That is small for a Nubian kid, which makes me wonder if there's not another one in there. It definitely feels like there's another
I bumped her belly, and I feel like there's at least another one, I would guess. But with how small that baby is, I wouldn't be surprised if she doesn't have triplets. Look how long these ears are! I think it's a girl, but I can't see real well. That's maybe the tiniest little Nubian kid I've ever seen.
"Yeah, you might just be used to calves." "Yeah, I guess maybe I got used to calves, I don't know. I think this is probably like a 4 lb kid. I have to weigh it to see. The typical is like 7 lb. You don't eat any... eat." I have personally never, ever seen goats be born before. You know, at this point, I've hatched hundreds of birds, I've had about 10 different calves born on my farm, I've helped some friends with sheep before, but I have never seen a goat born. And sitting there in my friends Jess and Jeremiah's barn, watching as one little baby goat was born and waiting and wondering if the second goat kid would be born, it's just kind of magical, and I just felt so lucky to have arrived at my friend's house just in time to be able to see all of this in action. "It's a girl!" "Yeah, so I... I lost."
And it happened so quickly. There was a mineral deficiency in one of our cows that caused her to rain her... she was just shivering real bad, so I just wanted to get her real dry. "It's okay, Jessica, you bit." "A fussy moment all the time you guys slept in." She's pushing, her getting up and down is signs of her having contractions. And you see how her back starts like that? That's a push. She looks so much like... incredibly have both because play's color. You'll see stretch their mouth left and right. She di... yeah, that's pain. Oh, I'm sorry for you, Mom. She's... she's straight up nursing a child. Do you want to bring the baby closer to the middle so she'll get away from the wall? "Yeah, that's a good idea." She's like trying so hard, she's trying so hard. Let me see. It's so cute. You go look at it. There she goes. That temp she did, you're walking. It's crazy how animal they get up. Like, they're prey animals. That's what I'm saying. Like, prey animals have to move fast because that's their protection, and their parents can only protect them by moving. Keep their eyes closed for like two weeks. Predator animals, they're usually help, and that's how babies, like our babies, work 'cause we're predators. Bear cubs actually, I think bear cubs move quickly. So you want kids to have just like cows, you want them to have colostrum within an hour. "Yeah, an hour, that should get good too." Yeah, so sometimes you have to watch, moms will lick their babies a time but not feed them, so you have to make little Bal... there's definitely something else in there. She's a brave little one. "Yeah, really." "Yeah, they over... we're done." "One more SN."
For those of you guys watching all of this and wondering like what the heck happened, like probably one of the last videos you saw, it was like really snowy and it was chaotic, and now here I am in a place where there is no snow and you can see fresh green grass everywhere, and I'm on this flat pastoral farm landscape. I should probably catch you guys all up on what's happened. So in the last video, as you saw, I was leaving my farm, and I ended up going to Washington DC. You know, my wife and I, we used to live in Washington DC. My wife's sister actually still lives in Washington DC, and she ended up getting married this past weekend. So we went down to DC for the wedding, and it was amazing. It was so much fun to spend time with family and friends like that, and my sister-in-law, who is an amazing person, plus her well, fiance, now husband, like it was awesome, it was great, it was so much fun.
But I figured since I was already away from the farm and I was also already kind of in the South, that it wouldn't be too hard to go further down south and come down to South Carolina to visit my friends Jessica and Jeremiah Sard. If you guys have watched my channel for a while, you know Jess, you know Jeremiah. Jess was actually last up at my farm back, I guess it was in September, and then, you know, we'd even done a couple of videos via video over that same time period. And over the years, we've just done so many videos together, and I haven't been back here at their farm in, I don't know, I guess it's been about three years. And so it seemed like a great opportunity to come down and hang out with them and spend a few days with them and their boys and I don't know, just chill and get away from it all. But the thing I didn't expect is that I would be arriving here during goat kidding season. Are you kidding me? I don't feel anything hard presenting, so she may not have anything else in there. Huh. Just one tiny little baby still deep in there. And so yes, roughly 15 minutes after arriving on their farm, they had the first kid of the season born. And then overnight, it was like magical waiting. Jess and I just spent hours just catching up and chatting in the barn while we waited for the delivery. The second one, I don't know, it feels like a sack that feels full of liquid, and if I go real deep, I can feel something hard that feels kind of like a mouth, but I'm like, what am I pressing up against that deep? I don't know. The only other other times I've ever had to reach in goats, there's usually parts right there, right? How long do they before they usually pass the pa... um, an hour or two can be normal. You love liing there, girl. Yeah, just put it right in there. Sing on their own, like fig out sck cu like a punching bag banging against the head. Good job, girl! You're a star already in. It's a little warmer. Come on. Let a lot warmer, but a little B, it'll stay a lot longer. That's actually the bigger difference. You know what, she's looking less and less like she's ready to. "Yeah, yeah, I think that she might be done."
