Freya must have over heard me saying that we rarely get afternoon kiddings, so of course she kidded in-between barn checks shortly after lunch.  Three more girls to add to Docs total for the year.  He is up to an 8:1 ratio.  Two of the girls are blue-eyed buckskins and one appears to be all black with blue-eyes.  Kids will be available after weaning.

We no get a break until late April when Mojito and Breezy are due.  

Amaretto barely looked pregnant the morning before she kidded with quads on March 13th..  The first kid was a stuck breech which which my daughter helped into this world.  Amaretto then went on to surprise us with three more kids for a total of 3 girls and 1 boy.  That brings Doc up to 5/1 so far from two does.  So he is off to a good start this year.

Unfortunately the second born girl was very tiny and undernourished, and despite our efforts throughout the night she passed away early the following morning.  Less than 12 hours old, but at least she was warm and had lots of love before she passed away.

Next up to kid is Freya.  She is also bred to Doc and is looking like she too is getting close to kidding.

Kids are in birth order right to left.  The mostly black doe kid was the first, the second passed, the third is the black and white doe with a single spot on each side.  And the buckling looks like his dam.  He will be available as a pet wether.

We kicked off this years kidding season on the evening of March 11th with two beautiful blue-eyed doe kids out of Dr Pepper and Pepper Potts.  Of course with "Pepper" in both parents names it was pretty easy to come up with a couple of pepper names.  T1 - will be named Jalapeno and T2 - will be named Belle.  As much as I would love to keep these girls I'm still in herd cutting because of my increasing disability so these girls and possibly their dam will be available after weaning.

I haven't blogged a lot this year.  I've been down with acute back issues and have been seeing a spine specialist.   This latest bout had me out of the barn for three weeks. Thankfully my daughter is home from college for the summer and she has picked up all of my chores.

Knowing I won't always have help available I considered a total herd dispersement.  But I just couldn't see myself being completely goatless.   So I am keeping three adults and 2 kids from this year.  Not easy choices and some of the ones up for sale are family favorites due to their friendliness.  I kept my two most standoffish does not because I don't like friendly goats, but because in such a small herd I think I can convince them to be more people friendly.  

So that leaves me with an updated sales page that includes 4 blue-eyed ADGA registered adult does, two of which are in milk.  Also three 2023 doe kids all with blue-eyes.  Lots of great pedigrees and high LA scores behind these ladies.   

After losing Violet last fall, and then having health issues of my own, and computer issues I have been rather neglectful on keeping up with the news.  So here is a recap before the next round of kidding occurs.

On 3/25 Gal x Tundra produced quads, 3 bucks and 1 adorable doe kid that will be retained.   Gal short cycled and I bred her to Tundra again and apparently both times took.  After she delivered the placenta 8 hours post kidding with what we thought was just triplets out popped a huge single buck kid that was DOA.  My best guess he is was a product of the first breeding as he had a different placenta and was almost twice the size of the other three.    

On 4/16 Kaimu x Tundra kidded with a single large buckling. He was as large or larger Gal's kid that had a three weeks head start on him.  We have nicknamed him Rocket man and he has such a big personality and he loves to jump.  He is going to be a wether companion to his sire. 

Introducing our newest buck - *B TILL-RIV TA DR PEPPER.   This blue-eyed boy born in 2021 will be replacing Tundra as one of our two herd sires.   Tundra will be staying locally within the county so we will be seeing him again.   Doc's dam has an LA score of VEEE91 that she received as a  9 year old.  In 2020 she received the ANDDA Total Performer Award. 

I have been trying to write this post for months now.   I still can't talk about this beautiful girl without getting choked up.   If you read my blog entry from July 25, 2022 you know that we had Linear Appraisal that day and the Violet was scored VEEE 90.  At that time she was 10 weeks post partum with a retained kid.  

WSU veterinary hospital checked her again in Sept and said that the skeleton wasn't breaking down or encapsulating and that there was nothing to be done.  They could put her down, or we could take her home with an uncertain future.  "She could live another 2 days or 2 years, there is no way to know."   We couldn't bring ourselves to have her put down and planned to make her time with us as comfortable as possible.  She passed away during the night of Oct 15th/16th.

We buried her in the pasture and the remaining herd gathered round to watch as we lowered her into the grave.  A little later I was sitting outside the barn and little Vortex walked over and stood looking over the pasture.  She gave a soft mama call, and then her older half sister Valkyrie walked out of the barn and stood shoulder to shoulder with her. Just two lost sisters looking off into the distance and missing their mama. 

