Rockville Ridge

01/17/2025

Little update on Sheba… I am so happy with her and her little doeling! Sheba is a FF out of Better Wayz Swiss Mister, who has the most gorgeous front end! Sheba has amazing brisket extension and I think it has passed to her little doeling! Woot woot! 🎉

She is also producing a solid quart per day just 7 days post kidding as a FF who had a single! Very happy with that. 🎉

And, she is very young - turned 1 yesterday! Her teats should get longer in a couple weeks, but I am also pleased with how her udder is developing! 🎉

Better Wayz Sheba

Dam: Better Wayz Queenie 1*M VEEE90
DD: SG Better Wayz Queen Lillian
DS: Better Wayz Sir Bear * B

Sire: Better Wayz Swiss Mister *B VEEE90
SD: SG Better Wayz SwissMiss Carabear VEEE92 Elite
SS: Better Wayz Is A Hunk *B

01/11/2025

Sheba had one beautiful, wide, swiss marked doeling. 💕 She will be available to someone with a similarly aged 100% bottle kid or she can wait to go with a buddy once my other does kid in 7 weeks.

Update: not available. Planning to retain for now. ☺️

01/10/2025

Our website also has our kidding schedule and pictures of each doe and buck on the farm!

Welcome To Rockville ridge About Us We are a small hobby farm located just west of Richmond, VA We raise ADGA registered Nigerian Dwarf Goats with a focus on correct conformation and high dairy production. We participate in both Linear Appraisal and Milk Test programs, which provide independent evid...

01/10/2025

Better Wayz Sheba is in the kidding stall! Due today and ligaments are totally gone. Video was her 2 days ago running out before everyone else to come get on the stand for a small late pregnancy grain ration. Can’t wait to see these kids! They will be available. Kids could also be polled and moonspotted 👌 Pic of sire in comments.

01/03/2025

We finished a new kidding stall build just in time for Sheba (due Jan 10)! In the past, we used a canopy tent and cattle panels as our temporary kidding area until high winds broke the canopy last season. So, over Christmas break, I added a new 2 stall kidding area at the barn.

Super happy with how it turned out - especially considering I only had to put about $250 into it (mostly the gate hardware, metal roofing, and the 10’ roof supports (I scrimped and didn’t do 12 footers)). The rest was already on site from prior projects.

I have learned to build a little over the past 5 years of goating just by going for it and learning as I go - and while nothing is built perfectly (at all) I am so proud of being able to do it myself. I have paid to have the electrical work done, but the rest has been me, YouTube, and my kids as helpers. I would highly encourage people to just go for it if you need something built! (My tip - I use screws on everything, so I can change my mind or realize something needs to be done differently and it’s easy to take apart) 🙂 Pics show some of the progress from posts to roofing and finally getting gates up on New Year’s Day!

I am sure the girls will enjoy the new digs for kidding! ❤️ I hope to use the space outside kidding season as well.

12/28/2024

First kids hit the ground here Jan 10th! 🤩 First up - Better Wayz Sheba - a beautiful doeling out of Better Wayz Swiss Mister *B (3 LA 92 does and 5 Elite does in his pedigree!) And she has his front end - pictures don’t do her justice 🥰

Sheba’s dam Better Wayz Queenie also LA’d VEEE90. Sheba is polled and has a big moonspot over her eye.

She is bred to Better Wayz Genesis +*B, son of Elite Old Mountain Farm Elton Jay ++*B. We have freshened many of his daughters and Genesis consistently passes very nice high udders with solid production (every Genesis daughter here has earned her AR star as a FF)!

Kids will be 100% bottle fed and will be available. Reach out if interested in being notified once her kids are born.

Located just West of Richmond, VA.

11/23/2024

Next recipe… THICK yogurt! My family likes Greek yogurt so I had to find a way to make my Goat’s milk yogurt nice and thick. You can Greek strain it too, but as you can see in the photo, you probably don’t need to. Heating the milk to 180 degrees for 10 mins is the key to having a thicker result. Yes, we prefer raw dairy here, but since we are adding a good culture anyway and already do plenty of raw dairy, we heat this milk for the thicker result.

