Goats and Related Info

[dave1949]

This thread is carrying on some posts in the 'Help Neighbor's Horses Fence' thread.

Dennis -

One of the impediments here to meat goat production is they say there isn't an FDA licensed slaughter house in Maine. I understand FDA licencing isn't cheap to attain.

It a chicken-egg problem. No way to get your goats processed, so not many meat goats are raised, therefore no market for the slaughter house.

There is a good market along the northeast coast for goat meat due to the immigrants from the middle east. I used to work with some consultants from India on an IT project. Once a week we would go to lunch at an Indian restaurant. I tried the goat meat and found it tasty.

I always asked them to pick the restaurant that made food like their Mom would. Figured at least I would get to taste authentic Indian cooking. They have some good tasting food.

There are a small number of dairy goat operations focusing mostly on artisan cheese I think.

This used to be a big sheep area. The soil is not so good for grain production, plus it is full of rocks. The summer's are on the short side. People do grow grass hay on the good fields, and generally do fairly well with it. The rest is trees but the lumber/pulp industry is slowly going down hill.

Dave.

 

[DennisArrow]

Dave.......Glad YOU did this.......

You have a HUGE market for chevon (goat meat) in Boston and of course down in NYC. I really do not know about livestock auctions in Maine, Vermont, a New Hampshire. I can only go by here and in the southwest. At those auctions goats are just another commodity that is sold by small and large producers and then hauled to slaughter facilities by the hundreds.

Here for instance, at a small auction every Thursday perhaps a couple hundred goats per week are sold; but up the road by Nashville perhaps 500 to 1000 are auctioned off. There is a HUGE auction every week in New Holland, Pa that services NYC.

These are just my thoughts; but a director for the ABGA, American Boer Goat Association, has his herd in NH. Folks have herds in Alaska, Michigan, Indiana, ....on and on......The problem is feeding them and shelter through the winter, which I suppose is an ongoing problem for folks that have snow cover until early March or so. Kidding season in the south is late January or February so I suppose in the north it would be in March or April. Actually this would not be bad to raise the little ones through the summer and into fall and then let them hit the auctions in early December when the market is high...........So depending upon how to shelter let's say 20 or more momma's through the winter it would seem to NOT be a problem.

Hay that is high in protein, not just forage would be necessary as would supplemental feed. For 20 mommas 2 bales of hay per day and around 25 50lb bags per month. In addition one would need to keep some mineral/protein tubs for them to snack on. Of course, one can let them forage perhaps as the weather allows. COLD does not hurt goats but getting wet does. They really do not go for frozen water so one needs to have a supply for that........

Anyway, just thoughts.......God Bless........Dennis

 

[dave1949]

Dennis -

You hit on the nub of the problem - over wintering. It's what has made me shy away from keeping animals here. I just won't get involved with keeping livestock or poultry that I couldn't care for well. I guess buying in the spring and selling early winter is the only way to avoid the over wintering.

I was pretty spoiled where I used to live in NW Ohio. A good custom slaughter house and grain elevator both within 5 miles. I had some chickens and raised a few feeder hogs a year.

In this area, even the deer stop moving around from mid-winter to spring. They yard up in areas with good stands of spruce and fir. They will travel some but only on a well beaten path through the snow for short distances. Basically, they just try not to starve to death.

So, there would be ~3 months a year that browsing would be difficult for goats - I think.

Yes, there are goats in New England, some sheep and alpaca too. Excuse me, but I get the feeling the alpaca thing is very similar to a ponzi scheme. I'm sure that's not true for all breeders, but if you ever look at their MARKETING literature - well you have to wonder.

Dave.

 

[kwin]

Also glad Dave you started this thread


I have ten acres that is wooded and what I wanted to do is let the goats clear out the underbrush so that I can see what trees that I want down. How many and how long would it take on five acres at a time. Only the fount is fenced so I was thinking potable electric fence in rear and inside the fount to the t posts. Do goats eat all the way down or will I have to pull stumps. The trees that I don't want I can take down and let them eat.

1. fount gate
2 inside land
3 looking down fount of land
Thanks

 

[dave1949]

Hi Kwin -

Nice lush growth there. I would think goats would be happy in that.

We seem to have lost DennisArrow, he's probably busy with something.

I would think the goats would only eat the twiggy and leafy parts of a sapling until they get down to the mostly woody parts. I suppose they might work on that too if they were hungry enough, but that doesn't sound too good.

