Is anyone getting rich raising goats?

PaulNKS,
Do you use a herd dog? If so what breed?

I have a Border Collie, but I was never smart enough to teach what I wanted him to know.

I did have an old dog that was half Australian Shepherd and half Blue Heeler and he was a great her dog. Usually, if they see me outside, they come running. If they don't, I can call them in or just show bang something on the feed bunk. A nibble is enough to keep them coming in.

With goats as a hobby, if you break even you are doing well. It's possible to make money with goats if you get really serious and have a lot of them...but for a backyard type opperation it is far easier to make money with sheep. In fact, I know someone who uses her "sheep money" to pay for her goats...lol....

You make great points - most of which I agree with.

However, startup costs can be pricy, IMO. It all depends on what you have and what you can find.

Good goats - 200.00 apeice on average. Start with the absolute best buck you can manage to pay for, and good healthy does.

Housing - barn(s) for doe herd, kid crop, bucks, milk room, equipment/feed storage.

Fencing - goat fencing can be pricy. Especially since they knock it down in high traffic areas every 2-5 years. Unless you have tons of acres fenced off, your pasture will look like a well manucured park shortly and you'll have to start feeding hay again. We also have an isolation pen for new stock or sick stock, as well as kid pens for raising the kids in or weaning the kids.

Dairy equipment - buckets, dairy soap, glass jars, udder wash, teat dip, strip cup, milkstand, milkstand feeders, pasteurizer...

Raising kids - lambars, nipples, bottles, dimethox/wormers, castrating tool, disbudding iron(s), tattoo clamps, tube feeder, always keep frozen colostrum on hand just in case...

General equip - wormer(s), vaccines, antibiotics, drench gun, copper boluses, copper bolus gun, BoSe, syringes, needles, probiotics, CMPK, clippers for shaving udders (for dairies mostly, though handy for boers too with wounds etc), minerals, baking soda, leashes/collars, LOCKING grain storage, hoof trimmers.

Feed - most expensive single continuing cost on a farm. Boers usually need some grain during kidding season, especially if expected to kid 2x per year. Dairies need grain daily when milked. Alfalfa/grass mix hay, alfalfa pellets for dairies.

Feeding equip - feed pans, hay feeder, mineral feeder(s), water troughs (how ya gonna get a ton of water to these goats constantly, even through the winter? Auto waterer that doesn't freeze? those is pricy! )

Then there's the disease testing, of which I reccomend at least 3 negative test results before deciding you're disease free - at about 21.00 per goat for CL, CAE, and Johnes. Some only test for CAE, some don't test for Johnes (which is scary IMO). But that adds up pretty darn quick.

There ARE ways of doing it cheap. Sometimes cheap isn't always the answer, however, and can result in more problems. I try to cut all costs that I can, and we are trying to work towards making money here. Most generally accepted practices - like yearly disease testing - are NOT conducive to profit, but it's hard to sell kids at all if you don't test yearly.

I KNOW I'm forgetting a bunch of equipment that I've amassed over the years in hopes of making my life easier. Always be sure to build a catch pen aroudn the area you normally feed their grain so they're not afraid to go into the smaller area and are thus easier to shut in when needed for routine management.

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Dona Barski

"Breed the best, eat the rest"

Caprice Acres

French and American Alpines. CAE, Johnes neg herd. Abscess free. LA, DHIR.

That's as I said before. Know your market. Your market sector requires a more intensive approach than the meat market which carries a totally different approach.

With the commercial meat market, we're after a faster turnaround, or in other words, fastest gains possible from birth to the stockyards. Where I sell, people aren't making buying decisions based on whether the animals are papered, screened or tested for disease, etc. Therefore, out on farm expenses are possibly less than someone targeting the market you target.

A homesteader has to know what his/her market will bear. He/she has to know what will provide the highest profit margin for that market sector.

In other words, we have the same expenses when it comes to vaccines, dewormers, hoof trimming, etc.

The farm where we have the goats is 160 acres. There are 4 ponds with the largest being 2-1/2 surface acres. In the winter, I chop ice on one pond twice daily for the goats and cattle. The rest of the year, they drink freely. When I'm weaning, I fill a 300 gallon tank of water and place it next to the weaning pens. With me being 100% off-grid and collecting rainwater, I can't very easily use frost free waterers.


