WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGES~ Hadassah Kids Twin Does

The time has come for the second round of kiddings on the homestead. Hadassah (Haddie) is the first of this group to kid. We are expecting Bailey and Naomi to follow her any day now, but goats being the creatures they inherently are, it could be another month. We'll let you know about any new kids as they arrive.

Haddie's labor went almost textbook perfectly. The only strange element was that the first "bubble" presented, was not the first kid delivered. And, that "bubble" did not break until the second kid arrived. A little strange, but since we have two healthy, beautiful does to show for the laboring, we will not complain. (The "bubble" is the amniotic sac containing the kid(s).) In these images, you can see the intact bubble below the second bubble holding Mackenzie, the first kid actually born. The second kid is still inside her unbroken "bubble" almost ready to be completely born. It was strange and another first for us. Usually, a "bubble" presents, a kid starts to emerge and we hold our breaths until we see 2 hooves and a nose. We keep holding our breaths until that kid moves in any fashion. Then, with a sigh of relief we wait in case we are needed, but basically, we let nature do its thing.

We hope you enjoy the video and images of Hadassah's kidding. Since I caught the second doe, I only got pictures of her being born.

MacKenzie, Oberhausli-Lamancha doe, 7 pounds

Miss MacKenzie was READY to move when she was born. She stood within minutes of her birth, found her Momma's udder, latched on and nursed with no assistance from us.

As lovely as she is, MacKenzie is not for us to keep. She will be paired with Mason and we'll find her a great home with folks who want to raise dairy goats.

We thought to pair the second doe born with Kirk because of her coloring and planned to name her Marimanee (Mari) accordingly. After considering it for a bit, we decided to pair her with Theodore (Teddy) instead. They have lovely complimentary coloring and both of them have full ears, where Kirk was born with lamancha elf ears. They are also very evenly tempered; as goats go, these two are laid back and sweet. That being the case, we are going to call our champagne coated doeling, Brice.

Brice (Oberhausli-Lamancha) doe, weight 7 pounds

We'll have lots of new images of these two in the days and weeks to come. Thanks for visiting with us tonight, friends. We're really happy you are here!

Sean & Sonja ♥

Homestead Updates

This week has passed in a blur of working, building, making, designing, and kidding. Whew! I know you are all anxious to read about the new kids born yesterday and I am in the process of editing the videos I captured, but that takes a lot of time. That video is uploading and when that finishes, I will post it, too. I am hoping to have it finished tonight. We'll see if the interweb cooperates with that plan.

In the meantime, I can update you on Superman's hand. I removed the stitches on Friday because I couldn't put Sean off any longer. I really wanted to give it a full 10 days of healing before taking them out. I was worried that if they weren't ready to be removed, it would reopen and have needless complications. But, they were driving Sean mad. He started insisting I remove them on Tuesday. Since Sean's skin was starting to grow over his stitches, he won and out they came. The injury is healing well and improving every day.

With the improved weather last week and Sean feeling better, we were able to repair and move the wind-damaged turkey fencing to fully expand the duck and geese enclosure. From 64' × 32', it more than doubled again to 64' x '90', which gives the ducks and geese an area totaling approximately 5760 square feet to wander and explore.  Ferdinand and Frances have settled in well. Frances is laying eggs in a nest. We are hopeful that Frances will hatch a nest this Spring. 

All the birds are picking up in their egg-laying.  We are collecting roughly 14 dozen eggs each week right now and that should increase as the daylight does.  We have five egg shares spoken for and can easily satisfy another five shares, so if you are local and are interested in farm fresh eggs each week, let us know! An egg share provides a total of 18 dozen eggs for the cost of $50- that's only $2.78/dozen!!!

One morning this week, Sean and I walked through the woods to where it borders the stream at the back end of our property, dreaming of this year's fence expansion for the goats. It is a lovely space. Quiet and peaceful. It may not get finished until next season, but we are hoping to be able to finish the goat pasture expansion this year. If we can, this is the view they will enjoy. Not too shabby, huh? Now, imagine it in high summer, with the stream running with small fish and wood ducks and the brown grasses alive and green.