One of the surest ways to get help on TBN is to say something really stupid. We may have to resort to that

I really don't have any goat answers. Just exploring the idea and don't know anything much about them. Thought I might get some good info on TBN, or what others have done.

Looking back at my earlier posts, I see I had some things wrong. To sell the meat outside of Maine, they have to processed in a USDA approved slaughterhouse, not FDA. Plus, there are some of those here, but I think too small to handle large numbers of animals was the issue. I read an article about this and have forgotten the exact details - I don't remember where I read it. It's **** getting old

Dave.

 

[Uncle Doug]

Also glad Dave you started this thread


I have ten acres that is wooded and what I wanted to do is let the goats clear out the underbrush so that I can see what trees that I want down. How many and how long would it take on five acres at a time. Only the fount is fenced so I was thinking potable electric fence in rear and inside the fount to the t posts. Do goats eat all the way down or will I have to pull stumps. The trees that I don't want I can take down and let them eat.

1. fount gate
2 inside land
3 looking down fount of land
Thanks

Some have had success with electric fence I have never tried it. The fence in you pictures will work so/so. Goats will try and stand on the wire and may push it down if not secured well. We also had a problem with horned goats with a wire mesh fence that was large enough to stick their heads through. Every afternoon was spent pulling the same goats out of the fence. We ended up taking it all down and putting up 7 strands of barbed wire.

Goats are browsers like deer. They will eat a lot of what is shown in the photos but the staubs and the stumps would be left. They will also peel the bark of certain trees if they take a liking to them. This is rare if there is other browse. They will browse as high as they can reach, which could be 5-6 foot high. We use them now to clean up our fenced pasture and fence line. They love those Chinese Tallow trees that are a PIA in this part of the country. We had a huge buck that would push down stalks with his chest and walk down the stalk clearing every leaf.

 

[Uncle Doug]

We never had much of a problem selling goats for meat in this part of the country. Selling to locals was easier than hauling to one of the larger goat sale barns that were a couple of hundred miles from us. They would bring good prices at those sales. Many of the major buyers would truck them to the east coast which has a very high demand.

Last I heard the US still imports more goat meat than is produced in the US.

Feed costs have risen over the past 5 years. Having to feed a pellet feed over a long winter can be costly even if buying in bulk. We were buying by the ton and driving to the feed mill to keep costs lower but fuel kept eating up most of the savings.

 

[dave1949]

UncleDoug,

Thanks for the info.

The over-wintering in Maine is truly a big obstacle. I sort of hate to get into goats just for the other 8 months. Starting from scratch, since I don't keep other livestock, is also not good.

A trailer, shed/barn, feed cost, feed storage, fencing, water, etc. It just all adds up to 'Am I nuts?' I don't have any real interest in going into it at a commercial level. But, it never hurts to check things out and think about them.

We have lived here about 3 yrs now, as you probably know, it takes a long time to put together a 'homestead' worthy of the term. I haven't finished the interior woodwork yet

Dave.

 

[kwin]

I didn't think the fence would be the right one so thats why I think that three strands of electric on stand offs would work. I'm also not interested in a profit as i have other interest (retirement and getting house built)
I slept on this and it may be best for me to lease for a 1.00/ year to someone that would put their goats on there so that I can do what I want. I am only looking to get some way to see thru the woods so I can see what I want to cut down.
How many do you think it would take and how long would it take to do this?
P.S. I'm past retirement age and am ready to go fishing!!!

 

[Uncle Doug]

We sold off our Boer goats a few years ago due to some heath issues and lack of young help to tend to the herd. Now that the heath is back I find that it is much easier to "borrow" a few goats from friends in the industry who are looking for pasture space for a while. We did over the summer this year. A friend brought over 4 does he had pulled kids off of and and a buck. We fed them a small amount of pellet feed every evening that he supplied. They had cleaned up the pasture and fence line good by 3-4 months. He did put up a single strand of (solar powered) hot wire as the buck tended to be non content inside of the fence and prefered the weeds on the other side of the fence. The hot wire did work.

We kept about 10-15 mixed boer percentange does with a full blood boer buck. Then you add in kids born each year and raised intill sold. This was on about 5-6 acres under fence. We did this for about 10 years. This was more goats than the land would support as brush goats without supplementing with feed every day.

