My buddy René and I drove out to Salamá and surrounding areas looking for two milking goats. We're told that there are heaps of them in a place called Rincón. There was one. So we looked some more and there were a few here and there. We ended having to drive through a river to get the first one, which came with two kids. The second one came from her neighbour who was understandably not willing to part with his 3 milking goats, but did sell us a pregnant one (we believe she's pregnant anyway). She's due in December (we think). They are nubians.
We brought them home, cleared the laundry off the lines and tied them up under our car port for the night. You can see Blaise here, licking his lips.
This is Cappuccino Surprise, the pregnant one. She's timid and a very slow eater. The name comes from Amber and Blaise: Amber thought she had cappuccino colours and when we asked Blaise what we should call her, he said "surprise" because that's what we called the goats before we took him out to see them. My addition is that anyone drinking a cappuccino with goats' milk in it will have a surprise.
This is the nanny of the two kids. I'm letting René name her and her two kids.
This is the 3-month-old billy.
This is the 3-month-old nanny. We're going to wean them as soon as we have time. Their mom isn't giving a lot of milk right now so they might already have started weaning.
I milked her this afternoon to try and empty her udder and got a measly 80 mL.
We're not in a hurry to have huge production, but in time we'd like to each get at least 2 L between the two nannies.
This morning René and I went and bought wood and sheet metal and we built a shelter for our goats. It is complete with feeding trough. René's brother Horacio helped a lot. My hands are really sore from using the handsaw all morning.
Blaise is living my dream.
5 comments:
Mmmmmm....goat's milk. We had goats when I was a kid. A white nanny named Candy and a black billy named Licorice. I think Licorice tried to kill me once. So they went to the auction. The End.
ooooh. I read the other blog first...you just got the goats...new experience. Good luck! They are quite the creatures. a real handful. but the milk is sure valuable. The main thing with goats is the fencing, or the restraining. always the threat of choking or hanging. They also like to buck little children......you had a close call or two.
Goats are great. We had a goat named Nanny when we were young uns. She had twins. We didn't milk her. She would sleep on the back steps and when someone would get out of their vehicle, would get up and bolt toward them, then stop on a dime with her head inches from their body (and goats aren't so tall). The sheer shock was enough to have a few 'travelling evangelists' not return for a second visit. She also walked to the end of the driveway when we were catching the school bus. I think she thought she was a dog, except the time she got on the bus, then she thought she was a 'kid' haha.
did i ever tell you about the most comfortable couch ever? Aimee and I found it on the side of the road the day I moved to Quebec. It smelled like goat...
Ha! I love everybody's goat stories on here! And Zaak the name is perfect:) Maybe by time the baby goat is born Blaise and I will have some new name ideas for you. Oh and I hope these goats don't wear you out! I guess you'll adjust to the early morning milking sessions hey. I'm looking forward to when Acadia only needs my milk in the mornings and not in the night:)
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