These pictures were taken by Emily, you can see me in the doorway...
Thursday morning Emily saw that Spots udder had filled with milk and that she was uncomfortable along with a couple other signs. Amy and then Aaron watched her all day but it didn't look like anything was progressing.
You might remember last year that Spots lost her baby and had a C-Section partly because she never went into full on labor. Its always dangerous to have a VBAC anyways and coupling that with not really knowing why last years went so bad...needless to say we were all rather stressed. Emily had already decided she wouldn't put Spots though another C-Section (she never fully recovered until Tulip had her babies and Spots had a bigger herd to protect) and would instead put her out of her misery if it went wrong...
Around 10pm there was too much stress and we went to bed. Unbeknownst to me, Emily checked on her at 1130 and all was very calm in the goat shed. Tulip was quiet (she essentially snores) and Spots was laying down trying to sleep. Poor tired goaty having been in labor all day. This made Emily feel better so she could really sleep. I woke up at about 1230 and went out to check. Spots was having major contractions pretty close together and was trying to lay down between them and sleep but they were too close together. I watched her for a bit, getting more and more upset thinking she would have to endure this all night until we could get a vet in...
I came inside somewhat overwrought, especially now that Spots had started whimpering. Before waking up Emily, I decided to time her contractions to convince her it was worth the money for a nightime vet visit. Her contractions were every 3 minutes lasting about 2 minutes long.. I counted through 2 (with Spots getting more pathetic in her bleating) and on the 3rd her water broke... wait, that's good! I went in to get Emily.
Like I said, I was a bit overwrought with no sleep and stress :) Emily was very calm especially compared to my emotional state. I went back out while Emily was getting dressed and Spots was definitely progressing. Emily saw the hooves but realized they were upside down meaning the baby was breech. Emily said "good thing I just read about this", grabbed a towel to wrap around the slippery legs and started pulling. It felt like she was pulling for 10 minutes with Spots bleating and struggling on the ground (Tulip wouldn't lay down and Spots wouldn't get up). Halfway through Emily checked her phone to make sure she was doing it right. She saw the tail which meant the baby was crouched with her legs tucked up which is part of the reason she was stuck. I wanted to help but Emily said we didn't want to pull harder and break anything so I just tried supporting Spots on the ground. Eventually the legs kicked out (Emily was worried she had pulled the legs off) and now that the baby was long and skinny she was pushed through with one more contraction... Emily thought she was dead with all the stress (she was so big and heavy) but she twitched and started coughing once Emily got the goop off of her.
There was obvious meconium so the poor baby was definitely in distress... Emily had saved two lives that night.
And what a night it had been.
Spots loved her baby but wasn't sure why she wanted anything to do with her udder. This is the first time Spots has been able to keep her baby and its like she is a first time mom. We had to hold Spots in place trying to distract her with raisins, cookies, sugary vinegar water while the baby nursed.
We (mostly Emily) had to force the issue every four hours holding Spots still so she could nurse and eventually by Saturday evening Spots was finally letting her nurse on her own.
These pictures are from Friday Morning (May 6)... Spots is so protective.
One of the side effects of not all getting milk as she needed, and a really big baby was that the knuckle on her front legs would curl under instead of supporting her. One leg eventually got better but she was favoring the other so Emily splinted it with a popsicle stick. She was jumping around even more after that but we don't know if it was her getting stronger or the splint. The next day Emily took the splint off and her leg was fine... well, at least we didn't hurt it :)
Last night (Wed May 12th) I took Spots baby (Dot) out to be with Tulip and the other kids to see if Spots would graze. She is so spastic and protective she won't leave the baby alone for a minute to go out and eat. Tulip would put the kids down for a nap in the shed and then head out to graze... especially if we were there to watch them. Spots is not that type of mother (helicopter parent.. sigh). Once we were out there she did graze a bit.
Spots gazing out into the distance...
Emily came to join me and Dot was so tired. I took a video of her "grazing" while lying down but it is sideways... so here is a different video.
Our nursing kids are so unfriendly... :)
FYI, its common practice to take the babies away and bottle feed them. They do it for many different reasons, I.E. so disease is not passed from mom to baby, it maximizes milk production (take all the milk the mother can make rather than just how much the kids need), you can sell the babies right away, and it supposedly make them more friendly to humans.
Emily has tested the goats for CAE each year, and we are not interested in maximizing milk production or selling the babies right away. And I think the kids are fairly used to humans :)
Its funny to watch Tulips kids interact with Dot... They butt her to play and then run off. She tries to run after but then can't find them cuz she's not as fast given the 3 week age difference. They come back and run circles around her. Then Spots gets nervous cuz she can't tell which is hers. She smells them all until she finds Dot and then nips at the rest to get them to leave. Then Dot goes off to play with them again and it happens all over again. Helicopter mom...
P.S. Everybody is welcome to come play with our (Tulips and Spots) kids! Text, Call, IM or Facebook :)
