Strangers in the Night....

Well, looks like I'm going to have to edit my last post in regards to the kidding schedule.

Last night, I went to feed the goats their dinner & milk Ishtar.  Normally she pushes everyone out of the way to get to the barn and stands right in front of the milk parlor door then looks at me as if to say, "Any day now!"

So imagine my surprise when she was nowhere near the barn.  She was standing at the fence line where Pan is.  And was not making the slightest movement towards me or the barn.

So I clip everyone else to their appointed feeding stations, divvy out the grain rations and trudge back to the house to put on an old coat.  You see, I was expecting to simply go out to the barn, milk, feed, close the chickens up, then come back inside.  But no.  I was going to have to play PimpMomma tonight.

Apparently Pan did not hit the mark last time.  I kind'a wondered if he was getting it right as there seemed to be a little more struggling than usual......serves me right for not setting up the cinder blocks for him.  He had no problem with Nettie, who's also a full sized Saanen, but Ishtar is bigger than Nettie.

So by time I go back inside, put my mucky boots on along with an old coat, it's getting pretty dark.  So I pull out my new handy-dandy-no-homesteader-should-be-without headlamp:

For whatever reason, I'd put off getting one of these for like, ever.  Now I'm kicking myself when I think of how many early mornings / nights I've monkeyed around with having to carry eggs or milk buckets or whatever and a flashlight.  This thing is awesome.  But back to the goatsex.

So I've donned some of my goatpimping gear and make my way out to Pan's enclosure.  I set up a few cinderblocks for him, go back and clip Ishtar to a lead, drag her away from the fenceline and then get drug by Ishtar all the way to Pan's enclosure.   Both participants (the goats) were anxious and cooperative, although I think we only had one good connection.  Not sure if Pan was getting sleepy because of the darkness, but he wasn't his usual spunky self.  And I couldn't sit out there for a half hour as I had our Fire Department Christmas party to go to in less than an hour (and I still hadn't made the green bean casserole).

So I drug Ishtar back out of Pan's enclosure and put her back with the rest of the does.  Ran into the house to peel off the smelly coat & boots and had Paul "sniff" me to make sure I didn't stink of goat piss.  Hurriedly put together green bean casserole, put kind'a nice shoes on, nice (i.e. non-barn-smelling) coat on and off we went to the party.

And through the entire party, all I could think of was Ishtar & Pan.  Was one time enough?  Should I just hope that she'll still be in heat tomorrow and try to have her bred again in the morning?  What if she's not in standing heat by morning?  What if I missed another breeding opportunity?  What if this is her last heat cycle for the season.  Did I leave the iron on?

We had stragglers from the party come to our house afterwards, so I didn't go back outside for another try at breeding Ishtar.  It's not that I have to hide the fact that I am a pimp for farm animals as our friends are pretty much aware that our animals do have sex.  But I didn't really want several guys (with a few liquid libations already down their gullet) accompany me during my nighttime goat loving outing.  Because you just know that they would wonder why I was going outside in the middle of the night wearing one of Paul's old jackets, muck boots and a headlamp secured to my noggin.

And I wasn't sure I was up to loud men chortling, laughing and cracking crude farm animal intercourse jokes in the middle of the goat pen, in the pitch dark.  Guys can be soooooo immature!

So I waited until this morning to bring Ishtar back to Pan.  And hopefully it was successful.  Guess I'll know in a few weeks.