Latest / Beyond Labels Premium / Episode #196: Homesteading Wisdom with Morgan Michaluk of The Chatty Goat

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Episode #196: Homesteading Wisdom with Morgan Michaluk of The Chatty Goat · Beyond Labels Premium

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Hi, everybody.
• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to another episode of Beyond Labels.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Dr.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_01: Stina McCullough, and I'm here with my favorite co-host, Joel Salatin.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: Today we have a special guest.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: It's Morgan Mishkelech.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: Morgan is the owner of The Chatty Goat, and she's the author of the book, Homesteading with Dairy Goats from Birth to Butcher.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: She maintains a social media presence with the goal of educating and empowering new dairy goat owners and budding homesteaders.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_01: After quite a negative first experience with dairy goats back in 2013, Morgan set out to learn how to manage goats in a way that not only benefited her, but also the animals.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: And Morgan says that it turns out all those negative goat stereotypes fall away when the herd is well managed and their needs are met.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: Morgan, welcome to the program.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for having me.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: I'm happy to be here.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, I'm going to start with the first question of Joel isn't mine.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_01: I would love to know more about this negative first experience with your goats.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: What happened?
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so this was back in 2013.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_02: I didn't know anything about goats.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I did not grow up farming.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_02: I grew up a typical suburban kid.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_02: I was obsessed with horses, though.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_02: That was since I was little.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_02: Loved horses.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so I got my first horse when I was a teenager.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_02: My parents asked if I wanted help getting a car or a horse.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_02: And I picked the horse.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_02: I said, I can ride my bike.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um so I did do an animal science class in high school, and I raised a batch of meat chickens in my parents' lawnmower shed because we had an hoa um in the neighborhood, so nobody could know that there were meat chickens.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: It had to be clapped clandestine.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: Clandestine food production.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_00: That's the ultimate test of a homesteader, clandestine food production.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_02: So I raised 25 meat chickens in there.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and that was sort of the start for me into food.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, I worked in restaurants, um, and I would see the Cisco truck pull up and the GFS truck, and we were making beautiful food from not quality ingredients.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_02: And it was the first time that I realized that that was even that there were not quality ingredients.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_02: And so then there must be quality somewhere.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so the dairy goats, the first dairy goats were actually not mine.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_02: Um, the guy I was dating at the time who worked at the restaurant, he had a homestead that he had just started.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_02: And he had Nigerian dwarf goats, which are a common breed to start out with for homesteaders, um, because they're small and they're cute.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_02: And those things would not stay in offense and they would um eat all of the garden.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_02: And they were just, they were like out of control children.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I couldn't stand them, and I couldn't see the appeal in them beyond just okay, they're cute.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_02: But then when that's done, they're unruly.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_02: They just they do whatever they want, whenever they want.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um and you know, they would, of course, the bucks would get in with the doughs, and so then they're being bred out of season, and to who, I don't know.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_02: So it was just a lot of um, there just wasn't any control.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think typical of a lot of people, I blamed the goats for that.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but what I've learned since you know, having those goats early on, and I did have, I got Nubians shortly after, which are a much larger breed, um, and I was having issues getting them bred, and a lot of the issues I realized now were just mismanagement or a lack of understanding of the animals' needs.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_02: And I mean, I think it goes for any livestock, certainly herding animals, if if you aren't their leader, they will be the leader because somebody has to, you know, take control of the herd.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_02: And if it's not going to be you, then then they'll do it.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and I think that's when things feel really out of control.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_02: So I swore off dairy goats said I would never have them again.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_02: And um then in 2019, I believe it was, um, we picked up with dairy goats, my husband and I, and we had a baby on the way, and we had a brief stint with a Jersey dairy cow because we thought surely surely the Jersey cow means you've made it as a homesteader.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_02: The Jersey cow and milking in your sundress in the field.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um and she was lovely.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_02: She her name was Fiona, she was a beautiful cow.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we were only on three and a half acres at the time.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_02: And at four in the morning, she wanted to be milked, so she would start bellowing.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_02: And they are so loud.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_02: So all the neighbors could hear our cow at 4 a.m.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_02: bellowing to be milked.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_02: Um, she was also just a physically large animal, obviously.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_02: Cows are a lot bigger than goats, and she had horns.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and she would just kind of set her head at me if she didn't want to do something, if she didn't want to go, you know, the direction I'm trying to lead her.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and I found her very intimidating, which is interesting because I'm not intimidated by horses, but I am intimidated by cows.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_02: And so I found the dairy goat to be a more comfortable size because I do most of the the work on the homestead myself.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_02: My husband works full-time.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_02: Um so we we revisited the dairy goats around that time, around 2019.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_02: And having learned a lot more about them, I've I've fallen in love with them.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: Oh.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_01: So just like you're saying that the goats become unruly, right, when when they don't have a leader.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: Do you think that's true with the cows?
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_01: Like, do you think that's what happened with your Jersey cow experience?
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_01: Like maybe the cow didn't see you as the leader, or I'm just trying to see if there's any similarity there.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_02: I definitely think so.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_02: I think she could tell that I was nervous around her.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so I think that was part of it.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_02: And for me, it was just I think understanding the context that we were in at that time and and seeing it not so much as a failure, but you know, we're on three and a half acres, and I'm smaller stature, and I'm intimidated by the size of this animal.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_02: And so that's okay.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, we want dairy for our homestead.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_02: Is there another animal that that fits it better?
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_02: So I think a lot of it comes down to context.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, when I talk to people who are interested in starting out with with dairy for their home, it's it's always important to understand um the size of their land, the topography, like is it wooded or pasture, their comfort level, um, what animals they're drawn to.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_02: Like I think all of those things matter in the success of whichever animal they choose.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, if if you only had three and a half acres, and uh, you know, if you say, well, an acre was taken up by yard and garden and house and outbuildings and stuff, now you're down to two and a half.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: I'm trying to set the context for our listeners.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um that now you're down to actually two and a half acres.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: And that gets a little bit dicey uh for a cow.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: Um now if you if you paddock it off and move her every day to another paddock, you know, it would probably it would probably work.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um but but yeah, it gets a little bit it's it's minimalistic for a cow.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: It is.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and and too, I think sometimes a lot of it depends on what you grow up with.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: You know, if if you had grown up, if you'd grown up on a dairy, you probably wouldn't have been intimidated at all by the cow.
• 8:15
  SPEAKER_00: But um if you don't grow up, it's kind of like kind of like butchering.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know, people man, they're always scared.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: Oh no, what are my kids, if my kids, what am I gonna do?
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_00: And and if you know if you grow up with you know slaughtering chickens and lambs and and shooting deer and stuff, it's it's it's just it's just not a big deal.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um but if you if you've never if your only engagement with an animal has been a pet dog or cat, and then suddenly you you know you engage in this uh butchering thing, it's it's um it's a bit of a shock.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, I yeah, that's that's a really important point that you bring up.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and it was, you know, my experience prior to the horse anyway was cats and dogs and hamsters, small animals, pets.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so and I think a lot of people are in that boat right now.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_02: You know, we're seeing we're seeing this homesteading movement, and currently eggs and dairy are under attack.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_02: And I think it's because they're some of the most nutritionally available, you know, food that you can have in your backyard.
• 9:22
  SPEAKER_02: So people are getting chickens, and now people are wanting dairy animals.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_02: And if they've only had the dog or cat, that thousand-pound cow is gonna be a change.
• 9:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_01: So there's lots of different um negative stereotypes that we've heard about goats.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_01: And um, you know, of course, people who are regular listeners know that like I have this kind of love relationship with goats because that was my nickname as a mountain biker, right?
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: Because goats climb the mountains well.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so so that was my nickname.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: So I've always loved goats because of that.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: But but there's some negative stereotypes about like how they'll escape a lot or they're really loud or just unruly, like you mentioned with um your ex-boyfriend's example.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_01: Why, like, why do you think the goats get that way?
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_01: So, first of all, is that now your experience with goats?
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: And if not, why do you think that goats act that way?
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_01: Like, is this how most goats act?
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: Are they trying to get attention?
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what's going on?