Sean wants to fence so the stream is the fourth wall of the pasture. I think that would look lovely, but I am very worried that the goats would go swimming- though they are not known to like water- just because they are GOATS. Goat code clearly reads that any time it is inconvenient to follow goat etiquette, goats will do as they please, when they please, how they please. Research is wanted before we do anything more, but it is a good idea...

 While I am discussing those goats, this goat has decided that she can roam at will. She has discovered a place in the back woods where with just a little pressure, she can slip under the fencing. I followed her to see where she was getting out and caught her in the act. She caught me watching her and slowly removed her head from the fence and sauntered back to the barn hoping all the while that as an inferior-brained human, I would forget it and not repair her escape route. Look, I am not denying that they may have the upperhand in the "Canniness Department". I just don't like it rubbed in.

Afterward, she spent the afternoon pretending that all was well in the world while secretly planning her next escape attempt. Peter is only a few weeks old, but look how he has grown! He is going to take after his Daddy and be a big buck, for sure!

We have had a bit of bad news, too, to share. Sean and I replaced the damaged turkey fencing panels with some four-foot tall, rolled chicken wire and metal posts. Since our animals free-range, fencing is meant to give a small barrier to predators, not keep our birds contained. The downside of freedom is danger. And, that struck us last week. We lost three turkeys in two days. At first, Aquila was missing at night when we went to put them to bed. That isn't completely unusual, as the turkeys have a penchant for roosting on our roof, the chicken coop roof, or in the summer pig pen. I wasn't too worried. In the morning, we were missing two turkey hens. Sean went searching the woods and found them. It was clear a predator had taken them- most likely a fox. That night, we brought them up to the chicken yard. There have been no further attacks, but it is still hard to lose animals, both mentally and financially. The alternative is captivity and that brings its own risks. We will continue to free range our birds as much as we can. Despite these rare attacks (this has been the 2nd in seven years), we feel it is better for our birds to live as freely and naturally as possible. But, another advantage of expanding the goat fencing is that they do a wonderful job of clearing out the brush and under-growth. Open land means less cover for a would-be predator to get close to our birds.

I don't want to end on a sad note. Overall, things are going well for the homestead. We can feel the weather changing and with it, we are bursting with plans for the coming season. As soon as the video of Haddie's kidding uploads, I will post that for you, too.

Thanks for visiting with us today, friends. We're glad you're here.

Sean & Sonja ♥

WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGES!!!!!!! Superman's Kryptonite

Our resident Superman is adept and capable of tackling nearly any project that needs it. His ability to improvise, adapt, and build our dreams with his strong hands, is just one of the reasons why I love Sean so. There are many. My Superman has his kryptonite, though; it takes form of a simple, utilitarian box cutter. Exhibits A-C: (a) Before Sonja, Sean gouged his side with a box cutter while working at Petco. (b) While cutting a rubber trash can to create a chicken feeder, Sean sliced open his thumb, which is still numb in one area. (c) Sean nicked himself through the years in various box-cutting mishaps. Which brings us to this morning. Sean is really careful using box cutters and open blades, having experienced their wicked help before. He thought to make certain that his appendages were well away from danger. Yet an accident still happened while using a box cutter to remove a sliver of wood from the side of a door, so as to insert the hinges. His hand slipped. His hand slipped with enough force to slice through the fleshy part between his left thumb and forefinger, leaving a gaping, perfectly parted, 2 inch wound- very nearly to the bone. It severed through Sean's skin, protective fat, vein and nicked the muscle within. Blood welled bright red and gushed from it. Thinking quickly, Sean clamped his uninjured hand over the injury and pinched together the skin while moving off the family room's carpeted floor- so as to bleed on the more easily cleanable wood floor- and calling for my help.

