Love Is In The Air

   Huck and Tom have been in rut for the last couple of months and the time has come to put them to good use. The smell hasn't been that bad around the farm, but when you get close to them you can really smell them. Along with the musk smell that comes from their glands, they also urinate all over their front legs and face. This must really turn on the ladies.
   A doe goes into heat every 21 days and last for about two days. Sometimes they are subtle about it and sometimes not so much. Montana is one of those unsubtle does, she yells at you when you go out to see her and when you let her out she runs right to the buck pen and yells at you to let her in. Sally and sugar will just go up to the buck pen and shake their tail back and forth as to say " I'm ready". Katy was a little more difficult, she didn't have much signs at all other then standing next to the buck pen.
   If you put a doe in with a buck and she is not in heat, she will have none of his antics and start head butting him. But, when there is magic in the air and the time is right, she will stand still and let the buck do he is job. So far all the does are breed and we are waiting to see if they cycle again. If all the does took, then we should have a bunch of babies running around the farm early May.

Homemade Ice Cream

   Now that we have all this milk, we’ve been playing around with making different things. Miss J made some soap, but wants to continue in the fall when things aren’t so busy. We’ve also made a couple types of cheeses, one was good but the other was a little too strong for us. We use the milk in such things as pudding, pancakes, and other baked goods, but everybody’s favorite is the ice cream.

  I found the recipe on Antiquity Oaks website, and quickly realized how easy it is to have ice cream in the freezer all the time. The recipe is simple:

4 cups goat milk  

1 cup sugar

4 egg yolks whisked

1 tsp vanilla

   You put all the ingredients in a pan and heat them up, stirring frequently. You want to bring it right up to boiling point. As soon as it starts to let out some steam I take it off the cook top. Pour the mixture into a jar and refrigerate tell it has cooled down completely, I let it sit overnight. Then pour into an ice cream maker, if you have one. We just bought one and are very happy with it. Let the machine run for twenty minutes or so. Right when the mixture stars to look like ice cream add any type of topping or extra ingredients like chocolate chips. Once done scoop out and store in the freezer.

 
  The nigerian dwarfs have higher butterfat content than any other goat or cow, so the milk makes a creamier ice cream. I can’t have a regular ice cream due to the fact it upsets my stomach, but I’m able to eat this type of ice cream. The ice cream comes out just as good if not better then store bought ice cream, the only problem is trying to keep some in the freezer due to three hungry kids.         

Goat Roll Call

   The goat herd has made some changes in the last six months. We have sold, bought, and even helped make some of our own goats. With all the changes I thought a roll call was in order.

Montana

    Montana is the queen of the herd. She is the first to get milked, the first to eat, and pretty much the first to do anything. When she goes somewhere all the other goats follow, that’s why she wears the bell. If we want the herd to go anywhere we just grab her and the rest follow. This spring she delivered four kids, which is pretty good for a first freshener, and she is giving us a little over a quart of milk a day with only milking her once a day. She turned out to be a great mother always looking after her kids, and was sad when they had to leave. It’s no secret that she is my favorite goat.

Sugar Cane

    We picked up Sugar about two months ago, from a very good breeder. We were told that she was bred but as it turn out it didn’t take. I always want a buckskin goat, not because of the black like cape on their back from which they get their name from, but because of the stripes down the face. When I found out that she had blue eyes, I had to get her. She has very good confirmation with her long body and tall legs. She should produce a lot of milk. We can’t wait tell next kidding season in spring to see how she turns out.

 Sally

    When we sold Meadow back to her breeder we had to find another goat in milk to keep up with the demand of three thirsty (human) kids. I ended up finding a local breeder through craigslist that had a couple of goats in milk that they were selling. They told us about Sally and sent us a picture. She looked just like our first goat, Goldie. When we meet her for the first time she was very outgoing and not nervous at all, and then they showed us a quart of milk that they milked from her that morning and we were sold. Although she is on the smaller size, she still gives us almost a quart of milk every day. She is easily our most friendly goat we have and is the kid’s favorite.

Katy

   We have had Katy for about seven months, but for some reason she still is the low goat on the totem pole. Just like Sally she is on the smaller size, for good reason, both their grandparents come from the same farm. She has a great temperament and until recently we have never heard her cry at all. We just had her breed and she is due towards the end of September. We can’t wait to see how much milk she gives us; we have been told she has the walk of a great milkier.

