School's out

The baby goats were getting big, and happily drank down daily their two quarts of milk, then ate hay all day long and nibbled at whatever grain might have been spilled in their yard. They also practiced their escapes and generally wreaked havoc with the fencing. 

One favorite activity of us all was called 'goat TV'. We'd stand by the hour and watch them cavort. Sometimes the human children got into the mix and all 10 or so wild beasts dervished together.

Dear Old Dad made the mistake one day of lying in the warm sun, in a spot of soft grass that appealed to him and happened to be in the kid pen. He was soon covered with young goat damsels. The blade of grass in his mouth didn't last long...

We couldn't wait for school to get out so we could take a break from getting up too early and start enjoying each other in a less-structured way. The children had been playing with the next-door neighbors. Their children were similar in age to ours except for the youngest, who was just emerging from toddlerhood. Other children in the neighborhood played with ours, too. I envisioned a summer of ball games and running through the sprinkler and the squeals of a dozen or more happy vacationers. 

But it was not to be. 

The family next door seemed to share our interests, and I was full of hope for a real friend in the old house so near ours. But things weren't progressing too well. Our family seemed to be greeted with suspicion every which way we turned.

It wasn't our lifestyle per se, it was the sense that we were out to cheat them somehow. The father particularly seemed looking for offense, but both adults at times acted oddly. It seemed to begin with the warm weather, when we were all outside so much more often.

One incident seemed innocent enough: the neighbors' year-old puppy, a doberman gangly and goofy and named Spanky, came loping into our yard when I was the only one home, trotted up onto our open porch, and grabbed Dusty's feed bowl. I opened the door to coax her to let go, but she was already heading for home. 

I ran over to their house myself so I could keep an eye on where she went. That other property had a big barn plus a carriage house on it, in addition to their home, and I knew Spanky could take the bowl anywhere, then lose interest, and I might never find it.

But she went straight to her house, where Nancy (the mom) and her mother, visiting from another state, had just come home from buying groceries. 

I ran breathless around the corner to their door. Spanky was already inside, greeting Nancy with huge wags. The bowl was sitting just outside the door.

Both Nancy and her mother looked at me curiously, then Nancy went into the house with bags of food. I explained to her mother that Spanky had come over and carried off Dusty's bowl, and I was there to get it. I picked it up from where it lay at her feet.

But she objected. She said that Spanky didn't do that, wouldn't do that, and I could leave the bowl there. I started to laugh, then saw that she was entirely serious, grimly serious.

I looked for Nancy to come out to tell her mother that that wasn't Spanky's bowl, but she didn't. 

I left without the bowl, figuring I could pick it up later when grandma wasn't around. I was filled with confusion. Spanky was certainly acting as any puppy might, and I found it mildly amusing. It was human behavior I just didn't get, the flat contradictions and doubting my word over such a trivial thing.

That was just the first...

Out of the nursery...

Throughout April kids continued to be born, and each time we took them to the pen in the basement to join their older cousins, we were amazed at how fast the older ones were growing.

A brand-new kid is the size of a small cat, if you don't count the long legs. Or the size of a man's shoe, plus legs. They stand within an hour of birth, and start to bounce and kick an hour after that, if they're still awake.

But a week later, they are noticeably bigger, and their skills are equally more impressive.

The baby goats were all 'on the ground' and well. We moved them from the pen in the basement as soon as they were big enough to step over the fencing. We were amazed at how fast they'd grown. They went out to the 'kid yard', where they continued to 'popcorn', as we called it.

They still needed to be fed by a bottle, but that was no problem now that the weather was nice. We'd fill up the pop bottles to the top, cap them, and send them out two by two in the arms of the human kids. They'd prop the bottles under their elbows and the babies sucked them dry in about 2 minutes.

We let them have as much as they wanted. There was plenty.

But the milking routine now took longer: gather equipment, put the goats on the stand, milk out the half gallon or so they gave per milking, run it into the kitchen for filtering and pouring into bottles through a funnel, run back out with the bottles and feed the babies, who knew the routine and were crying lustily.

You could tell when a baby was full because his sides stood out and he'd begin to stagger. Soon he'd crawl into the pile of already sleeping babies and doze off.

By the end of April only the tiniest babies remained in the basement, but we decided not to keep them there. We moved them out with the other babies and they learned the routine quickly.

It remained only to dismantle the nursery and haul the used bedding to the garden. The plastic tarp that we had put down under the bedding, before the first baby was born, made the clean-up fairly easy. We dragged the sheet up the stairs and out the bulk head and around to the garden, where it helped nourish the roots of our future meals.

