hi all.

Just a question of curiousity and interest really - goat products (ie milk, cheese, butter) are becoming more and more poopular in the supermarkets, yet i have never seen any goat  farming , is this simply in my area (east sussex, UK) or do we import all the goat foodstuffs - i know that there is alot of goat farming in Spain for example? If not, I would be interested to here from anyone who does farm goats and their experiences and reasons for becoming involved in farming them.

 thank you for reading (again!)

 

Kat

Hi Kat,

There is quite a lot of goat farming going on (see my avatar) but we're mostly small operations so not very visible on the radar.  The likes of NFU, etc. have no time for us so we get virtualy no representation.  Unfortunately I'm in a bit of a hurry right now to explore the topic more, but do a google for British Goat Society, British Angora Goat Society, etc.  I'll post a bit more tomorrow if I get a chance

 T.

 

thanks townie,

i figured there must be lots of you out there somewhere! thanks for replying!

 

*wonders off to play on google!*

Ok, more substantial reply.

Firstly, the best starting point is the British Goat Society who have an excellent links page to all the breed societies as well as various breeders and special interest groups.

In the UK goats are kept for a number of reasons.  There are the dairy products - milk, cheese, yogurt, butter, fudge, etc.  There is meat (often marketed as chevron.)  There is fibre: mohair from Angoras goats, cashmere from others.  Then there is the pet goat market.  As with cattle, sheep, etc. various breeds have specialised in particular niches, although there are some multi-purpose breeds too.

Much of the goat produce you can buy in the UK is produced here.  Certainly all of the fresh goat milk, butter and yogurt that places like Tesco are now stocking, as well as the meat where you can get it.  Of cheese, much is imported from France, who are the real specialists, but a great deal is now produced here too, often to French regional recipies, but increasingly to locally devised recipies.  All goat dairy products return a premium.  Goat meat is harder to come by in the supermarkets, but the increasing interest from the ethnic markets is fuelling a demand that is difficult to meet and therefore produces pretty decent returns; the Muslim festival of Eid in November is eagerly anticipated by goat farmers!

I specialise in fibre goats: Angoras.  This developed from a longstanding interest in fibre products: we had native breed sheep as well at one time and also have some camelids.  In fact Mrs Townie has used animal fibres as diverse as sheep, goat, cat, llama, alpaca, rabbit and shetland pony.  Mohair, the fibre of the Angora goat, is an outstanding fibre exceeding any man-made fibre in softness, resilience and flexibility.  We take two clips per year each of 4-6 kilos for an adult and 2-3 kilos of the super-fine kid mohair.  Return on kid goat fibre at current prices and assuming you add no value beyond bagging and selling on slightly exceeds the total cost of shearing and raising the kid.  If you then sell on the meat, you are into a reasonable return.  Kid mohair is produced over the first two clips (at 6 and 12 months, roughly) at which point the animal can be kept into adulthood or slaughtered at around 14 months returning a carcass plus a fantastic skin.  If you are prepared to put some more effort in a more substantial return can be had from the fibre selling on yarn or finished products as many breeders do.  The fibre is enhanced by blending with other fibres such as merino or southdown wool, alpaca or silk to give a range of interesting combinations of properties.

As I mention, Angoras have a secondary market in meat, although the premier meat goat is the Boer.  In fact the Boer is made up from native African breeds such as the Nubian combined with Angoras.  The meat of both is a very lean tasty meat similar to the best lamb and superior to the meat of dairy goats; many dairy breeders are now using an Angora or Boer buck unless they are breeding replacement milkers.  The chief benefit of the Boer is the quicker growth to a larger carcass (obviously the Angora puts a lot of nutrition into the fleece.)

Downsides?  Well it depends upon the breed.  With Angoras, we note that they can have more foot problems than other breeds, not so much rot as a tendency to horn seperation and injuries.  I believe this is more due to too soft a pasture and following the departure of our builders this year I built a 'mountain' of rubble for the goats to climb and this has actually helped to reduce the foot problems significantly - our llamas also love this mountain!  As the fleece is clipped twice a year, in early Spring and early Autumn, there are inevitably periods when too little fleece means they are too cold or too much means they are too hot.  Therefore adequate shelter to keep warm/cool is required.  They don't much like rain although I have found giving them free access to the outside, unlike many breeders, they will venture out far more often than advertised!  Ideally they should be indoors for kidding as young goats are more delicate than their sheepy cousins.  Many dairy flocks are kept indoors all the time with outside access limited to hard standing; I don't personally believe this is ideal for such a curious and browsy creature, but the flocks in question seem to be doing quite well financially so I can't really argue with that!

