The name of the game in the show goat industry is and always has been bucks.  If you have a bonafide producer of a buck, then you’re going to have fun.  Plus, you need a lot of bucks to gather those quality of bucks.

In 2010, we had built a herd founded on Turner, Harbour, Powell/Holman and Kelly females.  I had used the Harley buck from Kelly and the X Factor buck from Powell/Holman to sire the females that served us for years to come.  I knew that we needed bucks.

I began working on it early in the year.  This included trying to make a clone.  We had DNA on ice with Viagen.  They were trying to make a clone of two different wethers for us.  They were unsuccessful after numerous attempts.  This was a “cheap” experiment.  Currently, I have this year’s bill to continue keeping that DNA stored with Viagen for future use.

We were regularly talking to Mike Kelly.  About bucks, wethers, business, etc.  We were feeding several wethers from him at that time.  In fact, the grand at OYE 2010 was a Smokestack wether for Kelly’s that was shown by Chance Greenroyd.  The grand wether at Enid District 2009 had been a Showtime wether shown by Meaghan Rhodes.  That spring, he hinted that he might let me use a buck–no names mentioned.

In March, I was in south Texas hunting older wethers.  I looked at some November born flush kids at Mike Halffman’s.  He had the nuts left in several of them.  He priced them.  There was one that I liked but I had lots of miles to go.  Plus, I felt safe that buck would not leave there anytime quick.  So, the hunt for bucks continued.

On a Friday afternoon in May 2010, I purchased a freshly weaned Freaky kid from Gallagher’s.  He wasn’t cheap.  Looking back, the price doesn’t seem that high but values have changed since then.  I was pretty pumped about this purchase and looked forward to the future of the buck that would become Freak On A Leash.

The next morning, I sorted through all of the first crop of 191 kids at Helms.  He had them priced.  Some of them were full ownership, some for 1/2.  They were priced reasonable.  But, there was a greener goat that was a flush mate to all of the good bloomy ones.  I asked his price.  It kind of caught Kenneth off guard as that wasn’t one that he thought that I would be interested in but he had a price.  We agreed on the deal.  That flush included a 1315, 1325, Red Cape and the 2011 res. grand wether at OYE.  My purchase came to be known as Joe Dirt.

Two weeks after purchasing Joe Dirt and Freak On A Leash, I was back in Texas.  Poe, Milligan, Thompson and I were studying skinny wethers and doe kids at Mike Halfmann’s.  Actually, Thompson was n’t studying them.   He hates looking at skinny goats.  That buck was still there.  Poe and I discussed it.  I told him that we needed that buck but that I was about tapped out–the combination of cloning, buying FreakOnA Leash and Joe Dirt hadn’t taken it’s toll on my bank account.  He was getting ready to have a kid so he was a little bit strapped as well.

So we made a call or two.  Found a partner with Allen Miller and we bought another buck.  This buck was not named at the time of purchase.  But later happenings that evening in Sonora, TX led to this buck being named Rainman the next morning.

A week later in June 2010, we were at Kelly’s wether sale.  We were told that we would be taking a buck home to use.  I was hoping for Showtime.  We had to wait till after the sale to get him.  Not an issue. It wasn’t Showtime but I was pleased.  I had been the first Okie to go to Kelly’s.  We bought wethers, does and trusted him to buy Harley.   More importantly, I had brought numerous customers with me that spent lots of cash for wethers over the years.  We had lots of success with Kelly wethers and this led to us getting to use this buck.  The only restriction was to not call the buck by name.  No problem.  It was pretty easy to figure out which buck it was.

We only had the buck for 3 weeks and he had to go home.  Luckily, on the 5th of July, there was a cool spell followed by a couple of days of light rain.   Several does came into heat and that buck was busy.  We had a nice set of kids born in November/December 2010.

I left the nuts in 5 of those “Black Sabbath” sired kids.  I also sold a good set of wethers online in April 2011.  Four of those five wethers made the sale at Tulsa, including 2 res. div. champs.

As for those 5 buck prospects, I decided to sell 1/2 interest in them.  I did not advertise them.  Anybody that had hit me up about a buck that winter/spring was allowed to look at them before OYE 2011.  Helms, Tolson/Lenhart, Pullan and Nation, Seelkes, Poe, Pat Lyons and Allen Miller all looked.  I told them that we would sell them the Saturday afternoon at OYE.  I would contact them with place and time.  I got Milligan to auctioneer.  Helms couldn’t be there so he was on the phone.  We all met at one of the empty horse stalls and went over terms.

The first buck was sold–1/2 interest for $13,500.  The next was 1/2 for $7,250.  Then another for $5,000.  I had a home for one of them in Texas at $2,500.  This left one as a PO.

Milligan still says that this is the most effed-up sale that he has ever heard of.  He auctioned goats that weren’t there and he had never seen.  Several prominent breeders jumped me after the sale why they weren’t invited.  That was easy–they hadn’t asked me about bucks.  I didn’t leave anyone out.  I just included those that had inquired.

I sent the PO buck to Poe and told him to lease him out and split the proceeds with me and Thompson.  This worked well.  This buck became known as Blackjack.  Blackjack sired a div. champion doe at Tulsa in his first crop.  Poe then sold Blackjack to Brillhart’s in KS.  I just recently found out that Blackjack is still going and he sired the 5th overall wether at the 2017 KS State Fair.

The $2,500 buck worked in south TX for several years.  I still keep tabs on this dude’s off spring and whereabouts.

The $5,000 buck became known as “Pocket”.  He sired a div. champ doe at OYE and made good kids for Miller, Lyons and then Kesters.

The “$7,250 kid became known as Fade2Black.  He has sired numerous div. champs, class winners, bucks and premium sale goats at OYE, Tulsa, Enid & Woodward.  He is the sire of Black Rhino and Black Market’s maternal grand-dad.

The best goat in that sale was the high dollar one that went to Tolson and an un-named partner.  His mother was one of the wicked good All Jacked Up daughters that I had–MB2.  I never got to see that goat again.  But, his legacy is still around.  He became known as “2nd Mortgage”.  He was the maternal grandsire of the 2015 res. grand wether at Tulsa.

And those purchased bucks?  FreakOnALeash sired the 2013 grand wether at OYE for Schneberger.  That goat did not make the wethers that I hoped for but he did leave a bomb set of females that are still generating.  I sold him back to Gallagher’s.  Joe Dirt and Rainman—well, I would need more space to write what those dudes have done.  Especially, their daughters.

I don’t know if I could ever replicate 2010 in terms of gathering buck power.  The market and the industry has changed.  Too many that aren’t allowed to sell bucks, too many that don’t want to sell to me and maybe there aren’t very many good ones to be had.  I would spend the money on the right one(s).  And as a result of all of those previous bucks mentioned, I have some pretty good bucks of my own.  So, maybe I will just sit here in my little corner of NW OK.  Maybe.  Maybe not.

Have a good one.