And not even on goats. Work has been pretty much insane as of late, and while I certainly need the work, it has dominated every part of our lives. I am taking a moment today to play a bit of catch up, although I am sure I won't get very far.
We had been waiting on one last yea
rling doe to kid out to complete May (which ran into June kidding in the top field. After seeing what a great job all these young does did with their kids, I would probably have been safe to have bred them to kid out in potentially freezing weather, but I wasn't sure, and only hindsight is 20/20. We had some new goat friends visit to look at our goats and see more about the Kiko breed, and Aggie had been walking around "hollering" all morning, so we were expecting her to start labor relatively soon. Chuck took the visitors down over the hill to see some of the older does and some of the unbred yearlings that we had deemed not quite big enough to breed for this kidding. Not long after, Aggie's water broke and she began her labor in earnest. I texted Chuck so he would know she was beginning to kid. Aggie was one of the bottle babies we have bought, and we didn't know if this would make a difference in her maternal instincts or not. She and her sisters did get a few weeks with their mother b
efore she died, though, and that seems to have been long enough. PJ had already kidded out and was taking good care of her twins. Not to be outdone by her sister, Aggie was cleaning the first kid before the second was even out. The first kid was a flashy little thing, looking a lot like granddaddy Iron Horse. There was a delicacy around the muzzle, though, that made us hopeful that maybe we had our second doe kid of the group. Chuck didn't want to be too intrusive, but tried to look and see, and Aggie was totally unbothered by his presence. As of matter of fact, she wasn't the least bit worried about any of us. She accepted visitors watching the event without the bat of an eye, and she really rose to the occassion. She showed them a textbook Kiko kidding. She got the kids out, cleaned, and the first
was up trying to shakily butt her udder for that first important drink of colostrum in less than ten minutes. When she had the second kid, brown like she is, we again were thinking that this kid really looked feminine. After Aggie and her kids had some time together and everyone had been up to nurse, Chuck investigated more closely and confirmed we had two new doelings. Finally. So out of the ten kids born to six does, we had seven bucks and three doelings.
rling doe to kid out to complete May (which ran into June kidding in the top field. After seeing what a great job all these young does did with their kids, I would probably have been safe to have bred them to kid out in potentially freezing weather, but I wasn't sure, and only hindsight is 20/20. We had some new goat friends visit to look at our goats and see more about the Kiko breed, and Aggie had been walking around "hollering" all morning, so we were expecting her to start labor relatively soon. Chuck took the visitors down over the hill to see some of the older does and some of the unbred yearlings that we had deemed not quite big enough to breed for this kidding. Not long after, Aggie's water broke and she began her labor in earnest. I texted Chuck so he would know she was beginning to kid. Aggie was one of the bottle babies we have bought, and we didn't know if this would make a difference in her maternal instincts or not. She and her sisters did get a few weeks with their mother b
efore she died, though, and that seems to have been long enough. PJ had already kidded out and was taking good care of her twins. Not to be outdone by her sister, Aggie was cleaning the first kid before the second was even out. The first kid was a flashy little thing, looking a lot like granddaddy Iron Horse. There was a delicacy around the muzzle, though, that made us hopeful that maybe we had our second doe kid of the group. Chuck didn't want to be too intrusive, but tried to look and see, and Aggie was totally unbothered by his presence. As of matter of fact, she wasn't the least bit worried about any of us. She accepted visitors watching the event without the bat of an eye, and she really rose to the occassion. She showed them a textbook Kiko kidding. She got the kids out, cleaned, and the first
was up trying to shakily butt her udder for that first important drink of colostrum in less than ten minutes. When she had the second kid, brown like she is, we again were thinking that this kid really looked feminine. After Aggie and her kids had some time together and everyone had been up to nurse, Chuck investigated more closely and confirmed we had two new doelings. Finally. So out of the ten kids born to six does, we had seven bucks and three doelings. The older kids were quite interested in the new arrivals, much to Aggie's annoyance. A few of the new girls' cousins got "flattened" by aunt Aggie. The following pictures show 34's brown and white buck kid by Ace visiting the girls. We also see that PJ's black and white buck and doe pair came to visit their cousins. Aggie and PJ are twins sisters by Iron Horse and were in the last set of kids out of Purdy, so they are heavily Tasman Zo
rro. PJ's kids are Boomer's, and Aggie's belong to Ace. We'll see how the two sets develop over the next few months.
rro. PJ's kids are Boomer's, and Aggie's belong to Ace. We'll see how the two sets develop over the next few months.
Congratulations on your doelings!
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