Being browsers, rough grazing is the best thing for goats: a clean well fertilised sheep or dairy cattle sward IMO will not produce decent returns on any goat venture.  For supplement, there are specialised feeds on the market, or a combination of straw and hay: never feed goats silage, it is far too rich and can kill them.

Feel free to ask any questions you may have.  I'm pretty sure I've noticed a couple of other goatkeepers posting on here from time to time.  You could also check out the various smallholding forums out there such as ACL or Smallholder magazine or River Cottage

 

WOW! thank you so much! I was recently discussing this with the mrs, and whilst a conversation much ahead of time, we were thinking about keeping goats and sheep when we get our own place (and I've gone and been all educated on husbandry and so forth!) and you have managed to answer so many of my questions!

with regards to dairy farming would you know if the logistics are very much the same as with cattle and i know ou mention tht you ave gone into fibre goas because of an existing interes, but where there any other deciding factors to your choice?

you mention that you get quite good finncial returns on your goats, would you think that farming soley goats and sheep would produce a sustainable enough income or do you farm your goats as a sideline to more profitable ventures?

thank you so much for talking the time to reply, it is very much appreciated - i might go and see if i can subscribe to smallholder through their website, because it doesn't appear ont he shelves around here and it took me long enough to find a shop that stocked FW!- thank you so much for being such a source of information once again!

 

KAt

having just looked at the angora goats i can see why you would want to keep them! they are beautiful animals!!!!

 

Hi Kat2

My experience in NOT farming goats is...and I hate to say this..the smell of the Billy Goat!! (I would rather have  a pen of pigs at the end of my garden!!) The Nanny wasn't too bad though! Good Luck!

The Royal Association of British Dairy Farmers (RABDF) has organised an introduction to commercial goat farming, to be held at Ross-on-Wye on 28 Nov 07.  Contact Laura Dickinson on 08454582711.

Yup the smell is an issue, although mainly with dairy goats.  With Boers and Angoras it's not so much of a problem as the buck only gives off his alluring (to girl goats) odor during the mating season and it's a lot less obnoxious than that of the dairy bucks, who scent all the time.  Angora bucks also have the benefit of a fleece that helps to mask the scent; by the time you come to shearing, he's generally been off the girls for a months or two and any rain has washed out the odor.

Kat2 asks about logistics.  I assume you mean the rules and regs?  It's usual to treat goats just like sheep for the purposes of regulations as Deathra basically do the same.  There are a few points of departure, but those probably won't affect you unless you get interested in import/export, which is a serious pain with goats.

For us we mainly chose Angoras because of the fibre angle.  We did have a dairy goat at one time as a 'house goat' to provide milk for the family, but frankly the commitment to hand milk every day, even when you already have enough milk, was not what we were looking for.  I have the utmost respect for any dairy farmer (cow/goat/ewe/...) because that life really is a 100% commitment.  So we passed her on to someone who was more into that idea.  We now get all our milk from a friend who runs a commercial dairy goat operation.

 

Kat the Second,

kat2:

you mention that you get quite good finncial returns on your goats, would you think that farming soley goats and sheep would produce a sustainable enough income or do you farm your goats as a sideline to more profitable ventures?

With regard to returns.  Clearly there are a number of dairy operations that are now making a pretty decent return.  A cracking example is St Helen's Farm near York.  Another smaller scale effort not far from me is Kid Me Not who produce a range of fantastic fudges as well other value-added products (Mrs townie loves the coffee fudge, I quite like the yougurt smoothies.)

For meat, I don't know of operations making a living solely off goat meat.  Most are either a diversification alongside other livestock or on the smallholder scale with other tourist or non-farming income.  Whether that will change when/if goat becomes a more popular meat, who knows.  It's easy to point to the ostrich farming 'bubble' of a few years ago or the alpaca pyramid scheme, but there is a genuine market for goat meat in some of our immigrant communities and I don't see why this couldn't be developed to commercial levels.

