Nite Lite's Ordeal

Nite Lite is Abby's showmanship goat that she purchased last fall. Abby had been placed down the line in showmanship at a few competitions with her goat, Billa. The judges always remarked that their reason involved the fact that Billa had a scur. A scur is a small horn that can grow if the goat is improperly disbudded as a kid. Genetics can also play a role as some bloodlines just seem more prone to developing them no matter how well the animal is disbudded.

So Abby bought Nite Lite, a full grown goat with no scurs, to replace Billa. Abby used her own fair earnings to buy Nite Lite and was anxious to show her this coming fair season. Nite Lite was bred in October and scheduled to kid on, or about, March 25th.

March 25th came and went and Nite Lite was huge. We figured she was either having two very large kids or triplets. We started to give her calcium supplements to support her as we waited for her to freshen. By April 1st, when she had not kidded we started to get concerned. She was having a hard time walking and didn't like to be hassled with.

My friend Cara came out to check Nite Lite for me and determined that her cervix was not even a little bit dilated. We decided to induce her to get things moving and relieve Nite Lite of the strain of what we now truly believed was triplets. We induced her Thursday morning with little success.

By Friday morning it was apparent we were going nowhere and getting there quickly. Around mid morning we observed what was the beginnings of a vaginal prolapse and a call was made to the vet. The earliest she could be here was around mid afternoon, according to the secretary. And so we waited.

Around 3PM, I called the vet office to get an ETA on Dr. Ennis. She was finishing up on the current call and would be heading in our direction within the hour. At 4:15 the vet phoned to say she was stuck in traffic and didn't know how long it would be. We feared she was stuck on the highway in the middle of an oil tanker rollover that had shut down 395 in both directions. At 6:30PM Dr. Ennis called to say she was finally clear of the highway and would arrive in 20 minutes!

When she finally arrived we helped to gather up all that would be necessary to do an emergency c-section. We maneuvered poor Nite Lite, who was ever so reluctant to move, onto a stanchion so the vet could get a real good look at her. She announced that we wouldn't need to do a section! She rearranged a few baby goat body parts and pulled out a seven pound doeling!

While Abby was drying off the baby, the vet and I switched from surgical mode to delivery mode. Some more rearranging inside of Nite Lite and another doeling, weighing 6.5 pounds, was born. The last kid was rather contorted and it took a few minutes to bring the head around and into position. But the last kid was a ten pound buckling!

All are healthy and Nite Lite is looking immeasurably happier!