Why I am not tough enough for this farming business...

The horrors of kidding season are over, finally. Less than a month of good, honest work and I am totally exhausted. In the end we ended up with 17 live and 21 dead kids. Talk about horrific. No wonder I feel like I've been drug through a slough by my ankles! For the most part the dead kids were born hairless with huge goiters and lasted only a few agonizing minutes of screaming and bleating. It was terrible, and their little bleats are forever singed into my memory. I am angry, very angry, although with whom or for why I am not sure. It just seems that with a horror of this magnitude someone should be responsible or have some answers for me. I wish I had some answers to give the does, who, although they'd never raised their own babies or even had the chance to nurse a kid before cried and bleated for days. Mourning the loss of their kids? Perhaps. Calling out in the agony of going through 5 months gestation, the pain of birth, and now enduring the discomfort of a tight, red, full udder with no relief or kid to show for it? Maybe. Or perhaps they are just goats, and bleating is what they do best.

In the end the vet lab results concluded that the does were iodine deficient in pregnancy causing their kids to be born with congenital goiters. For the most part they were stillborn or died shortly after birth. Of the 17 live kids many were born with goiters, small and weak. We forged ahead, applying iodine topically and holding them up to nurse from their mothers every few hours, determined to pull them through this rough beginning to life.

The last "live" kid was born the evening of February 26th. I went out to check the last two does that were due to kid. Crumpled in the straw was a tiny frame, nearly devoid of hair and motionless. My heart fell...another statistic to add to the death count. Closer inspection showed that this tiny little premature goat was actually breathing! Holy hell! I couldn't believe it. I looked him over. He was frail, not a bit of muscle on his bony frame, a huge goiter on his throat, and weak, spindly legs that bowed so badly that he was walking on his fetlocks. Oh, this miserable creature did not stand a snowball's chance in hell of making it. But I must give him a chance, so I set to work.

I returned to the house for supplies, and upon returning to the barn I found that the last goat had kidded in my absence, bringing an end to the nightmare that was our first kidding season. Two dead doe kids lay in the straw. My heart fell, but at the same moment I resolved that I must throw my back into saving the little premature goat who seemed to refuse to give up on life.

I held the little gaffer up to his mama and he immediately took a teat in his mouth and sucked with such a voracious appetite and fierce will to live that I was shocked. He struggled to stand, forcing his rubbering, bent legs under him. He was a fighter, this one. It was decided that he should become a house goat. Goats without fur are not meant for outdoor living. We made him a nest in a Rubbermaid tub and moved him into our laundry room.

I christened this little goat "Velveteen Nesbit". His wrinkly, pink skin was covered in a soft, velveteen sheen and Nesbit matched his new "foster brother", Norbit. Norbit was a 3 lb triplet who wanted a mama of his own as he was constantly pushed out of the way by his bigger brother and sister at meal time. We bottle fed Norbit for a few days, and promptly moved him in with Nesbit's mama when Nesbit upgraded to palatial urbanization.

Despite all odds Nesbit continues to live. He is growing stronger by the day, with a fiesty attitude and demanding beller at mealtimes. He will down a baby bottle of whole cow's milk in seconds. His coat is finally starting to come in, although it will be awhile before he gains any muscle mass to fill in his scrawny figure. His bowed legs are gaining strength with the help of tiny splints I've fashioned from vet wrap bandages and the handles from plastic picnic forks. He gets stronger by the day and is starting to walk further and further on his daily excursions from his tub.



I know many seasoned goat ranchers would laugh at me for putting so much effort into a lost cause. But really, how can I not? And when you see lil Peanut looking up at you with his Big Brown Eyes and curiously eyeballing the pink, bald goat in our laundry room, I want to show him that all creatures deserve love, caring and dignity right up til their last day.

Til next time,

Tam P. Exhaustion