Boer Goats

[HDRider]

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How many of you raise Boer goats? Can you talk about the breed and your markets?

Did you consider Kiko? Do you have Kikos? Do you run anything with your Boer goats for crosses?

Can anyone discuss the pros and cons of these breeds? Climate differences, personality differences, anything that can help a person understand all the differences of these breeds.

Boer seems to dominate the meat goat market. Are there other breeds that one should consider?


Thanks

[PaulNKS]

It all depends on your market. If you don't have a goat market, you have to create one, if possible. If there is a market, check around and raise what the market demands.

Here, I sell them at the St. Joseph, MO Stockyards. They have one day per month that is devoted to sheep and goats. They always bring as much as if I could sell them privately and less headache. When selling there, they pay more for "meaty" looking goats such as the Boer and Boer cross.

So, since my market dictates Boers for higher prices, that's what I raise. I do have some Nubians and some Alpines. But, soon, other than the Boers, I'll have just Alpines and Boers and keep them purebred with no crossing.

[PaulNKS]

Originally Posted by HDRider

Boer seems to dominate the meat goat market. Are there other breeds that one should consider?

The reason being that a Boer kid will grow and put on weight as fast as any breed of goat. Since most goats are sold for meat and Boers have more meat per animal, it only makes since that they dominate the meat market. Also, it helps that they can breed at any time of the year, unlike many breeds.

[HDRider]

Originally Posted by PaulNKS

The reason being that a Boer kid will grow and put on weight as fast as any breed of goat. Since most goats are sold for meat and Boers have more meat per animal, it only makes since that they dominate the meat market. Also, it helps that they can breed at any time of the year, unlike many breeds.

Thanks Paul. You and I keep crossing paths.

[mygoat]

Originally Posted by HDRider

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How many of you raise Boer goats? Can you talk about the breed and your markets? I do! The majority of my animals right now are boers.

Did you consider Kiko? Do you have Kikos? Do you run anything with your Boer goats for crosses? I OWN crosses, but I currently use a PB buck on crossbred does. I've considered crossing my alpines to a boer buck, but it may not ever happen. I do not own kikos - I've never seen an ad for them around here, and I would bet they aren't disease tested. I've never heard of disease tested Kikos. For a small raiser like me. It's important to have a purebred/fullblood buck, so that ANY goat bred to him will result in at least 50% registerable offspring. I rely on registered kid sales as well as meat wether sales.

Can anyone discuss the pros and cons of these breeds? Climate differences, personality differences, anything that can help a person understand all the differences of these breeds. My boers are extremely sweet for the most part. Some are wild. I've taken to bottle raising any keeper doelings to keep them sane. I also disbud my goats - my buck is pushy with his horns but I bought him with horns so that's how he's gonna be. I also have 3 older does who behave with horns very well, bit it means I had to specially make the hay feeder so they could use it, and it weakened it and it's popping welds (it's a cattle panel wrapped around a bale of hay). However, ABGA has apparently changed it's standard to say that disbudded animals cannot be considered for ennoblement - not that mine are up to that standard anyways. I've heard boers are prone to having bad feet, so keeping them on dry clean bedding and selecting for good feet is important. They also supposedly have less parasite resistance - I haven't noticed this, but then I'm not a huge commercial raiser either.

Boer seems to dominate the meat goat market. Are there other breeds that one should consider? Kikos and boers are about it, IMO. All goats are meat, some just do it better. Myotonics come to mind - very meaty smaller goats, easy to contain - but they simply do not grow as fast as boers. Pygmies actually have a very good meat:bone ratio, but they do not grow as fast and are not seen as 'meat' animals, so they are likely not the way to go if you plan on advertising MEAT animals.


Thanks

My opinions in red!

[ozark_jewels]

Originally Posted by HDRider

________________________________________
How many of you raise Boer goats? Can you talk about the breed and your markets?

