# Yearling milkers? Yay or nay?



## moonmilk_creamery (Oct 21, 2015)

Hey y'all!

I am considering breeding my oberhasli doe this season. She is a march baby so she will be 8 months in November. I would really like to get her bred this season so I can get milk. I have read many things on the web saying that 8 months or 80-90lbs is a safe minimum for breeding. Others say wait till 1.5 years. It would be great to have some advice from people who have bred goats for a while. Thanks!!


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## Laney3535 (Jun 25, 2012)

So in my own personal opinion I would say no.... 8 months is very young. Some people just want to make as many improvements as possible in a shorter amount of time. Since she is still doing a lot of growing, a pregnancy can possibly stunt her growth. We had an 8 month old kid get bred last year and she definitely hasn't grown as well as her sister who wasn't bred. But it's up to what you think is okay. If she is large enough that you think she could handle giving birth right at this very moment, then go for it. But I think 10 months is as low as I think is safe. 

She should be okay if you breed her now, but her growth could be stunted is all! How big is she???


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## Ranger1 (Sep 1, 2014)

I say 8 months is too young. Maybe not too small, but too young. 
This year will be my first year breeding yearlings. They will kid when they are about 1.5 years old. I don't want to go any sooner than that. 
Every yearling I leave dry, just gets extremely fat and besides, I get nothing out of them for a year. So, I've come up with a new plan. 
Pam is born in February of 2015. I breed her January/February of 2016 for June/July kids (let's call them Sugar and Pie). Then I milk her through and breed her fall of 2017. By September of 2017, Sugar and Pie are each a little over a year old. Then I breed them for February kids (they will be a year and seven months) and the cycle begins again. That way, I have no big, fat, dry yearlings, and no skinny, little, milking, just-over-a-yearlings. 
I don't know why I even wrote all of that-oh well.


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## thegoatgirl (Nov 27, 2011)

This is a topic that I have seen debated for ages. Personally, I think it all comes down to the animal and the circumstances.

Some lines grow very fast, and mature early. These are the lines that you would try and breed earlier, as they can also get overweight and become harder to breed. Good minerals/vitamins are a must, as the doe is focusing on the kids and will need to be in excellent condition for kidding, *especially* if she comes from high-producing lines. If an animal is not at least eighty pounds, I personally will not breed, and I try to shoot for around a hundred pounds. You would also want to make sure that she has a very low worm and cocci count before breeding. 

For slower maturing lines, I prefer to keep them dry. Most of my does are very slow maturing, and I learnt the hard way that they need time to grow, if not as yearlings as slightly older does. They are also very heavy milkers, so it is much harder to keep weight on them. 

A downside to keeping a doe dry is that they can get spoiled rotten and sometimes become the farm nuisances. If they have very strong heats, that can also be a problem. I currently have a doe who will remain dry this year, and she screams bloody murder for three days straight every 20 days, refuses to eat, and roams the pasture looking for a buck. I can only imagine how bad it would be if I did have a buck on-site. You also end up waiting ages to see mammary systems, which personally drives me crazy. If I can repeat the breeding, I don't worry about weight *quite* as much.

An upside to keeping them dry is that they will likely gain a lot of body capacity, have plenty of weight on them for breeding season as yearlings, and can be bred very early in the year.

Obviously, if the animal is small and stunted and underweight, don't breed.

Weather conditions are also important. If you breed an animal too early, then she will kid in winter - and while Texas does not have a problem with extremely low temperatures, other places do. If you breed them too late, they will kid in spring/summer, and flies will be all over them, at least here in Texas. I don't know about other states. 

Just my two cents.


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## lilaalil (Sep 5, 2014)

I'm fairly new to goats, so don't have any experience to add, but I am in the same boat you are, with two late-March babies. I was planning to breed them in February, but may actually just wait until next fall, depending how I feel when we get to February. I'm sure they would be fine either way, spring or next fall; waiting longer is really more to do with other things going on in my life right now. 

I do have an older doe already milking... if I were desperate for milk I would definitely be breeding them in February. Going off of what they look like now (tall, slim teenagers) there's no way I would breed them next month at 8 months old.


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## lottsagoats1 (Apr 12, 2014)

I breed my does their first fall, I always have. They are all well grown and the same size as their dams by 8/9 months. I have never had one stunted and they all stay milking until they are in their teens. I make sure they have a good solid diet with plenty of calcium rich feed (alfalfa pellets and soaked beet pulp in my case) and loose minerals. A couple of times I held them over until their second fall and had problems with them being on the tubby side. Except for their tubbiness, they were no more mature or growthy than their half or full sisters who had been bred their first fall.

