HELP! Goat got into Chicken Grower/finisher and possibly in labor OR Bloat?

[Icedangel11]

Color should be secondary to milking ability. Nigerians often have flashy kids no matter the pairing! Look for a buck whose dam had high and tight attachments. If he happens to be white or have white markings...great! If not, your doe should still produce some nice, blue eyed, and moonspotted kids for you.

As a rule...Nigerians have a very poor carcass when it comes to butcher. They are so small, there just isn't much there to actually put in the freezer. If you want a goat for the freezer, sell any excess males as bucks or pet wethers, and use the cash to buy a boer wether to raise up for butchering. That way, you get more than a few lbs of ground meat and some wimpy roasts for your effort.

As for what to ask for him, what is going rate in your area? That is your base on what to ask for him. And if people are interested in him, and considering he just hit the ground yesterday, you don't have to make a call on what to price him at right now. Give it some time to research prices and then get back to interested parties with the price you feel is fair. Some folks will say thanks but no thanks, but those who truly want him will buy him. Beware of lowball offers and stick to your guns. I recently had someone offer me $100 on my registered Angora goat doe. ALWAYS GET A DEPOSIT. $50 is the usual going rate for a deposit, and they are nonrefundable in the event the buyer changes their mind and backs out of the sale. They should only be refundable if he becomes unsalable, like if he gets sick, injured, or dies.

Some people might care less about the dam's udder. The blue eyes and moonspots might factor more into his desirability than her udder attachments. Or that because her udder is capacious, easy to milk, just poorly attached (which can be corrected), it isn't a big deal.

You can't call him homozygous until you actually know. You can speculate, but until he shows a pattern of 100% blue eyed kids, even when bred to brown eyed dose, it is impossible to say he is.

Of course, of course. I'd never sell him AS homozygous, just as having a higher chance of it. He's got a 50% chance of being homozygous, assuming that Tea is heterozygous for all the traits. However, from what breeding I do know, he comes from a long line of flashy goats.

I may invest in pygmy goats. At one year old they are about 70% of their adult weight and yield about a 60% carcass. I really don't want to dive into fullsize goats, but a pygmy/boer cross wouldn't be horrible.

As for price.. The 'normal' around here for blue eyes seems to be 200-300$. Moonspots are rare around here, though, so I might get away with 300-350. Some guy wanted to pay me 50$ for one of Teas kids and I just about laughed him away.

How can you correct a bad udder?

 

[cassie]

How can you correct a bad udder?

Use a buck whose daughters have good udders.

 

[Icedangel11]

OH.

I thought.

Like.. A sling or something. Haha, brain fart.

Just Milked Tea again, in about four hours she made another 2.5 cups of milk. Making todays total 9 cups of milk. Or... 2.25 quarts of milk.

Heavens help me I paid 75$ for her. And I'm ashamed to admit it but I also missed the rim of the jar a lot, so some got spilled.

 

[H Diamond]

As for price.. The 'normal' around here for blue eyes seems to be 200-300$. Moonspots are rare around here, though, so I might get away with 300-350.

For an unregisterable goat with not great conformation? That's outrageous! What do your show quality registered nigi's go for?

 

[Icedangel11]

They both run the same price.

The unregistrable ones are sold as excotic pets the same as pot belly pigs. This is just for the Dwarfs/Pygmys though. Bucks sell for anywhere from 25$ to 300.

Full sized 'mutt' goats only go for 100ish bucks.

Boer goats can be up to 400. There are LOTS of Boer crosses, too. Everything gets crossed with a boer, then sold as some form of useful goat. Like Boer/Nubian being sold as 'Excellent Dairy goats'.

I don't think they would be, though..?

 

[Icedangel11]

Oooh, wait though. I was just checking Craigslist.

Okay, went to the classifieds and livestock options. He's worth, roughly, 150-200 as a buck, 100 as a wether. Going by registration status and coloring. Nothing in the ads really mentioned milking quality.


So a Buck takes his udder genes from his mother. Not his father? I.E A Buck will only affect his DAUGHTERS udders and not what his son can pass on?

 

[Stacykins]

Oooh, wait though. I was just checking Craigslist.

Okay, went to the classifieds and livestock options. He's worth, roughly, 150-200 as a buck, 100 as a wether. Going by registration status and coloring. Nothing in the ads really mentioned milking quality.


So a Buck takes his udder genes from his mother. Not his father? I.E A Buck will only affect his DAUGHTERS udders and not what his son can pass on?

It is easier to see what he passes on through his daughters! Because his daughters have udders that can freshen, while sons do not.

For instance, I have kept two daughters (from two different breedings) from my one buck whose dam information I do NOT have. I will freshen them to see how they turn out, hopefully, well! If not, aww crap! He is homozygous for blue eyes, I believe. 10 out of 10 kids he has sired here have all been blue eyed. So when I have too many related daughters, he'll be my buck service buck. Plus, I'll know by then what he is throwing, udder wise. He is correcting steep rumps, which I like. His daughters have much smoother, level rumps than their dams.

 

[Icedangel11]

I see, that makes sense!

This morning the twins are doing well, but I'm a bit worried about how much they should be eating. They each gobbled down 2.5 ounces and still seem hungry, but their bellies feel pretty full (Not tight, but bit firm..) and they'd only been eating 1-1.5 ounces in the past.

Should I feed them until they stop headbutting me or keep them from overeating?

 

[H Diamond]

How often are you feeding them? Are they in with their dam still, or are you their only source of milk?

 

[Icedangel11]

I'm the only source of milk, and I feed them about every three hours? Or when they headbutt my leg.

Normally I'd just feed them. But their belly feels full and I don't want to make them sick.