776 Shady Lane Farm Road
Prattville, Alabama 36067 SAMLAUBURN@CS.COM 334-365-5146
Shady Lane Farm is our home and has been the Abney Family home for
five generations. In March, 1867, Capt. Zachariah Abney
established himself in Prattville where he practiced law and took
up farming. He married Alexandra Victoria Doster. They had four
children who survived childhood. Zachariah Abney, Jr. was one of
those four. He married Marian Frances Bowen. These are Sam’s
grandparents. Capt. Abney served Autauga County as Register in
Chancery from 1883 until his death. Many long term
Prattville
attorneys can still trace the beginning of their careers back to
reading law under Attorney Zachariah Abney. According to family
tradition, Zach and his twin brother Sam, were the first set of
twins to graduate from the University of Alabama. All the present
Abney generation are loyal
Auburn
Alumni and fans. We currently live in the original house that has
been moved to its present location about ½ mile from where it was
built. It is a continual work of love.
Shady Lane Farm Road
Shady Lane Farm is located just off Doster Road in Prattville,
Alabama. We are about 8 miles north of Alabama’s capital in
Montgomery. Two main highways pass within 1 mile of our home.
Highways 82 and 31. Interstate 65 is just about 5 miles east of
our farm.
Daniel Pratt moved to Autauga County in the fall of 1833. He
purchased a large tract of swampy land, ditched and drained
it, and prepared the foundation for the first building to
begin the town that now bears his name, Prattville. The town
was built, styled after a New England village. Pratt
continuously improved his gin and became the largest gin
manufacturer in the world. Prattville and Autauga County are
among the fastest growing areas in the state. It has come a
long way from being “The Birthplace of Industry in Alabama”.
Sam and I are proud to be a part of this progressive town.
Sam retired from
sales in 2002. He has been able to live his dream of raising
goats fulltime. He is President of The Sheep and Meat Goat
Commodity of Alabama and Chairman of the Autauga County Farmers’
Federation Sheep and Meat Goat Commodity. He has a part-time
business with his mother managing Shady Hill Mobile Home Park,
next to Abney Estates.
Day
Lillies at Shady Lane Farm
For the past 37
years, I’ve taught first grade. 34 of those years have
been at my Alma Mater, Billingsly School. My classes look forward to the
visits of the goats. Sam brings the goats to school and teaches a
mini unit on goat farming.
We promote the goat
industry by sponsoring a youth Boer Goat Show in February. The
Autauga Agribition is in conjunction with the Heifer / Steer
program for youth. The show continues to grow each year. This
year’s show has 41 youth participating and 141 goats. Four states
were represented.
We do an open
sanctioned Boer Goat Show in March at Garrett Coliseum. It is the
Southeastern Livestock Expo Boer Classic. This has been an ABGA
and Int. BGA show and has grown with number of exhibitors and goat
entries.
Sam and I married
in 1982, blending two families for a total of 5 children. They
were active in 4-H, showing steers, heifers and horses. Two of
our children and their families help us show goats. The youngest
of our children, Zach and Maria, raised goats as youngsters and
still enjoy this today. Zach is married to the former Robin
Roberts. They have a new home in Tallapoosa, GA. Zach works in
Center, AL for Wal-Mart and Robin works for Harbin Clinic in Rome,
GA. They have a daughter Samantha, who in addition to being
pretty good at showing goats, plays basketball and softball. She
was an All-Star softball player last summer. Maria is married to
James Collett of Prattville. They have two children, Will and
Madyson. James works for Lithonia Lighting in computer
programming. Maria teaches kindergarten at Locust Grove
Elementary. Their home is in McDonough, GA. Will is 8 and has
been showing goats since he was 2. Madyson had her debut at the
2005 Autauga Agribition as she and her goat dressed as Thumbelina in
the Goat Parade. She is now 2 years old.
