Last Saturday we brought our two new goats home. We decided to change their names; we always want to go along with our farm theme, Serenity, but we keep straying. My plan was to call them Bridget and Saffron (Joss Whedon fans will understand) but Christine didn’t love the name Saffron and so we ended up with Bridget and…well, I think the other name is still up in the air but I’ve been calling the bigger girl Sweet Pea. She’s at the bottom of the totem pole with the other goats, poor little lass, and she is such a gentle soul.
Both goats are being very heavily picked on by the others in a way that has not been a problem before when we’ve brought in new goats. I just see it as part of the deal…they have to find their pecking order. Christine is more troubled by it. Hopefully they will all figure it out and be kinder to one another soon.
We did end up selling one of our Nigerian Dwarf doelings yesterday; our first livestock sale on the farm. We had planned to sell Mooey, but in the end we couldn’t deal with Beebee continuing to nurse on Felicia; Felicia has been our weakest goat and I think this is in part due to having a 4.5 month old baby still on her. This will help her get stronger; plus, we can milk Felicia twice a day now.
(A little about Felicia…her eye coloring is never good. The way you tell if a goat has parasites is checking the color of the eyelid. The redder the better. White means they’re about dead. Felicia’s always close to white. We’ve wormed her repeatedly. We’ve given her oregano. We’ve given her black walnut. She just doesn’t improve much. We finally came across this article and considered maybe she is just iron deficient. So we started giving her yellow dock tincture, the alcohol free type, and she pinkened up a bit! Having a baby on her this long may just be sucking her minerals right out.)
So ever since Saturday evening we have been milking four goats. It’s been yet another learning curve…the two new girls have such different teats than the others! And already we had Kissy who is the goat I will always be comparing others to since she was my first (and remains my favorite) and Felicia who has ridiculously near-impossibly tiny teats that you must grasp with just the pointer and middle finger. Now these new girls that are half sisters have an odd texture to the inside of their teats…I can’t think of a way to describe them except that if you ever held one of those odd tubular kids toys with the liquid and sometimes glitter inside that caves in upon itself so that you cannot keep it in your grasp, that is what they are like. If you don’t grasp them just so, the teat all but disappears up inside the bag! Once you’ve figured it out though they milk quite easily, very pleasant for the hands.
The first day I milked all 4 of the goats myself. After that I’ve gone downhill and we’ve been sharing the milking about 50/50. The new goats have refused to jump onto the milkstand and so we are doing a lot of “I’ll take the front legs, you take the back” hoisting. They are friendly and very well behaved once on the milk stand, unlike Felicia who is still quite the kicker/squatter. We should probably just take a video.
We’ve decided with all the fighting going on because of the new goats that the small doelings, Mustachia and Mooey, should sleep inside the barn where they used to sleep. So now they are back in there with a divider to protect them from the bucklings. Not that they need much protecting…
Monday or Tuesday Kissy was showing signs of being in heat. She was peeing a lot in various places and flicking her tail around. At that point I wasn’t totally positive she was in heat (is that even what they call it for goats? In season? IDK) but I thought it would be fun to put the buckling, Trinket, in with her to see what would happen. I had planned on spring babies until recently learning that winter babies are hardier, grow bigger and stronger, don’t get the parasites as much because of colder temperatures, and aren’t at risk of being killed by fire ants (sadly that can happen). So I realized that only a few days before she came into heat and wanted to take this opportunity.
So in Trinket goes with Kissy. Kissy peered around her dog house, suspicious as she always is, but when she saw a BOY she totally changed personalities. No longer a jerky alpha goat, she put on her best dress and diamonds and pranced out to meet him. Pretty much serious here. She looked good. She stretched out. Showed him her best side. Stuck out her tongue (apparently that’s supposed to be attractive if you’re a goat). Tried to rub her face on him. But he couldn’t care less! He was like…oooh…leaves on the ground??? YUM!
It was just sad. Kissy seemed so rejected that she came over for attention from us. She seemed to be pleading with us. HELP, Do something!! So I felt bad for her and thought, okay, we’ll try Chaplin. They would have pretty blue eyed babies. So Christine carries another goat down the hill and puts him in there. He’s had a little bit of a goat smell to him in the past. I thought surely this would work.
Nothing. Nothing at all. Just boys excited over leaves and alfalfa. Poor Kissy Girl. Better luck next time, we hope.