Rain in Our Hearts

It's raining this morning in Leavenworth County, and how we still need it. 

I did chores between onslaughts. 

I'm waiting now to go out and get the morning paper.  

Raining in our hearts, too, because we lost our little Kody Moses yesterday at the vet clinic. 

He had so many bladder stones he "lit up like a Christmas tree" as the vet said, when they xrayed him again. 

I have learned so much from this episode, but oh, how horrible a way to learn things. 

We will miss him so very much, as we miss his brother.  

Thank you , Alica, for sending me such encouragement and advice from your own episode.  I am so glad you were able to save your boy.  Not one of my goat friends here had ever had an episode of urinary calculi, let alone two in a month. 

Jocelyn... I saw your comment, and will you please write me at Ksredhead1950@gmail.com, so we can talk about it?  I would appreciate it. 

Donna, at Our Forest Haven... you made my Saturday a better one when we saw our boy suffering and were unable to reach a vet to help us... thank you for your always good advice when you are still recuperating from your major surgery. 

And thanks to everyone else for all of your wonderful comments and encouragement, Keith and I appreciate all of them. 

When we left on Sunday, Kelly was running up and down the pen, crying for his "brother".  He was hoarse when I got home that afternoon.  He spent yesterday eating hay and calling intermittently.  I knew we either had to make a decision to re-home him... and believe me, I was discouraged enough... or to get him a companion right away.  I called a friend from church whom I knew had goats. 

She agreed to sell me two girls that she had bottle-raised this spring. 

My dear friend Jill came over after work and we went to pick them up....

Kelly is not too sure about these girls, that are his age, but only half his size: 

Meet Winnie and Windy. 

Goat owners amongst you will notice the distended belllies.  They have not been wormed, have not had their CD and T shots, and their hooves need trimming badly.  I realize now that our boys exposure to not just their little boulder pile, but access all over the property is helping to keep their hooves down. 

Because they are bottle babies (though weaned) ... they are gentle and friendly as Kody and Kaycee were. 

Kelly let me pet him on Saturday. 

Yesterday evening, while I sat and talked to the two new babies and loved on them... he quietly came up to me and stood with his head down a little.  I reached over and began to scratch his back along the spine, and did this for 3 minutes, talking to all of them and scratching the girls with my left hand.  Then I gave them all a pat and stood up, and he stood there looking for more.  It has taken almost 2 1/2 months to get to this spot, so no... I don't want to rehome him or give up on him.  He is a nice little boy. 

Sunday, when I got home... I sat for an hour in the barn with him. 

We sat so long, talking (!) (okay, I was crying) that he began to doze off.   I realized that Kody was so like a big dog that Kelly was always in the background, and I did not pay attention to him.  He was not as spectacularly marked as Kody and Kaycee, but he is a lovely young goat, nevertheless.  We began to be quite good friends after this, and he followed me to the gate. 

I also noticed how well his mama taught him... he is a good hay-eater, and went to the minerals while I was in there. 

That's good, because the vet told me yesterday no more commercial feed for them. 

Tomorrow, I'll take Windy and Winnie separately to our vet here in Tongie for a well-baby check, for shots, and for worming advice.  I'll talk to him about the advice I got from K State and go from there. 

I did purchase prairie hay, four bales, and am mixing that with the brome I had left.  We intend that Kelly will not develop the urinary calculi that killed our other two babies. 

I just realized, looking at this picture, that Kelly appears to have a heart on his forehead! 

Whew, that was a jarring change of pictures, wasn't it? 

I show you this because I truly lost my temper at him. 

See where his tail hooks up to the left, and yes, it WAS a big thick one? 

I've never seen a snake swallow an egg so fast... he coiled up and got ready to srike when I took hold of that tail above just out of view the left of the picture, and gave it a shake. 

Guess what?  I went back out there about ten minutes later, and he was long gone. 

It is still raining steadily here, so I think I'll grab a hoodie and trek out to the gate to get the probably sodden paper. 

Our prayers are going out this morning to all those affected by yesterday's shooting... and to those who are stranded or have lost so much in the flooding to our west.  

We are so blessed here in our wet little world.