Tom Sawyer “181”

   Sawyer was born on our farm this spring. His dam was Meadow, and one of the reasons we sold her was because we were planning on keeping Sawyer, and didn't want to have him breed with her by accident. He is a very friendly buck who always comes up to the pen to greet you. He has good confirmation and will add some good genes into our herd through the years. His nickname is 181 because he has it written in white on one of his sides.

Huck Finn

   We needed to get a friend for Sawyer to keep him company in his separate pen, so when we picked up Sugar we asked the breeder if she had any good bucklings that have good lines to add to our herd. She showed us Huck who was only six weeks old but looked like he was three months old. We said we’ll take him. Huck comes from some very impressive lines and is not related to Sugar at all. He is a very good looking buck and has a lot of different colors. Even at a young age he loves “hanging out with the ladies” and has showed us that we have to keep the bucks separate so that no funny business happens.

The Buck House

Milking Goats Using The Henry Milker

   I've been milking our goats now for about six weeks, and the whole time I've been using the Henry Milker. After a week of milking with the milker, I made some changes to it. I first made a box for the quart jars and the pressure gun to sit in, and made a special notch on the box and the milking stand so that it can be easily lifted off and put back on. I also added on longer tubes, giving me plenty of slack to get to the goat's udder.

   I wake up every morning at 7, and fill up a pail of cold water. I then get out of the freezer two old sour cream containers that I filled with water the night before and add them to the pail. I also grab a half gallon mason jar and head out to the barn. I start by assembling the Henry Milker, putting on the lids and then hooking up the tubes. I try to remember to turn the valves to close and pump the pressure to make sure it holds the vacuum. I then go get one of the goats. They know which one is first, which is Montana. She runs into the barn, and then runs up to the milk stand but doesn't jump on. She'll then do a lap around the barn and then wait for me to lift her on. I use a seat for them to jump on and then jump onto the milk stand but she doesn't like using it. I need to make a lower seat so she'll jump on. Once she's on, she digs into her grain which gives me time to milk. I start by hand milking four or five squirts into a separate cup to get the old milk out and check for mastitis. After that I take a warm cloth and wipe her udder clean, I also massage the udder with the cloth to get the milk to flow. I then make sure the pressure is a little bit less than 10 on the dial of the pressure gun and then attach one of the cups to the first tit. I slowly turn the valve to allow the vacuum to hold the cup onto the udder and start the flow of milk. I then attach the other cup and do the same thing. I hold one of the cups between my index finger and middle finger and the other one between my ring finger and pinky finger. Even though the vacuum makes them stay on, if the goat starts to move too much she can kick one of them off. As the milk flows, I make sure to keep the pressure between 5 and 10. As the milk flow starts to slow down, I use my thumb to push against the udder trying to squeeze out any milk left behind. If the goat is still nursing kids I don't worry too much about leaving a little milk behind, but if there is no kids then I milk out the last five squirts or so by hand into one of the cups. Once done, I put the cups back on the box and then lift the box out of the way. The whole milking process takes less than five minutes and I usually have to wait for the goat to finish up her grain. Before I let the goat down, I spray her with some udder spray to help stop mastitis from happening . I let Montana down and put her in the run and then grab Sally.

She runs right in and then jumps on the milk stand. She's a good little goat. I do the same process with her making sure to get out all the milk. Once I'm done with Sally I pour the milk into the mason jar and put the jar into the ice water to rapidly bring the temperature down. I rinse out the cups and tubes with warm water and do the same to the lids and jars. I also spray everything with mixture of water and bleach and then rinse again. I can usually do all this while Sally finishes up her grain. I let her down and put her with the rest of the goats. I then grab Montana's kids, which spend the night in their own stall in the barn, and give them to her to take care of during the day.

   



   The whole process takes about twenty minutes for start to finish. Between the two goats, which are both first freshners,  we get about half a gallon of milk a day only milking once a day. Everyone in the family loves the milk and the Henry Milker makes milking a whole lot easier.

Montana five weeks fresh

Chicks and Baby Goats

  It's been really busy around here down on the farm, between chicks hatching and catching kids as they come out of goats. A couple of weeks after Leroy started crowing, which means he is sexual mature, we decided to try to incubate some eggs and see what happens. We didn't put a lot of effort in to it because we weren't sure that he was making the rounds. We just grabbed some the eggs that looked like the came from the other Buff Orpingtons and put them in the incubator. Sometime we remembered to flip them, sometimes we didn't, we even forgot when we put them in there. My wife told me to go head and throw them out because she didn't think anything was alive in the eggs, and she stopped turning them three days ago. I never got around to throwing them out luckily  because as she was chasing the kids around the house getting ready for bed time she heard a strange peeping sound coming from the kitchen. A bunch of chicks were pecking they were out of the eggs. 

