First bottle kids of 2013

When I first got into goats I thought bottle kids were such fun. Now, not so much. I still fall in love with them but I dread the responsibility. But this is part of the job when raising animals whatever the breed or species. My first two are not siblings, not orphans but victims of happenstance. One little guy started out with a great mom but he is just a dummy. He knew to go to his dam and butt around but couldn't figure out what the teat was for. I thought surely he would figure it out. I milked mom and tube fed him hoping with some colostrum in him along with some additional Thiamine maybe his brain would kick in. I tried a couple of times to help him nurse through-out the day but he would take 4 or 5 sips and back off and start crying again. Poor mom kept looking at me as though asking me to fix him. I brought him in. He loved the bottle and for the first time he was warm and full. He fell asleep standing in front of the gas heater. He finally woke up enough and sat down on an old radio we got out when we had bad storms come through earlier in the week. Later he decided it was okay to lay down.

The second kid was just born to a dummy mom. First time to kid. She had no idea what was going on and spit one out, focused on it and never looked back at the second one. Put her in a small bonding jug and she would bite, butt and try to grind him into the dirt. I held her several times a day to let him nurse. Fortunately, for him he is a fighter and he took every opportunity to snatch milk from her. He stayed full but after finding him wandering loose in the hay barn I decided enough. She had to have butted him up the panel at least 18 inches off the ground and shoved him through a hole for him to have gotten out of the pen. He loves being inside and gulping down a bottle without having to chase after it.