Calm & Gentle Dairy Goat Farm |

First Kid of the Year!

Sunday morning, February 24th, at 4:00am I was walking the dog around the yard. It was dark and silent until I heard a cry from the direction of the doe barn. Since none of my pregnant does were due yet, I first thought, "what a funny sound the cat is making.." The cry came again, and I realized it was the sound of a baby goat! I ran to the barn and found a preemie kid, just born, laying on the ground, protesting the cold and dark surroundings as the first freshening mother and her two companions in that pen stood looking at the noisy baby. They didn't know what that thing was, or what to do about it. I scooped up the soaking wet baby and took the dog back to the house.

The kid (a doe!) was small, with little stick like legs, short velvet fur, no teeth, and chilled. By the due date I had on the mother the kid was 17 days early, but upon consulting my calendar, the doe had been with the buck earlier which would put the kid at only 10 days premature. I dried her off, warmed her up, heated up a bottle of treated colostrum, and discovered to my relief that this doe was able to suck from the bottle. She took an ounce of colostrum before dozing off to sleep. I held her either in my arms, or on my lap wrapped in a towel to help her maintain her body heat, and kept her chest elevated above her hips to help keep her immature lungs clear. Every 3 to 4 hours I would offer her the warmed colostrum and she would take a small amount. Around noon she had some congestion, and I called my vet's emergency cell phone number to see if he could give her an injection of dex to strengthen her lungs, but unfortunately he was out of town and too far away to help me. He suggested using AniHist (an antihistamine/expectorant) to clear her lungs, and a course of antibiotic to prevent aspiration pneumonia from setting in. It took a lot of work and attention to her every need, but she did well and began to act like a normal newborn in about a week.I have named her CALM & GENTLE CTO'S MINUETTE.

Here she is sleeping in an awkward, but funny pose, at 4 days old.

And here she is a few days later.

Pearl had Twins!

March 6 @ 10:30 am... A buck and a doe -

CALM & GENTLE GIL'S GEMSTONE and CALM & GENTLE PEARL'S DIAMOND

Concertina had a Single

March 7 @ 6:00 pm...a buck - CALM & GENTLE CH CONGO

Daisy had Triplets

March 8 @ 11:30 pm...a doe (did not survive, umbilical cord around neck), then two bucks - CALM & GENTLE AP DANNY BOY and CALM & GENTLE AP DAPPLE JOHN