My wife has a very good maternal extinct, you are supposed to stop turning the eggs three days before they hatch and that's what she did, accidentally  We ended up with thirteen chicks all said and done which we will use to replenish the flock as the older ones pass on.

  When we brought over a buck to breed with our does, we didn't think Aspen ever mated. Then she started to develop an udder to our surprise. We thought she would kid after Montana but on Monday she started acting weird. I was outside doing some work on the pig pen and she was screaming really loud at me and pawing at the ground. She seemed really restless,so I went inside and told the wife to get ready for some more kids. Three hours later I went to check on her and she was lying on the ground with a little bubble starting to come out. I yell for the wife and told her to hurry or she was going to miss it. This time the baby came out front feet first, like they are supposed to, but as the the head started to come she seemed to stop. Being new to this we thought we should help and pull with her. I wasn't come easily, so I put my fingers inside and could feel the head kinda face backwards causing the log jam. I tried to re-position the head a little bit and we both pulled as she pushed. Eventually we got the kid out. After doing some research, I found out that had we just given her time she would have probably pushed it out just fine by herself. We thought she would only have one, due to this was her first time having babies and she looked on the smaller side. As we dried the first kid off one more popped out. She had one buck and one doe, not bad for a first freshener.

   

Three days later Montana started to act like she was getting ready to have her babies. Being pregnant was hard on her due to the fact that she looked like she swallowed a kitchen sink, so she was more then ready to get those kids out. I put her in the kidding stall and let her have some alone time. Nothing was really happening so we put the kids to bed and I did some work in the shop. As finished up at 10:30, I checked on her one more time thinking that it probably wouldn't happen tonight, but I found her lying on her side starting to push. I called the wife out over the monitor and she came running out. We let her do her thing and she pushed out one kid and then another, and then another, and then another. Two does and two bucks, very good for a first timer. We dried them off and got them under the heat lamp and then waited for the placenta  to come out. When I went into work the next day, I told everyone "I was pulling out a placenta at 2:00 in the morning. How was your night?"

The older bucks are starting to get mischievous.

Three Billy Goats Gruff

***WARNING!!! GRAPHIC PICTURES TO FOLLOW!!!***

Me and Miss E keeping Meadow company during labor

     Meadow finally went into labor last night around 5:30pm. The kids and I were inside having dinner and I could hear her lower, quieter cry happening more frequently over the baby monitor so I slipped away quickly to take a quick peak. I figured I had about two minutes MAX so I made a quick assessment, and just happened to witness her having a contraction. I had the same ah-ha moment that I had with myself each time I finally went into labor. For days I'd question "Is this it? Could this be the beginnings of labor?" But when it is finally really happening I just know, and at this moment I just knew.

Meadow having a contraction during early labor

    
     I called Mr. J at work and told him that I was finally certain that Meadow had gone into labor. While he was wrapping things up at work to come home for our first kidding EVER, I was trying to calmly allow the kids to finish eating their dinner so we could all bundle up and head out to see Meadow. I hadn't even put my dinner on the plate yet and at this point I was too excited to eat anyway so I just put all of the leftovers in the fridge, wiped up the kids and the table and left the dishes in the sink to do later. 
     Mr. J arrived around 6:00pm and by then we were already out with the goats. Meadow seemed to be progressing nicely and was getting more and more vocal. By 6:30 Miss D and Mr. T were cold and bored, so Mr. J took them inside and agreed to let me and Miss E stay out with Meadow. I will forever be grateful for his willingness to let me stay by Meadow's side throughout her entire labor. Miss E has been obsessed with kittens and puppies and how they are born for quite a while now, so she and I had already talked about her desire to watch the baby goats come into the world. 
     We sat right in the kidding stall with her petting and comforting Meadow and she licked and sniffed us in between contractions and "told" us all about the pain as she contracted. Miss E was a little grossed out by the "goo" that came out of Meadow with each contraction, but otherwise seemed quite happy to be with me during this special occasion. We had a great time guessing how many kids Meadow would have, what colors we thought they might be, and whether we thought they'd be boys or girls. We told Meadow that we couldn't wait to meet her babies and even though, as Mr. J likes to inform me often, goats do not speak English, I am certain that she understood us. 

