First rough kidding experience.

This was only my second kidding ever and boy was it an experience. I have a doe who is half Pygmy, half Nigerian who is very small. I never intended to breed her because of her size, but my husband accidentally left a gate open and she got in an area adjacent to the buck pen and was bred through the cattle panel fence. I didn't want to terminate the pregnancy if there was any way she would have a healthy pregnancy and birth so I let her carry to term. She weighed about 38 pounds at the time of breeding and was 16 months old. Well she went into labor at 11am yesterday (day 145 on the dot). She wasn't pushing until about 2pm and was progressing slowly so I let her keep laboring. several bubbles came out but no kids so at 3:30 I decided to "go in" to make sure the kid wasn't presenting wrong. It's knees were in the birth canal but it's feet were pointing backwards and it's head was bent backwards! I was able to hook the legs and bring them forward and get the head pulled forward into the right position but the hooves were HUGE. 
We tried to let her push for a few more minutes but I could tell she wasn't making any progress so I tried to gently pull it with the contractions. No luck. We ended up loading her up and heading to the vet at 4:30 where the vet tried for another 30 minutes to pull the kid. Still no luck. She ended up getting a c-section and having a 5 pound 2 ounce single buck kid. Amazingly, the kid was still alive after being stuck, with a broken bag for so long. Luckily his cord never broke which is why I think he lived. 

The vet did an amazing job (he actually let me watch!) and she and baby are residing in my laundry room for a few days to bond and recuperate. Thankfully after a little prodding she has accepted her baby and both are doing great. I had the vet go ahead and spay her during the operation to prevent this from happening again because I firmly believe she is just too small. I weighed her today after kidding and she weighed 41 pounds.

I'm praying that the next two kiddings I have will be far less eventful as they were planned breedings and both does are much larger.  

Here is Firefly and her baby boy this morning. I paid more for this stinky, unregistered little buckling than I did my registered does! What can you do though? It was definitely a learning experience and if any accidents ever happen again I think I will terminate the pregnancies because this was way too scary. 

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  • You are all so brave. I am looking forward with both excitement and trepidation to my first kidding mid-March and hope I don't have to deal with a difficult birth right off the bat and if I do, I hope I keep my wits about me. What an experience. I am glad mom and baby are doing well.

  • Wow! That is quite an experience. Single kids can be big, which is why "one" is actually my least favorite number of kids. I'm glad you had her sterilized so she can't kid again. I have one that size, and I never sold her because I realized she was never going to grow up, and I was afraid she'd wind up with someone who thought they could create teacup goats. Her mother was actually at the max height, so she very well could have had some huge kids if she had ever been bred because the genetics were there. Your doe might have also had some genes that didn't entirely match her size.

  • What a huge baby! Thank you for sharing your experience.

  • I didn't give her any grain until the last 2 weeks and then it was only 1/4 cup twice a day. She shared 2 flakes of peanut hay every morning with my 4 other goats and had free-choice coastal all day. My buck is only about 65 pounds and nearly 2 years old so I'm at a loss as to why the kid was so large.

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