Trying to Stay Cool

We are ridiculously hot again.  Everyone just lounges around.  The goats are heading out to pasture fairly early in the morning.  They hang out under the trees during the hottest part of the day. It’s too hot for me to go out there, so all my pictures are from the barnyard.

Vinnie and Vulcan

Harley

Pepe

Daisy and Dahlia

Cookie with Chiffon and Marge in the back

Maisie with her baby, Moose

Bonnie

Penelope

Maybeline just hangs out luring Tony over so she can spit on him because she might be pregnant. Who knows?

Maybeline and Tony

On Wednesday, we had a line of storms pass through that brought everyone back up to the barnyard.

At least it cooled us down a bit before the ridiculous heat returned.

Odie and Maybeline eating in the shade of the tree.

I am spending my time making sure everyone has plenty of clean water and that they aren’t getting overheated.

Penny and her kid, Pipsqueak

One evening, I did have to hose Aurora down to cool her off.

Aurora (And look-the pool is still clean!)

I’ve been worried about Tony, too, but he’s hanging in there. I’ve added a fan in the buck room to help keep the air moving.

Tony Llama

The goats are doing okay.  We’re all ready for a break.

Dahlia and Joy in pasture with the big goats.

We are now looking at the end of this long stretch of hot weather.  Next week looks to be back to more reasonable temperatures.  Thankfully.

 

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Moving and Birthing

I decided I had to move my moms from the two buildings where they were penned to the north paddock.

Daisy and Dahlia

Unfortunately, I still have a lot of my March babies up there.

Bubbles, Sacagewea, Moira, Squanto, Angela, John and Tootles

That means it’s kind of crowded and going to get eaten down, and I don’t have enough shelter if we get bad storms. I’d have to go out and move someone.  I’m thinking aobut letting Bubbles and a couple of other kids back with the big herd, but I don’t want to put kids out there to reunite with their moms to be sold in just a couple of weeks.  We’ll see how it goes.

Bubbles (these kids never stand still)

It wasn’t too bad to get everyone moved up there.

Bambi and Lucky

I also spent a big part of the day putting chicken wire on the panels between the yard and barnyard. Pepe was a good little helper.  He was nibbling my ear and being pretty sweet.

Pepe

The chicken wire was necessary though because the little babies just zip through the cattle panels like nothing, and Sky would treat them like they were a funny-colored short-tailed squirrel.  That would  not be good.

Sky

I really had to get them moved because I did not have room for poor LilyAnn.  I had to shut her in because she had her kid!

LilyAnn and her baby

She had one big boy.

Ringo

I think his name is Ringo (because of the little ring of white around his one front ankle.

Vinnie

Now we’re just waiting on Vinnie.  Come on, Vinnie!  I want to sleep!

The Game Continues

The morning after we started Hide-and Goat-Seek, we began the second round.  My gloating about how smart it was to shut the gate because the kids would be easy to find might have been a bit premature.  After I did my morning errands (buying yarn and dowels), I got home to find the goats in the barnyard, but Aphrodite and Daisy had left their kids in pasture again.

Dahlia

I went out filled with confidence!  Then I got to the other side of the ditch.  That was crazy thick.  It took me an hour to find Aphrodite’s little girl, Button.

Button and me

After I brought her back to the barnyard, I went back to look for Daisy’s doe.  No luck.  After three hours of searching, I called it quits.  I went to the house and took a short nap (Don’t judge me; I’m still getting up in the night to check Vinnie and LilyAnn).  By the time I got up, they had all gone back to pasture. I joined the herd, and helped Cookie’s girls keep up.  Aphrodite was by herself, so I assumed she had left Button in the barnyard this time.

Cookie, Marge and Chiffon

Zinnia was doing a good job with Joy.

Zinnia and Joy

Then I stumbled across Button just randomly standing there.  Seriously?  I gave her back to Aphrodite.

Aphrodite and Button

Then I saw Daisy cut from the herd.

Daisy and Dahlia

She knew exactly where her little Dahlia was.

I knew where all five kids were and I had to go back to the house.  I hadn’t gotten any lunch, and I was afraid I was going to not make it back.  That is the only reason I didn’t carry Button back up with me.  I quickly had a peanut butter sandwich and went back to pasture.  Button was lost again.  Seriously?

Cookie feeding Marge and Chiffon

I began calling to her when I realized Joy was yelling.  She had lost her mom.  I decided I was going to deal with that before I lost her too, so I scooped her up and took her back to the barnyard (Since she wasn’t technically ever lost, I didn’t score a point on this one).

Joy

Then, I spent another hour systematically scouring the pasture.  My legs ached, and I was one pass from calling it quits when I found her.  Sweet baby!

Button

Finally we all made it back to the barnyard.  Relief!  I immediately shut Aphrodite, Zinnia, and Daisy in the greenhouse again.

Aphrodite

I did let Cookie stay out with her girls, but the next day, it was even too tough for them.  They ended up sleeping beneath a big cottonwood tree where I found them after another hour of hiking.

Because of storms in the forecast, they got shut in before Saturday.  I swear, if I wore a fitbit it would read “Girl, what are you thinking.  Sit down and have a glass of wine.”  If you lost track of the score, we currently stand at Farmer Teresa: 7; Goats 2.