My Ginger (two years old this past March) is not showing any signs of labor rather than the babies "relocating" a few days ago. I asked her yesterday if she is even pregnant! Her weight is about the same as it has been for the past year, maybe a big bigger, but it is redistributed. She has bagged up but no changes in the last few days. I am starting to be concerned simply because of the length of time, mostly because of the nightmare from last year with her mom who went a few days past Day 145. This year, my junior doe kidded on Day 140 and Capri kidded on Day 146. Capri and Ginger were bred to the same buck if that matters for length of gestation. So far, I'm not getting that gut-wrenching "bad feeling" I had last year during Capri's last week or so, but think she really should be ready. For two or three days now, everyone else has been sniffing her behind like they know something is up. The other does have been challenging her often the last few days. She has alternated between going off by herself a bit and being with everyone else.
Honestly, I have considered taking her to the vet to verify she is pregnant but wonder what I would do if she went into labor on the way. Delivery in a dog crate would not exactly be ideal.
Is she pregnant, or as last year, "well-loved" as Deborah so kindly put it? She did not come back into heat after I took her for breeding but she was the last one bred so no one else coming in would have prompted her to start hollering, too.
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I would not say that just because a doe comes into heat, she should be bred. I don't breed my does or ewes after they are 10 years old. My daughter once bought two 11-year-old does without my knowledge. One either wasn't really pregnant or miscarried, and the other died when her kids were a few months old. She just never recovered from kidding. I also had a 10-year-old ewe get pregnant because a ram busted through a wall to get to her when she was in heat, and she died when her lambs were a month old. I've noticed that after about age 8 or 9, does take longer and longer to regain their pre-pregnant condition after kidding, and by age 10, it takes many months, which is why I just don't breed after that. In the case of my does that have quintuplets, I will be retiring them even earlier, as multiples increase the risk of uterine rupture, and age increases the risk of uterine rupture, and since I had a 9-year-old die from a uterine rupture when she gave birth to her second set of quints, it's pretty real for me.
Michael Garwood said:
Glenna,
I don't know what Deborah and others will say about her getting pregnant at 4 to 5 years old, especially for the first time, but I can pass on the story from a friend who is a breeder in Texas. She said she asked her vet about breeding a senior doe. The doe was 12 or 13 years old and had come into season, and the vet said that if she is standing for the buck, her body is saying it is OK. The doe was bred and went on to have one healthy kid. The doe was not able to breed after that season; finally her body had retired. I am not sure how this pertains to Ginger, but I thought I would relay it, in case it is relevant. Compared to that 12 year old doe, Ginger is a "spring chicken", but I certainly don't want to advocate for something about which I am clearly ignorant. (We are hopeful that finally our doe Chloe is pregnant; we have "zero" experience!) What I can say is that Chloe has a similar problem to Ginger in that she knows how to eat (and eat, and eat, and will get bigger, seemingly on air). A dairy goat friend here says that if Chloe ever gets pregnant, the indications are that she could be a good milker, because if a doe can't put the food in, she can't put the milk out. Hopefully it is the same with Ginger.
Michael
Thank you Michael. She is four now which means if I bred her this year, she would be five when she kids. She is my first born here - I know that you, especially, understand that - and she was to become my herd queen and to live out her life here. Of course that plan included her having lots of kids to carry on for her even if I could only keep one or two (limited by city code). I'm not sure, at this time, if I will breed her again. I have to do some research into the cervix issue as well as the undeveloped fetuses. Of course I have months before any decision need to be made.
Today I discovered a cut on her left teat when I was milking her; I've posted here separately about this. I have no idea how she could have gotten cut; the only thing is that it might have been a blackberry thorn from branches on the ground in their pen. It's definitely a cut versus damage from milking (I am hand milking anyway). Now I am in a catch-22; she must be milked to keep her from getting mastitis but milking will undoubtedly delay/prolong healing. She is producing a quart a day, milking twice a day, which means there is at least a cup in her udder at any time. I milked out two ounces to relieve the pressure and am now waiting an answer as to what to do. This is further complicated by her smaller (though not tiny) teats. Do I milk her as dry as I can twice a day or a little bit many times a day . . . poor Ginger.
Regarding her weight, I think it will stay more in the normal range now with her milking since she was at 75 when I weighed her. She certainly looks slimmer than she ever has before; and her collar is much looser as well.
Oh Glenna! I am so, so sorry for you and for Ginger. I know how long you have been waiting for her to kid (first to get pregnant and then to carry).
