Oh Rocky!

Meet Rocky, our new buck! 

   Rocky is a tall, dark, and handsome Nubian boy that we got about a month ago in order to breed our three full sized girls, Josie, Thea, and Gertie. We decided on a Nubian because they are supposed to produce very high fat milk. We are hoping that he and Thea, our Saanen, will produce a doeling or two that will eventually produce large amounts of higher fat milk that will be great for cheese making!  

 We picked up Rocky from a nearby farm and transported him in the back of my Honda Element. We were a little nervous about moving a large and potentially stinky buck in the car, but we were pleasantly surprised when we picked him up that Rocky really didn't smell at all, and he was very polite and easy to handle. 

 The boy is all legs and for the first week he was here, the girls all beat him up. He would actually run and hide behind us if a girl came too close. We were sure he would never man up and get the job done. I even took to calling him a big old sissy baby to his face to try and shame him into being a big tougher. We started joking that he was named Rocky not for Rocky Balboa, but Rocky as in Rocky Horror Picture Show. Oh Rocky!

 I think Big Onion was just happy to have another man around the farm. 

 Then one day Josie started flirting with him. After a couple days of flirting with no real action, I locked him and the three girls in the goat yard with strict orders that no one was getting let out until I saw some funny business!

  Well, I got my wish and then some! Josie and Rocky sniffed and nuzzled each other. She wagged her tail at him, and he stuck his tongue out at her (this is actually a compliment in goat-talk apparently). There was a lot of finagling and shifting around and pawing and then they both just stopped. Rocky looked up at me like, "Really, you want me to do this in front of everyone?!" 

  So I quickly shooed the other two girl out of the yard and stood there waiting for the fireworks. Rocky leaned over Josie's back and all but called me a perv for standing there and watching so I retreated into the poultry house and peeked through a screen and sure enough, I was barely out of sight when the boy got straight down to business. 

  After that Josie and Rocky were inseparable. They napped together and grazed together all the time. Rocky got over his shyness and was prone to mount Josie at the most awkward times. Some things you just can't un-see. 

  After a while, we decided to separate the love birds so Rocky could turn his now expert attentions to the other two. We saw him cover Thea, but not Gertie so far. In about a month, we'll be sending pregnancy tests off for all the girls so we know for sure and can probably send Rocky off to a new home. 

  

  Although he's been a really nice buck, sweet with the girls, not smelly at all, and not aggressive at all with us so far, it has been a bit of a logistical nightmare making sure he gets to spend time with the three big girls and keeping him away from Gwen and Eve who are both too young and too small to be bred. 

  Not to mention the fact that Rocky does not like to be locked up alone. At all. The noises he makes are kind of hilarious. You can hear him in the background of the video below. I love how all the goat girls are standing around with expressions like, 'Really? Really?! You want us to mate with THAT?!"

I might also point out that my little Gwen is totally glowing in the video. It's obviously because she is soooo angelic. Yeah.