Egypt Creek Diary

Can you really have too much "Nick" genetics?

2018-10-26T16:49:00.000-05:00

It all started with Sunboy Stanton 149, better known as Nick.

Can you really have too much of a good thing? I didn’t think so until one day I realized my Kiko herd’s family tree was pretty much one big limb from the Sunboy Stanton 149 “Nick” bloodline. I first used Nick, a Moneymaker son, in 2005. Thirteen years later, his bloodline still runs deep in the Egypt Creek gene pool.

It wasn’t an intentional strategy. I was just keeping the best bucks as replacement sires and I ended up with all Nick grandsons. But it all started with a couple of exceptional Nick daughters.

In 2005 we flushed my JTV Klondike daughter, JTV Queen, to Nick. We implanted some embryos and froze others. From the first crop of kids, we got ECR Hanky Panky in 2006. That fall we implanted some of the frozen embryos and got ECR Princess Nicki in 2007 — a full sister to Hanky Panky but a year younger.

ECR Rusty's Rambo

In 2008, in partnership with Bill and Brenda Moore, we flushed Hanky Panky to TAY Onyx semen. From that kid crop came BBM Hanky Panky’s Y266, born in 2009. HP, as we called him, served us well for many years and we have a supply of semen that we are using.

In 2010, Hanky Panky delivered a pair of buck kids sired by ECR Rusty. We kept one of those — ECR Rusty’s Rambo, who is still our senior herdsire at 8 years old.

ECR Powerstroke

In the meantime, little sister Nicki was busy having boys, too, and these have been too good to sell. At the moment, we have these Nicki sons in the buck pen:

• ECR Powerstroke, born 2015, sired by BBM Hanky Panky’s Y266 (his mom’s nephew).

• ECR Rustnick, born 2017, sired by ECR Rusty’s Rambo (another nephew — Rambo and HP have the same mother).

• ECR Bunker and ECR Fort Knox, born 2018, sired by RDH Out of the Blue (an outcross that we nicknamed “Handsome”).

So, yes, we have four Nicki sons — for a total of six Nick grandsons in the lineup — two of them, Powerstroke and Rustnick, are double-bred Nick! We probably would have had another Nicki son, ECR Slash, born in 2016, but he disappeared and was presumed killed by coyotes.

This year I decided it was time to bring in some new blood to help Handsome bring some diversity to our genetics.

ECR Rustnick

Earlier this summer I stumbled upon a buck that was owned and raised by Shane Hesterman of Deep South Kikos in Brooklyn, Miss. DSK Yukon is a 2016 buck that has a lot of old genetics close up in his pedigree — and nearly all are an outcross to everything on my ranch. Names like CPK Rooster Cogburn, ELH Blue Boy, WMB Sasquatch, AAS Goldmine I and Tasman Zorro. Plus he’s meaty and tough as nails. Shane has been culling hard ever since he started raising Kikos and Yukon is proof he’s doing it right.

ECR Bunker

We also acquired one of the 2018 flush bucks from Kendell and Dana Barnes’ Chey-View Kikos in Winchester, Ky. He’s out of CVK June II and semen from performance-proven MGR Titan’s Hammer. We named him Hammerhead.

In this year’s West Virginia buck performance test, Hammerhead finished 9^thoverall and one of his flushmates finished 12^th. Their dam, June II, is out of LRF Pango Hua and AVG June. This cross produced a Top 10 buck on the 2013 Maryland test.

We think these two new bucks, in combination with our Nick grandsons, will give us the genetics we need to move into the future.

ECR Fort Knox

Our first outcross buck, RDH Out of the Blue

CVK Hammerhead

DSK Yukon

Here's a slick trick for unsticking a pup's head

2018-09-25T09:51:00.002-05:00

Usually it's a goat's head that I have to get unstuck out of a fence. This time it was a guardian dog puppy. Somehow he managed to get his big head through a 4 x 4 gate panel. Nothing seemed to work and I didn't want to cut the panel, so I poured vegetable oil on his head to get it all greased up. Then I grabbed his back legs and worked his body and head back and forth. It didn't take much effort for the head to slide out. And the pup's littermate enjoyed cleaning his head off. That vegetable oil was a real treat!

This puppy's head is firmly stuck in the gate.

First, grease it up with vegetable oil.

Once the head was greased up, a little backward pressure finally freed his head.

Kikos a natural fit for eastern half of U.S.

2017-11-27T09:40:00.000-06:00

By Terry Hankins

Reprinted from Goat Rancher, May 2007

The Kiko breed of goat, long overshadowed by the popular and pretty Boer goat, is starting to make serious inroads into the meat goat industry. This growth in prominence is most notable in the Southeast and Midwest, where kids with Kiko influence can be seen at local meat goat sales on a regular basis. Kikos, however, still are a rare sight in the Texas Hill Country and points farther west, although a handful of producers are using Kiko bucks on their Spanish does to increase milk production and on Boer percentage does to tighten up udder problems.

Back east, producers have learned that Kikos can be raised in a hot and humid climate a lot easier than Boer goats can. It’s not that there’s anything fundamentally wrong with Boer goats, they just weren't made to thrive where pastures get 50-60 inches of rain a year and there are no rocks. Boers were bred up over the last 80 years in South Africa, where most of the country gets less than 20 inches of rain a year, about the same rainfall as San Angelo. You can raise Boer goats just about anywhere, but they really thrive in areas basically west of Interstate 35. A glance at the accompanying map puts it into stark perspective. East of Dallas, lots of rain — west of Dallas, very little rain. This difference in climate is why the Boer and Kiko perform so differently. The Kiko was developed from feral goats in New Zealand, where annual rainfall can run to more than 100 inches on both the South Island and North Island. Only the east coast of the South Island has a scarcity of rainfall. The development of the Kiko in this temperate climate with high humidity, soggy ground and parasites galore made it the perfect goat for places like Mississippi, for instance, where I have been raising them since 1997.

