Banding & Billies

I figured I'd get the educational blog out of the way for this week. As we still wait for the kids to be born (I'm guessing tomorrow since it's going to be raining and cold), I thought I'd share our thoughts on banding and billies. 

Males have it rough on farms. At birth, or shortly thereafter, it's decided whether a male will one day be able to reproduce or not. As we've seen how Nutty is during rut, and the fact he got the job done for the ladies, very few intact males are needed. Depending on how varied you want your bloodline, is how many billies you have. We're not into goats for their bloodlines, we're in it for their milk. 

So, most if not all of our bucklings born will become banded. Essentially a river band goes around the sac and it dies off due to lack of blood flow. It's humane and it makes them into wethers. The only males I would consider keeping intact to sell are those who are naturally polled (out of Cocoa or Caramel). I haven't decided how many wethers we'll keep as is not wise to count your chickens before they hatch. Or rather, count your kids before they're born.