One of my goat books(a very old manual) suggests alternate year breeding of goats. The situation being if only two does were being kept to maintain a steady milk supply for the homestead, the resulting offspring were not going to be kept etc. Does anyone have any practical experience with this? How hard would this be on her? I personally think that maybe it would be easier on the health of the goat than an every year breeding? Would the yield drop off in the second year if I maintained milking twice a day? Thanks for any thoughts.

-- Terri (terri@tallships.ca), October 22, 2000

Answers

We have two goats as our exclusive source of milk. What I do is breed one in Aug/Sept and one in Feb/March. It works great for us, as one is declining in production, the next kids, and as one dries off we are weaning the first kid. We have nubians, and a line that has an extended breeding season.

-- MarciB (daleb@kent.net), October 22, 2000.

If you kept milking the doe for a year and a half it might work out alright. Personally, kidding season is the highlight of the year for me, and it'd really bug me to not breed a doe unless she was sick or too small/young to be bred. The only thing I'd worry about is that the doe might lay on fat while she was dry too long, and then have trouble breeding back.

-- Rebekah (daniel1@itss.net), October 22, 2000.

Terri, breeding a healthy doe is not stressfull on her or her milk production. Breeding every other year would work on nearly any breed that has a great lactation to begin with, but I wouldn't let a yearling do it. Once a doe has kidded two or three times you will have a much better idea of the amount of milk she will produce, and a biggy for me is do I really want to bother freshening out her daughter! A first freshener that only milks 3 quarts the first lactation will dramatically milk less the 2nd year (milked through), where if you breed her she will have a more mature body being able to eat more food, and a much more mature udder, with teats easier to milk also. Honestly I would only be considering this if I had a swiss breed doe.

Good for you having such good production in your does, most folks let them have their kids, milk them for a couple of months, and then complain in the following lactations that they are poor milkers with poor will to milk. You have taught those first and second fresheners to be poor milkers, by drying them to soon after weaning their kids. This is why it is always such a gamble to purchase older stock from hobby farmers, who only let the kids nurse their kids, never milking them for the full 10 months. Vicki

-- Vicki McGaugh (vickilonesomedoe@hotmail.com), October 22, 2000.

I have a goat that had twins 4 years ago, and she is still giving milk. The first 3 years I usually got 1 quart in the morning and 1 quart at night. This last year I got lazy and was usally only milking her in the morning and now I only get 1/4 quart - 1/2 quart. I suspect most of the decrease is my fault, and currently she is at a friend's place for breeding. I kind of figure it will be nice to have small ones again. I guess that this kind of thing doesn't happen all the time, but I suspect if more people would just keep milking instead of getting their goat bred every year, you might be surprised to get another year out of her! Good luck!

-- Michael W. Smith (kirklbb@penn.com), October 22, 2000.

Now I have just learned something new again. We bought some adult does 2 and 3 year olds. That is why when the babies were 8-12 weeks their bags were going away. I thought it was because they were young does and the bags get bigger as they get older. I have some I milk the full 10 months, but these new ones it wasn't worth it. Is there a way this time to reverse this and teach them to be milkers? I bet I would have to milk from day 1 huh? And keep the kids separate. Now I have a new challenge comming in the spring!

-- Cindy in Ky (solidrockranch@msn.com), October 25, 2000.

Cindy- milk production is supply and demand. If you don't milk them, they'll quit producing, as the udder reabsorbs the unused milk. no goat will be worth milking if it never gets milked.I leave the kids on my does AND milk them twice a day, and have had the best production this way. The constant demand by the kids means that the production stays high. I milk them out 2X a day, because the kids don't always drink all the milk, and sometimes prefer one side to the other, and you also need to check for mastits, and other udder problems(plus keep them used to having their udders handled!)If I need a lot of milk, or the buck kids are getting too rough on the udders, I shut the kids up in a pen at nights and let them run with their dams during the day.The kids grow a lot faster, and they learn to graze and eat solid food much faster because their mothers teach them all that.And, they don't get beat up on constantly by the rest of the goats,because they are a part of the herd, and their mother protects them. That means you don't have to seperate them from the herd and then put them through lots of stress when you re-introduce them to the older goats. I have found that this management gives me the best production, their milk actually falls off considerably when the kids are weaned or sold, because they aren't demanding the milk constantly. I have a friend who has had about 40 breed leaders(top ten of the breed for production), and this is how she manages her herd, too. We all do things differently,and right now dam raising has a bad name because it hasn't been done responsibly.Start milking your goats, and they will start milking more( make sure to increase their grain,too).You can probably get their production to increase this year, if you do.

-- Rebekah (daniel1@itss.net), October 25, 2000.

Rebekah, that's what I like to do too, is leave the kids with the moms to get milk for as long as they can. I lock the kids up at night, they can see their moms, and milk in the mornings, and then turn out all together after milking. The little boys are wethers so they can stay with moms, and they are just happier that way. But I don't have show goats. I will milk them all twice a day in the spring, and see how they do. But I have to be sure babies are getting enough milk too. Moms with new babies stay together in stall for about a week or so to bond good and be alone. At what age of the kids do you start milking the does twice a day?

-- Cindy in Ky (solidrockranch@msn.com), October 25, 2000.

I start milking twice a day right from the start. At first I will put the kids on first before milking, to make sure they have gotten their fill of milk. I'd hate to milk the doe out completely and then have the kids wake up hungry from a nap! After a week or two, they catch on and run to hurry and nurse before I milk! I shut the yearlings , does with triplets, and bottom-of-the-pecking-order does in a pen for a few days, but most of the does kid in the main pen and stay there.

-- Rebekah (daniel1@itss.net), October 25, 2000.