Like many folks I jumped on the Boer bandwagon early on. But it took me only one kidding season to realize I had to do something drastically different. First, I had to learn more about goats. And failing that, I had to find a goat that could survive my management — or lack thereof. In the summer of 1996 I launched Goat Rancher and hit the road promoting the new publication. One of my first stops was the American Boer Goat Association National Show, which was held in Tyler, Texas, that year. In addition to seeing my first real Boer goats, Jacques Valley of nearby Athens, Texas, had a booth set up promoting his Kiko goats. Jacques and his wife, Therese, were among the first serious producers and promoters of this New Zealand import. They were some of the first to advertise their Kikos in Goat Rancher, along with Steve and Sylvia Tomlinson of Caston Creek Ranch in Oklahoma, Frank and Mary Dyson of Robinson, Texas, and An Peischel of Goats Unlimited, which was located in northern California at the time. The more that I talked to these producers, the more interested I became in the Kiko, especially after I lost 24 Boer percentage kids and 10 does to parasites in one spring. So I began seeking more information on this new wonder goat.

In the March 1997 issue of Goat Rancher, I ran the first major article about Kikos. The cover story was an interview with Kiko importer Graham Culliford that was written by Sylvia Tomlinson, who by then had joined Goat Rancher as a monthly columnist. Later that year, I visited Frank and Mary Dyson's Sunset Place Kikos just outside of Waco, home of the famous bucks Money Maker and Generator. In the August 1997 Goat Rancher I published my article on Sunset Kikos — and that same year, my cousin and I went together and bought our first Kiko buck from the Dysons, a 1-year-old son of Moneymaker, for $1,000.

Longtime Goat Rancher readers will remember my many articles about those first kids out of Sunboy III, or as we called him, King Tut. We still didn’t know much about raising goats, so we just turned Tut out with a herd of black Spanish nannies. We didn't see much action during breeding season, but come the spring of 1998, we had little white kids running everywhere. My cousin, Joe, and I didn’t know what to expect. We went to the pasture with our towels and Nutri-Drench, items we had needed the year before when little weak kids started dropping out of two dozen anemic mothers. This year was different, however. We couldn’t catch the kids to give them the Nutri-Drench, so we finally decided they didn’t really need it. We didn't find any weak, wet kids, so we just sat back and enjoyed watching the healthy kids play. We tried to catch the kids so we could eartag them and try to keep up with who was whom — which was becoming difficult since all the does were solid black and all the kids solid white. We couldn't even do that. We finally got the whole herd of mommas and babies into a catch-pen. We then tagged all the kids, not knowing who they belonged to. Then we turned them all loose, and over the next few days, we watched and took notes as we observed which kids nursed which moms.

Those first kids grew up with a bare minimum of attention, medication, deworming — and feed. We didn't lose a single kid that spring. They grazed all summer and we put out rolls of hay in the winter. There was no such thing as a sack of goat feed in Mississippi at that time, so we put out a few molasses tubs and range cubes made for cattle. Although I was still raising Boer goats, it was becoming apparent that with my work and travel schedule, Kikos were going to fit better in my ranching situation. So I started taking steps to increase my Kiko herd and moving from an unregistered meat goat operation to a registered breeding stock enterprise.

I got my first two purebred Kiko does from Jo Ann and Brinson Taylor of Valdosta, Ga., who, ironically, had first read about Kikos in the Goat Rancher. I added two more does from Jacques and Teri, another nanny with a doe kid from the Tomlinsons, and over the years I have purchased three does from Dr. An. These nine purebred Kiko does were so long-lived and prolific that every buck and doe on my farm and the dozens I have sold over the years, are descended from them. Plus I still have three of those original does on the ranch — two of An's does (ages 5 and 8) and one of Jacques', JTV Queen, a Klondike daughter who had her 9th birthday and a set of twins in April.

I still have several dozen Boer percentage does on the farm. They definitely are an example of survival of the fittest, although they do require regular deworming. They run with the Kikos, and some of them are the most aggressive browsers I have. It helps when a 200-pound nanny leans on a tree and the rest of the herd is able to join in the feast.

When we work our goats, we squeeze them into an alleyway where we can easily check their eyelids for signs of anemia. In most cases the Kikos and Kiko percentages score 1 to 2 on the FAMACHA chart throughout the summer. The Boer percentages consistently score higher. This dramatic difference in parasite resistance — or parasite tolerance — is the greatest benefit of the Kiko from an economic standpoint. It is costly and labor-intensive to deworm on a regular basis, plus it just creates a new generation of resistant parasites. The loss of life from parasite infestation has cost me thousands of dollars over the years. I have talked to many producers that have had experiences like I did trying to raise Boers outside their natural environment. You can do it, but you have to really work at it. If you have hardy Boers, hang onto them. I have settled on Kikos. Through my years of experience, they have risen to the top of my list as the easiest goats to raise, the cheapest to maintain, and these days they sell for a whole lot more than my Boers ever did.

History of Egypt Creek Ranch Kikos

2017-11-20T10:27:00.005-06:00

By Terry Hankins

I purchased my first goats (Nubians) in 1985 to clear blackberries bushes off a small farm in north Alabama but it wasn’t until a decade later that I took a real interest in these animals. Meat goats first caught my interest when I was an agribusiness columnist for the daily newspaper in Jackson, Miss. An article that I wrote in 1995 on a new meat goat co-op created an unusual amount of interest. I figured there might be something to this new meat goat industry.

One thing led to another and I left the newspaper business and became a magazine publisher/goat rancher, a job I’ve enjoyed since 1996. Like many folks I jumped on the Boer bandwagon early on. But it took me only one kidding season to realize I had to do something drastically different.

In the summer of 1996 at the American Boer Goat Association National Show in Tyler, Texas, I met Jacques Valley of Athens, Texas, who had a display set up promoting his Kiko goats.

Jacques and his wife, Therese, were among the first serious producers and promoters of this New Zealand import. Later I also met Steve and Sylvia Tomlinson of Caston Creek Ranch in Oklahoma; Frank and Mary Dyson of Sunset Place Kikos in Robinson, Texas; and Dr. An Peischel of Goats Unlimited, which was located in northern California at the time.

The more that I talked to these producers, the more interested I became in Kikos, especially after I lost 24 Boer percentage kids and 10 does to parasites in one spring. So I began seeking more information on this new wonder goat.

In July 1997, I visited Frank and Mary Dyson at their farm just outside of Waco, home of the famous bucks Money Maker and Generator. My cousin, Joe Luther, and I went together and bought our first 100% New Zealand Kiko buck from the Dysons, a 1-year-old son of Moneymaker, for $1,000. We turned our new buck, Sunboy 111 (nicknamed King Tut) in with a herd of black Spanish nannies. We didn't see much action during breeding season, but come the spring of 1998, we had little white kids running everywhere.

