Sassy, our little girl with the cleft palate (left), is now over four months old. She is learning to cope with her disability, which prevents her from eating as much as the other goats– even when we give her private snack time. We give her nutritional supplements, too, but she just isn’t growing very fast.
I spoke again with Dr. Panter at the USDA a couple of weeks ago. He said that Sassy having survived four months is a good sign. If she makes it to six, she will most likely learn to adjust and will be reasonably healthy after that, although she will always be at higher risk for pneumonia.
As a point of reference, the goat on the right is Willow, born June 2. She’s only 6 weeks old, and is already bigger than Sassy!