Sam’s first
memories of goats was at the young and impressive age of six. A
white doe on the family farm kidded in a ditch about 100 yards in
front of the house. He was so excited and impressed by the two
kids, he has seldom been without goats since. When we married in
1982 Sam provided animals for the live nativity at the First
Baptist Church of Prattville. Two of those animals were Nubian
does named Dolly Parton, for obvious reasons, and Abigail. While
we were on our honeymoon, Dolly Parton gave birth to twin bucks
who were named Honeymoon and Chester. This began my love affair
with goats. From those two does our herd increased to about 150
fullblood and cross bred Nubian goats.
In 1998 Sam heard
about large boned, meaty goats from South Africa called Boers.
We bought our first fullblood Boer does from our good friends,
Jimmy and DuWayne Middlebrooks of J&D Boer Goats. Jimmy told us about
the Ryals from Tylertown, MS. We made an appointment to visit,
hopefully to purchase a buck. On the trip down, as fate would
have it, the Ryals stopped at the Mississippi Welcome Center
coming home from the Lebanon, TN goat show. We walked over to the
trailer to check out the goats. The trailer just so happened to
belong to Rocking R Boer Goats. We followed them to Tylertown and
spent half a day in goat heaven. I saw Magnum and was hooked
forever. Bill and Blake served us tea and while we sipped tea, we
picked their brains about Boer Goats. We realized how little we
knew and how much we had to learn. Since that day our friendship
has grown. We feel fortunate to have the family as our mentors
and friends. That day we purchased a son of Top Brass.
(Click on picture for more
info)
(Click on picture for more
info)
We own "Ennobled"
Bigun, DOB: 02/17/02. Bigun is a son of RRD Remington M160
"Ennobled". Every animal in his pedigree except one is ennobled.
Remington was the 2001 ABGA National Reserve Grand Champion Jr.
Buck and the 2001 International National Grand Champion Jr. Buck. Bigun placed 1st at the 2003 NAILE, 4th out of 65 in the 12-18
month old bucks class at the 2003 ABGA National Show, 3rd at the
2004 International BGA show, 3rd at the 2004 Houston Livestock
Show, was Over-All Reserve Grand Champion Buck at the 2004 Dixie
National Boer Goat Show, Grand Champion Buck ath the 2003 Ohio
Meat Goat Association Spring Fever show, 2002 1st at the Greater
Alabama Boer Show, 2nd at the LMGA (LSU) Boer Show, 2004 Over-All
Reserve Grand Champion West Georgia Boer Goat Challenge, 2004 Sr.
Grand Champion Fullblood Buck Indiana Summer Wether Series #1,
2003 2nd West Georgia Boer Goat Challenge, 2004 Over-All Grand
Champion Buck Southeastern Livestock Expo Boer Classic, 2004 Bayou
Boer Goat Classic Over-All Grand Champion Buck, and 2005 Cajun
Classic Day 1 Over-All Grand Champion Buck. He has numerous
progeny who have been winning in the show ring.
Bigun is the sire of RRD Hammer Time, a
beautiful paint buck who has won 5 grand championships and 2
reserve grand championships. He is the grand sire of the 2005
ABGA National Grand Champion Jr. Doe, the sire of 6 Grand
Champions, 10 first place winners, 5 second place winners in the
ABGA with numerous winners in the top of the class at ABGA and
International Shows. He has a gentle personality and is still in
top condition. We breed and flush to him often. Bigun and his
off spring have a total of 205 Traditional points, 54
Non-Traditional points and 20 unassigned points.
We purchased 'Right on Target' at the
Ryals dispersal sale, in partnership with Jeff and Melissa Lathan
of Lazy L Boers. We have semen available on him from Luke
Vickry.
We
do flushes in the fall and spring at Shady Lane Farm and natural
breedings. Semen straws are available also. People are
welcome and encouraged to visit us. Sam is usually ‘round
and about, either in the barn or nearby. We have several
youth we are sponsoring, as well as our grandchildren.
Hopefully, you are enjoying your goats as much as we do.
Come on down to Prattville. We’ll sit awhile, talk a lot and
introduce you to true Southern hospitality, Prattville style.