Joe and I didn't know what to expect. We went to the pasture with our towels and Nutri-Drench, items we had needed the year before when small, weak half-Boer kids started dropping out of two dozen Nubian mothers. This year was different. We couldn't catch the kids to give them the Nutri-Drench, so we finally decided they didn't really need it. We didn't find any weak, wet kids, so we just sat back and enjoyed watching the healthy Kiko kids play.

Those first kids grew up with a bare minimum of attention, medication, deworming or feed. We didn't lose a single kid that spring. They grazed all summer and we put out rolls of hay in the winter. There was no such thing as a sack of goat feed in Mississippi at that time, so we put out a few molasses tubs and range cubes made for cattle.

Although I was still raising Boer goats, it was becoming apparent that with my work and travel schedule, Kikos were going to fit better in my ranching situation. So I started taking steps to increase my Kiko herd and moving from an unregistered meat goat operation to a registered breeding stock enterprise. I went to the friends I had made in the Kiko business to purchase my foundation animals. From Jacques & Teri I added two 100% New Zealand Klondike daughters (JTV Queen and JTV Nina). From the Tomlinsons at Caston Creek I purchased three New Zealand does: a Money Maker daughter (Sunkist 113, a flushmate of King Tut), her doe kid out of JTV Hercules (CCR Anastasia), and a Goatex Generator daughter (CCR Sara 812).

For my purebred herd (94-99%), I purchased a purebred Money Maker son (CCR Xcelerator) from the Tomlinsons, three does from Dr. An and two from Jo Ann and Brinson Taylor of Valdosta, Ga.

These ten purebred and New Zealand Kiko does were so long-lived and prolific that every buck and doe on my farm for the next decade descended from them. One of the Klondike daughters, JTV Queen, had a set of twins on her 9th birthday. Xcelerator lived to be 11. Rusty is 13 and enjoying his retirement.

In 1999 we purchased AAS Goldmine II. We added Southwest Cisco in 2001.

The crossing of these genetics - Money Maker, Klondike, Goldmine and Southwest Cisco - gave us the foundation on which we are still building today. Money Maker gave us the meatiness, Klondike the frame, Goldmine the width and depth and Southwest Cisco the extreme hardiness and parasite tolerance.

Some of our best-known offspring came from these genetics, including:

* ECR Rusty (Southwest Cisco x JTV Nina)

* ECR M2 (Goldmine II x CCR Sara 812)

* ECR M4 (Goldmine II x JTV Queen)

* ECR Gloria (Goldmine II x Sunkist 113)

* ECR Black Gold (quadruplet brother of Gloria)

* ECR Samurai Jack (Southwest Cisco x Sunkist 113)

Within the last 10 years, we have sought to bring in more outside bucks to cross with our foundation does. In 2005 we invited Bill and Brenda Moore of BBM Kikos to bring their Money Maker son, Sunboy Stanton 149, better known as "Nick", to our embryo flush to cross with JTV Queen and ECR Gloria. These matings produced numerous "keepers", including Queen's ECR Hanky Panky.

The "Nick" x Gloria kids turned out to be some of the best Kikos we had ever produced. Kids from this mating were featured in our first production sale, held in Bowling Green, Ky., in August 2006. The nine highest-selling Kikos in the sale all were flushmates out of the Nick x Gloria mating. Kids and grandkids from this pairing are found on many prominent Kiko ranches and have performed well in several buck performance tests.

In 2007 we again went to Bill and Brenda Moore to borrow another buck, SKY S408 Sports Kat, an extremely meaty Kiko buck. In 2008, out of the doelings I chose as additions to my own herd, 75 percent of them were Sports Kat daughters.

In 2008 our breeding program took a totally unexpected turn. Chris Luton of Boulder Hill Farm in Stendal, Ind., announced he was dispersing his herd because of health reasons. Chris had bought out Jacques and Teri Valley when they retired and had spent eight years developing his own herd. Chris had a reputation for producing big, framy bucks that were popular throughout the Midwest. I acquired six bucks that represented different bloodlines he had been developing. In one purchase, Egypt Creek Ranch had acquired some of the best bucks in the country that also were outcrosses to most of my does.

In 2009 when Bill and Brenda Moore announced their retirement from the goat business, I moved our remaining partnership does from Georgia to Mississippi. I still maintain the BBM herd and prefix here at Egypt Creek.

As Egypt Creek Ranch begins its 20th year in the Kiko business, we hold true to the values we developed two decades ago: invest in good stock, raise Kikos that others are proud to own, keep overhead costs to a minimum and above all else let your goats be goats.

Kiko doe raises kids despite broken leg

2016-03-09T13:13:00.000-06:00

CVK Sally II cleans up and nurses her kids while
her broken leg (left rear) dangles uselessly.

On January 30 my grandson Rylan and I were working goats. We were running them through the “tub” and into the alleyway so we could FAMACHA and just give them a good looking over. One very pregnant nanny who has never been a problem before decided she would jump out of the catch pen this time. She didn’t quite make it and her left rear leg got caught in the top rail. When her weight hit the ground, that leg bone snapped with a sickening pop.

It was one of those scenes where you see it happening in slow motion but you are frozen and there is nothing you can do except watch … knowing what’s about to happen. I cussed the goat as she ran down the hill, favoring that left leg as her foot dangled and whirled like an airplane propeller. The bone was cleanly broken but the skin was intact. I debated whether to splint her or shoot her.

I was able to get her into a small corral. After watching her for awhile, I decided she was too heavy and too wild to try and splint. I didn’t want to carry her to the vet. I decided I would keep her penned up and hope for the best. Hopefully she would have her kids and I could bottle feed them or graft them onto another mother.

I had heard of broken legs healing themselves, but I didn’t know about a break this severe. I also know that splinting a leg was not always successful. I once had a buck die from infection after we splinted his leg. Another Kiko producer told me her goat’s leg actually rotted off from infection. In many situations, it’s just hard (or impossible) to catch a wild goat and keep the bandaging cleaned for the amount of time it takes for a broken leg to heal. I decided my best course of action was to leave it to nature. She would either heal or not.

