Chloe delivered an adorable set of triplets (two doelings and a buckling) around 2:00 in the afternoon on March 8th. The kids all got daddy’s color, Chamiose, but they are all look very different. It took several tries to get good photos of these little cuties, but I think it was worth the wait…
These lucky siblings all get to stay together when they move to their new home. They have a bright future with a young 4H family interested in producing their own milk.
Hurricane kidded early in the morning, luckily before anyone had left for work or school because her little boy was chilled through and had to spend his first several hours in the house getting warmed up and bottle fed to make sure he survived. (Many thanks to an understanding boss and the ability to work from home while tending a baby goat.) He had a bit of a rough start, but it has made him quite the affectionate little snuggle bunny. He will pester and paw until you pick him up and then he’s content just to lie in your arms for however long you’re willing to hold him.
While he’s a full week younger and smaller than Dolly’s boys, he keeps up with their shenanigans whether he’s outside playing in the snow, or chasing around in the barn. He’s gotten the nickname “Mouse” because he seems so small compared to the older, bigger boys.
Not to be outdone by Dolly, Stormstruck also kidded exactly on her due date. Because the (human) kids had an early school release day, Kati was able to attend the 1:30 birth of her goat’s doelings. Everything went well and the kids were up and nursing quickly. Stormstruck gave us a pretty light buckskin with white and a sweet dark chocolate with a bit of white as well.
For the second year in a row, Dolly delivered right on her due date. I wish they all did that! Dolly was also very cooperative in that she delivered at 2:30 in the afternoon instead of the dreaded 2:30 a.m. delivery. Both Kati and Clayton were home from school just in time to oversee getting the kids cleaned up and make sure they were nursing well.
Dolly gave us all bucklings this year and I think we might be saving a couple as buck prospects.
Buckling #1 is a flashy buckskin with white overlay. We’ve nicknamed him “Ovaltine” because he has a perfect oval on his side and he is the color of chocolate milk. 
Buckling #2 is an equally flashy black and white boy with moon spots. He’s discovered the joy of jumping and is almost impossible to get a photo of because he’s always launching himself into the air as soon as you try to take a photo.
Buckling #3 is a very dairy buckskin with moon spots. His color is more subdued than his brothers but he makes up for it with his sweet personality and his refined dairy character.
Here’s a few bonus photos just because they are so darned cute…
I have been looking forward to Black Friday for weeks this year. I made all the usual preparations to get ready for the big day…made a list, planned my route, stopped by the bank for cash. I even set my alarm clock for an early wake up…but I wasn’t headed to a big box store for electronics. I was off on a half day road trip to pick up our newest buck, Dynamo Falcon Ziggzag, who scored an Ex 90 on his Linear Appraisal as a two year old.
Ziggzag made the trip all the way from Julie Shere’s farm in Embarrass, MN and traveled like a pro. After stepping out of the kennel and calmly surveying is new territory, he waited politely for a lift down from the truck bed. Then it was off for the “new arrival” routine where he was weighed, dewormed, given probiotics and settled into a nice clean quarantine stall with fresh hay and a heated water bucket. Ziggzag took it all in stride.
It’s hard to see under all that winter hair, but Ziggzag is a very correct boy with great dairy character. He has a lot of milk in his background and I’m excited to see his kids which should be arriving next May if all goes well.
We normally milk twice a day through the summer and then drop down to once a day when school starts to allow time for a little more sleep in the mornings. But this year we have a Linear Appraisal scheduled for October so in order to keep the girls’ udders in top shape, we want to keep up twice a day milking until after our appraisal date.
When faced with the requirement to get an entire herd of goats fed, watered and milked and the milking equipment cleaned before 6:30 a.m., we started looking for opportunities to increase our efficiency. Our solution was to upgrade from our two single milk stands to a gang stanchion which is a milk stand for multiple goats. This would allow us to go from milking two goats at a time to milking six at a time.
Clayton has become the primary farm carpenter this year so he was assigned as the project lead. Luckily he’s been making and selling single milk stands for a while now so he had some experience under his belt. But it was still a bit daunting to draft plans for a stand that combined six working head gates into one functional piece that would fit in our little milk room.
After several days of planning on paper, we kicked off construction over the Labor Day weekend and spent three days cutting, gluing and screwing our new masterpiece. We finished just in time to install it in time for the Monday evening milking.
I was worried about how the girls might react to the new stand and the accompanying change in routine but with a little reassurance they figured it out and adjusted surprisingly quickly. 
I’m happy to report that the new stand is indeed a huge time saver for us, reducing our milking time by almost 30 minutes. Although I’m still planning to cut back to once a day milking and sleep a little longer in October!
We started off the show season with a bang this year as our newest doeling, Carl B’s OH Sweet Champagne, took home Grand Champion Nigerian Dwarf Junior Doe at the Little Falls, MN Spring Show. This was a very large three ring show with more than 300 does in attendance and we are very proud of both Champagne and Clayton, whose outstanding showmanship secured his first ADGA grand champion win under judge Ellen Considine.