I bred Boers(fullblood and percentages) for ten years. I sold out of The Boers last year due to moving and having less room to run two herds(Boer and Dairy). I had nothing but good results with my Boers. Choosing your stock when starting out is very important. Choose for traits you need. Choose good feet, worm resistance, mothering ability and milk. And find a herd that manages like you plan on managing!! If you are going to have a commercial herd, DO NOT buy from a pampered show herds. There are herds out there that breed for all the right things and let their goats act like goats, and also show. But many show herds feed a LOT of high-priced feed, have lotted goats and those goats will not do well if their enviroment is drastically changed. You want a goat with lots of honest meat/muscle on it. You do not want a *fat* goat that looks good but will melt when faced with reality.
I ran a FB buck with a few FB does and the rest were Boer/Dairy percentages. I never had more than 20-25 breeding does at one time, so I didn't deal with marketing large amounts of kids.
I marketed most of my doelings off the farm as breeding stock. Inferior doelings were butchered by me for the family freezer or they were marketed as butcher goats with the wethers. Spectacular bucklings were sold as bucks(1-3 a year), everything else was wethered and went into the family freezer or was marketed for butcher. I also sold a few real nice show wethers most years. If I had just a lot of butcher goats and a slow year, I'd sell to a buying station near here.
I bred for early kids so that they were ready to market before market prices took their summer slump.

Did you consider Kiko? Do you have Kikos? Do you run anything with your Boer goats for crosses?

I wouldn't have turned down a good Kiko if I had the chance, but I never met an available Kiko that I liked. Had a friend who ran Kiko/Boer does and used a FB Boer buck. Good kids. But always use a Boer buck.
My best market kids by far were my Boer/Dairy percentages. Always the best show wethers too. Always use a FB Boer buck, start out with strong, tanky, sturdy dairy does. Breed them and with all the meat from daddy and the milk from mommy....those kids grew faster and weighed more at weaning, than the FB Boers. I like the 1/2 Boers and 3/4 Boers bred back to a FB Boer buck. Throw the nicest kids.
But don't expect skinny little frail dairy does to cross well with a Boer buck. Start out with strong stock.
My best crosses were Boer/Lamancha and Boer/Saanen. Big tanky kids that grew like weeds. Boer/Alpine were my next pick, followed by Boer/Nubian. Nubians have the right type of ear to cross well with Boers, but somehow the other breeds were always better structurally with more meat.

[TRAILRIDER]

Good info here. I learned a thing or two!

[Ford Zoo]

Great question and I'm glad you asked this! We are just starting with boers, but we are not close to a goat area, dairy or meat, so I have been learning vicariously thru the internet about marketing when we are ready.

We are about 2 hours away from an area with a high population of goat eating cultures. I did go to an auction this past spring, was around easter, and 2 gentleman were bidding against each other for the limited goats available that day. They were the sorriest dairy goats I've ever seen, but they averaged $2/lb live weight, so I am going to investigate more and try to sell at the right time next year.

[HDRider]

Originally Posted by TRAILRIDER

Good info here. I learned a thing or two!

That is what I love about this board. Good info from good people.

Thanks all.

[Cliff]

Had Boers for about 10 years, now have had kiko and kiko/nubian for about the last 5 yrs.

Finally gave up the boers when a buddy convinced me how much less work kikos were (he is a pretty big meat producer and had both also.) He was right. The boers were always wormy so needed worming more often, did better with feed than on just forage/hay and had major foot issues. They just weren't very hardy, and obviously they cost a lot more to raise. Bobbyb pointed out recently that maybe it's our hot humid climate, that they don't seem to have those problems in Texas where he is. I think he may be right. Anyway, the kiko do fantastic here, they're very worm resistant, do great on just forage and hay have great feet and we're much happier with them.

The kiko/nubian crosses have the best rich sweet milk, better than straight nubian. And they are big meaty things that grow fast.

[Ford Zoo]

It was hubby's idea to raise meat goats, and I've been thinking about getting a nubian. Perhaps this will convince him to throw one in the mix.

[HDRider]

Originally Posted by Cliff

Had Boers for about 10 years, now have had kiko and kiko/nubian for about the last 5 yrs.

Finally gave up the boers when a buddy convinced me how much less work kikos were (he is a pretty big meat producer and had both also.) He was right. The boers were always wormy so needed worming more often, did better with feed than on just forage/hay and had major foot issues. They just weren't very hardy, and obviously they cost a lot more to raise. Bobbyb pointed out recently that maybe it's our hot humid climate, that they don't seem to have those problems in Texas where he is. I think he may be right. Anyway, the kiko do fantastic here, they're very worm resistant, do great on just forage and hay have great feet and we're much happier with them.

The kiko/nubian crosses have the best rich sweet milk, better than straight nubian. And they are big meaty things that grow fast.

Thanks for the input. I was pondering a Kiko/LaMancha cross.

