TBraswell
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Nigerian Dwarves (Goat)

I have read in an article, recently, that Nigerian Dwarves make great pets as well as milk producing livestock for a small homestead. In this same article, it was said the milk of this particular variety was sweeter/creamier due to higher concentrations of fat in the milk. I am interested to know if anybody has any experience with this breed at all and, if so, if they would make good livestock on fledgling homestead.

valley
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Well, what I've heard is they have bad leg joints and they have trouble birthing. I'm sure there are people here who have 1st hand experience with them.
The girls have pygmy goats, they seem to be great animals and give wonderful milk.

They, Pygmy Goats, will do well for what you have in mind. you might consider them.

Richard

TBraswell
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Thank you for the tip, Valley! More research is to be done on my part. :)

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Ozark Lady
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I have never owned a ND and hadn't heard that about their joints. I have owned pygmies. They are meat goats, and definitely not dairy animals. They are fine as pets though.
If you want dairy character, you really need to get a dairy breed of animal. I even ended up with half pygmy goats, still not dairy... So it depends on what your purpose in getting a goat is.

valley
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Ma Lady, With the girls two fresh Pygmy does, we got a nice amount of great milk, for milk and cheeze. We got a couple Toggenburg, spent for tests to see that they were in good health and time, they were wonderful animals gave large amount of milk. But we didn't like the milk, the taste. I raised Saanen years ago, their milk was better but the Pygmy milk was by far the best, in our opinion.

Re: the joints, this I was told by my daughter, as well as the birthing problem, If she mentioned joints even though I haven't read it on the internet, I thought it worth mentioning.

The girls hand milked the Pygmy, for the family,{ a small homestead} a couple doe can give all they need and then some. We found this to be true.

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Ozark Lady
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I wonder if there is a meat and a dairy line of pygmy goats?
We had about 6-8 that we had to milk for one reason or another, usually birthing issues, and they were a pain, gave about a cup per milking and were almost impossible to find their equipment.
But, the kids were ready for the freezer in a few months.
The pygmies that we had were about 10-25 inches tall, some taller and some shorter.
They were fun, just not good for milking...
I wonder if pygmy is size and not a settled breed?
I had Nubians, Oberhasli, Alpines and La Mancha also at that time.
The best tasting milk of all (to us) was the La Mancha...
That was when I ran 35 goats, now that I limit them to less, I have.... 6 La Mancha full sized does.

La Mancha is not a stabilized line and the books are still open on them, is why I wonder if pygmies are likewise.

And how else can two experiences be so different? Has to be not a stable line.
Nigerian Dwarfs are rare and expensive here, pygmies are much more common.

valley
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Greetings, When the girls milked them out, their udders increased in size. I just asked the girls how much milk they got each day. over 1/2gal. With two fresh does they were putting l over 1 1/2gal in the fridge, that worked out well for us at the time. I ordered cups for their size teats, but with a surge milker, you know the belly pan type, there was too much clean up time for the equipment, they hand milked and could cope with the plumbing size, too small for my hands, for many families that's enough. We bought a hand milker, that worked out well, you would pump it like a pistole with a long trigger. Every couple days, a gallon was available, I would make cheese. If more is needed a milch goat would be the thing if the milk was to their liking.

Richard

The girls are telling me in ml, they home school with BSDE and Australian school. one goat, puddy , was giving about 1000ml in the morning at her peak. That's a little over 1 quart both would give less in the afternoon.

That's more like it. I had to look at the conversion table on google.



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