After the kidding has occurred, what requires your attention?
The dam will probably clean and care for the kid if you allow the opportunity. She is, after all, "by far the best stirrer of life and general sanitizer. She will lick, massage, and tend her kid as soon as it enters the outside world, and then efficiently deliver a second or third, tending them all within an hour’s span. An experienced darn has her progeny delivered, up and about, licked, and fluffed-up within fifteen to forty-five minutes of the first one’s presentation".
If the drop from the dam at birth has not done so, you or the doe will need to remove the membrane over the kid’s face to prevent suffocation. You can clean the kid’s nose and mouth with a clean towel. You may also dry the kid and stimulate circulation of its blood.
If the kid is not breathing or if its breathing is labored, hold it up by its hind legs so inhaled fluids will drain away. You might give it a smack on the side with your open hand to make it gasp and begin normal breathing.
Sometimes a newborn kid’s lungs are greatly congested with amniotic fluid. One writer suggests that if there is serious congestion with amniotic fluid, the fastest way to clear the lungs is to swing the kid gently by the legs, upside down. Centrifugal force will tend to eliminate the fluid. If the congestion is not critical and the doe is lying down, the kid may be placed on its tummy with its lead hanging down over the dam’s back to drain the lungs. Fluid in the nostrils and throat may be sucked out with an ear syringe.
If kidding occurs at below freezing temperatures, as it often does in Alaska (Minnesota too!!), be particularly careful to see that the kid is thoroughly dry. Then provide heat up to 40 degrees F.
Kids can be lost through infection of navel. The kid should have been born onto a clean surface such as straw, sawdust, or cardboard. When delivery is finished, remove all wet and soiled matter (being careful not to unduly disturb the now resting dam) and replace it with clean bedding material.
If the umbilical cord is still attached, tie it with a soft (preferably cotton) cord about two inched from the kid’s belly and sever it below the knot with sharp, clean scissors. The tag end will dry and fall off the kid in about three weeks.
Within four hours of the birth of the kid, pour some 7% iodine solution into a small container. Press that over the navel against the kid’s belly and slosh iodine so as to paint the area around the navel. Keeping the kid on clean bedding, having a sunny exposure in the goat run, and avoiding touching the navel all help eliminate navel infection.
The kid should get its first feeding of colostrum within about fifteen to thirty minutes of birth, and never more than an hour or so. Flow to give that vital first drink is a subject for unending debate.
Most professional breeders, and many small scale goat keepers, take the kids from the dam before any real suckling takes place. Others leave kids with their dam for four hours then separate them. The theory seems to be that the dam is too stupid to miss them, and the kids won’t know or care whether their food comes from a bottle or directly from the udder. They also argue that taking the kids from the dam saves wear on the dam’s udder, provides a means of assuring equal and measured nourishment to all the kids, permits pasteurization of milk for disease control, avoids later weaning problems, allows accurate measurement of the does milk production, and affords increased opportunity to raise "people oriented" kids.
If you intend to rear the kids by hand, you are advised to take them away from the dam before they have any chance what so ever to nurse, or else have tape on hand (obtained from dairy goat suppliers) to seal the teats to prevent nursing. Hand feeding kids is usually great fun, especially if children are helping.
Other goat keepers feel it is best not to go against nature - that neither the dam nor the kids should be deprived of maternal association for at least the first four days. The argument here is that the doe is best equipped to care for the kids during their first days, especially if you are a relatively inexperienced hand at raising kids. Proponents of this method are convinced that both the doe and the kids are emotionally and physically better off when left to enjoy each other’s company and attention, and the herder is relieved of some pretty tedious care responsibilities for at least several days. There must be round the clock feeding of kids in their first week, a four or five hour intervals, including the middle of the night. If the keeper is not able to be available on such a schedule, the kids are best left with the dam.
If newborn kids are with the dam for more than a few hours
and are then to be hand raised, it will be necessary to have a separate pen for
them. If they have suckled and have any hope at all of nursing again, they will
refuse bottles and pans of milk. If the kids are removed from the dam during the
first day they can be returned to the goat yard as soon as they have accepted
hand feeding - usually within two or
three days and they likely will have no interest in nursing their dam.
The decision, of course, is yours.
Newborn kids have no natural protection from disease. Essential antibodies come from colostrum -that special thick yellow milk produced by the dam for the first three to four days after kidding. In addition to supplying vitamins, nourishment and antibodies, it also acts as a laxative to get the kid’s digestive and elimination systems off to a good start, helping the kid’s expel the black substance which is its first feces. This should start to appear (in the straw bedding) within twelve hours. If it doesn’t, you have a problem which likely requires assistance from a veterinarian.
If for some reason colostrum is not available, give the kids some warm milk with a teaspoon of Milk of Magnesia, and hope for the best. (incidentally, if your doe produces more colostrum than the kids need for the first two days, it’s a really good idea to save the excess in the freezer - you never know when you or someone else will need it later.
The kid is at first essentially a simple stomached animal, with only the fourth chamber of its digestive system active until the rumen is developed and it begins to nibble hay or other fodder. Therefore, kids should be fed only colostrum during their first two or three days of life. If you plan to leave the kids with the doe, encourage them to nuzzle and suckle soon after birth. There, are formula’s such as Land 0’ Lakes, specially prepared for kids. Calf replacer is lower in protein, and lamb replacer is higher in fat than the goat milk. For kids, lamb milk replacer seems the better of the two. Choose a replacer which contains milk solids rather than vegetable protein. Mix some of the substitute with goat milk and gradually increase the amount of replacer while reducing the amount of milk. (Note: If you are going to sell the kid before weaning, it is easier for a new owner to continue a feeding program if it is on milk replacer.
Kids need hay for rumen development. At two week of age, start providing hay, free choice, even if green pasture if available. Introduce a little grain also. (If you are pan feeding, you can sprinkle grain on the milk or water.) It is important that they begin eating solid foods, so try offering a variety of "goodies" like comfrey leaves, sunflower seeds, and vegetable trimming. Provide fresh water at all times.
At eight weeks, or when the kid has triples its birth weight and is chewing its cud, start weaning. Gradually dilute the milk with water and eliminate on the twice a day feeding for a week before, stopping all such feeding. The kid will be weaned without really noticing it.
If you are planning to sell the kid and it has been running with the dam and or other goats, you might try preparing for the break by separating the kid over increasingly longer periods of time. Start with ten minutes and gradually lengthen the time to several hours or even a whole day.
The first feces passed by a kid resembles black grease. In the normal course of events, this soon changes to yellow-orange clumps, and finally small scale goat pellets. Scoring is diarrhea. It can have very serious consequences. It seldom occurs in kids who have received sufficient colostrum early in life and who don’t experience sudden changes in their diet. If it does happen, treat it immediately. Try any of the following: (1) dilute the milk by half with water; (2) use boiled, then cooled, skimmed milk; (3) add some Kaopectate to the formula. It is important to avoid the loss of any more body moisture than can be avoided.
For constipation, use Milk of Magnesia in the milk - the same amount as prescribed for a human baby of the same weight.
The easiest, least expensive, and least traumatic method of dehorning is the electric disbudding iron. This is done preferably at four or five days of age (depending somewhat on the breed of goat.) Earlier disbudding may be advisable for a buck who will pursue a career of breeding. This is a subject which deserves a separate discussion.