Looks Like Babies Are on Their Way!

As I previously posted, I was trying to establish how to get the goats bred. I finally figured out the best way, bring the buck home! We bought ourselves the nicest (both in looks and personality) buck. Although he is not a Saanen, we have decided this year to breed for "Snubians" or "Saabians" as some people call them. These kids should have great milk production based on both maternal and paternal lines, but they will also have (hopefully) an increase in butterfat from their Nubian heritage. That means, more CHEESE!

We are expecting around eight to ten kids this year. They will all be registerable with ADGA, and we will happy to do that for anyone intersted in purchasing them. If you are interested, please let me know and I will happily send you photos and pedigree lines along with LA scores that we have (or will have in the near future).

As soon as the weather clears up around here, I am planning on taking pictures of everyone to post - but as apparent - you will need to bare with me as my blogging skills are less than desirable.

This is our Nubian buck: Thunder Ridge HN Wasabi. Click here to get to his pedigree and LA scores. He has covered our three registered American Saanens, one recorded NOA Saanen, and a registered second generation Mini-Toggenburg. As we have a mixture of girls to choose from, please don't hesitate to contact us for more details.

It's That Time of Year

Time to start making fall breeding plans (for the goats) and spring breeding plans (for the horses). Interestingly enough, I have a solid spring plan before the fall one.. tssk on me!

So for the spring, I have the two lovely ladies lined up for a breeding to an up and coming star. This year (being as it is our first year to have our own foals and not someone else's), I decided to breed for half Andalusians. I am very excited as there are a number of registries that they qualify for including the Andalusian (IALHA) Registry - where they will receive a half bred number. Also, it is my ultimate goal to get into Andalusians and this is my starting point. As this develops more, I am sure I will have lots to discuss.

For the fall breeding plans, I had a solid plan that is not as solid as I assumed. We have a small herd of dairy goats (Saanens) and were planning on having them covered by a gentleman's buck about 20 minutes away. His buck is very nice with good proven lines and would cross with our lines beautifully. I was very excited. The problem is we keep  driving the girls back and forth and they are never in that perfect moment to allow him to breed. They show every sign of being in heat, but some how it's just not right on timing. We are now a solid month past when I wanted to get them bred and many gas miles into this - so we are trying to come up with a back up plan quickly. Our back up plan include using LH to get a more perfect timing of their heat, but this will cost almost as much as buying a decent buck as our vet won't prescribe it without coming out on a farm call or breaking down and buying a buck to cover our girls.  The other option I have was to buy a cheap buck and use him as more of a tease then take the girls over to the registered buck to get the job done...Of course, we are running out of time and I need to get this worked out yesterday. So, here's to getting this worked out!

If anyone has any other suggestions, please let me know! I have a buck rag and I have been watching them for signs of heat (which they are showing) but somehow I am missing the sweet spot where she will let the buck do his job...