3 Pinions Farm

3 Pinions Farm 3 Pinions Farm is a small, family-owned farm specializing in dairy goats, pack goats, and Highlands cows.

Well, we had the trifecta today. Our third goat of the day who is also our last goat of this season kidded late this af...
05/21/2026

Well, we had the trifecta today. Our third goat of the day who is also our last goat of this season kidded late this afternoon. She might have rushed this one. We went from the biggest kid we've had born in our barn from this morning to the two smallest. One boy at 6 lb 9 oz and a very little girl weighing 3 lb, 1 oz. She looks like she could be a tad early, so we'll be cautiously optimistic. She has some hurdles to overcome, but she seems to be a fighter. It's probably good that she is so little because she was a true breach (rear end first, not back legs first). Once again my goat doula daughters did a great job.

Edit: The little girl lived 31 hours. She was very loved while she was with us.

Today has been busy! We've been checking on our pregnant dairy goats regularly. Last night we had two Alpines moved in...
05/20/2026

Today has been busy! We've been checking on our pregnant dairy goats regularly. Last night we had two Alpines moved into the barn for closer observation. One of the does had a single boy very early this morning all on her own. He's probably the largest dairy kid we've ever had at 13 lb 2 oz. He'll make someone a great pack goat.

We still had one more pregnant doe in the goat pasture, Gwen, and when Amanda checked on her this morning, she was showing signs of early labor, so we moved her into the barn. Gwen is a first time freshener. In the early afternoon I took a casual glance in the barn to find that she was screaming and actively pushing. Amanda and Bethany came out to help while I ran back to the house for towels. I was only gone a few minutes, but the screaming from Gwen had escalated by the time I got back to the barn. Amanda had verified that the kid was in the proper position (front feet were sticking out and we could see the muzzle, but Gwen wasn't making a lot of progress. I worked to stretch Gwen while Amanda tried gently pulling. Finally Gwen decided to stand up, which gave us more room to work. Honestly by this point we were fighting our own rising panic. The only times I've heard that level of screaming for a doe in labor, it meant we needed to transport to Blackfoot Animal Clinic (30 minutes away) for expert intervention. Amanda took a calming breath and reached in to figure out what was going wrong. She discovered the kid's head wasn't moving forward with the legs, so she grabbed the back of the kid's head so it wouldn't slip back anymore. With one hand holding the hooves and the other on the back of the head, she managed to pull the kid out...alive! One big boy at 10 # 3 oz. Then the girls worked together to take care of both the new mother and the kid.

We have one more doe to kid, but it's already been a full day.

Mother's Day kicked off our dairy goat kidding season. I've seen all the memes about moms wanting a goat for Mother's Da...
05/13/2026

Mother's Day kicked off our dairy goat kidding season. I've seen all the memes about moms wanting a goat for Mother's Day, and I got 2: one boy (11 #) and one girl (almost 9 #). The pair looks almost identical in coloring and size to the first goats born on our farm (Tuxedo and Cookies N Cream).

As we're beginning kidding season for 4-H Boer goats, I realized that I haven't posted an update on this year's county f...
12/21/2025

As we're beginning kidding season for 4-H Boer goats, I realized that I haven't posted an update on this year's county fair. It was just my girls showing animals this year with a little help from Nathan and a friend for group classes in the dairy goat show. Amanda leased a shorthorn heifer that she was able to observe the AI breeding process on. And she showed one of our Boer goat kids, as well as dairy goat and Holly, her dairy cow. This was her 4th year showing Holly, and the pair earned Amanda a Reserve Grand Champion Dairy Cow Showman placing. Also, Amanda trained her dairy goat wether to pull a cart with mostly voice commands. It was very impressive when she drove her rig into the show ring.

Bethany showed dairy goat and cat. And qualified for small animal round robin with our cat, Charm. Bethany has a t-shirt that says "I don't need luck, I have Charm." That's very fitting for this cat. She's been used by both girls for the county fair cat show for 3 years. The animal that the child uses to qualify for round robin is the one that is in the round robin competition. This was Charm's third year as a round robin cat. I had no idea Charm has her own fan following until just before round robin this year when another participant asked me if Charm was one of the two round robin cats. I confirmed that she was, and the young lady was excited and walked away with a smile.

Overall, we were really pleased with how the Boer goats and lambs that were born in our barn did at the fair. Several families purchased our stock and finished them out well. It was a nice finish to our raising sheep years as we sold the entire flock this summer.

Video of Amanda and Phantom in the show ring in the comments.

The same night the Highlands arrived, Amanda's Jersey cow, Holly, gave birth to a beautiful heifer calf. Biscuit is a je...
12/21/2025

The same night the Highlands arrived, Amanda's Jersey cow, Holly, gave birth to a beautiful heifer calf. Biscuit is a jersey/charolais cross. This is Holly's second birth, but her first live birth. It took her a few days to click in as momma. The night Biscuit was born, her momma left her out in a cold rain rather than keeping her in the dry cow shelter, so we had a full day of warming a cold calf and working to get colostrum down her. But Holly's mother instincts finally kicked in, and Biscuit became strong enough to nurse from her mom. That little heifer has a huge personality. Video in the comments of Biscuit leading the herd the first morning she was turned out with the big cows.

Amanda added two Highlands to our menagerie this fall. Purchased with her earnings from 4H. Whiskey is an 8 year old hei...
12/21/2025

Amanda added two Highlands to our menagerie this fall. Purchased with her earnings from 4H. Whiskey is an 8 year old heifer who is confirmed bred, and Honey is a 6 month old heifer.

Kidding has begun. Pinky blessed us with one boy (standing) and one girl this morning. We're really excited about the c...
12/20/2025

Kidding has begun. Pinky blessed us with one boy (standing) and one girl this morning. We're really excited about the confirmation of these two. They are going to make great 4-H projects.

Our second momma cat had her kittens. She was pretty tiny, so we were guessing only a couple. She delivered four healthy...
05/01/2025

Our second momma cat had her kittens. She was pretty tiny, so we were guessing only a couple. She delivered four healthy kittens today! Looks like we won't have mice and voles for a long time.

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Idaho Falls, ID

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