My little not-quite yearling doe (the subject of the Preggo or Ragu thread) went into labor today. She was not able to get the baby out with the whole family trying to help...
We took her in for a C-section...vet says baby is probably not going to make it but her chances are pretty good. Thank God it happened while the vet clinic was open and they are only a 10 min drive
If you are the praying type she and the baby could use some thoughts their way. We usually call her "Ita"
Thanks
Juliana
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The only thing I can think of is that one of these goats has a standard in their immediate heritage that popped up some big genes on this breeding? Because neither Truffle or Miyagi is papered. And the breeder does have at least one or two standard goats on her farm. Though I have no idea if they were wethers or does (since they were in with the general population)
Or maybbe Truffle just got too much alfalfa during her pregnancy?
As for Truffle's discomfort, yes she is improving. The first day she was walking really funny, now she is walking basically normal. But she still will not climb up on the milk stand, I pick her up. she won't jump down either. When it is time ot get off I will put the steppy stool there for her to use and ask her if she wants to do it but she won't budge. Then I go to put my arms around her and she sort of pushes off into my arms for an airlift down to the floor. I don't think me lifting her is painful for her because she is very cooperative about it, even kind of jumping into my arms like I said. Seems like she would protest if it were hurting her, right? I tried to milk her on the floor but I just could not do it without practically lying down by her lol.
She also will not eat branches that are at the top of her feeder that require her to stand up against the wall to eat (they'll put front feet up on the wall to reach the top branches). So I just keep everything low for her.
Her incision still looks good, though that we are on day 4 now so that is really promising. Vet said the first couple of days would be a big deal. Thank god my fly traps started working and the barn flies are much better than they were last week.
This sort of scares me. I want to breed Summer but she is so much smaller than her mom that I wonder if I should wait until she is two years old. The three of them lined up are like stairsteps, percentage-wise Ginger is the same to Summer as Summer is to Capri with Ginger only 10 weeks old. So I wonder if Summer is small or Ginger is going to be big. (She was 22.8 lbs. at the vet's yesterday.)
Summer was born when Capri was 16 months old; Summer is now 17 months old so older than her mom when she gave birth. I was wanting to breed Summer to Ginger's dad but Ginger was a 4-lb baby though Capri had triplets her first litter last year. That Summer might not grow any more and have a 4-lb baby seems a scary possibility even though she would be at least 23 months old at birth. Does anyone have any idea how much the father has to do with the size of the babies? Or is it more the size of the mom?
I am so glad Truffle is doing well. Does she seem to be getting over the discomfort of the surgery? It always seems so bad for animals since they have no idea what it's all about - and her hormones must be going nuts for a baby to take care of.
Hmm . . . Miyagi doesn't sound that huge for a yearling ND, and Truffle is a decent size for 10 months, but probably not big enough to give birth to a 6-pound kid! My biggest doe had a tough time pushing out a 5+ pound kid, so a 42-pound doe was probably just too small to give birth to such a big kid. I wish we could figure out why it was so big! Singles are typically bigger, but like 3.5 pounds, maybe even 4 pounds, instead of 2.5 or 3 pounds -- not 6 pounds!
Oh, I am so glad she is doing good and milking also. I don't know that much about all the other but my guess is that the sizes for Miyagi and all the weights and all are probably not bad. About the only thing that really seems far off to me is that the poor little Truffle got caught so young and that it didn't turn out well. I can't be sure what Deborah will say, but I HOPE and my guess is that it will be that after she has an appropriate amount of time to heal and grow that she stands a good chance of being able to kid normally. That is my prayer for the both of you anyway. I think you both deserve nice healthy kids. She has been through so much and should get to have her some kiddies later. Only time will tell. HUGS to you both!
I just read this old thread about weight:
http://nigeriandwarfgoats.ning.com/forum/topics/weight-range-for-ni...
And I am thinking both Penny and Annie are quite small for NDs? Now I'm gonna have to redo Penny on the bathroom scale just to see...I know they are very short. I shudder to think what Annie must have weighed when I brought her home because she has gained a lot already but still only is 45. Plus I can still see every one of her ribs.
Okay here are their stats:
Truffle weighs 42 lbs according to my holding her while standing on the bathroom scale. She turns one year on July 27th.
Annie, the skinny one, still only weighs 45! (I weighed her so I can tell when she is gaining weight since she needs to) I think I recall Penny weighing 50 when I took her to the vet last year- I did not try to pick her up for the scale.
