Wednesday, March 25, 2015

Kids before Kidding

Yesterday we had our first kidding here at Krazo Acres.  Dilly popped out two bucklings with ease Tuesday late afternoon.

But we've had kids here since Saturday.  Some sort of time-flux?   Space worm-hole?

Nope.  I went and picked up two bottle bucklings:

We goat a call from the neighbor asking if we wanted a couple of free eight week old baby Boer goats.  Their son had a friend that was wanting to get rid of them because they were tired of taking care of the goats.  Sure, why not!  As long as we weren't expected to keep them as pets and weren't required to sign off on a statement saying that they wouldn't end up in the BBQ.

Well, it turns out that they weren't so much eight weeks old, but FOUR weeks old.  Which means that they would still need to be fed.  With a bottle.  By me.  For four more weeks.  And they were bucklings.

It also turns out that the guy was hinting that I should pay him for these "free" goats.  He kept asking me what goats were bringing in at the sale barns and when I told him "squat" since the market is currently drowning in baby goats, he mentioned that he could get $150 for one later on.  Which I agreed.  He could.  After spending more money on goat milk replacer, and after bottle feeding them another four plus weeks, and after buying grain, hay and other medical necessities.  Oh and did I mention that I picked up the goats at a house in the city limits?  With NO yard.  And no doubt, without the "permission" of the neighborhood association or the city's blessing.

Wether or not there was a misunderstand between Goat-giver-upper, Goat-giver-upper's friend, Goat-giver-upper's friend's parents, and Goat-taker (me) about the meaning of "Free", I guess I'll never know.  But there was no way I was paying for two buckling bottle babies when I'd have to be buying goat milk replacer to bottle feed them (for FOUR more weeks) until my milkers freshened.  So in the end, I didn't end up paying for the goats, but did end up giving him money for the bag of milk replacer, which I would have had to buy anyhow.  I wasn't rude about anything, but I get the feeling that he thinks he got screwed out of something.  Hope he isn't bashing me on Facebook or anything.  And if he is, I'd be glad to give him his goats back.  After he paid me for disbudding and vaccinating them.

So that's the story of how we got goat kids before actual kidding started.

Paul's Take
She said they were free.  Then they weren't so much free.  If I were with her we would have slammed the car in reverse the moment he started hinting that he wanted money for these goats.

Oh, and do you recall that Carolyn, JUST FIVE BLOG POSTS AGO, was talking about how she hated bottle babies?  Apparently she forgot already.

6 comments:

  1. I like Paul's take, ha ha! We have a vet disbud out kids, and it's not getting any cheaper. This will be our last year with goats.

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  2. We had a goat show up here once. Never did know where it came from it just appeared one day trying to get into the pen with the ewes. I ended up giving it to a guy down the road and I never even hinted that I wanted money.

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  3. They are adorable! We had a dwarf goat show up at our house and it had a collar on. It was just strolling around the ridge so we penned it up before it was coyote dinner. We checked and no one claimed it so we assume someone got it for a pet and dumped it out in the middle of nowhere. They were lucky someone found it. We ended up giving it to the fire chief that lives in our valley and he gave it to his son for the grand kids to play with.

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  4. I have experienced something like that but not with goats over here near Springfield, Mo.... Here people think goats are a cash crop.

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  5. I wouldn't have paid either. Inn fact I would have worked it to where he needed to pay me for taking them off his hands. Lol! No body tries to make me feel bad....... lol!

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