As the main reason we got into goats in the first place was to raise a better show goat for our children and then grand children. Now the kids are grown and scattered all over the area. Most of the grandkids lost interest in them so we saw no need to build a herd back up. It was never more than a tax write off for us and was a money pit at times.

As far as brush control they work great. Start with just a few and work from there. Buying from a general auction barn can be hit or miss. For brush goats it should be ok. A lot of times breeders will sell off does that will not breed or animals with other problems. If it does not work out you can always haul them back to the auction barn.

 

[DennisArrow]

Back again..........In the rains we had over Saturday, which combined with the week's previous rains of 10.6 inches, we had a road washout that goes to the barn, a 30" oak go over and pull down 3 others, and other run off problems. We live on a forested mountaintop and slope, so protecting the land and fighting erosion is an ongoing effort. Especially with the drought killing/damaging old trees and then deluges undermining the roots....But, what this does do is provide us firewood for the stove. We have 2 heatpumps but burn wood instead as God has blessed us with all of the drought killed trees. I have maybe 3 cords ready to rock and roll; but the clearing and splitting of these new ones will give us 2 or 3 more............ON AND ON.......

Ok, GOATS.....

Kwin.......We gave 4 mommas access to 3 acres of what looks even worse than your middle brushy pic in mid July. You could barely fight your way across it originally due to brambles, muscadine, cats claw vine, poison ivy, and seedlings. NOW.....we just drove through it the other day in the RTV to go to an adjoing pature. Yes, we had to clear out fallen logs and thumb sized tree stems BUT SO MUCH BETTER. In another 6 months pretty much all that will be left is the trees.

Goats DO NOT actually eat wood, they do eat small twigs that they can reach and yes they lean on a tree by standing on it's back legs, bend it over and then go after the leaves and twigs. The tree then dies and one easily cuts it down. Anything larger than let's say a pencil will be left. Perhaps a bit larger.............Again as posted earlier, they WILL eat the bark with relish off of certain species of trees thereby girdling and killing the tree. In our area this is dogwood, cedar, palonia (thank YOU so much), and cherry. They won't eat thistles, poke, or tobacco weed. Pardon the local names..............

Check out: Electric Fencing for Goats - Premier1Supplies

We have several sections of the portable stuff. Its easy to install, remove, and work with. Actually after the goats get used to it, we dont even charge it on subsequent locations. Goats are smart. They HATE rain, loud noises, and getting zapped.

The U.S. imported last year, 15 million metric TONS of goat carcasses.........15 MILLION TONS.........yes, there is definately a market..........

For us, we raise registered Boers. These are a proven meat producer. There is also a market for the milk from goats. We dont try these as they are a seperate breeding program. Yes, with the way things are going we need one for when the "crash" happens for our self-survival program, but that's another thread..........Anyway, getting into a program of raising goats for "profit" can take several routes. Yes, it's a great "farm" tax write off. IT IS A BUSINESS.......
One can have a MEAT herd which takes: good pasture, a market, guard dogs, and of course time. To me, possibly 50 head would make a profit. LOTS of folks buy little ones early in the spring, pasture them through the summer, and then sell them off in late fall when the market is highest price in early December............This uses your grass pasture, clears brush from woods, and takes advantage of the falling leaves and acorns in the fall.....HIGH PROTEIN.........
One can over winter productive mommas to sell the kids the next fall. A momma, on average will have twins. Singles are seldom, triplets often, and quads seldom. So....overwintering lets say 10 mommas will give you perhaps 20 kids more or less. One culls out the promising kid does and less than satisfying mommas to the auction in the fall and then repeats the cycle.
We raise genetically fantastic momma's..........At weaning and ready for market our kids will average 80 to 90 pounds. The average brush kid is 30 or 40 pounds. You have no feed expense with them at weaning, so to take them to auction at that point brings great profit. One can also sell them as registered for breeding which makes even better profit.

Anyway, the sun is up and it's burning daylight.........Gotta get out there and split wood, box blade the new section of road repair fill across the gully (two loads of chert ore), herbicide on the corn field for crab grass........ON AND ON

But ya know, in my "retirement" it really keeps it interesting to not just sit and veg.......GOD IS GOOD..........Dennis

 

[dave1949]

Dennis -

Sorry to hear the rains caused you so much work. Figured you were tied up with something. The drought and then down pours are sure not friendly weather. On the plus side - oak is great firewood! The red and black oaks around here are pretty easy splitters and long keepers too.

