/24/01:
We gave rabbit Paul the day off today. He’s been doing his best trying to work with those uncooperative does and deserved it.
One of the new baby chicks died overnight so we’re down to 52. Tonight we begin their feed restriction schedule. This type of meat birds are developed to grow so fast that if they are fed unrestricted they will eat themselves to death. Really. They will eat and eat and eat faster than they can digest, stuffing their crops full of food to the point where if they sit down it presses on their little hearts and kills them with a heart attack (known in the business as “flip”). The solution to this is to remove their access to food periodically. There are different approaches to this but we will be removing all food from them for a period of 12 hours from about 7PM to 7AM from now until they are butchered.
6/25/01:
Re-wormed Trudy, Angel and Nutmeg today.
Nice weather with a high around 85 degrees F. and some afternoon rain.
Weighed the goat twins toady: Ordoño=12.5#, Anise=10.8#.
The light has finally come on for rabbit Paul with his waterer! After intense (seriously intense) efforts by Kathryn he is actually drinking out of the waterer on his own. It seems so stupid to be so excited about this, but we are. In the end all it took was half killing him with thirst (I don’t even want to think about what this has done to his breeding potential), 8 or 10 trips out everyday for a week to play “Water Maid” for him and a couple of days of jamming peanut butter up the spout of his waterer but we think he’s really got it! Now Sage is the last rabbit to get on the bottles and life will be good. Hopefully the peanut butter trick will work for her also.
6/26/01:
Lost another chick overnight so we’re down to 51 now.
Spent the whole day working on planting the Cotoneasters for the windbreak at the Veg Garden. K worked the backhoe, loosening up the soil down a couple of feet, I went behind and rototilled up the big chunks until everything was pretty smooth. I then, again with the rototiller, worked in a bunch of organics (yards and yards of mostly goat house compost but some mulch and other stuff too), then raked the whole area nice and smooth. We then dug 16-18” holes about every 18” and planted the stock, making a deep well for watering as we went. The plants showed up bare-root but were well into coming out of dormancy. They looked great with good size and terrific root growth to start from so we are encouraged.
Planting the cotoneaster wind break for garden
6/28/01:
Worked on building a surround for the generator shed at the Powerhouse today. Using primarily scrap and salvaged wood (aside from some OSB for the siding), the project went well and will now protect the machine from the dust and elements. My only concern was that, while I put eave vents and a good-sized exhaust port area, it restricted, somewhat, the airflow to the generator which really was designed to operate without an enclosure. As it turned out the concerns were valid. When we went to run the generator for a couple of hours this evening it shut itself off with an “Over Temperature” warning light. I let it cool off for a while then re-started it with no problems. This time I left the ~4x8’ door propped open and it ran nice and cool. So now our choices are to either; cut and screen a lot more air vents in the siding (which will negate any dust control benefit), or open the door whenever we run the generator. For now we’ll opt for the second choice as it is the dust control that is the most important reason for having the enclosure.
6/29/01:
We weighed the little goat twins today: Ordoño=20#, Anise=17#. Big problem today: We noticed that Ordoño’s castration banding doesn’t look like it is working. While the band we put on is secure and it is doing it’s job of cutting off the circulation to the “purse”, it has apparently slipped down and it’s obvious that the important parts aren’t in there any more. This is really bad. We don’t really know what to do, but we cut off the band (I made THAT sound easier than it was I’ll tell you), thinking that maybe we will be able to pull the testis back down and re-band right away. No way we were going to be able to do that, it was just too small and tight. Now we’re really worried so we called up our neighbor and all-round solid goat person Linda who also works at the feed store in town. She says, “Bring him in so I can take a look”. We are beside ourselves with feeling how we have screwed up and bring him in to the store right away. Linda took a good look at him and after commiserating for a bit told us that it wasn’t that bad and she’d be glad to help us put another band on in a week or so, after the part we had banded had a chance to heal more.
We have been doing research and discussing for some time whether or not we wanted to add some more solar generating capacity to our PV solar set-up. While we are generally squeaking by, we use on average just a bit more juice than we generate on a given day. This means that we need to run the LPG generator for a couple of hours every few days to keep the batteries where we want them to be. It also means that we have to continue to be extra vigilant in every power-using thing we do and that when something special comes up (like needing a heat lamp for baby chicks, or having company visiting) we are stretched too thinly. Today we decided that, in the interest of improving our piece of mind and easing our lifestyle a bit, we would go ahead and get another 3rd array. This means a commitment of around $4,000, which might, arguably, serve us better invested but we will proceed with the project anyway. The big trick will now be to get our solar guy to do it. He has recently been tied up with a new venture and has been virtually impossible to get a hold of, let alone get committed to do another job.
6/30/01:
Applied fertilizer to the trees and other fruits in the orchard then irrigated the area, also filled the water tank at the well.
We’ve been (OK, mostly I’ve been…) talking about getting an Internet domain name registered for the ranch. Today I did it. While my first choice for the name was already taken we ended up with a pretty good one: “BlackMesaRanchOnline.com”. It cost $16 a year for 2 years (with first refusal on future usage) and according to all the info it should be available for use in a couple of days. In the mean time I will be forwarding our current web page through that address and working on getting our new email addresses (David @ BlackMesaRanchOnline.com etc.) up and running. Whooo hooo what fun!
We actually got to see some of the town’s 4th of July celebration fireworks show from our house tonight. We were surprised when we looked out our living room window and spotted the tops of several large starbursts visible over a far mesa on the horizon. It looked like a pretty good display, what we could see of it, so we’re going to climb to the top of our mesa next year and camp out up there for the whole show.