Basic Management

All of our goats have free access to prairie grass and/or sedan hay that we cut and bale ourselves. Our milking herd/late gestation does are sometimes supplemented Alfahay- an alfalfa product we keep in stock year round. Due to the quality of local alfalfa sources (with the exception of one) we choose not to feed a lot of Alfalfa hay because we have found it to be very wasteful with the abundance of stems that goats do not prefer. 

Clean and fresh water must be offered at all times. During the summer months on the very hot days sometimes we will also additional electrolytes. During the winter months we use deicers and/or heaters to keep water available year round. 

We use a custom made goat ration that is about 16% protein. We feed grain to every animal, every day, year round. During the warmer months we only feed once/day, during the COLD winter months we feed twice/day. Milking does are fed grain only on the milk stand while milking throughout their lactation regardless of time of year. We feed our grain using fenceline feeders which keeps feed of the ground, keeps feet out of the feeders AND eliminates the rushing of goats when going in and out of pens. 

Free choice access to Duraferm Goat Concept Aid year round. We have found in our area with the hay we provide that when using Duraferm we have a lot less issues with having copper and/or zinc deficiencies. In a pinch if we run low and cannot pick up Duraferm we have access to Sweetlix Meat Maker. 

Our adult herd is vaccinated with Endovac-Dairy and Calvary 9 prior to kidding. Kids are vaccinated with CDT (or Calvary 9) at disbudding with a booster at 3 weeks, at weaning and then yearly. 

We do not deworm on a schedule, instead we monitor famacha scores and run random fecals as needed. We have set our farm up to rotate pastures/dry lots giving each pen 30-45 days rest before reintroduing another group of animals. Pens are rotated as needed based on weather conditions, grass growth and need for sun/shade. 

Deworming:Valbazen and Noromectin injectable as needed.

External Parasites: Ultraboss Pour-on for flea, tick, fly, etc prevention as needed.

Coccidia Prevention: Calf-Pro given daily starting around 3 days of age on kids. Bottle kids will stay on Calf-Pro until they are established well on medicated grain around weaning off milk (8-12 weeks of age)

Coccidia Treatment: Baycox 5% if needed

The majority of our shelters are 3-sided that provides protection from wind and rain or snow and keeps them dry. The majority of our shelters do not have access to power and therefore we RARELY use heat lamps. 

At Harvest Moon our personal lives are very busy with kids very active in sports. That being said we do not choose to pen breed often. Most all breedings are live cover (using a buck on our property) when the buck and doe are kept together for about an hour when doe is in heat. We also utilize Artificial Insemination practices right here on the farm. We do not rush heat cycles and generally only use hormones to bring does in heat when we have our bucks being collected.