Pack Goats?

[HomesteaderWife]

I was curious to see if anyone here has had personal experience in training goats for pack purposes?

When I began researching the benefits of raising goats, I learned that there were more amazing qualities than just milk/meat/and foraging. One of the things I saw mentioned was the training of a young castrated male for packing (as long as you picked a hardy, strong breed). While I do want to have goats available for sale and for milking, I want to challenge myself to train a pack goat (then eventually train an ox for the plow!)

I would not be requiring the goat to pack heavy, though some people have them carry camping equipment. It would just be nice to have a companion animal to help haul minor equipment when we go out in the woods.

Does anyone have any input on this subject? Thank you so much for your time!

 

[outdoorhoney]

Howdy there, HomesteaderWife. I have been doing plenty of research lately myself on training goats to pack. I recently adopted an Alpine doeling (5 months old now) in hopes that my husband and I would be able to take her on hunting trips with us. Although we aren't expecting her to carry our entire campsite with us, it would be wonderful to have a goat carrying arrows, snacks, first aid and other smaller items for us during our trips. We loved the idea of having an "easier" to train and smaller livestock animal than a horse, ox or mule. When we first started taking her out, we realized she needed a companion goat to come out hiking with her. Her best buddy is a ND who is much younger than her (11 weeks) and although we thought she might have a harder time keeping up, we still decided to pick her to hike with our Alpine. We won't be expecting her (ND) to pack any weight and we're hoping to just have her come along for companionship. We started with brief hikes and have slowly been working our way to longer hikes and steeper terrain. We are working mostly on rope lead training and will continue to do this and building up our hikes for the first one-two years. Eventually we will put an empty pack on the Alpine and get her used to walking/climbing with something on her back but she still won't be carrying weight for a couple of years. I am planning on kidding the Alpine and using her for milk eventually so I don't want to stress her body out with heavy continuous packing. Although typically hunters and hikers prefer wethers for a strong pack goat, does have been proven to be just as great of a pack goat and if they happen to be in milk during a trip, you get fresh goats milk in the woods which is a great benefit I think it's adorable that our ND thinks she is just as big and bad as her older Alpine sister. Right now, she's having a harder time keeping up with the older girl but I think with time they will be a great team. One thing I have noticed about our girls though is that they tend to get whiny around their feeding times if we are stuck out in the woods (yes, I know they have plenty to forage but SWEET OATS AND HAY maaaahm). Goats really are amazing and they are capable of so much. I love the idea of packing goats. Just be aware of the predator risk while outdoors with your goats!

 

[KaliMoran]

How did you familiarize your goat with journeys away from home? I always heard about what escape artists they are and their fabulous (stubborn) free spirits, but my new doe gets extremely nervous if walk her out of her pen on a leash. She's brand new to us, only a year old, and has a 6 week old baby so I suppose THAT could be part (all?) of it, but I really didn't expect such stress from being on the other side of the fence. Is this normal?

 

[HeidiO]

How did you familiarize your goat with journeys away from home? I always heard about what escape artists they are and their fabulous (stubborn) free spirits, but my new doe gets extremely nervous if walk her out of her pen on a leash. She's brand new to us, only a year old, and has a 6 week old baby so I suppose THAT could be part (all?) of it, but I really didn't expect such stress from being on the other side of the fence. Is this normal?

Food is a great motivator for goats. Find something they really like, and give tiny amounts while out of the pen. Raisins, grain, just don't go overboard so they get sick. She is in a new place, which is scary, but she also has a baby to think about. Are you taking the kid out with her?

 

[samssimonsays]

This is very intersting to me... I never thought about doing this with goats... May be something I will have to try with my wether...

 

[outdoorhoney]

@KaliMoran I agree with you about goats having fabulous (stubborn) free spirits. Is your doe more comfortable leaving her fence when they baby

How did you familiarize your goat with journeys away from home? I always heard about what escape artists they are and their fabulous (stubborn) free spirits, but my new doe gets extremely nervous if walk her out of her pen on a leash. She's brand new to us, only a year old, and has a 6 week old baby so I suppose THAT could be part (all?) of it, but I really didn't expect such stress from being on the other side of the fence. Is this normal?

First, I could not agree more about goats having fabulous (stubborn) free spirits! Second, when you are removing your doe from the fence are you leaving the baby behind or is the baby coming with? One thing I've noticed about my goats is that if I've removed one from the other, they will cry and refuse to leave until they are together again. Goats like having a friend with them and generally get pretty lonely when they are by themselves. It may help if you aren't already to bring the baby out with her. @HeidiO has a great suggestion about bringing food to her attention to get her to leave her area. She's viewing her fenced area as a "safe" area. When you start presenting treats (whatever it may be that she LOVES i.e, honey oats, raisins, grains) she will hopefully begin to show interest and start following you (just don't overfeed). It may take a few tries but being patient pays off! She may just still be getting used to her new home. Just keep working with her and eventually she will feel comfortable on a leash and will start associating the leash with treats, more pasture and fun times.

 

[KaliMoran]

Thank you! I will keep working on it. I did allow baby to join us, however he is QUITE the energetic and adventurous little man and doesn't bother sticking close by, which I'm sure stresses Honey out more. Hay stretcher and my clicker were the only thing that kept her from really losing it, but it was tough to distract her from her worries even with that. Regardless, it was adventure number 1 so... All things considered, I suppose it went well.

 

[pnptrapp]

I'll be very interested in hearing of your progress, since I am also interested in training goats for packing and driving/pulling!

 

[MMWB]

I've dabble a bit with packing and have four serviceable wethers now and a fifth I will sell or butcher. He is okay, but too stand offish and I won't mess with the personality stuff. Training constituted putting the saddle on and going for a walk. The big goat is skittish about the bags (he'll get over it), but the de-horned one doesn't get excited about anything and took to the bags with nary a second glance. They do tend to want to chew any loose straps though, so one has to tuck them up and out of the way.

 

[HomesteaderWife]

@MMWB - I love those photos! It's nice to see someone who has successful pack goats. We are finally getting ready to build our pen and bring some goats home!