It all boils down to having a plan and determining what market sector you are after and what your area can bear.

But, back to the OP's original question of can you get rich. The answer is no. You won't get rich. But, you can have a goat operation that is profitable.

I doubt if anyone gets rich raising goats. Some people can make a living at it, but I wouldn't call them rich. There is a family in my state who have a commercial dairy as well as a cheese plant, but you need to be willing to invest in the equipment necessary to pass inspection for licensing. One of the country's best known Nubian breeders belong to my goat club. Their kids are all preordered before they hit the ground. Two of the three women work outside the home as do all their husbands.

I appreciate everyone's posts. I asked the question of getting rich with goats tongue in cheek, but I was serious to find out if the market is there and the different approaches being used.

Thanks

PaulNKS at what age do you wean your culls and buck kids?

With my Nigerian Dwarf goats we don't seem to have to spend quite as much especially since my herd is only 6. It does save us money when they are in milk.

A gallon of whole milk here is around $4.25. DH and DS12 alone can drink a gallon a day; add in the girls drinking some as well and that's a gallon and 1/2 a day. So, being in milk saves me about 30 bucks a week. That is huge to me.

Plus, they're fun

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I don't even chase my whiskey, what makes you think I'm going to chase you?

Culls are any animal that is not meeting the standard of performance and are disposed of (sold). This is whether they have outlived their usefulness or purpose. For example, when a doe is not able to raise a kid, has trouble birthing, has a history of mastitis, doesn't have twins, etc. Any that need to leave are considered culls.

I don't wean based on age as much as other criteria. For example, if a pair of kids are not growing as quickly on mother's milk as the others, I may leave them on her longer and supplement with high protein feed. Otherwise, I base it on the size of the kid. I honestly don't have a certain weight when I wean, but I base it on how they are performing and if they look like they weighing enough. If a kid is not performing well and growing at the same rate as the other kids, while on mother's milk, he will usually not do any better if weaned onto feed. So, I will leave him on the doe longer than the others.

With that said.... the age is usually anytime from 8 weeks to 12 weeks.

For example, if you take a dairy kid that was an only kid compared to a pair of crossbred Boer twins, the one dairy kid will outgrow the others by leaps and bounds and be weaned at a younger age, because he is getting so much more milk. However, once all the kids are weaned and on goat grower for a month, they usually even out.

I do it this way, because when I sell at the stockyards, I want all the kids to be as close to the same weight as possible. If your kids are all close in size, in a commercial meat market, they will be sold as one group, and will usually bring a higher price than the same animal sold individually. Same thing goes for cattle. At a sale barn, the groups of calves sell higher than individual calves for several reasons.

So, to wean, I try to base it on their performance on mother's milk and how well they have done compared to the other kids. When I wean and put them on grower, I know that they will even out and get me closer to a consistency to sell as a group when I take them to the stockyards.

There is one of several reasons I want to switch from Boer and Boer/cross kids to all Boer. The kids will more likely be able to all be weaned at the same time, making it a little less labor intensive and help with the overall herd management. Also, a purebred Boer kid will reach market weight sooner than the crossbred kids meaning I have them on feed fewer days and still reach my target weight for market helping the bottom line (profit).

I hope I answered your question without too much rambling.

Almost no dairy goat operations exist for profit; mostly they are essentially for enjoyment. Cattle people sometimes tend to look down on goat people, perhaps because these operations frequently operate in the red and thus are considered "impractical." They are practical to a degree, however there is a point at which it is not. For example, having enough goats to feed yourself is practical; having 20 goats and tossing milk every day is obviously impractical.
In terms of a monetary net return, unless you plan on selling milk, you will operate in the red, no doubts about it. Dairy animals are labor-intensive and money-intensive as well, unless you can grow your own grain and hay. If you have enough of them, and you feed them very well, you can go broke very easily.
One can also raise show animals, and sell expensive stock, but again this is still difficult to do without operating in the red. Even when you do make money on them, it is not adequate for the amount of time. For example, I've kept track of the time spent with the goats and the profit we've made and I average at about $4-$5 an hour. We've managed to come out ahead, but barely, which is why our operation is starting to lean towards beef and sheep meat markets.
Typically the dairy goat person's main crop is kids, which doesn't always work because dairy goats love to give you bucklings that you either have to eat or give away.
Dairy goats are enjoyable, don't get me wrong, but I'm telling you: if you want to make money on dairy animals, you will be sorely disappointed.
Meat goats are a different story. They can make money, provided they don't come down with CL, foot rot, worms, or simply drop dead for no good reason.

