Our 2012 Kidding season is about to begin!

Hi Everyone!

Our 2012 Kidding season is almost here! The momma goats are getting bigger by the day. Our very first kids could arrive as soon as March 23th (145 days gestation) if they got bred the first day they were put in with their assigned buck. Typically they arrive at 147-152 days gestation. Our major kidding will continue on through the month of April. As you can imagine, it will be a busy time on the farm very soon.

We have been busy preparing for our first arrivals. All of our Does received their annual CDT booster so the babies will be protected at birth. The kids will then receive their first CDT vaccine at 4-6 weeks of age, a booster 2 weeks later and then their last booster 4 weeks after that. By that time it should be just about weaning time!

Other things we have been doing around the farm to get ready are:

-We condition scored our Does and they are looking fat and happy. We did sorted out 4 of our older girls that we felt needed a little more tlc and put them on a richer protein diet.

-We recently replaced some of our old barn lights in our kidding area. I’m so excited to have reliable lighting this year!

-All pen card forms are printed out for each Dam and are ready to be filled out with the newborn kid information as they arrive. If you would like to see a copy of what our pen card looks like, here is the link to it: www.hmrpygoras.com/kidpencard5-19-01.PDF

-Our kidding supply bags are all put together and ready to go.

-Kidding supplies ordered and received.


Some things still left to do:

-We will be hauling hay tomorrow and filling up our barn so it’s well stocked throughout kidding season.

-This coming week we plan to clean get our kidding areas and layer them with fresh straw. (BIG JOB!)

-We will be wrapping up the last of the bucks that need shearing

-We will start crutching the bred Does that need it. (shearing their bottoms and udder areas only)

-Our “clip, dip and strip” supply tote put together.

Thanks for checking out our Blog! You can see more information at our website at: www.hawksmtnranch.com

Take care,

Lisa

Our herd sire, "Boo Boo" is looking good!

Our breeding groups have now been together for just over 3 weeks. We will be keeping them together for another 10 days.

We are using 11 herd sires this year. 2 of the breeding bucks are bucklings that were born last spring. One is named, "Copper Spats" and is a beautiful brown buckling with frosted ears and nose. He is out of our late herd sire, "Spats" . He definitely knew what to do when he was first put with his group of girls.

Our other buckling, "Hot Dog", was a little slow to figure things out so he missed the first cycle of his group of girls. Fortunately he is now showing interest in his girls as they are starting to come into their 2 cycle. It looks like his girls will be the last to kid. This is not uncommon for bucklings to be slow as I found that they mature at different rates. Sometimes bucklings won't come into maturity until late winter.

It looks like the rest of our 9 herd sires have settled most of their girls. I am ready for breeding season to be over so I can take down the breeding pens and send the boys back out to their pasture away from the girls. I'm looking forward to peace and quiet until the babies start arriving in March!

Lisa

Week 2 of breeding season

Our breeding groups have now been together for over 2 weeks. Things are starting to quiet down. I think most of the Does have been bred as I'm not seeing any signs of them showing any interest in their bucks. Of course the Bucks still check to see if there is any interest but with no luck. Hopefully this means that most of our Pygora babies will be arriving within a 2 week time frame. That would mean during Spring Break! Yeah! It should be a very busy time on the ranch!

This week we had a few sunshiny days between rain storms so we took the opportunity to take some updated photos of our bucks. Check back as we post new photos of our handsome boys!

Lisa

Preparing for breeding season

Setting up our breeding pens


All our does were hoof trimmed and de-wormed this week as we prepare them for breeding season. We will be putting our does with their carefully selected buck next week. We are now busy putting up panels around each of our 12 breeding pens as added security. We find that if the bucks can't see each other, they are aggressive on our pens and their interest and energy is spent on their girls.

Once our breeding pens are ready, we will be bringing in our does and sorting them into their individual breeding areas. We will then bring the bucks in and they will get de-wormed (they were hoof trimmed earlier before they went into "rut"). Once this is done, the boys with be put in with their girls. They will be together for 4-6 weeks. Spring kids are just around the corner!