I promised to share my experiences with my first kidding, so I decided to start a mini-blog beginning with the first signs of labor.
Trauma, aka Queenie, is due anywhere from September 4th to the 13th since the previous owner “pen bred” her. This will be her third freshening, so she is more experienced than I am!
This morning Queenie was more vocal than usual. She has a very raspy call, so it is easy to detect her from among the other three Nigerian Dwarfs. She didn’t want to eat and kept walking from the barn to the attached run. I went out again with my coffee and sat in the barn with her. She doesn’t
appear to be in active labor, does not appear to have dropped, her bag is still pretty small, and her rear area looks “normal”. She was standing in the corner of the barn facing out. When I came in I sat on the straw and after a little while she came over to me and tried to eat my hair. She then waddled out to the run and I went back into the house. The run can be seen from our patio door and I plan to spend extra time just hanging out in the barn today. I have clean rags, iodine, ky jelly and surgical gloves ready in case I need them.
I am going into so much detail about this experience so that it might help someone else in the future AND so that if anyone has any suggestions they hopefully will ad them!
To be continued…………
Replies
Deborah Niemann-Boehle said:
Danielle Besley said:
Unless you want to bottle-feed all of your kids, which some people do, you should start selecting based on personality. I've found it's highly genetic, and since then I stay away from buying goats from herds that bottle-feed, because you can't really tell what the natural personality is. Since I prefer to dam raise my kids, I want goats with naturally friendly personalities. If you bottle-feed kids from an unfriendly dam, they'll be friendly, but if their kids are dam-raised, there is a good chance that they'll have grandma's personality. Of course, the amount of attention you give them as kids (from the day they're born) will also make a difference. People who are just breeding their goats to make money (don't milk, don't play with the kids, etc) will have unfriendly goats that give dam-raised goats a bad name. So, it's a balance between environment and genetics.
Who knows what your current milker would be like if she'd had better milking experiences, and your doeling could be okay on the milk stand. She's one I'd definitely put on the milk stand for the last couple weeks of pregnancy, so she knows that's where the grain is. And then continue to give her grain on the milk stand even if you're not milking her.
Of the first three goats I bought, I sold two of them, because they were not good milk goats. They had bad attitudes and bad teats. I bought all three from a herd that did not milk, which is why I always tell people that if you want to milk, buy from a herd that milks. Every goat I bought after that came from a herd that milks.
Good luck! You're learning a lot!
Danielle Besley said:
So, I think the doe does not LIKE to be milked and is smart enough to remember that the last time this happened the people eventually gave up - I told her that wasn't going to happen with me - and I guess she finally believes it, but I do not believe I will be keeping this lady - life is too short! The doeling; I will see how the first kidding goes. I have read about FF settling down after they kid. I plan to bottle feed her kid(s) so they are as friendly as possible. The baby buckling, I was afraid to keep him with his mom based on the fear of him breeding her. Is this fear unfounded?
Thank you so much for the help. I am not too happy with my first goat purchase - they were all bought together - but I have sure learned at lot.............
When you said his mom was giving you trouble on the milk stand, I thought he must be nursing, because most does are fine on the milk stand if they don't have kids on them. So, there's surprise #2! If she doesn't calm down, then she just may not have the personality to be a milk goat. And if your other doe won't let you touch her, you should start working on her ASAP with treats and such, if you want to milk her. When I got my first goats, I had a couple like that, and they are no longer here. I realized that they had wild daughters also, and it wasn't worth the frustration when there are goats who fight to get into the milking parlor first, happily jump on the milk stand and WANT to be milked.
Danielle Besley said:
We only have five goats and the only other doe is not friendly AT ALL so I couldn't compare tail ligaments.
If you have other does, you can check their tail ligaments and use that as a reference for the doe that is due to kid. We used to do that all the time the first few years.
Deborah
I had been checking on her all day, but didn’t have any luck checking the tail ligiments, since I didn’t have a point of reference. At 2:20 pm she went into active labor. She was panting and licking her lips and calling out. She passed some mucus and then started yelling and pushing. I guess her water then broke and I could see two feet. The kid looked very big. She was pushing for a while and the kid kept slipping back inside of her. I started to get nervous so the next time she pushed the feet out I grabbed hold of them and held them. When she pushed again she was able to push him all of the way out. I took a clean rag and wiped his nose and mouth off while moving him to her belly. She immediately started cleaning him off . I didn’t move him away from her at all but I also helped to dry him off with rags. I didn’t use the iodine I had purchased since she kept licking every inch of him. As soon as he was standing I tried to get him to nurse. She was great, but he refused. I tried everything I could think of, or had read about but it was no use! I didn’t know such a brand new creature could be so opinionated. I was also wondering if she was going to have any more babies? I went inside the house to look up colostrum timing & additional kids. When I came out – with a baby bottle – she had passed the afterbirth and was eating it – ok.
I tried to get him to drink again and then took warm water and a rag, washed her udder, and started milking. What small teats! She was very good though. She kept trying to clean me too so I think she bonded with me. I got the baby to drink a tiny bit of colostrum. I stayed out with them for quite a while, giving him a break and then feeding him again.
It took me so long to write this update because she has been throwing a HUGE fit each time I milk her. She was very accepting of the process for the first three days and then the Fit Throwing began. She kidded on 9/3/10 at 2:30 pm and yesterday was the first time (after my initial, temporary success) I was able to milk her without receiving multiple bruises. Ugh, but that’s another story!
Deborah Niemann-Boehle said:
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