Goats in totes

It's official. I have two bottle babies. 

 

I tried everything I could think of, but in the end, Amelia proved to be more stubborn than I. In the first 48 hrs she went from being uninterested, to mildly interested but unwilling to nurse, to hostile.  At hostile, I gave in and pulled her out of the pen. Interestingly, she has taken to sitting up against the panel between the two pens -- where she can see the babies, but doesn't have to interact with them. Not a great mothering strategy. 

I did try to milk her, both to feed the babies and to get the oxytocin flowing, but that was not very successful either. She hated it. Kicked, squirmed, tensed up, you name it. I never got more than about 1/2 a cup from her at a time, which wasn't enough to feed the babies and didn't seem like enough to justify stressing her out either, so I stopped. 

On the upside, I am totally hooked on the possibility of a dairy goat, not that I need any more chores. 

Um, no. 

Not right now. 

But someday maybe...

Once Amelia was out of the picture, I put the babies in with Riversong, Martha and Martha's little one. I won't bring them inside unless I think they're at risk for some reason . 

So far, so good. 

Martha tolerates them.

Riversong is a nice warm body.

And their big brother is thrilled to have them.

 

F is for Harry

F names?

What was I thinking?

No, I need H names for Pygora kids this year.

And now we need three -- for two bucklings and a doeling.

Amelia had twins last night. A little white mini-me and a beautiful black and silver buckling. Both are doing well.

Fortunately, Amelia was already in labor when I went out to feed the ponies at 10. Otherwise, I probably would have missed it and they might not have made it.

Amelia -- miserable, unhappy, first time mom -- walked away from both the minute they hit the ground. She wouldn't even sniff them. She seemed as much in shock as anything.

I stuck around for hours, slowing cranking the bottle baby machinery into full gear while keeping an eye on Amelia. This morning she seems to be coming back to herself, eating and moving around, but still not interested in the babies.

She's got a serious bag though, so the current plan is to milk milk milk her and keep trying to get her to take the babies. I won't be giving up easily. We'll see which of us is more stubborn.

And that's it for baby goats.

I think.

Pretty sure anyway.