A week later the leg was still dangling, swaying with every step she took. She didn’t seem in pain and she was eating good. When I checked on her the afternoon of February 5, I discovered she had kidded — triplets. One doe kid looked like it was born dead but there was another healthy doe and a buck kid. The mother had cleaned them up and they already were nursing … as she stood there on three legs.

Less than a month later, the leg has healed. There is a knot where the break occurred and her lower leg is a little crooked, but she can put her entire weight on the leg and as you can see in the accompanying video, she gets around pretty good. She is successfully raising her two remaining kids.

I’m still not ready to turn her out in the big pasture with the other goats. She has done so surprisingly well so far, I don’t want to risk her re-injuring it with all the hills, ditches, fallen trees and bullies in the pasture. I figure in a couple more weeks she’ll be as good as new. Just another example of a good goat that was healthy enough to heal herself and raise her kids.

This doe is a 4-year-old 100% New Zealand Kiko that Mary McDonald and Sandy Rittenhouse of Rittenhouse Kikos purchased last year at the Southeast Kiko Goat Association sale in Perry, Ga. (http://www.sekga.us) and brought here to Egypt Creek Ranch where I manage their herd. CVK Sally II was born at Chey-View Kikos in Kentucky. She is a TAY 007 granddaughter on the top and a JTV Goliath granddaughter on the bottom — some old genetics that have stood the test of time. In my opinion, she has endured the ultimate performance test. She’ll have a home here for as long as she wants it. Just don’t be jumpin’ any more fences!

ECR Hanky Panky's 'younger' sister makes an impact

2016-02-23T14:26:00.000-06:00

9-year-old ECR Princess Nicki and day-old ECR Slash.

My oldest Kiko doe, ECR Princess Nicki, is also my last Nick (Sunboy Stanton 149) daughter still living. She turned 9 on February 7 and became a momma for the eighth year in a row on Feb. 22. This is the first year that she had a single instead of twins. Last year it was twin boys; the year before that twin girls. Nicki’s dam was JTV Queen, a JTV Klondike daughter that I bought from Jacque & Terri Valley’s JTV Kikos in Athens, Texas, in 1999.

Nicki’s is an interesting story. She was actually conceived — became a fertilized embryo — in the summer of 2005. When we did our embryo flush that year, we ran out of recip does, so we had to freeze her and put her in the tank for a year. We implanted her into a recip doe in late summer 2006 and she was born here in our pasture in 2007. She has been here producing for us ever since.

Her flushmate sister that we did implant in 2005 was ECR Hanky Panky, who went on to become our best-known doe after ECR Gloria. Hanky Panky went to Bill and Brenda Moore of BBM Kikos when she was weaned — that was the stud fee they received for letting me use Nick. They flushed Hanky Panky three times to three different bucks that you’ve probably heard of: Sports Kat, ECR Rusty and TAY Onyx (frozen semen).

When Bill and Brenda retired, I brought ECR Hanky Panky back to Egypt Creek Ranch. We also brought her Onyx son, BBM Hanky Panky’s Y266 with us; he is owned by Rittenhouse Kikos and has produced performance-proven bucks for them and for ECR (http://egyptcreekranch.com/performance-testing.php). ECR Hanky Panky also is the mother of our ECR Rusty son, ECR Rusty’s Rambo.

But this story is supposed to be about Nicki — not Hanky Panky. Although she is Hanky Panky’s full sister, Nicki never got the recognition like her famous sister. Because Nicki was born a year later, Hanky Panky was having babies by the petri dish full while Nicki was still nursing. Also, Nicki is white while Hanky Panky was a beautiful gray with dark trim. People remember color.

Nicki has well earned her keep here. She has produced some feminine yet big-framed does and some powerful bucks. We retained one of her buck kids from last year, ECR Powerstroke, as a replacement sire. And her new buck kid, ECR Slash, looks promising. Already, we consider Nicki a Doe of Distinction. She will always have a home at Egypt Creek Ranch.

This video is of Nicki's son Powerstroke meeting his first does last fall.

Breeding season under way at Egypt Creek Ranch

2015-09-26T10:50:00.002-05:00

BBM Hanky Panky's Y266 (in the back) with some of his girls. The buck,
a TAY Onyx son, and most of these does belong to the Rittenhouse Kikos herd.
For those who don't know it already, here at Egypt Creek Ranch, we manage
the Rittenhouse herd, Bill & Brenda Moore's BBM Kikos as well as our own herd.

Breeding season began in earnest this week. After running together all summer, the does have been divided into different pastures with their bucks. Part of the fun in managing a goat farm is deciding which does to put with which bucks. You sit down with your lists and pedigrees and past performance records and hope you make the right decisions: Which buck will add what strengths to this doe? How did this mating work last year? Am I getting these genetics too close? Do I need an outcross here? How can I maintain that "look" yet add a little depth or muscling? You do the best you can. Try to make the best, educated choices. Listen to your gut on some decisions. Then wait five months to see what hits the ground.

Custom-made ornaments will add special touch to Christmas tree

2014-11-12T10:11:00.002-06:00

Ornaments with the images of ECR Rusty (left) and Iron Horse were
handcrafted from the photos on the catalog cover, pictured here.

A closeup of the Rusty ornament. The image is engraved
on a gourd then hand-painted.

While visiting one of the vendor booths at last month’s Cream of the Crop Kiko sale in Corydon, Ind., I noticed a display of Christmas ornaments engraved with goat artwork. One particular ornament really caught my attention because it looked just like my buck ECR Rusty. As I looked closer, I discovered it was Rusty! And there next to it was an ornament decorated with another famous Kiko buck, Iron Horse.

I soon learned that the ornaments had been engraved by Pam Jones of Legacy Keepers Farm in Hazleton, Ind. She had used the cover of the Cream of the Crop catalog as a guide for duplicating the likenesses of the two bucks. Pam was recovering from surgery and was not able to be there, but her table was well-manned by her energetic daughter Jaime.

After the sale was over and she was packing up, Jaime presented me with the Rusty ornament as a gift and also gave Dave and Linda Sparks the Iron Horse ornament. I guarantee these ornaments will have permanent spots on our Christmas trees.

Pam custom makes these ornaments, working from a photo of your goat or other animal and charges only $20. She has a variety of other handmade items available. Pam says there is still plenty of time before Christmas if anyone would like to place an order. She can be contacted at home 812-784-4104 or cell 812-385-6877. Her website is www.legacykeepersfarm.com.