Right before Meadow began to push

     At one point Miss E told me that this was going to be "the best day of her life!" We had quite the tender moment together when she asked me if it was going to be mine and I told her that while this day will always be special to me, my favorite day was the day she was born. Upon hearing this she declared that this would be her favorite day as a kid but as an adult her favorite day would also be the day she becomes a Mommy! You just gotta love that kid. She is so wise beyond her years and this conversation is actually quite typical of ones we have on a regular basis. I will always remember and treasure our special one on one talks. 
     By now it was probably 7:15 and even though we were bundled, had a heating pad beneath the stall  and a heat lamp all set up, it was definitely getting cold! I half expected Miss E to run out of stamina, but she was still insisting that she was not too cold and wanted to stay to see at least one baby be born. Mr J. was listening to everything over the baby monitor from inside with the other kids and kept coming out to check on things every 10 minutes or so. I honestly have no idea how he was able to stay away as much as he did, but I will forver be grateful for him doing so and allowing me to "steal his thunder" and stay right by Meadow's side throughout her entire labor. It was truly an awesome experience and I will never forget it as long as I live.               

Meadow pushing. You can see the tail if you look closely

     Within the next fifteen minutes it became quite obvious to me that Meadow was in "transition." She was clearly unable to get comfortable, had begun moaning, rather than simply crying, and was starting to push a bit with her contractions now. By 7:30 she began to push consistently with each contraction and that's when I really switched into "Goat Midwife" mode. I was cheering her on more and more, rubbing her neck in her favorite spot and encouraging her as best as I could all while making sure that I didn't forget to alert Mr. J over the baby monitor to come once I could see a baby getting ready to come out. 
     I honestly completely lost track of time at this point. it was as if the clock just stopped. If you have ever been in labor (or been part of one I imagine,) you know exactly what I am talking about. Anyway, she only pushed 3 or 4 more times before I could see something coming and I called over the monitor for Mr. J to come out NOW or he may miss it. He soon appeared, with camera in hand just in time for the bubble to emerge and then a quick moment of panic rushed over me when I realized that what I saw inside that bubble was a wagging tail! I looked to Mr. J and said "I think that's the tail, what do I do?" In his ever calming way he replied "just let her do it." 

Sweet William entering the world backwards!

     It was at this moment that I doubted our judgement in encouraging Miss E to be a part of this. Was she ready to handle the harsh reality of this not ending well? Was I? Ugh! Too late to worry about that now I guess. With the next contraction, Meadow pushed and moaned with all her might and as I watched her struggle I thought to myself, "there's no way I am just going to sit here and watch her try to do this on her own. What does he know anyway? He's never given birth!"  So, with her very next contraction, I just went for it. I grabbed that slippery little bubble, yanked along as she pushed, and within seconds the first baby was out. 

Meadow meeting Sweet William

     As I was trying to get him to breath and help Meadow dry him off, the second baby just fell right out in the correct position onto the hay. I grabbed him, set him next to his brother and we started drying him off as well. Then, moments later a third black bubble emerged and I announced excitedly, "oh my gosh, there's another one...and he's black!" He came out in position right into my hands without a hitch and I broke the sac, got him breathing and put him next to his brothers as I dried him off as well. 

Sweet William, Timothy & Sawyer

     I was so in awe of how tiny they were. I don't know what I was expecting, but THEY WERE TINY...and skinny!!! I was actually a little freaked out when I pulled out the first one that he might not be alive or fully developed because he was so small and skinny. The only indicator that I had to let me know he was indeed alive and well before I broke the sac was the tiny rapid heartbeat that I could feel against my hand. Now I know what a healthy, live, newly birthed Nigerian Dwarf kid looks like.

Meadow is such an attentive Momma!

     By now it was probably close to 8:30 and Meadow was busy licking her babies and crying a constant, happy cry in between licks. It was so cute to see her with them. I sneaked a peak at each one two or three times not 100% sure of what I was looking for, but from what I could tell they all looked like Bucks to me. Miss E was pretty quiet and obviously still absorbing all of what she had just witnessed. She joked about naming the little black buck Aspen (one of our other doe's) since he looks so much like her. I suggested the names Sweet Wlliam and Timothy for the two white boys since they look so much like Meadow Sweet, their mom. Sweet William is a meadow flower and Timothy is a meadow grass. 

