This week we began weaning the older kids. Jan has a gentle system for doing it. At sunset, we simply close the baby gate, keeping the babies on one side of the milkers’ pen, and the mamas on the other. Everyone can still see each other and touch each other through the fence. But, the babies can’t nurse during the night any more.
This means that we milk first thing in the morning now - and the mamas are full of milk! Soon, when the babies are completely weaned, we’re going to have to milk twice a day. So, yesterday Jan started teaching me how to milk.
I started out on Mothra, who was a bottle-fed baby, so she’s very human-oriented. She’s also just easy on the milking stand - not someone who’s liable to kick me in the face for being a lousy milker.
Well, I suck so far. I’ve watched Jan milk these goats a hundred times, and it looks so easy. I thought I did what she did. I thought I did what she said to do. No milk came out. Finally, I began to get the hang of it, but by that time, Mothra had eaten all the oats in her bucket, and was restless to get back off the milking stand.
Jan milked the rest of the goats - we figure I’ll just practice on Mothra every day ’til I’m ready to take on somebody less patient.
When Jan brought the last milker in, she told me to go open the baby gate. That’s a really fun part of the morning. When I open the baby gate, the babies run toward their mamas and hurl themselves against their udders, drinking madly.
But wait, first of all, you need to know that goats who are nursing normally butt their mothers’ udders in a way that looks really painful. So, bearing that in mind, imagine the kids running pellmell and then launching themselves at their mothers’ udders. It’s really amazing. Being a goat mother is not for the delicate. To put it mildly.
Yesterday morning, I watched the babies run to their mamas, and then I headed back to the milking room, passing by a the tire that we have in the pen for the babies to play in. Lying next to the tire were two babies. They looked terrible! And, who were they? They looked so much like Ocean and Roger that, for a second I thought, wait! Could Ocean and Roger have gotten that desperately sick overnight? But, how could they have shrunk?
And then I realized that they were newborns! Delta must’ve delivered a week early, in the middle of the night!
I ran for the milking room, yelling for Jan to come help. I could tell that one of the babies was alive, but I couldn’t tell if the other one was. We scooped them up, and took them into the kidding parlor - I sat on the floor, unzipped my jacket and stuffed them both inside, rubbing them with towels.
Jan ran inside her house, filled two big jars with hot water, stuck them in a bucket with a towel on top, and we put the babies in that make-shift incubator. I kept rubbing the babies while Jan worked on a better incubator.
The babies’ temperature, when we found them, was around 90 degrees. Goats need to be 102 degrees. But, somebody had cleaned them up. As best we can figure, Delta birthed them, cleaned them up, and then, when they wouldn’t get up (because they were too premature) she gave up and walked away from them. I don't know if she felt the kind of despair I feel when I think about that moment. I hope not.
Jan ran out and hauled Delta into the kidding parlor - we had to try to help her bond with her kids. At first, Delta wasn't interested in her babies at all.
Soon, Jan had a laundry basket rigged up with jars of hot water and two heating pads and bunches of towels. We got the babies in and got their temperature coming up, and Jan called the vet. He said to feed them colostrum every hour. (There is a rumor that you have to wait ’til goats get up to 100 degrees before you try to force milk into them - the vet said that’s not right, that we should start getting nutrition into them now).
These babies! At first they didn’t even know how to suckle! We put colostrum in the goat bottle, but their suckling instinct hadn’t turned on yet! So, we had to squirt little bits of milk into their mouths with a syringe. Within a couple of hours, the smaller baby - and these goats were only slightly over three pounds each - got the hang of drinking out of the bottle, and became a great eater. The bigger baby, not so much.
When the babies' temperatures seemed to be stabilizing, Jan put them in the straw. Suddenly, it was as if a switch turned on in Delta's brain. She understood what those little guys were. She started licking them like crazy.
Another issue: in order to begin to eat on their own, the babies need to be able to stand up. Normally, goat babies stand up within an hour of delivery. Girls usually stand up really quickly, boys take a little longer. Our premies just didn’t have the strength. They were so wobbly! Finally, around 5:00 in the evening, the smaller one got to his feet and managed to stand on his own for a few seconds before his mama knocked him over, licking him. Jan and I had a quick dinner, and divided up the feeding times for the night - so we alternated who fed the goats, and each of us got a little bit of interrupted sleep.
And, everyone made it through the night! They're a little livelier this morning than they were yesterday. The smaller one can now walk. The larger one can get his back legs to stand up, but not his front legs. I'm sorry they don't have names yet! They need names that start with the letter D. I suggested Drogo (after Khal Drogo from Game of Thrones) but that was not appealing to Jan. At one point, she was thinking Domino for the black and white one. But, she's not sure.
Anyway, we're thinking we'll bottle feed them every other hour for at least another day - meanwhile Jan has a plan for putting Delta on the milking stand and teaching the babies to eat for themselves there. Keep your fingers crossed! I want these babies to live!