The LittleFlowers Farm Blog

The babies are doing well and growing quickly! All except the latest arrival (Faline’s girl) and Sun Yi’s polled (naturally hornless) girl have been disbudded. The vet used a very funky silver spray afterward on them, so the babies look a little strange.

Faline’s little girl is doing much better - her breathing is easier and she is feeding well and often. Today was warm enough that I put her out in the baby pen and she was very excited! She still isn’t great at prancing but she’s practicing a lot. She is still very tiny – one of Sun Yi’s triplets looks big next to her…

… and Kai looks absolutely huge! Hopefully she will continue to improve and get around to growing a bit, but for now it’s nice to see that she has the energy to play.

Faline, Squee’s sister, delivered early – she wasn’t due until April 5. Her baby girl is tiny and has a hard time keeping warm, so for the first time I’m trying a makeshift “goat coat” in addition to that old standby, the hot water bottle (plus a microwaved towel at times). My goatcoat is made of a cut down sock, and needed some adjustment at first to give her legs free room.

She didn’t look all that happy about it at first, but seemed to get used to it quickly. At least she stopped shivering for now. She is very small, so I’ll probably be keeping her past weaning age to make sure she is healthy. Goatbabies with low birth weight can catch up very quickly. Her mother and aunt, Faline and Squee, were both tiny babies and have matured to nice doelings.

Much as I love goatbabies, the end of the delivery season is always a relief! I can start catching up on sleep and enjoy the babies

Here are the babies that were born this past week. First is Pepi’s little girl, who is a “mini-Nub” – half Nubian and half Nigerian (in thie case McLovin). She definitely takes after her mother, and is a lot longer in the leg than the Nigerians. She was born Thursday night and is already very active!

Peach’s boys are both doing very well, despite the long delivery on Friday.

One is gold and white just like Peach, with a face that reminds me more of a lamb than a goat, though I’m not sure quite why.

His brother is a gorgeous silvery brown, a oolor I’ve not seen before (I’m disappointed he’s not a she)! I’m sure the color came through his father McLovin – he is Floozie’s baby and she always produces very unique colored babies. Between McLovin’s colors and Fat Boy’s tendency to throw polka-dotted buckskins, it’s always exciting to see what the next baby will look like!

I’ve got a welcome hiatus now until April 5 or so, when the last goatmom is due. It’s been a very hectic kidding season, with everything still at odds since the move. Hopefully next year things will be a bit more settled.

Catching up on pics of the newer babies today. SunYi’s boy has a perfect Charlie Chaplin mustache (we won’t say he looks like Hitler)!

Holly’s little cinnamon boy is a bit wild still – he definitely needs some lap time!

Floozie’s baby is still enormous compared to the others, but he has a cute face.

He and Holly’s boy have been flirting shamelessly. Holly’s boy mostly paws at the girls (and sometimes at the boys, too – at this age they are not too discriminating).

Floozie’s boy specializes in “sweet talk” (though he sounds like a mallard duck) and “blubbing” his tongue. He started both when he was barely a day old, which is precocious even for a goat!

Another alligator snapping turtle tried to cross the pasture (the first was in the late fall or early winter). He (she?) seemed baffled by the fence netting, but wouldn’t back out, either.

I think this snapper is larger than the previous “guest”, and happily was a little less aggressive (for a snapper, that is). I managed to get one foreleg untangled but then had to flip him over on his back to free him completely. I didn’t realize how little their underside is covered – the plastron of a box turtle is much more extensive. I can definitely say that the underside of a snapping turtle is no more attractive than the topside!

The tree at the end of the stone patio is covered in blooms! No leaves yet, just clusters of tiny purple flowers on the branches (some on the main branch as well).

This tree is old and has a lot of character. It has holes in its trunk that make it look like a Halloween tree when it’s bare, but it really has turned lovely with it’s spring covering!

It’s overcast and a bit rainy today, so the goatbabies are curled up with their moms. The big babies are staying in the doe pen overnight now (though in a “baby-proof” cage). I don’t have another delivery until late this coming week, so Holly and SunYi are still in the kidding pens with their babies. I let them out a few times for some private “mom time” and found it very hard to get them back in!

“Pumpkin” is an orange tabby who has been living on his own since October or so. He was a housecat who was accidentally let out, and was too skittish to recapture. When I moved here in November I saw him around and made inquiries, so was able to connect with his owner. We tried to recapture him but he was terribly shy – he would run like mad if I even opened the door. We tried live-trapping him but Donna Piano (another stray) would end up in the trap. I started putting out extra dry food for him, but could never get close. He never came around in daylight, which made it harder to make contact with him.

Sometime between November and December Pumpkin injured his face terribly. I think the injury must have been incurred when scavenging food from metal cans at the street dumpster, because a large part of his upper lip was severed. He seemed to bounce back quickly, though, and I often saw him playing by himself out on the pool deck late at night.

When goatbaby season began I was necessarily spending a lot of time outside at night, so I started talking to Pumpkin. He eventually reached the point at which he wouldn’t run from me, and has been becoming more comfortable with my presence (though very slowly). I joked with my Mom that if I was ever able to touch him he’d either become instantly friendly or slice me to bits!