I had been chatting on the phone with a friend, took one look at Sean and the blood running through through his hands and dripping onto his pants and said, "I have to go. Sean's hurt." and hung up the phone. Sean was not going into shock, but he was clearly hurting and the amount of blood running from his hand was ringing alarms in me loud and strong. We are not easily scared by injury. We do most of our own doctoring around here. Step on a nail- clean it, disinfect it and bandage it. Dislocate a thumb- put it back into place while you have the window of shock to cushion the pain. Slice yourself- clean it, disinfect it, butterfly it if you can. Even without seeing the wound up close, there was NO doubt in my mind that Sean needed help and stitches. I was a little sick at the thought that he might be more gravely injured than that. I grabbed a clean towel and on the count of three had Sean quickly remove the pressure of his hand and push the cloth over the wound. It happened so fast, I couldn't see more than blood, so I still had no idea how bad this was. The nearest hospital is 20 minutes away and we spent the ride there joking to each other to lighten the mood. It was laugh or give in to the fears and worry.

Inside the Waldo County General Hospital ER, Sean's hand was still bleeding profusely. In the waiting room, the blood ran down his palm, through the cloth and dripped onto the floor. While a more absorbent cloth was applied, I got my first peak at the damage. It was bad- worse than I imagined. There was no doubt Sean would need stitches.

He joked," Are you sure you don't want to just stitch me up so we can get back to work?"

"Well, we came all this way, we might as well let the doctors have a go at it." I replied. "Oh, that's a good picture! Stay still."

The triage nurse did not know what to make of us. Obviously Sean was injured, but he was joking and laughing in between wincing in pain. And, I was taking pictures of everything. What a pair of loons she must have thought us!

The staff was wonderful. Professional. Competent. Compassionate. Sean was numbed, debrided, stitched and released within a couple hours of arrival. 12 stitches: two inside to close around the muscle and ten outside to close the skin and keep everything in place where it belongs. Sean should not suffer any permanent damage, but he won't be doing much in the way of work this week- if he'll listen to me.

Debriding the wound, even numbed made Sean wince and jump. 

A lovely row of neat stitches.

Final product. Everything back inside where it should be.

The unexpected trip put us behind schedule on the list of things we needed to do today. Things like, making soap and cheese, mailing packages, washing the laundry, replacing Kristen's bedroom door and deep cleaning the chicken coop. While we were gone, the girls helped with straining the feta cheese and setting it to drain. They also kept the laundry going. Once we were back at home, Meaghan and Kristen pitched in to help us with the afternoon chores, while Sean looked on in frustration and carried water buckets and bales of hay with his good hand whenever I turned my back for an instant. Sean restrained from using his hand and chores completed, Sean walked Kristen through using a chisel and hammer to finish preparing her door to be hung and ate his lunch. I talked Meaghan through making garlic alfredo sauce for tonight's dinner. The list that needs attending is still long, but we'll get through it together. Milking goats in the morning should be interesting!

I had planned on writing to you tonight about other happenings around the homestead. I'll try to make some time to finish those posts as soon as I can. In the meantime, thanks for visiting with us tonight, Friends. As always, we are sure glad you are here.

Sean & Sonja ♥

FLASH SALE

In response to Nature's effort to redecorate our turkey coop and yard, we posted a FLASH SALE on our Lally Broch Farm Facebook Page this morning. This is what our coop and protective fencing looked like on February 15th. The turkeys hop over it to free range and visit the other farm animal areas. They like to challenge and run at Molly- who can't understand why they are not afraid of her. She tucks tail and hides behind me when the turkey babies are out. I would love to say they roost in their coop, but really they don't. They prefer to sleep on the roof of their coop (or the chicken coop) or on the fencing itself. They do eat inside their coop, so all the time and effort moving it from Swanville to here, was not for nothing. :)

Mother Nature's overnight remodel February 16, 2016. I like the lack of snow cover and I can definitely work with the warmer, sunny feeling. I feel the protective fencing is somewhat lacking, however and could use some work.