ECR consignments to 2014 Cream of the Crop sale

2014-09-29T13:47:00.001-05:00

The Cream of the Crop Kiko production sale will be held at 1 p.m., Saturday, Oct. 4, at the Harrison County Fairgrounds in Corydon, Ind. These are the top consignments from Egypt Creek Ranch. A complete catalog and list of activities can be seen at www.creamofcropkikos.com. I can be reached by e-mail at kikogoats@hughes.net or call/text 662-519-9697, if you have questions. We hope you can make it to the sale, but if you can't, phone bids are welcomed. Contact me and I will arrange for someone to help you bid. We will also help make arrangements for delivery. Learn more about our Kiko operation at www.egyptcreekranch.com. All of our Kikos are registered with the NKR; learn more at www.nationalkikoregistry.com.

LOT #8 -- BBM Vicky T728

BBM Vicky sells bred to our TAY Onyx son,
BBM Hanky Panky's Y266, pictured with her below.

LOT #32 -- BBM Kylie

Perfect genetic combination: Rusty and Nick on top and Sports Kat on the bottom.

LOT #33 -- BBM Kitty

Twin sister to Lot #32.

LOT #58 -- ECR Damon

Proven genetics. Double-bred Onyx on top.
Dam is Sports Kat x ECR Gloria.

LOT #59 -- ECR Axel

Solid black. Solid muscle. Solid genetics.

LOT #96 -- ECR Hallee #392 (Substitute)

50% Kiko doeling.

LOT #117 -- ECR Madee #2

50% Kiko doeling.

Breeding season in full swing on Egypt Creek

2012-10-24T19:27:00.000-05:00

We began some limited breeding in August but this week we gathered up the main herds, sorted out the does and put them with bucks.

BHF's 3rd 'G' Traveler. He doesn't win any beauty contests,
but his offspring sure could — both boys and girls.

SRK Percival (TAY Onyx and ECR Rusty genetics).
Percival and these does are part of the Rittenhouse Kikos herd.

ECR Pharaoh
(ECR Rusty son with Onyx and Nick genetics on the bottom).

ECR Rusty's Rambo (Rusty x ECR Hanky Panky-Nick daughter).

ECR Spartacus (3rd G Traveler x BBM Vicky-Nick daughter)

ECR Xcalibur (double-bred Xcelerator) with our
high-percentage Kiko commercial does.

Multi-tasking on Saturday morning

2012-09-29T18:24:00.001-05:00

This is the fourth and final pen of does we worked this weekend.

Over the past 2 days we have gone through every doe and buck on the ranch checking for parasites or any other problems. We also pulled out all the goats that we are consigning to the Cream of the Crop Kiko Production Sale next Saturday, Oct. 6, in Corydon, Ind. (For more information on the sale and the ECR consignments, click on the link at the top right of this page.)

Although it has been dry this summer, the goats have thrived. The adult does have regained body condition, and the February and March doelings look like yearlings almost. Out of the pen full of goats pictured above, only one needed deworming.

We pulled these does out of the pasture; they are

consigned to the Cream of the Crop Sale.

Rudee Lee gets her nails done by Roland McAvoy

before she heads for her sale debut in Corydon, Ind.,

next weekend.

ECR Rusty's Rambo meets the women

2012-08-02T14:54:00.001-05:00

ECR Rusty's Rambo (ECR Rusty x ECR Hanky Panky)
in with a group of does.

I got up early this morning and was able to catch Rambo before he and the other bucks took off for the pine forest for the day. He didn't like being dragged through the yard and to the next pasture, but as soon as he saw who was waiting for him, all four brakes unlocked! I put him into a pasture of about 20 head that I plan to sell bred. They are all nice does, so if they don't sell and I keep them, they'll be bred to one of the best bucks on the farm. There's still not a lot of activity here -- just too hot. But a cool front is headed this way, so a small change in the weather may spur some action.

For pricing on these does, see the Goats for Sale-Does link

in the top right corner of this page.

Rambo likes the look of this commercial Kiko doe.

Sorting and deciding who to sell

2012-08-02T10:12:00.000-05:00

The goats pass a neighbor's home on Hankins Road on their way

to the barn. It's a quarter-mile from their pasture to the catch pens.

For several days this week I have gone through every pasture and looked at every goat, male and female, making that annual decision on who will stay and who will be sold. In an ideal world, I'd keep them all and just keep growing the herd. But in reality, there are feed bills and land notes coming due this winter and the goats are responsible for covering a lot of those expenses. So some goats have to be sold.

Some selections are easy, like in a goat show. The very best and the very worst are easy to spot. The worst — the ones with rough coats, the skinny ones, those that didn't raise kids this year — can go to the local sale barn (or in the freezer as ground goat meat). The very best stay here. At least most of them.

Some of the good ones go to the Cream of the Crop Sale, which Egypt Creek Ranch and Goat Hill Kikos have hosted since 2008. These is where the decisions get tougher. If they're good enough for the production sale, they're also good enough to keep. Sometimes it gets down to "one for me, one for the sale ..."

This year I will be taking 21 does and 3 bucks. I made my final decisions yesterday and hope to begin updating my For Sale pages soon. I have a good number of really nice Kiko percentage does that I have raised and purchased. I plan to offer some of these for sale off the farm also.

I was extremely pleased with how well the does and doelings were looking. Everyone was healthy and meaty. The hot weather seems to have agreed with them. We are about 15 inches behind in rainfall, and in this area, that's a lot. The pastures are crispy on the hilltops and hillsides. I was surprised to find quite a bit of bermudagrass in the bottoms. The goats don't love it, but they eat it when there's nothing else. Also, with the drought, I've noticed a lot of leaves falling off the trees; that has helped the forage situation a good bit.

The does in the bottom photo have been with their moms all year and have never had any supplementation. I'm putting four of those and four of the red doelings in the Cream of the Crop Sale. All of these doelings are on pasture. The ones I purchased from the Russells are on light supplementation because they were pulled off their moms and moved to a new environment. That "change of address syndrome" can be tough on kids so I try to keep their nutrition level up.

Yesterday, however, most of the 35 doelings that I am supplementing didn't show up at feeding time. I jumped in the truck and found them around a drainage ditch enjoying some fresh grass. It was after 6 p.m. and they were content to continue their grazing. I blew my horn and headed them toward the barn. I knew that once it got dark, they would just bed down right there. There is no guard dog in the pasture, so I wanted them closer to the barn at bedtime.

