Kid Raising Philosophy

When our does reach the start of their 5th month of pregnancy, they are moved to kidding barns. As the due date approaches, does are watched constantly by camera for signs of labor. Once a doe is in labor, we are present at the barn and assist if neccesary. Once the kids are born, they are immeadiately dried and removed from their dams. Once the kids are breathing well and mostly dried, they are brought into the house where they get their navels tied and dipped in Iodine and are bottle fed their first heat treated colostrum. Once fed and completely dry, the kids are given I.D. collars and placed in a clean playpen. We feed the kids every 4 hours for their first 24 hours. When the kids are one day old they get their first dose of Bo-Se. Eventually the kids are transfered to pasteurized milk and moved to our "Big Inside Pen". That gives them a lot of room to play and frees up a playpen for the next batch of kids. We disbud all kids between 5 and 21 days old, depending on breed and sex. At this time they are given tetenus Antitioxin. We do take requests for horned kids as long as long as we have received a 50% deposit before the kid is one week old. When the kids are about 10 days old, they are moved from the house to the "young kid pen" in our milking barn. All of our kid pens have yards with grass and lots of play equpment and play structures. Eventually the kids move up again and again until the reach the "Big kid barn" when they are weaned at about 4 months old. We bottle feed them pasteurized goat milk, free-choice hay and small amounts of grain until this point. Once the kids are weaned the continue to be fed hay and grain. We vaccinate kids for CDT @ 4 weeks, 8 weeks and 12 weeks, de-wormed @ 12 weeks and Bo-Se at birth, 4 weeks and 12 weeks. We also use a regular preventive coccidiosis treatment.

The reason we feed pasteurized milk is because certain diseases that can be carried by the dam can be transmitted through the milk. Pasteurizing the milk destroys these certain diseases even if you do not know that the dam may be carrying the disease. None of our goats have ever tested positive for any of these diseases or do they show signs of any disease. We just feel that doing this gives the best odds of having clean and healthy kids. Bottle feeding also helps to make really friendly kids. We really enjoy working with our goats that have been bottle raised. They are very people oriented, easy to handle and have really amazing personalities! If our goats ever get out, they run to us, instead of away from us. We are also able to take our goats for walks. We also find that we spend so much time with them you are really aware of their health, injuries and how much they are eating. It is also very easy to treat for illnesses or give vitamins strait through the milk.