I usually breed them a month or so after I breed the mature does, so I start in December. They start kidding at 14 months at the earliest.


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## AncientBlue (Dec 21, 2014)

I have one who was bread at about 9 - 10 months. Not because I thought it was a good idea but because she was able to escape my efforts for 5 seconds. At this point, she seems fine.


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## nicolemackenzie (Dec 27, 2014)

I always personally thought waiting is better. But I'm considering breeding g a young doe this winter. I spoke to another experienced breeder and he said that he only breeds them to be milking yearlings if they are at least 80lbs and they have a wide hip structure.

So the conformation of your doe matters too not just age and weight. She needs child bearing hips 

Is your doe narrow?

Also I worry that I see a lot of first fresheners with singles. I've seen a doe die because she had a huge single kid as a yearling. 

Diet during pregnancy and the type of buck you breed to (and the size kid he usually throws) are also things to consider.

My doe is 7 months and 73lbs and is super wide in the rump. So I think she is safe to breed. Ill wait until dec-jan though when she's 9-10 months old. I would leave her doelings as dry yearlings.


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## lovinglife (Jun 6, 2013)

I breed the first fall. There are so many different ways to manage a herd, with my limited experience I have had no issues so far. My only exception is with Guernseys, some are just so slow to mature and since they are my hobby not my main milkers I am fine just letting them grow more. I did have an oops one year with them and the out come was just fine. The other standard breeds always get bred the first year, kidding just over a year old, they always go on to be good milkers and healthy and as big as one who was not bred early. I think the early months in a kids life have a huge effect on whether or not they should be bred this young. If they didn't get cocci prevention and proper worm control they probably will not be ready to bred this early. I am OCD with my kids and they grow fast and healthy. So take your pick of all the wonderful advice you get on this forum and figure out what is going to work for you.


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## NyGoatMom (Jan 26, 2013)

My only experience is with one nubian yearling. I had her bred and she kidded at about 13 months old. She stayed small...had twins bucklings but was extremely hard to keep weight on. She was getting free choice grass hay, loose minerals, and daily she was fed 6 cups alfalfa pellets, 3 cups sweet 18, 1 cup beet pulp, 1 cup calf manna, and 1 cup oats.

I will never have a yearling bred again. In fact, this year she is getting off because I want her to grow. She is already starting to grow and she has only been dry for about a month.


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## margaret (Aug 30, 2013)

I say yes, most of the time. It does depend on the doe but 8+ months is not too young to breed. If the doe is healthy and a good weight I see no reason not to. I'm keeping a couple dry this year, mostly because I need some dry yearlings to show next year and I'm already freshening 13 does, but otherwise I would breed all 6 of them. It's also a lot cheaper and easier to not have to feed them dry for a year and it really sucks when they come into heat all the time.


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## thegoatgirl (Nov 27, 2011)

nicolemackenzie said:


> So the conformation of your doe matters too not just age and weight. She needs child bearing hips  Is your doe narrow?
> 
> . . .and the type of buck you breed to (and the size kid he usually throws) are also things to consider.


Two very important things that I missed entirely, LOL!


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## Goats Rock (Jun 20, 2011)

I think it all depends on your circumstances. I try to breed for them to kid at around a year.
But, only if they are in good condition, large framed and healthy. I'll kid out about 50 + does this year, 25 
currently in milk, 15 yearlings and 10-15 of this years Spring kids. The late May and June kids will have
to wait until next year. 

If you look at your doe kid and think, boy, that kid is small, don't breed her, no matter what the scale says! Like with everything goatie, there are many answers to every question. Go with what you are most comfortable with!


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## groovyoldlady (Jul 21, 2011)

I just read through this whole thread and the upshot is: It's up to you! If you think she's healthy enough, strong enough, and big enough, go for it! I have 2 mid-April Nigerian sisters that are very different. I will breed one (powerful and extremely healthy) in December or January and the other will either be bred in spring or even the following fall, depending on how she matures. Right now she's a bit too scrawny for me feel comfortable with breeding her.


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## janeen128 (Dec 31, 2012)

I've had several 4-6 month doelings bred, which I do not recommend, WAY too young, however, everything turned out great, and they are very good milkers... Totally up to you...


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