Our first kidding season was over. Our older bucklings were leaving for their new homes, mostly in suburbia. We were working from dawn till sunset and beyond. And we had a new habit called 'goat TV', which was the pastime of standing and watching the babies cavort to express their joy of being alive.

I catch a kid...

The day finally arrived when one of our does liked having me there when she delivered.

It was Elegant, sweet girl!

Elegant had grown right along with her pregnancy, and was looking like a copper blimp. She had grown more and more affectionate. We kept an eye on the calendar and on her, and on the sunny Saturday morning when we figured she was due, she kept close to me during chores.

And when I rubbed her, she voiced her approval in a tender way.

I added some fresh hay to the milkroom and led her into it, and sat on the milkstand so I could see what was going on. Not much, unfortunately.

I left to get some chores done, but she called after me in a loud Nubian voice. The rest of the ladies lifted their heads, then went back to eating their breakfasts.

The sunshine was warmish, but the milkroom was in the shade and cold. I grabbed a warmer jacket, the washbucket, some rags, and a brush. Might as well do some goat grooming while I kept near her.

By the time I got back to the barn, she was lying down and breathing hard. Her mouth was a bit open and she was looking off into space. Hmm! It looked promising.

Then she pushed. And pushed and pushed.

I had no idea how much was a normal amount of pushing, and when I should become concerned. I hurried to let myself into the milkroom. The brush, rags and water went on the little shelf, and I knelt down at Elegant's rear to see what I could see.

Not much.

I have a great respect for natural processes and think we all must work pretty well or we wouldn't have survived this long. So I was ok with waiting and seeing. Except for my natural impatience.

I couldn't tell what might be going on inside with the baby or babies, but goat people had told me the babies had to get themselves untangled and lined up during labor so they could come out face first.

In fact, the normal position, as I reviewed for myself, was the two front legs coming first with the nose just behind the tiny hoofs. Anything else was difficult to make come out right.

After some waiting, she pushed again and I saw a bubble about the size of my fist appear. The front of the baby should be in it, and what I wanted to see as I peered more closely was what part of the baby.

More pushing on Elegant's part gave me a better view, and I quickly saw the two white hoofs. But where was the head? The murky fluid in the bubble didn't give me a good view. Why hadn't I thought to bring a flashlight?

I called to the children, who were out and about doing jobs or cavorting on this first beautiful day of the Spring. I knew they wanted to see the birth. But Elegant was pushing harder now and I went back to trying to figure out if the kid was in the right position.

I was trying to discern the contents of the bubble when suddenly it surged outward and a blackish kid plopped onto the straw, with his face still in the sack.

Elegant reached around and made tentative licks on his tail. But his head was still covered, and he was bobbing his head up and down as if he were trying to get that thing off. I couldn't wait. I pulled at the sack. It was fairly tough, but in a moment - who knows how long! - I had it open and the baby let out a tiny, infantile meh! meh!

Elegant looked startled by the sound and began to lick him more vigorously. Then she quit and began to push again. I rubbed the baby with a rag fairly vigorously and he seemed fine. Then another bubble appeared: Baby #2 was about to be born.

She slid right out. She was red like her mom, but with spots. Cute bright white spots! The sack broke right away and she shook herself.

Sad to say, I scooped them both up and ran them to the house. Elegant would have to love me instead of her babies. She was soon milked, and the babies were fed and settled down to sleep. I treated her to her 'goat tea', the bucket of hot water new mama goats so appreciate, and I brushed her and talked to her and she rubbed her head on me.

The babies were first a little buck, then a little doe. They were gorgeous, with long Nubian ears and a bouncy attitude. We didn't name the little boy because he would end up as someone's pet (and only if he were lucky), but the little girl became Anandalila Velvet and took after her mom in temperament as well as looks. It was a beautiful day!

Elegant had done well for a new mom. Next time she might do more licking and be more self-sufficient. Within a few days she would be one of the goats who leapt onto the milkstand in her turn. And when she saw her babies again, she wouldn't know them. And wouldn't miss them.

At least so we hope.

What you do with baby goats

After I discovered Monique with her babies, I went into full gear with the routine we had decided on.

First, I needed to get them away from Monique. If I wasn't going to leave them on her for their entire childhood, I needed to get them away from her before they got the notion that she was where milk came from. And from thinking Monique was anything special.

