Hobby Farm Families?

[BenedictGomez]

I grew up raising goats in 4H.   Back then, nobody owned those dwarf goats, it was all full-size goats (Toggenburg, Lamancha, Nubian, or Alpine).

 

Best I can tell, sometime in the last 20 years those dwarf goats exploded in popularity here, probably because folks have less space in Jersey and/or they're easier to manage.  Who knows.   I'm not a fan through, give me a real, full-size goat.  We raised Nubians, and growing up I never drank cow milk from a grocery store.

[Batsto]

Goats are wild! They love beer and cigars.

[gphunter]

Awesome-we've got a 4H shooting club out our way called the Hunterdon Deadeyes. I'm going to start my girls (6 and 3) out with chickens to get them acquainted with basic care and feeding, etc...then if all goes well I'll look into goats. What breeds of chicken have you had? I'd like to start with some gentler breeds that are easy for the girls to handle and then over time get some that are better foragers. From what I've heard the breeds that forage really well aren't usually that fond of being handled.

We tried a bunch of different chicken breeds, the only time we had a problem was with roosters. The meat birds just sit and eat all day and are only around for about 10 weeks before they find there way to the freezer. We had a couple of goats for a while and we personally enjoy sheep a lot better. If you can get your girls a couple of lambs in the spring it might be a better experience for all of you, the goats we had broke out of the pastures and got into everything then broke back into the pastures when you spotted them.

[Rusty]

Goats are wild! They love beer and cigars.

 

         

[Woodsman416]

No goats or sheep yet but we do have horses. Probably chickens next year. Kids are grown but grand children open up new possibilities for 4H. For the last couple of years I've been entering vegetables in the Hunterdon County 4H fair. I entered six classes last week and took home 5 ribbons.

[Swamp_Yankee]

Had some visitors to the pond recently:

 

 

 

Disregard the "ASSUNPINK" stamp on the images-years ago I used to put this camera up at Assunpink Wildlife Management Area when I hunted there.  It's an old Moultrie camera and not very sharp-the newer ones are much better, but it's pretty clear that we've got a sow and some cubs frequenting the area.  In other news the septic work is progressing:

 

 

 

Only eight more feet of excavation and 1700 tons of select fill to go...    Finally we met the new neighbors at the farm down the road for a picnic and almost brought home a goat-still a little early for that though:

 

[Swamp_Yankee]

Septic work continues...

 

 

 

 

Kind of funny considering this place would have had an outhouse when it was originally built.  That's about 800 yards of displaced dirt.  The hole will be filled with 1200 tons of select fill to create the zones of treatment and disposal for the effluent coming from the field, then all of the dirt has to be spread on site and regraded.  

[Swamp_Yankee]

Merry Christmas from the farm!

 

[tcook8296]

Very nice. My wife and I purchased a small farm and were hoping to start building soon. Good luck with it

[Farmshine]

Welcome to the Twp! How’s the deer population on that side of the mountain? Any animals yet?

 

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Edited December 28, 2017 by Farmshine

[Bonefreak]

You guys are living the dream owning hobby farms in NJ. Must be fun for family and kids. Would love to do it, but there is no way to afford it....wife is a halfa city girl anyways!! Lol

[Rusty]

Merry Christmas from the farm!

 

Glad you're all settled in and the family is enjoying farm life Yankee.  Merry Christmas to you too.    

[Swamp_Yankee]

Welcome to the Twp! How’s the deer population on that side of the mountain? Any animals yet?

 

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Deer population is healthy-the guys who hunt the farm next door took two nice bucks during the rut.  I've been so busy lately it's been a struggle to get out, but I've got my calendar cleared for the permit season in January/February.  No animals yet but first order of business for spring is to build a new chicken coop/run on the foundation of the old sheep shed.  The buildings were demolished years ago but there is still a good intact block foundation and two 15 amp circuits running out to it.  The girls are going to have to prove themselves with taking care of the chickens before they can graduate to anything larger.  I'm getting lobbied hard for a horse but they're going to have to crawl before they can walk!

 

You guys are living the dream owning hobby farms in NJ. Must be fun for family and kids. Would love to do it, but there is no way to afford it....wife is a halfa city girl anyways!! Lol

 

Amen brother-it took a long time for us to get here, but it was worth it.  It might be more affordable then you might think-we don't have a lot of property (2 acres) but we're isolated so we can pretty much do what we want.  This was the view on opening day of buck week this year:

 

Edited December 28, 2017 by Swamp_Yankee

[outdoorslife]

very awesome place youve got! Beautiful pictures!

[Bonefreak]

Beautiful!! I lived the rural life during high school in the Poconos, not on a farm, but on a small mountain w few neighbors....was so much fun and adventure for me n my brother as young outdoorsmen....something that my boys will never experience. I now live on a 100x100 ft lot in a neighborhood, but the running joke w the wife n kids is "dad is working on the farm" again when I'm outside raking leaves, cutting grass, tending to the garden, fixing n building stuff, etc. Lol. My pal hav Xmas tree farms n that is a neat business!