This is the picture of the "Wide Loads" bellied up to the food trough on the evening of March 28, 2023. One of them, Winnie, the second from the right, who is a first freshener (first time having kids) would go on later that night to be the first to give birth to the first of the baby goats for this year. That's a lot of firsts!
It was cold this evening, teens on the thermometer (Fahrenheit), with a dusting of snow overnight, but all these mammas had been moved into the pole shed a week ago and tucked in warm awaiting the arrival of their babies. The heat lamp and mamma Winnie's licking helped to dry them off and keep them warm overnight.
These are the pictures and videos the next morning. Welcome Babies!
I've returned to this posting at a much later date to post family pictures of each doe and her kids, for future reference.
Winnie gave birth to two kids on March 28, but for some reason, the white one, as seen in the pictures above, was found dead about two days later. I have no idea why. She would go on to take good care of her Golden Boy, who favors one side of her udder. She is giving an incredible amount of milk out of just the one, so I'm looking forward to next year to see what she can produce with both udders in production. Her Golden Boy is relatively friendly.
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On March 29 Harley had three kids, but the last one was still in its birth sack when I came out to check on her. It was already suffocated and cold. I would lose several kids this birthing season for this very reason. I don't know why sometimes goat moms don't always lick all their kids right after birth. It is frustrating when this happens, as I try to pay close attention to when kidding is happening, but I can't catch them all while they are giving birth. She was left with an even set, a buckling and a doeling, which look more like lambs than kids.
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Fuzzy had triplets on March 31st, and she has been a great mamma. With several losses this year, she was not responsible for any of them. She has also gone on to become a truly terrific milker. I'm getting at least 1300 grams of milk from her, and frequently more, which is fantastic! She has the softest udder. The smallest white kid is the only doeling (female), with the other two being bucklings (boys). The runny backside of the girl is left over from earlier when they went out into the pasture. Sometimes kids get what is called scours when they first start eating green grass and leaves. She's fine now, but still has dirty pants.
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Biscotti gave birth to an even set, a dark brown/black buckling and a black doeling on April 6. I briefly put her on the milk stand, which I have never done before, but she was just such a stubborn old nag who was just too much trouble to deal with than the milk I got from her, so I stopped trying.
