Sunday, February 5, 2017

Day 2 With Amethyst

To my surprise Coral didn't get up when we went in.

Coral and Amethyst are doing great! I'm still going to do a post to show a video of her labor and birth, but I'm having to figure out how to convert some files, so it will have to wait.  I'll just share pictures and video from today with Amethyst.

 Your baby is not a pillow hehe.

Coral is still tired, but they are both doing great.  I LOVE watching Amethyst play and explore.  I forgot how much fun goat kids are.

 I LOVE her racing stripes on her ears.

We gave them the first day alone together to bond, but today it was time to start socializing Amethyst so she doesn't end up feral like her mom.  Coral doesn't like it, humans still stress her out, but she didn't fight us.  She just watched closely and talked under her breath to her baby.

 Hubby giving Amethyst a cuddle.  

Ammy doesn't like being held, but she quickly gives up struggling.  She will get used to it.  I couldn't tell right after her birth if she was black or dark brown, but now that she's dry it's obvious she's jet black.  I love it.  Black and white (or all black) is my favorite color in goats, although chocolate brown like Coral and Topaz is my second favorite.


Then we just sat still and watched her play and learn her balance.


Always eating.  She takes such small little meals, very frequently.  That's why bottle feeding can be so hard on babies because humans try to give them too much per feeding when they are designed for small, frequent meals.

 Nibbling her feet and then watching us.


She eventually started warily approaching us of her own free will.  Check out this video below.  It's very short.


Isn't she cute??


I like this shot.  I hate that I have to use flash which makes the eyes weird, but it shows off her half mustache and racing stripe on her ear.  I'm pretty sure she is going to have parti colored eyes.  The bottom is a blue and the top a light brown.  It's still possible they will go all brown, but Crockett did have mottled eyes, so I'm not going to count it out yet.

 Another snack.

 Approaching me again to nibble on my sweat pants.

I had to stop taking pictures because the battery was about to die in the camera, but Amethyst eventually got to where she was confidently walking up to us, nibbling on us, getting scratched and petting all over her body.  She loves to be scratched behind the ears and along her back.  She is so adorable and so soft!!  She is going to be so easy to tame.  Coral really doesn't like it, but I think the more she sees her baby interact with us and go safely back to her and smelling our scent on her might help her learn to trust us.  We keep all interaction brief so as not to stress Coral unnecessarily.  She has really impressed me with her tolerance to our presence.  She even let hubby crawl to her and check her udder for heat or hardness (checking for mastitis because she seems sore when she tries to lay down) without us having to catch or restrain her.  Her udder is fine by the way.  It's probably just sore because it's so swollen.  She's a really good milk producer.  I wish she'd had twins, but I'm happy to have Amethyst.  I'm in love with her already!


She eventually went down for a nap.  I put it in black and white because I don't like the red light of the heat lamps.

We decided to leave them in peace.  Coral is a nice looking doe!

What made me really happy is when we got up to leave Amethyst came over to us and started nibbling on our pants and shoes.  Then she followed us out of her pen!!!  I gently steered her back into the pen toward her mom.  When we closed the door and left she let out one loud bleat like she wanted us to come back.  So cute!!!!!!!!!!!  It made me so happy!

P.S.  I almost forgot!  Here is a video from yesterday of Coral and Amethyst's first moments together.  I was going to put it in the same post as the birth, but I don't know when I'll get that one processed, so enjoy it in this post instead.

Direct Link

7 comments:

  1. She's adorable! Glad mom and kid are doing so well.

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  2. She is so cute, glad she is becoming tame so easily and is reaching out to you two. Good job!

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    1. She is a total cuddle bug now! She crawls into my lap and just lays there. I was so worried she would be skittish like her mom, but she's not at all.

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  3. Replies
    1. Thank you! She is up to thirteen pounds and three weeks old! She's growing so fast.

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    2. Oops, I mean thirteen pounds at two weeks.

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