I used the horse height tape on Miyagi and he is approx 51cm which according to yahoo is 20 inches. He is now just over a year. I am sure this is not as accurate of a height as a stick, but it was the best I could do. Is that very large for a yearling buck?
Also, you are supposed to wait until they are 40# to breed, right? Truffle was bred at 5 months and delivered (not) at ten. She probably weight thirty or less when she got pregnant.
So how do these stats bode for her ever being able to be bred again? She is still recovering well, by the way, and giving me two cups of milk a day, bless her little heart.
I did not weigh Penny's kids. When she had them, they didn't impress me as being big or small, and she did not seem to have the least amount of trouble delivering them (and of course they are my first and only newborn kids I've ever seen so what would I know--I just know they came out with no trouble) I don't have a measuring stick but I do have a horse measuring tape, wonder if I could do anything with that or just a regular measuring tape.
By the way Truffle is 5 mos pregnant in that photo on the website. She has shrunk significantly! She looked positively deflated when I picked her up this morning.
Let me think now, I honestly don't recall exactly how old Miyagi is. We brought them home June 1st of last year, and he was approximately weaning age, 2 months, at that time. Maybe a hair older. So that would make him a year and two months now, and that photo was taken of him maybe a month ago now so that would make him like 13 months in that photo. I will measure him. I think weighing him is not possible, I don't think i could pick him up lol. He is a fiesty boy and even if I am strong enough I don't think he'd let me. If I ever had a free afternoon (LOL) I could drive him down to the vet and throw him on the dog scale.
Did you weigh Penny's kids? I'm just thinking that twins would be smaller than a single kid, and if Penny is older and has kidded before, she might not have had trouble with kids that were on the large side -- like my two does that gave birth to 5+ pounds kids. Any chance you have a goat measuring stick or know someone with one? It would be interesting to see how tall Miyagi is. Or maybe you could weigh him? There isn't much to compare in the photo, but I looked at it first and then was surprised when you said his age because he doesn't look like he's under a year in that photo. He looks pretty big. Truffle is a very pretty and dairy doe.
Well I can't get the picture to load, but you can see him here:
http://bluestarfarmftmyers.weebly.com/goat-profiles.html
No, Deborah, the buck who did it was my boy Miyagi, who was about 6 months old at the time. The only thing is, he is not papered. Breeder said he was about 99% ND, and he looks it (I'll post a pic). But maybe he has some heritage I don't know about?
No other bucks had access to her, period. It was Miyagi during the accidental fence-tangling incident when hubby let him loose for a moment. Same buck bred Penny for healthy and normal sized twins that she kidded with no trouble in Jan.
As for the hay, I feed very little. They are on nice pasture 12 hours a day. I try to cut branches for them to munch overnight but when I don't have time to do that I give them an orchard/alfalfa mix and it is frequently from different locations- not the same source because decent hay is hard to come by in these parts. More often than not it was STandlee hay company hay because their alfalfa is not gmo so I buy that whenever I can find it.
I wonder if the crazy protein content of hay is due to the GMO? Alfalfa has just gone GMO.
At any rate she would go for weeks at a time with no hay at all, just some branches overnight and pasture during the day. When they get hay it isn't much, of those tiny compressed bales I would give them 1 little flake between the three of them and that's it in a 24 hr period.
I did not feed her any grain at all during the entire pregnancy (didn't even know she was pregnant for most of it). In the last week I had started to give her one handful once a day to start acclimating her to it like you said. I feed a 16% sweet feed but I cut it 50/50 with plain oats to cut prices because I special order organic from Timbucktu and it costs a fortune so I mix in oats to make it last longer. All does are in excellent condition and producing super for me.
So that's the grain I gave her a total of like 5 handfuls of in her entire pregnancy.
I am not worried what she produces this time around...anything she gives me will just be gravy because I didn't plan this kidding...and so grateful that she is even alive...
Now I'm a little afraid to breed my buck again and I just love him, he is a really special boy. But maybe he needs to go breed standard does lol. For that matter Truffle is not papered either, could she possibly have big goat genetics in there somewhere that pop up randomly? I have no idea how that works, really.
Oh and I just remembered that in the beginning of Truffle's pregnancy, before I knew she was pregnant, I thought she was fat. I was seperating her and feeding her straight timothy at night because I thought she was getting fat on the alfalfa mix the other girls got. She never got straight alfalfa and the mixes around here generally don't have much in there but it is the only thing my milkers will eat, snobs!
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