My favorite culture is the “Sweet Yogurt” culture from Cheesemaking.com. There isn’t any added sugars, the cultures just yield a milder result which has less tang and therefore tastes sweeter without any sweetener added! ❤️
This recipe is based on the approach shared by Gianaclis Caldwell in her book about Yogurt & Kefir.

11/15/2024

Thought I would start also sharing some of my favorite things to do with our goat milk! I have multiple athletes in the house and fresh raw chocolate milk is an excellent recovery drink! This syrup is delicious, keeps sooo long, and makes way better chocolate milk than the stuff with 18 ingredients! ❤️ (also great on Goat’s Milk Ice Cream)

Enjoy!

11/14/2024

All of our does have settled and due dates confirmed! Our breeding schedule is at http://www.rockvilleridge.com/sales/ First due is polled Better Wayz Sheba - Jan 10. She was bred to a son of Elite Old Mountain Farm Elton Jay ++*B. We used our leased buck on everyone else this year - Better Wayz Is a Samurai is a stunning buck out of EEEE92 SG Better Wayz Isabelle! 🤩 We should have some VERY nice kids available this spring and I only plan to retain a few!

Pic of Bella's udder since I could look at it all day! 😉

11/03/2024

Got 20 # of apples processed into Apple Butter this week and put up 20 half pints. I won’t have to do it again for a few years! Simple process, but takes so long to peel/core and cook it all down! But, it is sooo delicious! Totally the taste of autumn in a jar!

Apple Butter Recipe:

10 # apples (weight prior to peel/core)
3 quarts sweet apple cider
Spices: 2 tsp Cinnamon, 1/2 tsp Salt, 1/2 tsp Allspice, 1/2 tsp Cloves
2.5 cups brown sugar

Start boiling apple cider & cook down by half.
While reducing cider, peel/core all apples.
Add apples to reduced cider and cook until soft.
Blend to smooth (I use a stick blender)
Add spices and sugar, mix well.

Now cook down until it is thick enough to round up on a spoon. Do NOT burn! Stir frequently. I cook overnight on the lowest flame in the stove and set an alarm for every 90 minutes to stir. My MIL puts it into a roasting pan and cooks at 200 degrees overnight and doesn’t wake up to stir. ☺️ You can also use an electric roaster on low. Whatever you do, just go low and slow and stir when you can to keep it from sticking / burning to the bottom. This becomes more important as it gets thicker.

Ladle into hot jars, leaving 1/4” headspace and process 10 minutes in a boiling water bath canner.

Enjoy!!

10/24/2024

For those local to me, I get many questions about feeding, how to trim hooves, what type of hay to get and where do I find good hay in our area, what to look for when buying animals, options for breeding if you don’t own a buck, etc...

There’s an incredible amount of information online, and I won’t pretend to know everything, but I still love meeting people and doing in-person, interactive learning (might be the homeschool Mom in me)!

I thought I would put together a class that shares my answers to the above and a bunch more. Hands on hoof trimming, taste some milk and cheese, ask all your questions and let’s Promote the Goat!

Reach out with any questions or to rsvp. If you are interested, but can’t make this date, let me know as I may do another one if things go well!

10/16/2024

Huge announcement for our breeding plans this year. We have been so blessed to be able to lease a stunning buck for this season (Thank you Kathy Beck-Mullins!!). Oct 1st, we added
🏯 BETTER WAYZ IS A SAMURAI *B 🏯
and put him straight to work!

Samurai is a son of EEEE92 SG Better Wayz Isabelle 3*M! Isabelle has been an ELITE doe for 5 years straight. She’s also been TOP 10 for Butterfat 3 years! Such a beautifully correct doe who can also milk! 🔥🔥

Sam has basically put my other bucks out of a job this season. He happens to be a good match for every doe I own - my herd has been built on does all sired by Amethyst Acres Zebulen crossed with a son out of Old Mountain Farm Elton Jay (Better Wayz Genesis +*B). As such, it’s easy to get too related here, but I love working with the Better Wayz lines that I’m already familiar with. Isabelle is such a gorgeous doe, I can hardly believe I have her son this year. So very excited to see these 2025 kids!

