Anbody out there a goat fan?

[Ellie May]

:cboy:

 

[fit2btied]

I didn't vote in your poll but I used to work for an old one and I didn't care much for him! :lol:

 

[WORANCH]

my wife says she has an old goat ...........ME

 

[A. delaGarza]

with the goat market (cabritos) in Northeast Mexico I almost cover all the expenses of my farm

 

[Ellie May]

I'm so happy so far I have had 5 kids born this month. I'm hoping my kid crop will be bigger then last year. Goatta love them Boers.
Ellie May

 

[Anonymous]

Alejandro --- do you lose a lot of the young goat kids to coyotes and other predators? What sort of special precautions do you take, if any, to protect the adult goats or the kids from predators?

Do you raise straight spanish goats or do you cross with Boers?

I've read that goats are very compatible with cattle on a lot of the type of range we have in the southwest -- that you can run them through a pasture after taking the cattle out and they will clean up much of the brush, huisache, mesquite, blackberry vines, etc. that the cattle won't touch. Do you find that to be true?

Thanks for any comments you care to make. Arnold Ziffle

 

[Ellie May]

Yeah goats go good with cattle, because they will eat stuff that a cow won't. Such as cedar, prickly bushes oh & rose bushes are one of their favorites. Well I started out with dairy & then got into boer so now I cross my dairy with boer & have other Boers too. We don't really have a porblem with predator cause we use Llamas & Donkeys. And of course have horses, ponies, & dogs to back them up. Any questions go ahead & ask away.
Ellie May

 

[sam]

Ellie mae, where you been girl, i haven't seen you around in a while

 

[A. delaGarza]

Alejandro --- do you lose a lot of the young goat kids to coyotes and other predators? What sort of special precautions do you take, if any, to protect the adult goats or the kids from predators?
Do you raise straight spanish goats or do you cross with Boers?
I've read that goats are very compatible with cattle on a lot of the type of range we have in the southwest -- that you can run them through a pasture after taking the cattle out and they will clean up much of the brush, huisache, mesquite, blackberry vines, etc. that the cattle won't touch. Do you find that to be true
Thanks for any comments you care to make. Arnold Ziffle

Arnold, NO, we don't loose young goats to coyotes or bobcats or kind of predators because we keep them in a nursery corral, the females that we will keep as replacements or as herd increment are kept in these corrals too till they are old enough to be out with the herd. We raise Spanish does as well as Saanen and use Boer bucks to breed them. I've 20 pygmy does and 4 bucks that are mainly use and sold as pets. I use guardian dogs, Collies and German Shepherds, and my good old Pal .223 as predator protection.

Goats are compatilbe with cattle and YES, they will make a clean up of the brush, huisache, mesquite, vines, cactus flowers and a lot more of the bushes that cattle won't eat, so goats are a perfect cattle partner in a farm specially if the expenses of the farm are afford with the sales of goats.

 

[Craig-TX]

No doubt that goats will clean a place up and make it look like a park. I like to see a place where the tree limbs are all even underneath and the creek bottoms are neat and clean. The main expense is fencing. If a place is not fenced for sheep or goats it costs an awful lot to get ready.

Craig-TX

 

[dun]

There's a guy near here that runs 1500 plus goats. He uses hi-tensile multi strand electric. It works very well, not only to keep the goats in, but I have seen coyotes sulk around the outside and not going anywhere near the hot wire.
Granted it's an expense, but you don't need fancy fencing to keep them in and the predators out.

dun

No doubt that goats will clean a place up and make it look like a park. I like to see a place where the tree limbs are all even underneath and the creek bottoms are neat and clean. The main expense is fencing. If a place is not fenced for sheep or goats it costs an awful lot to get ready.

Craig-TX

 

[Anonymous]

Good to hear from you Ellie May, I like goats. However, a couple of my mules don't.

