When To Wean Baby Goats - The Thrifty Homesteader

During the spring, I get a lot of questions about when to wean baby goats. And, as usual, the answer is … it depends.

However, a few guidelines can help you determine when it’s the best time to wean baby goats.

As you dig into this article, be aware that most of these tips are based on my experience with Nigerian Dwarf goats. With that being said, you can use this information as a guideline for your own breed.

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When to Wean Baby Goats Doesn’t Depend on Age

I know you’ve probably seen a lot of people talk about weaning kids at two months of age, and that’s what I did for the first decade or so of raising goats. Over the years, however, I discovered that when to wean has more to do with the weight of the baby goat and not just the age.

Kids grow at different rates, especially if a doe is trying to raise too many kids. It is not true that a doe will always produce enough milk to feed all of her kids. On top of that, a doe only has two teats, so if there are more than two kids, the most tenacious kids will get the most milk. Even if a mom has enough for three kids, one can wind up gaining more weight than the others because it’s more pushy.

Nutritional Needs

There isn’t any food that can provide the protein and calcium that milk can. A kid can’t possibly eat enough goat feed or alfalfa to get enough protein and calcium. Goat feed and alfalfa are bulky, and a baby goat has a tiny stomach, so it must drink its calories and nutrition.

In other words, milk helps a baby grow and develop. It provides the protein young goats need to build strong muscles and the calcium needed for healthy bones. And no matter how much grain or alfalfa you give to a baby goat, it cannot eat enough to meet its nutritional needs.

If you tried to give a baby goat the equivalent nutrition in the form of goat feed, which is grain, the kid would end up with scours. Additionally, it’s not possible for a baby goat to eat the same amount of alfalfa to get the protein and calcium.

I’ve been contacted by far too many people who were sold a kid that was 3-4 weeks old and told that it was old enough to be weaned because it was eating grain and hay. Yikes! The kids are often half dead by the time I get those emails, and it is a long, hard hill to climb to save them.

Trying to switch a baby goat to a bottle at 3 weeks of age is quite a challenge, although I did it when a doe died with one-month-old triplets. It took 5-7 days for the various kids, but I could not imagine a new goat owner trying to do it because kids that age act like you’re trying to poison them when you try to give them a bottle — and they are big enough to put up a good fight.

Kids start mouthing everything when they are only a few days old, but they are only exploring the world. Their tummies are too tiny for them to actually get much nutrition from what they’re nibbling on.

Baby goats use their mouths to explore the world around them. They learn from this, and even more importantly, they learn from their moms. So when you see a two-day-old baby goat “eating” a piece of hay, they’re just mimicking their mother and not necessarily eating it.

Over time, baby goats begin to eat a 16% protein goat feed and hay, but it’s a very gradual process. So, you can’t base weaning off of food in the mouth. Here is more information on what goats eat.

Click to download our “What Do Goats Eat?” cheat sheet

Selling Baby Goats and Weaning

If I know I’ll be selling a baby goat, I won’t wean that kid before it leaves my farm. The day the baby is picked up is the day it is weaned.

When goats are stressed, they’re more susceptible to illness, worms, and coccidia. And a baby goat with coccidiosis is a baby goat with diarrhea and eventually dehydration. Maybe even death.

So it’s my goal to prevent stress as much as possible before selling a baby goat, because I want to set them up for success in their new home, not sickness.

Baby goats are extremely stressed at weaning. It’s probably one of the most stressful moments in a goat’s life. Overcoming that moment takes a lot out of the baby. And in that same vein, leaving home and joining a new herd is equally stressful.

So, instead of giving the baby goat two stressful events by weaning it and then sending it off to a new home a week or two later, I limit it all to one bad day. There is no benefit to having two separate, stressful events for the kid.

With that being said, I do not sell a baby goat until I am comfortable with its weight and health.

Weaning Bucklings To Keep

Aside from a healthy weight, the other determining factor in weaning bucklings is sexual maturity.

I don’t feel comfortable leaving intact male baby goats in with mom and sisters for much more than 10-12 weeks, even though I have never had a successful breeding by a buck younger than 5 months. So, while I rely on weight, I also keep a close watch on age when it comes to bucklings. However, if they get enough milk and hit my 4-ounce-a-day weight gain goal, they will hit 20# by 8 to 10 weeks of age.

A lot of people worry about baby buck behavior, but many bucklings display mounting behavior within days of birth. So it’s not a reliable indicator of sexual maturity. Some goats, even doelings, are dominant and constantly mount other goats.

When to Wean Doelings

Since mother’s milk is the best defense against health issues, I also consider it a health insurance policy. And in case you haven’t noticed a trend, here’s my motto: I try my best to keep kids with their mothers as long as possible.

So, when it comes to doelings, I let mom decide when it’s time to wean her kids. I find that kids raised naturally, with mom, are some of the healthiest goats produced. Not to mention they grow faster and sometimes larger than goats weaned earlier. Most of them never have a problem with worms or coccidia, and they are more likely to reach two-thirds of their adult weight by seven or eight months so they can be bred to kid as yearlings.

When I first started raising goats, I had not heard anyone say not to breed does when they’re small. In fact, everyone I knew in the early years would breed does to kid as yearlings. But the one time I went against my better judgment and bred a smaller doe, I ended up in the vet‘s office during kidding.

So What’s a Good Weight to Wean a Goat?

Since I raise Nigerian Dwarfs, I can speak specifically about this breed, although some of the same thought theories may apply to other breeds as well.

I’ve found that kids handle weaning best when they weigh about 20 pounds, which is one-third the weight of a full-grown Nigerian Dwarf. I’ve had the best luck, healthwise, when I’ve allowed kids to reach this weight before weaning. They thrive well and grow into healthy adult goats.

Any less than 20 pounds, and I’m uncomfortable with weaning or selling a kid. In fact, any less than that probably means the kid needs more milk.

This brings me to my next point.

Enroll in my “Just Kidding and Raising Kids” courseGuide to Pregnancy, Kidding, and Newborn Care

Growth Rate as a Tool

Nigerian Dwarf kids gain, on average, 4 ounces a day if they’re healthy and everything in the milk factory is firing on all cylinders. Standard-size dairy goats gain closer to half a pound daily, with meat goats gaining more. I’ve heard of some gaining as much as a pound a day.

If a baby Nigerian dwarf isn’t averaging 4 ounces per day, there could be something wrong. Weighing baby goats daily for the first two weeks and then weekly can put you ahead of the curve before serious problems become unmanageable.

A baby goat that’s not growing can indicate a variety of issues like disease or lack of milk. If a doe has mastitis or CAE, she may not produce enough milk, and some does simply do not have the genetics to produce as much as other does. When a doe has more than two kids, one of them could be less aggressive than the others and may not get its fair share and will need to be supplemented. In other words, slow or no growth could be a red flag that means you need to begin bottle-feeding a baby goat before it’s too late.

I prefer to know a kid isn’t gaining enough weight for a few days than to come out and find a half-dead kid when it may be too late to help.

So, as you can see, there isn’t one answer to the when-to-wean question. And a lot of the timing depends on growth, gain, and the health of your baby goat. In other words, let nature help you make the decision regarding the right time to wean your baby goats.

Want to learn more on how to raise your baby goats? Check out Raising Baby Goats: Essential Tips for Success

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