Goat Adventures....The saga continues....

Two weekends ago, we decided to do a little maintenance where the goats are concerned.  Oh yeah...the trouble started there.  The two older females had *really* been needing a hoof trim.....I mean, really.  Soooo, after we were thinking after hoof trimming, we'd do some disbudding.  Have you ever hot ironed a baby goat's head?!?!?!  It is not pretty.  And not fun.  And not pleasing at all to the nasal orifices.  "We" have only done it once before.  Actually, my husband held the hot iron and his brother-in-law held the baby goat....all I did was turn my back and hold the stopwatch and pray the seconds would fly swiftly by so I could yell, "STOP!!"  At any rate, since it had been a year, I went inside to google disbudding and refresh myself on all the details.  While inside, Darren did the hoof trimming.
After perusing much information on disbudding, I returned outside....I was very much not looking forward to being an active participant, but knew we had to get it done.  Usually disbudding is performed inside a week of birth...our babies were 3 1/2 weeks old.  I had read tho, that even if they were showing spikes, it could still be done...it's just there's no guarantee there won't be scurs (any growth that doesn't come off) and/or future horn growth.  And just so you know, disbudding isn't a bad thing.  A goat with horns can injure a fellow goat while playing or it can get stuck in a fence.  Plus, I really don't like horned goats around kids.
So, we went to the pen, and got the little buck.  I had decided to be the one to hold the hot iron as opposed to the goat.  I was terrified that I wouldn't hold it tightly enough and something unfortunate would happen with the hot iron.  It was horrible.  Have you ever counted the seconds that you were making something else endure pain???  It seems to last forever.  He has hair on his head, so of course it was smoking...he was yelling....I think I stopped breathing during the entire episode.  Finally, it was over and I breathed....  we took him back to the pen...he ran to his momma...they "nuzzled" and talked and he was fine.  Time for the little doe.  For some reason, I had a hard time holding the iron to her head...I think she had more hair so it was smoking more.  I was just glad for it to be over with ....and ever so glad it only has to be done when we have new goats.  So, not very often and not many at a time.... 

Little "spikes" showing...  which will turn into horns later...and potentially be very harmful to herself or others

The evil hot iron...  shiver.....

Holding her head....