Archive for the ‘Goat Play’ Category
Happy Mother’s Day to All You Goat Maaaaas!
I hope all you goat maaaaas out there are having a wonderful Mother’s Day!
I know I am.
And check out what the kids got me:
A goat scarf!
Soon to be all the rage.
Maaaaaaa!
Three Baby Goats Standing on a Ledge…
Sounds like the beginning of a song, doesn’t it? Nope, just a regular day in the goat pen.
And also my Goat Berries entry for the She Who Blogs 3rd Anniversary Photo Contest in which contestants are asked to submit their take on the theme “3” or “THREE” if you prefer.
Up for grabs is a $33 Amazon gift certificate; you still have time to submit your photo (contest ends May 8th), so get snapping!
And good luck!
P.S. I also put up a “3” photo over at Bleeding Espresso.
Honk If You Heart Pinta!
In Mixing Dams and Kids…and the Power of the Honk, I mentioned that Pinta has this weird noise she makes when she’s playing with the other kids.
Well I’ve got it on video. This particular honk (at around the 15 second mark) isn’t *quite* as honky as she used to do it, but I think you’ll still enjoy it along with all the literal bouncing off the walls:
Honk if you ♥ Pinta!*
Guess we won’t be taking her to NYC any time soon, though. Look what I spotted the last time I was there:
Harumph. Honk haters.
*Thanks to my friend Julie for the title!
Goat Games in the Pen
Kids like to play — and Nina, Pinta, and Colombo are no exception.
Now that all the dams and kids are together, playtime has become quite an event. Some of the kids’ favorite games include the following:
King and Queen of the Mountain:
Follow the Leader:
Peek-a-boo:
And my personal favorite, Goat Yoga:
Aaaaah. And…rest.
Mixing Dams and Kids…and the Power of the Honk
A funny thing has happened in the pen now that we’ve been letting all the moms and kids hang out together as a herd. Remember we had previously put Pasqualina in a kidding stall by herself in one pen because the other two bullied her?
Well in the past few days, we’ve been opening the gate between the pens to let them all interact. So, you throw everyone in together and here’s the new dynamic:
Pasqualina is super-protective of Pinta and will chase down the other two kids for no reason other than their existence.
The other two dams still pick on Pasqualina when there’s fresh food around, but during playtime, Pasqualina and Margherita lock horns (figuratively, as they don’t have any horns) just like they used to when it was just the two of them.
Every now and again, Carmelina will look threateningly at Pasqualina and raise her ears; Pasqualina gives the look and ears back, and they just kind of go off into their own little spaces. They don’t spar much at all. Truth be told, for the most part, the groups just switch pens and investigate.
But the biggest surprise? Pinta is a little fireball!
I was initially worried about her feeling left out of the other two kids’ bonding experience and also being vulnerable to dam attacks because her own mom has been bullied in the past.
But Pinta has *no* fear of the other kids or dams. Indeed, at first the other kids shied away from her advances (they’re starting to engage more now), and although the other dams give her a rear-end nudge now and again, it’s nothing nearly as hard as they still give to the other kid who’s not their own.
The most hilarious thing, though, which I must catch on video, is when Pinta runs at full speed from one end of the pen to the other and announces her presence with a hop, stop, and honk, usually within inches of one of the dams who isn’t her mom.
Yes, a honk! It’s a rather unique noise that seems to want to be a snort, but since she’s so little, it comes out kind of honky. Almost like a kazoo. Hilarious!
I’ve seen kids sneeze at each other in play, but that honk is just over the top. And oh so very Pinta.
Our lil’ Pinters.
Two Weeks and Counting
All of the kids are now two weeks old. Whoa.
It’s strange to think back to a time when we had no idea what they’d look like, how many of them were in the girls’ bellies, or even whether they’d make it through the birth OK. What a huge relief that all the births went well. I can’t stress that enough. I was *so* nervous and anxious reading all the horror stories on the Internet.
I hear pregnant women say things like that all the time–how reading information on pregnancy tends to scare you because it’s all the bad stuff that gets written about. Well, goat birth stories definitely did the same for me. Of course it’s nice to be prepared for the possibilities of complications, same as with human births, but still…it can really get your imagination working overtime. I had lots of really scary thoughts about having to deal with a breech birth or worse….
Anyway, can you do me a favor and tell me whether you think they’re growing?
It’s so hard to see the changes when you’re with them every day, but every now and again, you get a good glimpse like in this photo with Nina’s baby hooves up on the gate. Doesn’t she look enormous?!
One of the coolest things in the past two weeks has been seeing the difference in their confidence levels.
They used to stand on my lap with these shaky, wobbly legs. Now they love to use me as a springboard as they jump up and off my lap — sort of like mini-skateboarders with the way they’re starting to kick out their legs off to the side on the jump.
They also rather enjoy just boinging around the pen, off the walls, off whoever might be standing there videoing the whole thing. etc. YouTube wasn’t so kind on the quality of this video, but you can still get the point, I think.
It’s *so* easy to spend hours in there with them.
Sponsor the Old Goats of Apifera!
GoatSpotting!
Goats that readers have spotted out and about. Send your photos to michelle(at)goatberries(dot)com!
