bottle vs dam raising?
 

Which do you do/prefer and why? We bottle fed our goat babies this summer and are seriously thinking about keeping the babies with their mamas this next year instead.

There are definite reasons to bottle raise. CAE prevention is a good reason in dairy stock. However, I believe a lot of learned herd behavior is lost when one bottle feeds. I see a distinct difference between the feeding habits of those goats I have had that were bottle fed versus dam raised. They learn what to eat and what to leave alone by watching their elders and I feel that the bottle raised babies lack some of that knowledge and a get into trouble sometimes because of it.

But I really think it's a personal choice. I'd rather have to cull hard should I come up with CAE issues than put forth all of the effort and essentially add to the cost of raising my kids. Maximum output with minimum input is how I'd like to make my money.

The breeder we purchased our Kinders from does sort of a half and half thing - she separates the kids from their dams at night (all the kids go in a kid section of the barn out of sight from mom, in the morning she milks the dams out some - reserving milk for bottles, then brings the kids in and bottle feeds those who will take it. The kids are then reunited with their dams for the rest of the day. Not all of the kids will take a bottle, though, but all of them get handled in the effort and get to experience being around close to humans a little in the process.

We didn't bottle feed our kids - we both work so would have been too hard to pull off. Breed seems to have a bit to do with it. OUr Kinder kids are pretty skittish, only a couple of them are coming around on their own. They're all headed for freezer camp, so I'm not trying hard....the Kikos on the other hand will already let us pet and mess with them - and we have managed them no differently.

It seems to me that you always get more people oriented goats by bottle raising, but they do better overall on the Doe. It takes a good deal of time to "tame" a doe raised goat, and they never seem to get to where you can easily work with them. The CAE and all is a good reason to bottle feed. But the overall health and vigor of doe raised kids argues the other way. I understand if you wipe out CAE by bottle feeding in one generation you are done with it? If so then that's likely what I'd do.

I don't have a really large herd and all my does are very friendly. I don't have a problem with 'wild' kids. They are all crazy about the people and looking for scratches and my kids and the does kids run around and play together. And I also, when I am milking, separate kids at night from their moms. If I had milking machines I might start doing it differently but 5 does and just my hands, I'm good with once a day!

My 2c; I raised my 1st set of MiniManchas on their dams. They were born in March, the doelings are still nursing!

My children played with them a lot, so they are well socialized. However, I think they could be more so. I will be bottle raising this next set.

Cratercove has a good thing going. The 'lock them up at night' works great. I've done it many times. That is often the perfect solution. One of my doelings, however, has an extra set of springs in her legs and hops the 4+ foot door!

It's a time and personal inclination thing. I really do NOT like bottle raising kids, and my personal schedule is too full for it. I would much rather spend available time with them and tame them that way.

I think the biggest difference is if you attempt to dam raise kids on half-wild does. They pick up the skittishness from their moms. Tameness wise, I've seen no difference between dam raised kids on friendly does and bottle-fed kids. The more the goats are handled the friendlier they become, regardless of feeding method. You can still have crazy wild bottle-fed kids if you just use a lamb bar and never handle them otherwise. Only difference is they'll trample you to get to food:-)

both of my milkers were dam raised. they are as quiet and tame as you would want. i spent time with them as babies, and gave their dams little bits of snacks to make them come easy and fast. babies learned when i show up, hurry or you'll miss out! i don't want the headache of bottles, i have too much to do. lock em up overnight, milk moms, together all day. also leaves me the option of sneaking away for a few days once the kids are old/big enough to empty the dam.

Let the dam raised kids come in the milk house while you are milking the dams. Feed them Cheerios. :) They will be very gentle.

I also prefer to dam raise our kids here. If your herd is CAE tested & negative I see no reason to bottle feed to prevent CAE. I like CraterCove have very friendly dam raised babies but our herd is small & we spend a lot of time with our goats.
Dam raised kids learn so much from their mothers & others in the herd.

I did have 2 bottle kids this year but not my choice, I wanted a specific kid for the bloodline from another breeder & she ONLY sells as bottle kids because she wants the milk so it was either take her as a bottle kid or she'd sell her to the next person on the list but that's another story.
My bottle raised kids had to be separate from the rest of the herd for a long time because they had no mother to protect them, they didn't learn goat things near as fast as the dam raised babies & the Biggest thing I Noticed is they didn't grow as nice with as much heft to them as my dam raised kids, even though I bottled them for just as long.

