This week on the Compound

First a little background: We call where we live "The Compound."  The Compound consists of 12 acres owned by the Wheatley family.  They live in a large house on the back half of the property, we live in a smaller house on the front end, and the Fillerups just moved into the detached garage converted to small house next to our house--our doors are about 20 feet apart.  We are all members of the Church and Greg has known the Wheatley's since they moved here nearly 20 years ago and even babysat for them a few times.  We're a close-knit group.

With that bit of background, we had an exciting week.

It all started last Sunday.  Greg and Henry stayed home from church due to Henry having a fever.  As I pulled in after church I noticed a large, but beautiful husky with a chicken in its mouth (the Wheatley's have 6 free-range chickens).  Greg had also noticed and was on the front porch looking at the dog.  By the time I parked and got inside, Greg was long gone.  A few minutes later I look out the back door to see Greg running toward the house with one near-machete-size knife in one hand, another slung on his back, and his 0.22 rifle in the other hand.  Greg was going to save those chickens dang it.  He did manage to get another chicken out of the dog's mouth before the dog had a chance to kill it (it later died).  When the kids saw Greg, they decided to help.  Rex grabbed a baseball bat and Alice got a stick and the three of them went back out to chase the dog away.  Greg didn't want to actually harm the dog as it obviously was someone's pet; he just wanted to scare it away so fired a few shots near it.  About 45 minutes later, they came back having convinced the dog to cross the highway on which we live.  I asked if the dog had a collar; Greg said yes, I asked if Greg had looked at the collar for the owner's information, to which Greg responded, "Oh, well, that would've been easier.  I should have just caught the dog."  Just then the dog reappeared in the backyard with another chicken in its mouth.  This time Greg left the gun and knives inside and just called the dog to him.  Just then the owner showed up looking for his dog.  He did not offer to replace the 3 chickens his dog had killed.  Luckily for him, the chickens have significantly decreased their egg-laying so no one was too upset.  And the kids got to chase a dog around with sticks for a hour.  We'll call it even.  Minus we're down 3 chickens and have feathers all over our yard.

Friday afternoon, Rex and Alice were outside playing with the neighbors when I got a text from Becky saying one of the goats was having a baby.  They got 2 female goats for Christmas and about 2 weeks ago acquired a male goat.  I assumed she meant that one of the goats was pregnant after spending a few weeks with the male goat.  She responded, "There's a hoof coming out of her."  Meaning the goat was pregnant when they bought her, after being assured that she was too young.  I ran right over.  Becky, Annie (the new member of the compound), and I looked at the goat for a while and then decided that we should let nature do its thing, so we all left.  I worked on some projects for another hour or so, then decided that I should go check on my kids and take a quick picture of the new baby with #wheatleycompound for Instagram.  When I got to the goat enclosure, Becky and Annie were already there.  Nothing had happened.  Still only one hoof had emerged.  Goat labors aren't supposed to last more than an hour.  Becky called the woman who sold them the goat.  Annie called her husband whose father is a large animal vet in Wyoming.  I googled "stalled goat labor."  We all came to the same conclusion: someone was going to have to pull the baby out.  After my reading, I decided we needed some lubricant.  Just as I decided this Parker Wheatley, age 17, showed up with Caleb Wheatley, age 14, and their cousin Alton, age 13.  I ran to get some lubricant, which grossed Parker out...well Parker, things are about to get a lot more real, besides how do you think I got this way?  I get the lubricant and Becky puts some gloves on then rubs the lubricant all over her hands to make it more comfortable for the goat.  Parker held the goat, and Becky pulled.  Then she pushed.  Then she put her hand into the birth canal looking for the head.  She managed to get a second hoof to emerge.  But couldn't find the head.

Then Greg came.  And Greg is a man of action.  He jumped right over the fence and was determined to get the baby out, which was obviously dead.  We decided we just needed to get the baby out to save the mom.  Annie's husband called back and gave us some ideas of how to get the baby out--one was to create a type of lasso to insert into the birth canal and use to pull the head out, but it had to be done by someone with small hands.  And guess who that landed on?  Me.  But when Greg is in get things done mode, you do what he says.  So I hobbled around to the gate, put some gloves on and stuck my hand into the goat's birth canal.  But she was too small and I couldn't get past her hips.  Using all my knowledge of natural birth in humans, I suggested we reposition the goat.  So Parker moved around a bit and we tried again.  I got my hand up a little further but still could not feel the head.

By now the goat was getting a bit more distressed and Greg decided this baby just needed to come out so Parker held the goat; I held its horns to prevent it from killing Parker; Becky held the perineum (the skin around the birth canal) and Greg pulled as hard as he could.  It got a little gruesome.  I won't go into details.  We switched positions a few times; Greg had Caleb help pull.  Still nothing.  Keefe Fillerup, who helped his dad deliver farm animals growing up, ditched work and came home.  Annie looked up vets. Becky called her husband.  After a few more pulls with little progress and still no head, we called a vet, hoping to be able to save the mom.

We had been in the goat pen for about an hour and a half by this point.  Henry had woken up from his nap and the other kids were getting antsy, so we dispersed as we waited for the vet and let mama goat rest for a bit.  About 15 minutes later, the vet called and said he wasn't coming.  Eric came home.  I got in the shower and started making dinner.  Greg went back to the goat pen.  I stayed home to keep the kids in the house.  Besides it was getting late--about 6:30 by this point.  They did not need to see what was going to happen next.  Keefe's dad finally called back and said the only option was to dissect the baby to get it out of the mom and save mom's life.  Again, being the get-things-done guy, this feel to Greg.  I guess it doesn't help that he also has a small arsenal of very sharp knives.  Now Caleb held the goat while Greg performed the surgery.  After extracting all four legs and the body, there was still no head, which had been severed during the pulling earlier in the day.  And it became readily apparent the damage we had caused with all our pulling.  We had pulled a little more than baby goat legs out of mama.   Greg came back into the house and left with a gun.  They took mama goat to the woods and put her out of her misery.

Greg couldn't eat or sleep that night.

I questioned all that I believed in.  Well, not everything.  But everything I believe about birth and nature.  That goat needed a C-section, and I don't believe in C-sections.  She also needed a good vet.  She did not just deliver a baby in a field without a problem like I thought all animals did.  She needed a good vet and a C-section.  Grant it, she was probably 1 month old when she gotten pregnant, which is too young, and she was probably just too small to have a baby fit through her hips (another things I usually poo-poo when people say about humans).  But that's not how birth is supposed to go.  I am still delivering at a birth center because I can obviously deliver a baby without interventions, but I am also grateful that the new birth center is very close to a hospital and that the midwives there have many, many years of experience.

I also just feel bad.  The chickens getting caught by a dog--get the feathers out of my yard.  But we killed that goat.  We tortured her.  We had no business doing what we were doing.  We weren't trying to be horrible; we were trying to follow the instructions of the vet's son, the internet and the breeder, but we failed and the goat suffered.  A lot.  And, unfortunately, the other female is quite possibly pregnant now.  We have six months until due date and we get to do this all over again.  But we've also decided that next time, we're just going to call a vet first thing, because we have no idea what we're doing and as great as Google is, it can't deliver a baby goat.