Goatorama kids of 2014

[Nanno]

Phil loves it when Finn helps with his work. Or at least helps him watch inane YouTube videos.
   

Finn's teeth are growing and yesterday he was showing them off, the little monster! Did I mention that these sharp, scary little teeth are the first thing I felt when I reached inside Lilly to see what the delay was about? The first thing Finn did before he even entered the world was to bite my finger!
   

But once I saw him I thought he was way too cute to put back.
   

You can tell these two belong together--they look like a matched set!
   

Yesterday we went for an outing in the scrub oak behind the house. Finn thoroughly enjoyed himself, hiding behind bushes, leaping from rock to rock, and tasting everything in sight.
   

Oh, and I was wrong about Finn being polled. At one week old he's finally got sharp little pokeys breaking through. I was hoping to avoid the "to disbud or not to disbud?" question. The thoroughly practical side of me says that all goats raised here must be disbudded for the sake of everyone's safety and convenience. But the sentimental, au naturel side of me feels that disbudding is tantamount to mutilating one of God's beautiful, perfect creatures, and if he has horns then he has them for a reason. That said, I still intend to disbud all the girls born here so that they can be sold to anyone with kids or hornless goats, and to people who want to show. I don't want any good dairy girl going for meat because of a set of horns! But Finn, being a boy, will never be shown, and I'm certain this is one we're going to keep for ourselves. I love horns for a lot of reasons, but I'm not sure about the wisdom of keeping a goat with horns when the rest of our herd is hornless. Cuzco is pretty good to the other goats and doesn't abuse his horned advantage, but I don't know what this young upstart might do as he hits puberty and starts getting cocky.

[Taffy]

Nanno and Phil - Congratulations on your new addition! What a gorgeous young man he is! I'm glad you were there to help during kidding. I can tell he's not spoiled at all!

[sydneyjd]

Both neat and cute!! Congrats Nanno and Phil!!

[Nanno]

Finn is growing like a weed and already these photos from last week look dated. It won't be long before we won't be able to do this any more!
   

Petunia has been fairly intrigued by her little brother and is more tolerant of him than the other grown-ups. They started playing recently, and this morning they were butting heads. Petunia even tried standing on her hind legs, which looked really funny because she's so huge right now!
   

"Mama, play with me!"
   

"Play with me now!"
   

"Why are grown-ups so boring?"
   

Petunia is due this week, and I'm pretty sure she's got twins. I've felt a baby on the right and a baby on the left at the same time. I suppose it could be one big stretch limo of a baby, but I certainly hope not! It/they are lively little critters too! I love feeling them kick after the heartbreak with Nubbin's kids. I'm probably going to be a bit of a nervous wreck until these babies are safely delivered!

Petunia was looking tired and depressed earlier this week, so I started giving her an extra ration of grain by herself in the mornings along with some Gatorade powder and she seems to have perked up quite a bit. She's also got a stubborn cough that she contracted a couple of weeks ago. Nubbin was coughing first but she got over it as soon as she lost her pregnancy. I wonder if Petunia has the same thing and is also having a hard time fighting it while pregnant.

[Nanno]

I've been so busy lately doing horse stuff that I haven't taken any pictures of our fast-growing Finn for the last two weeks! I figure I'd better remedy that before Petunia's babies show up and steal the spotlight.
   
   

Looks like our little guy is going to keep his horns after all. We wavered back and forth about it but made up our minds to disbud him. But the day we were going to do it, my friend who had the disbudding iron got locked out of her van with the disbudding iron in it. We tried to reschedule twice but ran into conflicts, and now the horns are so big I don't want to try to burn them for fear of leaving scurs, which in my opinion are more dangerous and problematic than horns. We'll see how it goes, and if he turns out to be a menace to the other goats we can try to sell him to someone who wants a horned packgoat.
   

"Please let me up!"
   

"Somebody let me up!"
   

Rocks are great fun!
   
   
   

[nebs]

He is a handsome little duffer. I love watching little kids play on rocks

[Saltlick]

What a cutie!!!

[Nanno]

Well, it's nearly midnight and still no sign of babies. Petunia's been teasing us all day. She woke up this morning with an enormous udder that she can hardly walk around. I told Phil she looks like those severely uddered-up goats at Nationals. Her ligaments have been gone since day before yesterday. She hangs around the pen pawing, circling, laying down with her head stretched out, then pacing around like she's ready to go into labor any moment. Then, like someone flipped a switch, she goes straight back to eating and chewing her cud like she's happy hold out for a few more days if necessary.
   

Finn loves his big sissy and tries to play with her a lot. She hasn't really been in the mood to play recently, but she did butt heads with him for a few short sessions today. I never realized a baby could be so wholeheartedly embraced by an entire herd! Finn has wormed his way into everyone's affections, and Pac-Man has fully adopted Finn as his own.
   

Finn climbed up to see if he could get in to meet the tin porch goats. Then he discovered the joys of balancing along the top of this rock wall. I'll have to post some video tomorrow if I get a chance.
   

[Nanno]

After mooning around by herself and pretending she was about to kid for the last several days, Petunia finally decided it was time to do it for real, and we've got two precious little bucklings.
   

This big fella came first and he weighed in at eleven pounds. His head was back and I had to go in and fish him out. It was a bit tense because I had no idea what I was doing and all I could find were two legs and no head. I wasn't sure the legs even belonged to each other, and since I couldn't fit my hand in there with both of them anyway, I ended up pushing one leg back in, finding the head that went with the leg I had, and pulling him out by only one.
   

This little guy came second, head only. I was sitting by Petunia's head, congratulating her on the first when she gave a couple of big pushes and here comes this face. I had to push him back in so I could find a leg to pull, and then he slid out easily. He weighed nine pounds. Phil was thinking since we've got 9/11 babies we could name them Al and Qaeda, but I told him that probably won't go over well with anyone.
   

This fella has Pac-Man's ears and red coloring.
   

And this one has Petunia's ears and gray roaning and the same striking brown-and black legs of Petunia's father.
   

What a beautiful family!
   

Phil's got his arms full!
   

[Dave-Trinity-Farms]

hehe look at all those ears! Beautiful!

On a side note, we had a couple of bucklings today ourselves. Tracy's Togg finally finished off our season with Togg/Lamancha cross boys. They are the ear ying to your yang! LOL Grats!