Kya has Goat Babies!
July 24th brought us goat babies that were three days overdue. First a tan and black strong baby and then a weaker all white one born in the sac. I had to hang him upside side and help get all the birthing membranes off his head. Coughed some to get his airways cleared. She had them, two boys, up in the juniper duff of the pen, dirty. We brought them down and put them in the stall until the kids are strong and can keep up with mama in such a big, rocky pen.
Kiya in the morning on the day she finally popped!
These little lives started in cold January when we got this doe, Kya, and another, Mabel. We had them bred before bringing them home in March. Now, 148 days later, out popped a little chamoisee buckling kid, followed not long after by what appears to be a white gold brother. I am no Nigerian Goat color expert, so these color terms are new to me and a briefly educated guess.
Nathaniel heard Kya delivering the chamoisee kid, he whistled to us from the goat pen, and I knew she was finally kidding! Clancy, Livia and I made it out with plenty of time for us to wonder if a second kid or the placenta would come. Just when I began feeling a little impatient, Kya began grunting out another. She is such a small goat that watching her quickly push out a second kid fully in the sack was remarkable.
She was a little preoccupied with the first and uncomfortable with our presence, so she didn’t respond to the second little one squirming and breathing in birth sack slime. I quickly grabbed it by its hind feet and went to work peeling off the membrane that clung suffocatingly to its body, legs, and head.
It was quick work, and the little instinctual coughs cleared its airway.
We quickly realized that the goat pen was far too large, the ground so loose and dirty with Juniper tree duff that we didn’t want to leave them out. They needed a small area to get their legs strong with mama’s milk before being left to navigate the rocks and dirt. The stall was in good enough order and required almost no work to make it work. Win-win.
Clancy loves to pick them up and put them in new spots around the stall. I love to snuggle them in my lap. Livi loves to watch them and grab them up in her tight clutches!
I am not sure their names will stick, but so far, the dark one, the chamoisee, is Cheeky which matches his spunky go-getter personality. The dreamy little creamy is Peep, which matches his calm and snuggly personality.
Our other doe, Mabel, was bred too. Her due date came and went with no signs of impending goaty labor. No enlarging of the teats—bagging up, changing how she carries her belly on the right, or loosening of her hind end area. We have to accept that these are our goat babies unless we take her back to be bred. We would likely wait until October or November to have spring babies!
But that is a decision for another day. For now, we will love these two little cuties and hope we can make them very friendly without doing any bottle feeding.
