Ginger and Xena are twin does. They are 25% Nubian, 25% Alpine, and 50% Kiko. All three of these breeds have their strengths, and we hope to capitalize on them. Alpines are noted for their milk production, Nubians for the richness of their milk, and Kikos for their hardiness, growth rates, and meat production. These goats were the results of a planned breeding strategy at Roll Farms. We are quite proud of the lineage that our girls carry, and excited to be able to further the goal of an outstandingly hardy dual-purpose goat.
We've also recently added two new girls, Scarlet and Prissy. Scarlet is another Roll Farm product, 33% Kiko / 66% Boer. She's a beautiful little monster, with more attitude than is good for her! She is the first goat that we ever had jump from our hayloft! She is quite a regal young doe, and takes no flack from anyone. Scarlet is white with a red head, and has a couple of red spots on her chest and belly. Prissy was a salebarn goat, a triplet that was rejected by her mother. As such, she was underweight when we got her at 3 wks. old, but is very long and looks to possess some of the characteristics that we would like to add to our herd. She is white with a black head, and has a white blaze on her nose. She appears to be roughly 50% Boer/50% Alpine.
The Ginger X Dexter mating gave us Belle and Clara, both excellent examples of what we have been looking for in our program. Xena X Dexter was somewhat disappointing, as Xena refused to accept her kids. We lost one kid, and the second required a substantial amount of care to get her through. Although she had a rocky start, Oreo is doing fine now and we hope to breed her to Boomer in Fall/2009.
Belle x Boomer gave us a beautiful single doeling in Summer/2009. We will be keeping Buttercup to add to our herd.
Xena x Boomer produced a near-white buckling and doeling. They are growing nicely and currently for sale.
Ginger x Boomer also produced a male/female set of twins. The buckling is traditionally colored, while the doeling is mostly white with some interesting facial markings typical of her Kiko heritage. Both of these kids are also for sale.
All of our 2009 kids are being dam raised.
Dexter was our first buck. He was a young guy, full of energy, and particularly amicable. He was 50% Kiko, 50% Boer. Both of these breeds are meat breeds, and Dexter did them proud. He was a beautiful example of caprine masculinity, with outstanding topline, bottomline, depth and width. He came from Roll Farms as a 9 month old, and has sired some impressive kids there. We were very excited about having him sire our kids at Hard Way in '08. We lost Dexter in Jan '08 to a rough bout with pnuemonia.
Boomer replaced Dexter. He's a classic Boer with a red cape and white body. Easily one of our friendliest goats, he's never been aggressive aside from aggressively wanting his chest rubbed and head scratched! He has sired all of our 2009 kids.
Thunder is our newest buck, and he appears to be very high-percentage Boer. He was a sale barn goat, but his paint coloring was so impressive that we felt we had to add him to our herd. He is developing very nicely and we look forward to using him on a limited basis in Fall/2009.