[ozark_jewels]

Will add that my Boers never got wormed more often than the rest of the herd. Twice a year at most. Some once a year.

[Shygal]

my wethers are Kiko/Alpine cross, they are not very meaty looking at all lol

Where do you FIND a goat market? I don't even know where any livestock auctions are around here. I know there is a beef slaughter place, how do you find these things?

[HDRider]

Originally Posted by Shygal

my wethers are Kiko/Alpine cross, they are not very meaty looking at all lol

Where do you FIND a goat market? I don't even know where any livestock auctions are around here. I know there is a beef slaughter place, how do you find these things?

Google "livestock auctions New York"

I found these, but don't know where you live...

::Empire Livestock::

Welcome to Finger Lakes Livestock Ex Inc: One family, one location,our goal:BE THE BEST

and there were many more

[Cliff]

We went a couple years with a nubian buck. Got a kiko again a few months ago. His first kids were just born - I had forgotten how bouncy and lively they are. I remember that's something the meat producers here like about them over boers - they say the kikos "hit the ground running."

[Ford Zoo]

Originally Posted by Shygal

Where do you FIND a goat market? I don't even know where any livestock auctions are around here. I know there is a beef slaughter place, how do you find these things?

Here's a source:

Goat Rancher | MARKETS

[Goat Servant]

Like anything else, you have strong genetics & weak genetics. Good growth poor growth. Worm resistant or not.
Then you have management. Some throw em out there & never do much.
Not many Kikos here.
Find ethnic market. Preferably target your sales for ethnic holidays with animals ready to go on buyer's calender.
Unlike most white Americans, they want it fresh, not dug out of the freezer.

[phantomriver]

I've never had pure bred Boer because the purebreds that I could find around here just weren't as nice as the crosses. The folks around here I've talked to that did have them complained about the parasite problems and went back to crosses. You never see the awesome looking goats like what is advertised in Tx and western states here. A strapping buck of any apparent breed will easily bring $200+ at auction here so I'm not sure how worthwhile fretting over papers and private sales is. Heck, I sold a little 60lb mutt buck for 125 a few months ago. I've never seen pure kiko stock advertised closer than TN and to be honest most look like heavy built dairy goats to me. It seems most herds closer are relatively new and just building their stock so I'm not going to get anything decent. I have a KikoxBoer buck that I've crossed with a couple saanen does and and a couple smallish boerxspanish does. The kids from my dairy goats are definitely more substantial than dairy goats but not built with the rounded out look of having a boer or a boerx mom. The kids out of my boerx moms are right beefy looking....and I do loooove the long ears.

I'd love something with papers but I'm just not going to pay more for a meat animal that isn't as nice as the unregistered one. Even if I could just find one that is equal I'd pay more. Anyway, my guy is a year old and other than I worry about him being overweight and in rut in this heat seems fine. My saanen does have been much more of a struggle with both parasites and require periodic foot care. His feet always look beautiful and I just wormed this guy for the first time since I bought him last year. Really he and my boerx does could have gone without the wormer but since my Saanens were having an issue with it I went ahead and did everyone. Ordinarily I would have just continued to watch but I'm 8 months prego myself plus 2 small human kids and can't be dealing with wrestling and worming goats by myself in this heat so I went ahead and did everyone while DH was available to help me catch. I think hybrid vigor is a fabulous thing.

[Sherry in Iowa]

KiKo Experience~None. Had a friend that replaced her Boer buck with a Kiko and loved the results.

We use Boer bucks on dairy breeds first. We had Nubian and Saanen girls. We kept back the doelings on these breedings and bred to Boer bucks. That is definitely the best for us. These girls milk great..but their kids are bulky blocks with legs on them..lol.

We also paid attention to the bucks, does and their offspring. One line of does we had was susceptible to worms. Get rid of that line and the worm issue was basically gone.

We also had some does that had feet that had to be trimmed. Changed our Boer buck for another one and the hooves straightened right out.

We sell at Kalona Sale Barn..Kalona Iowa. They love meat goats! Buyers from Chicago are there every Wednesday morning. We switched from selling six month old kids to 2-3 three month old kids. The money difference was pretty astounding and sure cut down on overhead for us.

The Boers and their crosses have done great in our state of extremes. They tolerate extreme frigid conditions as well as drought and extreme heat.

I love the Boer breed because while friendly..they are very independent and self sufficient. They have done us well and they don't owe us anything.

Hope you enjoy whatever breed you get!!