Goat-O-Rama Kids of 2024!

[Charlie Horse]

Oh man. I love baby goats! No baby animals for me this year.

So this year is a bigga successa! Lookin' forward to more pics and video when you do your next live-stream.

[Nanno]

Well, Sadie finally got down to business yesterday afternoon and produced two of the brawniest babies we've had at Goat-O-Rama in years. We haven't named these two big bruisers yet, but we'll keep you posted! They weighed in at 10 and 11+ lbs. respectively, and they have legs a mile long so Sadie needed a little help bringing these two into the world! Both kids are the spit and image of their daddy, Pest. Tall, strong, big-boned, broad-shouldered and with massive foreheads. 


When I pulled this guy out, I said, "Wow, what a massive kid!!" Sadie was having a hard time getting him out so I gave a few tugs on his front legs. I couldn't find his head anywhere so at first I thought he had his head back, but no, his legs were just so long it took a while for his head to follow. He was also quite impatient. Sadie wasn't pushing much, so this guy's front legs were waving around like he was trying to claw his own way into the world whether Mama helped or not! 


Look at these moonspots! This our first truly moon-spotted kid. Pest's moonspots don't present quite like this but he carries the genetics and now he's finally passed this fun color pattern to one of his offspring! 




This is baby #2. I thought the first one was big, but boy oh boy, this one was even bigger! He weighed in at over 11 lbs. he wasn't so eager to come out. He only had one leg in the passage and he took a bit of pulling. Somewhere in the delivery process, Sadie sat down hard on my box of kidding supplies and smashed the lid. It was a soft landing for her. Among other things, the box was full of towels. 
This guy is more of a dark blue roan. Pest doesn't have a hint of blue roan in his coloring, but he's now thrown several babies who have it so it must be somewhere in his ancestry. I can't wait to see how big these guys get. I have a feeling they're going to be huge, powerful goats by the time they're grown! 

[Charlie Horse]

Sadly moonspots can completely vanish with age.

[Nanno]

Some can, but I don't think these will. Pests actually got more prominent as he aged, as did his son Clyde's. I think these will stay spotty.

[dragonmaker]

Beautiful kids! I’m loving the moonspotted buckling!

[Nanno]

Snowball was tired and hungry the day after kidding, so Phil and I thought we’d give her a break and do a little babysitting. Gandalf and Esmeralda were happy to come into the house and hang out for a while!




They even helped us play a board game!



Until the board game made them bored! Ba-dum-TISH!





There’s nothing more relaxing than sitting on the couch with a couple of fuzzy, warm, and brand new baby goats snuggled in your arms!

[Nanno]

The Sunday after the kids was born was beautiful, so Phil and I took Snowball’s new babies out into the big, wide world to do a little exploring. Pluto made sure they stayed safe. Dixie kept her distance. She tried to sniff the new babies the morning after they were born. Snowball had a very strong opinion about that, however. She backed up for a good running start and charged Dixie at top speed. She hit the dog broadside with all her force and sent Dixie rolling end over end across the goat yard. The dog let out a terrified screech, scrambled to her feet, and raced out of the pen like her tail was on fire. She hasn’t touched another baby goat since. If one tries to walk up to her, she gives them a sidelong look and quietly slinks away. I’m glad she’s learned not to mess with babies. I’d been worried about her because she can be very rambunctious and she plays rough. Baby goats won’t survive a dog playing rough with them, so I was wondering how I might keep Dixie away from them. But it turns out that Snowball had the matter well in hand!


The rocks offer lots of fun play opportunities for baby goats!






Pongo and Maya were excited to meet the new kids. Maya was excited to have someone smaller than her to bully. Pongo is a gentle soul and just wanted to introduce himself. He’s been so gentle with the new kids, just as he was with Balto last year. I’ve never seen another goat quite like him. Most youngsters are rough and enjoy bullying anyone smaller than themselves, but Pongo has never shown that tendency. Maya, on the other hand, got a few disciplinary whacks from Snowball before she learned to mind her manners around the little ones!


Snowball wasn’t sure she liked having her kids play on the big rocks. She very purposefully rounded them up and marched them over to the tires on the other side of the yard as if to say, “Babies your age should stay in the designated play area!”

[Missy]

So sweet! Snowball is a great mom!

[Nanno]

It’s been a busy few weeks with all these kids running around! Gandalf and Esmeralda grew by leaps and bounds while Skeeter’s and Sadie’s kids were just starting to find their legs. Gandalf is quite the little chunklet! He’s going to be a big, strong boy when he grows up. He and his sister want to be involved in everything and they love nothing more than climbing on people.




