Ragdollcatlady's Just a Little Patch of Weeds Farm journal

[ragdollcatlady]

Thanks BWG and CBL.

This morning we had the market goat show. I actually ended up missing most of it as I had to run home and get Beaux Jangles so my DD could fill in for the senior dog showmanship spot (the first place person was sick)in small animal round robin. My kids have never shown a sheep or market goat so they were both totally new at this. DS won 1st and DD was 2nd in showmanship. Their market goats were in 2 different groups, Hazel was 2nd (overconditioned and needs firmer muscling=excersize) and AJ was 1st. Buddy was 3rd in his class.

DD won 1st in senior small animal round robin, DS2 won 2nd in senior small animal round robin, and DS3 won 4th in senior large animal round robin....after a huge (1300lb) steer kept stepping on his foot and heel of his shoe! He has never handled or been near cows at all so that was a very new experience today. I said I would give him a ride to town tomorrow so he doesn't have to walk with the smushed up foot and all!

Long day but good. Tired animals and tired kids.

Little had to come up to the kidding pen. She was very sad, but she is ready at any time. Katastrophe was originally bred at the same time, but didn't take, so Ravi is the only other goat due at the same time and Ravi doesn't do the kidding pen! So poor Little is alone. If she stays upset I might try and see if Katastrophe wants to keep her company.

 

[ragdollcatlady]

Oh yeah, since DD was in the small animal round robin I had to judge the poultry part of the show. The person in charge seemed concerned if I could be impartial about my own kids being in it.... I would gladly let someone else do it, but she didn't know anyone else that knew poultry. I think I can be fair. If anything I would expect my kids to be much better, all of them having won several poultry showmanship contests after being in poultry for 7 or 8 years.....But I judge pretty leniently for round robin anyway....the kids are showing animals they may never have handled before. The kids that know their stuff awesome! The kids that clearly tried really hard to learn it awesome! The only kid that didn't seem to know anything and didn't seem to have asked anyone to show her...lowest score.....but they should all be commended anyways for showing well enough to get to round robin and being brave enough to try it. Some of my own kids were super nervous about asking other kids for advise when they needed to learn about the different species. We have been poultry kids forever. Dog and rabbits too. Dairy goats as of the last few years....no pigs, sheep or cows. I couldn't judge this at the county level, because I like being fairly easy on the kids... and in exchange, I get to learn about some body parts that apparently have moved or are new.....

 

[babsbag]

I remember my friend's son going up to a lady at the county fair and asking her if she would show him how to show a cow. He did really well and was a quick learner. It sounds like your kids did well, congratulations, you should be proud.

It probably good we don't live closer, but right now that would be handy so we could swap goats. And yes, goat addicts do tend to enable each other.

 

[ragdollcatlady]

Little brought her own company to the kidding pen....2 doelings and a buckling! I am shocked! I was hoping she would have 2. It looks like we have a chocolate and white girl, blue eyes, black and white girl, blue eyes, chocolate buckskin with extensive white boy, not sure on eye color yet.

That makes 14 kids for the year, 7 boys and 7 girls.

Little had started pushing but her vaginal opening wasn't dilating enough. It was only maybe an inch or so open, but the bubble was bulging and pushing really hard from the inside. I stretched as much as I could and we had a tongue and face presenting but no feet, she had a tiny bit of room above the kid, but none below, so I grabbed her head and pulled, trying to guide upwards. Bobble headed kid came out fine and the next 2 were out within minutes, delivered head and feet like normal. These kids were up and at it really fast. One was even climbing on me at only 20 minutes old to suck on my face!!! (she might be a keeper!) These are Jack kids and since I sold him, I will most likely keep one girl.

Reeses girls are incredible, they both had triplets their first time! And with Reese having quints this year, I am definitely loving this production!

Little has a tiny udder, nice but tiny. Have to see how it fills in in the next week. She is one of my smaller does. Closer to Janes size.

 

[OneFineAcre]

Congrats on the babies

 

[ragdollcatlady]

Thanks OFA.

