# getting does to kid in daylight hours



## spidy1 (Jan 9, 2014)

I found a study by Gus Konefal that proved if you feed your does in the evening or at dusk you have a higher % of daylight kiddings, I have fed in the afternoon all since I started in goats years ago, and have only had 1 doe kid at night, (she was a wild thing) I had no idea my feeding schedule had anything to do with it, they say only 15% (cows, sheep and goats studied) birthed after 6pm on this feeding schedule.


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## Jessica84 (Oct 27, 2011)

Oh I’ve read the article. With the cows it does work! With my stubborn goats nope. For mine it was actually when I started feeding in the morning that the started kidding not just in the day time but before noon! Last year I only had 2 (out of 60 something) kid at night, one was only a hour off and i has to untangle kids so she should have been during the day. The other was midnight. The 2 years before I didn’t have any good at night. 
I actually prefer to feed at night though, kidding aside I like the idea of them going to bed with a nice full stomach, but this time of year unless I want to fight cows off to get the hay to the goats or fix fence I have to feed in the AM :/


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## mariarose (Oct 23, 2014)

Spidy and Jessica's goats are communicating and saying, "Here's how we can really mess with their heads..."


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## Jessica84 (Oct 27, 2011)

mariarose said:


> Spidy and Jessica's goats are communicating and saying, "Here's how we can really mess with their heads..."


Pretty much! Honestly I have just come to grips mine are odd balls and enjoy making my life..........interesting lol


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## mariarose (Oct 23, 2014)

:bookgoat:onder::what:


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## Dwarf Dad (Aug 27, 2017)

Jessica84 said:


> Pretty much! Honestly I have just come to grips mine are odd balls and enjoy making my life..........interesting lol


Nine little goats keep me busy, mad, laughing and happy as can be. How do you handle all of that, multiplied?


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## lottsagoats1 (Apr 12, 2014)

Because of my work schedule, I feed my goats (horses and dogs) at 0830, 1330 and 0000. Most of my goats will kid during the morning chores (between 0900-noonish) or during night chores (midnight to 0100). It is very convenient, too say the least!


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## Island Milker (Dec 11, 2018)

i have yet to know when my goats will kid. I do however feed them around 9-10 am and 9-10pm seems to give me a chance to go out to social events and sleep in in the morning. I was feeding them at 7am and 7pm, it really isolated me in the evening.


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## Goat_Scout (Mar 23, 2017)

Feeding meaning feeding hay or feeding grain? Because I fill hay feeders both morning and night, unless I'm feeding square bales (they go through one square bale every 3 days).

But starting about a month before they kid, I feed grain to my dairy girls in the evening. I remember that last year out of 9 dairy does, 8 of them kidded between 9:00am and about 2:00pm I think? No later than 3:00. The 9th, a FF, kidded in the wee hours of the morning.

I kind of want to start feeding my 5 pregnant does in the morning now, just to see what happens.


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## Jubillee (Dec 22, 2017)

I feed at sun-up, and just before sun-down. So right now like 7am and 5-6pm. (usually 7a/7p during longer days). I have always done this and last year I had 3 does kidding. All 3 kidded anywhere between 4-6pm. One was earlier in the week and the other 2 were the same day. And to top it off, the first one was on a day I was going to go out of town (2 hours away) with my husband. Saw her possibly in labor and decided to stay. She had them while he was on the way home (around 4-4:30ish), so had I went, I'd have missed it. The other two, I had plans for dinner at a friend's. Saw they were in labor (though not strong) earlier in the day. Sat outside with them ALL day off and on and one had one about 5 and the other about 6. Same time I would have been at the dinner. This was in June so it didn't get dark until like 8:30ish.

Seriously hoping everyone kids during the daylight hours this time again!!


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## Jessica84 (Oct 27, 2011)

Jubillee, no matter what rule there is or how they should go blah blah having plans is a sure way to make them go into labor lol seriously we can all do a new study. I’ll take plans for night (honestly I wake up every 3 hours even though they seem to have day time pretty much down) and someone take plans for day time and I bet you we will get some dead on results lol 
One year mine was when ever I took a shower lol it didn’t matter what time of day it was. I took a shower, was happy to be fully birth, dirt and anything else totally free and no more then a hour later I was covered in it all again lol 
Dwarf dad it’s really not too bad. I’m a stay at home mom, also my dads right hand woman on the ranch and my husband is a fire fighter and gone 4/24 hour days a week (more when there are fires) so it keeps me busy and it’s my “9-5”. But you are right on the days they make me mad it seems that it’s not just one who has to be bad or push me it’s ALL OF THEM! I deal oth it by swearing a lot lol


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## lovinglife (Jun 6, 2013)

All my does are together and fed at the same time, I have one who always kids in the middle of the night, every year, and most of the others are morning or late evening, every year. I think it depends more on the goat.