These are some of the percentage Kiko doelings that I

purchased from Lynn and Ware Russell of Camden, Ark.

These ECR doelings have been with their moms on pasture since

they were born in February-March.

Bucks delivered to Oklahoma forage test

2012-06-25T15:46:00.002-05:00

After the incoming bucks were processed, they were put into a

holding pen before being moved into their grazing paddocks.

Each buck was examined as it was unloaded. Each received

a CD&T vaccination, deworming, fecal test

and FAMACHA score.

On June 21 I delivered six bucks to the Kerr Center in Poteau, Okla., for the 2012 Oklahoma forage test. There were a total of 57 bucks from 14 breeders in seven states consigned. States represented include Kansas, Oklahoma, Illinois, Missouri, Texas, Mississippi and Arkansas. Breeds included Boer, Kiko, Savanna and crosses.

The bucks will get a warm-up period until July 1 to get acclimated to the climate and the forage. The test period will be July 2-Sept. 19. The field day and awards ceremony will be Saturday, Sept. 22.

For more details on the test, visit http://kerrcenter.com/event_links/goat_buck_test.htm.

Kiko does that made an impact at ECR

2012-06-10T15:30:00.001-05:00

Sunkist 113 in 2001 with her set of quads out of Goldmine II.

We talk a lot about our bucks but Egypt Creek Ranch has been fortunate enough to have some great foundation does. We started with Gloria's mother, Sunkist 113. She was a Moneymaker daughter and our first 100% New Zealand doe. The next New Zealand does we purchased were two Klondike daughters: JTV Queen and JTV Nina (Rusty's mom). We purchased these three does in 1999 and their genetics are still a big part of our breeding program today.

ECR Gloria and ECR Abigail (Sport Kat daughter)
(Both of these does are deceased)

JTV Queen, mother of ECR M4, Nicki and Hanky Panky. She's pictured here

pregnant at 8 years old. She died later after giving birth to twins.

Super Star Lineup (clockwise from far right): BBM Vicky T728,

ECR Hanky Panky, ECR Princess Nicki, BBM Vanna T718 and

BBM Nick's Gloria W952. Hanky Panky died from childbirth

complications in 2011, shortly after Maximus was born.

When our friends Bill & Brenda Moore of BBM Kikos dispersed their herd several years ago, we brought our partnership does home to Mississippi. They include the BBM does listed here, plus Vanna's sister BBM Nicky, who had to be put down after a dog attack. This year Nick's Gloria (probably the youngest Nick x Gloria daughter alive) had twin does; Vicky had twin boys who are full brothers to our replacement buck Spartacus; and Vanna had a single doeling.

Vanna (left) and Vicky. Both are Nick daughters. Vanna's mom is

TAY W26 and Vicky's mom is TAY W27.

This year's crop of Nick granddaughters.

Egypt Creek bucks look good at recent photo shoot

2012-06-10T14:44:00.002-05:00

I guess folks are starting to think about the fall breeding season already because I have gotten several calls about the bucks I have listed on my For Sale page on this blog. I've had Maximus and Saxon listed there for months with few calls, so I haven't bothered to update the photos. The ones I have there were taken last winter. Earlier this spring, no one looked too good with rough coats and thin bodies. I wasn't excited about taking any pictures then.

I had to confess to one caller Friday morning that I had not even seen my bucks in at least two weeks. I promised that I would try to get updated photos and post them. In the back of my mind I was hoping they were still alive — and healthy.

I was pleasantly surprised when I drove the mile down the blacktop road to their pasture and found them grazing and lounging near the road. I was even more surprised and impressed at how much weight they had put on in the last month. Everyone was slick and you could see the muscle tone as they walked by. These guys have had no supplementation since around February and no deworming in recent memory.

I also manage the Rittenhouse Kikos herd and have their bucks in with mine, so I have those bucks' photos posted here, too.

I managed to get good photos of everyone but "G" and "HP". They are definitely camera-shy. I took their photos anyway but I will try to do better next time.

ECR Maximus — BHF's 3rd G Traveler x ECR Hanky Panky

SRK Iron Knight — BBM Hanky Panky's Y266 x GHK Iron Maiden
(Owned by Rittenhouse Kikos; Iron Maiden is an Ironhorse daughter)

BHF's 3rd G Traveler (We call him "G")

ECR Spartacus — "G" x BBM Vicky T728

Spartacus and Maximus — Their mothers are both Nick daughters.

ECR Ghost -- BHF Onyx's Shadow x ECR Abigail
(Abigail is Sports Kat x ECR Gloria)

ECR Saxon -- "G" x ECR Princess Nicki.
(Nicki is Nick x JTV Queen; she's a full sister to ECR Hanky Panky)

ECR Rusty's Rambo -- ECR Rusty x ECR Hanky Panky

BBM Hanky Panky's Y266 — TAY Onyx x ECR Hanky Panky
(Owned by Rittenhouse Kikos)

What to do with buckling crop -- Part 2

2012-06-10T12:14:00.000-05:00

From my last post:

Let's assume the bucks that are destined for the slaughter house and not the breeding pen now average 45 pounds. I plan to market the bucks no earlier than November so they will be here another 6 months. If I let them forage all summer, if we get an occasional rain and if pasture nutrition remains moderate, I might see a .2 pound per day gain per head. Over the next 180 days the typical buck should gain 36 pounds for a total weight of 81 pounds — a good market weight. However, with some supplementation — .7 pounds a day of 16% feed — I might boost that to .3 pounds ADG for a total of 54 pounds of gain, or 99 pounds total weight, which may be too heavy and garner a discount from the slaughter buyers. I'll do some more ciphering and get back with you...

OK, here's what I came up with. I'm assuming a feed conversion rate of 6:1. In other words, it will take 6 pounds of feed to produce 1 pound of weight gain. Feeding .7 lbs. a day per head will require 126 pounds of feed per head over the next 180 days. At 23.7¢ per pound for Purina's Noble Goat 16% feed, that adds up to $29.86 per goat for feed. If all my predictions are accurate (HA!HA!) and the bucks gain an extra 18 pounds each, at $2.50 a pound at the sale barn, I will earn an extra $36 a head. $36 extra profit minus $29.86 extra feed cost = $6.14 per head extra profit. If I get discounted and the goats only bring $2.00, I'll be in the hole if you consider any kinds of labors costs.

