Goats used for Lawn Mowing

[HayBay]

I was not sure if this was posted already.

http://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2009/10/17/Mass-town-using-goats-as-lawn-mowers/UPI-56911255806071/

Officials in Andover, Mass., say they are using goats to keep one of the town's public meadows trimmed, even as they trim a bit of government spending.

[atouchofnature]

Goats are great for grass.

Many years ago, I bought a small farm that had not been maintained very well at all. The "pasture" was badly overgrown with weeds. Wild mustard, thistle, goldenrod, ragweed & everything else imaginable was up to 7 feet tall. I decided to try my hand at raising goats to sell for meat. I bought around 25 goats & put them into this "jungle".

Cattle & sheep graze from the ground up, eating the grass, clover etc first. Goats graze from the top down, preferring the weeds (they are actually browsers rather than grazers). After about 2 months there were practically no weeds. After about another month of the goats eating weeds & dropping manure on it, the pasture looked better than most lawns. Goats will not eat grass down to the ground, unless they have no other choice, so most of the grass was kept about 4 - 6 inches high, and since they prefer weeds, any time a new one grew, it was eaten before it grew tall enough to become evident. Besides that, they were constantly dropping manure & urine over the area, feeding the soil. For those who don't know, goat manure is tiny pieces, about the size of a jelly bean, and they don't drop those pieces in "piles" typically, but drop off a dozen or so pieces here and there, usually while walking, so they even take care of "spreading" it.

After I learned this, I started taking the more tame ones to my lawn once a week to "mow & fertilize" it for me. I had fertilized & seeded it already, but just letting them spend one day a week working on it kept it looking great.

Maybe more information than anyone wanted, but I find them fascinating. I think cities should allow homeowners with fenced lawns to have goats on them (it is only the males that smell bad, and they only smell bad when a female nearby is ready for breeding). Of course, that would cost some of us some business, unless we added fencing to our list of services.

[Grohorganic]

been there done that a few times, got 3 new ones on the way, ate the old mower before she got to old and not so tasty. if you can then do it!!! the only area we hand mow is the fenced yard around the house, it is going to be a veg garden soon so we need the fence to keep the goats and wild life out and the veg crops in....

[corey4671]

I have six goats on an acre lot behind my house and there is nary a weed in that lot and I've yet to have to mow it this season. As was stated above, they keep the grass down to about 8" high. Kids love em too. They actually sell pretty decently around here. Mexicans love to eat em. I bought my last four which were probably all under the age of six months for $92. I had sold one young Billy that was about 7 months old for $65.

[DUSTYCEDAR]

there was always a goat chained along the fence line on the farm kept the fence nice and clean

[ICT Bill]

there was always a goat chained along the fence line on the farm kept the fence nice and clean

Dusty, that was almost a full sentence, maybe a first for you, wooohooo :clapping:

[phasthound]

Dusty, that was almost a full sentence, maybe a first for you, wooohooo :clapping:

I'll bet his fingers hurt from all that typing! :waving: