And does eat oats
I've been intrigued to
realize that the beds of oats that our goats have repeatedly nibbled
throughout the fall and early winter are staying green longer than the
un-nibbled beds (which are pretty much dead by now). I wonder if the
nibbled beds are producing more underground biomass as well as regrowing
their leaves repeatedly? After all, I've read that, when grass is
grazed, the plants slough off a proportional amount of root mass
(although I've yet to see a scientific study to this effect). If the
root-sloughing is more than a permaculture legend, then you might
actually add more 
biomass
to the soil by letting goats graze your cover crops a couple of times
than by simply letting the oat plants mature and then die in situ.
Of course, even re-nibbled, there's only so much oat growth at this time of year. So I've been taking the girls up in the woods every day or two
to hunt down honeysuckle. This week, we found a huge tangle not far
from their pasture, where a fallen pine held honeysuckle branches high
enough off the ground that deer were unable to dine. Enter the biped and
the caprines! Artemesia thinks that humans are pretty darn awesome
because we can pull vines down from way up high with our flexible
fingers and opposable thumbs. But Abigail gets sick of waiting, so she
simply hops up onto the trunk of the fallen pine (three feet off the
ground) and chows down. If our local deer were as agile as Abigail,
there would be no honeysuckle left at all!
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About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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Hi Anna and all,
I have read books about this effect. One professor measured over 3X. The latest AcresUSA has a Joel Salatin article that would seem to imply even more of an effect?
This BIG question at least for me is WHY?? What is the animal doing that makes things grow so much better? Adds biology? Adds biologically bound minerals?
You can read many articles about using 'night soil' and producing the same if not a bigger effect?
Maybe it really doesn't matter?
Maybe the real questionh is: What do we need to do to make our system healthy, productive and well?
Happy Holidays to all.
John
I noticed you referred to taking/leading your goats into the woods. How do you get your goats to follow? Do you have very many? I have twelve. They do not always follow...even with a bucket of food. I want to rotate them on pasture, but for their safety, we have to pen them at night (coyotes, neighboring dogs, etc.). Let's just say, I have 8 children and when we try to get them into the pasture/pen it can be quite the prospect for America's Funniest Home Video. I would love to know if you have a trick. Thanks, Kristi
I know the ditty, but I also learned a rhyme when I was a child... Does eat oats and goats eat oats, but little lambs eat ivy. I spent some time in the NC mountains and the person that taught me the rhyme said it was to remind folks not to let their livestock eat mountain laurel which is also called ivy. Just wondered about your title.