Body condition, doe by doe
Spring checks start with hands on animals, not eyes from the gate. Work through every doe and score her condition by feeling the spine and loin through the coat, because a thick winter fleece hides a thin goat beautifully. Does who came through winter underweight need feed adjusted early, since a doe who starts the season behind rarely catches up once she is working; does carrying too much condition need the opposite conversation before rich spring grass arrives. Note which animals repeatedly finish winter thin — that pattern, year on year, is the herd telling you about teeth, parasite tolerance or simply age, and it should shape who breeds and who retires.
Feet, eyelids and the parasite picture
Trim every foot and look properly at what you find: overgrown horn, smell, heat or separation in the wall all need dealing with before wet spring ground works on them. Check eyelid colour and general bloom as part of judging parasite burden, look at droppings and condition together, and talk to your vet about whether worm egg counts on a sample of the herd would sharpen the worming plan rather than treating everything by habit. Spring is when burdens build quietly on pasture grazed last year, so the aim is a herd going onto grass monitored, not a herd rescued in midsummer. While you handle each goat, run hands over udders, check mouths and teeth, and feel for lumps along the jaw and body.
Vaccination, minerals and the vet conversation
Review where the herd stands on its vaccination programme with your vet, including what breeding does need covered before pregnancy so that protection passes to kids, and write the agreed plan down where everyone helping can see it. Check mineral provision honestly: what is offered, whether the goats actually eat it, and whether blocks have dissolved into the mud since winter. Breeding herds ask a lot of trace elements, and a dispenser nobody touches is the same as no dispenser at all. This is also the moment to flag problem individuals to the vet — the doe who aborted, the one with the chronic foot — and decide their place in the season before it starts.
Bucks, fences and the ground they will work on
Bucks get skipped because they are not milking or kidding, but a breeding season stands on them. Check feet, legs, body condition, teeth and general soundness, and watch him move; a buck carrying too little condition will lose more during the rut, and one carrying too much is often sluggish. Walk fences, gates, water troughs and shelter with the same fresh eyes, and think about pasture rotation: which paddocks rested over winter, where last year's kids grazed, and how you will keep this year's young stock off the most contaminated ground.
None of this works on memory once the season is moving. A doe's KinsLe Pet Passport keeps her kidding history, treatments, condition notes and vaccination record together in one packet, so when you are deciding her feed, her worming or her breeding group in spring, you are deciding from her actual record.