There seems to be a massive weight range - is this true?
The consensus seems to be to wait until 40 lbs at least to breed (to allow proper growth for the mother). This is where I get confused because...haha..my goat books say the goats weigh 30-50, then I come online and they the goats weigh 50 and 80. In anycase should I be asking the breeder what the mother weighed as a comparison figure?
I'd like to be a good 'goat mom' and breed at the right time. But would it be at 40 lbs or 60 lbs? That's a huge difference that's really confusing me why there'd be such a difference in the literature and online.
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Here is a post that has a link to a PDF with explanation of body condition:
http://nigeriandwarfgoats.ning.com/forum/topics/body-condition
It's normal for you to feel backbone, but the best way to get a good feel for whether your goats are at a good weight and condition is to look at the underside of their tails. If you can see each bone and there is a lack of padding there, (like a rat's tail) that is an underweight/poorly conditioned goat. If their tail is full, and you can't see individual bones, but you can see the outer shape of the tail bones, that is a goat with good condition. If their tail is fat, with the look of a plump sausage, and no visible bone at ALL, then you have an overweight goat.
Thank you, I suspect you have it with the "anyone who has ever owned" phrase. It is a product of the internet, I suppose..good information..and bad. It makes me curious as to why someone would intentionally breed smaller than the standard, but apparently they do. "Cute" isn't productive if you can't show or milk your dairy goats (or safely breed them).
I can't imagine that anyone who has ever owned NDs would say the average is 30-50 pounds. No way! Yes, a lot of them will be 30 pounds by 6 months. A fact commonly tossed around by breeders is that NDs don't reach their full size until 3 years of age, so every now and then people argue that a permanent championship should be contingent on a goat being measured within the height limit at age 3, but that's not going to happen. I haven't seen any intermediary numbers, but I don't think most goats gain more than 1-3 inches in height after a year of age. They mostly fill out and get wider and deeper in their body capacity, which means they're gaining weight.
Deborah, thank you for that. I've also read several places that the "average" was 30-50 lbs. I think my first kids were that by 5-6 months, and worried they'd be oversized. Speaking of which, on average, are ND about fully grown at what age? I know for my horses, they say that 80% of the height is at a certain age. I'm just wondering, as my yearling doe is 20 inches (and probably 50 lbs.), is she about done growing her height? I still expect her to fill out, her mother is in the 65-70 lb. range, I'd guess. She feels like more sometimes. :)
You didn't say what books you've been reading, but "Raising Goats for Dummies" says NDs average 75 pounds, which is what I'd say. Author Cheryl Smith has been raising NDs for more than a decade, so I think she has a pretty good idea of what they weigh.
It is incredibly sad that there is a book out there that says NDs are 30-50 pounds. That is just plain wrong. As an author myself, I'm sorry to say that just because something is in a book, that does not make it true. There is a goat book out there that I reviewed a year ago, and it has so much misinformation in it, I was pretty much screaming the whole time I read it. The author owned ONE goat -- an Oberhasli wether -- and said that Oberhasli were primarily raised for meat while also listing them in the dairy goat section. There was at least one factual mistake on every page. I don't remember what she said NDs were supposed to weigh, but she did say they were supposed to be 17-19 inches tall, which is completely wrong, regardless of which registry you look at.
If you ask the breeder how much the parents weigh, be sure to ask if she has actually weighed them. They don't look like they weigh that much, but they are very solid little animals. I do happen to own a doe that weighs under 50 pounds and is 17 inches at age 3, and I would never breed her, and I won't sell her because I'm worried that people who want teeny tiny goats might breed her, and she is just too small. She looks like a six month old but a lot stockier. I never bred her because she just basically never grew up. She was born a runt. At a year she was only 25 pounds. At 18 months, she was still the same size as the six month old does. She just gained a bit of body capacity as she got older, but anyone who ever saw her -- even people new to goats -- would refer her to as "that little goat."
I did once have a ND doe that weighed 80 pounds, and she was as long as a freight train! Bucks weighing 80 pounds is not that uncommon. There are a lot of things that go into weight for an ND besides height. Depth, width, and length of body play a much bigger role than height. Almost all of my does fall into the 20-22 inch height, but their weights vary by 20 pounds. My favorite does are in the 65-70 weight range.
I feel like I'm rambling, but I guess I'm not completely sure I understand your question. Are you assuming that a goat has to be at its full mature weight before you can breed it? If so, that is not the case because NDs grow until they're three years old. So, if mature weight is average of 75, most does are going to be 35 at least by a year, probably more. If not, don't breed. And if they don't weigh that much, then you need to look at management, including feed and parasites. There is nothing wrong with waiting until they're 18 months to breed them, even if they are on the bigger side.