Just that.

My wife wants to get some goats to help with weed control on some of our property.
She's having a tough time selling me on the idea, so I want to see if there's anyone that raises them and what they have to say.
They would be contained mostly with electric fence since we have barbed wire for the cattle and horses.

My aunt has them when I was young and all I remember is what a pita they were. But hers were free range and basically feral. Lol

School me on them folks

When they get out they'll completely destroy trees and gardens. I sold all mine off and my life's better for it.

We did. My recommendation is don't get goats. They are to personable and most women don't like selling them for meat, so they become like white elephants and a financial and time drain.

Keith

Not to mention most of the people who want to buy goats are a pain to deal with

We raise Nigerian dwarf. There alot easier to contain. We started raising them for weed control.
They have been a great asset to our acreage for weed control. We only have 5 acres. 12 - 14 goats seem to be about right for our place. We sell the kids to help offset winter feed expenses. And fresh or frozen raw milk most of the time.

I'll be following this ....kinda want some brush control and wife keeps talking about goat milk being good for her hair or something

Wolfie,
Hears the results of trapping around my goat fence.

Dad fooled with boers for a bit. Shameful if you ask me. Good fences is the first rule and I'm not talking cow fences either. Next is they need more doctoring than cattle. They got to be wormed and their feet monitored and trimmed as needed. Pasture rotation helps with worms. Don't expect to make any money unless you deal in papered stock or got a big mexican population that can support sale barn sales. If you do on site sales check your state laws on processing on site as many buyers of that type of sale want it processed right there.

Our sheep are much easier than the goats we had. Hair sheep not too hard to keep after you figure them out and how not to kill them.

Come on Keith, the wimons don't get attached to the goat and sheep babies.

Excellent work there Giant Sage.

My wife isn't afraid of butchering or selling. But I could dang sure see her dressing the kid goats up. Lol

Trying to convince Savell to take that lawnmower back and get goats.

Sval is the GOAT. He don't need no competition.

shoot I'm still waiting on all the predators to start rolling up in my hard for the quail

Nice haul Sage !

Thanks Sval,
Having goat babies is the secret. Don't tell no one K.

While I no longer raise livestock I had milk goats for years and they are the hardest animal to keep inside a fence I have ever dealt with, if there’s a weak point they will find it, over, under or right through it if possible, i once watched a group of 20 led by an old nanny defeat a new 6 wire high tensel electric fence at a spot that just happened to have a very slight dip in it of maybe an extra inch or two by dropping down onto their sides and and sliding under the bottom electrified wire, that bottom wire was set at 6 inches off the ground, yes it was a real pain keeping the weeds mowed under it to keep it from sorting out but at that one spot because of that dip it was maybe 8 inches high hardly noticeable but they found it fairly quickly

If you think you can keep one in with a single wire electric fence like cows ect forget it, or a bobwire fence for cows same thing they will get out sooner or later, woven wire, chain link ect to be sure but they can be the Houdini of the animal world they say you should build a fence horse high, Bull strong and hog tight, IMHO that should be goat tight because I have never see a hog climb up a fence but have seen goats do it

By the way goats love to climb on stuff so when they do be prepared for them to climb upon your car and dance around on it, if your one of those guys that gets upset when you go out in the morning and some neighbors cat has left dirty paw prints on the hood of your car be prepared those goats will do more then leave a few prints behind

I raise goats, and I even like them. However, they are a plague and a nuisance. What nightlife said about fence is 100% correct, so if you intend to get goats plan accordingly. As far as "eating weeds" goes, they'll eat the tasty weeds and leave the ones they don't like. They're pretty good at clearing brush/woody plants, because most of them are palatable (at least around here), but when it comes to herbaceous plants, you'll be trading a tasty plant community for an untasty plant community.

We have one goat; originally we had two but Gretal died a few years back. We used them to clear out weeds in a fenced in area, they ate every weed and cleared it out pretty quick. Just don't let them get to your seedlings or garden or grapevines, they'll demolish em! Ours never ate very much grain so they barely cost us anything to keep.

Don't do it! There a pain in the arse, just my opinion