Pig/Goat Question?

[gwstang]

I'm wondering if pigs and goats can be kept on the same fenced in area? I want to get several and would like to be informed first. It would be about 1/4 acre fenced in with electric wire around the top/bottom of fence. I have had a goat before when my kids were small. Dang thing would not even stay with the horses. Get out and go to raising he** around the county until someone would call me to come pick it up. :confused2: That was many years ago. I'm talking about maybe a couple of pigs to raise to eating size and maybe 3 goats or so. I have 69 acres so I could move the goats around some in the edge of the woods but I am concerned about the dreaded coyotes which we have lots of around here. They go to yapping and howling about dark every night and run a rabbit or deer through the fields around here. Thanks for answers/suggestions on pairing the critter up. I could put the goats back in the pen at night.

 

[STx]

I'm sure the goats and pigs would get along fine but, goats need GOOD fences. There are lots of goats around here and people say that if you think you've got a good fence, put a goat in it and he'll show you where you don't. People that keep them use about a 4' tall, mesh wire fence. Anything less and they will get out. Anything to stand on near the fence and they'll get out. Any holes in it and they'll get out. I think you get the picture.

 

[gghb]

goats need hot wire top and bottom of field fence. pigs need hot wire spaced into pasture so the can't root out fence.

Greg

 

[Egon]

Pigs like to scratch their back on the lower wire as they are walking through. Goats use the pigs as a stool to get a higher jump start.

 

[rox]

The best pig raising blog I know of is this one.
Sugar Mountain Farm | Pastured Pigs, Chickens, Ducks, Geese, Sheep, Dogs and Kids in the Mountains of Vermont

 

[2LaneCruzer]

Don't know much about goats, but it won't take a couple of hogs very long to root up a 1/4 acre lot. It might contain them both, but I'm not sure it would be very hospitable in a short time. It would essentially be a feed lot.

 

[quicksandfarmer]

Fencing that will contain goats won't contain pigs. Fencing that will contain pigs won't contain goats. Fencing that will contain both is more than twice as expensive as fencing that will contain either. It's cheaper to fence two pastures than to try to make one contain both.

Goats will eat the vegetation down until it looks like a lawn. Pigs will eat every living thing until it looks like a rototilled garden. Goats like dry ground and can get hoof rot if they have to stand in mud. Pigs like mud.

Both pigs and goats are bullies. Pigs are bigger and stronger and will injure the goats.

 

[gwstang]

Thanks guys, you have given me a lot to think about.

 

[newbury]

Fencing that will contain goats won't contain pigs. Fencing that will contain pigs won't contain goats. Fencing that will contain both is more than twice as expensive as fencing that will contain either. It's cheaper to fence two pastures than to try to make one contain both.<snip>

Reads like experience there.

OP -
Why do you want both?

The reason I ask is that I've been looking into clearing undergrowth on some of my acreage, especially those areas "where a rabbit wouldn't go".

I'm pondering building a shed or two and either:
A small goat proof coyote/big dog proof permanent paddock and a movable fence covering < 0.5 acre (depending on brush density)
or
A very large goat proof fence covering 10 to 15 acres.

I've about settled on a small permanent and a moveable Electro-stop goat fencing area.

I'm not sure that the electro-stop fencing will slow pigs down (like a D6 going through a 40" high chain link fence) but they advise it will.

 

[Egon]

Page wire bottom & barbed wire top should keep both in.