The weather has been strange just about everywhere it seems. We had a rain catchment pond dug last fall. It had a 3" layer of ice on it by mid-November when it was half full. Then we had a storm that put down 5" of rain overnight on frozen ground. It went to the pond so fast, the ice floated up underneath the overflow pipe and took it right out.

Weather has been odd all this year too. Nobody had good gardens this summer here, cold, wet, blight, dry - just a mess.

I am really learning a lot from your posts, and UncleDoug too.

I gathered from the alpaca info I sent for that tax advantages for 'gentlemen farmers' were a big part of the pitch. I doubt I could qualify under either catagory

I don't know how the alpaca fiber could pay for the animals from the prices I have seen on eBay. Plus with millions of alpaca in Bolivia, if there were a big fiber fad, they could send it here by the boatload probably cheaper than we could produce it in the US.

Goats seem like a better choice. I think the prices for goat stock are based on their true market value be it breeding, chevron, milk or utility. Is that a true statement?

It is good to learn about the business/tax aspects too. For all the complaining folks do, it is actually not hard to set up a small one-man farm type business here in Maine.

Good luck on those trees and road repairs.
Dave.

 

[DennisArrow]

Dave........Just a note before my afternoon nap..........YES, for me, the Alpaca thing is a "yup/generation X" type situation. A colony of lesbians in a neighboring county raise the stuff and then weave it. We were at the Airstream national last year down by Macon that happened to be having an Alpaca "show" and I swear it looked like a gospel convention with all of the custom buses etc. used to haul the critters.......

By the way, it's CHEVON. Comes from the spanish for Goat.......chivas.........I think. Yes, it's true as to the cost of goats. At auction, the meat buyers pay pretty much by weight, but utility animals, brush goats, are priced accordingly. Breeding stock, whether it is for dairy or meat goes beyond what the slaughter guys are willing to pay.

Auctions though, are THE WORST PLACE to buy an animal that you are going to keep. Goats carry are suceptable to a lot of diseases, and when a guy is gonna get rid of a goat for sure is when it is sick. So, he takes it to auction, exposes it to the 200 or so goats that are there, and the next thing you know you bought that sick critter or one that comes down with what it was exposed to...........

Nap time.......see ya soon........Dennis

 

[dave1949]

Dennis,

I kind of figured auctions to be dumping points for sick, problem animals - goats or otherwise.

I think a good source would be to go to a local region person who is working hard to build a good herd. They probably always have animals they don't wish to breed or would sell for chevon (thank you) anyways.

That should result in a sound animal, local to my climate, and at least I know who I am dealing with. I think most around here would be upfront on the plusses and minuses of their stock if approached the right way. Many are doing it to build a grass-roots industry or hobby.

You deserve the nap! You will live longer too.

Dave.

 

[Uncle Doug]

We went to one of these Goat workshops in the early years (6-7 years ago) that were a big help. I sure that some groups still offer such a workshop.

Goat Gathering CD Table of Contents

 

[dave1949]

We went to one of these Goat workshops in the early years (6-7 years ago) that were a big help. I sure that some groups still offer such a workshop.

That sounds like excellent advise. Thank you for the link - guess I've got some reading ahead of me - it looks very informative. Pretty soon, my wife will claim the computer - unless the Red Sox are playing

Thanks, Dave.

 

[Uncle Doug]

My grandson (then about 11-12) went with us to the goat workshop. It was a 2 day weekend event. On Saturday they had 20 different booths set up serving cooked goat meat. Every thing from traditional cabrito to goat chili. From then on every time we talk about goats his mouth waters. Of course my wife having bottle fed some of the babies wound not even taste any.


Check out the last one with the Cabrito Recipes

 

[dave1949]

My grandson (then about 11-12) went with us to the goat workshop. It was a 2 day weekend event. On Saturday they had 20 different booths set up serving cooked goat meat. Every thing from traditional cabrito to goat chili. From then on every time we talk about goats his mouth waters. Of course my wife having bottle fed some of the babies wound not even taste any.


Check out the last one with the Cabrito Recipes

I know how that goes. I raised white meat rabbits one summer thinking it would help the grocery bills. The kids just wouldn't eat them. Maybe I shouldn't have slaughtered them where they could watch , but I thought I was doing the right thing. They are so lean they don't have much flavor just fried, nothing like the cottontails we hunted, I gave up on them.

Dave.