Nigerian Dwarfs were well represented with 33 Junior does in attendance and about the same for Senior does, but I forgot to write down that number. 🙂
We showed the goats fuzzy (not clipped) because the weather had been so cold and I was very thankful for that decision on show day when it was only 53 degrees with a cold wind. Brrr! Almost everyone wore a coat over their dairy whites and it made for some pretty funny fashions in the show rings.
We are thrilled that Nibbles’ girls, Caramel and Taffy earned 1st and 2nd place in the Jr. Doeling class of six. Taffy has been retained so she will continue her show career with us. Caramel is going to a new home where she will hopefully continue winning for her new owner, Jennifer.
Ribbons are nice, but we all know it’s really all about the milk! We brought a couple of the milking girls with us which means bringing along the milking stand and milking at the show. Clayton got to try out his new milking stand which is his own design and much lighter and easier to take to shows than the one we used to use. Clayton will be making more over the summer to sell so let us know if you need one!
Champagne ended up being the star for the day with two first place wins in her Sr. Doeling class of nine as well as her Grand Champion win but we are proud of all the girls and are quite happy with Glory and Dolly each placing 3rd in their classes. There was very strong competition in the milking classes and they did well hidden under all their winter fuzziness!
Sr. Doeling
Sweet Champagne, 1x GCH, 2x 1st, 1x 3rd
Jr. Doeling
Caramel, 1x 1st, 1x 2nd
Taffy, 1x 2nd
2 Year Old Milker
Morning Glory, 1x 3rd
3 Year Old Milker
Dolly (Annabelle), 1x 3rd
Glory delivered two very nice moon spotted bucklings this afternoon. (Hmmm…I wonder if the excitement of yesterday’s ultrasound adventure helped things along?) One bucking is a very unique and lovely smoke gray color. And yes, we’ve nicknamed him “Smoke”. Maybe his brother will get tagged “Coal”?
These guys are so sweet and already loving people. They’ll snuggle up to us just as quickly as they snuggle up to their mom. They’ve even developed a fondness for being scratched at only six hours old. (Please pardon Glory’s rather scruffy look in the photo below. She’s still shedding her cashmere and we didn’t take the time to brush her off before taking photos of the kids.)
We always provide the girls with a bucket of warm molasses water after they give birth. It’s great for restoring energy and the girls always seem grateful for the offering.
This is the last kidding of the year for us. While I’m rejoicing at being able to sleep 
though the night again, (no more 1 a.m. goat checks!) it’s sad to know it will be almost a year before we have more sweet, soft, snuggly kids to dote upon. In a few short weeks we’ll be sending most of this year’s babies off to their new homes-another bittersweet time. If only we could keep a few more each year, … but we’d soon run out room so we must say goodbye to more than we’d like. It makes it just a bit easier knowing that they will be going to new homes where they will surely bring joy to others.
The preferred method of breeding goats is to provide two romantically inclined goats with a suitable location for a lovely date, chaperone the encounter, diligently record the event on the calendar and anticipate the new arrivals 150 days later. But then there’s reality…
Since there is no guarantee of pregnancy after the first date, it’s necessary to watch to see if the doe comes into heat approximately 3 weeks later so she can go on another date if needed. And because it’s possible to miss signs of heat when you’re not spending as much time with your goats as you’d like (long hours at work and sub zero temperatures are contributing factors!) it’s a good insurance policy to put the doe and buck together on an extended date of several weeks “just in case.” And while this increases the chances you’ll end up with cuddly kids, it also increases the chances of an unknown due date.
Luckily, most of the girls got pregnant as planned this year but as they say “there’s one in every crowd” and this year it’s Glory. Since she missed her original due date, we’ve been watching her closely. Several times this week she showed signs of being in early labor only to change her mind and remain stubbornly pregnant. (Yes, goats can have false labor, also know as Braxton Hicks Contractions.)
So today we loaded Glory in the front seat of the truck and drove her to the vet clinic for an ultrasound to find out what’s going on in there. I’m happy to report that Glory is indeed pregnant with at least one kid who is very near full term. Dr. Joel found a healthy fetal heartbeat and the consensus is mom and kid are healthy.
Glory wasn’t too sure about the ultrasound machine itself, but she seemed to enjoy the outing and the change of routine it provided along with all the attention from the clinic staff. (So sorry about piddling on the floor!) Now if only she’ll deliver so I can change my routine of 1:30 a.m. goat checks!
Kidding season means excitement, anticipation, joy, anxiety and interrupted sleep. As the does near their kidding dates, we try to check on them about every 4 hours around the clock so we can be there for the kidding. There are usually signs that a doe is getting close to kidding but not always. When I checked Nibbles last night, she didn’t show any signs of labor and her ligaments were not loose enough to signal an immanent birth so I felt like it would be safe to sleep through the night.
This morning we woke up to find she had delivered triplets during the night. Two adorable doelings and, unfortunately, a buckling that didn’t make it. We’ll never know if being there would have made a difference for him or not. While I love raising livestock, losses are inevitable and always a cause for sadness.
But there isn’t time to linger on what ifs and should haves because there are umbilical cords to dip in iodine, kids to weigh, does to milk, and records to be written. It’s better to pause for a moment of reflection then keep moving forward while giving thanks for the precious, healthy kids snuggled in the hay.