Bottom line: Feed them a little to keep them coming around the catch pen. Otherwise, let them be goats and make it on pasture. Regardless of what they weigh and what they bring at sale time, if you have no inputs, you're still ahead of the game.

With the high price of replacement does these days, commercial as well as registered stock breeders can produce cash flow by selling quality doelings. Most years I make what I need to run the farm by selling replacement does. Whatever I get for the slaughter goats and cull/old nannies in the winter is just gravy and comes just in time to pay the winter feed bills.

Decision time nears on what to do with buckling crop

2012-06-08T11:59:00.001-05:00

Part of the Kiko buckling crop.

By lining the goats up like this I can make side-by-side comparisons
of body width and length as well as overall size in comparison to their cohorts.

Nomination time is nearing for the two buck performance tests in which I plan to participate this year. Kerr Center in Oklahoma needs to know by June 15 which bucks I am sending there, with delivery on June 21; I'm not sure if Western Illinois University has a nomination deadline but they must be delivered to the campus farm on June 30.

The bucks are currently on medium quality pasture and are being lightly supplemented with approximately .5 lbs. of 16% medicated pellets per day. I have not done weights to calculate average daily gain with this group; I have used the unscientific method of eyeballing the bucks on a regular basis. As I have said for years, the biggest kids in the pasture are the best gainers, whether they were born triplets or singles. This eyeball analysis won't work when evaluating the mother's production performance, but it is a method that has worked for me when selecting bucks for test.

This year, however, I have multiple decisions I must make regarding the bucks. I have to decide who goes to the forage test in Oklahoma, who goes to the full-feed test in Illinois and who I will keep at home to sell this summer. Then there are the categories of culls and keepers — these are usually easy to pick.

At least 50% of the buck crop goes into the cull category in the first 6 months. You can watch them in the pasture, view them as they stand beside others in their contemporary group and instantly see who is not performing as they should. (You can look at the photo of the bucks at the trough and easily pick out at least 3 culls.)

And what to do with those culls? Well, these days they're worth a lot of money as slaughter goats if grown out and finished with a little extra feed. I and others have discussed this at length, and if meat goats are bringing $2.00-$2.50 a pound, a producer can afford to supplement. I tried putting a pencil to it this morning to see how much supplementation and for how long would be feasible. The big unknown factor is pasture quality. Winter grasses are drying up and summer grasses are medium quality at best since I refuse to fertilize (spending money on feed versus fertilizer is a tough call). For now I choose to spend on feed. But calculating anticipated average daily gain (with and without supplementation) for the next 6 months is — as Dr. Frank Pinkerton says — a wild ass guess.

Let's assume the bucks that are destined for the slaughter house and not the breeding pen now average 45 pounds. I plan to market the bucks no earlier than November so they will be here another 6 months. If I let them forage all summer, if we get an occasional rain and if pasture nutrition remains moderate, I might see a .2 pound per day gain per head. Over the next 180 days the typical buck should gain 36 pounds for a total weight of 81 pounds — a good market weight.

However, with some supplementation — .7 pounds a day of 16% feed — I might boost that to .3 pounds ADG for a total of 54 pounds of gain, or 99 pounds total weight, which may be too heavy and garner a discount from the slaughter buyers. I'll do some more ciphering and get back with you...

Goats benefit from a little drought

2012-05-30T08:27:00.000-05:00

This map shows drought conditions across the U.S. on May 22, 2012.

Conditions range from Abnormaly Dry (yellow) to

Exceptional Drought (dark brown).

I just knew when I checked the U.S. Drought Monitor this morning that northwest Mississippi would be under a dark brown Exceptional Drought alert. I was surprised, however, that we are just Abnormally Dry. Our area is 12 inches behind in rainfall this year and my pastures are beginning to show it. Fortunately we had plenty of spring moisture and early warm weather, so our pastures were knee deep in grass by the end of March. With only about 100 head of goats on 175 acres, they have made only a slight dent in the forage.

The forage that is out there has a low moisture content, which makes for better grazing. As the grasses dry, the nutrient content condenses; in a normal year, our grass is probably 90 percent water. It's a lot harder for the goats to get the nutrition they need from such high-moisture grasses.

There was an article in this month's Stockman Grass Farmer about the benefit of feeding good hay to cattle while they are grazing on high-moisture pastures. It helps with nutrition and digestion. The same thing probably holds true for goats. Right now, however, I literally have "standing hay" in some areas. I guess it is good for the goats because they sure look good right now.

The dry weather also has helped with the fly problems. A month ago I had to keep fly traps out and spray occasionally around the lounging areas to control the flies. For the past week I have noticed that the flies are not nearly as bad. All the mud holes have dried up too, so that has helped with the mosquitoes.

When raising goats, some dry weather is beneficial. I just hope Mother Nature doesn't go to any extremes.

Coyotes take bite out of weaning ratio

2012-05-10T11:14:00.000-05:00

These are some of the buck kids we weaned over the weekend. They are

10 weeks old and have had no supplementation — except plenty of

momma's milk. Unfortunately, coyotes took a lot of this kid crop.

Kidding season started out great at the last of February — lots of the commercial does having twins, all the moms were healthy and had plenty of milk. With just a few does having singles, I was shooting for a 175% kid crop. Then my big female dog had puppies, not in the pasture where the does and kids were, but under the barn near the Goat Rancher office. And that's where she stayed. That left one dog in the pasture to guard the goats.

It's my own fault that I let myself get down to two grown guardians. I've had as many as six Great Pyrenees guarding the various pastures. But as I let the goat herd get smaller, I also let my herd of dogs shrink. The number of goats may have been smaller, but the acreage they were roaming has grown, so I should have known a couple of dogs couldn't patrol 175 acres cut into numerous pastures.

By the time we weaned the little boys last weekend, the weaning average had dropped to 80%. In other words, coyotes had taken nearly half the kid crop. That also included at least three New Zealand Kiko bucklings and one NZ doeling. Conservatively, that was a $2,000 predation loss. Including a number of commercial kids adds another couple thousand dollars. In hindsight, I could have purchased and fed several more guardian dogs for what I lost in goats this year. I can promise these losses won't happen again.

