How To Handle Planning a Bottle Baby??

Patty Meyer March 14, 2015 at 3:16pm

Great! That was my goal. :)

Deborah Niemann-Boehle said:

I think it sounds firm and kind.

Deborah Niemann-Boehle March 14, 2015 at 3:14pm

I think it sounds firm and kind.

Patty Meyer March 14, 2015 at 3:13pm

Thanks for checking it out, Rachel. :)

Rachel Whetzel at MigMog Acres March 14, 2015 at 2:57pm

The letter looks good. :)

Patty Meyer March 14, 2015 at 12:52pm

Would you ladies mind reading this email I'm going to send to the gal who wants a baby from me? I'd appreciate your thoughts. Is it firm/kind enough?

Sandra,

I've been thinking about your situation, and mine. I wanted to encourage you to look around for a farm that already raises all their kids on the bottle, because I think it would be more fun for you to pick out a baby you like, instead of just getting what you get. I just want to say I don't mind if you end up getting another baby before mine are born.

One reason is that I really don't want to have my doe go through birthing and not have a baby. That means that if she has only one, I won't take it away. In fact, I'd rather only pull one if she has three.

However, I'll gladly stick to our arrangement if you want as long as she has at least two. I hadn't even thought of the possibility of her having only one baby. I don't expect that she will, in fact I expect her to have at least two. However, it could happen.

Also, if it were me, I would think about how the single baby will feel all alone, with only two older does who will push her around and dominate her. She would probably do much better with a fellow kid to grow up with. Last time you had the bottle babies, it sounds like you had two. I'm sure that made it much easier when it came time to put them outside in a pen and shelter. This baby is unlikely to take to it as well as two babies together did.

It's hard to communicate in only words, but please know this is in no way a criticism of your plan or ideas. Just some things to think about.

Please let me know how you feel about this. If you want me to, I'll hold on to your deposit and honor it as the first one I've gotten on a future Ginger kid, with a doeling being your first choice. If you find another, better choice before then, I'll happily return your deposit.

With best wishes,

Patty

Patty Meyer March 14, 2015 at 12:31pm

Thanks, Rachel. That's true. I'm going to encourage her to look around her area for a farm that already bottle raises.

Rachel Whetzel at MigMog Acres March 14, 2015 at 11:08am

It's not too late to return her deposit if you need to.

Patty Meyer March 13, 2015 at 11:02pm

Thanks very much, Deborah. I'll take into account all you've said. Unfortunately, I hadn't thought this all through before I said she could send me a deposit. :( I hope one day I learn to think first and act after...Not sure exactly how to go about this now. Many thanks for all your good advice!

Deborah Niemann-Boehle March 13, 2015 at 10:07pm

It's hard to say with complete certainty that her supply will be more if she's nursing two rather than one IF you are milking her twice a day when she's nursing one. However, my does with more kids tend to make more milk. I am not saying that they always have enough milk for the number of kids that they have, because unfortunately I have one that throws five and doesn't have enough milk to properly feed more than three. When a doe is only nursing one, however, you have to be absolutely faithful about milking her twice a day or separating the kid overnight and milking her every morning.

Cicada is a perfect example:

http://nigeriandwarfdairygoats.com/does/cicada.html

She had triplets as a first freshener, and although I wound up bottlefeeding one when the kids were a couple of weeks old because she wasn't making enough for three, you can see that she actually made a lot more milk per day as a first freshener than she did as a second freshener. The second time she kidded, she only had a single, and we were not very good about milking her regularly. Lesson learned! I almost sold her after her second freshening, but I knew that her low supply was partly our fault, so I figured I'd give her another chance. And I'm glad I did! She is my second best milker! (I just realized I need to put her 2013 and 2014 milk records up there. I didn't know I was that far behind!)

It's impossible for me to put myself in your situation, but personally, I'd suggest that she get two kids. Even though she has other goats, there is no way that it would be safe to put a newborn with two strange adults, and keeping him inside will just create a sad situation down the road when he did have to eventually go outside.

My youngest used to have a kid in her bedroom every single year. And whenever she'd finally evict them to the barn, they would be SO unhappy because they truly did not understand that they were a goat. They'd scream themselves hoarse. That's why I don't like to have a single bottle kid now and why I brought two of Agnes's quints inside -- because I didn't know that I'd have another set of quints the very next day and that one of Agnes's kids would have had company. (Agnes certainly has enough milk for four.)

The idea of her documenting this process has me shaking my head. There are already so many YouTube videos out there filled with bad information, created by people who don't know what they're doing, but they have a video camera, so they can spread their misinformation far and wide. I really would try to gently educate her about this so that she doesn't just go buy a single goat from someone else. I don't know if you want to share this with her or just read it yourself for ideas on things to say, but this is a post I wrote about people who want "a pet goat" -- http://www.homegrownandhandmadethebook.com/2014/06/debunking-9-ill-...

Patty Meyer March 13, 2015 at 9:16pm

Yes, Deborah, that's helpful. Thanks. :)

The gal who wants this baby particularly wants a new baby, to raise herself as a bottle baby. She's got two does that she raised as bottle babies when she was a teen, and now she's a young adult and wants to do it again and have this one as a pet as well, with the two she has. Hers are disbudded pygmies. She said she wants to make a documentary of the process of raising a bottle baby as she's raising it for a pet.

I'm for sure going to tell the gal that if the doe has a single kid I won't take it away. I don't expect her to have a single, but it could happen. If I start milking her right away, and keep at it, will her milk supply for sure be affected if she only has one kid nursing?

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How To Handle Planning a Bottle Baby??

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