I hope you will take a couple minutes to hop over to our Lally Broch Farm Facebook page to see what we have offered for sale. If you have a $5 coupon from us from a past sale/auction, you can use it for deeper discounts. Or not, your choice. ♥

Our plan for the day involves driving to meet a bonded pair of geese in Rockport and their coop-mates, a pair of hens. Their family is moving across country soon and they may be joining us on the homestead. We'll meet them before we make any decisions to make sure that this is a good fit for all of us, but I have a good feeling after talking with their family that we will be able to provide them a good home.

The 7, year-old hens we just collected from a friend in Abott last week settled in fine and are doing well. We have room to add up to 20 additional hens to the farm this year now that we have moved our ducks and geese to their separate yard. We'll breed to keep an additional 8 turkey poults, too. I am excited about hatching new chicks, ducklings, goslings, keets, and poults come Spring. If you are interested in adding some to your family, do contact us about what we are expecting to have available in these lines this year. :)

Thanks for stopping in, friends. We love your company.
Sean & Sonja ♥ 

It Rains and It Pours...

The adage says, "If you don't like the weather in Maine, wait a minute. It will change." Over the weekend, our temperatures plummeted to -30* degrees. By Monday, the brutal cold eased and we climbed to +8* degrees. Tuesday saw the temperature increase to nearly 50* degrees during the day, but with the warmer temperatures came gusting winds up to 50 MPH and torrential rains through the night. We woke this morning to survey the damage.

 *Sigh*

All the safety walls collapsed.

Thomas and Lazarus

My first thought was that we had suffered a predator attack over night. My stomach dropped and I felt sick at the thought. I stood in the kitchen window, imaging the horror of dead or missing turkey babies. It was not an attack. The destruction was caused by the brute force of the winds tearing apart 2x4 framed, wire panels. We are very thankful that all of the turkeys are unharmed. They met me at the top of the field. And are wandering the yard, as normal, right now. But, that fencing must be repaired.

The Waldo County Woodshed Shelter Disaster

The second casualty we discovered was the heavy duty shelter Sean and I built and staked down in November. It belongs, along with the wood it covered, to The Waldo County Wood Shed. Sean surveyed the damage. It seems the covering might be salvageable and if they sell replacement parts, the main supports which twisted, bent and are ruined may be able to be replaced. With a heavy heart, I contacted the coordinator to report the trouble. :( No one was injured. That is most important, but these are not the things I want to wake up to. It does NOT make for a good start to the morning.

With nothing else to do, we set to work. While we waited for the hardware store to open, Sean and I put our backs into manual labor. We cleaned out the entire barn and all its stalls. I cleared the horse stall, the main doe stall and the buck stall; Sean cleared the kidding stalls. Fresh shavings and new bales of hay filled me with a feeling of setting something to right. It looked good and smelled good. I accomplished something. A deep breath, a trip to the store and a plan for the afternoon to clean up the mess and repair what we could did much to restore my spirits.

We'll be hosting a sale in the next few days. We need to make us some money! Stay tuned on our Lally Broch Farm facebook page for that.

And, there are these to remind me to smile:

Nyota

Nyota and Spock. She is almost the inverse of him in terms of coloring. While she is white with black spots and brown legs, he is black with white spots and brown legs. And they both have the sweetest outlined ears! We are going to offer this pair for sale this season once they are weaned. If you are interested, please drop me a message. :)

So that is what is going on in our world. :)

Thanks for visiting today friends. We are glad you are here.

Sean and Sonja

Veterinary Visit to the Homestead

The weather is supposed to drop to -20 degrees in our area overnight. That
means the barn doors get closed and sweaters go on the kids. Sean will check
on the barn every few hours through the night to make sure everyone is okay.

