Pan Dee's Twin Does <3

These two beautiful girls arrived Tuesday, January 29th! I had been watching my doe, Pan Dee, all morning as she had been acting like she may kid soon. I had finally gone to lay down with my daughter at nap time and my husband got home from work a couple of hours early...he yells down the hall "Cait, go check your goats!" I ran to the window and saw she had dropped two kids in the snow. I called my pals Meredith & Tammy in a panic and ran outside to wrap them up in towels. Jamison helped me get them in their house with their heat lamp and before we knew it, they were getting their first drink :)

All I have to say is...thank goodness I finally got 2 does, considering 2012 brought me a total of 6 bucklings!

 

 

My new goat house (chicken coop) Jamison picked up fo me :) I'll add a heat lamp and some hay and it'll be all ready for the first doe to kid!

 

 

I'll put this house in my back yard, so I can keep a closer eye on my does 24hrs a day. I can see it from my house, so I don't have to walk out to the barn at night to check on the does in the cold :) It's getting harder being only 6 weeks away from my due date! Keep your fingers crossed they go before I do, so I don't have to worry about does kidding while I'm in the hospital.

No baby goats from Lady or my pal's does yet! What are they waiting for? (hopefully a warmer day)! I got a message from Morgan that Lady looks like she's going to pop, she's laying down a lot, talking a lot, and has discharge. I hope she goes soon...she can't be very comfortable. I'll see if I can get  a pic of Lady from her to post on here.

I  can't seem to get any good pics of my critters, but here are a few that I did get...

Helga, Pan Dee, Peachy, Alva and Stella

Turkey

RM

I've been feeling anxious with my other 2 goat pal's girls getting ready to kid and I have about a month to wait for mine :( I got a message from my cousin that Lady, (chocolate nigerian dwarf with blue eyes) is showing all of the signs of labor! This is exciting because I'm trading Lady for one of her doelings, so keep your fingers crossed she has at least 1 :) Morgan says she looks like she should be having triplets...I'll keep you posted and of course post pics when they're born!

We're still only getting 1 egg a day from the hens...hoping it's because of moving them all into one coop and they start laying more soon, otherwise, they're being sold and we'll start fresh with chicks in the spring. It's so crazy to feed 18 hens and only get 1 egg! We got a little more done on the barn yesterday. I'm hoping to have it all done very soon, but I've been saying that since July! It WILL be done before my 3 does kid or they're coming in the house...jk, but I'll do what I need to do to keep baby goaties warm! It's supposed to be VERY cold this week my friends, so stay warm :)

I got an update on Junior...apparently he head butted a 5 month old wether to death :( I don't mean to judge, but when you introduce a new goat to a herd you shouldn't leave them alone. They should be watched for several things, but especially to see if they all get along. If they don't, they should be seperated so these things don't happen. I don't understand why he would do this considering he was the quietest goat on our farm and never head butted or was aggressive. I feel badly that this happened...I hope the owners keep a better eye on the goats and seperate them if there are any more problems in the future!

The day after Junior left, his brother Jetti also went to his new home with an older gentlemen in Bethel, who wanted a companion for his pygmy wether goat. I goat a picture message of him the next day and he said he was doing well.

It's pretty quiet around Little Bit Farm...we're just waiting for the does to kid :)

We brought Junior to his new family yesterday morning :( I haven't heard from them, so hopefully all is going well with him. I got a call this morning on his brother, Jetti. He may be going to a farm in Bethel to be another goat's pasture mate. I guess selling goats is part of the breeding thing, huh? I'm not sure I'm cut out for this...I get attached and it's so hard to part with them when someone is actually interested in buying them! It's what's best though...we'll have 5 does and 1 buck and I'm sure 3 of the does are bred, due to kid Feb-May. Selling all of the bucks and wethers just made room for the kids coming!

Jamison is bringing the kids and I to the Maine Agricultural Show today...I'm hoping we're not too bored!

It's another cold, windy day...but my husband has the day off (which doesn't happen very often), so I'm going to con him into helping me work on the goat barn. I'll post pics as soon as it's done!

We have a lady buying Junior on Monday :( I hate selling goaties that we're already attached to, but we can't keep them all and we have to make room for the 4 doe's kids coming Feb-May!

It's very chilly here, but I suppose winter had to come eventually! We were pretty lucky this year having warm weather as long as we did. Tuesday night Jamison FINALLY caught all of our chickens and put them in their winter coop...thank goodness! We had lost a couple of chickens over the past month from the cold and we hadn't gotten any eggs for a couple of months due to free range chickens hiding them and the dog stealing them. I hate putting so much money in to grain for "laying" hens and not getting any eggs, but I'm happy to say after putting them in the coop we got 1 egg last night! Hopefully now that they are confined and warmer we'll start to get a lot more eggs.

Now...if I could get him to finish my barn or at least get the barn door on, I could shut my does in the barn at night with a heat lamp. Two of them are ready to kid in the next 4 weeks and I really don't want to lose any of them because they kid out in the cold! You can bet if I wasn't pregnant I'd be up on a ladder with a hammer finishing the barn myself!