The final student of the year

Yesterday morning we bade farewell to our final vet student of the year - Elena.  Hopefully she has enjoyed her 2 weeks working with the goaties and I am certain that she will have relished her lie in bed this morning instead of having to get up around 5am!

Although only a second year student from Bristol, she has already done a huge amount of work experience all over the world including Bolivia, Australia, India and Costa Rica.  Amazing stuff!

Anyhow - she was very popular with the goaties, as you can see ...

 

And also with the cats ... Mitzy decided that Elena would make a very comfy place to sit ...

 

 

Mitzy always manages to find the best places to sit - here she is snuggled up to one of my bears ..

 



Looks very cosy to me ...

Meet the new boy

So, as I mentioned in our last blog, the goatlings have a new boyfriend.  Meet Hugo:

Looks a bit grumpy in this photo but he is a lovely Anglo-Nubian buckling.  Very handsome and rather well bred.  He was living near Canterbury with a lady who found that he was getting a bit too big and strong for her to handle and so he has come to live with us.

Hugo has lived on his own away from female company for quite some time and so he was VERY excited to be confronted with a yard full of pretty young goatlings!

Unfortunately for Hugo, the goatlings have never seen such a big chap at close quarters - especially one with such huge ears - and so they were all very wary of him to start with.  As he ran into their area, they all ran to the other end and just stared at him:

Unperturbed, he sniffed around for a bit on his own

As the goatlings' curiosity gradually got the better of them and they started to come a little closer

 

Meanwhile, the milkers were trying to get a better view over their gate (which we had shut as we walked Hugo through the yard)

 

And, it has to be said, his arrival has caused the other boys to sulk.  Badly.  They can smell and hear that there is a new boy in town but they haven't yet met him.  But they know that he is out there with THEIR goatlings.  Not happy.  Not happy at all.  In fact, the boys sulked so much that they all refused to eat for a whole day.  Couldn't even be tempted by a nice banana.  Now that's a serious sulk.

However, like most things goatie, their grumpiness was short-lived and they are now back to their usual selves, snorting and blowing at the other girls in the barn.  Their turn will come!!

Musical chairs

Just when you think you have everyone sorted, the music starts again and all the goaties move around!  Doesn't seem 5 minutes since kidding but we are now starting to get everyone ready and in position (no pun intended!) for mating season. 

Oh yes ... it's that time of year again.

So, the goatlings are now outside in the cattle yard, waiting patiently for their new young man to come along.  Hopefully, I am going to collect a handsome chap tomorrow but more on that in due course. 

All the babies are now in the barn that the goatlings used to inhabit ... all 170 (ish) of them!  It's quite a battle of wits and speed to get food in to them every day but I think we all have fun doing it!

Here's a bunch of them at their hay rack:

But who is that black goat with the long ears??  Looks too big to be a little kid ...  Yes indeed, it's our lovely Cleo.  As Cleo will have a special boyfriend (with long ears), we need her to be moved away from the rest of the goatlings and their boyfriend.  However, there is also someone else who has had to be moved away as we can't let her become pregnant ...

Little Fizzy.  Fortunately, she and Cleo are best friends and so they are perfectly happy together with all those babies.  And, as you see, Fizzy is around the same size!!

  

So that's the girlies sorted .. what about the boys?

Well, my 6 little stud boys have all gone off to their new home in Somerset: 

 

 

And the big chaps are temporarily back in the main barn waiting to go to work with those lovely girls:

 

 

 

The smell level has risen ever so slightly with their arrival .... and they are well into the swing of things.  Blowing raspberries and snorting over the fence at all the girls and other such unpleasant habits that are characteristic of male goats ... Trust me, you don't want to know!

 

  

Life in the slow lane

It must be the season for our old goats to start showing their age ...  Betty goat (sister of our dear Wilma goat) had a bit of a funny turn yesterday evening.  Her face was swollen and she was having problems with her breathing .. looked almost like some kind of allergic reaction as she did start to settle down after a while. 