 

[Ellie May]

Hi everybody. Yes goats are easy keepers once you put up the right kinda fence. I was wondering if anybody has any ideas. We had 7 kids born last week. And 3 of the youngest died. They were nursing & looked good when I left I didn't get to check on them till today (that means one day I didn't check on them) I found 3 dead just curled up in the hay in the barn/shed. I was thinking it might of been too cold, but never had a problem with them being too cold. It was only about 40 degrees. I dunno!! The rest are bouncing around. One bad thing about living on a farm the deaths but the best thing is the births. I just LOVE to see newborns....calves, kids, lambs, foals, crias, everything.
Ellie May

 

[BLACKPOWER]

I wouldn't have a goat because my Ranch has an image to uphold. If I had goats running all over the place people wouldn't give me any credibility. Kind of like I don't to Ellie Mae.

 

[A. delaGarza]

maybe you don't have goats cause you haven't find a homo black one :lol: :lol:

BP just joking

 

[Ann Bledsoe]

Hi Elllie

Just because you see them nursing doesn't necessarily mean that they're getting enough nutrition. And some does are real bad about only letting one kid at a time nurse so the first-born, or stronger, kid gets the lion's share, and sometimes there's just not enough left for the other one. When I had goats I didn't let them dam-raise -- first off I wanted the extra milk (diary goats -- alpines and la manchas), and secondly by milking and bottlefeeding the kids, I knew exactly how much they were getting AND I could make sure that the kids got the richest milk and best colostrum from the best producing does.
Kids are real prone to hypoglaucemia. Cold night + not quite enough milk = dead kid. Friend of mine lost one last year to hypoglaucemia -- kid seemed fine at bedtime and was dead the next morning. Doe was bred too young but appeared to be milking fine and her single kid was nursing -- but the doe's milk was of very poor quality which wasn't discovered until the kid was dead and the owner started milking the doe. Her milk was like water, this year as a second year freshener, she's giving good milk and her kids are doing fine.
One of mine spent a whole day and night on my couch being spoonfed -- chilly, damp night, kid was almost dead in the morning, at least we did pull that one through.

Good luck, hopefully you won't lose anymore -- it is heartbreaking to lose one. So far we've done real well around here, never lost a kid and out of 30+ bottle calves, we've only lost 1 and he had an excuse, he was a salebarn calf that didn't get colostrum.

Ann B

Hi everybody. Yes goats are easy keepers once you put up the right kinda fence. I was wondering if anybody has any ideas. We had 7 kids born last week. And 3 of the youngest died. They were nursing & looked good when I left I didn't get to check on them till today (that means one day I didn't check on them) I found 3 dead just curled up in the hay in the barn/shed. I was thinking it might of been too cold, but never had a problem with them being too cold. It was only about 40 degrees. I dunno!! The rest are bouncing around. One bad thing about living on a farm the deaths but the best thing is the births. I just LOVE to see newborns....calves, kids, lambs, foals, crias, everything.
Ellie May

 

[Ellie May]

Thank you for your help.
Ellie May

 

[MULDOON]

Didn't have much luck with the goats , One hung itself in the fence, one the horses killed , the other two ran away !! don't blame them.
Now I've had much better luck with the Barbado sheep.
Sold a couple of rams @ auction , not evan big horns ,and averaged 52 bucks!!
My big ram got sassy with my 1/4 broodmare, She kicked him in the head =dead

Any body got any good recipes for barbado's???

 

[dun]

Didn't have much luck with the goats , One hung itself in the fence, one the horses killed , the other two ran away !! don't blame them.
Now I've had much better luck with the Barbado sheep.
Sold a couple of rams @ auction , not evan big horns ,and averaged 52 bucks!!
My big ram got sassy with my 1/4 broodmare, She kicked him in the head =dead

Any body got any good recipes for barbado's???

The best recipe for Barbados is a deep hole and lots of dirt on top. It still tastes like range maggot.

dun

 

[Anonymous]

Goats used to bring $5 at the sale barn period. Any type any size.
Now we have a large influx of hispanic folks movin into our area.
I've seen goats bring over $100 in the last couple of years.
They must taist good? Dont think I'll try it.
Hillbilly