It's A Boy!

[sheepdog 10]

Well, kidding season is off! First kid, a single buck was born yesterday. So we hurried up and moved the herd back to the house where I can keep a closer watch on them. The place next door is too rough and brushy to ever hope to find newborn kids, there are just way too many places for them to hide. This morning early I was presented with a pair of twin doe kids. The mom has been hanging with them all day, so hopefully they will be ok. The 2 of them seemed so small after seeing the big single buck kid. I?ve really been trying to get my hosting credits run up as I am just not going to have much time to mess around online this next month. I tried to submit a tutorial in hopes of getting a little ahead, but it was never approved, so I guess it wasn't the proper subject matter for this forum (it wasn't about computers, lol) The goats will keep me busy enough, but I still have dogs to shear, my flower bed and garden to plant, quite a few more fruit trees to put out and I still don?t even have my taxes figured out yet! Then there is keeping up with the house and the laundry. One thing you will never see on a television commercial for any of those so called stain removers and laundry detergents is one that will claim to get out birth fluids from delivering baby goats. Oh sure, they get out blood and grass stains, maybe even chocolate and wine, but I can assure you, baby goat juice is a forever stain. So I?m afraid I won?t be in here much for awhile. Maybe I can squeeze in a few minutes late at night, if I can keep my eyes open. One good thing about goats and their kidding habits is they never have kids in the middle of the night, unlike dogs who usually do have their pups after dark While goats may kid at the very first crack of dawn, if you can make it till about an hour before sunset, you can probably call it a day.

[sheepdog 10]

I am now 8 days into kidding season. They sure are dragging this out. Only one more kidding since the first 2 on April 2nd and 3rd. This time I got a single doe kid. That brings the count to one buck and 3 does. I am surprised that they are dragging this out. Last fall I borrowed a "fresh" buck, he was not running with any other does, just another buck goat, so he wasn't all used up, and I really thought I would get a mass of kids all at once since he was so well rested and ready to go to work. I normally just buy a buck at the sale barn, and you expect them to be well used and half wore out when you get them in the fall. We did have a couple cold nasty days in this past week, and I swear I saw a few of the goats crossing their legs and trying to hold kids in till better weather, but it's been pretty now for the past few days and still no new kids. Otherwise, things are going pretty well. Did finally get my income taxes done, so that project is complete. Hubby almost has the tiller fixed and working properly, and if we can get a few more days without rain, he will get my flower bed tilled up for me. I'll post a picture of the twin girls and their mom.

[Mich 0]

You are kidding!!!!!! The young'ns are soooo cute. And look at the green grass. Wish we had some here in Michigan. Our daffodils are just peeking through. We had one extra warm system come through that bumped into a cold front and waalaa, we had tornado weather. Lots of wind damage. Now we are back with the cold weather and predicted snow. When will have green grass like yours?

[sheepdog 10]

Well, it's nearly over now. Been a long month. I still have one more hold out to go, but she is an older, more experienced doe and should be ok. At least I'm not having to run the pastures out every 2-3 hours like I was. I can believe I made it threw the entire season and didn't have to pull a single kid! That's pretty unusual, nearly every year I get at least one set that I have to help with. A kid will have a head cocked up and over the pubic bone inside, or one leg pulled back, or even worse, 2 kids will try to come at the same time, that one can get really hairy when you are trying to sort out which leg belongs to which kid so you can pull the right one first. This year nearly all the momma's kept up with their kids. I only had to jug up 2 sets of kids. I have a small pen in part of the lean to in the barn where the goats are, I just keep a low panel in front of the gate into it, so the adult does can jump over it to get into their kids, but the kids are too little to jump out. Usually, by the time they are big enough to jump over it, they are big enough to keep up with their moms. Works out pretty good that way. Saves me a lot of time and worry about keeping up with all the little ones. I also take my camara out with me when there are newborns so I can get pictures of the kids with their mom, so I know later on which one's belong to which doe. Makes it a little easier to keep track if anyone comes up missing. I have ended up with a really nice looking bunch of kids this year. They are good sized, and everybody is growing really well. I used a purebred Boer buck, I have some purebred boer does, but the majority are 50 percent boer and 50 percent Alpine Dairy goat. I have just a few purebred dairy does left now, after several years of crossing back boer. I really think the 50% kids do the best. When you cross the Boer with the dairy, the resulting kids get the good big boned and meaty body, and they have dairy goat mothers that give lots of milk and they grow out by far better than even the purebred boers who's moms know milk nearly as well as the dairy goats. Anyway, kidding is just about over, so hopefully I can get back to posting, at least a little more than I have been this past month. Still have lots of landscaping to do, my flower bed to plant, if the ground ever drys out enough that we can till it. I did manage to get the vast majority of the dogs groomed, but still have some of them to do, but I'm gaining.