Trudy - Herd Queen

July 2008 update:

Last fall Trudy decided that she needed her own place to live. It was becoming hard for her to compete at the manger for food and to move around in the big space of the doe barn. We got right to work and made her a special pen and shelter right by the big propane tank - her second favorite place. Her most favorite spot has always been next to the John Deere tractor's exhaust pipe. So much for appreciating our clean country air!

July 2007 update:

Trudy is finally accepting that her bum leg won’t let her do the things she did in her younger days. She has learned to let the other goats go out on long browses without her. She will stay in the shade of a tree and snooze, or browse a bit closer to home, sometimes she gets babysitting duty and cares for the kids while the milkers head out into the valley. She still climbs the stairs up to the milking parlor and comes in for some grain and cookies. We ordered a custom made brace for Trudy last year, but had to send it back for some adjustments. The adjustments, which were supposed to take one day, ended up taking almost a month. By then Trudy had lost too much mobility in her knee for the brace to work. But she is still enjoying her retirement and we love going out to pay extra attention to her. Trudy, our very first goat, has a special place in our hearts…and in true goat fashion, she takes full advantage of that. Excuse me, I need to bring her some more animal crackers now, and perhaps some raisins…

Trudy is a wonderful goat. In fact, we blame her for getting us into the dairy business. We tell her that if she’d only been a mean, cantankerous thing, we’d have stayed away from getting more goats. But she showed us how fun and interesting goats are. After a hard day’s work, we’ll go sit outside with the goats and relax. Trudy will come over to rub her head on us and we’ll blame her for how tired we are. She seems willing to accept that responsibility, as long as she can get scratched and loved on.

Trudy gave us triplet daughters this spring and then retired. She hurt her leg many years ago and it is getting hard for her to move around while carrying kids and/or a full udder. She is still first to come into the milking parlor, just for a little grain and a handful of animal crackers, and her name is still at the top of the milking line-up board. Hopefully, it will be there for a long time to come.

Trudy is leading our herd through the official DHIR milk testing that has been started at BMR. Trudy will be getting her Star for the amazing quality of her milk. She's helping us make wonderfully rich cheeses with her amazing butterfat! Way to go, Trudy!

Trudy is our benevolent herd queen. She is a very good girl - our very 1st goat on the ranch. She arrived here at BMR with her daughter, Angel, in February 2001.

She started out as pretty much a "barn potato" when we got her but now takes her herd on big browsing walks all over our 280 acres, and then some. One year we found her leading the group way up the rocky mesa that backs the ranch, just 2 days before she kidded with twins. What a trooper!

Trudy has a "thing" for our John Deere tractor, we think it's love and wouldn't be surprised if she gave us little green and yellow kids some year.