Riversdell

This is one of Glory’s two girls just waking up from her nap yesterday. Unfortunately, the smallest of her triplets, a buckling, did not survive. He seemed OK the morning after kidding but was looking quite poorly by noontime. We brought him into the house to tend to him. Which amounts to, really, doing pathetically little while lambasting oneself for not doing it sooner. Distressed goat kids sound eerily like human babies when they cry out. Sigh. The good news is that all the other kids are doing fine and the weather has been sunnier than has been predicted.

Glory had her kids a few hours ago, right on schedule. She had triplets — as yet unsexed. Here she is with her traditional post partum drink of warm water and molasses. The last kid out (on the left) is smaller than the other two. Glory’s first time kidding several years ago we had a little trouble with her initially rejecting the second kid. This time she does not seem to be rejecting it but does seem a bit indifferent. We put it on her teat and it suckled for a bit, so time will tell.

Glory was indeed our widest doe this season. Here she is day before yesterday lying on the ground and grunting repeatedly. We moved her into the barn that evening. We now get a bit of a respite since our next due date is April 5th.

Our fourth kidding, this time twin doelings about five hours ago courtesy of Nellie. Another of Puck’s by the looks of them. Note the semi-erect airplane ears.

Samatha, another of our first-timer yearlings, followed right on the heels of Hope by having a single buckling on Saturday morning, March 5th. The kid is dark and sturdy, just like his mom.

Hope kidded Friday March 4th in the afternoon. Although she is a seasoned veteran, being 5 years old, she only had a single buckling this year. This guy has wattles on his neck.

We’ve been getting a dose of belated winter weather lately — 2 – 6 inches of of snow a few times within a week. We are tired of winter and are ready for spring, but at least winter does provide it’s own style of beauty.

It’s hard not to smile at a goat kid! This is Artemis’s single, Louie, at 9 days old and doing fine. In the background you can see our latest snow. The weather has been quite variable; we are trying to have the kids in the barn for at least their first few days to make sure that they are staying dry.