I have been watching tv less than I usually do.  Granted, most of my tv watching takes place in the middle of the night, but I have been trying to change that.  I’ve been trying to learn how to sleep.  (It ain’t going well, but….)  With the sun setting early, I have been in the house earlier.  I did watch The Goldbergs on this fine evening.  Not that I am a fan of the show, but the favorite daughter works for that show.  So, I sat and ate pizza while watching it.  But, once that was over, I went to flipping channels and there it was, the very start of one of my favorite movies from my high school years….BATMAN!

I have had numerous conversations about which was the best Batman movie.  I really like the past few newer movies, but they aren’t the best.  Christian Bale is probably the best Batman.  The newer movies are very well made with many great characters.  However, the 1989 version was/IS the best.  It connected the campy tv Batman shows with the balloons that had Crash! Boom! Pow! for effects.  Yet, it was made to be modern and dark but still kin to the cartoon from which it was created.  All of the movies since have been modern and dark without the campy effects.

Jack Nicholson made the movie.  He WAS and IS the best Joker of all-time.  Sure, Heath Ledger was great as the Joker in The Dark Knight.  But you don’t get that version without Jack Nicholson first perfecting the character.

I recently had a conversation about the greatest Guns N’ Roses song.  That great intellect argued that it was November Rain.  I love that song.  Great Song!  It’s long, and legend has it that they cut 11 minutes off of it that has never been released.  But you don’t get November Rain without first having Sweet Child O’ Mine (which may be the greatest rock song of all-time).  However, I grant that November Rain may have the best rock video of all-time.

I also watched another show called The Big Interview.  I have now decided that I want Dan Rather’s newest job.  He cruises around and interviews big-time musicians.  People, this dude ain’t young.  And whether you agree with his politics or not, he has been a part of delivering history for a long, long time.  And now, he is interviewing Steve Miller, Sammy Hagar, Willie Nelson and the list goes on.  That is a heckuva retirement gig.

There is an event taking place in Oklahoma this weekend called the Fall Classic.  Everybody that is anybody in the hog industry will be in Duncan, Ok.  I used to go but haven’t in years.  Those hog breeders don’t have no problem selling $300,000 boars along with lots and lots of other high $ oinkers.  That sale may hold the record for the most record high sellers!

I wish the goat industry had such an event but it won’t/can’t happen.  Why?  Too many different factions.  Too many people who can’t/won’t sell bucks.  The technology to utilize semen and embryos is too hit and miss.  Therefore limiting the common person.  Too many people worried about who is making money off of their genetics.  And the list goes on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on. (you count em if you are that damn bored)

The big and the elite excel in the goat game.  (as for us here at Kelln Livestock, we are neither…just little and better than most…but it works for us.)  It is hard for just some random person to get a foothold.  Not so, in the cattle or hog game. Mating the right cow/sow to the right bull can be done.  Then, it comes down to feeding and or marketing.  The big boys still benefit in this game of bulls and boars as they can offer services to market and place animals.  And selling a high $ bull or boar doesn’t seem to hurt those breeders.  In fact, it propels them.   There are lots of viable industries that feed off of bull/boar sales and reproductive sales.  All of the side industries in the goat game feel like buddy deals and or back alley kind of happenings.

Or just mythical.

So and so got x# of fertile embryos with such and such.  No.  That ain’t what I heard.

This guy is good.  But, he will sleep in his car and doesn’t shower.  And you might want to provide clean needles.

You need to try this protocol and have so and so do the work.  Of course, you will need a vet to write scripts.

This guy is good but he is hard to deal with and it needs to be done off the books.

What?  Why?   Whole other chapters.

Or it’s, I will let you breed to this buck as long as I can breed to that buck with future implications and a player to be named later.  But, if you raise a keeper buck, you can’t let so and so breed to it.  And you can’t sell semen and you can’t breed your does to him or your neighbors or your dairy doe to him and this crap gives me a headache.  The ONE consistent amongst ALL goat enthusiasts in the USofA, they are ALL looking for the next great buck piece.  And we wonder why there isn’t much genetic progress taking place in the goat industry.

I bet if you read back through this crap, it is easy to tell at what point I got a call about hogs in Duncan, OK.  Many, most, if not all big time goat breeders are leaving piles of cash on the table by NOT following the cattle/hog sales model.  Those people only have decades upon decades of experience to base their knowledge upon.  The goats, not so much.

Sure, I sell bucks.  We have done so successfully.  And our bucks have produced for customers.  I, as well as others, have raised bucks that were good enough for ANY breeder.  But because of biases, politics and camps, some can’t use those genetics.  Or they were bought, used and genetics were not advertised.  Oh well!  The checks cleared.   That opens the doors for others.  If the big breeders ever decide to flood the market, will it hurt Kelln Livestock?   NO!  Will it help us?  YES and EVERY other breeder in the USA including themselves.  I can’t imagine what the first real buck offered by Pfeiffer’s or whomever would bring.  A LOT!   Like Oprah says, you win, you win and I win. We all win!  Does it enable me to become one of the big boys?  NO!  Why? I don’t want to be any bigger and I don’t like female goats.  THAT is our limiting factor.  But…but…if I can cash-flow a high dollar buck for a few does, some of the others ought to really be able to CASH FLOW a big big $ buck.  And me bidding against them is the American Way.  $50k to $150K are numbers that can work—IF–the genetics are right.  IF—the phenotype is right.  IF—marketing angles are all square.  Even with the crappy ET work and AI rates that we currently enjoy in this industry, the $s still work.  Basically, we are all optimists.

I think that I will stop typing.  This is getting long but not wrong.  You come to this website, to this blog for random crap like this.  We covered Batman and Joker,  the greatest Guns N’ Roses songs,  Dan Rather, a pig sale and now part of what is wrong with the goat industry.  And now The Great Divide is playing on my tunes.  Seems fitting.  If you are going to text me about the best Batman, Joker or GNR song—keep it short and I will try to reply.  The goat crap of this blog will probably best be discussed while sitting on buckets or clipping stands while holding…..

peace out and have a great one.

p.s.  Huey Lewis and the News, our back porch smells like cow shit and 2nd hour Ag class makes it all worthwhile.  And you can add all that to the random list.  Have a great tomorrow and a better one after that.