IT'S A TWO-LEGGGGGG!! !! !! !! !! !! !! !!

The two baby goats that were born the day before the wedding are the wildest we have ever had.

I was sitting in the maternity ward the other day, holding the two new babies on my lap, feeling guilty for how wild the two born four months ago had become. As I sat there, with the two little furballs generating heat on my lap, I realized what had happened.

Well, for one thing, I was not even home the day they were born. I was at work, cleaning the room for our wedding, dusting and mopping the floor, taking down and setting up tables, decorating, folding silverware into napkins, stacking plates and on and on and on. I was on my feet from 7am until 4pm. I was exhausted once ds2 and I arrived home. I had enough energy to walk out and see the new babies, and I think I actually held them for a moment or two before I had to get back in the house and start getting more things ready for the wedding. I was then up until 9pm getting last minute things done. Up at 4am the next morning getting packed and ready to leave. Gone all day, we were home for an hour or so and then off to the hotel for our honeymoon. We came home to milk the next day, but were only home an hour or so.

I didn't have time to hold babies and acclimate them to people. That's why they got so wild.

My friend was in the midst of her own wedding preparations, she had agreed to take the little buckling, but things just got so hectic.

The easiest solution at this point, unfortunately for the boy, is the freezer. He is seriously wild.

The doeling, on the other hand, has value as a future milker. But not as a wild creature. She is going to have to be tamed down.

When I got the maternity ward in position, I decided that I wanted to get Miss Z and her doeling, who I may name Wild Thang... into the maternity ward, too. Because it's IMPOSSIBLE to get near Wild Thang in the big pen. She runs like a stampeding bull whenever one of us come anywhere near her. In the maternity pen though, I have options.

The first thing I had to do was get her into the maternity ward. I had a plan, and I knew if I was patient, I could move her over relatively easily. I milk her dam in the morning, at 3:30am. Some mornings it is very dark, and the little girl doesn't see me, I guess. Miss Z sees me. All the does know she is the only one that gets milked in the morning. Miss Z comes running around to the wooden gate and when it's very dark, Wild Thang runs with her, out of the gate. But on the mornings when the moon is full and it is light out, Wild Thang stays away. I knew if I just waited, she would come running out. This morning was the morning.

Miss Z came running out, and Wild Thang came out with her. WHOOPS, "It's a TWO-LEG!!!" she bleated out in alarm when she realized I was standing there. Her dam ran into the milking parlor and jumped up on the milking stand waiting to be milked. Little Miss Thang was crying out, "Mama, mama, where are you? Mama, where are you?"

My plan was coming together. I milked Miss Z, and let her off the stand. She went running back over to the wooden gate. Her doeling ran beside her, anxiously trying to get into the doe pen. I had picked up a short length of hay twine so I could wrap it around her neck to hang onto her.

LJ was out there with me. Little Miss Thang stuck her head into the wooden gate, trying to squeeze her way back into the pen, but I pushed against it so she couldn't get in. I was able to reach down and get the twine around her neck. When she realized she was caught, by a TWO LEG, she reared up and started screaming. LJ isn't used to seeing the goats act so crazy, and he was rushing toward her, smelling her behind, jumping around, like he thought she was going to play with him. I yelled at him to stop.

Dh was throwing hay and heard the screaming baby goat, and heard me yelling at LJ. The baby goat screamed again, I yelled again at LJ. Bear in mind it's 4 o'clock in the morning. Sound travels in the country, lol. Dh was alarmed, he thought something bad was happening. He was afraid the newborn baby goats were in danger because the other day ds2 observed our female dogs rushing up to the baby pen fence scaring the baby goats. I apologized later, because I'm sure it was very frightening to hear your wife screaming at your dog and hear a baby goat screaming. He came running over and I told him LJ was okay, I was just trying to get Wild Thang into the maternity pen. He opened the gate for me and she wrenched and leaped and almost twisted her head out of the hay twine I had twisted around her neck. Whew. If she'd gotten away, it would have been VERY difficult to capture her again. I would have probably have had to let her and her dam back into the big pen and wait another couple weeks until she let her guard down and ran out with her dam.

Now the work begins. I spend time with the baby goats, I'm in the pen holding them on my lap. I am also working with them as I usually do with baby goats, training them to allow me to pick up their feet so they will be good at hoof trims. Miss Thang cautiously watches me with the other babies, and I've also been bringing treats for the other goats. The other girls all crowd around me and Miss Thang sticks her head closer to see what's going on. I will be working with her for quite some time to get her accustomed to me, or she will be impossible to milk. My goodness, I thought Starburst was wild. This one is as wild as a stallion. Here in this next picture, you see her dam standing up on the fence, trying to figure out what I'm doing. Her wild baby is the black baby with the tan lines on her face and white ears, to the left. She's looking up at her dam wondering what she's doing.


Cautiously peering around her dam.

After a few days, I will start putting Miss Z back into the doe pen over night, and that way we can harvest her night time milk. We leave the doelings on their dams until they are six months old, but not full time. Four months is old enough to be without mom's milk overnight.

Ahhhhh, the tiny new babies.

The bigger boy's hornbuds were ready for disbudding yesterday. I think his littler brother will be ready tomorrow. If you look at the larger image you can probably see the two black round marks on his head?

Starburst is doing very well on the milking stand. She even jumped onto the stand herself last night, and tonight! That is great progress! As long as she is busy with grain, she does not kick. She stands still and allows us to milk her. We are only taking some of her milk since her babies are very tiny. But milking her will teach her the routine. The big test with Starburst will be to see if she responds to her name and comes to be milked once she is in the doe pen in a few weeks. Slowly but surely. I hope I never let any of the doelings stay wild again. I hope I've learned my lesson.

Nighty-night!