# Dam raised vs bottle baby



## alsea1 (Jun 23, 2014)

I think I prefer dam raised.
My kids are all dam raised.  They are friendly enough but prefer goats for companionship.
I just got a new doe kid and she was a bottle baby.  She prefers me and see's me as a place to run to.
She also seems to be at a loss as to get a place in the group.
I hope she gets past this as a I hate looking out and seeing her all by herself. Seems rather lonely.


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## OneFineAcre (Jun 23, 2014)

She'll find her place in the group. 

We got new buckling, Fortunato who came to us "trough" raised.  Breeder still takes the babies away at birth and they learn to drink milk from a trough.  But, same principle they look at humans as their moms.  It took him a couple of weeks to "fit" in with the other babies.

On another subject, did you ever  get some Toltrazuril ?

It has worked really good for us.


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## alsea1 (Jun 23, 2014)

No I have not yet. Its on my list though.
Do you happen to know what the milk with hold on it is?


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## OneFineAcre (Jun 23, 2014)

You mean milk withdrawal time?  No data on that.  And since it isn't USDA approved, no vet is going to even make a recommendation on the subject.

Best I can find it's 72 days for meat, in New Zealand for sheep.  Milk withdrawal is always less than meat.

I wouldn't give it to a doe in milk.  We've just been giving to kids.


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## goatgurl (Jun 23, 2014)

I've raised them both ways and for me, if it is a doeling i'm going to keep to milk i like to bottle or bucket raise them so them are super tame and think i am the be all, end all of their life and they are easy to work with but if i am raising them for meat then i like to let mom do the work.  I'm still able to work with them but they are a little more standoffish. so far its worked for me


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## goats&moregoats (Jun 23, 2014)

New to babies late winter(not my choice, previous owner) and early spring. Winter babies I bottle fed, Spring babies dam raised. I have not quite made up my mind on preference. I kept one of the bottle babies and she does follow me everywhere. I am hoping that as the one dam raised I kept gets older they will make a connection. They do play together a bit. Winter baby is 4 months and Spring baby is 2 months. Hopefully adding some new babies (bought) in a couple of weeks might help as well.


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## alsea1 (Jun 24, 2014)

For me its important that they want to be with the other goats as my electric fence will not hold a human oriented goat baby. LOL
And I'm a bit lazy. I like not having to do bottles and such.  And the mom seems to know just how much to let them have at a time.


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## alsea1 (Jun 24, 2014)

I am concerned that this doeling did not learn mothering skills from her mother.  Has anyone found this with bottle baby does.  
Just how much of goat mothering is pure instinct and how much do they learn from their mother I wonder.


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## goatgurl (Jun 24, 2014)

I totally agree that electric fence won't hold a determined goat of any size and people oriented goats can be determined!  some years back i fenced my garden with electric and had an Arabian mare that would tolerate the zap to get in but wouldn't go back out and would stand there till i got home from work to let her out.  and laziness is why i let the moms rise the bucks and wethers.  don't have to milk mama or feed babies. most of the time if i have more than one or two babies i use a lamb bar to feed them and it is pretty easy to keep clean.  i enjoy learning how others care for their herd


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## goatgurl (Jun 24, 2014)

just saw your last post.  that age old question nature vs nurture.  even the babies who were bottle raised were good mothers if they kidded with bucks and i let them keep the babies.  I've never had any of them reject a kid and woe be the dog or chicken or duck who comes near their baby.  had one of the yearlings grab a duck by the tail the other day.  i laughed


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## OneFineAcre (Jun 24, 2014)

We bought 3 goats a couple of years ago, who not only were bottle raised themselves, but had each freshened themselves before and had their kids taken and bottle raised. (1 goat had freshened once before, the other 2 had freshened twice before)

All 3 were excellent mothers when they freshened at our place.


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## alsea1 (Jun 24, 2014)

That is great to hear. What a relief.


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## jodief100 (Jun 24, 2014)

I don't have much experience with bottle babies but I can say I have had a difficult time with milk goats.  Every milk goat I buy is a horrible mother.  My theory has been that since they are usually bottle raised and have been for generations, there is no selection for mothering ability. 

The one bottle baby I had that I kept for breeding was a good mother.  I think if the bottle babies are kept in with the general herd they will learn to be good mommies but if all the bottle babies are kept separate they might not.


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## alsea1 (Jun 24, 2014)

Hmmm. 
I guess I will find out if Elennore has it or not in April or so.


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## Melanie (Jun 24, 2014)

All my kids have been dam raised.  I have one that acts exactly how people describe a bottle baby but his dam was an ff and did raise him well but left him alone frequently.  I spent lots of time with all of them and they all are very very friendly.


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## OneFineAcre (Jun 24, 2014)

We sometimes do a little of both.  We've had dams with quads or trips and we've gotten the littlest on a bottle too.
The thing is when we give them a bottle the others become curious and come around to see what's going on.  We've had some that do that and you stick the bottle  in their direction and they will suck on it too.

We've experienced something this year that we never have seen before.  A doe letting another doe's kid nurse her.  Both of Rosemary's bucklings are gone and one of Daisy's kids nurse her and she let's him.  Never had that happen before.


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## hilarie (Jun 25, 2014)

My adult does, acquired 2 years ago, were all bottle raised.  None of them had any mothering "demonstration", and before I got them, their babies had always been removed at birth. They were, of course, very tame and human oriented (I happen to like that, and it makes milking them a snap).  The first year I bred my does, two out of three were allowed to raise at least one baby because they were doelings I wanted to keep.  Those goat mamas, without any blueprint to follow, were excellent moms.  Their babies, yearlings this year, are very tame and sweet girls, but I have a small herd and I'm able to socialize them a lot as they're growing up.  One of them is expecting this summer - it will be interesting to see how she does.  She could hardly be better than her dam, who did great on instinct alone.  I've no idea if this is generalizable - this is just my experience, which has been a really good one.


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## hilarie (Jun 25, 2014)

OneFineAcre said:


> We sometimes do a little of both.  We've had dams with quads or trips and we've gotten the littlest on a bottle too.
> The thing is when we give them a bottle the others become curious and come around to see what's going on.  We've had some that do that and you stick the bottle  in their direction and they will suck on it too.
> 
> We've experienced something this year that we never have seen before.  A doe letting another doe's kid nurse her.  Both of Rosemary's bucklings are gone and one of Daisy's kids nurse her and she let's him.  Never had that happen before.


One of my goat mentors calls that kind of doe a "goat auntie."


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## Fullhousefarm (Jul 2, 2014)

Just chiming in late. I have a goat who's dams have been bottle raised exclusively for at least three generations.  She was a great mom with no previous example of motherhood.


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