| Good Fencing for Goats & Livestock... |
*Good Fencing for Meat Goats & Other Livestock
by Doug & Hillary Willhite
Boer meat goats are a
win-win arrangement to provide your family with fun, husbandry skills,
increased food security, and wildfire safety. They can substantially
ease your mowing, weed trimming, and tractor work load!
Strong, durable, long-lasting fences are a must for Boer goat containment. A herd of Boer goats that are hungry, horny, or both will jump up against your fence, walk along leaning their weight hard against it in order to scratch themselves, and ram into the fence with their horns trying to break through.
The hardest wear and tear on our livestock fences comes when there are goats on both sides of the same fence. That is when the ladies-in-heat and the bucks get really aggressive about trying to knock through the fence. Even if the does aren't in heat, all the goats want to be together. That is when they appear most content.
To avoid having them on both sides of the same fence we keep all our meat goats together in one herd as often as possible. When we do separate the bucks from the does, or the mamas with kids from the others, we try to make sure there is at least one pasture in between them. We use multiple pastures ranging from three to ten acres each. (Space limitations would certainly make this approach more difficult.) Is there anything a herd animal hates more than being
alone?! When keeping our buck "George" separate from the herd we always make sure he has a companion. We have a wither (or castrated male goat) named "Steak" who was born and raised with "George" and is an old companion.
Good livestock fencing isn't inexpensive. It's a one-time, up-front cost that can be budgeted as a long-term investment & deducted against any livestock sales income on your tax return. (Include a Schedule F tax form.)
To contain our goat herd we use heavy duty, 12-gauge wire, five-foot tall, horse fence with two by four inch rectangular openings (not the thinner, welded wire). 12-gauge, 2" X 4" wire horse fence is commonly available. We go to our local Home Depot Pro Desk and ask them for a bid (on orders exceeding $2000.) They fax our request to their home office and generally phone us the next day to offer a 10% discount.
We've tried using standard wire "field fence" (47" tall with smaller openings at the bottom & larger openings at the top) which is less expensive. But goats will constantly push their heads through the openings trying to get to a plant on the other side of the fence and then get their horns / heads stuck (sometimes at night or on the "back forty" where you can't hear them crying.) Also, small kid goats are able to leap out through the larger openings in a field fence; and small predators, such as bobcats and coyotes, can squeeze through the larger openings.
We know herders that say they're satisfied with electric-net fencing for goat containment. Electronet fence is probably fine when you're in need of a temporary pen. But we live in a highly fire prone area and our mini-farm is off the power grid & solar-powered -- so we're always looking for ways to be more fire safe and to reduce the demand on our solar-electric system. We prefer a stronger, more permanent fence.
We keep a couple of barking guard dogs and a guard llama with our herd at night which wards off predators -- including mountain lions which can easily leap over a tall fence.
A strand of barb wire attached along the bottom of your fence will help discourage digging underneath by stray dogs and coyotes.
Horse fencing comes in 100' rolls. At the Eldorado Goat Farm we install a 7' X 2-3/8'' metal terminal post in concrete at each end of the roll with 1-3/8" angle braces. Pound 7' terminal posts 2' into the ground every nine or ten feet in between the end posts. Use a 2-15/16th" or larger galvanized metal post for hanging gates. Moore Fence (located in Perris, CA) makes our gates to fit the widths of each opening.
Goats will eventually eat everything down to bare dirt if left too long in the same pasture. This will cause needless dust, compaction and erosion. Therefore, keep your herd culled and rotate them from one pasture to the next frequently. Regularly moving your goats will help native plants and grasses to recover again and again, and enable you to "dry farm" more sustainably for years to come.
Young male kid goats should be eaten or taken to market between the ages of six and eight months. You can fatten them up by supplementing their diet with alfalfa hay, 4-grain (goat ration), or hay pellets.
We would reiterate that Boer goats are a win-win arrangement to provide your family with fun, husbandry skills, increased food security, and wildfire safety. They can substantially ease your mowing, weed trimming, and tractor work load!
|
|
|
