I have been known to go on long distance road trip or two to pick up a new goat but picking up Kingfisher in Maryland was without the most epic goat road trip yet!  

The whole family went on this two week, 22 state trip and along the way we got to see many friends and family.  Kingfisher who was only 7 weeks old when we picked up him up was a good traveler and attracted a crowd of admirers wherever we went.

So what makes this guy so special?   His dam has an LA score of 90 and his sire was the 2014 ADGA spotlight sale Nigerian Dwarf buck.  His paternal grand-dam is the amazing Summerbird LA score of 91.  (see pictures below)

​Very excited to see what this sweet heart of a kid will add to our herd.

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My last blog entry was about moving our family and herd to Idaho.  And while I had every intention of keeping up with the blog, there were a lot of obstacles not the least of which was lack of electricity and internet service.

We had been promised that water and power would arrive by the end of August and while the power company showed up as scheduled the pump guys did not.  So we hauled hundreds of gallons of water to keep our herd in water for over a month.  What a relief to finally get running water.

The next big delay was getting the barn built.  It was supposed to be finished by the end of October, then it was "by Thanksgiving" and we were finally  able to move the goats in after the first of the year.   Sadly on the day we moved the goats out of their calf hutch shelters through the snow to the barn we discovered that "Double the Kisses" aka "Dutch" and expired for unknown reasons.   I had yet to use him on any of my does and was heart broken by his loss.  I do not know exactly what happened but I suspect fast acting pneumonia, although I saw no signs of any issues the night before. 

Due to the move and dealing with temperatures they were not used to none of the does showed any signs of heat until a few weeks after they moved into the barn.  Having better living conditions and being just a fence away from the boys seemed to sort of wake everyone up and we managed to get maybe half of the does bred.   I decided that June/July kids were ok, but I didn't really want any August kids so I cut off breeding.   Since LA will occur here before my does kid I will have to wait for next year and will try to have everyone bred by the end of November 2019. 

I intend to draw blood for pregnancy checks in April and will post results when I know for sure who is and is not pregnant. 

This spring and summer we will work on fencing pastures and moving the bucks out of the weaning pen in the doe barn and into their own barn.  And we will also be working on getting everyone (including me) in top shape for a good year in 2020! 

This morning we are moving the herd to our acreage in Idaho.  This doubles the amount of land and it will also allow us to build a barn that is specifically built to the needs of the goats and perhaps in the future a micro-dairy operation.

​We will be located about 20 miles east of Moscow, ID at the edge of the Palouse region which is known for wheat, lentil, garbanzo bean and split pea production along with Timothy Hay. 

Blush kidded with twins sometime yesterday.  Earlier than was expected, but I'm not sure they were actually premature, all I know is neither of them made it.   One we know for sure was a girl, but the other one we didn't look at.

We waited two years to finally get a breeding to take and now this.  It is very heart breaking for us, and thankfully it is a rare occurrence.   So far Blush is doing ok, no signs of depression or greiving and she seems healthy enough.

Snowfall kidded early this morning with two cute blue-eyed doe kids out of Midnight.  She required no assistance and mom and babies are doing great!   Because we are having to reduce herd numbers ahead of our move to Idaho next month we will be offering her and her doe kids as a package deal.

We finished off the first half of kidding this afternoon with twin blue-eyed doe kids for Emmylou and High Tide.   Both girls have their dam's black boots and dorsal stripe.  And the lighter colored ones white band goes all the way around.    

We get a bit of a break with kidding now until the beginning of July when we have 3 more scheduled to kid, and then 2 in the middle of August.

For the past three years I have hoped for a doe kid out of Alex and Midnight.  This year was no different, I hoped for a doe kid and they gave me another buckling.  But he is a very handsome blue-eyed boy.

I thought Ginger wasn't bred until the end of December (my breeding dates were lost when my phone died) but she obviously was one of the ones bred at the end of November.  She kidded this morning with a beautiful black and white blue-eyed doe kid out of Midnight.   She has tentatively been named "Oreo" by my daughter.  I know I need to keep my herd numbers down, but more than likely she will be retained in our herd.

I milked for the first time this year this morning.  What a joy to see and feel such lovely udders!  Violet has an amazing first freshening udder, soft, nice medial and large orifices.  I didn't milk her out but was quite pleased with how quick it was to get what I wanted.   Bonus - she stood like a champion for her first time on the stanchion.  

Dassy is a second freshener and I could see and feel the improvement in capacity.  She has a lovely udder to milk, large orifices and nice length of teat for hand milking.  I also didn't milk her out, but I could feel she had much more to give.  Her rear attachments are a little high, and teats could be a little more on center but they were basically plumb despite her being a little on the overfull side.

Once we have some consistently warm days I will give the girls their summer haircuts and take some better pictures.  But I couldn't resist taking these this morning on their first overnight fill. 

GotKids? Ultrasound service came by today to check the remaining six does that weren't bred the last time she was here at the end of February.  The BEST news was that Golden Era Made Me Blush is finally bred!!  She is carrying at least two kids and will be due the middle of July!   Snowfall is also bred and due right around the 4th of July.   Dahlia is probably due near the end of July and Levana and Vita werre "short bred" meaning they were only 28-30 days bred which puts them kidding in mid August.   Mosiac was still not bred so she will be back to living with Tide.