{"id":13199,"date":"2016-02-26T11:48:00","date_gmt":"2016-02-26T18:48:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/?p=13199"},"modified":"2016-03-25T07:54:30","modified_gmt":"2016-03-25T14:54:30","slug":"of-course","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/?p=13199","title":{"rendered":"Of Course!"},"content":{"rendered":"

I totally forgot. \u00a0Didn’t even think about it. \u00a0Not once. \u00a0Until I got home from AAA with a bag full of TripTiks and travel books and the phone rang. \u00a0My friend had a doe whose labor was not progressing. \u00a0What did I suggest?<\/p>\n

That’s when I remembered. \u00a0Of course! \u00a0It’s kidding season! \u00a0There I was with a handful of travel plans and not a single pregnant goat in my barn and it’s kidding season for rest of my tribe!<\/p>\n

I listened to the details: \u00a0Active labor for a little over an hour. \u00a0No stringy mucous or vaginal discharge. \u00a0Doe not in extreme distress–still comfortable and cudding between contractions. \u00a0No previous history of difficult births. \u00a0I shrugged to myself and advised my friend to wait it out. \u00a0She has as much or more experience than I have in kidding goats. \u00a0But, of course, the temptation to intervene is strong when it’s your goat struggling through labor right in front of you. \u00a0When it’s your own goat, it seems like you’ve waited 10.3 hours for a kid to be born when it’s really only been 10.3 minutes since you last peered anxiously at the doe’s nether regions. \u00a0An important responsibility during kidding season is to talk each other down from unnecessary interference. \u00a0I remembered my responsibility and I talked her down.<\/p>\n

I told her to call me back around dinnertime if the doe had not progressed. \u00a0I made that suggestion based on the scientific medical reasoning that it is better to assist kidding when dinner is done and out of the way but before you just want to go to bed already. \u00a0I remembered how miserable it is to be hungry and tired in the midst of a kidding crisis. \u00a0Of course, veterinary medicine advises contacting the vet if kidding has not progressed after an hour of active labor, but really, what do vets know?<\/p>\n

By 6pm the doe was still laboring with no evidence of imminent kidding—still not even any mucous. \u00a0So Pretty and I went over to have a look. \u00a0When we arrived the sun was down and the temperature was dropping fast with a chilly breeze. \u00a0Of course. \u00a0I remembered how goats love to kid on frigid February nights, always bypassing the balmy 60 degree days that are scattered throughout the month. \u00a0 Although Brownie got bonus points for settling for a cold night instead of in the midst of tornados that swept through the area the day before. \u00a0We all pulled our coats tighter and nestled into the straw out of the wind.<\/p>\n

My friend had contacted the vet and the vet told her just to go in and get the kids out, but my friend couldn’t even feel kids during her first attempt. \u00a0I hoped that I could snag a leg or nose and get the first kid untangled and out. \u00a0I figured Pretty, whose hands are smaller, could snag the kid if it was necessary to reach farther in than usual. \u00a0Too bad that neither of us could really tell what we were touching and we had to reach really far to even brush against anything that felt like a goat kid. \u00a0We discussed the vet’s confident assurances that we just had to go in really, really far and really, really manipulate the kid to move it into position. \u00a0We talked about how vets just go in up to their elbows and start rummaging around in there like it’s the miscellaneous bin at Goodwill and how that’s normal and necessary and not a big deal for vets.<\/p>\n

Of course there was on way in hell we were going to go that far.<\/p>\n

So the vet came and and calmly reached in up to her elbow and rummaged around in there like it was the miscellaneous bin at the Goodwill \u00a0and the goat screamed until her tongue was hanging out and I thought the goat was going to die and I thought my friend was going to scream and beg the vet to stop and I thought how watching the vet dig around inside a uterus (using her heels to get leverage as she pulled) for 10.3 minutes seemed like watching it for 10.3 hours and must have felt like 10.3 days to the goat. \u00a0And when she finally freed the first kid, it was, of course, a buckling. \u00a0I remembered how that works. \u00a0The most difficult kiddings are always the males that you can only sell for about $50. \u00a0On a good day.\u00a0 On a bad day you end up trading him for a few old hens or a sick piglet just so you can get rid of him before he tries to breed with his own mother.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The vet kept going and pulled out a second buckling. \u00a0Of course.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Then she kept going, amidst an alarming puddle of blood and goo, and finally pulled out a doeling.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

And all 3 kids were alive and the doe went about cleaning her kids in the cold darkness as they rooted for teats. \u00a0Of course. \u00a0Just when I was thinking that a 21 day road trip out west was much better than a night of ghorific (yes, the combination of gore and horrific that accurately represents all traumatic births) kidding, the barn was filled with magical sounds of life—-the occasional muted bleats of newborn kids, reassuring murmurs from Brownie, and the rustle of hay as they all started settling down for the night.<\/p>\n

The vet reminded us that it was best to get the vet out after an hour of active labor that hasn’t progressed and that it would have been cheaper to come in the afternoon instead of after-hours, too. \u00a0You know, better to call in the afternoon right when I was telling my friend to wait. \u00a0 Because that’s the kind of awesome, additional after-hour expenses, bad-advice-giving friend that I am. \u00a0Then the vet mentioned how easy this delivery was compared to the prolonged and painful delivery of a dead calf she had finished that afternoon. \u00a0Which reminded me why I’ve never owned a cow.<\/p>\n

The next morning I figured I could make it up to my friend by bringing over an old fleece for the kids to cuddle in.\u00a0 I knew I had a dingy white fleece in the barn that I never bothered to pick or wash because it was so off-color.\u00a0 Of course, in the light of day it didn’t look like the kind of gift that made up for an expensive vet visit.\u00a0 Good thing we have been friends a long time.<\/p>\n

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The doe looked fine and the kids were up and about.\u00a0 The kid that had been stuck had one floppy ear, which may resolve itself and may just be the end result of getting stuck in the uterus while your owner’s bad-advice-giving friend calmly eats dinner.\u00a0 But he had blue eyes which may make him worth an extra $50 or another chicken or two.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

For years I encouraged people to come and cuddle the goat kids born on our farm.\u00a0 Handling dairy goats at a young age is the best way to keep them manageable throughout their lives and have them see humans as a reliable source of care and comfort.\u00a0 But for the first time in a long, long time I sat and cuddled goat kids that weren’t mine.\u00a0 And I realized why all those people were willing to sit in my barn holding babies while I trudged around doing my chores.<\/p>\n

Of course!\u00a0 The cutest, most adorable babies are the ones that you hold and snuggle and pet and then put down and walk away.\u00a0 I left while my friend was figuring out that Brownie’s teats were uneven and she needed to express some milk and encourage the kids to nurse on both sides.\u00a0 Plus, the doe wasn’t eating her current grain and was holding out for fresh.\u00a0 And her other doe (who used to be my Vanessa and before that, her Vanilla) was pregnant but didn’t look it.\u00a0 Maybe her dates were off or maybe she only had 1 kid in there or well, who knows, really….<\/p>\n

Of course, I really don’t like buying milk from the store.\u00a0 But I think I am really going to like visiting other people’s goats.\u00a0 And then going home to look at my TripTiks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I totally forgot. \u00a0Didn’t even think about it. \u00a0Not once. \u00a0Until I got home from AAA with a bag full of TripTiks and travel books and the phone rang. \u00a0My friend had a doe whose labor was not progressing. \u00a0What did I suggest? That’s when I remembered. \u00a0Of course! \u00a0It’s kidding season! \u00a0There I was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13199","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13199","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13199"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13199\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13261,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13199\/revisions\/13261"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13199"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13199"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13199"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}