The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Community => Introduce yourself => Topic started by: Violetsprite on October 29, 2011, 12:32:14 pm
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Hello everyone - i've just stumbled across this site and love it as a source of advice! I've had goats for about 14 years but only small numbers and generally taken in as older goats looking for new home. Just this week i have collected 2 x 4 month old gorgeous girls - one looks BT other looks Saanen x but they are sisters and mum looked like a x - smaller than my saanen but not as small as pygmy & cream in colour. They are adorable & extremely friendly having had some bottle feeding to supplement the mum who wasn't a great milker apparently. Questions i have are - firstly - i have put them in a barn together but separate from my 2 older girls (a Saanen with horns & English without - both 10 yrs +) - they have been walked around the field with them but my Saanen is a bit of a head butta - so question is how long should i supervise meetings or am i worrying too much and should trust that the kids will quickly learn to keep out of her way? Secondly - they weren't registered - apparently because they were between defra forms ?? Anyway i have the holding no where they came from so should i tag them with this no. or my own? Any advice much appreciated - thanks.
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Hello violetsprite,
I live in central Scotland and have far too many goats!
The kids you have collected really should have been tagged by the breeders- it is illegal of them not to do this. DEFRA forms shouldn't have anything to do with- as long as they have a registered goat flock number, then the kids could have been tagged. I would get back in touch with the breeder and ask if they can't get tagged, even though you have them.
Female goats can registered until they are 2 years old, though it is cheaper to register them by 6 months old.
Beth
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:wave: Hi and welcome from sunny Shropshire. :goat:
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Hi - thanks for your comments - i also posted this on goat forum and one reply suggested registering them as my own - seems simpler - i did reply to say i didnt think there was anything sinister about them not registering - just naive. Thanks again.
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Welcome to TAS :wave: :)
When you say 'registered', do you mean tagged or actually registered with a breed society? When you say the breeders were 'between Defra forms', do you mean that you had no movement document when you first got them?
For tagging - tags absolutely must be applied on the holding of birth, using their own flock/herd mark. The idea behind this is traceability and when you have a farm inspection there will be a problem if you have tagged them with your own herd mark but they have not been born on your holding. There may be nothing sinister about the fact that they haven't been tagged, but there is no excuse for it. It was probably that they had not bought in tags but as breeders they must have them. You cannot obtain tags with their flock/herd mark so you have to go back to them to supply them.
Tagging is a nuisance but it has a function in protecting all stock farms from disease, or rather enabling any disease outbreak to be traced quickly and minimising culling in the event that an outbreak does occur.
Similarly you must have a movement document for your animals as this is how movements are kept track of.
Please contact the breeders and ask for full documentation and tags.
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hello and welcome :wave: