The Results of the SNIFF TEST!

At the beginning of kidding season, we decided to have a 'sniff' of all of the does that were due to kid. Why? Because there's a theory that a doe that smells bucky will have bucklings, and a doe that smells like hay will have doelings. 

Following is our results for the 2014 breeding season at Firestone Creek farm.

Doe (Dam)	Buck (Sire)	Smell / Gestation time	# of doelings/bucklings
Muddy Creek B2 Panama	On Firestone Creek AA Mesa (history of producing high % of doelings)	Panama's head smells 'bucky' on 2/14; she is due on 2/21. She is pregnant with multiples--looks like three or more. She has a history of having bucklings, so maybe there is a doeling or two in there.	1/2 Kidded on Feb 24th with one small doeling and two bucklings, one on the big side! She did have a bucky smell, so I'd say this one was a 'positive.' POSITIVE RESULT
On Firestone Creek HWD Acorn	On Firestone Creek AA Mesa (history of producing high % of doelings)	Acorn smelled like hay on 2/14; she is due on 2/15. She has a history of having doelings. She looks like she may be pregnant with one or two kids.	Well, she smelled like hay, and she had one doeling, so we are at 100% right now! :) POSITIVE RESULT
NC PromisedLand Z Bella	On Firestone Creek HWD Bo Peeps	Bella smelled like hay on 2/14; she is due on 2/15. She has a history of having doelings.	Bella kidded 2/22 with TWO bucklings. So this is 100% contrary to how she smelled, which was like hay with no bucky smell at all! I'd say this is -100% NEGATIVE RESULT
On Firestone Creek Palisade 2*M 5*D	*B NC PromisedLand RB Bolero *S	On 2/14 Palisade smelled a little bucky. She is not due until 5/15. She has a history of twins and triplets; the triplets are usually bucklings and doelings.	Palisade kidded with THREE doelings, which is quite contrary to the bucky smell she had in February. I'd say this was a big -100%, too, unless maybe I smelled her a bit too early. NEGATIVE RESULT
On Firestone Creek BJ Kukarabisha	On Firestone Creek AA Mesa (history of producing high % of doelings)	On 2/14 Kuka smelled like hay. She is due on 2/20.	Argh! Kuka smelled like hay but delivered two healthy bucklings on 2/24. This result is another negative--strong one, just like Bella. NEGATIVE RESULT
On Firestone Creek R Palabra	Proctor Hill Farm B Cuervo Gold *S	On 2/14, Palabra smelled a little bucky. Due on 3/13.	Buckling and a doeling. This would be a positive, I suppose, since she did smell just a little bucky. POSITIVE RESULT
On Firestone Creek UP Sunnee Day	Proctor Hill Farm B Cuervo Gold *S	Will smell again next week. She could tell I was up to something and didn't want to be sniffed. Perhaps she thought I was going to nibble her or make her wear deodorant. Who knows! :) NO RESULT

RESULTS:

While we did have bucklings out of some of the girls that smelled bucky, we also had THREE (3) --yes, you heard right-- THREE doelings out of a doe that smelled a bit bucky! I would say that was a big NEGATIVE. We also had one doe that smelled like hay that had only bucklings, which is also a big resounding NEGATIVE result. Essentially, I have to say:

SORRY, FOLKS! The sniff test doesn't seem to work 100% of the time. In fact, the results were sketchy at best. Oh well... we are talking about goats after all. You didn't think they would make it THAT easy for us, did you? Guess we'll have keep playing the waiting game...