Pregnant or Fat?

We had the joy of hosting a buck in our barn for a month over the holidays in hopes of getting at least one of our does pregnant. If you don't know anything about goat bucks, well, they're stinky. Really stinky. They fragrance themselves with their own urine in order to appeal to the ladies. Their fragrance permeates the barn and travels on the wind so that you can smell it while walking in the woods on a breezy day. If you brush against the buck (or a doe who has been friendly with the buck) while you are bringing them hot water on a bitter cold winter night, then your coat will smell like buck for days, as will your mudroom, and also your car, especially if you forget to switch out of your “barn coat” during the morning rush to feed the goats before you drive the carpool.

If you get used to the smell after a while (as women are more likely to do than men), then your children will remind you regularly that you do indeed still smell like buck. You will start to feel self-conscious at your kid's basketball games because, although you are used to the smell, you get whiffs of it coming off your boots and realize everyone else who is not used to it can probably smell it too. You worry about the carpool kids being so disgusted by the smelly minivan that you'll lose your wonderful carpool arrangement until the smell fades away. You start to threaten your children with timeouts in the barn when they misbehave (and then have a few weeks of very good behavior).

But you really want goat kids and the one-day effort at the neighbor’s farm last year didn’t work. Having a buck in your barn is supposed to help bring the does into heat. Having the buck for a month helps ensure he will be there when the does go into heat.

So, this fine fellow, Romeo Santos, took up residence on our little farm. I kind of wish the smell could travel over the internet so you could experience it just for a minute. 

Mabeline took to him right away, which wasn’t a surprise to any of us. She has a bit of a reputation that way. Don’t they make a cute couple?

I know Romeo Santos enjoyed his time with Clementine as well, although she was never enamored with him the way Mabeline was. We didn’t see any “connection” between Romeo Santos and Temperance, which also wasn’t a surprise. Although Temperance is the most affectionate of the three, she seems rather indifferent to the reproductive process. But who knows? Maybe they snuck in a moment when no one was looking.

It’s been about three months now, so we have our wonderful vet coming this week to do an ultrasound. She’ll tell us if any are pregnant, and with how many kids. If we have several kids on the way, we want to be prepared. But while we wait for her visit, we can speculate: Pregnant? Or winter weight?

Anyone want to place bets?

Mabeline

Clementine

Temperance