In Progress: Hay Feeder

I am making a hay rack. I don't really need it. But it will be useful for feeding free-choice grass hay. Why am I making it if I don't really need it? Because we had this old crib piece lying around. I hate seeing things going to waste, just sitting in a corner.

The bars on this thing were too close together, so I cut some of these bars out. I'm saving them - they should be useful in finishing the thing. I'm taking my time on this project, so there is no telling when it will be done. I'll let y'all know how it turns out!

$2 Mineral Feeder

Carina's mineral feeder

A few days ago I had what I thought was a brilliant idea. Ever since Carina moved her goats (and her supplies) out, I've been looking for a mineral feeder to feed loose minerals in. Carina had a lovely mineral feeder with two separate compartments, one side was used for feeding free-choice baking soda, the other side for minerals. But I could not bring myself to pay $15 for one of those things.

So, why not make my own for a lot less? I could get a sturdy plastic container of some kind, make two holes in it, and attach it to the fence with metal clips. A few days later I stopped by at the Dollar Tree store and popped in to see what they had. They didn't have metal clips, and since I didn't want to go all the way to Lowe's hardware store to get some, I grabbed a pack of zip-ties instead. I also found a clear plastic container that would work.

Back at home, I made two small holes in the container and attached it with zip-ties to the (cattle-panel) partition in the goat barn. I attached it on the hay-storage side, for I had no wish for the goats to rest their front feet on it and crack it. This way, their heads can pop through the fence to eat the minerals, but they cannot use it as a playground.

The immediate results? I love the thing! The goats can get to the minerals, and it cost less then 2 bucks! But the next morning when I come into the barn, they have somehow unlatched the gate and got into the hay area. You've guessed it. They have stood up on the feeder and smashed it to bits.

I think that I will pay the $15.

Let's dry her off!

To dry off a doe is to stop milking her. Ideally, a goat is dried off two or more months before she has babies. This is a good idea for several reasons:

1. It gives the doe time to rest and recuperate before she has babies and has to go through another strenuous ten months of milking. It's really hard on a doe to have babies and produce large amounts of milk. She deserves a break!
2. The major part of a kid's growing takes place in the last two months of pregnancy. If the doe is producing milk, her body will be so worked by trying to produce milk and grow babies that she or the babies might develop deficiencies resulting in sickness, miscarriage, or difficult kidding. Scary!
3. It gives you time to rest. Don't you ever get tired of going out twice a day in rain, snow, fog, or whatever else, and afterwards having to go through the process of filtering, cooling, and storing the milk?
4. If you don't dry your doe off, she might dry off by herself anyway, and then (horror of horrors!) you'll feel cheated!

Have I convinced you? If not, you are free to go elsewhere for advice. Since you are still reading this, I will assume that I have. So let us continue...

To dry off a doe (as aforesaid), you have to stop milking her. When a doe dries off in nature, it is because the baby gradually stops drinking her milk, then pressure in her udder tells her body to produce less of it. Anyway, here you have it:

How to dry off a milking doe

• About two months before the date that you want your doe dried up by - the exact time depends on the doe - start milking her once a day. Here's how to go about it: milk her out entirely on the first morning, and then check on her in the evening to see how she is doing. If she is very full, milk her out half-way; otherwise you can leave the milking until morning. Repeat this process every day until she is comfortable (i.e. producing a little less milk and not filling up as tightly).

• Now you can start milking her every other day. Begin on the first day by skipping the milking, or if she is still producing too much milk to do that, milk her out only half-way. On the second day, milk her out entirely and on the third repeat the process of the first day. Again, continue until she is comfortable with it.

• At this time you may start milking her every third day. To do this, pretty much repeat the same thing that you did to start milking her every other day.

• By this time, your doe is probably very much dried off, so much so that it would feel comfortable to stop milking her altogether. If that is the case, go ahead! If not, keep making the gap between milkings longer and longer. By the time you get to a week between milkings, your doe will probably stop producing milk and you will be able to stop milking her.

Notes:
You might hear some people say to discontinue feeding a doe grain when you are drying your doe off. I disagree. Removing the grain will not stop milk production; it will only cause the doe problems from trying to make milk without the proper protein.

Also be aware that though she has stopped producing milk, her udder will not necessarily look empty. If she is not getting any fuller, but she is still at least partly full, it just means that she has not yet started absorbing the milk back into her body. Roxy has only a little more than a month until her babies come and she still looks half-full of milk!