Abby Arena, DVM with Judah

It has been a week around here! First, I stepped on a nasty screw in the barn while helping with the barn remodel last Thursday. Then, on Monday Sean and I were in a small car accident on 1-95 which left a dent in our van and caused the other two vehicles involved to be towed away. (All the peoples were fine- we were in the middle car, but the vehicles took beatings!) Levi took ill with meningeal worms. Cassie showed signs of an ear infection. And, this morning Bo started to be weak in the rear legs. We were very grateful that our veterinarian, Abby Arena, DVM was planning to come out for a herd check up.

Rachel was very interested in the kit.

Folks, I cannot stress this enough. Do not wait until you have a medical emergency to try to find a veterinarian who works with small ruminants. I don't know of one who will make a farm call if you are not already a client. As homesteaders, we learn so much as we go; from experience, from each other, from what didn't work~ all valuable and sometimes costly lessons, but it cannot replace the knowledge and experience your veterinarian has under their belt. If you care for goats, sheep or the like and you haven't already lined up your veterinarian, now is the time to make that a priority. And then, like we all do, hope you never need to call them for anything life threatening.

Hay on top is what we bought today.
Compared with the older hay.

Close up of good hay; green, lots of leaves, and
few stems.

Today's visit opened my eyes to some things we need to change around here and it also gave me the tools to be a better care-giver. Dr. Arena showed me her technique for tube feeding, especially how to know you are in the stomach and not lungs and left me with the proper equipment for doing it should I ever need to. (Tube-feeding can be necessary on weak animals, new goat kids are especially vulnerable.) She talked me through when and how to inject Dextrose directly into a kid's peritoneum in a case of hypoglycemia. (Triplets, quads or runts of the litter might some day need this intervention.) We looked over the entire herd and discussed their overall health and nutrition. We have been keeping goats for 6 years. We know not to be confused by a fat "hay belly" when checking for health. But, y'all we have been checking this WRONG for several years. We had been educated to check under the goat's rib cage for a layer of fat, like with dogs, to see whether a goat was too fat or skinny. Abby reeducated me where to check along the spine. We have hay available for our goats to eat 24/7. We know to look for moldy hay, but we often feed first cut, which isn't as green as 2nd cut hay. Since we depleted our regular hay provider completely out of hay and also our back up provider, we have been getting hay from a 3rd farm. We knew the hay was more brown than we'd been getting, but it wasn't moldy and the goats were eating it fine, so we never thought more about it. We were just grateful to have found hay. Again- WRONG. Though the goats were eating it and filling their bellies, the nutritional value of this hay was not ideal. We stopped using it immediately. Sean and I found some 2nd cut hay, paid $6.50/bale, and started the goats on a road to better nutrition. You can bet that I will be a "hay Nazi" around here from now on.

Today's visit also made me feel better about our herd and where we are going with our homestead. Dr. Arena complimented our barn set up for being properly well-ventilated, our new hay manger design (yes!), our large pasture/browse area, and our plans for improvements for the coming year. We talked about our change from using the deep litter method to cleaning out the stalls each week and how that is working out for us. We checked on the herd. The newborn goat kids looked healthy. Levi is on the mend with only one more dose of Ivomectin needed tomorrow. She gave him a steroid to help regain his strength. He is still weak and it will take some time to bring him back to full health, but it looks very promising. Dr. Arena talked with us about copper bolus as a preventative against Barber Pole worms. Sean and I are collecting fecal samples from all of our goats to get a baseline for the entire herd. And if there is a problem, we will work on a plan of attack for it. We'll try swabbing Ivomectin externally around Cassie's ears. She may have some mites causing the irritation and the infection will likely resolve on its own without the mites. If not, we have a plan B. We'll have another visit this summer, where any bucks that we won't use for breeding will be castrated under anesthesia. Dr. Arena is ordering us some supplies and medicines to stock our vet kit; like 50% Dextrose in small dose bottles, 25 g needles, syringes (at substantial cost savings over getting them at a feed store), and stomach feeding tubing. We'll also have BoSe on hand for kidding and a small amount of Banamine in case anyone else in the herd shows signs of meningeal worms. Dr. Arena is sending me information about everything we discussed and left me with handouts which included a great dosing chart for dewormer medicines. I just feel better.... equipped, I guess is the right word. I am so thankful to have her on our side and on our team.

