Leave it to Hope

To turn our "buck" year around! She did it again and had two beautiful doelings yesterday, bringing our doe to buck kid ratio up to 7 doelings to 10 bucklings. Hope is one of our Boer does. Her registered name is 5605 RB44, but I did not think that was a very personable name when we got her so I named her Hope. She was named Hope because we bought her near Hope, KS. She is an 88% Boer that was six years old this past December.

Hope is an excellent mother to her kids, a trait that is held in high regard on our farm. She has raised all of her kids herself and in fact the reason she has that funny looking ear that kind of sticks out is because she lost part of her ear a few years ago while protecting her newborn kid from a pushy dog.

Hope is predictable, and I love that about her. She has had twins every year with no health problems or complications, and just to be extra considerate of us she usually has them during the day as well. That Hope, always thinking about others! We don't like to over-work our goat mothers here so we typically only breed them once per year. Hope also holds the farm record for most doe kids born! Now I know it is the buck that determines the sex of the kids so maybe she is just lucky but for some reason Hope has girls...lots of them. Out of the ten beautiful kids she has had, eight of them have been girls! She kept up her predictable pattern again this year by having two more girls with no problems at all.

Her first kid born this year is a pretty 8.5 lb brown and white paint with a large, very square brown patch over her shoulders. Kind of looks like she is wearing a backpack, and we have already started calling her backpack as a means of identifying her from her sister. She is resting near her mom Hope in the picture above after filling her belly with colostrum.


This was the second doeling Hope had yesterday. She was 9.5 lbs at birth and is a very pretty tri-color paint. Her head and neck are red, as is the top of her legs but then it changes to black on her lower legs, her belly is also black. She is really a unique and pretty color. I swore I was not keeping ANY kids this year, we are in fact planning on cutting back on the herd some....but this one sure is tempting to keep. I just think she is so pretty. Jamey probably won't be happy to hear that, he says "half our herd are Hope's daughters". Not that there is anything wrong with that, she has some great kids but I guess he figures we have enough goats with this bloodline.

(Hope without all the scruffy winter hair and pregnancy belly)

It is true that in our herd we currently have four of Hope daughters (actually 6 right now counting the new ones born yesterday) and two granddaughters of Hope. That is actually one of the reasons Hope will forever have a home on our farm. Since her daughters are high enough percentage Boer they can be registered as Purebreds with The American Boer Goat Assoc, she has made a huge contribution to building the Purebred Boer part of our herd through her daughters and granddaughters.

Hope has been such a good goat for us and I think if a goat produces lots of kids for you, is always healthy and never causes any problems for years she has frankly earned a lifelong home, which she will have here on our farm.

In the herd Hope isn't a shrinking violet, she is not that herd wimp that needs me to stand over her food dish and guard it from the other goats for her. She gets in there and stands her ground to any of them. She was disbudded before we bought her but she doesn't let the fact she does not have horns slow her down, she has a perpetual small bald spot on the top of her head from butting heads with the horned goats but she don't back down, yet she isn't a bully either. She has never caused any problems in the herd, and her funny, deep "tug boat" (that is what my husband calls her) almost sheep like BAAA makes me laugh. She likes tums and graham crackers and has quite the personality.

One of my favorite Hope daughters, "Dot" also had her kids just the other day. She doesn't seem to be following her mom's record for having doelings I am afraid. Seems she is trying for the opposite, she has had five kids and so far four of them have been boys! She did finally have a doeling this year, she is the kid in front. They were both only a couple hours old in this picture. She does have her mother's excellent maternal instincts though and has been a great mother to her kids.

I am still waiting on Hope's other daughters, Nifty, Heart & Party to have their kids as well as six other does that are due any day. I hope the beautiful weather that was here for Dot and Hope's births sticks around for the rest of them!