Yeah, we ended up actually waiting so long that like it was getting towards like midnight. Eventually, it didn't seem like anything was happening, and we started to wonder if the mama had actually only had one kid, and so we went to bed. But when we woke up the next morning, two more kids were born. Unfortunately, one of those kids was actually stillborn, but there was a second kid that was born. And so it was just magical that next morning to wake up and just be able to like help these little baby goats nurse and spend some time with them and experience that. I even shot a video for my second channel where I got to just, you know, basically have some kids sitting on my lap while I shot that video, and I don't know, it's just kind of magical. "It's okay, Bingo." So is this one sleeping? This one a girl or a guy? "So this one's definitely the girl that was born last night. This one here, I can check for you. Yeah, I think that's a girl. Yeah, she popped out another one in the middle of the night. Yep, he's adorable. You can't nurse off your sister, that just doesn't work." I did give her some hay.
Yeah, you know, when it comes to having goats on my farm, I have three weathers. So I have Linus, I have Telemachus, and I have Baracus. Weathers are essentially male goats without their testicles, so they can't breed. I never intended to really breed goats. I don't necessarily have that much interest in breeding goats. Seeing those baby goats on Jess's farm, I don't know, it has it has me thinking things. I I don't I don't know. I don't even want to say it because it's going to get people all hyped up down in the comments section. Now, aside from playing the role of goat doula, it was also kind of nice just catching up with Jess and Jeremiah, spending time with their boys, and actually even helping their boys make videos and little stop motion animations and just, I don't know, having a really good time. I think when it comes down to hanging out with Jess's boys, like I don't know, all my big uncle energy comes out, and I genuinely enjoy it. Not that I want kids of my own, but it is kind of nice to hang out with other people's kids in small doses and just be able to be the fun guy, and not like a fun guy like that, but like a fun guy, you know, fun guy.
Now, while I was here, Jess was consistently telling me that I shouldn't expect all goat births to be as difficult as the one that happened when I first arrived, but I honestly wasn't too sure about that until yesterday afternoon. "Hey Jess, I think she might be getting close." "You doing it well, what Mery girl? Come on!" "That's a boy." See, that's probably like an eight-ish pound kid. That's what I'm saying, they were like four or five lbs because they were three. Um, she'll probably have another one. They're saying how big she is and how it could be that she had triplets, but with a kid that big, it's more likely that it's just two. Now let's see how fast he stands up too. That'll be 'cause he's so big and strong, he probably will be up and sturdy. Fluid number two, maybe? I don't know, there's a little flush of blood there, so we'll see. So they either pass have another kid or they pass the placenta. I'm guessing another kid though. She really pregnant. Yeah, this one might be bang, bang, this how it normally is. 8 hour late, 10 hour L. Look at him, he's almost he's getting up on his knes already. "Yeah, thank you for that clear shot." Yeah, there's another tongue sticking out. This one's a big kid too. M m. Oh, this one's pretty. You think she's done? Give me both of them are. That's a full belly work of kids right there. I to you Mo over here. She... that's a girl. So I would be surprised if she if she popped out another kid, it would probably be very small. Yeah, just that's a that's a lot of kid right there. Those are two big kids. The boy is bigger, he probably weighs more by he probably weighs several o one than a girl. Look at him. So that's why I was kind of like the other day with the girls, I was like so little like this is this is yeah. See, she's not stepping away from them trying to eat and stuff like that, which is good. Once they those two get like aggressive enough, like it won't be a concern, but we'll probably still come out here four times a day just to make sure that our bellies are saying Co their poop is moving. Is that what you have to do for btle babies is four times for books? "Yeah, uh you start at four and then after a week you drop down to three and then usually I try to get mine pretty soon to being yeah." I mean look at that. Yeah, look those crazy he's at least 3 lbs heavier than her. Yeah, especially like the bluey, she's she's definitely she's the smallest L ones. What you doing there, Bango M? I'm going to miss them so.
