Goats cleaning off a fenceline
I was a bit disappointed by our goats' inability to eat a thicket of weeds to the ground,
but I've been thrilled at how well they do at cleaning honeysuckle off
our fencelines. Every evening, after walking the girls back to
their coop, I move five cattle panels into a new arrangement to prepare
for the next day. Two panels lean up against the
honeysuckle-covered fence, and the other three (and two fence posts and a
bit of rope) complete the enclosure.
The next morning when I
bring the goats to their new pasture, Abigail runs right for the
honeysuckle and Artemesia soon follows suit. They gorge for a
couple of hours, then chew their cuds, then gorge again. By
dinnertime, that side of the fence is bare of honeysuckle leaves
(although some stems remain, proving that the goats will have to regraze
the same areas next year).
For the sake of
comparison, the photos above show yesterday's fenceline (left) and the
edge of tomorrow's fenceline (right). After reading that
honeysuckle leaves are equivalent in protein and total digestible
nutrients to alfalfa hay, I can understand why our girls do such a good
job removing the wily vine.
Back when I was just
reading about goats, I hadn't planned to let our new livestock within
our core homestead. In fact, I was going to keep them at least two
fences away just in case the tame deer (which is how I thought of them)
escaped and headed for my precious apple trees. Now I'm thinking
that maybe I overreacted. The only goat escape from my
cattle-panel tractors has been when I didn't tie one panel securely and
our little doeling slid out through the gap...then grazed right beside
the fence until I put her back in.
Now I'm thinking that
goats are like chickens --- they don't want to put in the energy to
escape as long as you keep them fat and happy. The big question
becomes: Can we keep the honysuckle buffet coming all winter? Only
time will tell!
Or explore more posts by date or by subject.
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.
Want to be notified when new comments are posted on this page? Click on the RSS button after you add a comment to subscribe to the comment feed, or simply check the box beside "email replies to me" while writing your comment.
I am thinking about getting some goats to clean my fence line. Many questions. Can you use the milk from a goat who cleans a fence line and eats poison ivy? Do you tie the goats to the fence line, or is that impossible? If you can't tie them, how to you get them to stay on the fence line and not eat all the pasture? Cindy