10 of 11 does have already been bred. We are waiting on one heat and to see if anyone didn’t settle first time. We will know in 6 days. 🥳

Pictures belong to Better Wayz. ❤️

10/14/2024

New Arrival & Breeding Annoucement!

We brought in a new doe this summer. We are so excited to have our first polled doe, Better Wayz Sheba!

Sheba is out of VEEE90 Better Wayz Queenie and the stunning Better Wayz Swiss Mister *B, and she has his beautiful front end with tight shoulders and elbows, proper leg placement, and great brisket extension for her age. She’s a nice wide girl and I am excited to see her udder since so far I like everything else, including her sweet temperament. She’s polled and moonspotted as a bonus.

She was bred to Better Wayz Genesis +*B, son of SG Old Mountain Farm Elton Jay ++*B. Sheba’s due Jan 10th.

I don’t have any setup pictures of Sheba yet - photos with the cream background are property of Better Wayz.

10/11/2024

There have been so many exciting changes this year that I have neglected to announce. My animals are never neglected, but I am still struggling to homeschool 4 kids, run the farm (and run kids to practices), and keep up with socials! Finally trying to catch up a little on the social media side and have so much to share!

First, we had a few adults leave to new herds this year:

Better Wayz Mocha Madness 4*M and Rockville Ridge Frankinsence moved to Wakefield, VA where they are the foundation does for a new herd owned by Sofia Stepasiuk-Tassinari. Rockville Ridge Queenie 5*M moved to Tennessee last spring where her super easy to milk teats have been well appreciated! Rockville Ridge SchotZee 6*M and her daughter Heidi are now the foundation of a new backyard herd in Rockville, VA.

Of course, we also had lots of kids moving to new herds this spring as well. We had 16 kids (9 does & 7 bucks) and all moved quickly to their new herds with the exception of 4 retained does - we kept 2 from Better Wayz Vader and 2 from Better Wayz Epic Wood. The retained girls are all being bred for late Feb kiddings and we are super excited to finally see some udders out of Vader and Epic! More details to come about breedings.
Including a video of one of our 4 retained Doelings from the 2024 kid crop. This is Rockville Ridge Bella's Beauty (Better Wayz Bella x Better Wayz Epic Wood). She's a long and level doeling - super excited about her.

03/02/2024

This makes me laugh — This is totally my husband! 🤣

02/17/2024

Update: deposits received on the gold buck (S9) and Swiss buck (S7). Still have 1 doe & 1 buckling!
**********
Highlighting our currently available kids...

We have 1 doeling & 3 bucklings left looking for a new home! One of the bucklings would love to go with the doeling as a wethered buddy! The other two could go as pets. All are 100% bottle fed, and disbudded. Doeling can be dual registered with ADGA and/or AGS. Reach out for more information! Location - Rockville, VA. Can leave for new homes Feb 23rd.

Available:

Out of Rockville Ridge SpiceZee 6*M x Better Wayz Vader *B
S3 - Buckling - almost entirely black

Out of Rockville Ridge SchotZee 6*M x Better Wayz Vader *B
S7 - Buckling - Swiss marked with heavy white

Out of Better Wayz Bella 3*M x Better Wayz Epic Wood
S8 - Doeling - Gold
S9 - Buckling - Gold with minimal white

For more information about these dams - each was highlighted prior to kidding on my farm page. Reach out if you want more pictures or information about anyone here!

02/11/2024

Zee finally kidded! 🙌🏼 She had 5 # twins! Both are big & beautiful! The buckling is sooo fancy and the doeling also has moonspots. Not the best pics yet, but so glad it all went well!
The buckling will definitely be available and all the available does will be posted shortly - after their photo shoots 🩷