One of the problems with goats in the winter is mud. Even if you pick a very well-drained spot for them, they'll tend to hang out at the gate closest to human activity. The result is trampled up mud, like this.

(In case you're curious, this is one of the bucks Artemesia turned down during her driveway date. She had three choices --- such a lucky girl!)

Our caprine companions deal with the issue by finding stumps to stand on, which keeps their hooves dry but still leaves me feeling like a slacker goatkeeper. So Mark finished off the gate he'd been adding to pasture two so we could rotate the girls over.

I'd like to say we'd stockpiled winter forage for the goats to enjoy in this new pasture, but we're not to that point yet. Abigail ate the few honeysuckle leaves she'd missed during her previous occupation, then the girls went back to the barn to dine on hay. At least they won't have to walk through mud for a few weeks now.

I'm curious to hear what others do about mud-pits in their winter pastures. Do you lay down gravel in those sacrifice areas, have big enough pastures that the goats don't congregate in the same spot all the time, or something entirely different?

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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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