Last night Pumpkin finally gave in and brushed against my legs. I reached down and very lightly stroked his back, and he started purring, “making dough” with his front paws and rubbing against me. He loves head noogies! (Poor deprived fellow). After I went to bed he appeared at the upstairs window and has formally declared (as cats do) his intention to become and indoor cat again. My resident cats need some time to get used to the idea, but hopefully Pumpkin will soon be a safely indoor cat once more.

We’ve had a busy week! On Monday morning Sun Yi delivered triplets – a matched set in tricolor black, chestnut and white, all with blue eyes. They look like a troupe of harlequins.

One little girl has a moonspot that looks like someone dropped bleach on her back.

Holly’s little boy has been checking out the various food pans and buckets. Even though he’s too young for solid food, he’s curious about new things.

I’ve been introducing Rio to the babies on a closely supervised basis – she is not a guardian breed and I’m still not sure she might not enjoy treating the babies like toys. She respects cats a lot but goatbabies look an awful lot like rabbits, which dogs see as entertaining prey.

She’s had a lot to deal with in our move. The previous farm in Louisburg was very secluded, but there are many more people and cars out here. Some locals have been amusing themselves by driving past the pasture and hollering at her and Kai so that the dogs will chase after them, which I think is pretty sad. I’m going to try and find out who they are so I can talk to them.

Sad news – unfortunately Holly’s baby girl died three days after birth, the first baby I’ve lost in four years of deliveries. She was very tiny but wa nursing well (and I was giving her some supplements on the bottle, though she hated it) but on the third day she started looking very listless and weak. I brought her in the house but she died that night. Our guess is that there was something wrong with her system that hindered her absorption of nutrients from the food. It’s terribly sad when a baby makes it through the entire gestation period only to have something go wrong after they’re delivered and off of their mother’s “life support”. She was a lovely little girl.

Holly delivered a boy and girl this morning! Given her unique coloring (chamoisee with moonspots) I was eager to see her babies.

The little boy looks like a miniature Oberhasli – he is a rich mahnogany brown with black points and blue eyes. He also has a star and a few spots of white hair that might end up as moonspots. He was very hungry and was nibbling on Holly even as she was cleaning him off.

The little girl was born upside down and backward, which was a new one for me. Hing leg first breech births are generally easy, though, and she was no exception. She also has blue eyes (Fat Boy’s contribution) and fur that is dark at the roots and tipped with silver. Holly has the same tipped fur, which gives her a “grizzled” appearance.

Once the babies dry off and fluff out it will be easier to tell what their colors are, but they are definitely different!

Yes, we now have what I call a “nipple thief” – a goatbaby who specializes in nursing on other baby’s moms (and is clever enough to get away with it). When goatbabies are introduced to the doe herd after their birth and few days isolation in the kidding pen, there is always a period of adjustment during which they learn that not all teats “belong” to them. Generally the goatmoms discourage thieves by butting lightly (commonly with the nose; occasionally with the head) or nipping. Sometimes a goatmom will nip a baby’s tail and lift it away from her.

And then there are the nipple thieves! One seems to appear every year, usually a baby with stronger siblings who decides that it’s better to scavenge than engage in direct competition. This year’s nipple thief is Squee’s girl, who is mostly white with just a few little spots. She is a very healthy baby and has no siblings, but Squee is a first time mom and does not enjoy nursing.

My chocolate-and-white doe Cookie had quads, which is quite a load on a goatmom because they only have two teats. I’ve been helping out by feeding her babies some extra on the bottle. Unfortunately, she is now the target of the nipple thief, so has five babies after her! She is also a very sweet tempered doe and won’t discourage the thief strongly enough (as Caroline and Floozie do), maybe because it’s hard for her to keep track of all the kids; Caroline and Floozie each only have one baby to track.

Nipple thieves are generally very clever, and this one is both clever and relentless in her pursuit of Cookie. Here are a few of her techniques:

1. Blend in With the Crowd – use Cookie’s babies as “cover” for nursing.

2. Shadowing -  follow Cookie and nurse from behind “on the run”. This requires agility and good coordination, but Squee’s baby is skilled enough to run behind (or completely underneath) Cookie while maintaining her hold. In this picture Cookie’s little freckle-nosed boy has given up and is complaining.

3. Stay as Close as Possible – maybe someday you’ll convince Cookie that you have a right to be there.

The spotted baby is Cookie’s girl – look closely and you’ll find the nipple thief in there:

4. Be Relentless! If Cookie lies down, jump on her head and belly and nip at her ears and tail so she has to get up.  (I’ve even seen the thief pull a nipple out from under Cookie when she was lying down, which is getting pretty darn low).

I try to give Cookie “breaks”, but as long as the babies are out she is a prime target. The nipple thief is also skilled in slithering through fences and gates, so the only way I can separate her is by putting her in the playpen (goatbaby Alcatraz) which has no gate and is bolted tightly together.

Hopefully this will be the only nipple thief this year – I’m not sure we could handle another!