One of our veteran nannies is pregnant again.
She’s had quite a number of kids at this point, most of whom are still around on the homestead.
She’s just about coming up to term again, now, and she’s been pretty healthy so we haven’t needed any scans or anything.
With that in mind, we’ve all been wondering how many kids she might have—it seems like the number has been increasing with each birth.
When wondering this, though, I realized I wasn’t really sure what the average number of kids is that a goat has.
So, I decided to look into it.
So, how many kids does a goat have?
Typically, a doe will have one to three kids in a single pregnancy. They tend to have fewer in their first couple of pregnancies, and more as they get more mature. Up to five is not uncommon, though more than that and you’re in outlier territory. Between 1 and 3 is average.
There can be quite a lot of variation, but what is plainly true is that where a single offspring is the norm for humans, goats typically have a litter of several.
This is quite common among herd animals of their size.
Let’s look further into this.
How many babies will my goat have?
Without taking the goat for a scan, you can never know for certain.
There are a few patterns you can expect the pregnancies to follow, though.
Firstly, what often happens is that on the first pregnancy, the goat will have fewer kids.
Often, only a single offspring on the first litter.
This isn’t always true, but it is almost certainly the case that the first litter will be smaller than those that come after.
It will also depend on the age of the mother—a younger goat is more likely still to have fewer kids on her first pregnancy.
From there on, you can expect the average number to rise.
As I said, the overall average for number of kids in a given goat litter is 2-3.
Once the goat has had its first pregnancy, it’s much more likely to have multiple in every pregnancy thereafter.
So, it really depends.
Your goat could have as many as five or, in rare cases, even 6. It could also only have one.
You can’t know for sure.
How many kids does a goat produce per year?
Again, it depends.
It will depend on the individual, their diet, the local climate, their overall health, their age, the availability of males—there are many factors at play.
The main thing is going to be whether or not the particular breed in question has a breeding season or not.
In general, goats do have a breeding season, and will be most virile in the winter months—goat pregnancies last around 5 months, or 150 days.
By getting pregnant in the summer, they can give birth in the spring when the weather is warmer.
Many goats have no breeding season, though.
Boer goats, for example, are more or less ready to breed year-round.
There’s really no good single answer to this question, then.
But they cannot carry more than two pregnancies to term in a year, and even two would be very rare.
So, one litter per year, which most commonly produces twins, is the best answer.
How often do goats have kids?
So, again, this really depends.
In general, they will mate in the winter and give birth in the spring—like sheep, and many other herd animals.
Though the pregnancy takes only five months, they will then have to suckle the kid for some time—during which time they are unlikely to get pregnant.
So, realistically, once a year is the best answer to this question.
The only practical way a goat could carry two pregnancies to term in a year would be if you took the kids of the first litter away to be bottle fed, so she could raise a new litter.
However, she simply is very unlikely to be sexually receptive at this time.
Their minds will be on suckling the new borns, even if they aren’t doing so.
Once a year, then, is best for the goat’s health.
How often do goats have more than 2 kids?
Well, it is worth mentioning that twins are the most common outcome of a pregnancy.
So, anything else is going to be in the minority.
Three is not uncommon—again, depending on the circumstances.
More than three is rare, though not unheard of.
Given the amount of goats in the world and the amount of breeding that goes on, the number of times goats give birth to a larger litter than twins is probably a very large number.
However, it will be dwarfed by the amount of twin pregnancies.
So, not very often, is the simplest answer.
We just don’t have a huge amount of concrete data on this question, though.
So, as you can see, it’s really always a bit of a gamble.
What’s more or less certain is that, at least after the first pregnancy, it’s almost always going to be more than one kid.
On average, you can expect up to three, and even up to five.
A lot of factors will influence the amount of kids a goat has in a single litter, but the fact is that it’s also just down to luck and chance.
The mating game is always this way in nature.