Bottle babies ~Layla's twins

Meet Layla's Twins.  The doeling is on the left and the buckling is on the right.  We decided to bottle feed these guys since we won't be keeping them.  We are hoping to sell them as bottle babies.  What that means is that tonight they are in the house and have been getting colostrum (first milk) that we milked from their Momma about every two hours.  Luckily most baby goats sleep all night so we don't have to get up and feed them.  Tomorrow we will feed them 4-5 times during the day,  the next day 4 times a day for about a week then three times a day for a month or so before we drop it to twice a day.  We are hoping that we won't have them that long though.

Our kids were at college when Layla decided it was time so my husband was forced into action.  He did great helping me dry the babies and introducing them to their Momma.

The little buckling had quite a bit of fluid in his lungs and Pat had to help me hang him upside down to drain it out.  For a little bit I didn't know if he was going to make it.






We disbud the babies anywhere between 2 days old and 2 weeks old.  It still amazes me that there is such a difference in the bucks horn buds and the does.  The little bucks come out with horn buds that need to be burnt off in the first few days and the little girls horns are tiny and not really ready to be burnt until a week or better.  We learned early on that it is better to do them earlier than later, especially if you don't want scurs.  This is not a fun job but it goes quick and the babies are nursing their Momma's or bottles in just a few minutes and have forgotten what just occurred.

Rosies twins are busy romping around the barnyard and bouncing off the walls of the barn.  It is so much fun to watch them play.

Funny thing happened with Rosie and Peppa (our big Alpine herd queen) the day after she gave birth.  Seems Peppa picked a fight with Rosie and they bashed heads for 20 minutes.  Peppa lost the caps off her horns and was all bloody before she decided to give up.  Rosie is the boss now......it is so funny to see Peppa slinking about the barnyard in fear.  One good thing that has come of it is that Dora (the low goat on the totem pole) now gets to eat hay and hang out in the barn without any issues from Peppa.  You go Rosie girl, you rock!

The two week wait~AKA baby goat watch

We are going to have baby goats here on the farm again.  Rosie is due in two weeks and she is getting bigger by the day.  We always try to guess how many they are going to have.  I'm guessing she is going to have twins and that Layla is going to have triplets.  The other girl's aren't far enough along for me to guess yet.

Well that was written to weeks ago and I never finished the post.  Rosie had twin doelings yesterday afternoon after a longer labor than I wanted to watch.  Partly because I was beginning to worry that she was going to have problems giving birth.  But once she started in earnest, it was rather quick.

This picture is of her during labor....poor baby.






Rosie really loves her babies and takes good care of them.  Here she is with the first born, if you look close you can see the second one starting to be born (just hooves) while she cleans the first one off.

We choose to breed her to our alpine this year since she is a strong, healthy girl who gives rich, creamy milk and he comes from great milk lines that produce a lot of milk.  We were praying for doelings since last year we had many bucks and one doeling.  We are hoping that they will have some good characteristics from each parent.  One of them has Alpine ears and one of them as "elf" Lamancha ears.  We love their coloring and it will be hard to choose which one to sell and which one to keep.

Well I better be off to check on everyone.  Supposed to be 27 degrees tonight so wonder about bringing the little ones in for the night.  More due this next week....excited and scared.

Making udder balm for the goats

We ran out of the salve we put on the "girl's" after we are done milking them so I thought I would give you an idea how we make it while I make a new batch.  It has worked wonderfully for the goats for many years.  I tweak the recipe occasionally depending on the ingredients we have on hand but for the most part it is made the same way from year to year with only minor changes.

 

This year I am adding Candy Apple Mint to give it a good smell and a little bit of a tingle to stimulate blood flow.  I begin by going for a walk around the yard picking comfrey, plantain, and candy apple mint to shred up in our pot with olive oil.


Once the herbs are added to the pot with the olive oil I heat them slowly over a low burner and then turn off the flame.  I let this set and heat the herbs 6 times (twice a day for 3 days) and then just let them sit in the oil to infuse into it.



Once they are infused, they are drained and placed in another pot I use specifically for making salve.  I then add some of the infused oil (comfrey/lavendar) I made earlier in the year to the pot and shave 1/2 oz of beeswax for the salve and placed it in the oil to warm up and melt.



Once the beeswax is melted I add tea tree, lavender, and peppermint essential oils to the pot.  I also use Vitamin E  for a preservative so I add the contents of 5 vitamin E capsules to the oil.  Once this is done I pour the warm salve into containers to cool and firm up.  Once firmed up it is ready to use. 


If the salve it too soft you can re-heat it and add more beeswax.  You have to play around a little to get the consistency that you  like.  I always keep notes when I make this so that I have an idea later what is in it and so that I can make changes based on our preferences for the next batch.