Tag Archives: raising goats

Jolina’s Kids

We’ve been waiting since nearly the moment of conception for Jolina’s kids to be born. They finally arrived and what a story we have here. First, she was busy giving birth in the goat corral and the other nanny goats started head butting her. Jolina has never been accepted by the herd, probably because she is my husband’s favorite. 

If her stomach had allowed it, she would have been already outside the corral with Terry, but she hasn’t been able to do any acrobatics this last week. So my husband and son ran out to save the day. Jolina had a baby half-in, half-out, and scampered out of the corral as fast as her delicate state would let her. 

In short order, Joel and Nina (yes twins) arrived. Jolina had enough of that sort of stuff and ignored her kids for the next two hours. To be fair, she did have a fairly traumatic birth experience. That didn’t stop her from chowing down a good supply of alfalfa though. 

Papa Chivo, AKA my husband, finally held Jolina still so her kids could nurse. Twice more he went out and forced Jolina into submission. I told my husband that I thought Jolina was a dud when it came to motherhood. He was mortally offended. How dare I insult his favorite pet?

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Jolina doing what she does best–eat!

By morning, Jolina was responding to her kids’ cries. My husband tied her in the food corral (otherwise she’d eat everything in sight) and her kids figured out how to help themselves to the milk supply. 

joel and nina

Nina looks just like her mother and Joel looks like Grandaddy Elvis.

Joel and Nina have certainly inherited their mother’s propensity for hollering and her circus tricks. Not 20 minutes after birth, one of the twins was inside the barrica (barrel) set up as a barrier to keep Red from bothering them, while the other was pushing it along. Another rescue was in order before they headed over Niagara Falls in that barrel.

They are good sized and healthy. The only issue we have is where to keep them. Terry had to be moved to the new garden area last night because his hysterical antics were making Jolina even worse. Fuzz is on the back porch. The Puppers are in the back yard. The corral has been divided for Lady and the goats. Red has his own stall. We just don’t have the space for more animals right now! Well, I guess we’ll do what we can.

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The Great Goat Escape

The other day, my husband sold one of our nameless goats to his buddy. He made sure there was no mix-up with Jolina, his princess. Nameless goat was taken away and we went about our afternoon and evening activities.

We were awakened at 2 am by goat bleating. My husband went out to investigate, but all the animals were sound asleep. I happened to peek out the front window and lo and behold, there was Nameless goat clamoring to get in. 

My husband went to open the door, but it since it opens outward and it must have scared Nameless because she ran up the hill. It was a moonless night, so chasing her around in the dark wasn’t an option. We settled back into bed and hoped she’d return.

About an hour later, we heard some goat screaming and were sure she’d been eaten by the coyotes. However, in the morning, she was waiting by the door again.

The fact that she returned troubled my husband greatly. He was sure his buddy was dead or had an accident. He even sent a search posse of other buddies who were unable to locate the guy. 

All of that worry was for nothing. Two days later, the buddy showed up at our house demanding the goat he had bought and paid for back, as if it was our fault she jumped ship. And that’s literally just what Nameless had done. Apparently, good buddy was already three sheets to the wind when he loaded her up and didn’t properly secure her in the back of his truck and she escaped.

He didn’t notice until he got home but couldn’t come look for Nameless because he had to recover from his overindulgence or continue with it, which was also the reason the posse couldn’t find him. 

Nameless is now safely housed in buddy’s goat shelter. Since he has a habit of leaving his critters unattended while foraging for long periods of time, I wouldn’t be surprised if Nameless makes another break for it in the future.

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The Last of Elvis’s Love Children

The last of Elvis’s love children, a set of twin boys, have arrived. While we have other goats that are pregnant, they aren’t due for a month or so yet, so their conception was after Elvis had left the building.

All of Elvis’s kids have the longest floppy bunny ears. Several have the distinctive black stripe down their backs like dear old dad. None are the lovely dark brown of Elvis though. 

While we were still celebrating Elvis’s fecundity, one of our other goats gave birth to a premature and sadly, short-lived kid. The rest shouldn’t be ready to deliver for another month or so. Since they are younger and smaller goats, we don’t expect any more twins, which is fine by me.

On other animal news, Lady is now nearly fully recovered from her hoof staking incident. She and Red even went for a short ride up the hill and back with my husband this week. Red has figured out how to open the goat pen to Jolina’s delight.

George and Terry have yet to become friends, both are extremely jealous of my son’s affections even though he tries to give equal time and attention to all three boys. Their neediness has prompted my son to declare that when he marries and has children, three are too many.

My husband had a scare with Jolina the week after Christmas. The neighbor down below had planned to serve birria when his son came to town and needed a smallish goat. He and my husband decided on which of our goats was to go. However, when the neighbor came to pick it up, my husband was working. He insisted that my husband had sold him Jolina and my son let her go.

In the morning, when my husband was feeding the goats, he noticed Jolina was missing. When my son told him, he panicked. He jumped on his moto and without even a helmet, headed to the neighbor’s house on a rescue mission. Fortunately, Jolina hadn’t been slaughtered yet and was brought back to the fold safe and sound. Whew!

Other than that, things are as quiet as they can be in our still overcrowded animal situation. Who knows what delights or tragedies 2020 has in store for our own animal kingdom?

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