Few hours after this cute goat kid came into the world we noticed the the baby looked too weak and dehydrated as opposed to the active, excited and hydrated New born we ought to see, these symptoms is an early sign of malnutrition suffered by the kid which wasn't supposed to occur giving the fact that the kid wasn't even a day old yet at the point and it should be getting a lot of those early milk to provide the kid with all the colostrum and nutrients that it will need during its early journey, these essential colostrum and nutrients helps the kid to survive, grow and thrive at different stages of its life's.

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The nutrients filled milk is released during the first 24 to 48 hours after birth and it is very important for the kid to get that milk as much as it can get, sometimes the kids don't get the milk due to one reason or the other and it causes high mortality in some kids their immune wouldn't have gotten some essential tools that it needs to survive same also the kids is malnutrition which also causes death amongst the goat kids.

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To control this there are some non conventional approaches that can be used to extract these much needed milk from the goat 🐐 to feed its kid without harming the mother or the the kid.

Hand milking is a common and the oldest method of extracting milk from mammals, extract the milk to drink after some stages of purification to ensure we take the right thing from the milk.

How to go about it?

There are hormones situated in the breast region that trigger milk production and milk flow, in some cases the hormones are probably not producing at all that way the breast is devoid of milk but in other cases the hormones are producing but the breast milk isn't flowing out probably cause the kid that ought to trigger it by sucking it is finding it difficult.

I have encountered cases where it took the kids sometime before the kid could see that way it couldn't locate the breast but there are other cases of the doe been reluctant to feed the kid or the kid been reluctant to feed.

First time doe find it difficult to feed their kid and it needs an extra level of care for the doe to feed its kid

We extracted the milk using a syringe that doesn't have a needle all we did was to take off the top part that is the pressure point when injecting the we made of our hands which should be properly washed by then to stimulate the breast into releasing the milk that was used to feed the kid.

Using a syringe is actually more convenient because you can easily observe the quantity you are feeding it and you can keep things hygienic as long as the syringe is new.

The cost of syringe was cheaper than I thought it would be so it's something you can get a pack and keep for emergency purpose.

Hand milking the doe and feeding the the kid can make a huge difference between life and death, but by hand milking the doe and feeding the kid with that milk we are giving that kid it's best chance of surviving and thriving.