The New Kids Have Arrived!

Jasper

In mid-March we went to visit a local woman with some baby goats for sale.  I'd been looking for a small doe that was less noisy than our Josephine, and had figured if we could find a suitable replacement than I would sell Jo.  I was also looking for a buck (or two) that I could spend a little time with and grow him up myself.

What we settled on was three kids, one doeling and two little bucks.   All were fathered by a 1/2 Pygmy, 1/2 Nigerian buck, and the mothers were 1/2 or full Boer.  This is perfect for what I've wanted.

The little blacked headed buck is Rascal.

On top of it, the woman was willing to trade the doeling for Josephine, so I didn't even have to worry about selling her.

A few days ago we got the call that the little ones were ready, so after a couple of days of fixing fences and such, we brought them all home.

Initially, there was a LOT of hollering.  These guys are just 10 weeks old and have never been away from momma, so this is the double whammy - new home AND weaning all at once.  Enough to make any young goat holler.

My husband and Frankie, the doe.

We've put them straight into the pasture with our other two ladies, so naturally there has bee a lot of head butting and what not as they establish who is in charge.  It's clear that Rascal is used to being the main man in the group, because he spends the most time challenging the older goats.

Because the pasture we put them all in a pasture without a very good shelter, we dragged the old turkey pen in.  It's got a flat, fairly solid top and isn't very tall, so it wasn't long before I saw the goats on hind legs looking at the top to see if they could get up there.  With the door open they have plenty of rain shelter and shade.

I went ahead and grabbed an old wood ramp we had around here from our motorcycling days and put it to where they could walk up it onto the roof.  It wasn't long before the kids were playing on the ramp, and just a few minutes before Miss Frankie was on top, followed by Rascal.  Neither adult ever went all the way up, though they both got on the ramp a time or two.

By dark everyone was all settled down and we are hoping for a fairly non-eventful night.  Here are some pics for you of the little guys playing!