cattle & goats

Reed77 · #1 05/29/11, 03:27 PM

will cattle be aggressive toward goats? I'm looking into dexter cattle,

Kshobbit · #2 05/29/11, 03:46 PM

I worked on a very large farm, Benz Farms in Tennessee, that had cattle and goats running together. There was lots of acres and lots of room to roam and the cows and the goats got along just fine. They do not eat the same forage nor do they share the same diseases so a healthy mixture.
I am not sure how it would go in a small area. Not that the cows are aggressive to goats but I had a large feeder calf in a smaller enclosure and one day she swung her head around and caught an old doe and slammed her into the barn. The goat died and the calf went into a larger pasture.

dosthouhavemilk · #3 05/29/11, 07:15 PM

Depends on the cattle and the goats. I would suggest having an area that the goats can get into to get away from the cattle. Especially a sleeping area. Goat manure is smaller and not quite as messy as cattle manure.

We run both. The goats have pens they stay in for most of the day. We rotate groups of goats out onto the 80acres throughout the day and the cows run that acreage.
The groups will pass through one another fairly regularly, but do not do much with regards to one another beyond that.

RoyalValley · #4 05/29/11, 09:31 PM

Ours are together all the time, they don't seem to bother each other at all. The only problem I have had is with the goats who have horns that bully the sheep around. But the cows and goats get along just fine.

I would think that dexters are more mellow than bigger cows.

copperhead46 · #5 05/29/11, 10:16 PM

Cattle and goats are just fine together, they even help each other with worm control.
I have both and it's not a problem at all except at feed time, I have to seperate them, but, thats just goats,

6e · #6 05/30/11, 03:47 PM

We run our goats with our cows and they do fine. The goats have their own sleeping area that the cows can't get in and we lock them up at night so I can feed the cow in peace. :-) They all graze together and the calf likes to "play" with the goats.

SpaceCadet12364 · #7 05/30/11, 05:24 PM

Do you have to refence everything if you wanted to try putting a couple goats into a pasture thats fenced for cattle? Been thinking of getting a goat or two to eat the stuff the highlands won't (or aren't, maybe theres just too much of the other stuff for the cows to mess with the stuff I wish they'd eat).

Reed77 · #8 05/30/11, 05:50 PM

what kind of fencing do you have? what kind of goats do you have?

Reed77 · #9 05/30/11, 11:08 PM

I'm looking into dexter cattle, but I'm still debating. I already have boer goats

SpaceCadet12364 · #10 05/30/11, 11:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Reed77

what kind of fencing do you have? what kind of goats do you have?

6 strand high tensile, 3 hots on a solar charger. Don't have any goats (yet)...been thinking about them for weed control though rather than chemicals.

Mickey · #11 05/31/11, 12:02 AM

We have one dexter cow and 2 goats, one of them is a little buckling. They're all in together all of the time. Our cow just loves her goats and is very protective of them.
We use 3 strands of electric fence, keeps everyone in just fine.