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's a good question.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so my goats that now are not that way.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I would say the big stereotypes are that they escape all the time, um, that they're prone to parasites, so they can't graze.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um, they are loud, probably that their milk tastes bad.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_02: I hear a lot of people say, oh, it's goate or off-flavored.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_02: And so all of those things I have found to be typically signs of mismanagement or um, you know, something about that goat, their needs aren't being met.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_02: So as far as the taste in the milk, the milk is delicious.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um, it's naturally A2A2, naturally homogenized, and it's sweet and it shouldn't taste funky.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_02: Normally, that's a sign of a mineral deficiency in the goat, or she's being kept too close to the bucks.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_02: The bucks are stinky, they are stinky animals, but a dough is a very clean, fastidious animal.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then just not cooling the milk properly can also cause that.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_02: Um, as far as the escaping, I mean, if they're not content with where they are, they're clever and they're gonna try to find a way out.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_02: And I've seen far too many, you know, backyard homesteading situations, which are well intended, but it's like a dog run.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_02: There's nothing, you know, there's nothing in there for them.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_02: Either, um, either there's just one.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, they're herd animals, they need a buddy or two, um, or there's not enough feed or enough of the proper feed.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_02: Like I think it's it's a learning curve to understand that an animal can be full in their stomach, but still nutritionally starved.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so goats have a quite high demand for minerals.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_02: They are browsers by nature, so they intend to eat up above them.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and what they're eating is stuff that has a very deep root.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_02: So they're plants that are pulling up minerals deep from the soil.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think they have a more complex mineral need than um a grazer would.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_02: So we supply our goats with a cafeteria style mineral bar.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_02: So they have multiple minerals to choose from, and they're intuitive, just like, well, probably better than we are now.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so they can choose what they need when they need it.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_02: And it's fascinating to see that throughout the season, you know, they'll choose more heavily of the copper or the phosphorus or cobalt or whatever it may be.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so we offer them that kelp is a really big one as well.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_02: Um and electric fencing has been so incredible for the actual like what style of fencing to choose.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um, they're very smart.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_02: And if they've had a shock or two from an electric fence, they remember that and they don't tend to test it again.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um, certainly they don't if there's no need.
• 13:28
  SPEAKER_02: So we rotate ours in the spring and summer when when the grass and the the forage is good for them.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and we use Premier One electric netting, or we just do three-strand.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_02: Sometimes we get away with two-strand if we move them to an area that's really desirable.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_02: They don't really have any reason to want to be elsewhere.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_02: And so I even have a friend who has trained her Nubians to single strand electric like you would a cow.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but she also is putting them in really, you know, good areas.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_02: They're not in like a dry lot, they're happy where they are, and she's rotating them.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so I think the electric fence is really helpful.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_02: The one sort of stipulation I would add to that is I don't recommend electric, certainly electric netting, if they have horns, because they can get tangled in that, and that can be a really bad situation.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um, which leads me to the horns.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_02: I think they should all be disbudded or pulled, um, which just means they either are genetically born without horns or you remove the horn growth at a very early age to prevent like the full horn from growing.
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um I think that yeah, I think all of the the negative sort of stereotypes about them normally come from a place of of mismanagement.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: So how so um the netting, of course, is a much more visible fence.
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_00: The you know, three three strands of wire are not as um whatever, not as physical, physically looking.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: Um what what is the minimum voltage that you like that you find the goats respect?
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: Uh what what kind of minimal voltage do you ask for?
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_02: So we have six or seven thousand is right around where our yeah, where our charger will run it.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_02: Um if it gets down to like two or three, that's not gonna keep them in if they don't want to be there.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_02: Um so we do we have a perimeter, we're around 16 acres now, and we fenced the entire perimeter with a strand.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and that's with with a you know a hot plug-in up to the task kind of, I think it's a Gallagher brand.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_02: Um and so then when we move them around within that that space, we just link to that outer perimeter, if that makes sense.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_02: So they're always in a pretty hot fence.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_02: Um and it's funny to see, I mean, similar to your pigs, when you take that gate down to move them to the next spot, they know the fence was there.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_02: And so even though it's not, they're they're hesitant to go through that spin space because they remember it.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_02: Um so they they remember it.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_00: So just just for our listeners that maybe are are new at this and not familiar with it, um, you said six to seven thousand volts.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: The reason I asked that was because I thought that's what you were gonna say, and just so everybody understands, a cow, cows can be easily kept in at 2,000 volts.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: So so goats can't.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: I really appreciate you uh you know dealing with these issues because goats can be kept in, but they're not gonna be kept in with the little cheap charger down at tractor supply.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: You you you gotta get a you gotta get a Premier, a Gallagher, um, a Ken Cove, you know, put your money in an energizer that's got some kick to it.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: You know, you're looking for a like a two-joule uh energizer.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_00: And if the energizer says we'll power five miles of fence, don't buy it.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: Because good energizers never make a mileage claim.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: Because anybody that's run electric fence knows it's all about your groundrod and the and the resistance, like weeds that grow up on it and things like that.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: So um, you know, that all that has a has a bearing.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: So anybody that's putting uh mileage on them is not is not a true uh they're they're they're not in the electric fence club.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um you know they're they're they're they're imposters.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: So uh yeah, Gallagher is a Gallagher is a wonderful brand.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and so so is your is your 16 acres um is it yeah, you said they are browsers.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um I'm waiting to hear this um hear this this the solution you have because the the browse has a slower energy, has a slower growback time than grass.
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_00: And so typically goats eat themselves out of their habitat because they kill the brush, they kill the browse, and then the grass comes.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_00: That's why goats improve land, that's why people get them to improve land.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: They eat up all the honeysuckle and then you got a nice pasture.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: Uh so so speak to that that that tension a little bit with habitat and the energy cycle of the of the browse versus the grass.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's a really good point.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so they do.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, if given the option, they're going to eat above themselves.
• 18:56
  SPEAKER_02: So they're going to eat that browse first.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_02: Um, they love the vines, they love the bushes and the shrubs and basically everything else that nothing else loves.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um so they will go for that first.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_02: And you're right, it does grow back a lot slower than the grasses and the forbs do, um, which is why it said, you know, they'll put themselves out of a job.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but they they will so they will graze um if their browse isn't an option.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_02: And for the dairy goats in particular, who are in milk, I mean, milk is the most metabolically expensive task that the body can do, even more than um pregnancy or growth.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_02: So we haven't found that our doughs get too fat on a nice pasture mix.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I absolutely think that the weathers and the bucks do because it's so rich and they're not producing anything.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_02: So, I mean, similar to a dairy cow and I would imagine a sheep, um, a good dairy animal is gonna milk off of their back.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_02: And so if her, you know, if her if her needs are not being met calorically or nutritionally, she's gonna start to lose top line in an attempt to maintain her milk production.
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_02: So our heavy producing milkers, um, they love the pasture as far as you know, the alfalfas and the clovers and um the grasses.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_02: We don't have a lot of it right now because we do still so we have 16 acres.
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_02: It was conventionally farmed in the 80s, I believe, which is hard to imagine because it's quite a lot of hills.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but then but then it was just left.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_02: So we have a lot of brush and small trees, and we are using the goats to sort of open it up and create a silvo pasture.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but when we were on the three acres before, we didn't have any woods, and we just we rotated them as we did the sheep.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and they grazed the one thing with the goats, you know, that then brings up the parasites.
• 21:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um and goats are more prone to um internal parasites, or I guess more prone to the impact of them than a sheep or a cow.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_02: And it is, you know, they're designed to eat high up, so they aren't typically designed to be eating off the ground where the parasites live.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um but if you if you learn the sort of life cycle of those parasites, most of them, the ones that cause the big issue being the barber pole worm, um, it has to hatch and then it has to go through, I believe, three larval stages before it's infectious.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_02: And that process takes about five days in optimum condition.
