Getting Your Goat
Buying a goat for lawn maintenance, including types of goats, feeding, health care.

 by Grail Damerow   
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  A Wall Street Journal staffer once came up with the ultimate economic indicator—the goat index. When times get tough, people buy goats. And with good reason: Goats offer an inexpensive source of milk, meat, fiber, and (not least of all) companionship. They require neither fancy food nor elaborate housing.

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Getting Started

Once you decide what kind of goats you want (see MOTHER'S GUIDE TO GOATS ), try to find a local seller. The goats will already be acclimated to your area and will take to the move more easily than goats trucked in from a distance. Avoid sale barns, since you never know what diseases might lurk there. If you plan to keep your goats in close quarters, another thing to avoid is horns. Goats on open range need horns for protection. but a goat in confinement can easily injure another goat, or you, by playfully turning its head at the wrong moment. Some goats are polled (born without horns). The rest should have their horn buds cauterized as soon as the buds start to show (usually by two weeks of age).

Goats are social creatures and enjoy companionship, so start out with at least two. Goats can be, and often are, raised in a manageable herd of about six. Those six may be all does (females) which you'll need if you want milk, kids, or both. Does also produce the softest fiber. If you wish to raise goats for meat, transport, or as pets, wethers (castrated males) make a good choice. A wether is as muscular as a buck (male) but as gentle as a doe (for seasonal breeding, rather than housing and feeding an intact buck year around. many goat owners find it cheaper and less hassle to use artificial insemination or a stud service).

Milk production requires annual kidding, so if you opt for dairy goats, prepare to deal with a burgeoning population. Goat kids are so cute and cuddly, it's tempting to keep them all. But if you do, your facilities will soon be stretched to the limit and you—and your goats—will be unhappy. Kids or surplus adults may be sold to help pay for the herd's upkeep. Prices vary from under $100 for a scrub goat, to several hundred for a registered purebred, to several thousand for a top breeder. The highest price ever paid for a float was for an Angora buck. May you be so lucky as to have such a goat born in your herd.

Home sweet goat home

Goats need nothing more than a simple shelter to protect them from rain, wind, and sun. A building that is well-ventilated but draft-free serves these purposes and also retains animal-generated body heat in cold weather. Each goat needs at least 15 square feet of living space (miniature breeds need 10 square feet). When goats must reach through head holes to get feed and water outside their stall, they waste less hay, so allow one head hole for every five goats for water and for a salt and soda feeder (more on that later), and one hole per animal for hay.

If your back yard or pasture has a weed problem, you may be happy to know that there's an effective, all natural weed-eating solution: Just bring in a goat. Goats have a well-earned reputation for being willing to eat anything, and because they're more interested in eating weeds than grass, you don't have to do much more than turn them loose where you want them to devour weeds.

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They're so effective that they're often used to control noxious weeds that are otherwise hard to get rid of, such as kudzu in the South and leafy spurge in the West.

To understand more about how this works, we went straight to the source and talked to a real live goat. Here are his candid answers to our questions about his favorite kind of work.

I've heard goats will eat anything, but what's your favorite food?

I'll eat just about any kind of plant, but I prefer weeds to grass. I've got my favorites, but I like to mix it up. I like cheat grass, dandelions, purple loosestrife, yucca ... what have you.

So you could say you're a natural weed-eater?

I think that's fair.

Do you eat kudzu?

Absolutely.

Christmas trees?

Delicious.

Laundry?

This is anonymous, right ?? I love it.

Hypothetically, if you were going to move into my back yard what would I have to provide in the way of room and board?

Well, taking care of a goat is a commitment. It's not something to be taken lightly.

For me, these are the basics:

Food. I'll eat your weeds, but I'm also going to want some hay and your basic commercial goat ration. If I don't get enough to eat, I'm out of there.

Housing. A barn would be nice, but I would consider moving into the right shed. Most goats just need some basic shelter, we're not that picky. But I definitely need a big yard to graze in, a couple hundred square feet at the very least.

Handled properly, goat milk is indistinguishable from cow milk. Some people who are sensitive to cow milk find goat milk easier to digest.

Dairy breeds fall into three categories: Swiss, tropical, and miniature. The first two average 1,800 pounds (900 quarts) per year, the latter about a quarter of that.

The Swiss breeds—Alpine, Oberhasli, Saanen, and Toggenburg—are relatively calm animals with upright ears. They do well in cool climates. The tropical breeds—LaMancha and Nubian—are better at handling hot weather. LaManchas (which have tiny ears or none at all) are known for their laid-back personalities. By contrast, floppy-eared Nubians are definitely more energetic..

The Nigerian Dwarf, a miniature dairy breed, gets along nicely on small lots. It is ideal for anyone who can't use the copious amounts of milk produced by larger goats. Instead of milking with your whole hand, be prepared to milk a Dwarf with two fingers and a thumb.

Dairy goats require a clean area in which to be milked. It may be part of the goat barn or a corner of a garage, mud room, or laundry room. A milkstand raises the does to comfortable milking height (about 12 inches) and holds them in place. Other equipment includes a stainless steel milk pail, a dairy scale to weigh the milk, a strainer with milk filters, and glass storage jars.

For the best-tasting milk, keep your dairy barn and equipment clean, the does healthy, and keep them away from strongtasting forage like cabbage, mint, onion, or garlic. Wipe each doe's udder before milking and spray the teats with teat dip afterwards. At least once a month, monitor udder health with a California Mastitis Test.

For information on breeders, books, sources of supplies, and goat-oriented organizations, consult Dairy Goat Journal, W2997 Markert Rd., Helenville, WI 53137, or United Caprine News, Drawer A, Rotan, TX 79546.

Mohair from purebred Angoras is creamy white. Any other color comes from crossbred goats and although generally inferior, is appreciated by hand crafters who prefer natural colors.

Fiber Goats The soft, fine hair of Angora and cash mere goats is highly prized by hand spinners. Both fibers have lots of "crimp" or waviness, making them easy to spin, even for a beginner.

Angoras are sheared twice a year, like sheep. Their hair, called "mohair," is approximately 6 inches long. A mature commercial grade goat averages 6 1/2 to 7 1/2 pounds per year. A purebred may produce 12 pounds or more.

Mohair from purebred Angoras is creamy white. Any other color comes from crossbred goats. Although crossbred mohair is generally inferior, it is appreciated by hand crafters who prefer natural colors.