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I'm an environmentalist, left wing, Ron Paul loving Prius driver with a farm. If you have a problem with that, kindly go take a leap.

Most people that raise small herds of dairy goats aren't going to make any money.

I think they can make sense for some people if you use all the milk, meat and manure, but in general most people have more goats than they strictly need for milk so they spend more on feed and goat care and often are pouring out extra milk or drying their goats up early.

Probably easier to make money raising meat goats although depends on your area.

I know some folks who ran a commercial dairy and made and sold cheese to several famous restaraunts and stores and they told me that working 60 plus hours a week they didn't earn as much as when they were teachers and teacher pay at that time in my state was 49th nationally

That's interesting...How is it easier to make money with sheep?

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I dream of a better world where chickens can cross the road without having their motives questioned.

The posters that provided the money-making tips can be summarized as management. management, and more management. You can make money with meat goats if you have a market and you can breed to meet demand. Getting rich? You've got slightly better odds than going to Vegas. Add management and the odds go up.

There are a couple of goat daries here that are profitable but the one of real interest is the new 1500 goat Cottage Grove dairy that is being built in McKinleyville Ca. These people are expanding to increase their operation because they market a well recognized brand of goat cheese.
I would think they are pretty profitable because the original farm was bought out by a Swiss group and they decided to expand operations within a couple of years. Grazing is possible down on the coast all year long but they will not be grazing the production does.

Less input in terms of feed, shelter, labor, etc. and they are easier to sell and command much higher prices (around here, anyway). Goats generally don't grow like sheep do on pasture alone...and they usually require more interventions.

I found this today as I continue market research:

Table 4.Top importers of goat meat
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Goat Meat (MT) %
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U.S.------ 9,551 18.2
China ---- 5,709 10.9
Italy ----- 1,451 2.8
Canada -- 1,374 2.6
France --- 1,151 2.2
Industrialized
Countries 16,097 30.7
World ---- 2,477
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Source: FAOSTAT, 2005. http://www.agmrc.org/media/cms/USGoa...67962C32D1.pdf

This tells me that US goat producers have a large opportunity with our domestic market to displace imported goat meat.

I second this. If you want to make money and want small, get sheep. Goats are pets and hence will never make much money, unless you have a commercial dairy. Even then you're only making about minimum wage.
Meat goats may make some money, but as Funny said they require more intervention.

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I'm an environmentalist, left wing, Ron Paul loving Prius driver with a farm. If you have a problem with that, kindly go take a leap.

Have you looked at the price for imported vs domestic goat meat? I know it's cheaper for me to buy rabbits slaughtered in China than locally. It would not surprise me if the same was true for goats.

I don't plan to make it big with farming, but I want my elbow room, and I don't approve of having that much lawn/unproductive ground.

I have close to 100 boerx now this will be my first year with so many last year I was in my 50’s the year before in my 20’s I just took that crop of weathers to market 11 in total and the top ones brought 171 a piece on average 150 they weren’t that big. I do all my own hay work so my average cost on hay is around 50 cents a bale. I own the equipment and the property is paid for also.
I’m still setting up pasture and barns, rotation on, kidding programs there a lot of work to go with it but just like any operation if you can keep your feed bill down and keep you production high you will make money in the long run.
I feed mostly grass except for at kidding when the momma gets a little help start out milk production. I also raise sheep and I have to say the baby sheep gain a lot better off the grass than the goats I raise a hair sheep so I don’t have to shave and the market for sheep is just as high and even higher at some times during the year.
I also think I could get more per animal at farmers markets or selling to a restaurant then actually selling to a stock yard. I know if there buying my animal for 2.50 to 2.85 a lb these big buyers are selling them for more at other location. It’s just to have the time to do research and start looking around at different outlets.