Aspen Shenanigans (Aspen Kidding 2/18/23)

 Once upon a time, 

....

There was a cute little goat named Aspen. She is such a sweet, slightly shy, gentle soul. Unless she is pregnant. Then she turns into the biggest grouch (I can relate sister). 

Our story begins on September 25th, 2022. Fences were being fixed and breeding plans were being made with much study and scrutiny. I was about 2 and a half months postpartum myself. I was just beginning to feel normal. The weather was warm and it felt great to be outside. One of the interesting things about fall is that goats can go into a strong heat. To the point, the shy and un-flirty become absolute hormonal TERRORS. Aspen happened to be in one of these strong heats and it was a few days before Flash (my big homebred buck) was to leave for a date. I had popped outside to stretch my legs and to check on my father-in-law. This is where I witnessed the foreshadowing. Aspen and Flash flirting and sharing goat kisses through the fence. I laughed and shooed Aspen away before briefly toying with the idea of locking the boys up. Hindsight tells me... I should have locked the boys up. 

I went inside to check on my wee sweet baby. A few minutes pass before I hear my father-in-law come in and say my name. My bedroom door was shut and I couldn't hear particularly well. So I went out and asked my mother-in-law what was going on.

"Flash got out!"

I looked her dead in the face, "Shit." (disclaimer- swearing doesn't count if livestock gets out.)

Flying out the door with muck boots in hand, I can hear her chuckling, "Well that's a word."

Flash and Aspen did not appreciate the interrupted liaison. We chased Flash around for about 3 minutes before I managed a running football tackle and got dragged about 6 feet. I do not recommend tackling a buck in a full-blown rut. It is disgusting and it takes a lot of work to get the urine smell out of one's hair. 

After the chaos had been contained, upon inspection, the damage had been done and Flash had covered a doe not meant for him. We had not planned to use him at all this year.  He apparently, had other plans. 

So I called the vet. The vet was able to give us a prescription for lutalyse and I gave her the shot. Lute can help stop a pregnancy in an animal and force them to cycle. 

I thought that was the end of it.

No.

It was not.

 One of the side effects of being a goat "farmer" (I use the term very loosely) is you tend to spend lots of time staring at goat butts. Then, you send pictures to your mom to ask if this seems normal to you and your sister announces loudly to the general public that "Natalie is sending goat porn again."  Fortunately, my mom's eyebrow lady has a sense of humor.😅  (**disclaimer- it's just what my family calls it. I do not actually distribute goat porn.)

Fast forward to January and I am out feeding animals. My entire herd had been bred at that point and I was glancing to check goat sizing. Aspen happened to catch my eye. She seemed further along in pregnancy development than my other does. At that point, I snapped a picture and a suspicion was forming. Texting one of my friends, I asked her what she thought.

"I usually associate that" (what was in the image) "with a very pregnant goat."

After lecturing Aspen, I wandered back into the house to tell my spouse the news... The lute had not worked (I gave it to her too early) and we were expecting baby goats in the middle of February. In the mountains.... and the pregnant goat in question does not read the labor book. Will was also not excited. 

Headed into kidding watch week, I was an anxious wreck. I always am during kidding season and I am also convinced my husband is a saint. Aspen will act like she is in labor for a week. Uncomfortable, chronically oozy, and crazy grumpy with a chronic case of the ups and downs. It leads to me texting friends in stress/panic and watching goat cameras like a hawk. We even spent the night in the barn because I was convinced she was in active labor (thank you exhaustion for assisting in the embarrassment).  

Aspen went into labor the day after her due date. I woke up Sunday and discovered that she was stringing. Aspen did not string the first time she kidded. So I was excited. After calming down, I let Will know I would not be attending church that day due to Aspen's pattern of behavior. Considering everything, I did what almost every slightly overwhelmed female does. I called my mom. 

My parents were so lovely to come hang out and wait for things to progress with me. We played many rounds of cards and cracked jokes. But when 8pm had rolled around, Aspen had yet to do anything. My parents had to leave. After harassing my husband into coming out to the barn with me, I went to check on Aspen due to the cameras deciding not to work. To my surprise, Aspen had decided to actually do something. She had a bubble and a nose with some tiny hooves poking out. I called Will, and he came hurrying out. The first baby was born, a buckling (we called him False Start due to his mom starting to stress me out during the Super Bowl). Within 1.5 minutes (we hadn't even had the chance to move False Start yet), another baby goat shot out. A doeling. She landed right on top of her brother. So we had to clean off the buckling (again) and get this new addition to the party cleaned off. Again, we had another baby trying to arrive in a hurry. So we quickly moved the two babies on the ground out of the way. This last baby had some trouble, trying to show up with just a head and no hooves. Babies normally try to present in a swan dive position. While I was desperately trying to dry babies off in 15-degree weather, Will had to go fishing for the legs. He quickly was able to locate one and the last baby shot right out. However, she was slow to figure out how to stand and use her back legs. After cleaning up and making sure everyone was dry, I sat and watched the young wobbly doeling try and stand. After witnessing everyone latch and nurse at least twice, I finally decided to head to bed. 

I slept like a rock.

Our doelings are named Galloway (like the Oreo 
cow's breed name) and Wobbles (for obvious purposes ;) ) 

False Start

Galloway

 

Wobbles