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_02: So the egg is laid when the animal poops in the grass, and then it can hatch within a matter of hours, but then it has to go through stage one larva and then stage two, and then it's stage three where it's infectious again to the goat.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: If the goat eats it.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_02: So if you're moving the goat in that, or if you're moving your herd within that five-day window, which would be too long anyway, if you're doing the rotational grazing for the sake of grass, um, then you stay ahead of the parasites in that way.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_02: And so the parasites aren't as much of an issue to them grazing.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_01: So, Morgan, for somebody like me who's a beginner, and maybe, you know, maybe there's some people listening right now that are interested in goats, like maybe you've piqued their interest.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_01: Can you kind of lay this out for us?
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you talk about how your farming practices follow nature's cycles of this grazing, browsing, movement, rest, and regeneration.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_01: Can you just kind of paint a picture for us of like what does that look like in a day or in a week?
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like you managing the goats.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: What does this actually look like in practice?
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so in the in the well, let's start in the winter because we just came out of winter.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so in the winter, we do keep our herd, so we keep our our does and our bucks separate all of the time.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we only bring a doe to a buck, or we'll bring the bucks to the does to be bred.
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_02: But otherwise the bucks live separately.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_02: So the does kind of have the nicer barn set up because we are in Michigan and the winter gets very, very cold.
• 23:22
  SPEAKER_02: The bucks have a three-sided shelter.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but both of them, they so they have barn access in the winter and we do deep bedding, um, which I learned from Joel reading his books.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_02: And we actually just scooped out two and a half feet thick of manure and composted straw and hay from this winter.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and we bought an old manure spreader and spread it around the pasture area that we chose to kind of focus our efforts on.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_02: I'm overwhelmed by 16 acres.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um, Joel, I don't know how you manage hundreds.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_02: Uh so I was like, okay, mentally I need to just choose a corner to focus on and really like just focus on this part.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_02: So we just scooped out, I don't even know how many loads, like 20 loads with this manure spreader or something.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_02: Um so that we do deep bedding and it was steaming as we were as we were scooping it out.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and they do really well on that.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_02: So basically, when the barn gets dirty in the winter, uh, we just put down a new layer of straw and um we like the straw in the winter because it's cozy for them.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_02: So they're always laying in a clean place, keeping their udders clean.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and they have hay nets.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_02: So we hang nets that have the hay in it to help them with that wanting to eat up above themselves.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then we I milk them in the morning.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_02: I milk some of them in the morning and evening, but I can't keep up with all of it with two little kids.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_02: We have a third on the way.
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_02: Um congratulations.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you very much.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_02: So um, so I'm doing the best I can, but most of them are once a day milking right now, which they do just fine with that transition.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um, they're they're flexible in that way.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_02: So I milk in the morning, and in the winter, the girls have access to a small sort of dry lot area outside, but for the most part, they're in the barn so that you know we do the deep bedding.
• 25:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um when our goats have babies, it's typically in late winter and early spring.
• 25:29
  SPEAKER_02: And we let our goats raise their own babies.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so that is kind of, I would say different than a lot of dairy sort of, I don't know that I would consider us a dairy operation.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_02: We have 30 dough, but um we let the we let them dam raise so the moms have their kids and goats can easily have triplets, quadruplets.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so they have a lot of babies for just two teats.
• 25:54
  SPEAKER_02: But we we let the moms raise the kids, and then around two weeks old, we start to separate those babies at night, um, and they go in a pen all together, and that way I can milk the moms in the morning, and then I give the babies back to mom during the day.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so we're milk sharing, we're getting a little less milk that way, but I don't mind it because I think a goat raised by its own mother is gonna be a more well-rounded.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, the most annoying thing for me in the world is a bottle baby goat.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_02: And I know I know a lot of people are like, oh, but they're so cute when they're five or ten pounds, but when they're a hundred pounds, I do not want them jumping on me.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_02: Um and they do that when they think you're their mother and you've always supplied their milk out of a bottle.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_02: So we let and they grow, they grow really well when they're with their mom.
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_02: They start grazing or browsing very early because they see her do it.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and as a mother myself, I just can't take babies from a mom.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_02: That's just my personal, my personal opinion on it.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_02: So we dam raise, and then in the spring and summer, when the weather is warmer, we start to move the herd out um on a daily basis.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_02: So our does come back to the barn um every night just for ease of milking again in the morning because our property is small enough, it's not hard for me to just walk them back.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_02: And they're very routine oriented.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_02: So once they know they get very excited to go out during the day, they get very excited to come back in the evening.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and we rotate them in the premier electric netting in the areas of the property where it's open enough to do that.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_02: And then we do just two or three strand um in the more wooded areas because putting up a net in the woods is really annoying.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, we we go for the strands there.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then so the mineral bar is available to the does in the barn.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_02: So when they come back at night, they have access to that.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um yeah, that's and then we so we have other animals as well, and we're trying to have this sort of cohesive dance with everyone.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_02: So we have a couple of horses.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_02: Horses can be really, really horrible for your land.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so we have them on a paddock paradise system, which basically they have like a track around the outer perimeter of the property.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_02: Horses need a lot of movement um for their digestion, unlike other grazers.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_02: So we give them that with the outer perimeter.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_02: And then the goats and the sheep are kind of the grazers within the perimeter and they get rotated around.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then we have chickens following behind to kind of clean up everything.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_01: So when you let them out from the barn each day, uh, you said it when it's warmer, do you um do they go to a new area each day?
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_01: So you're guiding the so each day they're getting something new, or is it like every couple days they're guided to a new area?
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like what is that, what does that look like for rotating on the land?
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, so it depends on how um dense the area was that we put them in.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_02: So I mean, at minimum, they need to move off of an area after about three or four days just for that parasite cycle.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um but so if we put them in an area that's really heavily, like there's a lot of forage and browse there, I kind of gauge at the end of that day when I bring them back.
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_02: Does it look like there's still more for them to do?
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_02: Do I want them to impact this spot harder?
• 29:38
  SPEAKER_02: Like if there's something we're trying to get rid of, we have autumn olives really bad here, and they have hefty thorns on them and the goats will just nibble them bare.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_02: It's amazing.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so if I'm really wanting them to wipe something out, I'll keep them, you know, take them back to that spot for a few days.
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but if I'm just wanting to sort of clip and and not, you know, take something out, then it'll just be for one day.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_02: So it really depends on the growth of the area that I've put them in and the goal that I want for them to accomplish there.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_02: Um and so, like Joel had said, the browse, the plants like the shrubs and the trees that have a slower growth rate, it's easier to um overgraze them to the point of killing the plants, which sometimes is the goal if you're trying to get rid of that kind of stuff.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_02: And so we would just move them back to that spot sooner.
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but it yeah, it depends kind of on where they're headed and what I'm hoping to achieve from that space.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_02: But I just take a bucket with a little bit of alfalfa pellets and a bit of grain and shake it.
• 30:43
  SPEAKER_02: And um, there's always a lead dough.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_02: There's always a leader, and ours is Matilda.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um, she's a she's huge Nubian.
• 30:52
  SPEAKER_02: I think she's like over 200 pounds.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um and it's so funny to see her, and then we have all the way down to the Nigerian dwarf.
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_02: So we'll have and the babies go with the moms.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_02: So that's the great thing about dam raising is the babies from the get-go, they learn the routine and they're not gonna leave mom.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_02: So even though they may be intimidated or you know, nervous about this new this new thing, they're gonna follow mom.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_02: So Matilda leads the way, she's following me, and there's just a trail of teeny tiny all the way down to the babies behind her, just running along, trying to keep up.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so they like I said, they learn the routine really quickly and and they're excited to get out and and graze and browse and get a little bit of grain to get them out there and then a little bit to get them back.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_00: Well, matil Matilda, Matilda uh hogs down all those alfalfa pellets all the time.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_00: So that's why she's twice as big as everybody else.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, she's a big girl.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_02: She's our matriarch.
• 31:48
  SPEAKER_02: She's eight years old, too, so she's a little, she's not old yet, but she's up there.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_02: You know, she's she's the boss, and what she says goes.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh for our for our listeners who who um know that I'm a I'm a almost a cultish uh daily move person, the beauty of goats, one of the beauties of goats, they don't they don't have as um as as as important a regimen for daily move as cows because they do tend to graze a lot above their shoulders.