Our lovely vet Peter came over this morning to check her out and agreed that it could have been a wasp sting - apparently, he has seen the same problem recently in a couple of sheep.  However, having given Betty a thorough examination (much to her displeasure), he was more concerned that she may be anaemic.  He took a quick blood sample and took it back to the surgery to check it out.

A couple of hours later, he called to say that she was indeed seriously anaemic.  There is a supplement that we can try but it is important that she is kept as calm as possible and doesn't get stressed by anything.  He was chuckling as he advised that Betty now needs to 'live life in the slow lane'.  No more excitement for old Betty goat!

 

Needless to say, this advice was completely lost on Betty who appeared at the gate trying to balance a bit of hay on her nose!

 

So it looks like our very first two goats are now retired.  No more babies.  No more milking.  Just trundling about and enjoying extra titbits of food .... Life in the slow lane for Betty and Wilma!

Checking for trolls

Remember the story about the Three Billy Goats Gruff?  A story told to all little goatie kids by their mums.  And all goaties remember this story and are very wary of trolls.

Trolls are invisible to those silly humans who just don't appreciate how they can lurk around corners just waiting for some poor unsuspecting goatie to walk past.

Take a field, for example.  To a human, it looks like a lovely open green field full of lush grass.  After morning milking, the gate is wide open - just tempting those goatie girls to trot out into the pasture.

But you can't be too careful ... who knows what dangers are hidden around the corner?

So, everyone has to stand at the entrance to the field and stare ... and point their goatie ears ... and check that everything is safe to go out again.  After all, who knows what may have happened out there during the night when the goaties were all safe and snug in their barn ...

Eventually, someone is brave enough to venture out and then everyone else knows that it is safe to follow:

And who is this brave little goatie leading all the others out to graze?  None other than our little Husky ..

Wilma goes blackberry picking

Regular followers of our little blog will be pleased to know that our dear old Wilma goat has been feeling much better lately.  On her evening stroll outside the barn tonight she headed straight for the blackberry bushes and happily munched her way along the hedge:

 

 

 It's so nice to see her enjoying her food again, even though it does take her a little bit longer to chew it all up.  As she seems to have got a bit bored with bananas, I am feeding her apples and fresh runner beans as a treat.  Lucky old Wilma goat!

Carnival in the rain

Bank Holiday Saturday.  Torrential downpours.  Carnival weekend.  A heady mix for my first Notting Hill market today.  But, I managed to find my way there without any problem and was delighted to see a couple of familiar faces behind stalls.  And I was absolutely thrilled to have 3 of my regular customers from other markets also come to visit.  They are such a loyal bunch .. I love them all!!

Hopefully it should be a great market for Ellie's Dairy and, considering everything that was against us today, we did pretty well.

I must admit to being a bit of a tourist on the way home though ... Many years ago, when I had a 'proper job', I used to work in a rather posh office in St James's Square (just behind Piccadilly Circus)

and, as my route took me back through Kensington and down Piccadilly, I took the opportunity to pay a short visit to my old stamping ground.  Despite the crowds in Piccadilly, St James's Square was empty (as I had hoped) and I found a parking space with no problem at all. 

I did have a chuckle though as I parked my overloaded and slightly grubby little white van between a rather smart Bentley and a very shiny new Range Rover.  Chuckle chuckle ...

And off to Fortnum and Mason I went!  In search of a little something for David who is rather partial to a nice bit of cheesecake.  And, I was not disappointed ... the F&M patisserie is a joy to behold and I trotted back to the Square clutching my fancy little cake box.  Went down a treat at milking time!

As it has been a rather damp day, the goats were bored and so milking time was the usual round of naughtiness and mischief.  Polly, Bunty and Blossom jumped down as soon as they had been milked and headed straight for the feed barrow:

Whilst Florence took advantage of the empty stalls next to her and decided to check if there was any food left next door:

 

Having had a little sit on David's knee (I told you that she was getting too big for this!):

 

 

Husky had her usual drink of water straight out of the tap:

 

 

 

And now they are all curled up in their nice warm barn munching on lovely fresh hay whilst listening to the rain pour down outside in the darkness.  Not a bad life is it?!