Kids are cute and doing OK. I am a little bit worried though. I checked her teats right after kidding and squirted a little colostrum onto the ground to be sure they were clear. All was fine. But the kids seemed to try and nurse a lot and didn't seem content. I defrosted some frozen colostrum and got the 2 girls to take some, the little boy wouldn't really, but since he was more persistent on mom, I finally went to bed around 3. I got up around 6:30, and fed all the big goats and milked Stinker. I defrosted more colostrum and mixed it with the fresh milk to be sure some enzymes and live cultures were there. The girls have been taking the bottle great all day, little guy not so much but we are working on it. Little never finished passing the placenta completely. At noon, I finally cut off the majority. If she hasn't passed it by tomorrow morning, we will head out to the vet. I gave her BoSe since the vet had mentioned low selenium can cause it (when Georgia retained last year). I crushed up some tums too and made sure she has her minerals. Normally after kidding my does burn through the oats, molasses, warm water. If they don't finish it, I just leave it and by morning it is gone. It doesn't look like she touched it. She ate some pellets, drank water and had a few nibbles of hay last night so I know she had some, I hope I am just worrying too much and that she is just tired.

I took a deposit on Reeses black kid. I was just a few minutes from pulling the add, but someone contacted me and came out to see her.....

So I guess I'll just have to keep a Little kid instead. How about the black and white one? It looks like someone drew on her face with a sharpie. DD said she has graffiti on her face!

 

[BlessedWithGoats]

Aww!! Congrats @ragdollcatlady both on the awesome job your children did at the fair, and on the new triplet kids!! Hope Little is doing well! Please keep us updated!!

 

[babsbag]

I love those ND colors, so fun. This year the color scheme was chamoisee and broken chamoisee at my place. Other than the La Manchas and the 1/2 boer kids all the kids born (31 of them so far) are either chamoisee or broken chamoisee, I can't even tell them apart...good things they are dam raised and the moms know whose kids they are. There might be one or two that have a little black highlighting here and there, but pretty boring colors out in the barn. Last year it was black and white, but I got a new chamoisee buck and I guess that gene is very dominant.

Hope that Little is ok.

 

[promiseacres]

Congratulations, so cute! Love hearing 4H stories 1 more year and my ds can be in mini 4H

 

[ragdollcatlady]

Thanks Babs and Promise,

Little is fine. I think I knew she would be, just maybe more worried since she was my tiny baby from last year. I carried her around everywhere, and I do mean everywhere, forever! The vet couldn't see us until 3 so I gave her some Oxytet this morning before work. By the time I had stopped back at noon, she had either passed the rest of the placenta or the part hanging out had broken off. We still drove her to the vet an hour away to get checked out. We will continue the antibiotics for a week as long as everything else is good. I also ordered a refill on BoSe as I am almost out and Ravi is due this week.

I called in to tell work that I was back in town and willing to come back in, but with only half hour left, did they want me to come back? My coworker joking said yes "Dr wants you to come mop the floor"! I walked in and they were like, uh, why did you come back in at the end of the day? I said, well K told me to come in and mop.......We brought the baby goats in to visit and show off for a few minutes. This same coworker is the one that mentioned one day how I always talked about these baby animals, but she never saw pictures.... I don't use my phone for everything and I guess my website is too far to go to see pics, so we brought the babies to her!

Then we had a 4H meeting and came home to feed. I heard baby goats out back, voices that I did not recognize, I stopped feeding and ran out to the big girls pen. I could just make out 2 little babies by Ravi! I ran back, yelled for kids to come and bring towels, and I grabbed the flashlight. I was glad I did because I would have missed #3 a few feet away from Ravi and the other 2 kids. We have 2 girls and a boy. They are red with a few spots on 2 of them. The little boys ankles/pasterns are weak! One little girls back legs seem to turn to the side. I am hoping its all just from being squished alot and that they will straighten out. I did give BoSe as I want to be sure they aren't showing deficiency symptoms. Ravi passed her placenta so we are good on that.

We quickly scrambled some goats around. I fed Littles kids and put her and her kids in the largest crate. Ravi and her kids are in the kidding pen for the minute, but she doesn't "Do" the kidding pen so they will be back out in the morning, but I will move the 4 week olds out with their mums to the big girl pen for now and let Ravi and her brood have the mom-n-me pen.

The bigger baby boys are all a little bit hoarse. We are weaning cold turkey and they are just not that into it. They decided they don't wanna be big boys anymore and just their mommies!!! So they have been crying all day yesterday and apparently today too.

I think that about sums up today. I am tired!