• 32:24
  SPEAKER_00: So they're not actually grazing right over their defecation.
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_00: And their manure is little tiny balls as opposed to great big pies.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_00: And so the, you know, so it's just um it's it's a more fastidious environment.
• 32:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so the daily move is not as important, is not as critical on a goat, uh, than it is as as it is, say, on a cow, where they're um, you know, they're actually I mean, cows will, you know, they step in their cow pies, you know, and carry it along where the sheep, I mean uh goats, and and and sheep too, but but goats especially um tend to not step in their defecation.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, not even not not only do they not graze over it, but they don't even hardly step in it because it's you know it's little little pieces a little bigger than uh rabbit, you know, rabbit dropping.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: So it's you know it's pretty it's pretty fastidious.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, that's true.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_02: And it is a bonus for me when I'm milking, um, I'm not wiping wet cow pie off of a nutter.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_02: Um the the little goat pebbles are a little easier to to manage in that way.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_01: So Morgan, um, so thank you for that.
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_01: You did a great job of painting the picture of what it would look like.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_01: So for somebody who's just starting out, uh, it sounds a little overwhelming.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what if you don't have a barn?
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_01: So, for instance, we just built our homestead, we have the house, and now we're getting ready to just build our first garden bed, let alone a big barn.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_01: So, what what do you think is like the minimum that somebody would need setup wise to get started into raising goats?
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_01: Like you so you mentioned their pack animals, which I can relate to because you know, so are my dogs.
• 34:11
  SPEAKER_01: I I don't ever have just one dog anymore.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_01: So, like what's the minimum number?
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_01: Is two enough?
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_01: And then what would I need to be able to successfully manage them and be their leader so they wouldn't, you know, be mischievous?
• 34:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um, yes.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_02: So you definitely don't need 30.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_02: Um I I'm like, I don't know that I need 30, actually.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_02: This is a lot of coats.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_02: Um this got out of hand fast.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_02: Um no, you can totally just have two.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and as far as like just starting out, they need something to get out of the weather.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_02: So like if you're in an area that does have winter, a three-sided shelter um or like three and a half, like that's what we did with our bucks.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_02: So we we covered half of that fourth side, so they sort of have an entrance in, but they have a wind break as well.
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and just plan to, you know, pack it deep with straw in the winter when it's cold.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and I would recommend having their home base kind of area with a physical fence so that you aren't relying on that electric fence because you know, power outages happen, the wind blows strong, that those things just happen.
• 35:23
  SPEAKER_02: So we have found that um cattle panel fencing is really effective because it's strong enough.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_02: Goats like to rub, they like to kind of like rub their bodies along the side of the fence.
• 35:38
  SPEAKER_02: So we either use cattle panel or we'll use that woven wire, um, I think it's red brand, woven wire fence, but then we put a single strand of electric on the inside about shoulder height, so that deters them from jumping up on the fence or from rubbing on it.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I would say that's the minimum.
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_02: Plan on doing a deep bedding.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_02: I have considered, Joel, the idea that you have about your chickens in the city where if you couldn't move them around, you could just do deep bedding.
• 36:09
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_02: I think you could do that with a couple of goats too.
• 36:12
  unknown: Okay.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_02: If you were tidy about the deep bedding.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, that that's the key is is making sure that you're uh you're pretty religious or you know meticulous about the about the deep bedding.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_00: You just can't let them get all smelly and juicy.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um and and and just so our listeners know, the three-sided shed you're talking about, a lot of those are called run-ins.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_00: That that's kind of the industry jargon for those kind of little sheds, run-in.
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, Morgan, you you could you'd know better, but I'm thinking a goat, uh, each if if you I mean, we always talk about well, how much square footage do you need, you know, for uh uh for a goat.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm thinking, I mean, for our our deep betting, we use 35 square feet per cow, uh per cow equivalent, but a goat, you know, probably I don't know what six square feet, seven square feet per goat would be would be enough.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: But if you but if you went if you went to a stationary situation, um you'd want more.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I agree with that.
• 37:19
  SPEAKER_02: You would you would want more if you weren't moving them around at all.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_02: But as far as the run-in or the shelter goes, um, we started with Big Matilda and then three little Nigerian dwarfs in a 10 by 10 stall.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then they had access to the outdoors, and that was plenty even for them to have their babies as well.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, sure.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_01: And so in the setup that you're talking about, so they had the run-in and used to the physical fence.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um, that would be the physical fence around like the property line, right?
• 37:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so in this scenario, I'm not actually taking them out and leading them and moving them around, like rotating them, right?
• 37:55
  SPEAKER_01: On I'm just letting them, they're just basically free ranging.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_00: Oh no, no, they're no you're no, you're uh I'll let Morgan answer that.
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 38:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um I asked.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_02: No, I'm not yeah, I'm not suggesting that you cattle panel fence the whole property.
• 38:13
  SPEAKER_02: That would be that would be an amazing fence, but it would be so expensive.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_02: Um I'm just suggesting dollar signs.
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_01: My husband would be like, what?
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna do what now?
• 38:23
  SPEAKER_02: No, no, I'm just suggesting like a small paddock um that contains that shelter in it, and that's their like day-to-day living.
• 38:31
  SPEAKER_02: And then as much as you're able to get them out of there, either in the form of you know, rotating them with an electric fence or just taking them for a walk through the woods.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, there's people who do that and and the goats browse and and the people get, you know, their hour nature walk in, and then they put the goats back.
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and I think the if you have a nice deep bedding setup, then you're not you're not as concerned from a sanitary perspective with them being in a smaller area.
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_02: And also the parasites, I mean, the one big parasite that's an issue for the goats is that barber pole worm.
• 39:02
  SPEAKER_02: And my understanding is it has to have pasture, like physical grass for its life cycle.
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so if they were in a smaller dry lot area as they're like day-to-day with a deep bedding setup, you wouldn't have that parasite to contend with.
• 39:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then of course, feeding like feeding them off of the ground in hay nets would be really effective.
• 39:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um, if you are feeding, producing dairy goats, you know, they're making milk.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um, ours do well with an alfalfa mix, hay, like a second or a third cutting, because again, milk is calorically, I mean, it's an expensive task for them.
• 39:41
  SPEAKER_02: So they need they need that coming in so that they can have that milk coming out.
• 39:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and goats are, I mean, they're incredible.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_02: The standard goat today can produce like standard sized goat.
• 39:55
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so we're talking a hundred to a hundred and fifty pound animal can produce a gallon a day consistently for a 10-month lactation.
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_02: Um, which is, I mean, relative, you know, to their size is a really incredible amount of milk.
• 40:10
  SPEAKER_02: The Nigerian dwarfs, which are about 70 pounds, they can do a half gallon and their lactation is 10 months.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_02: Wow, that's a lot.
• 40:22
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, yeah, in in general, in general, a um uh, you know, from a whatever, a resource-based or forage-based requirement, a goat is considered one-seventh of a cow.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_00: And when you talk about equivalency.
• 40:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um and so you start talking about one gallon a day, uh, seven times that would be seven gallons a day from a cow.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_00: And uh there aren't very many cows.
• 40:49
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you're not you're not gonna get seven gallons a day from a cow that's on grass.
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_00: Uh yeah.
• 40:55
  SPEAKER_00: You might you might get five, you might get five on a good milker with really, really good forage, but um, but you're not gonna get you're not gonna see so the efficiency, the efficiency, good all things being equal, a goat is actually a little more efficient than a cow.
• 41:12
  SPEAKER_02: They yeah, they are, and that's something that I found fascinating.
• 41:15
  SPEAKER_02: I've been really into reading old dairy goat books, so I've been finding as old as I can.
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and some of them are the late 1800s, most of them are from the 1920s to the 40s.
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and it's fascinating to read, you know, the the good dairy goats at that time, what they could produce versus what they can today.
• 41:37
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, even then they were incredibly efficient considering what they were being fed.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_02: Some of these goats are just turned out on scrub out west and we're still managing to supply a decent amount of milk.
