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Lightning had triplets yesterday morning and the first doe kid weighs in at just under four pounds. She is tiny and perfect… a little fairy baby

We weighed her in a tupperware on my cheese scale

Selena’s and Minnie’s babies moved out to the new kid shelter this afternoon. They are much too big to be in the house but I was hoping the wind would let up a bit before moving them out. Today was the best day to move them so they will have a couple of warmer days before the next snow comes blowing through. They are thrilled with the leaping room but a bit frightened of the sounds of the wind. Selena’s kids are about two weeks old and are very interested in eating hay and even tried the water in their bucket. Minnie’s babes are only one week old but are still enjoying the leg room and learning how to caper and leap.

Selena’s doe stops for a moment before trying another caper across the pen.

Minnie’s boys look handsome in burgundy coats to help them get used to the colder outdoor temps.

Selena’s doe did some impressive leaps in celebration of her new home.

Quan yin had a single buck kid yesterday morning. He is tall and spotted.

Here he is attempting to stay standing at nearly an hour old

Minnie had triplet bucks yesterday morning. It was an interesting birth and the first for my intern Lili. One kid started off with his head and one leg turned back making it impossible for him to enter the world. This situation self corrected, thank goodness. The second kid was born without any unusual circumstances but the third had both front legs streached back. I had to help him into the world by pulling his head as Minnie had contractions. It is a good thing Minnie is a mature and large doe.

Minnie buck kid #1

Minnie buck kid #2

Minnie buck kid #3

Next week and the week after most of the does are due to kid. It will be very very busy:)

Selena had a buck and a doe kid around 4:30 this morning after making us wait since Saturday. They are white and red like their sire and are doing well.

This is the little doe

Shanti and Calypso are due to kid the end of the week and by the end of the month we will have multiple does due on many days.

****warning… some of the photos posted here are graphic in nature****

The latest wave of kiddings is complete with the delivery of Marshmallow and Cassandra this morning. Both yearling does had single buck kids. This leaves us with twelve does kidded in early February, eight from late March to mid April and three left to kid in the second half of May.

First a look at Peaches two buck kids. This was taken yesterday at one day old.

Now for this morning… We went out to the barn to milk Peaches and Buffy but Dixie, our Anatolian Shepherd Dog, was letting us know something was up in the kidding pen. We found that Marshmallow was in early to mid labor and we had to milk Peaches and Buffy quickly and then we waited with Marshmallow. In this picture you can see the string of goop that means babies will be coming soon (Marshmallow is the white doe). The other doe in this photo is Cassandra who was in early labor and kidded right after Marshmallow.

 Here we see Marshmallow getting more serious about having her baby and you can see one hoof emerging. I was wondering where the other front hoof might be at this point and was becoming a bit concerned about where the head might be.

Marshmallow was not convinced that standing up was a bad idea for delivering her kid but no amount of coaxing would get her to lay down. Here she finally got down into a comfortable place and we can see another front hoof but still no head. It turned out that the kid had a huge head and it took quite a bit of help to get him out.

Here is the little guy sort of dry and on his legs. He set off looking for his mother or anyone who would take care of him…

The first thing he found was Dixie who was happy to help clean him up after his rough birth. All of the kids are formally introduced to Dixie so she knows what they smell like and that they are ours. This way she will let us know if they are not where they belong and she guards them with all her attention.

As I was milking Marshmallow for colostrum for her baby Cassandra got ready to start pushing her baby out. She is a vocal doe and yelled through the entire birth and delivered an average size buck kid fairyly quickly.

Cassandra’s buck kid is nearly as vocal as she is but he has a very tiny voice and is proof of Cassandra being bred to Morpheus… the bar on his nose and the frosting on his black patches come from Selena Morpheus’ mom.

Peaches finally kidded with two bucks yesterday morning. She had us guessing since her due date came and went with no babies.  We now have only five yearlings left to kid two of which should be having their babies soon and the other three are due next month.

The kids born in the beginning of February are being weaned and will be ready to go to new homes soon.

Time sure slips away… Calypso and Neesa kidded two weeks ago and not mention or pictures on this blog. I have been very busy and the time just got way from me.

So… Calypso is a yearling doe who is descended from one of my first girls and is a very pretty thing who comes from some excellent milking lines. I have very high hopes she will be an assest to the herd. Her single doe kid arrived at about 3am and is the first kid from a line breeding using one of our young bucks.

Neesa kidded at 9am in the morning two weeks ago Monday. She is a daughter of Sprinkles our herd queen who we lost to complications of kidding this year. She delivered a large buck kid with some of the dominant white seen in that family. He will be disbudded and neutered and will be going to live with my (current not living) in intern along with the doe kid that had the injured foot earlier this year. He should have a great disposition like the buck we kept who is a sweety.

The first of the two alpines kidded yesterday around noon. The kids are cute as buttons but the buck is huge and he came into the world with one front leg turned back at the shoulder… I had to help pull the kid out but all turned out fine. The kids look allot like alpines but the ears hang down like the nubians.

Willow’s doe kid will be staying so we can see what happens when crossing a heavy milker alpine with good milk lines in nubians.

Our first alpine/nubian cross babies were born around noon today. Willow had quite a time trying to deliver a very large buck kid who had his left front leg back from the shoulder. I had to help her quite a bit but I was unable to bring the leg forward. The buck was followed by a pretty little black doe. Pictures will follow soon. The ears are the funny part on these kids… the buck seems to have short nubian ears while the doe we are not sure what is going on… maybe alpine ears but then one might be alpine style while the other is nubian style….

Or at least the calendar says so. It was 15 degrees here this morning! We are still waiting for Neesa to kid… very hard to believe but she will kid when she is ready so what can we do….

We did actually have some very nice weather this past week with highs in the 60s so spring is really starting to get going. I have the mini-greenhouse ready for seed starting and picked up some addtional seeds from the Hudson Valley Seed Library at the farmer’s market today. I will have to prune the fruit trees this coming week also and get some dormant oil onto the apple tree. I hope to pick up some more material to build additional raised beds in the garden for the potato trials we are participating in this year. We will be growing three different varieties of organic potatoes as part of a program that NOFA-NY is conducting.

Our regular winter famer’s market season ended today in Poughkeepsie with the final Winter Sun Farms sponsered market. It was a great winter season and we look forward to next winter with the Winter Sun markets. We are not finished with winter markets though, we will be at the Rosendale community center on April 5, 2009 for their winter market. The regular market season will being the thrid weekend of May at Cold Spring and New Paltz… not far off at all.