Timothy in front, Sawyer snuggled up in the back

     Once things settled down and it became obvious that all of the babies had been born (the afterbirth was hanging out,) Miss E finally decided that she was cold and tired, so Mr. J took her inside with the others to get ready for bed while I stayed in the kidding stall to swoon over the new additions to our farm with their very impressive mama. I was not about to leave her until I was sure everything was fine and that both she and the babies were healthy and comfortable for the night. I got the little black buck to nurse right away, but the other two were not showing any interest. 

The white boys look just like their Mama.

     At one point a little before 10pm I went inside to console Mr.T, who was just not settling down for the night without me, and that's when Mr. J saw Meadow finally pass the afterbirth. He got her cleaned up and also freshened the hay in her stall, and was able to get the other two kids to nurse. 
     We left mama and her three little boys all snuggled together on the heating pad under the heat lamp for the night and then I finally made it inside for dinner and a hot cup of cocoa before bed. I was so tired that you would have thought I'd birthed the three kids myself! But, it was a good kind of tired and even though we left the baby monitor on in our bedroom and I definitely slept with one ear open all night, I slept much better knowing that all was well. I find it very fitting that Meadow had her babies on the first day of spring and I couldn't be more pleased with our first kidding experience. I can't believe we get to do this two more times within the next month. It's certainly going to be a busy spring here on the farm! Now, our next adventure will be learning how to milk. I can't wait!

Blissfully Yours, Mrs. J :)

The Goat Barn

   With nasty weather fast approaching, the pressure was on to finish siding the goat barn. A few years ago my father in-law and I built a wood shop for me to work in, and he had the insight to put a roofed storage area on the back. From the front of the shop it looked like it was a solid building but on the side it was open to store stuff . When we got the goats, we started by enclosing a 10' by 10' section of the roofed storage area, but as the herd started to grow we realized that they would need more room. We ended up making the roofed area around 25' by 10', and the outside pen where they run around in is about 16' by 36'. One of my neighbors just replaced some of his windows and was nice enough to let me have his old windows. I picked up some more siding from the local lumber store, and nailed up. Slapped in the windows and was done right before the wind and snow got here.
   The goats seem a lot more comfortable since the walls and windows been installed and appreciate no wind blowing on them. I still need to put casing around the outside of the windows, but I think that can wait tell spring time.
   A few weeks ago I saw a post on craigslist for nigerian dwarf goats for sale, and they were in the next town over. I went to go check them out to see what they  had, and to meet another nigerian goat owner. When I got there, I was very impressed with their set up and the goats. I then found out that all their goats came from Old Mountain Farm , a breeder that puts out some of the best goats around, and she was selling them for pretty cheap. Did I ever say I appreciated a good deal, some might even call me cheap. I left the farm with my wheels spinning in my mind. Aspen was supposed to breed with Atreus while he was staying at our place, but we think she never cycled due to a copper deficiency. If we picked up a new goat we could introduce some different lines into the herd and get the new doe to breed with Atreus while he was still here. I talked to the wife, and after I explained everything to her she was on board. We all went to the farm and picked out a cute little fluff ball of goat who also had great conformation. We brought her home and within a couple of days she was part of the herd. The only problem we had was that Atreus had to go back sooner then we thought and the new goat, named Katy Lane, was only with him for ten days. We'll have to wait tell spring time to see if magic was in the air.

Another Goat

   We were planning  on keeping one of the babies from our does this year to bring our herd to three, but when we found out that the breeder we got the goats from was getting out of the goat business the offer to get another one was to hard to pass up. Her  name is Meadow Sweet and she is four years old, she is actual Goldie's mother. She has a easy going temperament and easy to milk we're told, this will come in handy when we're learning how to milk a goat. Before we picked her up, she was bread to a different buck then the one we have and will be the first doe to kid. By having two different bucks genes in our herd, it opens up different possibilities down the road.

  With all these different animals running around, the family is learning a lot about what makes them work. Like just the other day my wife asked me " Why does the buck have an udder between his legs?". I simply  replied " Those aren't his udder".

Man of the Hour

   The breeder that we got our goats from was nice enough to let as use one of her bucks this year. His name is Atreus, and he is a registered pure bred Nigerian Dwarf just like our other goats are.  If all goes well with him mating the two does then we should have little baby goats running around the farm in spring, along with producing milk, which is what we're doing this for. I'm able to tell when Montana goes into heat, which should be next week, but haven't been able to tell when Aspen goes into heat. Nigerian Dwarfs cycle about every 21 days. We'll keep him for about four weeks to make sure he can be around for Montana's second cycle, in case the first one doesn't take. If Aspen doesn't bred in that time frame, we'll just deal with it next year. The girls weren't to excited when I put him in the pen with them, but when the time is right they will be.

