Hum.. I guess that title looks weird... I think it should be Debbie's Doeling's Due Dates...That is... we have the due dates for Debbie the goat's next babies and hopefully they will all be doelings!
We took Debbie up to the breeder for a date with the buck - a fancy Nigerian Dwarf with a fat title and who is um.... taller than Too Short. Apparently that little fella got the job done quick so Debbie is on her way home today.
Her due date will be March 13th or there about. Since she is bred with an ND buck her babies will be unregistered "Mini Manchas" and turn out to be about the size and temperament of Nibbles....but hopefully with better attitudes.
After swearing off ever having another buck we are just sending all the ladies out for breeding. You can read about everything I hated about having a buck here. And you can read everything I know about goat breeding here.To be sure not everyone agrees with shipping your goaties out to be bred but that's fine. We don't have to all do everything the same. Right?
While we're at it...a note on registered vs not registered. No, we don't care if our goats are registered or not ....and no, we don't care if the babies are registered. There is a whole be scheme behind this registration thing and since goats are not our money making business we do not want to put the extra time and effort into the registration process. The only reason we are making goat babies is so our milkers freshen in the spring.
To be sure, if you want to have dairy goats you need to have a plan for the babies. We are lucky that Nibbles and Debbie have such cute babies because people buy them up like hotcakes. While registered babies would get a higher price.... that's not really our focus. People like the little goaties for pets and that is fine with us. We've never not sold the babies and if, for some reason, they didn't sell well then...um... cover your eyes goat snugglers.... we'll sell them to the local ethnic meat market. You heard me. Fortunately cuteness rules around here and we don't expect to be stuck with any of the babies.
Another thing we learned last year was that we needed to be smarter about who gets bred and when. Since its apparent that Nibbles will never be a good momma we needed to make sure that Debbie is in milk when Nibbles has her babies. This way Debbie will nurse the new Niblets until we can get them sold.
I had a thought that maybe I'd try and find a full sized buck for Dahlia and see if I could get a star milker from her.. but really keeping a doeling has been somewhat of a disaster for us. Debbie has allowed Dahli (her baby from a couple years ago) to continue to nurse - thats right, Dahli's a milk stealer. So all my good milk from Debbie has gone down the gullet of a silly goatie and NOT gone toward fattening up the pigz. Or cheese for me. Fortunately tho when Debbie came into heat this fall she kicked Dahlia off for good.
The only reason we haven't sold Dahli - despite my constant complaining about her - is that she is a milking superstar. She milked over a gallon a day for most of the summer - on her first year of milking! Next year when she freshens she is really going to be putting the milk that in that bucket. So she stays and I'll just keep complaining about her.
But for now I have to go and see if Nibbles and Dahli are in heat yet. If so its going to be another long drive up to the breeder.
Happy Tuesday everyone! Do you have your goat breeding all set up?
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9 comments:
I'm STILL having a heck of a time finding a purebred Saanen for our Saanen doe. She's getting up there in age and I figure I've only go three more years of kids out of her and need to think about replacing her with another. We've just acquired a young boer buck to breed our new boer doeling (in a few months), and just got our stinkier-than-all-things-possible Nigerian Dwarf back for breeding purposes, which he has already performed, so as soon as I can get him out'a here, the better.
Mygawd, the smell is awful!!
I got a free buckling this year and he's such an $&!# that the only name I could come up with to politely call him when my children are present was Knuckles as in knucklehead. My 6-year-old can't wait until he's done his business with our doe/doelings, because she wants "knuckle sandwiches". I will be happy to indulge her with that one.
And seriously, you know God had a sense of humor when he created male goats, because how in the world does a female goat think blowing raspberries, saying "na na na," and peeing on your own face is attractive? I mean, my brother peed on his face when he was about 8 when he sneezed and was going to the bathroom at the same time and we just laughed at him!
Yay, pregnant goaties! Our buckling should arrive any day now, and we hope to breed in November and December and sell that buckling as soon as the job is done. I wish we could find a way to just drive the girls to a date and be done with it! Not in the suburbs, apparently.
I will say that I got an entirely different idea of what this post was about after reading that headline. I only have one doeling who will be bred late this fall. She is supposed to be registered, but her breeder is a nincompoop and the paperwork still hasn't gone through. I don't care, really, one way or another, although I paid for 'registered'. I am also hoping that having a kid will calm her down. Tell me it will.
I'm starting a new blog hop! Every Thursday night I will post Farm Fun Friday. I'd love it if you came and linked up every week.
Tayet
farmlifeatitsbest.blogspot.com
'Tis the season for hanky panky in the goat pens!
We were going to just take our girls on hot dates as well. We've owned bucks before and didn't want to do that again for a while. But... A most perfect, and reputedly sweet, buck has crossed our path. So now I'm heading on a six-hour round trip to buy the fella this Saturday -- and hubby is frantically building a last-minute buck pen.
At least now I don't have to drive six does on three-hour round trips, split into three groups of twos.
And, after some fattening up, we'll be eating our unsold babies. *slurp*
Good grief. I just had trouble reading the captcha verification code so tried the audio. Sounds like something out of the Blair Witch Project! I've got the heebie jeebies now. *shudder*
Carolyn, i swear the smaller they are the worse the stank!
Traci, i couldnt publish this until today b/c i was laughing so hard. hilarious on all points!
Free, this is totally work out.. but its a lot of driving for sure.
I'm sorry, Susan, but there are no guarnatees. Dahli was just as big of a loon after she had her baby... zoikes!
Thanks Tayet! has everyone see her new linky?
Good for you, Diane! Maybe that buck will be just the ticket. If we had more goaties we might bring a buck in but for these three.. its worth the drive.
Now you're running an escort service? Does the good queen known about this? Sertiously - any thought to eating any of your unsold bucks or doelings?
I didn't choose the thug life, Dave, the thug life chose me..... and nope we dont butcher the goat kids because they are more valuable to sell than for their food value. Dairy goats don't tend to be meaty and the mini's arent even enough to make a sandwich out of.
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