Another Long Weekend

Hello all! We're wrapping up another very loooooooong weekend which circulated around goats. 

But first, it's time to recap all that's happened since I last posted.

- We lost ANOTHER goat during labor. Ebony succumbed to ketosis after being in sorta labor for 6 hours. Hind sight is 20/20 right? We could have given her calcium to help. No guarantees that it would have worked, but you never know. 

- With all the goat loss this spring, we're at wit's end. We took one of the still living, still pregnant goats to the vet to get their opinion on things and get some tests done. They've been great to work with all along, but they're also stumped as to what might be going on. We're still waiting on results.

- In the meantime, the goat gal at the farm store was talking with us, and she said that this kidding seasons has been really hard for many goat owners. It's nice to know that we're not the only ones. 

- See if we EVER let the bucks escape again. As if the other times were intentional... :P The back-to-back-to-back kiddings is whooping us.

Speaking of kidding... Mazy had her babies on Friday morning. Mom and I stayed up with her all Thursday night, but the first baby was stucker than stuck. Poor Mazy was tired and hurting, but there is only so much you can do without doing anything overly drastic (read: pulling the babies out or c-section). We gave Miss Mazy calcium, warm molasses water (which she guzzled), nutridrench, etc, etc, etc. We threw just about everything we had at the poor girl. I don't think we had it in us to dig another 6-foot deep hole at the back of the property. That thought was proven the next morning when Dad made the executive decision that we needed to get that goat to the vet to let them take care of things. So we did, thinking that at least we could save the mother and have her to milk another day. 

The call from the vet surprised us:

We had triplets. 

...

I can honestly tell you that we weren't expecting that. 

But there was a catch to the sudden excitement - it had been a harried c-section. The vet techs even commented on how much it was a close call. You see, when they made the incision, Mazy's uterus ruptured, and she lost a lot of blood. The vet practically threw the babies to the techs so that he could quickly suture her up. They gave her IV fluids and iron, stitched her up as best they could (both inside and outside), and hoped for the best.

The two baby boys were the picture of health. Their sister on the other hand... well, we weren't supposed to hold our breath and hope that she made it. She was a text-book case of a selenium-deficiency: her front legs wouldn't stay straight, lack of muscle strength, and the difficult delivery are all symptoms of a selenium deficiency. 

I think that she was the first baby that 'clogged up the works' so to speak since her brothers were perfectly fine. I know that we'd be in a very different place if we hadn't had the c-section. We went through with the decision hoping that we'd have an intact milk goat at the end of things even if the babies didn't make it. What we got instead was a dairy goat that should never get pregnant again and three babies.

For Friday through Saturday, we had to bottle-feed the babies about every one to two hours since poor Mazy was not feeling good at all and wouldn't let the babies nurse. You can imagine the sigh of relief when we saw those little boys nursing. That just left the little miss.

Since she was in the condition she was in, we kept her in the house. Keeping her warm, stretching out her front legs, and the 'round the clock feedings that her brothers were getting. Sadly, though, Mazy has rejected her. We tried to bring the baby back to Mazy, but she wouldn't have her baby and pushed her over. 

So now we have a house goat. 

She cruises around the house, follows us, naps in corners, dances in the living room, and curls up and watches TV with us in the evenings. I've been joking that we need to tie a helium balloon to her so that we know where she is. I just might have to do that. ;) The funny thing in all of this is how much it's like having a baby in the house again. It's been :counts fingers: over nine years since we had a baby in the house.

Eli has dubbed the triplets Susie Derkins, Calvin, and Hobbes. I rather like it.

Until next time!

SG