Our first 4 goats - Nigerian Dwarf kids

Goats without warning - seriously, I sprung this on Colin without warning days after Christmas.

I wanted baby goats in hopes my sister would fall in love and decide to find work in town. After the holidays she went home as planned. Luckily, Colin and I have fallin in love with caring for goats.

Monday night after work we drove out to pickup our goats. We quickly learned that dame raised goats with little human contact are shy, but they can be caught with a flashlight and a net. 

Happy to have them home. We put the kids into a dog kennel with deep bedding and the dog crate.

Initially they hid from us in the crate. To build a friendship with these shy goats, we would take turns sitting in their area with food near us to encourage their curiosity. Eventually Scott (my cousin) was able to give a few sneaky back scratches and head scratches. Behehetsy, AKA Betsy, was the first and she decided she liked being brushed. 

In February 2024, Betsy had three kids and was fighting tapeworms. She was unable to keep all 3 kids fed so her little girl became a bottle baby and the two boys would nurse on mom and got extra milk from a bottle to make sure they were all getting enough nourishment.

In June 2024, Cthulhu nervously gave birth. While she was healthy, she had complications with her children and one was stillborn, the other was super tiny and we had to remove the stillborn so she could focus on her living son.

September 2024, Betsy and her bottle baby Jazzy are a pair always ready for pets, scratches and some human snuggles. Today, September 18th, Betsy's sons, Forrest and Johnny Jack, graduated with the teen bucks herd into the buck herd; while Cthulhu's son Reece and the summer born bucklings were banded so they will be wethers with the opportunity to stay with their moms. 

Yoshi was wethered soon after we brought the 4 home so that he wouldn't impregnate his sister and half sisters. Yoshi's sister Goatse has yet to get pregnant. 

These four were the foundation of our herd and will have a place with us forever.