Copyright ã 2007 www.braveheartfarms.com ½ All Rights Reserved
BRAVEHEART NOTES
by Manny F. Piņol
http://www.boergoats.co.za/
Privacy Policy ½ Site by John D. Pagaduan
GOAT HUNTING IN AMERICA
November 01, 2007
A month-long vacation, my first after 12 years of service as town mayor and governor, gave me the opportunity to go to the USA to join the television panel which covered Filipino boxing icon Manny Pacquiao's second encounter with Mexican boxing legend Marco Antonio Barrera at the Mandalay Bay Civic Center in Las Vegas on Oct 6.
Arriving in Las Vegas Oct. 2, I had enough time to prepare for the coverage which was carried by Solar Sports and GMA Channel 7 and of course, to plan my month-long goat hunting sojourn to many places in rural America.
Right after the fight, I was joined by Fil-Am friends Ferdie Dalope and Jack Alejandro on a long drive (18 hours from Las Vegas) to San Angelo, Texas to meet with young rancher James Stinson to firm up an arrangement that would enable Braveheart Farms to acquire about 1,000 Boer goat doelings for our massive production program set to start 2008.
The result: an initial shipment of 100 doelings gathered from different ranches and eight registered young bucks from Dale Page of Outback Boers which will be arriving in the Philippines before Nov. 10. Even before the shipment could arrive, at least three new goat breeders have already signified their intention to acquire some of the goats coming in from Texas.
(Police General Pol Bataoil is getting two of the young bucks and 20 of the doelings to start his own Boer farm in Luzon, Catanduanes Vice Gov. Tom Pizarro is getting one young buck and two doelings while Ruth Martinez of the Martinez Farm of Kidapawan City is getting three additional doelings. The rest of the goats will go to a new ranch that Braveheart Farms has established in Barangay Pag-asa, M'lang.)
I also visited my friends, Kim Dougherty of Rawhide Ranch in Palmdale and Rebecca Cogswell of Moonstone Ranch in Bakersfield to secure their commitment to provide Braveheart Farms with Boer breeding materials in their future production.
After firming up the deal on the acquisition of additional Boer breeding materials, I started looking up for breeders of Anglo-Nubians in view of the persistent requests from friends for Braveheart Farms to start producing good breeding materials for dairy goats.
Accompanied by a San Francisco based Cotabateno, Jun Laquindanum, I visited the Pinewood Dairy Farm in the rural town of Petaluma, north of San Francisco and met with a young goat girl, Trinity Smith, who showed us beautiful dairy goats (Saanen, La Mancha, Alpine and a few Nubians) and a modern goat milking and cheese making facility.
Trinity, who told us that Pinewood had no goats for sale until next year, also gave us directions to three of the top Anglo Nubian breeders in the US today - Wingwood Farm in Willits owned by her mother, Karen Smith, the Lakeshore Farm of Megan Tredway-Carter in Kelseyville and the Kastdemur Dairy Goat Farm of Karen Senn and daughters Krista and Erika in Redding, all in Northern California.
Accompanied by a family friend, Dennis Maniwang (who is married to nurse Rose Cinco of Pikit, North Cotabato) of Salinas City, Monterey, we drove for four hours to Willits arriving there at about 8 p.m. Nothing came out of the trip as Mrs. Smith appeared reluctant to part with her Nubians which I must admit were some of the most beautiful goats I have seen.
Undaunted, I persevered and continued efforts to contact the two other top breeders - Megan Tredway-Carter and Karen Senn. Both responded and on Oct. 28, I and my wife, Emily, and our youngest child Imman, flew from Los Angeles to Sacramento and drove the Mercedes Benz SUV of Jun Laquindanum to Kelseyville, a beautiful resort and vineyard city by the shores of California's largest natural lake, Clearlake.
There we met the Tredways, Larry and Kristine, Megan's parents, and Megan's husband, Aaron, who breeds La Manchas. The Tredways warmly received us and agreed to sell to Braveheart Farms two young bucks and six doelings of Megan's Nubians and a pair of La Manchas out of Lakeshore Farms' 2008 production.
Megan's Nubians are stunningly beautiful, especially the 10 young does that she retained out of her production for 2007. She has a small herd of Nubians but they are really outstanding which only confirms that Megan, young as she is, is really one of the top Nubian breeders in America today.
The highpoint of the very friendly conversation between me and the Tredways was our agreement that Lakeshore Farms will sell to Braveheart Farms all of their excess production for next year which they will not be needing for the goat shows that they participate in.
Karen Senn of Kastdemur Dairy Goat Farm was in Washington when we visited Northern California but she responded to my email by writing me and giving me a call. Karen, who is the acknowledged dean of all Nubian breeders in America today, sounded very friendly and accommodating agreeing to reserve for me 10 Nubian kids and four La Manchas from out of her 2008 production.
Just like Megan, she also agreed to sell to Braveheart Farms her excess production for 2008 saying in her mail that she would be very happy to help improve and develop the dairy goat industry of the Philippines.
It was actually Nubian goat breeder Fernando Velasquez of Palmdale, a friend of Kim Dougherty, who linked me up with Karen Senn. Fernando, who also participates in Nubian goat shows, has acquired his breeding materials from both Karen and Megan.
We are bringing in about 14 fullblood Nubians from out of the Kastdemur and Lakeshore goats that were acquired by breeders like Fernando and this is made possible through the effort of my friend, Rebecca Cogswell.
With this initial herd of outstanding Anglo Nubians and those that will be coming from both Kastdemur and Lakeshore by March or April of 2008, Braveheart Farms will now embark on a new mission of breeding the best Anglo Nubians in the Philippines and contribute to the development of the Philippine dairy goat industry.
Photo by Sidney Nanini
Manny and Imman finally meet, Sonoma, the outstanding doe that produced the champions 70 Rocky and Rawhide Riggin.
A herd of Boers prowl the Moonstone ranch.