Quit Mansplaining Raising Dairy Goats To Me: A Blog

I think I was the first Nigerian Dwarf breeder in Montana. No, for real. There was a farm in Kalispell who used to advertise themselves that way. But I’m pretty sure I had my Dwarves before they did. We’re talking mid-80s. I have receipts…but they’re in a storage shed piled eyeball deep in the detritus of the last 45 years. So I won’t try to prove it to you, and I’ll settle for “one of the first.” Because I was. And that’s close enough.

When I was in high school, I bought a breeding pair of Dwarves from what I think I recall was the Brush Creek herd in Washington. I may have that wrong. (I’m old, I like tequila, and I’ve dabbled in ketamine…I’ve done some brain damage. Topic for another day.)

Their first kid was a buck I named Poco. He was born with a cyst on his neck. I had the vet remove it…risky, as it sat right over the jugular vein…and when he excised it, I could see the vein exposed and pulsating. After removal, the vet cut into the cyst, and it was lined with hair. Cool. He went to a breeding home.

I don’t remember raising any other Nigerian Dwarf kids, although I’m sure I did. The other thing I did was to breed my ADGA registered LaMancha does to my AGS Dwarf buck (remember, in the 80s, the ADGA did not register Dwarves; mine had AGS papers). I sold these “mini LaMancha” crosses nationwide. Put them on Delta flights. The most memorable were a pair of black and white doelings who went to New York. If I wasn’t also the first person to raise mini LaManchas in Montana, I was darned close.

I sold my Nigerian Dwarf doe when I went to college. Along with all of my LaManchas. My buck stayed, but he died of age-related causes before I moved back home. There was a period of time where I didn’t have goats. I did maintain my ADGA membership, though, because I didn’t want to lose my herdname.

I mean, it’s a pretty funny herdname.

A few years back, the ADGA awarded me a permanent membership, based on the number of consecutive years I’d been a member. I have a love-hate relationship with the registry, but that was quite an honor. I mean, it’s not based on show results or appraisal scores or pounds of milk…all I did was pay my dues…but for almost 40 years, I’ve been paying my dues.