When I first laid eyes on Chloe it was instant love. She was perhaps the prettiest goat I had ever seen with some of the best confirmation, which made my decision to pick her very easy. I contacted Caprigem and Bit of Whimsy several months ago looking for kids when we decided Ivy needed a companion. Finally, kidding season was upon us and my husband and I made the trip to their farm to see the doe kids they had for sale. After spending what seemed like hours looking at the kids I had not picked one that seemed "right". In the conversation that ensued we discussed what our plans with our goats were and I mentioned the several shows I had already signed Ivy up for. This was our ticket to meeting Chloe! Jodi & Amber the owners of the farm had one doe in the basement that they were reserving for a show home. As soon as they brought Chloe up and set her down, she was remarkable. The longest most slender neck on a nigerian kid that I had ever seen and tremendous levelness over her top line, not to mention she was tri-colored buckskin, white and gray with moonspots! She was the unicorn goat I had been dreaming of for years. Hastily, I agreed to take her when she was a eight weeks old. Chloe is even featured in a viral video filmed in Jodi & Amber's house. Watch it here: https://www.facebook.com/ThosePetsPage/videos/1644484878933460/
Those six weeks drug on forever, and finally the day came to bring her home. We brought a cage to put her in the back of our SUV, but she sat on my lap wrapped in a towel the entire drive home. This is when I learned that Chloe was not only beautiful on the outside but the kindness, most loving goat I had ever met in my entire life. When we brought her home she met Ivy and they were instant friends! They spent their days hanging out in the barn until about three weeks into her life at our farm. Suddenly, Chloe disappeared into thin air.
We searched everywhere for her, in the barn, fields and woods surrounding the property. I posted fliers and sent notifications to anyone that would listen that we were missing Chloe. After 72 hours of constant search I was sitting in the barn crying and cuddling Ivy asking her if she knew what happened to Chloe when I heard a tiny bahh. I instantly flew into action, ripping my entire hay pile (250+) bales down in just a few minutes. Miraculously, Chloe was found at the bottom of the pile, wedged between hay and the wall completely unharmed. I have no idea what made her cry when she did, because I had been in the barn 10+ times calling for her since she disappeared. But, I was so relieved she did cry! We fed her a bottle of milk and one of electrolytes and she was bouncing around like nothing had ever happened. From that day forward we kept in her in a cage in the barn to prevent her from getting lost again.
In preparation for our upcoming show I scheduled a health check for Ivy and Chloe. During this routine appointment the vet listened to Chloe's heart for an extended period of time, and asked for a second vet to come in and listen. We were then given the devastating news that Chloe had a very severe heart murmur. Naturally, we had questions. Could this be treated? How would this impact her heart? What did this mean? What caused it? None of which could be answered without further investigation which our local vet could not assist with. We were referred to OSU where we took Chloe a few weeks later for her first EKG. Many assumed Chloe had a ventral, septal defect, where there is a hole in the wall that separates the chambers of the heart, but as it turns out she did not have this relatively common heart defect. She was diagnosed with the first ever enlarged aorta discovered in a goat. Unfortunately, since there were no other cases to compare hers to we had more questions than answers.
Have you ever had a goat that touched your heart so deeply?
To be continued in next weeks blog.
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