Babies, Babies, Babies
How and why do I breed baby goats? How do we keep them safe? What do we do with these beautiful babies on Spanglish Farms? In this week’s Topic we will discuss everything to do with day to day breeding….ok not everything because really it is so important and interesting and complex that we will never be able to cover it all in one post but let’s give it a go.
Why do we breed baby goats?
When we started Spanglish Farms it was because we wanted to produce our own food and provide a wonderful home for Goats and Geese. my love of Dinosaurs played an important part in our decisions…but that is a story for another time.
We knew we wanted to produce goat cheese, soap, milk and yogurt and in all mammals that means producing babies. Goats don’t produce milk unless they have babies and one of the great things about owning and raising your own herd of goats it that you get to produce other farms and families with baby goats all while you can enjoy the great milk, cheese and soap produced by the animals.
Our goats are pregnant no more than once a year and int eh rest of the year we produce milk. There is also a component to breeding which is very important and that is to improve the genetics and standards of the given breed and possibly show and do what is called Milk testing with our goats.
There are very complex standards for each goat breed especially in the show world and if you show a goat everything is taken into consideration from the way the goat’s back is shaped to even the way its butt looks. Most of our goats don’t hold a candle to the great genetics you will find in a show ring but judges look at different things such as how healthy and slim or thick a goat is.
Judges even look at rib bones to see how thick, round or flat they are and everything is important.
20 years ago Nigerian Dwarf does (females) were preferred to be stockier and more of what is called “Dairy standards” which was much more of a tank or larger and thicker looking goat with big cheeks and bones, rounded ribs and thick strong legs.
Now in the show ring more of a slender doe is preferred with delicate features and lines.
We have a couple great show goats who we do plan on showing in 2021, all of whom have amazing genetics such as Waddly, Cookies and Peanut but we love our big tank girls and our pet goats all the same.Ppersonally I love the look of a large boned goat.
in 2021 or 2022 we may be in the market at some point to get a larger, stockier goat…we have one in mind from a familiar farm but we will see what the future holds and if we can add a nice stocky girl to our herd in the next year.
Back to babies! When we produce babies we really only keep goats that would improve the genetics and overall milk and show production of our herd or improve our peronal breeding and farm plans. There are so many other factors that play into whether we would keep or find homes for new babies as they are born so we will have to take that as it comes this year.
How do we decide if we should breed a goat in a given year?
We decide who should breed based on whether they are physically capable of handling the pregnancy and whether they are mentally prepared to care for babies.
Physically our does (Female Goats) should be large enough to carry babies and her hips should be large enough to pass a babies head, which is the larger part of the body, through the birth cannal.
We also take into consideration if the goat has had any issues with their health and if they have bred before and what issues they had during that breeding or birth. We really only want to breed our goats every year or so to give their bodies time to recover. Sometimes we even wait longer because we want to be sure they are ready.
We take mental capability into consideration through a number of factors. First we look at herd hierarchy, we find that if they are at the bottom of the pecking order in our herd they may take a bit longer to mature and be ready. A goat who is constantly vocal may not be ready for kids yet as well.
Betty, our one of our Nigerian Dwarf goats is much larger compared to Rosie and will likely become phgysically ready long before Rosie but she is more quiet and reserved around some of the older goats.
She has just started to get out of her shell but she is easily intimidated by the dogs, adult goats and sometimes even her fellow friends in the herd.
She doesn’t get scared mind you but she always takes a step back to observe before she barrels in. This could be a sign that she is just relaxed and laid back or it could be that she is nervous. Only time will tell and the fact that I am not sure tells me that when she is physically ready I will want to be sure to observe these behaviors again and again to see where she stands.
While this behavioral observation is not always necessary for all herds it is something we take very seriously on our farm as we learn and grow with our herd.
I always look for a few key factors:
Can they try to solve social problems on their own?
How do they react to difficult or unexpected situations?
How are they around other does babies?
These are not hard and fast rules and every herd is completely different but once you have been around your goats for a while you will start to understand where thaey are mentally and it is a joy to watch them mature and learn new things about how to behave and act.
How do we decide if we want to keep a baby goat?
We look at conformation, personality, genetics, and ask what theyr farm job would be. Everyone on the farm has a job 🙂
Why do you not breed all your goats this year?
We take every breeding on a case by case basis and a lot of our goats are too young so we are very careful with who will and will not breed.
Why do you have so many boys? I thought most herds just have 1 herdsire?
This is the main thing that is different about our breeding program from other farms. We want the social structures of the goats to be well established. By observing many different personalities in teh boys and the girls my theory is that we can understand a goat’s personality more thoroughly and thereby not only match the breedings based on excellent conformation and milk standards but also by complimentary personalities as well. It is a working theory we are experimenting on in our farm. The other factor we want to encourage is friendship and communiy. goats become very attached to one another and we want everyone on our farm to have a lifelong friend. We try to have boys that help with different genetics so that we have a couple different trates to pull from when breeding time comes around.