• 41:48
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but yeah, the good, I mean, the top milkers today of those standard breeds are 6,000 pounds a year, um, which on a 305-day lactation is, I mean, I think that's over a gallon a day.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_02: Um, it's an impressive amount of milk from a small animal.
• 42:05
  SPEAKER_02: And and I think from, you know, if you're just starting out with your homestead, I mean, five gallons can be a little overwhelming.
• 42:12
  SPEAKER_02: And a smaller animal bringing in a smaller quantity of milk is sometimes easier to manage to start with as you get your feet wet with this and decide, you know, is this something that I want to be doing every day?
• 42:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 42:25
  SPEAKER_01: Have you noticed that any changes in your own health or your family's health when you are consuming um the raw goat milk?
• 42:34
  SPEAKER_01: Like raising your own goats and consuming that milk?
• 42:36
  SPEAKER_01: Has there been a difference?
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I don't know.
• 42:40
  SPEAKER_02: Um, can we talk about raw milk?
• 42:43
  SPEAKER_02: Am I allowed to say raw milk?
• 42:45
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 42:46
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 42:47
  SPEAKER_01: We'll put it behind the paywall part.
• 42:51
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, yeah.
• 42:52
  SPEAKER_02: So we do, I mean, we drink the milk raw, and my son, um, he gets so he's two and a half, and he gets eczema um if he has standard dairy.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_02: Uh we're not actually sure if it's the cow or if it's the fact that it's been pasteurized.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but if he drinks our goat milk, he doesn't have any eczema flare-up.
• 43:14
  SPEAKER_02: So we weaned him, you know, when I stopped breastfeeding, we put him on goat milk exclusively.
• 43:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I also make soap and I make goat milk lotion.
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_02: And I've had a lot of people tell me that they have kids with eczema, that the lotion is the only thing that it'll take the eczema away.
• 43:34
  SPEAKER_02: Like it reduces the rash and the itch, and then it also just removes the rash entirely within about a week.
• 43:40
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so I mean, the goat milk is amazing.
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_02: My health journey, like when I got started with homesteading, I I mean, I grew up normal American diet, which is yikes.
• 43:54
  SPEAKER_02: Now I look at it, I think, oh my gosh, it's it's just amazing what our bodies can handle and still function.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_02: And um I mean I was relatively healthy, but then I once I was married um started having well I guess I had had infertility issues, I just didn't know yet.
• 44:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I had five miscarriages.
• 44:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um and so I have two two kiddos now, and then this third, we're halfway through this pregnancy, so far, so good.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_02: And I just feel like through my journey, I had so I had my first three losses um were before I had Rosie, our oldest.
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_02: And that was like as my diet was starting to change and starting to get better.
• 44:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um and then just with every like subsequent pregnancy, I feel like I've just been healthier and stronger through it.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_02: Um, this was the first one where we just we were like, well, let's let's try to have a third.
• 44:57
  SPEAKER_02: And and it, you know, I'm I'm pregnant and there weren't any losses, and like the baby is healthy and um all of the blood work looks good, and like the things that I struggled with with my other pregnancies, I'm not now.
• 45:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I I could I attribute a lot of that to you know our lifestyle change in general.
• 45:18
  SPEAKER_02: Like I've gone from eating the standard American diet growing up to the last decade being making really intentional changes about our food.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_02: And it started with just well, maybe I'll buy the organic version of you know, X from the grocery store.
• 45:35
  SPEAKER_02: Um I think that's a start for a lot of people, and it's it's absolutely a good start.
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_02: You gotta start somewhere, otherwise it's so overwhelming, you won't start at all.
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_02: Um then it was you know, purchasing meat locally, and then it was well, what's be what's this animal being fed?
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_02: And so can we grow these animals ourselves?
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_02: And um, the dairy was a big one.
• 45:57
  SPEAKER_02: We consume a lot of dairy and with the goat milk, so all the milk we drink now is raw from the goats.
• 46:03
  SPEAKER_02: I make all of our own yogurt.
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I dabble a little bit with cheeses in my spare time.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_02: I would like to learn more, but that might be a minute.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but for the most part, I mean, the majority of our dairy is coming from our goats.
• 46:17
  SPEAKER_02: And um and I feel like now if I do have dairy, like if we go out to eat or we get an ice cream or something, I can't handle it.
• 46:27
  SPEAKER_02: My gut does not um, it just doesn't appreciate.
• 46:31
  SPEAKER_02: I I mean, I would assume it's the A1 in the pasteurization.
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_02: Um and it there's just a noticeable difference.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_00: I wanna I wanna uh go to one technical question here before we go to um ghosts don't live forever.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_00: Let's talk about that and um and and certainly the weathers.
• 46:54
  SPEAKER_00: You don't you don't need a whole farm full of a bunch of weathers.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_00: Uh that for our listeners, make sure I don't miss anybody.
• 47:00
  SPEAKER_00: That's a castrated, that's a castrated male goat.
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um so but but before we do that, um tell me a little bit about uh Cena was asking about the minimal, so everybody again everybody understands you can't have milk unless the goats have babies.
• 47:18
  SPEAKER_00: You you you can't just have a goat and the goat makes milk for five years.
• 47:22
  SPEAKER_00: She's got to have babies every year in order to keep lactating.
• 47:26
  SPEAKER_00: So if you only had two, let's say, dough, what do you what do you do about a buck?
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, do you what um do you have a friend?
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_00: Do you take them somewhere?
• 47:37
  SPEAKER_00: Do you import a buck for a month?
• 47:40
  SPEAKER_00: You know, what do you what do you do?
• 47:41
  SPEAKER_01: You rent a buck.
• 47:43
  SPEAKER_02: Actually, yes, I offer that service.
• 47:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um Joel, I am a natural homesteader.
• 47:50
  SPEAKER_01: Like Yeah, yeah.
• 47:52
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I'm exactly right.
• 47:54
  SPEAKER_00: I knew the answer.
• 47:55
  SPEAKER_00: I was just bated to make sure we got it out.
• 47:58
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I did not know I'm feeling pretty good now.
• 48:00
  SPEAKER_01: Like Yeah, yeah.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_02: So goats, um, well, goats are hard to AI.
• 48:06
  SPEAKER_02: So typically AI, like artificial insemination is not done with goats like it is with cows.
• 48:11
  SPEAKER_02: It's much easier, especially with such a small animal, to just put her in the back of your SUV and drive to a friend's house or to borrow a buck.
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_02: So I have a Ford Explorer and it's the best.
• 48:24
  SPEAKER_02: And I have put so many goats in the back of that, um, not at one time, but like in multiple trips.
• 48:30
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, so if you have someone who, like if you have a friend who has a buck, um I would say on the front end, there's there's a few diseases that you can test for.
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_02: Um fairly easy from a blood test with your goats.
• 48:46
  SPEAKER_02: You want to make sure that you're not taking infected goats to someone's buck or having an infected buck read your dose because that it's transmittable that way.
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and those diseases are Yone's disease, um, C A E and C L.
• 49:02
  SPEAKER_02: And I don't know that I can pronounce their full um their full names, but it's a fairly simple blood draw.
• 49:09
  SPEAKER_02: You can learn to do it or have a vet do it, and that just tells you, you know, you want to have that confirmation.
• 49:14
  SPEAKER_00: Not scrapey.
• 49:16
  SPEAKER_00: No, um scrapie as sheep.
• 49:19
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, scrapey as sheep.
• 49:21
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 49:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um so so yes, if you can find a buck in your area that is clean, then you can take the dough to him when they're in heat.
• 49:32
  SPEAKER_02: And normally it's pretty obvious when they're in heat, they're flagging their tail, so they're waving their tail, they're incessantly banging.
• 49:40
  SPEAKER_02: They're not normally that loud otherwise.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_02: So if they just seem to be crying over nothing and standing out and waving their tail around, that's typically a sign that they are in heat.
• 49:51
  SPEAKER_02: And they come into heat every 21 days.
• 49:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um, normally their heat is stronger in the fall, and so they're bred during that time for spring kids.
• 50:00
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but you can breed them out of season as well.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_02: It's easier with the dwarf breed than the standard breeds.