Not much of a consolation, but at least you know that she can get pregnant and carry to term, and furthermore, that she is likely to have multiple kids next time and to be prepared for that.
Will you now milk her through - for the milk, and..., to keep her weight off?
We will watch to see what that goat does and when she is bred again. Please keep us posted and again, out sympathies go to you both.
Michael
Thank you for asking, Michael. She did get pregnant the fall of 2104 but lost the baby(ies) March 17, 2015. She delivered, for certain, a 2-oz mummified baby; it is possible she may have had one(s) previously before she went into the barn, no way of knowing. A few days later, I miked her udder dry to avoid problems and no more after that.
She was bred again in October of 2105 - I just posted the tragic results of that.
Her non-pregnant weight varies a few pounds between 70-80. A few days before she delivered last week, she was 98.2 lbs. and two days after delivery, after milking a quart, she weighed 78.2 lbs. and was 75 lbs. two days ago. She has lost weight, other than babies, detectable because her collar is much looser.
Michael Garwood said:
Glenna,
I forget if you reported it....
Did Ginger ever get pregnant?
What was her weight the last time she was weighed?
Thanks,
Michael
Glenna Rose said:
They have grass hay and alfalfa pellets. The juniors are still getting a cup of pellets morning and night as I did not want to withdraw them completely but ease them off of them. They don't like that but they are eating more hay and, of course, no grain. They all do get more exercise that you might imagine as they go running back and forth a lot and especially so when the firetrucks (sirens!) and motorcycles go by. If they are on that side of the yard, it's a mad dash for them to get to the barn. Also, often when I see them on the south side, I will call them over for a treat so they do that extra running. Most evenings, they are very active. My yard is 100 feet wide and I have two pens on either side of it with a runway in the middle connecting the two. Each of the pens are about 75 feet long. They have access to all of it most of the time though occasionally I limit where they are if I am working there and want to leave the gate to the main yard open. They do a lot of climbing as well, more than one might expect. I have PVC barrels (formerly used to hold vinegar) and two with one cut at 1/3 are perfect for climbing "stairsteps" and, of course, bales of straw in addition to their pallet stacks. Neither Capri nor Summer have gotten heavy; in fact, I've always worried about Summer as she seems skinny to me but everyone says she is just fine. I am wondering if Ginger being a single and having all of mom's rich milk to herself has set a "life style" of overweight; I left her with mom all the time so she had all she wanted for as long as she wanted it.
The little stinker looks wide. . .and round! Her mom is wide but only the lower belly and is thin across the top but not Ginger, she is a roly poly goat (as in the song "daddy's little fatty" from the 1940s). I know I need to give it time, at least a couple of months, but it would be so nice to wave a magic wand.
Do you have access to plain grass hay rather than alfalfa? Or maybe grass hay pellets? It doesn't seem like goats get that much exercise in a pasture, but this is one problem I'm starting to see with urban goats. I guess all that walking around in the pasture does more for them than you would think. That's one reason factory hog farms keep the hogs in such a small space. The less they move around, the more weight they gain.
As for figuring out if she's losing weight, just keep checking her body condition. You should start to feel less meat (fat) on her bones as she trims down a bit, and she should be less wide.
I'm sorry, folks, I did not follow up. I guess I keep hoping babies will magically appear. Ginger was apparently never pregnant, undoubtedly due to her being overweight. I really wanted her to kid in the fall but that ship has sailed. In the meantime, I am attempting to limit her extra food intake to get her slimmed down a little - not an easy task. A goat-owning friend looked at her and said that both she and Dancer (my yearling from Ginger's half sister) need to be limited. Since her buck will be daddy, she has an interest in these girls settling.
With no scales available (she doesn't stand well on two legs for the bathroom scale<g>), I'm not sure how to determine if she is losing any weight at all. Perhaps measuring her at the widest point around her belly? If I cannot seem to be making any headway with her weight, I may ask my friend to board her for me.
My consolation for this has been that with no kidding, there were no kidding issues. Since she was heavier than the her mom and half-sister, it was very much on my mind. Also, there is not the sadness of sending babies away though I have been extremely lucky to find great homes for my babies so far. The new owners of Summer's triplets send me photos and videos of them. With two people to love them to bits versus sharing one person with seven other goats (ten altogether), they have to be in goat heaven. And they have acres of pasture at their wishes. The older triplets were tattooed earlier this week so will soon be going up for sale though I am keeping Tiny Baby (now named Flurry) who was 1 lb. 10.5 ozs. at birth. (Summer's babies' buyers wanted her but I just cannot let her go though it might mean selling her mom.)
Any word?
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