I have my two grown dogs, one pup from last year, a male and female I recently purchased and four new puppies. That gives me a total of nine guardians. That should be enough!

Our young female Great Pyrenees had four nice

puppies. Bad thing is she had them during kidding

season.

Another leisurely roundup

2012-05-10T10:11:00.001-05:00

Munching on berry vines.

It's a good thing that I have some hardy goats, otherwise I'd be in trouble (or out of the goat business). A busy spring has kept me on the road and in the office more than usual. That means less time in the pasture taking care of the goats. My little commercial herd had not been rounded up in about 6 weeks. The 2 1/2-month-old kids had never been eartagged or had any vaccinations. Click here to read more about our vaccination regimen.

Last Saturday the herd happened to be near a gate by the driveway so I opened it up and let them drift out. The roadside had grown up this spring with dewberry vines, weeds, johnson grass and saplings. The goats enjoyed all of it.

I was pleased with the overall condition of the goats — mommas and babies. The does have had no supplement. With plenty of grass and weeds in the pasture, the does are in great body condition and the kids are all healthy.

The does and kids ease down the road toward the barn.

10-week-old kids enjoy sweetgum leaves.

The goats arrive in the yard adjoining the barn.

Downed tree brings bounty from above

2012-04-26T10:33:00.001-05:00

We were in the office working yesterday morning when we heard this loud crash outside. At the same time, I heard the guard dog puppies squeal. A big sugar berry tree had blown over just down hill from the Goat Rancher office (which is located in the old farm house here on the ranch). The tree didn't hit anything; the puppies had just been startled and were hiding underneath the barn.

It wasn't until late yesterday afternoon when the goats began coming in from the pasture that they found the feast of leaves waiting for them. Everyone gorged themselves. I was afraid someone might get sick, but this morning there seem to be no ill effects. Just lots of happy goats who didn't bother to go out to graze. They're hanging out around the tree grabbing a leafy snack whenever they get the urge.

After feasting on the tree yesterday afternoon and this morning,

the goats have decided to just camp out here for awhile.

A ditch had washed out around the base of the tree loosening

the roots. The strong winds yesterday gave it a final push.

See the black & white doe in the tree? You can tell where the

goats cleaned the leaves as high as they could reach from the

ground. Now they are starting to work their way up the branches.

Creating 'Kiko Composites'

2012-04-10T10:18:00.000-05:00

We call this guy Peg Leg because of his red left front leg.

This young buck was sired by a 100% New Zealand buck but, as you can tell by his coloring, his dam had some Boer influence. He could be described as a Kiko-Boer cross of unknown percentage, but I prefer to call him a Kiko Composite. It sounds intriguing, experimental and even secretive....

If all goes well, he and several other Kiko Composites, along with some Kiko fullbloods, will be going to the Kerr Center Oklahoma buck forage test this summer. The buck pictured above was born on pasture and he and his mom are thriving on fresh grass. If he proves to be parasite resistant and can gain weight quickly on forage, I'll know that the secret formula from which he was created has potential for producing a profitable terminal animal.

Our barn isn't fancy, but it's functional

2012-04-04T16:11:00.000-05:00

This 48-ft.-wide shed has been patched many times over the years.

When I talk about our "barn", I use the term loosely. It's actually a shed — an old hay shed that my dad built in the 1960s to use for hay storage on our farm, which was a cattle operation before the goats came along. Over the years most of the roof has been replaced, a few partitions have been installed and I've added a few kidding pen gates. It's relatively dry (yes, there are still a few leaks) and some of the wood is rotten, but it faces south so it offers reasonable shelter when it gets cold and wet. It's not large enough to house the entire herd, but it works well when we're sorting or doctoring on goats.

Catch pens and the working system are located in front of the shed.

Out "barn" isn't fancy but it does offer a dry place out of the wind.

CCR Xcelerator — a legend — dead at 13

2012-03-29T12:23:00.001-05:00

It was a sad day on Egypt Creek Ranch yesterday. We found Xcelerator dead in his pasture. It looks like he just fell over. The old boy had lived a good life and leaves a lasting legacy in the Kiko world.

CCR Xcelerator was born at Caston Creek Ranch near Poteau, Okla., on February 24, 1999. He was a son of Moneymaker. His mother was a Goats Unlimited doe, a daughter of 14/89, one of the first Kiko bucks brought into the United States by Dr. An Peischel.

I purchased Xcelerator in November 1999 from Steve and Sylvia Tomlinson while visiting their Caston Creek Ranch. I had gone there to purchase does, but this chunky little buck caught my attention, so I brought him home, too. In the early days of the Kiko industry, there was no distinction between purebreds and 100 percent New Zealands. They were all the same to most of us early breeders. So we just bred best to best, which resulted in Xcelerator (97%) being bred to many 100% does.

Not only was Xcelerator quick growing and muscular, he passed these traits to his offspring. One cross with a Goldmine II daughter produced the winner of the 2007 Oklahoma Buck Forage Test, ECR Meat Eater. An Xcelerator son was the top-gaining Kiko at the 2004 Langston buck test and a grandson was the No. 1 gaining buck at the 2009 Maryland buck test.

Others liked his genetics, too, and proved it by consistently paying top dollar for his sons. ECR Ivanhoe was the high-selling purebred buck at the 2007 ECR production sale and ECR Sinbad was the high-selling purebred buck in the 2008 sale.

In addition to his production traits, Xcelerator was "pretty" with his long curling horns and bright, white sleek coat in summertime. His photo has been used in books and magazines to illustrate the Kiko breed. Of course he is incorporated into our ranch logo and his likeness appears on Kiko-related apparel.

Xcelerator retired from active duty when he was 8-years-old. He spent his remaining years in his own private pasture and shed and enjoyed 3 pounds of expensive senior horse feed each day. He died fat, happy and contented.

Xcelerator's likeness embroidered on

a denim shirt.

Xcelerator's head is part of the

Egypt Creek Ranch logo.

Xcelerator with one of his best sons, ECR Ivanhoe.

ECR Meat Eater, the Xcelerator son that won
the 2007 Oklahoma Buck Forage test.

Even his daughters were big and muscular.

An Xcelerator grandson, ECR Xcaliber, busy at work
on Egypt Creek Ranch in the Fall of 2011. We have
Xcelerator great-grandkids on the ground now.