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## Dwarf Dad (Aug 27, 2017)

This is all very interesting. I have never been around kidding, calving, foaling, etc. I had no idea about timing like that. Do you think it could be the doe being more comfortable in the timeframe because you possibly will be there? Like if you feed mid day, but spend more time with them in evening after chores?


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## spidy1 (Jan 9, 2014)

I think so, the friendly ones will wait for someone to be there, the wild ones will wait for you to leave, in my experience.


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## Lstein (Oct 2, 2014)

I read an article very similar (might be the same thing?) in the recent goat rancher magazine.

I feed in the morning around 5:30-6 and evening 5:30-6 during kidding and I seem to get the majority of the does kidding shortly after I feed in the evening or at night. Which unfortunately works out better for me anyway, since I'm at work all day. 

Not to make it even more confusing lol.


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## Ranger1 (Sep 1, 2014)

I feed my goats at 8 and 8, and most of my does kid between 9 AM and 5 PM. I’ve only ever had 3 kiddings at night(around 5 AM each time) and two were the same doe, different years. Actually, I think I had one doe kid around midnight last spring-but most of mine are born in the day.


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## Lstein (Oct 2, 2014)

This is making me really curious what the actual percentages are for my herd, going to make an effort to write down the time this year.


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## toth boer goats (Jul 20, 2008)

It is give and take. Not always predictable.


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## Goats Rock (Jun 20, 2011)

I breed the does at night. (After midnight, usually). They are used to my whacky schedule. Most of my kids are born between midnight and 6 am. Last yr. out of 105 or so kids born, about 10 were born in the early afternoon, 1 in the morning between 6 am and noon, the rest after 6 pm . I wonder if kidding has something to do with breeding time?


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## fivemoremiles (Jan 19, 2010)

I am truly blessed i make my living as a Shepard.
I lamb out 250 ewes and 50 goats. 
I have found through the years that the heavest lambing is from 6am to 9am, 6pm to 10 pm.
during the afternoon and the early am hours there is little birthing activity.
Sheep and goats sleep at night.


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## HoosierShadow (Apr 20, 2010)

We prefer having the buck out with our does so he catches them in time. Fall 2017, we tried to take them to him at first sign of heat (I watch them closely) and it took 3x for one to get bred, and I think 2x for another. As soon as we turned him out they were all bred with no issues.

As for daytime birthing... good luck lol 

We have had goats for 9 years, and for most of them we've fed 2x a day. We have very limited grazing/browsing especially during the winter months. They get free choice grass/clover mix hay, and late pregnancy we give them alfalfa.
I try to write down times of day they kid in their folder, and there is just nothing that is consistent. With the exception one doe doesn't generally kid in daylight, but last month kidded at 4pm. 
We stall our does at night about a week out. They go out during the day. If they are in labor they generally stay in, unless they want out and I keep a close eye on them and return them to the stall when I think they are getting closer.

We have one doe that tricked me, didn't think she'd go and she had the babies at 12pm in the doe shelter. Last year she kidded around 3-3:45am. 

One thing I notice, weather changes. If there is a big weather change, that definitely seems to trigger labor. Not always, but I've had it happen here at least 4 or 5 times. One year a major 'polar vortex' record cold for us, around -9F with wind chill -36! Crazy cold that seldom happens. Her water broke and froze to her back legs despite being under heat lamps! 
Had another doe another year do the same thing, cold front coming through, windy, quickly dropping temps and she went into labor and had her baby that night.
Years ago, had a tornado outbreak one weekend in April. The doe was on edge all weekend, I was checking her between storms, it was crazy. Finally I decided to sleep, a storm came rolling in, and she kidded and had just gotten them cleaned up by 6am check.
Same situation on a couple of others. 

I've only missed 2 1/2 births in 9 years of having goats. But we only breed about 6-7 does a season. 1st one was the 'tornado doe' lol, 1/2 was 1 kid of quads, 2nd one coming as I came out there. Third was last month, the doe that tricked me at lunchtime lol.


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## Jessica84 (Oct 27, 2011)

Yes!! Weather change is a huge one, and most reliable IMO. It never fails around here, a storm comes In and babies come......ok I shouldn’t say never fails because there is a storm not and I have does crossing their legs out there lol


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## fivemoremiles (Jan 19, 2010)

I watch the barometer like a hawk. a rapped movement in barometric pressure up or down is a trigger


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## Goat town (May 6, 2018)

lottsagoats1 said:


> Because of my work schedule, I feed my goats (horses and dogs) at 0830, 1330 and 0000. Most of my goats will kid during the morning chores (between 0900-noonish) or during night chores (midnight to 0100). It is very convenient, too say the least!


I'm hoping for this


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## spidy1 (Jan 9, 2014)

so far I have not had a bad wether kidding, ( we dont have a fingers crossed emoji) but we will see what the future brings


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