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20Since it was my goats (baby, elijah, pumpkin, peanut, fluffy, and hasbrown) that got me into this, it seems only right to share goat facts with you all as my reign of goat.
A little bit about my farm and goats. I’m an office worker by trade, so putting together these facts will help me too. We were gifted our goats by my husband’s friend from Michigan. They traveled by SUV for over 5 hours to get to us as juveniles. We have 4 wethers (castrated males) and 2 females. When the females are old enough, we will breed and milk them.
Goats don’t need much. Just fresh water, some grazing area (or hay/grain during the cold months) and a 3-sided structure for cover.
We just use the horse bard for the goats because we are not equestrian folks.
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I thought they looked a little horney. Normally people have more milking goats
@unksol our goats don’t have their horns cut, but even the females have horns.
Indeed, I have. : )
Where can I subscribe to goat pictures? I want pictures of the goats.
@gt0163c I second this. Videos would also be acceptable.
@gt0163c
Here they are grazing in one of our fields.
@mbersiam Hi goats! Looks like they have a very nice pasture in which to hang out. Is it true that goats are good at clearing out poison ivy and that it won’t hurt them in any way?
@gt0163c They can and love it
When we got our goats we had a ton of overgrowth of lambsquarter… like it was getting to be about 6 feet tall 
They ate through that in about about 3 months.
@Fuzzalini @gt0163c
I got some more photos today, including our puppy meeting the goats up close for the first time.
@mbersiam Thank you!
@Fuzzalini @gt0163c
Ugh my voice
@Fuzzalini @mbersiam Goats! And a puppy and a kid (of the human variety. Although maybe Baby qualifies too?). So much cute!
I miss cute livestock (spent time on my uncle’s dairy farm as a kid). Thanks for sharing.
@Fuzzalini @gt0163c @mbersiam
So cute!!! I love how one of the black ones has a single white spot on its side.
@Fuzzalini @gt0163c @Kyeh that’s how we tell Elijah (the boy) and Peanut, who has the white spots (the girl), apart
I hope your horse bard has sufficient caprine selections in their repertoire to keep your flock entertained/pacified.
@macromeh I wanted to go back and fix my typos… but alas, I couldn’t. I am so prone to typos because I don’t proofread before I hit the submit button.
@macromeh @mbersiam Here’s a goat poem for them:
Goat Fact: Goats are herd animals and will become depressed if kept without any goat companions.
So just another reason to get a tribe of them
@mbersiam that explains so much about the forum
City person question- why 4 wethers if plan to have babies later? Genetics? Are wethers for companionship or dinner?
@speediedelivery They actually came to us as wethers. Most of them are siblings and we don’t want to breed siblings either. Wethers are “meat goats”… like farm to table. And we will start looking for a buyer in the spring.
This is kinda me(h)ta.
@shahnm
Meh.com is the bestest *Me(h)taverse.
I read somewhere that insisted goats were “browsers” not “grazers”. Yours seem to be doing a good job of grazing.
@phendrick Much like the Mehrathons of late, these kids seem to be doing a good job of sucking.
Goats seem to have a reputation for being smart/crafty. Indeed, my kids’ 4H goats figured out how to open the latch on the gate on their pen, requiring me to up the security a few notches. On the other hand, they shit in their food dishes - not exactly a mark of shining intelligence.
So what’s the consensus on goat smarts?
@macromeh
You’re the person to know better than the rest of us.
My guess: Good (crafty) at figuring out how to get whatever they want at the moment.
Horrible at data collection/analysis (poor health habits, as they don’t use separated areas for elimination vs grazing), and poor long term planning (they should be busy figuring out how to be pets so beloved that no one will wish to eat any of them.)
Otoh, they can, in rural landscapes , survive nicely on their own, if they have access to any kind of pasture and water. Supposedly they are quite adaptable.
Goats should figure out how to entice humans into operating Goat Climbing Competition tournaments and seasonal leagues.
(Sort of like corgi racing, except that progress is vertical.)
I’m no animal expert. However, it’s my impression that fairly intelligent grazing herbivores usually don’t work very hard to separate out pasture areas for elimination vs eating.
Maybe that’s because the health risks of contamination are so much lower for herbivores; possibly it’s just not a huge survival factor.
@f00l @macromeh
One herbivore that separates grazing from elimination areas does come to mind. Rabbits.
Found this video today
If someone could scrub the internet of this incesant music that would be great.
https://www.facebook.com/reel/280854053934264?fs=e&s=cl
@mbersiam Seems to be gone.
We had an escapee today. Fyi… goats don’t like carrots
@mbersiam I remember when my cousins (who lived on a dairy farm) had goats. When the goats were young they were escape artists. They escaped their little goat barn and then their pen so many times. They squeezed through tiny holes, climbed and jumped over fences and barricades. As a city kid who just wanted to play with the goats, I thought it was hilarious. But that was the only herd (herd? a herd of goats?) was the only ones my uncle ever let my cousins have.
@gt0163c oh yes when they were juveniles and we just got them they escaped quite a few times. But we were able to fence up the holes enough that they stayed. It was much easier then to also carry them when they were being stubborn.
I spent time in Phoenix recently and they have an activity called “Goat Yoga” where goats walk underneath you and jump on your backs while you are doing yoga. It was interesting.
@januarymick were they full-sized goats or kids?
@mbersiam these were kids…some goats of fuller size were also wandering around…and a cow…and something else…if I can load this picture…this may be a full size goat on my back…but i’m no expert in this matter.
Yay goats!
We just moved onto 14.25 acres, mostly wooded and considered getting some movable fencing and three wethers (because don’t want to milk or pay female goat prices and wethers have none of the disadvantages of male goats).
Got so much more to do before we seriously consider it, but figured we have lots of trails through our woods that are being attacked by blackberry brambles, we’re animal lovers… And goats love to eat blackberry brambles.
/ Yes, we do take advantage of the brambles, got a huge harvest, enough to make lots of jam and wine last year, from the land last year while house was being built… But we just want goats to clear it from certain areas… And because we love goats.
@OnionSoup We also have way too many blackberry brambles (PNW). Our experience was that two goats barely put a dent in them. I think you would need a significant herd to be very useful for clearing blackberries.
@macromeh some help in that department is better than none.
I wouldn’t want to be responsible for looking after more than three…as fun as having a whole here would be.
That fence looks way too low for all goat escapist stories I have read. I cound actually string that up… but then I would have goats… Hmmm
@unksol it’s not that gate they got out of. There are other areas with lower fencing and we have one area that needs some reinforcement. That’s sctually a horse gate so it’s good.
But i did find some goats wandering in my driveway this morning. My puppy got to learn goat herding!.. she loved it
@mbersiam something about them climbing the fence. But that’s probably also size and breed specific and I guess if it bends they can’t climb. Maybe. IDK.
I took the dog out for a bathroom break and said “oh shit” when I saw my driveway. But it wasn’t awful getting them back in because of the puppy.
@mbersiam you seem to have a lot of escapes despite your protests that they are easy. Just saying lol
@unksol we went several months with no issue. This was odd
… hopefully 