It's a Girl...Twice!!

Last night Matthew was taking Brittany to the barn for the evening (In her advanced age, she can't get through the night without a mess waiting for us in the morning. It's much easier to clean up the barn from such an incident!) He heard a strange cry as he opened the door to the barn, turned on the light, and was met by this... Pumpkin had delivered two beautiful little doe kids. Matt came to tell me and we went back to the barn to see them. Pumpkin was taking care of them, but she wouldn't let them nurse. I hesitated to intercede, but I didn't want to wait too long before attending to the cold, wet, and increasingly weak baby. Matt was a huge help by climbing into the stall and doing what he could to encourage Pumpkin to let them nurse. When that didn't work, we did what we could to save the little ones. With a dose of colostrum in each and drying them off with towels, we decided to get them in near the heat of the woodstove.

Matt woke Marc up to milk Pumpkin and we readied the bottles. They perked up and after a bit stopped shivering. Matthew and Marc helped keep the babies warm and dry. About 3 hours after the discovery we put them in their new beds and tried to get some sleep before the next feeding time was due.

'Mavis' is the elder, and larger of the two. She was full of energy and wanted to keep investigating her new surroundings. 'Jessie' was the 2nd born and the one we didn't think would make it. She's doing much better today, though still weaker than her big sister. She doesn't stand or walk around as much...yet! Pumpkin is letting Marc milk her and then we bottle feed the babies their mama's milk. I think with a bit more tlc, both will be fine and we'll have kids running and jumping all over the barn.