• 50:07
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but you can take them to a buck, and that that is literally called a driveway breeding, and you hop your dough out, and in five seconds the deed is done, and you don't have to deal with the smelly buck.
• 50:20
  SPEAKER_02: Um, the other option, if you can't seem to see when the dough is in heat, is you can take a buck and let him run with the girls for you know four or five weeks and assume that he's gotten them bred again after 30 days of breeding with a simple blood test.
• 50:35
  SPEAKER_02: You can see if the doughs did get bred, um, which is just a nice assurance if you want to, you know, if you want to make sure that if you're depending on milk.
• 50:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and again, if you have two goats and you want to stay in milk year round, it often makes sense to breed to stagger those breedings.
• 50:52
  SPEAKER_00: That's what we always do.
• 50:53
  SPEAKER_00: We always had we always had uh milk cows, and we staggered, you know, staggered the breeding, so we always had milk.
• 50:58
  SPEAKER_00: All right.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_01: Let's um can I ask one follow-up question on that?
• 51:02
  SPEAKER_01: So you have to keep breeding them, like can't so if say she gets pregnant and then you know she gives birth to the baby and then she's milking, and you're also milking, and the baby grows up, but if you just keep milking the goat, won't she just keep producing milk?
• 51:16
  SPEAKER_01: Like so you'll have two of them.
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_01: So why doesn't she just keep making milk?
• 51:20
  SPEAKER_01: Like there's moms, human moms that will breastfeed till like the kids are five or six years old.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_01: They just keep making the milk, right?
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, that's true.
• 51:30
  SPEAKER_02: So making it so to an extent, they can um I want to say jobing with me, not at me.
• 51:41
  SPEAKER_01: I went to a public school in California.
• 51:43
  SPEAKER_01: We did not learn these things.
• 51:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's a fair question.
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, there's people who are like, why doesn't my goat have milk?
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_02: Well, have you bred her ever?
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_02: No.
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_02: So it's it's a fair question.
• 51:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but to some extent, there are goats that have what's called an extended lactation, and they can maintain two, sometimes even three years after kidding.
• 52:09
  SPEAKER_02: But that lactation curve does, I mean, there's a you know, there's a curve, there's a peak when those babies are about six weeks old, and then there's a slow decline.
• 52:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, because in nature, probably by like 10 or 12 weeks, those babies would be on their own because the bucklings by eight weeks old, a baby boy can breed whoever he can reach.
• 52:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um my I didn't realize it was that my that's new to me.
• 52:35
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't realize they were eight weeks?
• 52:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 52:38
  SPEAKER_02: So I have a little buckling here who is sick.
• 52:40
  SPEAKER_03: He pregnancies.
• 52:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 52:44
  SPEAKER_02: So I have a buckling here who's six weeks old, and I already saw him.
• 52:50
  SPEAKER_02: I he didn't luckily he he didn't um succeed, but he was giving it a go.
• 52:56
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, they're I mean, in nature, they would they would not stay in milk even as long as we push them to do it.
• 53:02
  SPEAKER_02: So most does by that you know nine or ten months, they're starting to really decrease in production to the point where it's just not worth milking anymore.
• 53:12
  SPEAKER_02: You know, you're getting like a few tablespoons or a cup.
• 53:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so it it makes sense at that point.
• 53:18
  SPEAKER_02: The way that we do it is um we breed them in the fall typically so that they'll kid in the like late winter, early spring.
• 53:27
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and their gestation is five months long.
• 53:31
  SPEAKER_02: So for those first three months, you're still milking them, and then it's the last 60 days of their pregnancy that you really want their body to focus on growing the babies because the baby's growth is the largest at that stage.
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and you also want them to quit making milk so that their body can make colostrum because those babies have got to have colostrum.
• 53:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so that the last 60 days is when you dry them off, and that's how you end up with that 305 or 10 month um lactation, lactation curve.
• 54:02
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, that's fascinating.
• 54:04
  SPEAKER_02: Oh yeah.
• 54:05
  SPEAKER_02: So are we going to the uh the the butcher topic next, Joel?
• 54:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh yeah, we're we're almost out of time, but yeah, I I think it's I think it's good to end end with the end.
• 54:15
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 54:16
  SPEAKER_02: So so that I think that is the thing that set my book apart from there's a lot of really wonderful dairy goat books out there.
• 54:24
  SPEAKER_03: I agree.
• 54:25
  SPEAKER_02: Um and Joel wrote the foreword for my book, which I will forever appreciate.
• 54:31
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but yeah, I talk about all of it, which includes the butcher, because there is no um there is no dairy being produced from that dough without the offspring.
• 54:41
  SPEAKER_02: And what I have seen a lot of is people get the goats because they're excited, and then the goats have babies, and then they keep the babies um because they can't bear to part with them, or simply because the market is saturated and there are there are a lot of baby goats for sale.
• 55:00
  SPEAKER_02: And so before they know it, their two does have turned into 20, and it's all manner of does and and bucklings and weathers, and it's a mess, and it's too many, it exceeds the carrying capacity of of their property size.
• 55:18
  SPEAKER_02: So I think before anyone gets a dairy animal of any kind on the front end, they have to consider what's going to happen with those offspring, um, because it's just not going to be fair to the animals otherwise to not consider that.
• 55:33
  SPEAKER_02: So I am a firm believer that there's a goat mentor I have who said once that there's a lot worse things for a goat than death.
• 55:43
  SPEAKER_02: And I agree with that wholeheartedly.
• 55:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um, our goats will never go to an auction.
• 55:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I don't just sell them to anyone because I need to get rid of them.
• 55:57
  SPEAKER_02: So when our numbers start to get too high, or obviously half of the kids born are boys, and you don't need all these boys.
• 56:07
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we do butcher, I I do most of the butchery myself.
• 56:11
  SPEAKER_02: Um, my husband isn't against it, it just ends up being me.
• 56:14
  SPEAKER_02: And that's another thing about goats I really love is I can physically handle them.
• 56:18
  SPEAKER_02: I can handle a hundred-pound animal.
• 56:20
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so I I am a big fan of the Farmstead Meatsmith and his approach, Brandon Sheard.
• 56:27
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so I actually I do cut the jugular veins as a means to um to kill them.
• 56:32
  SPEAKER_02: And it's very fast and it's very humane if it's done properly.
• 56:37
  SPEAKER_02: So, yes, offspring is is a part of dairying, and I think often it's a forgotten part of it.
• 56:45
  SPEAKER_02: Certainly in the industrial system, it's not well uh stewarded, those animals aren't respected.
• 56:51
  SPEAKER_02: So, yeah, we raise raise everybody on mama when it comes time to wean.
• 56:55
  SPEAKER_02: The boys go in a separate rotation and pen.
• 56:59
  SPEAKER_02: And then in the fall is when we do most of our butchering.
• 57:02
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and we decide we're always keeping track of our herd as far as their performance goes and how they meet the context that we're after.
• 57:10
  SPEAKER_02: So for me, like I want a healthy animal, I'll happily take a little less milk to have a parasite resistant, just healthy goat who's a good mom and friendly.
• 57:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so the lowest 10% of our herd performance-wise is typically culled in the fall, and then most of the um boys are as well.
• 57:32
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so the low the lowest 10% on on a on a whole metric of traits, are you friendly?
• 57:39
  SPEAKER_00: Are you know are are you are you not obnoxious, you know?
• 57:44
  SPEAKER_00: Are you are you easy to handle?
• 57:46
  SPEAKER_00: Are you healthy?
• 57:47
  SPEAKER_00: Are you do you have good feet?
• 57:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, da-da-da-da.
• 57:51
  SPEAKER_00: On on that metric, then you uh in cows we always say you call the old old ornery and open, you know.
• 57:58
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and and well, that's another one.
• 57:59
  SPEAKER_00: If she's a hard breeder, if she's a real hard breeder, you'd call for that as well.
• 58:04
  SPEAKER_00: But every year you cull 10% of your dough, so your average dough is like what six year five or six years old.
• 58:15
  SPEAKER_00: And then because if if you're culling 10% a year, essentially you're you're not you're not letting very many get much over ten years old.
