Caramel had 2 pregnancies while she was here with us. She came to us after her babies were weaned and we started milking her right away. Kori had a routine of milking both Caramel and Rayne twice a day for about the next 6 months. Once winter hit hard, she went down to once a day. We were pleasantly surprised when both goats allowed us to milk them for well over a year. We did not even purchase a buck until their 2nd summer with us. Both does had not been hand milked before, they had only dam raised their kids. Kori spent months training them to our hand-built stanchion.

Her first pregnancy left us completely excited but our inexperience left us a little unprepared for her to give birth on the coldest day that month. She delivered 4 babies in -14 degree weather overnight. We went out to check on her in the morning only to find one safe and warm. Unfortunately, the others did not survive. We were heartbroken and devastated but excited as she was an amazing mother to Maverick. Maverick ended up with a bit of frost bite on the tip of his ears and as he got bigger, we noticed the shape of his ears ended up shortening but he never had any issues. He is one strong buck to survive all of that so unscathed! Winter in the UP can be very unforgiving, and we learned how to better prepare our barn and our does for giving birth.

Her second pregnancy she gave birth to a healthy doe and buck. Once again, it was on the coldest day that month, but it wasn’t nearly as cold as the previous year. Moose and Eloise were strong and veracious eaters. Later that day when we went to check on them, we noticed Moose was doing well but Eloise was cold and crying. We brought her inside, warmed her by putting her in a plastic bag(head out) and placing her in a sink of hot water. We got her up to a healthy temperature over the course of a couple of hours and she perked up after drinking some colostrum. We brought her back outside to see if Caramel would take her back but after over an hour of trying to get her to nurse, we took her inside to feed her colostrum again. She became our 3rd bottle baby, not by choice. She joined our sweet lil Penelope who was only a day older. Kori took the night shift with the two lil doelings and I took care of them starting at 4-5 am until their last feeding around 10 pm. With the weather being still so cold we had to watch closely for pneumonia if we took her out to the barn and back inside. It wasn’t until she was about 3 months old that is warmed up enough during the day for her to stay out there for more than an hour or two. We had a warm spell and I decided to see how she would do with her mom for more than a short visit. It was 50 degrees that day. She jumped and played around with her brother and even though I still was feeding her the bottle, Caramel was treating her well. By the 2nd day I noticed Caramel was cuddling the two kids in the corner to keep them warm while they slept. A very good sign. We decided to see if she would be ok overnight with them. I rushed out very early the next morning wondering if I had made the wrong decision, only to find them all snuggled safely together. She was very excited for her bottle though. We successfully transitioned her back with the herd. We were able to give a huge sigh of relief!

Caramels 3 surviving babies born on our farm: Maverick, Moose, Eloise