Tags
baby goats, Fainting Goats, funny goats, goat milk, milking goats, Miniature goats, nigerian dwarf goats, pet goats, Pygmy goats
We’re very patient people here on the Bandit Ranch, as you know. Especially when it comes to things like waiting for our milk goats to freshen and for the babies to grow old enough so that we can begin milking.
But sometimes we get a little desperate.
That is when we can be found fiendishly eyeing the denizens of our fiendish little domain, and making fiendish plans. Isn’t ‘fiendish’ the awesomest word ever? Like my favorite word in the world. Forever. Or for the next three hours. Proving once again that I may struggle with focusing issues. … Wait. What was I saying?
Anyway, having not had anybody in milk since Christmas, we WANTED some. Caramel? Not for another couple months. Oreo? Hmm. Triplets are 7 weeks old now! Aaaaaaalmost ready!
But wait!
There is…
…Le Fifi.
You mean you didn’t know we were officially crazy here?
Being half Pygmy, half Fainting Goat, Fifi isn’t the type you’d expect to be a milk goat. Plus with only one baby, she didn’t have to produce a lot, and Giselle is nursing less and browsing more, so what she does produce is decreasing. And then there’s the small detail of…how do I put this delicately…attention span issues?
But with nothing to lose, we hauled Giselle off to the back pasture to be…gasp!…separated from mom for the night. Note: don’t attempt this unless you live way out in the middle of nowhere with no close neighbors. And by close I mean within 50 square miles. Although, come to think of it, we have neither of those factors in our favor. But we have never been known for our planning skills.
Whether it’s weaning time or just-separate-for-one-night-to-milk-in-the-morning time, it will sound like Texas Chainsaw Massacre meets One Million Years BC in your backyard. And beware, goats are very similar to middle school girls – when one starts talking, they ALL start talking. So last night it was either Jurassic Park or gym class, I’m not sure which.
But we survived the night with our sanity fully intact. I think.
In the morning, I put Fifi on the milking stand, expecting her to pitch a fit. I mean, if you look up ‘bat crazy’ in the dictionary, you will see this girl’s picture. She is Le Dork. Part monkey, part drama queen. Loud. Always on the move. Not a fence in this county that will keep her in. Did I mention LOUD?
I think she out-thunk me today.
Scratch that, I know she out-thunk me.
This formerly wild goat, who has gone from borderline feral to our resident jester with a minor dislike for restraint, and might I add has never been hand milked before, never twitched a muscle. She totally acted like she was napping.
I kept waiting for the rodeo. Which never came.
I think she was laughing up her sleeve (laughing up her hoof?) at me as I triumphantly clutched the jar containing exactly two-thirds of a cup of that precious ambrosia and carried it into the house.
Actually it was more than I expected to get from her, and it was enough to have a shot glass of heaven’s nectar along with a cookie. 🙂
So back to the daily grind we go, fortified by the taste of gloriousness. And soon we will be milking Oreo, and then Caramel again, and Cocoa will probably have babies this fall…
And then…
…you just never know what kind of trouble we will be getting into after that. 🙂