• 58:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, that's true.
• 58:26
  SPEAKER_02: So, I mean, we like the older ones because it shows a longevity um and an ability to produce for years, but if they get to the point where you know it's a quality of life issue for them, or if they're no longer breeding, like you said, um, then that's that's a time to go.
• 58:42
  SPEAKER_02: And then also just, you know, with parasite resistance, there's an inverse relationship with milk production and parasite resistance.
• 58:49
  SPEAKER_02: Um and so that's why I don't solely go for milk production because you start to lose some of those other things.
• 58:55
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, you'll lose you'll lose traits anyway if you if you focus on one, right?
• 59:00
  SPEAKER_02: So um we're trying to always look at a balanced animal.
• 59:04
  SPEAKER_02: I also have a preference for pulled, um, meaning genetically no horns, because I really don't like to disbud.
• 59:11
  SPEAKER_02: It's horrible.
• 59:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but I don't like the horns more.
• 59:15
  SPEAKER_02: So that's a fascinating thing I've been reading about is just the pulled gene in goats, because Joel, correct me if I'm wrong, but with cows, isn't there a test to determine um a heterozygous versus a homozygous pulled cow, like with a hair test?
• 59:33
  SPEAKER_00: Ooh, I man, you're over my pay grade, Megan.
• 59:36
  SPEAKER_00: I I don't agree with that.
• 59:40
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so I'm pretty sure there is for cows, and I was trying to figure this out for goats because what what you learn with goats is you never breed a pulled to a polled, because you take two heterozygous pulled and you breed them together, 25% of those are going to be homozygous pulled.
• 59:57
  SPEAKER_02: And there is a link to the polled gene in goats and um their sex.
• 1:00:04
  SPEAKER_02: So the females from that are then said to be infertile, and some of the males have fertility issues too.
• 1:00:11
  SPEAKER_02: So it's been said, it's been said just don't breed polled to polled.
• 1:00:15
  SPEAKER_02: Well, if you read the old dairy goat books, that's all they did because they didn't want to disbud.
• 1:00:20
  SPEAKER_02: Um, they actually called kids for having horns.
• 1:00:25
  SPEAKER_02: So then I'm like, where did this change?
• 1:00:27
  SPEAKER_02: And I cannot, I've called two labs.
• 1:00:30
  SPEAKER_02: UC Davis was one, and then I don't remember the name of the other.
• 1:00:35
  SPEAKER_02: And I asked if there's this test, because if we're making this claim that the homozygous polled gene is linked to fertility issues, then certainly there must be a test.
• 1:00:45
  SPEAKER_02: There's no such test.
• 1:00:47
  SPEAKER_02: It's all based on claims, which they may be true, but I don't I it's really frustrating.
• 1:00:54
  SPEAKER_02: So this year I'm actually going to do a couple of polled-to-pold breedings just to see what happens.
• 1:01:00
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not gonna sell the kids because even if I only have to call a you know, let's say 25% have this homozygous polled, even if I have to just call a quarter of the kids, I'd rather do that than disbud everybody.
• 1:01:15
  SPEAKER_03: Sure.
• 1:01:16
  SPEAKER_02: So I don't know, we'll see what happens with it.
• 1:01:18
  SPEAKER_00: That's uh that that's that's pretty that's pretty fascinating.
• 1:01:21
  SPEAKER_00: You know, where do these I mean, is it is it really just as simple as it's an old folk tale?
• 1:01:26
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you know, you you you don't know.
• 1:01:29
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, kind of like, you know, um put on this mask and it'll keep the viruses away.
• 1:01:34
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I mean, where do these things right?
• 1:01:37
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 1:01:38
  SPEAKER_02: Like where is where is the test for this?
• 1:01:39
  SPEAKER_02: Because if it exists for cows, how hard is it to do for a goat?
• 1:01:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so so the final thing I have to ask uh because of of the slaughtering, so um you do you do I mean you're doing like 30 goats a uh a fall, right?
• 1:01:57
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, we're doing yeah, we do quite a few.
• 1:02:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um you do you sell those?
• 1:02:02
  SPEAKER_00: Do you are you doing them at home?
• 1:02:04
  SPEAKER_00: Um uh uh I don't I don't want to get all the way down the regulatory rabbit hole, but I but I am looking for the you know the the logistics kind of are you selling all those?
• 1:02:14
  SPEAKER_00: What what do you do there?
• 1:02:16
  SPEAKER_02: So we do not sell currently, we do um we tan the hides.
• 1:02:21
  SPEAKER_02: I was doing that myself, but it got to be way too much.
• 1:02:24
  SPEAKER_02: So I found somebody in our area who does natural hide tanning, doesn't use any chemicals or anything.
• 1:02:29
  SPEAKER_02: So he's tanning the hides for us, which is really cool.
• 1:02:32
  SPEAKER_02: And we sell those.
• 1:02:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I keep some of the skulls too because I think they're it's a niche market, but it's it's uh you can definitely sell them.
• 1:02:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um and then we do save the meat.
• 1:02:43
  SPEAKER_02: Uh that was a thing to talk about just briefly is the meat from a buck from an intact male is pretty um, it can have some funk to it, um, some strong flavor.
• 1:02:54
  SPEAKER_02: But from a weathered male, it doesn't, and from a doe, it doesn't.
• 1:02:58
  SPEAKER_02: It's similar to venison in the way that it's pretty lean, um, but it's tasty.
• 1:03:03
  SPEAKER_02: So we eat them.
• 1:03:04
  SPEAKER_02: We also have four dogs.
• 1:03:06
  SPEAKER_02: Um, two of those are great pyrenees that live out, you know, with a stock all the time.
• 1:03:10
  SPEAKER_02: So we we feed um, especially if there's intact bucks that we had to do.
• 1:03:15
  SPEAKER_02: So we feed raw to all of the dogs.
• 1:03:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um okay.
• 1:03:19
  SPEAKER_02: And that's that's sort of an outlet for it too.
• 1:03:21
  SPEAKER_02: And some of them, I mean, the Nigerian dwarfs at butcher weight, you're getting, I don't know, maybe 20 pounds of meat off of them.
• 1:03:29
  SPEAKER_02: It's not a ton.
• 1:03:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um yeah, it's about like a about like a a a small dog.
• 1:03:36
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:03:39
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I'm sorry, Cena, I shouldn't have used that.
• 1:03:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh or or a very, very large cat.
• 1:03:45
  SPEAKER_00: I know.
• 1:03:46
  SPEAKER_01: I was like, I'm not enjoying the end of this interview.
• 1:03:49
  SPEAKER_00: Like we're talking about killing them, discarding photos, like you know but but Megan, but make so so Megan, the the business part of this, the business part of this is the milk.
• 1:04:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, yeah.
• 1:04:02
  SPEAKER_00: So it is and soap and and the other, all the other the the uh salves and things.
• 1:04:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, so the the business part is the milk.
• 1:04:11
  SPEAKER_02: I sell the soaps and lotions.
• 1:04:13
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we have started a herd share as well.
• 1:04:16
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so yeah, it's definitely the milk.
• 1:04:18
  SPEAKER_02: And then the you know, the offspring, the really quality ones I sell.
• 1:04:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but it's just really important to me that I don't sell my problems to somebody else.
• 1:04:27
  SPEAKER_02: And so those I take care of myself.
• 1:04:30
  unknown: Right.
• 1:04:31
  SPEAKER_01: Do you sell your soaps and lotions online or just local?
• 1:04:35
  SPEAKER_02: Um, yes, I do sell them online, and my website is thechattygoat.com.
• 1:04:41
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so we have the soaps and lotions there, and then my book is available through Sawdust Publishing, but there's a link to it on my website as well.
• 1:04:51
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and then we're on Instagram quite a bit.
• 1:04:54
  SPEAKER_02: So I try to educate through that, um, through that form because I can reach a lot of people.
• 1:05:01
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I love that.
• 1:05:03
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, one last just quick question because you're the chatty goat.
• 1:05:07
  SPEAKER_01: Are goats chatty?
• 1:05:08
  SPEAKER_01: Like are content goats chatty?