New Goat

   Goldie’s crying finally got too much for us, and probably the neighbors, to take. It wasn't  so much, how much she cried, but when she did cry it wasn't normal. It sounds like a small child being murdered. The breeder was nice enough to take her back but had no goat to trade with us. She had a friend though, that was looking to down size her herd and had a couple of goats that we would be interested in. We dropped off Goldie at the breeder’s house and went to see the other goats. She had a beautiful doe, named Montana, who was two years old and very lovable  We fell in love with her right away. We end up pay for her and the breeder is going to let us use her buck this winter for giving her Goldie. I felt like a kid on the playground trading baseball cards, with all the deals we were making.  We loaded her up in the van and got her home right away. We put her in the pen with Aspen and they got along real quick, with no issues. After a day, we could see them playing by head butting each other. Montana is very beautiful and has a large stature; we think she’ll become the matriarch of the herd.

What's A Couple More Kids?

Golden Rain "Goldie"

    We have been thinking of get goats for a while now, actually before Mr. T was born. Recently though, I started doing some research about different breeds and such, with the idea that we get them next year. We decide on the nigerian drawfs, with their high butterfat content and small size we thought that they we make a great addition to our farm. Even though they are small they still give a little more then a quart of milk a day.

Aspen "Penny"

    I went to go visit a breeder in New Hampshire who had a couple baby goats, because I wanted to see them and talk about what it takes to raise them. I was very adamant about how we were just looking and wanted to wait tell next year. She was very nice and told me everything I wanted to know. One of the things she told me was that the does take a year before you can breed them. When I left, she dangle the carrot in front of me and said that she still has one baby doe left and she'll throw in a baby whether to keep her company for a good price. A whether is a neutered buck. On the drive home a started thinking about how long it would be until we would have milk. If we waited tell next year, it would be a year before we could breed and we wanted babies in the spring. That means it would be 18 months before we would breed and all total three years from now until we would have milk. Way too long to wait. When I got home, with the wheels turning in my mine, I talked to my wife and decide to look into getting the two goats. When I emailed the woman about the goats, she  responded that right after I left someone called and put a deposit on the doe. Some would say that was a sign not to get goats right now. Not us.

   I contacted a breeder that was a lot closer to us and, some one who I talked to a couple years earlier about buying goat milk from her. She had a couple of baby does left and one that was 10 months old that would be ready to breed this winter, which means we could have milk next spring. She also said that we could use one of her bucks when it comes time to breed. The whole family went to visit the goats and everyone fell in love with them right then and there. The kids were not intimidated at all and were running around the yard with them, feed them anything they could. My wife was concerned about the taste of the milk because the milk we tried at the store had a funny after taste to it. I put a deposit down on the two that we wanted when we left, without trying any of the milk yet. The woman gave us a half a gallon of milk as we left. We went down the road a little bit and stopped to try the milk. My wife took a sip and gave me a thumbs up. Nothing like shooting from the hip. I tried the milk when we got home and it was very good. I actually had a big bowl of cereal for dinner with the milk, something I haven't done in years due to cow's milk bothering my stomach, and it didn't bother me at all.
   One of the reasons I was thinking of waiting a year was, now I had to put together a place for them to sleep and pen for them to run in. Now with everything else going on, I had to get something ready soon . I ended up making a stale underneath the lean-to of my shop, the same place where I made a quick pen for the pigs when they were young. I also put three cattle panels together to make a 16' x 16' run for them. With the short amount of time it actually came out all right. I made a hay feeder and water bucket holder for them and was ready to pick them up.

   Two weeks after we saw them I went to get them. The breeder let me use a crate she had lying around to put them in so they could ride together. We did some paper work, gave me some more milk, and put the goats in the crate and I was off. They did very good on the ride home all things considered. I put them in there new home and they seemed alright. When I would sit down with them Golden Rain (the little brown one)would jump right in my lap like she was a cat. Aspen seemed more content on eating the new leaves in the run. When I left to go in the house, Goldie would let out this awful cry. I thought she would settle down after awhile but, a couple hours after I left to go to work my wife called me and said that she had been crying the whole time. I left work early to see what was going on and ended up stay with them tell night time when they settled down. Its been a couple days now that we've had them and Goldie still cries for her mother, but every day gets less and less time she does it. It may take a little bit before she settles in completely.