sad goat

last week, the baby goats were born, and everyone rejoiced. they are incredibly cute. john took us over to visit them (they're in a different pasture) and they were tinier than we imagined; so small, in fact, that you could pick them up and pet them. the poor things were such messes that they could barely stand up properly. one of them fell flat on its belly. so cute. i think there were about 5 total, with more on the way.

while we were there, the baby goats were getting milk from their mammas. however, for some reason, a couple of the mammas weren't taking to the whole milk-giving process. apparently farmer john says its really painful, and some are in more pain than others. john has to basically force the mammas to stay still sot he babies can drink. but when he's not around, sometimes the mammas kick the babies away so they can't drink the milk, and unfortunately, this can actually kill the babies.

luckily, no babies were outright murdered. however, we were informed that one of the babies that we met died because it didn't get enough milk. sniff. that was the only baby that this particular mamma had, and farmer john moved that mamma over to our pasture here. she came here late last night and has been crying, non-stop, all day long. i think the other goats are getting irritated with her because they've been beating her up. i know, insult to injury, right. we heard her crying incessantly this evening so we went outside, convinced we were going to find her hanging from a tree or something, but instead she just stood there staring at us, crying loudly. then, from a corner of the pasture i saw blackie, another goat, back up and charge at her, ramming her with her head and knocking her against the house. vicious beast. the next thing i knew, two other goats got into the act and began to beat her up too.

its a sad state of affairs right now for this little goatling. i'm sure the other goats are giving her a hard time too because she's a newbie, but its very sad to hear those cries echoing out from the pasture all night long, knowing not only that she's mourning her baby, but that she's also getting bullied.