Although she looked as if she were incubating a small army, Momo confined her deliveries on March 28 to a handsome buckling (Mojito)
and shortly thereafter a gorgeous doe (Manti).
Both kids were soon up on unsteady legs, looking for a good meal
and then for a way to sneak out of their pen.
They were already awake for early bed check the next morning.
Eclipse was fascinated by the newbies across the barn.
As MeadowWild Farm waited for Chandra to dispense the last of the babies
the older kids took advantage of the spring weather
to run madly about
tussle on the Skyway
launch themselves into the air
and then nap furiously.
Chandra chose April Fools Day to deliver a buckling (temporarily called Tippy for the small white spot on the tip of his tale)
and then another buckling -- smaller but otherwise practically identical to the first.
They were up quickly, and Chandra was cleaning and nursing them
so the Farmers congratulated themselves on the completion of an unusually smooth, uneventful and successful kidding season
popped open a bottle of Barefoot Bubbly
and enjoyed a celebratory dinner at the Elmwood Inn.
Whoops -- too soon for the celebration.
While the Farmers were gone, Chandra must have gotten hold of The Bad Mother's Handbook. 
After those first few halcyon hours, she turned into Mommie Dearest.
When the Farmers returned, she was sniffing Tippy as if he were a space alien
and head-butting the smaller guy away whenever he approached her. He may have originated the problem. Baby goats naturally and reflexively poke the mom's udder to release milk, but this little guy was striking so fast and hard that we nicknamed him Cobra.
Whatever the cause, Chandra rejected the two kids -- who spent their first several days in a bathtub lined with rugs and towels that had to be laundered frequently. Barb bottle-fed them every few hours.
They got out regularly for exercise, gamboling on the lawn.
When they were big and strong enough, they moved to the barn
and enjoyed supervised play dates with Momo's kids
not without the occasional face-plant.
They then moved to a larger pen in the barn, and still must be bottle-fed 3 times each day.
Geisha and Viva, the bottle-fed babies from 2013, picked up the procedure quickly; they would latch on to the nipple immediately and drain the bottle.
Tippy and Cobra are not the sharpest knives in the drawer. At each feeding, Barb has to pry their mouths open and hold the nipple in place until they remember that they're supposed to start sucking.
Tippy even dares to go head to head with the older and larger Rider
as Manti takes on a more formidable Keeper.
Eclipse's kids stop playing long enough for refueling
reminding Cheeky's brood that it's lunch time.
The youngsters are starting to eat hay and grain, also,
growing bigger by the day
as Eclipse does NOT need reminding when 42-pound Ecio stands on her.
Two of the kids may be higher maintenance than we'd like, but we're delighted with the close of a healthy and productive birthing season.
1 comment:
Cool goats uncle Steve.
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