My day started this morning to the sound of thunder & rain against the windows. It was 4:30 a.m. Time to get up. The husband and pets snored on.
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| Sage the Sleepy Beagle |
I could not wait to get outside and feel the rain on my face! The moisture was very much needed. I put layers of coveralls and hoodies over my pajamas and headed out the door with my flashlight. Before I headed out the door, my stats from the previous three of four days showed: Seven mamas & 12 kids. Nine more does to kid.
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| Excited for 4:30 a.m. Kid Check! |
As I walked outside and turned to my right towards the goat pen, the brightness of my flashlight shown on one white dot out in the middle of our 2 acre pen. I had left a new family of twins + mom out in that same area during night check and figured that was them. Since it was raining pretty hard, though, I decided to go check the other babies to make sure they were warm and dry. What I found when I got to the shed was utter chaos.
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| This is utter chaos. |
Babies everywhere, but not one mom knew where her babies were located. There was one twin from a family having a sleepover with the twins next door. The other twin was on the other side of the shed. There was even a baby stuck in a hollow stump right outside the shed! I will have to reenact the stump moment since it is too dark for picture taking at 4:30 a.m., but I was laughing pretty hard as I picked it up out of the stump and returned it to it's mama. Once I figured out who went with who and where that baby went, I started out to the white dot in the middle of the pen.
Originally, I'd thought the dot to be a doe that had kidded twins a couple of days before. As I journeyed out through the rain, I saw the doe (#24) with two babies. But they weren't her's. She, like me earlier, was confused. The babies belonged to another doe (#11) who was claiming them, but #24 was up for a fight. She thought they were her babies and was trying to take them back. The twins belonging to #24 were actually safe and sound in the corner of the shed. These babies in the middle of the pen were brand new.
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| #24's kids warm and dry in the shed. |
There were two other does missing so I ventured out into the connecting 2 acre pen. What I've found out about does is that they are like cows and like to get as far away from the group as possible when they are having their babies. The will stay away for a couple of days and not leave their young. But, as hard as it was raining, these babies should be inside and the uphill shed was running out of room. Especially, since another doe (Twister) was kidding twins this morning, too - in the shed!
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| Jackie preferred to kid far away from other does. |
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| While Twister decided to stay put in the shed. |
The shed was getting full and we didn't want any babies to get stepped on, so the hubby helped me move all the does that kidded yesterday and last night down the hill with their babies to our kidding pens. We have 11 pens set up so we are prepared for bad weather and one family in each pen. Our pens are 8 ft long and about 5 feet wide so the does and their babies have plenty of room. They are furnished with straw and all the hay they want. We have to bucket them water and we have little individual pans to feed them grain at night. It's a pretty nice set up and they were all content in no time.
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| Three families with new babies in our kidding pens. See the triplets? |
The last doe to kid this morning was Jackie. Usually, Jackie gives birth to twins and they are always doelings (female goats less than 1 year of age). This morning, the rain stopped for a little bit and she headed out to the connecting pen to have her single doeling. Sage the Beagle came along with me to find her. Most mama does are very protective of their new ones and even get nervous around the farm dog. Jackie was not going to let Sage anywhere near her little girl, but she approved me to help welcome it into the world.
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| Jackie is cleaning off her baby. Her tongue is like a towel and baby will be dry in no time. |
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| Jackie is protecting her new baby from Sage the Ferocious Beagle! |
After a lovely morning of running around the goat pens in the rain, I was soaked to the bone but very thankful. I recorded my stats as of 9:20 a.m. - 10 does kidded - 17 kids total! Hope everyone else has a wonderful Friday!
Until Next time,
Mindy