(This practice of taking the babies away actually bothered me a lot. But it was considered to be necessary so that the babies would not hurt the udders. It was all well and good that in nature baby goats nursed off their moms, but that only lasted for a few months before the babies would be eating on their own, and we dairy people wanted to milk those udders for 10 months. And so on. So I went along and determined to remove the babies from their moms.)

So I went into the milkroom and scooped the two babies up and ran them to the house, one under each arm. They made baby goat noises, small meh-heh-hehs, and Monique called out to them. Soon I was safely inside. I carried them to the kitchen and put them down on the floor.

The next part of the routine was to check whether we had doelings or bucklings. We of course wanted does. What good is a little boy goat at a dairy? I checked and we had two does!

The third thing was to cover their navels with iodine, so infections couldn't work their way in. Even with a sheet of newspaper on the floor, that was a messy proposition. Baby goats are not prone to standing still, or lying quietly upside down in a lap. And these two were an hour or so old and were getting ready to run and hop.

Fourth, I needed to run back to the barn and milk Monique to get the precious colostrum from her and get it into the babies asap. Chances are they had gotten a little when they were with her, but we wanted them to have all she made. It would jumpstart their immune systems and had everything to do with their future health. And I needed to take a wash bucket with me, and the milk pail, and hot water for Monique: newly delivered does really love to drink hot water, maybe to warm them up after all the work they've just done.

And there wasn't a water bucket in the milkroom, so ...

I gathered up the three buckets, one big one full of hot water, one small one with Basic H and a rag for washing her udder and any other parts that needed attention after the birth (though they do well taking care of things themselves), and the milk pail. I also grabbed some newspaper so I could wrap the placenta in it, if she hadn't eaten it.

After milking out the colostrum, I then needed to bottle it and get it into the babies. We had soda bottles and black lamb nipples waiting, but we'd never used them.

By this time I had helpers home from school. We took turns trying to hold a baby, get the bottle into the mouth, get it to realize something good would happen if it sucked, and not waste colostrum.

The problem was, the nipple collapsed because no air could get into the bottle to replace the colostrum that had come out. We devised a trick of putting a rubber band into the bottle before putting on the nipple, which created enough space to let the air in.

The sixth thing was to clean up everything.

The kid-feeding process would need to be repeated several times a day. These were fully mature young kids, so they could probably go four hours between meals...

The kids grew sleepy after they ate, and we left them lying on the kitchen floor on some clean newspaper. In the normal course of events they would pass their mecomium, and it is a sticky, blackish-green nightmare, during their first day. We wanted that to happen before we put them in their nice clean pen.

Finally all the plumbing was working well, and we carried them to the basement, where they frolicked joyously, slept, ate, and generally fascinated the row of humans who sat watching them hours on end.

One birth down, four to go...

Freshening

The purpose of having dairy goats (at least in theory) is for the milk. Good goats produce milk for 10 months and then slacken off. To get them to start up again, they need to have a kid. Some great goats will go longer, but the usual rule of thumb is to freshen a doe once a year.

Like so many animals, dairy goats are on yearly cycle. A doe kid is born in the early spring, eats well for the better part of a year before winter conditions arrive, and has her own baby or babies when she is a year old, the next spring, so that the cycle can repeat itself on schedule.

The gestation period of a goat is 5 months, and at the end of that time the newborn is ready to leap up and begin life, on the move so as to avoid predators if in the wild.

On a farm, the newborn kid is not in danger of any predation except excessive petting and picture taking.

But the 5 month rule still applies. If you want babies in March, better get them started in October.

Most breeds of dairy goats are in season throughout the fall, and the kids are born throughout the spring. Some breeds aren't so particular, such as those whose origins are closer to the equator. These will breed in the fall for spring babies, but they will also breed in the spring for fall babies, or at any other time, just about.

We had only goats who were in season in the fall, and that presented a challenge if we wanted year-round milk. Does are usually milked 3 months into their pregnancy, then dried up for 2 months so all their energy can go into the babies. So that is two months when that doe will not be contributing milk to her owners.

The smart course is to breed some of the goats early, some late, in the fall season. Say some in late August with their first heat of the season, and some in November. Anything later than that is risky because the breeding season is almost over.

Freshening is all about bringing does into milk, not producing baby goats. In a sense they are throw-aways in the process, little mouths to feed that use up the precious milk.

But with good planning, they become assets, with homes waiting for them. More on kids later!

With a couple of does freshening around the end of January, and others coming into milk in April, the flow of milk can be out of bounds. Milking all those does is a bigger chore than it was in the fall, when the milk supply was running down and last year's doelings were not in milk at all.

What to do with the seasonal abundance of milk is the big issue of a goat dairy.