Kidding watch.... or not....

When I purchased Jasmine in June, I was told that she was bred to the blue eyed buck Diji WP Blu Dyumani with an expected kidding date of 7/30/09.  She just hasn't looked all that pregnant to me, but she does have enough body length to hide a kid or two, and her udder is filling so I can't discount that she may in fact be due any day now.   If that EDD was correct today would be day 147, and would explain her nest building behavior yesterday afternoon.

But I happened to take a closer look at the service memo last night and she was supposedly bred on March 6th, which would mean that today would be day 144.  (Normal gestation range for Nigerians is 145-150 days.)

And just to muddy the waters a little further, its not entirely certain that she was actually bred on that date.  She could have been bred by the "clean-up" buck that was put in with the herd in April.  Which would put her kidding date sometime between the end of August and the end of September. 

Oh and did I mention our heat wave that tends to make all of our goats behave differently than normal, so a change in behavior could mean the early stages of labor or just that the heat is taking its toll.

All that to say there will be many trips outside to check on her until she either kids or we are able to determine that she won't be kidding until a later date. 

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