• 1:05:11
  SPEAKER_02: Um yeah, so we are the chatty goat because one of our does is named chatty.
• 1:05:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um I didn't name her, she came to us that way, but some of them are more vocal than others.
• 1:05:22
  SPEAKER_02: For the most part, though, we haven't had the experience, you know, when people are like, they're so loud.
• 1:05:27
  SPEAKER_02: I I mean, ours get excited around feeding time and they will, you know, they'll bat when it's time to be fed.
• 1:05:33
  SPEAKER_02: But they don't really just they don't really do it.
• 1:05:36
  SPEAKER_02: They'll kind of murmur, and sometimes when they're really pregnant, um, they snore when they're sleeping together.
• 1:05:42
  SPEAKER_02: So they sleep in a big, we call it the cuddle puddle, and there's just this big pile of pregnant mamas, and it's really neat to see the family dynamics too, because we let the mamas raise their babies.
• 1:05:53
  SPEAKER_02: So Big Matilda has two daughters and a couple granddaughters at this point, and they all like they know that.
• 1:06:00
  SPEAKER_02: They're related.
• 1:06:01
  SPEAKER_02: So they sleep together in a pile.
• 1:06:03
  SPEAKER_02: And yes, when they're all very pregnant, they're all snoring.
• 1:06:05
  SPEAKER_02: And it's just really cute.
• 1:06:08
  SPEAKER_01: That's adorable.
• 1:06:09
  SPEAKER_01: That reminds me of how tribes used to be, like human tribes.
• 1:06:13
  SPEAKER_00: That's right.
• 1:06:14
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, totally.
• 1:06:17
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, Joel, do you want to um pose a community question?
• 1:06:21
  SPEAKER_01: Because this is a fun episode.
• 1:06:24
  SPEAKER_00: It is a fun episode.
• 1:06:26
  SPEAKER_00: I think I'll I'll pose the question.
• 1:06:28
  SPEAKER_00: I know we have we have people that that listen to this that have goats.
• 1:06:33
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I would I would uh encourage uh anybody in our audience that has a goat, um uh tell us your tell us your your funniest or cutest or whatever your your best goat story.
• 1:06:48
  SPEAKER_00: Um that that uh anyway that that'll either make us laugh or make us love goats or want to have goats.
• 1:06:56
  SPEAKER_00: Uh how about that?
• 1:06:57
  SPEAKER_00: That's a that's a that's a a lot of people don't have goats and won't respond to that, but it, you know, if we have we have those that handful of people that uh that have them, this might be your one big challenge outlet to uh tell the world about your best your best goat experience.
• 1:07:16
  SPEAKER_01: I love that.
• 1:07:17
  SPEAKER_01: Morgan, do you mind closing this out by sharing your experience?
• 1:07:21
  SPEAKER_01: Like something funny or memorable that goats a goat has done.
• 1:07:30
  SPEAKER_00: It better not be when they got out because that's gonna that's gonna just uh uh well.
• 1:07:39
  SPEAKER_02: Well, yeah, it doesn't help me to say when they got out, but does it help that 10 minutes before we got on this call, our barn door blew open with a 50 mile an hour wind gust, and they did get out.
• 1:07:54
  SPEAKER_02: And so it was not any fault of theirs.
• 1:07:58
  SPEAKER_02: Um but I was so it we have a side like sliding door that they're not supposed to go out of and the wind like shifted it out enough that it was just you know, it's just open.
• 1:08:09
  SPEAKER_02: So of course they're gonna go through it.
• 1:08:11
  SPEAKER_02: And I had thought like I should check on them before I get on this call.
• 1:08:14
  SPEAKER_02: And I come around the corner and there's a few of them poking their head out.
• 1:08:17
  SPEAKER_02: I'm like, oh, you like 10 minutes before you've gotta be kidding me.
• 1:08:20
  SPEAKER_02: I'm about to go tell everyone how amazing goats are.
• 1:08:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um they don't get out, but this one was no fault of theirs, and we were actually able to get them back in pretty easily because like the thing is when they're friendly, it's like a dog, it's like a dog who wants to stay with all the other dogs.
• 1:08:38
  SPEAKER_02: So um they are pretty easy to sort of you know get back to where you want.
• 1:08:42
  SPEAKER_02: But I will say, and I should probably knock on wood, that since my first experience way back when 2013, like since revisiting goats in 2019, we have never ever had goats get out of fencing um honestly just this one time because the barn door blew open.
• 1:08:59
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:09:00
  SPEAKER_02: So um, Joel, would you ever consider is so depending on the stories that come in, would you ever consider getting goats at Polyface?
• 1:09:09
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I mean, we we had goats.
• 1:09:11
  SPEAKER_00: Uh we we have had goats.
• 1:09:13
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 1:09:14
  SPEAKER_00: And and we have considered them, especially like to clean up fence lines and things.
• 1:09:19
  SPEAKER_00: As you know, we have sheep now, and we have Catahdin sheep, which are I call them the goatiest, the goatiest of the sheep.
• 1:09:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, you know, these hare sheep, they're they're a lot more uh goatey than like the you know the old uh standard wool wool sheep.
• 1:09:35
  SPEAKER_00: And so um I I kind of look at it like we kind of have a have a bit of a hybrid right now, and they do unlike a goat, they will not go on hind legs and go up to a bush, but they'll they'll go prel go as high as they can reach, and they definitely love love browse and have a much wider variety of you know stuff.
• 1:09:56
  SPEAKER_00: So we actually use them in the fence lines and things to you know to clean up autumn olive and auto and multiflora rows and things like that.
• 1:10:04
  SPEAKER_00: And um, so yeah, yeah.
• 1:10:07
  SPEAKER_01: Um so I guess the the short answer is no.
• 1:10:13
  SPEAKER_00: But don't don't push me too hard.
• 1:10:14
  SPEAKER_02: We've we've we've got okay right now.
• 1:10:18
  SPEAKER_02: But uh you're you're working you're working your way towards them, right?
• 1:10:22
  SPEAKER_02: When how I mean it was it a long time ago when you had them before.
• 1:10:25
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah, yeah.
• 1:10:26
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, uh back in the 70s, 70s and early 80s.
• 1:10:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we had we had goats for a couple of years, but you know, I mean when you think of how electric fencing has developed since then.
• 1:10:40
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my gosh, yes.
• 1:10:42
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that was back, I mean, you could hardly keep cows in back then, you know, with electric fencing.
• 1:10:48
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and so so what a what what we've got with electric fencing now compared to what we had in the 70s, there's you know, there's just no comparison.
• 1:10:56
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, I can't imagine raising the goats in the way that we like to do without that electric fencing, for sure.
• 1:11:03
  SPEAKER_00: But you you have you have really uh made this sound both enjoyable and doable, and that's that's the key.
• 1:11:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so uh so we we are forever in your debt.
• 1:11:16
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 1:11:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um blessings on your own your own um baby coming along.
• 1:11:22
  SPEAKER_00: Hope everything uh, as we say, comes out okay, and uh, and that your your goats will continue to be your greatest joy.
• 1:11:32
  SPEAKER_00: So everybody, thanks for this.
• 1:11:34
  SPEAKER_00: Has been a really uh enjoyable uh visit with Morgan and the Chatty Goat.
• 1:11:39
  SPEAKER_00: Remember the chatty goat, you can look her up, you can get her book.
• 1:11:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's got a great forward uh to the book.
• 1:11:45
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and and um uh enjoy what her wisdom.
• 1:11:50
  SPEAKER_00: She's doing good stuff, and she's not willing to just be content raising goats.
• 1:11:55
  SPEAKER_00: As you could hear, she was she's interested in looking at the old, you know, um what I call uh you know old literature, which uh that's what's half of this bookshelf behind me is stuff before 1940.
• 1:12:07
  SPEAKER_00: And we find that extremely valuable today as we try to turn the corner away from chemicals and vaccines and everything else.
• 1:12:15
  SPEAKER_00: So, Morgan, thanks again for being with us, and thank you all for joining us on another Beyond Labels podcast, and we look forward to being with you again next week.