Abby Arena is in private practice and can be reached via email at AbbyArenaDVM@gmail.com or texted to 207-992-7174. She specializes in small ruminants. She is accepting new clients. :)

Thanks for visiting with us today friends. We're glad you are here.
~Sean and Sonja

Some Days Feel Like a Win. ♥

Sean is on his way to get an estimate for our van repair from the accident on Monday afternoon. While he is gone, I thought it would be a good time to try to write a bit. The house is quiet and no one needs me at the moment. :) First of all, let me start with this adorable image of goat kid cuteness because goat. kid. cuteness, but also because this will be the image that attaches to this post and I think it is more becoming than the stall door images to follow.

Ebony and the silkies have the run of a 5 foot by 10 foot stall. I made
Ebony a hay cave under the stairs.

Ebony was not sure about this new home.

We spent the morning cleaning out Ebony's winter stall and building a 5th kidding stall in that room. Eventually (as in hopefully tomorrow), it will have a door to access it from the either the regular exterior door or from inside the kidding stalls. I love the new configuration of the barn. I am sure there will be tweaks as time passes, but for now, I anticipate this set up will be so much more convenient than ever before. Already the new hay mangers have almost completely eliminated the bullying from the dominant does towards the more docile ones. With so many feeding stations available, there is no need to fuss. An added benefit is that this new system has meant significantly less waste of the hay and that means that it costs us less money to feed them. I have lots of pictures of the new set up and also some video and I will get to posting about it as soon as I can. For now, I want to focus on an update on Levi, tell you about Anna's lad, Pete's struggle to get milk from his momma, and share a video of kid "play time" from last night.

Levi's Update:

We woke this morning to an alert Levi. He spent the night in the wooden crate in front of the wood stove. He was quite ready for Sean to help him to stand outside so he could urinate and defecate this morning. He stood unassisted and took care of his physical needs. Back inside, he had a good appetite for both hay and water. Since Sean and I planned on being in the barn for a good portion of the morning, we brought Levi outside with us so we could keep an eye on him. (I don't really enjoy having a goat kid in my kitchen, y'all. I will do it because it *has* to be done for the next few days, but it is NOT high on my list of wants.)  Levi stood unassisted and walked around under his own power for just about three hours while Sean and I cleaned out the stall and building. He laid down in a snow bank when we were nearing the end of our project, so Sean brought him inside the barn and settled him in some hay to rest while we finished up. Back inside, we administered his medicine: .5 CCs Banamine injected IM and .8 CCs Ivomectin injected sub-q. He got a treat of a celery stalk and 2 small broccoli heads while Sean was giving his shots as a distraction. It worked. Levi has been resting in his box for about an hour, sleeping on and off, eating fresh hay or chewing his cud. When Sean returns, we need to get back out to the barn to finish chores and Levi will come with us. The exercise and air will do him good. Because we are anticipating cold temperatures (of the 8* variety) overnight, Levi will remain inside in his box at night and return, goat-coated, outside with us during the day until his strength returns.

Anna's Reluctant Nursing:
Anna gave birth on Monday to a lovely Lamancha buck. She had him in the wee hours of the morning without notice nor assistance. By the time Sean found the kid, Pete was already mostly dry and standing on his own. As Monday passed, Anna gave no indication of allowing Pete to nurse from her. Colostrum is imperative to a kids health. According to this paper published by the Iowa State Extension Office, ideally goat kids should receive half of their colostrum needs within 4 hours of birth and must have it within 24 hours. After that, the kid's body cannot absorb colostrum- the window is shut forever. With these thoughts in mind, it was very worrisome that every time Pete attempted to nurse, Anna would kick him off and walk away. She had no trouble cleaning him, would call if he got out of sight, but eat? No way. Through the day Monday, Sean held Anna steady for 3-4 minutes and allowed Pete to nurse. We hoped that she would settle into the swing of things and by morning, everything would proceed normally. At least we knew that Pete got colostrum within the window.

