UGH

****WARNING!! PHOTOS MAY BE OFFENSIVE TO SOME! PLEASE BE ADVISED*****

Being a true farmer is the pits sometimes. Your income is based on what you produced, not a side hobby or side business. If you lose an animal, its lost profit. That animal is to be revenue to purchase other things such as minerals, feed, or other breeding stock.

My goats have been an emotional part of my year. Today Santa Maria, one of my originals, proven mother, ferocious protector, had twins. I found both of them OUT of the jug that she was sharing with Pinta. I KNEW i need to seperate them but didn't have one single thing to seperate them with. not even plywood or anything.

The buck was a gorgeous dark caramel color, the girl, a black agouti. They were out of Solar who carried the dark caramel gene (its highly sought after in the show pygmy world).

To give you an idea of our jugs. There are three permanent jugs. All are made of hog panels and are on a 6" high elevated area from the regular loafing area of the barn. The panels are secured along the bottom with 1"x2"'s and are about 8' x 10'. Each pen is then able to be divided again as needed into two 4'x5' pens. I normally have all goats kid in the 4'x5' and then as they get older, allow them to mingle with the other small jug and therefore making the pen 8'x10' again.

The gates all are about 2" further out from the elevated area due to the frame they are built on. SOMEHOW or SOMEONE (Pinta) pushed that bugger down and he was found dead stuck upside down in the 2" area with one leg on the jug floor seemingly trying to get back up.

The girl was pushed out in a tiny area that was not secured down. The mom (Santa Maria) was standing next to her on the other side of the fence calling for her and the baby girl was SCREAMING she was so hungry. I put her in the pen and SM wouldn't even look at her. I moved them to their own jug, new straw, heat lamp and all and she would not look at her. I rubbed that little boy down for 15 minutes pleading for him to 'come to' as some pigeons, piglets and kids do....even though they 'look' dead and are frozen, they still come back to life. God's little miracles. This wasn't working. And the girl was still hungry.

I ran to the house and made up some colostrum specifically for goats and brought the nutri-drench just incase. I have a kid/lamb nipple that screws onto a pop bottle. Well she latched on to that bottle and sucked away until her belly was nearly bursting. Good. Now she has something in her. I hope she gets hungry enough to latch onto mom. SM is normally a great mom and I hope that she realizes who she is as I rubbed the placenta all over her again......then again goats aren't known for reasoning or thinking too hard :)

I'll keep you posted. I am attaching a photo of the DEAD kid and the live one to show you how tiny they are and the color of the buckling. I again am sorry if anyone is offended but its part of farming. OK so the photo isn't true color b.c. there is a heat lamp AND flash and it looks like straw color.

Hopefully my two registered does, Sharon and Krista are able to 'adopt' the little girl if SM keeps ignoring her. so far she isn't mean, she does call to it but she doesn't go and lick it off like she should be.

...............time will tell...............