Keep goats or sheep

Raise the tough animals that turn thorny brush into milk, wool, hides, and more animals.

hard⏳ a seasontradition — not yet hand-tested

Goats and sheep are the survival animals of humankind. They eat plants you cannot — thorny brush, coarse weeds, tree leaves — and give back milk, meat, wool, hides, and young.

Pick by your land: goats browse bushes, brambles, and leaves and thrive on rough scrub; sheep graze open grass, give wool, and are easier to fence. Goats give more milk. One rule above all: never keep just one. These are herd animals — a lone one is miserable, loud, and forever escaping.

You need

• Two or three young females (does for goats, ewes for sheep) — a healthy one stands alert: bright eyes, clean rear end, shiny coat, no limp.
• A strong pen — for goats, at least 1.4 m high, no gaps a head fits through, nothing to climb on near the fence. Sheep are easier: 1 m and solid at the bottom.
• A shelter — a three-sided roofed hut, open side away from the wind, 2 square metres per animal, with dry bedding. Cold is fine; wet-plus-wind kills.
• Land or cut feed — a quarter hectare of decent browse or pasture feeds 2–3 animals in the growing season; otherwise carry branches and grass daily.
• Stored feed for winter — dried grass (hay), about 2 kg per animal per day when nothing grows; start drying and stacking in summer.
• Water — clean, daily. A milking animal drinks 8–10 litres a day.
• Salt — a lump of rock salt to lick weekly; grass and browse are short on it.
• A knife or shears and rope halters — for hoof care and handling.

Steps

1. Fence first, animals second. Push every post and check every gap — goats find the weakness within a day.
2. Keep new animals penned for the first two weeks and feed them by hand daily. They learn you mean food and the pen means home; tame animals are easier in every way.
3. Settle a daily rhythm — half an hour, morning and evening:
   • Fresh water, feed or a move to fresh browse, and a head count.
   • Look at each animal for ten seconds: eating? moving well? droppings normal (firm pellets)?
4. Move them to fresh ground often — rotate pastures or tether spots every few days. Gut worms picked up from droppings are the biggest slow killer, and fresh ground breaks the cycle.
5. Trim hooves every 6–8 weeks. Hooves grow like fingernails; overgrown ones fold under, trap muck, and lame her. Tie her short, lift one foot, and pare the overgrown wall flat to the sole in thin slices — stop before any pink shows (blood is close).
6. Breed in autumn if you want milk and young. Borrow a male (buck or ram) for a few weeks rather than keeping one — males are smelly, strong, and can be dangerous. Pregnancy runs about 5 months, so autumn breeding means spring babies, born with the grass.
7. At birthing, mostly stand back — a healthy mother manages alone. Have clean dry bedding ready; see each newborn breathe, get licked dry, and drink within an hour or two — the first thick yellow milk (colostrum) carries disease protection it cannot live without.
8. Shear sheep once a year, in late spring, after cold nights end.

Watch out

• Escapes. A goat that escapes once tries the same spot forever. Fix the gap the same day; bored goats escape more, so give them something new to eat.
• Sudden diet changes kill. A gut full of new rich food — spilled grain, a lush new pasture — can bloat and kill in hours. Introduce new feed a little at a time over a week; keep grain locked away.
• Poison plants: rhododendron, azalea, yew, and wilted cherry leaves are all deadly to goats and sheep. Learn what grows in reach and clear these before the animals arrive.
• Worms. A thin animal with a rough coat, pale inner eyelids, or soft dirty droppings likely carries worms. Move the flock to clean ground, feed better, and get experienced help or an animal doctor when you can.
• Wet feet. Constant mud rots hooves — the animal limps and the hoof smells foul. Keep bedding dry and give them dry ground to stand on.
• A down animal is an emergency. One that will not stand needs shelter, water, and experienced help — today, not tomorrow.

How it works

Goats and sheep are ruminants: their first stomach (the rumen) is a fermentation vat where microbes break down woody plants no human stomach can touch. That is why they turn thorns into milk — and why sudden feed changes are dangerous: the microbes need days to adjust; when they crash, the animal crashes too.