Odd thoughts about my bad luck this year

We've been going crazy with the two kids that died. Now, with a kid with scours, I'm beginning to feel cursed. But maybe it's my own fault.

We chose to have later births because cold weather is hard on the critters. But the kids that are having the most problems are generally the ones born later. Generally.

Oreo, our buck, is 4 years old this year. Annie is 5, Belle and Heidi are 4, and Delilah is 3+. My husband asked if the age might affect the kids. I was inclined to say no, but now, not so sure.

Thoughts? Musings?

I doubt that the age of the parent goats is much of a factor, if any. However, I'm only basing that on my own experiences. I had a 13 year old doe give birth a week ago and her babies are some of the nicest, healthiest, and most active ones on the place. Same doe gave birth last year and same story...great babies! I've also had 10 + year old bucks fathering babies that were awesome and healthy too.

I know nothing about the weather in Montana, but at least in my part of the world (south of Houston) my winter babies seem to be less stressed than summer babies. Here at least, the summer heat and humidity are not easy on new born baby lungs. But, the same heat and humidity seem to be great for parasites which in turn is another challenge those later babies have to battle earlier in life.

Again, not sure if the same circumstances apply in your neck of the woods....but maybe something to think about.

Hope your luck turns around!

IMHO with the average life span of goats at over ten years, there should be no "age issues" affecting your kids for years to come... Your goats are really in their prime right now. Not sure about where you are, but the front range of Colorado has had a real moisture problem this year... we've had more rain this spring than in years. Have you had a real wet spring? Could that be a contributing factor? We've only just now started getting real heat, with temps in the 90s.

frustratedearthmother said:

I know nothing about the weather in Montana, but at least in my part of the world (south of Houston) my winter babies seem to be less stressed than summer babies. Here at least, the summer heat and humidity are not easy on new born baby lungs. But, the same heat and humidity seem to be great for parasites which in turn is another challenge those later babies have to battle earlier in life.

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Latestarter said:

Not sure about where you are, but the front range of Colorado has had a real moisture problem this year... we've had more rain this spring than in years. Have you had a real wet spring? Could that be a contributing factor? We've only just now started getting real heat, with temps in the 90s.

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Okay, so the weather may be the factor. Dang, dang, dang. Sometimes to make things easier on the kids can actually kill them.

Typical NW Montana weather: cold and snowy until ? in spring. Then tons of rain, aka mud season, then around July 4th the water tap shuts off and we go into fire season -- hot and dry. This year with El Nino, we've been completely screwed. Weather went warm early. Firehose (rained a bunch) came out. The heat came early with the unlikely 90s in the beginning of June.

Whereabouts in Colorado do you live, Latestarter? I used to live there.

I'm about 20 miles N/NE of Denver. Mountains are within view and an easy hour drive away (with traffic). Truth be told, I'd rather be up where you are

I don't think that the age of goats is the issue, they are in their prime, and also not convinced it is the weather. Newborn kids can have a tough time with high daytime temps and low nighttime but you will usually see respiratory issues; not the problems that you had.

I struggled with 3 kids this year that were just chronically depressed and had scours. They were just off for no apparent reason. They finally turned around after 3 weeks with some scour halt but this was after trying everything else in the book, I think that they had e-coli. Right now I have another one with scours, and NOTHING is working; and another has been fighting pneumonia for over a month. Sometimes things just happen and we can't always explain it, and it just stinks.

Weve had a tough year two with three unexplained very sudden deaths (2 yr old, 3 month old, 6 weeks old). All super healthy and 4-8 hours later die in our arms. This following three miscarriages/abortions in early January.

We sent the last one in for a necropsy, but I'm not optimistic that they will find anything conclusive. It's heartbreaking because its been the handful of does that were for sure keepers, the special ones. The bottle baby. The one that was well on her way to being a champion that was second generation born on our farm.

It stinks. I'm almost done blaming myself but the last two have taken their toll. Sometimes farming is hard.