Things started greening up a little toward the end of April. It seemed very green at the time, but now I’m looking at it from two weeks later and thinking, “Gee, it sure was brown back then!” We’ve had a lot of moisture and sunshine to turn the pastures emerald.

The boys are in fine fettle. Scout and Sonic are fat and happy and need to get out for some hikes so they can get in shape! The big boys have been a bit neglected lately with all the babies on the scene.






Baby goat season is Finn’s least favorite time of year. He’s been quite sulky lately and is acting like a crotchety old man. Not only do the baby goats get under his skin (mostly because they steal so much of me and Phil’s attention), but he’s also feeling old because he’s no longer King. Pest claimed the crown last fall and Finn hasn’t been happy about it. The funny thing is that Pest is not much of a fighter, so I think if Finn wanted to keep his position he could do it. But it turns out that Finn, for all his bluster, was just a big bully with no real fight in him. So now he’s relegated to second-tier boss and it’s not sitting well with him. “Too bad, Finn! If you hadn’t shown Pest all your dirty bossing tactics he would never have turned the tables on you!”




Merlin and Morgana are two of the flashiest babies we’ve had, with their striking black-and-white coats. Merlin reminds me of Finn when he was little. And Morgana is the spit-and-image of her grandma, Petunia. She has the biggest eyes I’ve ever seen, and she knows how to use them!




Skeeter always wins “Mom of the Year Award”. Ever since, as a first-timer, she almost lost little Butterfly to a horse in 2020, she has been extra diligent about her kids. Even if every other goat crosses through the horse pen, Skeeter takes her babies around the long way. She makes exactly the right amount of milk and keeps her kids fed but not overfed. She keeps them perfectly clean and she watches them carefully but she doesn’t smother them or spoil them. She’s a rare, special kind of mama goat!






Merlin wanted to meet Gandalf. Gandalf was excited to have someone smaller than himself to challenge. I’m not sure Merlin was interested.




“Hmm… who else can I fight?”




Maya is always up for a tussle! She was mean to Gandalf and Esmeralda for the first week or two, but then she realized that baby goats are a GOOD thing! She actually has little ones to play with now who can match her energy and athleticism. Pongo would sometimes play with Maya, but he is not as fast or agile or energetic as she is and is more interested in being a companion than a challenger. The older goats aren’t silly enough to play Maya’s games, so she lacked an outlet. Now that there are babies on the scene, Maya has lots of friend to be wild with! Gandalf especially loves to rise to the challenge!




“Push harder, Gandalf!”




Phil loves to sit and play with his baby goats. Esmeralda can’t resist an open lap! Merlin and Morgana are still only politely curious, but it won’t be long before they start fighting Esmeralda for that lap!

[Nanno]

Sadie’s babies took a little while to name, but Phil took some inspiration from the Harry Potter books and named these two Moony and Padfoot from two of the mischievous characters in the series. Moony is, you guessed it, the one covered in moonspots, and Padfoot is the dark one with the hint of blue roan. These two boys are full brothers of Clyde, who is arguably the nicest packgoat prospect I've ever produced here at Goat-O-Rama. I think these boys are going to make someone very, very happy when they grow up!    




Meet Moony! He’s his daddy’s boy all over. This guy has Pest’s broad forehead and gentle, wide-set eyes. He has his daddy’s moonspots, and best of all he has his daddy’s innate love of people. I’ve never seen a kid so naturally drawn to humans. When he sees somebody he runs straight up to greet them, just like Pest did when I first visited the farm where he was born. Pest stamps all of his babies with his outgoing personality, but Moony has it in spades!




Padfoot is the larger of the twins but is more reserved than Moony. He is definitely a mama’s boy and he cried a lot when he was first born, but he settled down and got more curious and outgoing after his first week in the world. I think part of his problem was that he ate too much and was giving himself an upset tummy which made him cry more than usual. However, he’s over it now and this boy is going to a big, lanky bruiser when he grows up!




Sadie is not “Mom of the Year” material. She’s good but she definitely needs her “mama time”! For the first couple of weeks we had to watch these two and make sure Sadie didn’t leave them somewhere and forget where she put them. They were adorable snuggled up inside this crevice under a huge boulder.






It’s hard to go anywhere without Moony following along!






Yep, Padfoot’s a mama’s boy alright!




So many spots!




Skeeter and Sadie didn’t allow their kids to play together during the first week. But Merlin was determined to find out who this other kid was who looked his own size! It didn’t take long for both mamas to give up. Now the four youngest kids are inseparable. All six kids play together, but when it’s time for a nap the four little ones form an adorable huddle in the grass. I love baby goat piles! I hope I can get a photo of one soon. Usually they wake up and come running as soon as I approach them with a camera.