On fibre, the equation is more difficult.  As all sheep farmers know it is difficult to make a decent return solely on fibre as the international markets are volatile and the growth of cheap artificial fibres dents every natural fibre market.  Mohair is a niche fibre and very subject to the fickle requirements of the fashion industry; some years the mainly Italian buyers can't get enough, others there is no sign of them at all.  I'll spare you the history lesson on the world mohair industry, but in summary the major world producers (>90%) are in South Africa and in Texas.  As a comparison, there are currently in the region of 7,000 Angora goats in the UK, but even the smaller flocks in Texas number over 10,000.  However, with a severe drought in SA over the last several years and the withdrawal of government subsidies in the US, a lot of producers are drastically downsizing.

The big problem in the UK mohair industry is the looming genetic bottleneck.  By the early 90s there were 3-4 times the number of Angoras in the UK there are now.  But increasing government (UK & EU) restrictions made it harder and more expensive to import.  As a result not single Angora has been imported since 1999.  Only a few have been exported, mainly to France, by a handful of producers who have managed to get export approval.  Then came 2001.  More than half the Angoras in the UK were culled even though not a single one ever showed F&M symptoms or was subsequently tested positive.  Many producers simply gave up.  One of the reasons there is still a thriving Angora community in the further reaches of Wales is because the contiguous culls never reached us.  With the drastic reduction in numbers and near-impossibility of importing new bloodlines, there is a bit of a crisis.  In my opinion there is still a diverse enough pool to rebuild the industry and make an impression on the world market, but it is an interesting challenge!

In our case, we have a diversity of incomes of which the goats are an important part.  We raise some Welsh Black Cattle for beef in rotation with the goats.  These are perfect for us as they thrive well on hill pasture and complement the goats by mowing down the grass that the goats largely ignore.  The use of fibre products is also important, using both our own and bought in fibre.  We also have a small llama herd that we use to run treks for tourists both across our land and through the local forestry; this alongside the holiday lets we're currently developing is an important source of income.  Finally, we are just starting to run some courses in fibre arts, goat and llama husbandry and ... well that's for starters, but we'll add anything else we can think of !!

 

 I came accross this video on Youtube about the Meat Goat industry in the US.  I thought it was interesting

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SC54UJnDgLY

Just found this thread so thought I would chip in. I am a cashmere goat farmer in Devon with 250 cashmeres plus a few Boers and Angoras. We started with the Angoras and then moved into the other two. I am possible uniquely placed to compare accorss breeds for profitability regarding meat. I personally find Angoras make poor carcasses even when crossed with Boers because they still require concentrate feeding to get up to weight - so much energy is going into the fleece. They also take an age to get there. A cashmerexBoer however makes an excellent quick growing carcass with no supplementary feeding at all. We slaughter our wethers at various times depending on demand. Even the castrated male cashmeres with no Boer blood make an excellent economical carcass at around 12 months. As for the fibre - we have no problems processing and selling it here in the UK but we are 100% commiteed to QUALITY. All our cashmere and Angora kids are fibre tested . It's the only way forward in a small niche industry - that and taking fibre through to yarn and finished goods. We also keep BOWMONT sheep - pure bred, not bred with added Shetland as they have had to do in Wales recently to keep them alive in the hard conditions up there on the hills. The wool is 15-19 microns in the first fleece and deteriorates by another 2 microns over the following 6 years. The wool is to die for and I have a waiting list for fleeces. Again, all fibre is tested by a fibre lab.. There is money to be made from fibre goats but let no one think its an easy option - you have to work very hard to establish your market and a total commitment to QUALITY is essential. This involves a good deal of boneing up on the technicalities of fibre and textile production and in my case, learning to handspin, weave and knit so I understand exactly what my customers want. I am just beginning to sell to companies now who are seeking me out which has to be encouraging!! www.devonfinefibres.co.uk is my site if anyone wants to see.

 

Interesting. The same is true here in Canada. Anyone wanting to farm out here could do a lot worse than set up a Boer goat farm, especially close to one of the big cities, Vancouver, Toronto/ Winnipeg/ Montreal. 

More and more people are emigrating here who regard goat meat as a staple. There are crazy prices paid, especially around the Muslim festivals. There just aren't enough animals out there at present to meet the demand.