Tanglebriar Nubians

With Reason and Fancy having kidded, and Spice almost ready to kid, I can now give a better explanation of how I am raising the little Tanglebriar goatlings. They are being raised on a CAE prevention routine, although my foundation does were purchased from CAE free herds. The goatlings are removed from their mothers at birth (who have not seemed bothered by this in the slightest) cleaned up, and given heat treated colostrum as well as Manna Pro colostrum supplement for the first 24 hours. They have then been fed on pasteurized milk from their dams, and in the case when the milk production is not up to their voracious appetites, supplemented with Manna Pro kid milk replacer. One particular resource from Leaning Tree Boer Goats that I found extremely handy while trying to devise a feeding schedule can be found here, though I am keeping them at four feedings a day after two weeks, as I have the time to do so, and I'm happy with the commercial milk replacer.

The kids were disbudded as soon as possible, and most were done at three days. I used a Rhinehart X-50 iron with regular round goat tip for the doelings, and the buck tip for the bucklings. In future, I think I will tattoo their ears at the same time I do the disbudding so we can get all the stresses over at once, but this time I did them around a week and a half-two weeks-ish.

So far, this regime seems to be doing very well. The kids seem extremely vigorous, and are growing well. Behaviours that are cute when a kid is ten pounds are not cute in a full grown goat, and so I try to make sure that I am teaching the goatlings good manners right away. I have been making sure to handle their feet, so they will be easy to work with once they get older and need hoof trimmings, and also have been working on the not putting the hoofy-paws on the the people. They are also getting a great deal of socialization with dogs, as my own dog is constantly hanging around, and they seem to have adopted my mom's young Airedale as an honorary goat.