Our story
The Beginning
Several years ago we started looking for our next home. The thought was to raise animals and have lost of space for our gardening. We found a 5 acre home in Plantersville. It already had a barn and pastures that were divided up into smaller paddocks. It was almost perfect. All we needed were the animals and gardens. But first, we remodeled the home to make it our home. We added a large patio and space for our son to do his dog training.
Our First Goats
After we settled in, we were looking for goats. We found two rescue goats, Memo and Meme. Memo was a wether mutt goat and meme was a Nigerian Dwarf goat. Both were saved by Kisha. Shortly after that, a neighborhood goat that was attacked several times was rehabilitated by our neighbors and adopted. Dipstick became our third goat. He converted from hanging with the horses to becoming a goat.
Deciding on the breed
Kisha started to do research on what type of goats we wanted to raise. After months of googling and searching, she decided on Kiko goats. They are a good milk and meat goat. They are hardy and pretty low maintenance. perfect for the lazy goat farmer.
First Try
We purchased our first batch of Kiko goats. Maleficent, her daughter Dori, Toby and Aurora were the first ones on the farm. Not long into this we had our first loss. Dori, the little one, got her head stuck in the feed tray and we found her dead the next morning. This was a very sad day on the farm. Shortly after that, all the feed trays had the metal guards removed and thrown away.
Next Step
To breed goats, you need a male goat or buck/sire. We found one in Mesia, TX. We planned a road trip and picked him up. He was our first buck. Flapjack quickly did his job and impregnated the female goats. About 5 months later, we had our first litters. Much to our surprise, Meme had triplets. We were told that she was fixed. But evidently not. Butkus (our first kid), Pancake, and Charlie Brown. Maleficent had one girl, Snow Flake. Toby had a boy, Comet. Aurora had a boy, Waffles. Unfortunately, we were new to goats and we lost two of the babies. Butkus got sick and died. Charlie Brown was kicked by a donkey and severly broke his leg and was put down. We now check our goats regularly and the donlkey is gone. We banded Pancake and Pancake. Comet was a pretty tan goat and we kept him for breeding.
Our next batch of goats came to the farm. Lucky, Fiona, and Sparkles are all female Kiko goats. They were about 6 months old. We wanted to breed them but had to wait a bit for them to gain some weight and get to a year old. We believe that they are all pregnant except for Lucky. She was the runt and we needed to fatten her up.
Round two of the goat breeding followed. Meme had triplets again (two boys and a girl), Little Foot, Pietre, and Ducky. Toby had twins, Haley and Beignet. Sadly, Beignet was not well and died a few hours after birth. Maleficent had a boy, Sam. Aurora had a girl, Pepper. Unfortunately, Aurora got sick and died a day after giving birth. Pepper became Kisha's project goat. She spent a few weeks in the house thinking she was a dog. Her and Rhea (our Australian Shepard) were best buddies. Pepper is now a member of the heard. She comes running when she sees Kisha. She thinks she is getting another bottle.
New Goal/Vision
Now that we have done this a few times, we have decided on raising 100% New Zealand Kiko goats. They are prized meat/milk goats that can trace their lineage back to New Zealand. We did some research and found a breeder in Natalia, TX (just outside San Antonio). Loaded the crates in the truck and made another road trip. Planned on buying three but would up with five.
We are up to 23 goats now and will be looking for a new buck (100% NZ Kiko) to start our new herd. We will most likely be selling Flapjack and Comet and let them find a new home where they can be goat sires. We will be looking for about five to eight more does about the same age from different breeders to diversify our stock and then adding in the buck late in 2023.
Then we will be breeding the new buck to all of the females. We will be selling the offspring in mid 2024.