This goat has a funny little anomaly, a "forked teat", (apologies if that was TMI... this is life with animals) so she wasn't supposed to be used for breeding, but was perfect for companionship. However, my friend told me that she had broken in the with buck once last fall, for all of two minutes, so "she's probably not bred."
You know where this is going, don't you?
Apparently, two minutes is about all it takes.
This morning as I was milking Opal, I noticed that Annabelle looks an awful lot like she might be kidding... any minute. I checked on her later in the morning, and she was laying down looking normal. Then after lunch, Jonah came running in yelling "There's a new baby! Come look! A new baby!"
Sure enough! Annabelle was licking off a big, strapping buck kid. We watched a little while, and then along came another one. This one was born completely in the amniotic sack, which was really pretty neat, so I had Jonah take a good look and then I broke it off the kid's face since the mother didn't do it right away. She quickly started cleaning him up after that.
I guess that was our little homeschool science class for today.
This is that second kid (another buckling) as his momma was cleaning him up:
I was joking with a friend lately that I'm sure glad we humans don't have to lick all the birth goo off of our babies to get them clean... yuck. But the momma goats sure like to do it, and I guess that's good since they don't usually have a stack of clean towels handy.
I just can't get over how adorable cute they are! All legs and fluff, stumbling around trying to get their feet under them... So cute.
Annabelle seems to be a good mommy and is looking after them quite well. They both nursed like pros, even on the bad teat.
She was pretty happy to lick her babies, and then decided that Jonah needed a good licking as well.
And yes, I even have some videos of the new kidlets!
Now we need to think of names for these little guys. I'm open to any and all suggestions!
I just love that it's spring! We're waiting for more babies, as I have a hen on a big nest that should hatch any time (not sure when since she hid it on us and we don't know quite when she started to sit) and ducks who are starting to act broody as well. Ah, spring babies!
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They are adorable so are you keeping all of them? MY vote is for Huey And Louie. Jonah is so excited, what a great life you have out there!
ReplyDeleteI LOVE the colors! adorable
ReplyDeleteSuch cute wobbly little guys. Can you keep them, or do they go to Annabelle's owner?
ReplyDeleteAs for names, Salt and Pepper came to mind, but if they were mine, I'd call 'em Birch and Betula (or Betulin, since he's a he).
Goats with fish tits aren't suppose to be breed? I know Poppy has fish tits, and her babies are fine, and I milk her. Strange that I've never heard that before....
ReplyDeleteUm, "Fish tits"??? Never heard that one before... Do they actually have two holes? Yuck. I think it's disgusting. :-P And isn't that kinda hard to milk? Trying to control where the milk goes when you have extra holes to contend with?
ReplyDeleteAnyway, funny teats more acceptable in Boers than dairy goats. When the purpose of a goat is to be milked, it's preferred that they have nice, comfortable handles. :-D Generally, you don't want to breed a dairy doe with those kind of problems because you don't want to perpetuate it.
You've never heard the term 'Fish tits'?? Yeah! Cause their tit looks like a fist tail.... XD And it's not really hard to milk, I mean, sometimes the extra hole doesn't even work. On the other hand, you could just get that side done in half the time! You just have to adjust your grip.
ReplyDeleteThat's just my experience anyway....
Boy, if someone took that paragraph out of context.... Heehee
Yeah, I guess I can understand that you wouldn't want to breed goats with problems, but still. Maybe you should try milking that goat eventually, anyway.