Birth on our homestead

Every year in the spring on our homestead we welcome new life. This year our sweet Dolly, an all black female Nigerian dwarf goat, gave birth to 3 healthy kids. Dolly's birth story began last year when she was bred at our breeders in NY with a golden nigerian dwarf buck. After breeding she received an ultrasound to confirm that she was expecting twins/possibly triplets. A Nigerian Dwarf Goats average gestation is 145 days. As we approached Dolly's due date we moved her into her own birthing stall 2 days prior to due date.

On day 144 Dolly spent most of the day lying down and stretching with her legs up on the gate. I did not realize at the time that all of her stretching was to help get her kids in position for delivery. Later that afternoon I heard Dolly bahh-ing in the barn and went to check on her. When I did she was in labor and one of her kids heads was already out. With a little bit of assistance Dolly delivered her first kid.

After her first kid was born we started monitoring for the second. To our concern it took her 45 minutes to deliver the second kid, which we were reassured by our breeder was okay, and then 20 minutes after the 2nd her 3rd arrived. She delivered 2 bucks and 1 doe. All perfectly healthy. Dolly did an amazing job during her delivery and has been doing wonderful keeping up with nursing all of her kids.

It was an experience that my little kids and I will remember forever.