Birthing Question?

[Calendula]

Hey, everyone! It's been a long time since I've been on, although I wasn't very active and mostly just read everyone's topics. This place was a wellspring of information and is the reason I took my goats off grain (within reason -- lactating does get some).

Before I get to my question, I must brag: last Spring, my first doe had kids! Two bucks and one doe. We had video of it, and I'm proud to say that I felt great about how we did things and we will be doing the same this year. No kidding problems, she popped them out one after another like it was nothing.

Anyway, on to my question.

Recently, we picked our does up from the breeder. One of her does happened to have just had a kid, so she was telling us about the story. Apparently, this doe was at 153 or 154 days of gestation so she decided that was too long and tried to induce. Upon trying to induce, I guess the cervix wasn't dilated in the bit and before even doing anything, she broke the vaginal wall! And was apparently touching organs! This, for one, scares me... she always goes on about what a difficult doe this is with kidding, which is scary given that I have one of her kids who is expecting her own kids in a mere five months.

So I'm wondering, when would you induce for a doe? At what day is "too long"? I will, of course, probably be contacting the vet for his opinion.
Also (I don't know if this changes anything) but I know that my goat, this particular doe's daughter, is 75% ND, and then some part Pygora and Myotonic Fainter. The breeder's does are also all very overweight, which I think leads to most of her does' birthing problems (she is always complaining).

 

[TAH]

The does being over weight will cause issues, I am not sure so I will tag people who will help, @Southern by choice @Goat Whisperer @OneFineAcre @Green Acres Farm

 

[Goat Whisperer]

I have never induced, and would like to avoid doing so.
I think what the breeder did was irresponsible IMO. Inducing a doe that isn't even overdue in the manner that she did was careless.
She is lucky that the goat is alive. She shouldn't be breeding this doe if it is common for her to have kidding complications.
Being overweight defiantly plays are part.

If you ever had to induce, I would wait until the goat is past day 155. Only time I'd do it earlier is if I suspected dead/rotting kids. At that point it should be easy to tell as the doe would have a fever and would be acting ill. If you need to induce, get a vet involved.

Very glad your first kidding went well!
WHERE are the pics?!?! We need baby goat pics I can't believe you didn't keep us UTD

 

[frustratedearthmother]

I can't think of too many reasons that I'd induce. First - I'd have to be absolutely positive that I had a correct breeding date. But, just because most of the literature says a doe will kid at 150 days - I don't think the does have read the book! I've heard of folks who had does go 160 days or more. I'd keep a close watch on a doe and if she topped the time 'limit' I'd watch her some more, lol. If she seems healthy and eating I wouldn't worry too much.

The exception would be a tiny doe that might be carrying a big single kid. That's when it's wise of you to keep in touch with a vet and follow his advice. He/she can ultrasound and give you an idea of what's going on.

Kidding is a totally natural event and will happen on the does' time! They'll make you crazy waiting, but for the most part, I trust Mother Nature to know what she's doing.

 

[Goat Whisperer]

Kidding is a totally natural event and will happen on the does' time! They'll make you crazy waiting, but for the most part, I trust Mother Nature to know what she's doing.

Amen!

 

[Calendula]

Good to know that I wasn't just being paranoid or something about this. It's difficult trying to tell fact from fiction. I do know that she had (more or less) a perfect breeding date as the buck had escaped into the does' pen and bred her out of season (this happened two more times before she finally got it under control... by selling him).

@Goat Whisperer As far as "complications" go, she boasts about how all of her does have so many problems each and every year. Again, I sum most of this up to them being overweight... and her apparently being impatient. We have the same vet and we were worried that our goats were underweight compared to hers, but he came out and told us that they were perfect and that hers were overweight, and yet she continues to feed them (in my opinion!) way too much grain.
She just irks me! Last year she tried to tell me that my doe was too thin and needed to put on weight before she gave birth or else bad things would happen! Lies...

Also, thanks for the information regarding if there's a dead kid in there. I knew it was a possibility, but I didn't know how to keep an eye on it. I can keep an eye on a fever, though.

@frustratedearthmother Exactly what my mother said! She didn't understand why humans can go weeks over before having a kid, but a goat can't. And I know that the doe regularly gives birth to single kids, but she's a large doe and I think my kid from her, Fairy, was the same weight as a little buck we got from my first freshener who had three kids in her. And I've seen this kid that caused these problems, and she certainly isn't any bigger than the goat kids we had last year. I think her way of thinking it a little off.

 

[Calendula]

@Goat Whisperer And since you asked, here's some pictures of my lovely Daphne's kids. It was the scariest and yet most exciting event of my life. Just... the whole process. I remember she was very thin throughout the pregnancy and then she started to fatten up near the end and then one day, her whole stomach seemed to have disappeared. Scared me half to death and I thought maybe she was pregnant, but then the next day her belly came back.
And then on the day of her giving birth, I had been watching her on camera (she had been acting weird -- ate her grain, but not her alfalfa pellets, stared off into the distance, a little listless, etc.). I then took a brief break to take a shower and got back on the camera and there were two little kids stumbling about! We ran out there to then discover a third one. Her mother was nicknamed the "gumball machine" for spitting out three or four kids every year, but I was still shocked.
Before pictures, I would also like to add that I had read that you were supposed to separate the doe and her kids for a couple of days for bonding before letting any other goats around them. Well, the next morning came around and she was panicking. She wouldn't let the kids eat or anything, and I thought we were going to have to bottle feed all three kids. We ended up deciding that maybe she missed her herd, so we got one of our yearling does, Pixie, and brought her up. Daphne freaked out even more. Bucking, running around in circles, everything. I was scared, to say the least. So I removed Pixie and then decided to bring up Pixie's big brother, Stanley. We got Stanley the same year as we got Daphne, and the two of them have always been close. He had been in an adjacent pen to her while she was in the stall until she had the kids, when we removed him (for family bonding time). Let Stanley enter and she immediately calmed down, let the kids eat, everything. All that stress because she missed him and only him... luckily, he was great with the kids.

Now for pictures! The little gold and white one was called Billy the Kid, the black and white was Bronco, and the little chocolate and white was our doe, named Winona which means "first born daughter" in some Native American language.
As it turns out, I don't have any pictures of Daphne or Winona now, nor can I find the pictures of the boys as babies. But I have some of them a little older.

 

[babsbag]

Everyone covered this pretty well. A few years ago I had a standard Alpine doe that went to either 161 or 163. I knew the exact day she was bred but I was told that they don't always settle on that day, it can take a few more. I thought she was going to pop but if a doe isn't in distress I won't induce. I have a friend that did and she lost all three kids as her dates were wrong.

 

[TAH]

Very cute colors on the kids

 

[Calendula]

Good to know. I never really thought about it until then. After all, if I had followed my dates from last year, I would have induced nearly a month early! (Long story about why I got the dates wrong...)

@TAH Thank you. I was thrilled to see how different they all were!