I enjoy milking my goats. I like feeding the horses and chickens. I like trimming hoofs and brushing the horses. I'm sure I will dam raise the bucklings. I'll probably pull all the Doelings off the registered girls. My Daughter said yesterday that her favorite class is Agri. That was music to my ears. I'll have plenty of help bottle feeding the selected ones. I have a lamancha that will take any kid and can handle 4 at a time. I'll sell her kids at birth as bottle babies and let her raise some. I have a plan. It might all change in February.

my unexpected fall kids are being dam raised but I pulled them in for the first few days and bottle fed them and when I go out to feed the goats I pick them up and scratch on them and they are just as friendly as any bottle kid I have had, however I wont be doing that this spring and we will be using the buckets. It not only makes them friendlier in general but also makes them easier to sell earlier.

So far I have bottle fed everyone. Kids like it and I don't mind it, so far. This year we purchased a saanen that had twin bucks on her that were just over a week old. There was NO WAY to get near them or anything. Thankfully they were bucks and grew quickly. :whistle:

I have always bottle raised my kids. Eventually, I will probably have some that I allow to dam raise some kids so it's less work for me. Especially if I'm going to be eating them.

Our dam raised kids are just as friendly as any bottle kid, just not as obnoxious.

I dam raise all of my kids. I just see no point to pulling kids and having to spend time bottle feeding them when their dams have the knowledge and equipment to do it perfectly. I also very much dislike bottle babies - they grow into super annoying adults that don't realize they're goats (they think they're human). Just my own personal opinion.

We have done both not by choice. Our choice is to dam raise the kids and hande them daily. They have always turned out very friendly but they are more inclined to stay with the herd rather than me. The bottle raised kids were obnoxious brats who would do anything and everything to get to me rather than stay with the herd. I got tired of them being on my porch with their feet on my sliding glass door screaming at me all day long.

lol! I am enjoying hearing the bottle kid horrors. The one bottle baby I have, raised by Cannon Farms is super sweet and not at all a brat. It just seems she is behind the learning curve when it comes to herd interaction and following the lead doe. But she is very sweet and not obnoxious-- oddly enough one of my dam raised girls, Vicci, is the one who won't get away from you. If I am sitting on the ground outside she comes on by and swings her legs over my shoulder and wants to know what that is I am reading and if it tastes good!

I pull and bottle raise the dairies, and dam raised most of the boers. I don't have time to ensure all the dairy kids are tame if they are dam raised and I refuse to try to break a dam raised crazy doe to the milkstand. :) Bottle feeding isn't that hard nor does it have to take up a large chunk of your day. If you want to tame them the old fashioned way, then that's fine with me, too - but with our herd size and our schedules, taming that way is simply not feasible at all.

The boers are handled just a handful of times per year. Some are tame, some are not. I really couldn't care less, because they don't all need to be my friends to be valueable members of the herd. :) Most of my goats want my attention and to be honest, I already don't have enough hands. :) If a crazy one is sick, we pen it in an iso pen designed for easy capture. This is pretty rare though. Occassionally we'll bottle raise a boer kid because sometimes I"m struck by the fancy to have a tame boer doe. And because dad thinks the boer babies are the cutest. :)

Most people who have packgoats (usually wethers) think bottle feeding is the way to go. That's because you want your goats strongly bonded with you, not with other goats. This important because you're out in the boondocks away from home with your goats, and you want them to stick close to you wherever you go, not wander off and get eaten by mountain lions.

I actually did both this year. Next year they are all on the bottle. It was just to hard to get the dam raised kids to wean. I seperated them for three months, they still wanted to nurse, so I had to dry up the dam and tape her to keep the kids off. If I had a larger place with more room it might be a different story. Next year I will seperate kids, train them to the bucket, then when they get about a month old I put them all in with the does. They don't nurse the does but they get to grow up with the herd. They always know where the bucket is when they get hungry.

I do both. Most are raised by momma, but I do have bottle kids every year. This year I had 3 sets of triplets so took 1 baby from each momma. And had one new mother that decided she was far to busy to care for her kids. I do love my bottle babies but they are a pain the tush sometimes. :)