I had managed not to cry up until that moment but that just wrecked me.  Valkyrie and Violet were close, but when Vortex came along she and Valkyrie were kind of at odds with each other.   So to see Valkyrie be the one to step up was so sweet.   

Out of all the goats I have loved and lost over the last 16 years, the loss of my first doe Mame' and now her grand-daughter Violet who looked so much like her, have been my hardest losses.  Mame' and I had a special bond and while Violet and I didn't share that same bond, I waited two years for her to be born, and all my efforts to get Linear Appraisal for my herd were so she could get the recognition I knew in my heart she deserved.   RIP Violet! 

I really did think I had done enough - cutting my herd back to only 12 total, but with my daughter leaving for University tomorrow, and me having a extra tough time walking the past two weeks, it has hit home that I still need to make cuts no matter how much it hurts my heart to do so.   Since Violet will be on a break, that only leaves me one second freshener (my daughters doe Lotus) and 3 first freshners to kid next year.  Four is doable, especially if I can stagger their kiddings out enough for me to recover inbetween times.  

So I have listed Creamy and Gal for sale as does in milk.   Both are two years old and have blue-eyes. Creamy is a 2nd freshener with exceptional teat length and large orifices.  She is one of my all time favorite does to milk in over past 15 years, and she stands quietly for hoof trimming.  Gal is a very promising first freshener who is also people friendly and has great milk stanchion manners.  Her teats are not as long as Creamy's but her orifice size is good and she is easily hand milked. 

I am offering a discount if they are purchased together.  I have found that purchasing does in pairs tends to make their transition to a new home easier on them.  

We do the biosecurity screening through WADDL and have always received negative results.  2022 results are available upon request. 

Back in 2019 I signed up for ADGA Linear Appraisal (LA).  If you don't know, LA is different from showing because the goat is judged against the "perfect" goat based on specific traits and structural qualities.  In a show the goat is only judged against the others competing in that particular class.  Which theoretically makes LA a more accurate description of a goats traits.

In 2019 I ended up on the waitlist - but they were not able to fit me in.  Then in 2020 days after I had notice that I was on the list for an October LA (seriously LA in Oct when people are often in the midst of breeding season?!?) they canceled the rest of the appraisals scheduled for that year.  In 2021 I was again skipped but finally this year with only a months notice we were scheduled for LA. 

My biggest reason for wanting to sign up for LA was to get my lovely Violet the recognition I thought she deserved.  She kidded on May 9th this year with a single very large, very stuck doe kid.  It was a battle getting the kid out.  I checked for a second kid, but didn't find anything.  We gave her a course of penicillin but she was having a hard time recovering.  About 5 weeks after kidding she still wasn't herself and I smelled something off and we hit her with a second round of antibiotics that seemed to help for a few weeks.  Then she had chunky kind of discharge and I took her to WSU.  WSU did an ultrasound and then an endoscopy on July 7th and discovered she had a retained kid that she was slowly passing.   They said the best option for her was to allow her to pass the remains naturally and that the process could take several months.  And not to breed her this fall.  LA was scheduled less than 3 weeks away at that point, and I was so disappointed for her.   I should not have underestimated the queen!

With only a single live kid and a retained kid Violet's udder wasn't quite what it was in years past, but I decided against scratching her on medical reasons and went ahead and had her evaluated and boy am I glad I did!  Her final score was VEEE90 as a 6 year old 5th freshener.  I could not be more proud of her!

In other news, GraceRidge S One Summer Night scored an +VVV85 as a first freshener.  That is exactly the score I was hoping for given her sire is out of the Castle Rock herd and many of the 90+ LA does had scores in the mid 80's on their first freshening.   In fact, her paternal grand-dam Castle Rock Sarafina had a first freshening LA score of VVV+85.   On her last appraisal she scored an impressive EEEE92 as a 5 year old.  Summer has been sold to a show home, but one of her daughters "Summer Breeze" will be staying here.

Does in milk are now $50 off their previous price and are listed at $600 each.  Both of them have some very nice genetics and are unrelated to each other so would make a great starter herd pair.  Or pair one of them up with Ember who is ready to be bred this fall.  Ember is related to Gal as Gal's dam is Ember's great grand-dam.  

We also have three cute doe kids, two of which have blue-eyes that are ready to go to their new home.  Check out our Available page for details!