5/17/2019 0 Comments Handsome JaegerA little update on this two week old fella! His owners have given him the name Jaeger and he certainly lives up to it being confident, quick, sleek and strong. And now that the 4 bossy doelings have moved on to their new homes, he gets to have his chance on the kids' favorite rock. I took about a gillion pictures of him catapulting himself and preforming triple salchows off it but this is the only one that came out very clear, I told you he was quick! :) Ruth has proven to be an excellent mum and great producer. She easily gives 3 cups morning and evening while Jaeger is with her 24 hrs/day, not bad for a little lady! He is growing so strong and hefty! I am impressed with his hip and leg strength, and I would tell you how much he weighed, but Finchy broke my scale with her fluffy cutiness! I'll have to unearth my people scale and get his weight this week.
He's going through the curious but skittish stage right now, like all the kids do, but I trust he'll continue to warm up to us especially since it's just him, Dawn and Eve left in the play yard.
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5/16/2019 0 Comments New BeginningsIt's the beginning of the kids heading off to their new homes. Last week, Danu and Dana made the trek to Southern Maine. I hear they have settled in nicely and enjoy adventuring with their new owners. Each year Delta's kids grow quickly into solid, hardy goatlings and these girls are no exception. We look forward to updates on these two as they mature. This morning Goldfinch and Pipit traveled to their new digs together. These two are great pals and we are thankful they will spend their days together. This was Ivy's first kidding and I am impressed with her quick birthing, attentive mothering skills, recovery and milk production. Olive has matured greatly this year and has become a strong contributor to our milk production and fantastic udder development. She also had a quick delivery, swift recovery and showed fantastic mothering skills. We are hoping next year both of these does will twin.
5/6/2019 0 Comments 10 and 2This year's lambing and kidding season has come to an end with a pretty wild female to male ratio! Abe sired 4 ewe lambs and 1 ram lamb, and Jeroboam sired 6 doelings and 1 buckling! We were able to "deliver" for all the folks who made deposits this year and one person from our waitlist. We are very pleased with the Guernsey pairings and resulting kids born this year. I believe they are quality additions to the Registered Guernsey stock. Our lambs are also growing very well and our 2 first time mothers have proven themselves as excellent as Buttercup, who was our lone lamber (I think I just made up that word!) last year. Iris's milk is apparently so rich, both of her ewe lambs have milk goiters!
5/1/2019 0 Comments It's a BOY!Yesterday was day 156 for our doe Ruth. At morning chore time ligaments were gone and udder was heavy but she was still active and eating constantly, no signs of labor. Just a whole lot of walking around and laying down in rather uncomfortable looking positions..... Finally, at 6:20pm when I went to refill water buckets, there she was, standing in the goat yard with a baby hoof out and an extremely full udder! Two of the mama goats were sniffing her, all 6 kids were jumping on her and sprinting by her in their late afternoon frenzy of energy, so I brought Ruth in to the nice, clean jug we prepared for her. She hated it and wanted to get out! So, we locked all of the goats out of the barn and let her kid in the main stall as she pleased. Except, it wasn't as quick as we thought it may be. For an hour she had long spaced, short contractions of pushing which did not accomplish much. Only one front leg presented itself and kept going back in. After an hour of this and her getting quite tired, I waited for her next big push, applied some pulling pressure to the one leg and reached in to find the other hoof. Thankfully it was just above the other but a bit caught and I was able to get it straightened out, now we had 2 legs out. Ruth went to lay in a corner for some more pushes, contractions were coming closer together, but she wasn't able to make progress on those next couple pushes. Not wanting her to get any more exhausted, I pulled with each of her contractions until finally we had a head, shoulders and one last push for the rest of this big buckling. 8:12pm. This big buckling concludes our 2019 kidding season. He weighed in at 8.75 this morning. He will be a registered British Guernsey buckling and go on to his own herd of Guernsey does. Here are some pictures of this stellar buckling this morning!
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We are the Lowers....a homesteading, homeschooling, family of seven living in central Maine. We aim to be purposeful in what we do each day as we strive to be good stewards of God's gifts. Archives
February 2021
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