Native Arkansans Mark and Kathy Thompson of Pope County are new to farming, but raising Boer goats has proven to be a worthwhile endeavor on several accounts, the couple said.
“We’ve spent the first couple of years just getting to know the goats and feeling our way around the industry,” Mark, an ordained preacher, said. “My purpose in bringing in the goats was simply to clear my property when we started.”
One of the benefits of breeding the Thompsons noticed is the high occurrence of twinning in goats. “We even had triplets last year, so we’re expecting a bumper crop of kids this year,” Mark said. “We have seven pregnancies and pretty soon I’ll let out the other does to breed.”
“Fencing is the key to successful goat farming,” Kathy said. “That’s the one piece of advice I’d give to new farmers. If you don’t have good fencing, you can just kiss your goats and your property goodbye. They’ll eat your garden in a heartbeat.”
“You can’t just put up five-lined barbed wire,” Mark said. The Thompsons’ fencing is topped with cedar slabs for the rustic look Kathy prefers. “I run barbed wire through the square fencing because they’ll pick the fence apart, even just rubbing against it because it feels good and will tear down the fence, and the barbed wire detours them.”
“To a goat the grass is always greener on the other side,” Kathy said.
Providing adequate shelter is also important. “Goats don’t like the wind,” Mark said. He’s installed covered corrals for the does and a dog house for the kids.
Rotating pastures is paramount in providing proper nutrition, Mark said. “If the goats graze down too deep to get the grass, they’re liable to pick up worms too, so in that way it’s healthier to have them graze on newer grass, and they get a lot of nutritional benefits from the privet.”
“Most people say goats eat anything, but we didn’t find that to be true,” Mark said. “Our goats are persnickety eaters.”
“For instance,” Karen added, “they like the Beauty Bush, but they won’t eat the leaves when they first come out. They wait until a certain stage, and they eat the berries but only when they’re fully ripe.”
The goats are full of personality, and it’s easy to get attached, Kathy said. “Ziggy is such a funny buck. He just looks at me with those eyes, and I know he wants to be petted, but bucks stink, especially in rutting season. The closest I get to petting him is rubbing him with a stick.”
“Goats are territorial and have their own hierarchy,” Mark said. “Big Momma is part Saanen and is a little bigger than the other goats. She pretty much rules the roost.”
The plan is that with the large pen of does impregnated, the younger daughters of Rosie can be bred soon to maximize the return in the Spring.
In the pen with Roxie and her daughters Kathy makes a discovery. “It looks like Ziggy got to her, too,” she said, pointing to one of the young does. “She’s bagging.”
“She sure is,” Mark declared as he bent over the doe. “There’s never a dull moment with goats,” he said.