A Day In The Life with Dairy Goats

I found this 5 Part Video Series called A Day In The Life with Dairy Goats. I thought it quite entertaining and also learned how to make a natural udder wash. Hope you enjoy it too. Here you are: http://www.onthegreenfarms.com/raising-dairy-goats/goats/.

Handy Goat Supplies

Here is a list of some supplies that I especially like. You can click on the picture or name of an item to go to the website that sells it.

Feeding and Cleaning:

Storage crate- When coupled with a bungee cord it makes an inexpensive hay feeder that can be attached to fences. It's handy when you just have a couple goats or if you need a portable feeder.	Rubber feed pan- I like to use this for feeding young kids grain. It's low enough to the ground for them to get to and wide enough to feed four or five at a time. The rubber is bendable, so it doesn't crack if a goat stands on it
6 quart mini feeder - This is easily hooked over the front bar of the milkstand to hold your doe's grain. You can get circular ones, which are narrower and deeper, but I prefer the rectangular ones.	Feed storage bin - Works very well for storing grain and chicken feed; it's easy to open and it seals tightly when closed. You can also use a garbage pail to store grain.
Gerber 9oz. baby bottles - Inexpensive and effective, these are what we used these for Dicey's triplets last year. Carina did have to replace the nipples after the kids bit through them, but they work amazingly well for the price.	Rake - Rakes are handy for raking up stray pieces of straw, hay and goat berries from the yard. I like ones with bendable metal tines best; they rake out the dips in the ground and last a lot longer then plastic ones.

Milking:

Stainless steel pail - These come in a variety of sizes; you can get a Nigerian dwarf sized pail or one that you could milk your elephant into. I got mine from Hoegger Supply but you can also get it from Amazon.

Kirkland Premium Baby Wipes - I like to get these for cleaning goats' udders before milking, and wiping my hands if they get dirty.

Feeding Pregnant Goats

Text is taken from Raising goats for Dummies. Read the full page here.

A pregnant doe doesn't have increased nutritional needs until the last two months of gestation, which is when the kids do 70 percent of their growing. But the doe does need additional water throughout pregnancy. A feeding program for pregnant goats is as follows:

• Early pregnancy (first 3 months): Feed does to maintain their body condition or to improve their body condition if they are thin. You can meet their nutritional requirements with good hay or pasture, or some added grain for thin does. Unless they're lactating, does don't need grain in early pregnancy. Do not overfeed. Overfeeding can lead to complications such as hypocalcaemia and ketosis.

• Throughout pregnancy: Monitor and compensate for pregnant does' increased water consumption. Pregnant goats can drink up to four gallons a day. Monitor body condition and adjust feed and water accordingly.

• Late pregnancy (last two months): Does' nutritional requirements increase greatly during this time because the unborn kids are growing rapidly. Start grain gradually (just a handful a day) until your does are eating up to a half-pound of grain a day (depending on the goat size and breed) or half to two-thirds of their normal milking ration by the time they kid, in addition to hay. Gradually replace their hay with alfalfa so they get the proper balance of calcium and phosphorus. Continue to monitor their body condition and adjust feed accordingly; does carrying multiple kids need even more calories and nutrients.

Make sure not to overfeed grain during pregnancy to avoid the risk of having the kids grow so large that the doe has birthing difficulties. And very important is that your doe has access to a free-choice mineral mix or block. I like to also provide baking soda at all times as it helps balance a goats acidity level in their rumen. Anouther thing I like to give to my pregnant does is apple cider vinegar.

The goats are grazing

There are many reasons why we take our goats out to graze every day. They get all-important exercise, they help clear our weeds, we save on the cost of buying hay, and most important of all it increases their milk production.
On fine afternoons we open the gate and call, "Goats! Roxy, Dicey, Aphie, Babies!" And they all come running after us down the hill.  All except Roxy; she always heads straight for the pine trees and wreaks havoc. So we keep her on a leash until we get to the pasture.

Pine trees aren't on the menu today, girl!

We only keep the goats out for an hour or so because we have to be with them while they are grazing and we don't have time to be out more than an hour. They are eating the whole time that we have them out.

In spite of the common opinion that goats will eat anything - they like to feel everything with their tongues - goats are quite picky about what they eat and carefully pick out certain plants. Wild Rose, Bindweed, and Wild Sage are favorites among our goats, so we try to bring our goats to parts of the pasture especially abundant in these particular plants. Of course, our pine trees are preferred over all else and we have to be careful not to let the goats get at them - my dad went to a lot of trouble to plant those trees.