Jess, this has been my first experience with baby goats. Is this a normal or atypical experience with baby goats with Bingo and Bluey or Bingo? Well, I mean all four of them because I feel like I've gotten to see a lot. I think you got to see the spectrum. Neither one was obviously catastrophic. There was some loss. This was definitely definitely atypical with bling Bingo and Bluey, the way that was spread out, the fact that there were three very small babies, like the fact that she's obviously not a super experienced mom, but it obviously wasn't as traumatic as it could have been. The other is more what a typical birth 'cause that was so I mean that's I mean I feel like we were in here for we were what we went to about like around 11 or so that first night and still nothing and you know, this one was out in the morning basically. "Yeah, and then uh like uh the other it was like hour yeah." Usually it should be less than an hour that your kids are born eating up walking strong. They're so chill, they're really cool. I mean she's so sweet and what's funny is all right, so I've been here three days and watching her like go from barely alive till she's springing around and dancing. It's know it's nice to see. It is nice to see and they'll be they'll be all over the place in another week. They'll be climbing everything they can. She's getting real springy. Why do you have your goats like is that oh she almost knocked the camera over. I know I feel we got to just stop and observe this Behavior because like look at her she's like sneaking underneath she loves overhead these ears are ridiculous. So this is very specific to their breed. Yes, these are Nubian goats and they are known for their pendulous ears and of course the baby goats kind of have these huge ears they end up kind of growing into them a little more but you see on the mamas their ears stay very long kind of like the Jar Jar Binks gos. They're also the Roman nose you see how curved their nose is that's another very uh distinct trait of anubian and they have one of the highest butter fats of all milk and goats. So they're loud, they're known for being very loud and chatty there are other breeds that are more quiet but I don't mind their talkativeness. I like it a lot actually and they're very friendly um especially when they're they're well handled and any sort of dairy animal you end up with a real relationship with because you spend so much time with them every day.
All right, so so what's your ranking of like farm animal livestock hierarchy? Are goats above cattle in your opinion? "Yeah, for me they are. I'm glad we have cattle, but I'm glad Jeremiah takes care of them. I mean, I personally like that I can handle these. I like that I'm not going to get hurt by them. Um, if things get kind of chaotic, and they do sometimes with goats, I can rain it in pretty well. I like my kids can help me with them. All of the kids help me with milking, which is really nice. But I would say goats are probably the top of my list aside from, you know, my pets." Yeah, I've definitely undergone a goat conversion, I feel like in the last six, seven months yellow. I think goats are about the perfect homestead animal though because with any farm animals, I think that we should treat them as a hobby as well as a source of sustenance because they may be, you know, more pricey than just going and buying the food. We're able to get really great quality food, and we're able to interact with animals, which I think is really good for us. And goats for me, I mean they they browse, they eat great on less quality land. You don't have to have super great pastures for goats. They do wonderful just being moved through woods and stuff like that. Provide them with some hay and some good grain during the milking, and they'll give you milk and lots of laughs in return. This summer, I'm going to be doing a lot of experiments with my goats around seeing how well I can get them to browse and seeing how well like they can do kind of keeping like the edges of my pasture clear and like complimenting the cattle. So yeah, it's going to be interesting to see. Bingo here was just eating the tripod, and it's adorable. It is pretty cool her turnaround going from being dang near lifeless to now obviously being very full of life. So Jess, if folks want to find you, where would they find you? "Roots and Refuge Farm on all platforms and the Farmer's Table also on YouTube for cooking and soon we'll be making some things with goats milk because we're about to have a copious amount of that again." Want to go in the world? All right, we'll let you out in the world. Get some sunshine. We're going to take a nap in those sun rays.