Tuesday brought no change to Anna's inclination to feed Pete. Sean or I held Anna gently and helped Pete to latch on and nurse for 3-4 minutes until tail wagging was achieved. In some ways, bottles are easier. At least with them, you can see how much your little one is eating. Every time we got near their pen, Pete seemed famished. We checked Anna's udder and she did have milk- though her bag was terribly small. There was no telling how much milk she was producing. Milk production is normally an elegant example of supply and demand; the bigger the demand, the bigger the supply. Most of the time, this works perfectly. Sometimes it does not, though. With that in mind, Sean liberated 3 ounces of milk from whatever doe was close to hand for us to supplement bottle feeding Pete each morning and night. While this little is certainly not enough to feed Pete exclusively, it did a great deal to soothe my worry.

Wednesday dawned and nothing changed in Anna's mind. Rather than continuing to milk a doe and giving Pete a bottle, we decided to skip the middle man and allow Pete to nurse directly from another doe while we watched. Pete was able to finally latch on unassisted and Keziah was willing to allow him to nurse- so long as she didn't realize it wasn't her kid. We couldn't try to adopt Pete out to Keziah. For one thing, she was uninterested in adding to her parenting responsibilities. For another, Anna was an attentive mother in all other aspects. I didn't have the heart to take her offspring from her. The end of Wednesday marked 72 hours~ roughly 15 attempts to get Anna to fully accept her young. I admit, we were beginning to worry that Pete would become a bottle baby.

Thursday dawned with wonderful tidings. Sean walked into the barn to check on everyone and found Anna allowing Pete to nurse from her. Full on, standing still, tail waggin', nursing!!!! Success! 12 hours later and I actually sighed while writing this to you. I cannot tell you the relief this is for us.

Finally, I promised you some video of those goat kids playing. Tomorrow we begin milking four of the does who have kidded; Abby, Jane, Rachel and Keziah. We won't milk Anna this year at all. Though it was also Keziah's first year kidding, she is a year older than Anna and we planned on breeding her. She has a nice udder formed and I feel comfortable introducing her gently to milking. Anna is younger than we'd like. She bred before we wanted her to. This year, we are going to let her focus on being Mom to young Pete and not put any kind of pressure on her to give us any milk. We'll make decisions about which does will be milked this year as the others kid and we can evaluate them.

To prepare for sleeping in a separate stall from their mothers, we gave the kids some goat kid play time- away from their Moms. The mothers took it in stride. I nabbed Rachel's twins last and she yelled and yelled at me... until I took her kids. With a look of relief to her kid-sitter (me), she quietly turned her attention to eating in peace. It was hilarious. I could only imagine her yelling, "Wait! You forgot to take mine! I need 2 minutes of peace to pee in private! C'mon!" The kids had varying reactions. Some just wanted to tackle the stump. Others wanted to tackle each other. Some never made a peep and didn't notice Mom wasn't in the same stall. Others called and called until their mother stuck her head over the stall. With nine kids in the same stall, it won't take more than a night or two for the kids to settle in to the new routine.


I am excited to begin milking- even without shelter, in 8* weather. I have been missing the joy of fresh cheese. I should have enough milk to make chevre tomorrow and feta on Saturday. I am in cheese making heaven. To add to my excitement~ Sean got the spider webs ::shudder:: removed from the barn tonight. This forward progress feels soooo good. ♥

Thanks for visiting with us tonight friends. You make the journey all the more pleasant.
~Sean and Sonja ♥