I have a general milking question here: our doe had two kids back on March 30. We allow the kids full access to mama for a couple of months before we begin separating the kids and mom at night, and milking her in the morning. We are planning on selling the boy and keeping the girl here pretty soon. My question: what should I expect when there is only one kid nursing on mama throughout the day instead of two? Should I expect less milk production? What about her udder with only one kid nursing? Any advice and/or tips would be great! Thanks!!
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If you get more out of one side than the other, it's probably because the kids are favoring one side. That usually is not a problem with twins, but it can happen. It's a good idea to milk out both sides completely.
Sometimes you will discover that each twin has a side that they always nurse on, so when one twin is sold, the other side just fills up completely. So we always put a doe on the milk stand twice a day for the first couple of days after we sell a kid, and milk out both sides completely so that we get an idea of how the remaining kid is nursing.
Every few years we also have a situation where the remaining kid never nurses again after the sibling is sold. Sometimes it's the doe that doesn't let the kid nurse again, but one time we never saw the doeling even try to nurse again after we took away her brother.
Like Bev, we learned the hard way that a single can favor a side, and the other side can dry up completely in less than a week! Now when we have singles, we completely milk out a doe twice a day. I say that I'm the twin that wasn't born. If you don't milk out a doe that has a single, you'll wind up with a very fat kid and a low producing mama. Even if you milk her out twice a day, you'll usually wind up with a very fat kid, but at least you'll have better production in the mama.
Thanks for the rely Bev. Another question: I seem to get more milk out of one udder than the other with our doe. Is there a way to try and even out both sides of the udder, or is that just the way some mamas are? Currently, she still has two kids on her during the day.
Be careful. I have had a doe with one kid nursing and they use both sides and everything fine. But got tricked this year - My one girl had a single birth, I noticed after the first week that one side was a little bigger than the other so milked the bigger side thinking he was nursing more on the other side. Tricked me - she was drying up on the small side and I was milking the side he used. Took me a few days to realize what was going on. I am milking on both sides now and getting very little but bringing back some supply in the side that was drying up.
I will be locking him up in the next day or so and will see what happens to her udder. Hopefully I can get it looking good, especially with Linear appraisal coming up in July.
I will milk a little out of any doe with a single birth from now on, probably twice a day. To keep the production up also.