Our kidding season for 2025 was quite chaotic and had kiddings spread so far out from each other, that it made my milk testing schedule so complicated. We had many unfortunate happenings that interfered with plans. My dad always tells me he doesn't make any plans because they never work out anyway. Every time I start to "plan" for something I hear him in my head saying that! He is right though. I can plan all I want and things will happen that are out of my control.

Since we had Kenai, a senior buck that kept going backwards in health every time he went into rut, but was the main buck we wanted to use, breedings were all over the place in terms of timing. When he got to the point where I just knew he wasn't going to be able to cover does anymore, I went ahead and started breeding with my other sires as does came into season. We ended up losing Kenai in January 2025 and it made me realize how important semen collection is when you are trying to preserve something. I regret not getting him collected, but I also did not plan on losing him so soon. He was sold to me cheap, because he was old, so it was a blessing he was able to give me what he did. 

As does came into season, it was evident that I would be kidding all the way out to Summer. Something I try to avoid at all costs, becuase of the heat, flies, parasites etc. There was a long list of first fresheners that needed to be bred to get the program rolling and the sires I am using proven. Our linear appraisal date of course would be early on the year my kiddings were later. Subsequently, there were does that were too fresh for appraisal, some that didn't even freshen yet or were not bred. Two weeks before appraisal, one of our most anticipated does to get appraised came down with Polio. We were able to get her through it and back in shape to be appraised. She later succumbed to pneumonia, but we found out there were many pre existing issues with her that were the root cause of her health problems. She was also a half sister to Kenai and came from the same home as he did. They both had the same symptoms in the end but at least with her we were able to figure out what was happening and extended her life as much as we possibly could. It was extremely devastating to lose her, since we own two of her daughters, her dam a half sister, and now a buckling she had with her half brother Kenai. I was really looking forward to getting her milk star and continuing that down her line. The milk test we did do on her is not a true representation of her real production capabilities, because she was sick. Lanna had an incredibly capacious udder that was well attached per the appraiser this year. Funny, last years appraiser did not have the same opinion, but she was also not in lactation like this time. 

After the chaos of preparing for Linear, having a doe go down, freshening does, and making sure we were milk testing on time to get a Genetic Evalutation for does who were freshening, my dad had a minor heart attack. I had to be at the hospital with him for almost a week, so I ended up missing disbudding a group of kids. That's ok though, being with him was far more important! It absolutely wrecked my focus and attention to the goals I had. It took me a long time to get over the stress and anxiety that my dads health diagnoses brought me. 

To add salt to injury, in the middle of Summer at the peak of the heat, our well started drying up. At that point we had to make difficult decisions to downsize the herd. When we went without water for four days, and the goats drank almost 500 gallons in two days time (because we hauled water in), I realized something that in the past I had the privilege to overlook. That being, if an animal does not bring me joy and it has more negatives than positives, it does not deserve to take up our precious resources. That was an eye opening moment for me! It does not matter the bloodline or pedigree. We put our time, our land resources, have to financially sustain each one of these animals and care for them every day. Some of them I had never thought of letting go as they were part of our foundation plans. I found myself having to think long and hard about my goals, and which animals were going to fit with the direction I want to go. We were fortunate to find great homes for all of the goats we decided to let go of, but it was a hard thing to do nonetheless. 

Kidding so late in the season really hurt the production on our girls too. It was so hot, they were so miserable. The ones peaking in their lactation in the middle of the worst heat waves we have ever had in our region struggled. I could tell, they didn't want to eat as much and that certainly affected production. Then, someone who I respect and who has so much experience made a comment that really put things back into perspective. "It is imperative that their peak production coincide with cooler temperatures". Afterall, I had always planned our breedings to be in late Winter and early Spring. Trying to build my herd and get the most out of the genetics I had access to completely derailed my previous routine. I also considered that I need a break from milking too, and with this crazy all over the place kidding schedule, I would be milking well into the next year, and kidding again at the same time. 

I made an executive decision to dry everyone up, and start over. Forget about the milk stars right now. I got a lot of information that I really needed from participating in DHI and would regroup, get back to a better routine. 

Lucky for us, our does started going into season late Summer. Breeding started extremely early for us, which was an answered prayer. With willing and able young sires to get the job done, my plans of regrouping and being on a strict kidding schedule, with a strict deadline started coming together!

Our kidding season begins in December 2025 and ends February 2026, with three possible kiddings in March from does who may or may not have short cycled. We had one doe abort unfortunately, so she will not be re-bred and participate in any performance programs for 2026. Again, I need to stick to the plan. This coming year will be another telling one on what I keep and move on once again. I have very specific expectations for milk production. 

This is what our schedule looks like in number of does kidding for each month:

December 2025: 8 

January 2026: 14

February 2026: 5

We've confirmed 7 so far! 

Granted that things go as planned, we will be milking all of our does daily 2x a day for a minimum of 240 days! Wish us and all of our does a fruitful and safe kidding/milking season 2026.