I have 11 goats, and all seem perfectly ordinary as to breed except one. She is a cross between a pure Alpine (mother) and an Alpine/Boer father. At birth she seemed exceptionally tiny - probably a good 3lbs. lighter and just generally smaller than her twin sister. I just thought "runt" and left it at that. As she has gotten older, however, she remains very noticibly smaller than her sister and all the other spring kids (even the younger ones). She is healthy, extremely smart, and has beautiful markings - just very tiny. I didn't know there was such a thing as mini goats until recently - can anybody tell me what qualifies, or if there are midget (not dwarf... she is perfectly proportioned) goats?

-- Deborah Stephenson (wonkaandgypsy@hotmail.com), December 18, 2001

Answers

There may be a few reasons why she is small. One being the lack of receiving a cocci treatment. Cocci will stunt a goat's growth, especially a kid. It also may be nurtitional as well. I recently picked up some does for another person and was shocked to see that they were almost 18 months old and as big as my kids form this yr! Proper nutrition is important as well. There are such incidences as "runts" in the bunch as well, could be she is just that. It can also be genetic as well sometimes. How big were her dam and sire?

As for the "Mini" breeds, I don't know anything at all about them, do not raise them and have no interest in doing so. I breed Alpines and will admit to a token Togg. I have seen websites for the "mini" breeds, but have not had the chance to visit. Maybe someone will be better able to discuss the "Mini" breeds with you. Good Luck, she sounds like a sweetie!

-- Bernice (geminigoats@yahoo.com), December 18, 2001.

Deborah, mini breeds, pygmy and Nigerian Dwarfs are breeds, not mutations, or nutritional stunting. We do know now that there is a dwarf gene in Nubians, G6S, and it stands to reason that there could also be one in boer, or even in the other dairy breeds, only the Nubian breed was tested at the University. Along with the dwarf gene sadly comes a slab sided kid with heart problems and unthrifyness, and a shortened life.

How tall is your doe and how much does she weigh, same with her sister? Vicki

-- Vicki McGaugh TX (vickilonesomedoe@hotmail.com), December 18, 2001.

Vicki and others who responded, Sorry I took so long to answer this - been busy tring to sell a piece of land. Anyway, I finally got around to taking a tape measure out to the goat yard. After chasing them around for half an hour, (I think they thought the tape was some sort of weird snake!) I managed to get some approximate measurements on the major players in this little soap opera. (I say soap opera because one thing I forgot to mention is that the sire of the tiny goat is also her brother. They have the same mother. He was very precocious and we didn't realize that he was THAT mature until too late!) Results: mother is 28" tall at withers; 30" long chest to rump. father is 35" tall at withers; 36" long chest to rump. sister (Sugar) is 26" tall at withers; 26" long chest to rump. "Tiny" (Spice) is 22" tall at withers; 24" long chest to rump.

By way of comparison, two other spring kids born one month later (same father, pure Saanen mother) are both 27" tall and 28" long. Their mother is only 2" taller and longer than the Alpine doe.

As far as nutrition goes, we are very careful to give them the recommended amounts of grain daily, mixed with (16% protein) goat pellets, all the fresh hay that they want (free choice), plus salt and minerals and fresh water. In addition, we feed leaves on a regular basis and offer occasional treats of apples, carrots, sweet potatoes, etc. They are very healthy. We have only had to treat two goats for worms (when we got them from another person), and a couple of minor infections from cuts in all the time we've had goats (about 6 years).

As ex-zookeepers, we are very attuned to the behavior and health of all our animals, so I feel pretty confident in saying that her size isn't the result of any nutritional deficiency. She has no problems in the herd pecking order either. She is very plucky, self-reliant and the smartest goat we have.

What do you think of her size as compared with mini's? Is she just petite or abnormally small?

Thanks everybody!

-- Deborah Stephenson (wonkaandgypsy@hotmail.com), December 21, 2001.

How old is she?

On worming, do you fecal sample yourself or have the vet do it? The damage done by worms is not something you see, the massive diarrhea and death isn't by any means a normal symptom of worms. Small size is. I would love to see a picture of her, lots of times we become barn blind, and another breeder seeing photos of the does can eaisly see the unthriftyness we see as healthy (pot bellied) etc.

On the measurements, its really hard to tell, to correctly measure they need to be on level ground perferrably a milk stand, then you take a square, a piece of anything that sits on the ground and then has an arm to go over her withers, you measure the stick from the ground to the bottom of the cross piece. 28 inches is a minimum heighth for the small breeds, 30 inches for Saanen and Nubian, and I don't know anybody who doesn't have much larger does than this. So compared to her dam and sire, especially if she is young, I wouldn't worry, though I would wait till she was 2 to breed her. Clear as mud? Vicki

-- Vicki McGaugh TX (vickilonesomedoe@hotmail.com), December 21, 2001.

if the kid is a result of a really close inbreeding, that could be the cause of reduced size. But if she was little at birth, sometimes it just takes them a while to catch up. It sounds like the dam is a little on the small side anyway, I do have a few that are short, 28" at the withers, but they should be taller. So by inbreeding on that dam, it wopuld be possible to get offspring that are even shorter tha herself.

-- Rebekah (daniel1@itss.net), December 21, 2001.