Cooter

I have put it off because it was too hard to talk about. A week has now passed and my feelings aren't quite so raw. I first noticed that Cooter was acting a little off on Monday of last week. I couldn't put my finger on it but I knew something was wrong. By Tuesday he was obviously in trouble.

He kept standing in the hot sun panting. I finally had to stake him out in the shade, so that he couldn't get to a sunny area. Then I noticed that when I went out to check on him that his right hind foot was always wrapped up in the rope. This just wasn't like him.

The second time I went to untangle his foot, I was bent over and starting to pick it up when someone hit me hard on the top of the head with a baseball bat. I studied the pretty stars in the darkness of my brain for just a moment, then picked myself up off of the ground.

I was shocked that Cooter would just butt me like that but after we observed him for awhile later we realized that he didn't butt me at all. He was spinning violently to the right at times and that was the reason that the rope kept wrapping around that right hind foot.

Since I wasn't sure what I was dealing with, I started pumping different things into him; Electrolytes, B-Complex, lots of Thiamine and Antibiotics. Then later; Probiotics, Vegetable Oil, Baking Soda, Nutri-Drench and finally two Enemas.

I stayed up with him that night until around 2:00. On Wednesday morning he was still in misery, so I made the decision to put him down. I was not going to put him through another hot day. At this point, I was certain, after talking to several goat people that he had a twisted gut. Something else had started the problem but after his falling and flopping around several times, the result was that he had twisted something.

He drank water all day and was urinating well but his bowels had stopped working. Even with the oil and enemas, he never even passed the enema water that I put into him.

Angel stayed by his side throughout the day and all night. She followed us as we took him to his final resting place and after the grave was covered, she sniffed the dirt and laid down beside it. As we were leaving I was afraid that she might stay there but after we arrived back at the house, I looked back and seen her come up over the hill.

I miss him. Even though I had made up my mind to sell him, it is still hard for me to deal with. I miss the way he cocked his head when he looked at you and the way he always had to rub on me. I even miss the way he smelled. I can still get a whiff of him from time to time when I am close to his favorite places.