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04/12/2011: "New Arrivals"

I'm catching up on old news again... when I was down at the farm at the end of March Lou told me the story of the new baby goats. Molasses (the momma) was pregnant, and expected to give birth any day. On Saturday night, however, his daughter couldn't find her come dusk. So, she just rounded up the rest of the herd, and penned them in the cow shed in the usual way.

However, the reason that Molasses could not be found was that she had wedged herself up under the non-basement side of the barn to give birth to her twin kids. Lou and his wife were enjoying a bit of a campfire out in the orchard late on Saturday night when suddenly they hear a commotion. A group of ten or fifteen coyotes were yipping and howling, right up by the barn! Lou knew that something was up, for the coyotes usually stay down by the river. Lou quickly told his wife to go fetch a rifle, and meet him by the barn. He grabbed a portable propane heater that was handy nearby, and turned it upside to force it burn with a flame rather than as a nearly invisible catalytic burn. He advanced on the barn, and found one scout coyote nosing around the corner of the barn. The coyote didn't like the look of the flame and took off; when Lou's wife arrived he sent a volley of shots down the slope to scatter the rest of them. Then he investigated what it was that had drawn the coyotes, and found Molasses and two baby goats under the barn.

Moral of story: if your mama goat is late-term pregnant, and you can't find her, she's probably ready to give birth!