Horned and dehorned goats living together?

[Baxternbuddy]

New to goats and trying to decide what breeds to get. Only interested in goats for brush clearing and as pets. I have a couple of boar wether kids reserved. The Boars are not disbudded, so they will have horns. Although I am starting with just 2 goats, I hope to add a couple more to my herd later. Given that the boars will have horns, will I be limited to only getting other horned goats for safety reasons? Also, is matching size important (I.e., not mixing standard and dwarf breeds).

Jennifer

[bluefish]

I have had all of the above and had no problems. However, I have a lot of room. If you're tight on space, it might be more problematic. Also personality of the goats. If you have a real bully, and I mean more than normal as goats tend to be fairly nasty to each other anyway, then you'll have problems with or without horns.

I only have one disbudded goat left and she is not top of the pack, but she's not at the bottom either. Also my boers seems to be pretty mellow. They are all ranked below any of the dairy goats that they live with.

I have also had nigerians for a little while in with everybody else. They did fine. Again, I have a lot of room.

[Clovers_Clan]

Ditto what thermopkt said. If they have plenty of space and are being raised on browse, they'll get along peacefully, even mixed herds of standards and miniatures. When/If you must feed hay or grain, the goats lower on the pecking order can miss out, particularly the minis. You can manage this by allowing more feed space and spreading out feeders. The farther apart the less likely the bullies are to run off others from their feed.

I've had horned goats and non-horned goats, dominance has more to do with attitude and disposition.

If you don't have space and/or time for these management practices, I would recommend getting similar size/age goats. That certainly would be easiest.

[freenerik]

I recently stopped going to a feed store here in Oregon due to that question. I have a doe who had 4 kids, they all chose the same side and even though I was milking her she developed mastitis, this is the reason I went to the store was to get antibiotics and to dry that side up. I was asked by 2 employees if I had horned and unhorned together I said yes and they had the gall to tell me that the horned doe must be beating up the unhorned and thats why she had mastits. I said that was not true and they said I should be ashamed of myself for keeping them together. my does never fight and in fact my young doe screamed while kidding I could not find anything wrong I decided to put my older doe in with her and they snuggled up until the kid was delivered. long story short you know your goats better then anyone go with your gut and have a mentor on speed dial just in case.
Good luck with you goats they are a joy.

[Crazy Farmgirl]

I have both horned and disbudded goats in my herd and have NEVER had an injury due to horns! My opinion is injuries due to horns are few and far between and they are just as likely to get an injury from some other object, accidents happen with or without horns!! I do refuse to buy a horned goat whose owner handled them by the horns or used them as a means of control, those goats tend to feel it is OK to use their horns on humans. I rely more on temperment than horns or not, I won't have a goat (horned or not) that is aggressive toward humans. As long as they have ample space they will be fine...get whatever goat you fall in love with next!!

[Clovers_Clan]

Originally Posted by Crazy Farmgirl

I have both horned and disbudded goats in my herd and have NEVER had an injury due to horns! My opinion is injuries due to horns are few and far between and they are just as likely to get an injury from some other object, accidents happen with or without horns!! I do refuse to buy a horned goat whose owner handled them by the horns or used them as a means of control, those goats tend to feel it is OK to use their horns on humans. I rely more on temperment than horns or not, I won't have a goat (horned or not) that is aggressive toward humans. As long as they have ample space they will be fine...get whatever goat you fall in love with next!!

I had a small herd of meat does. Though dam raised they were used to being handled, a lot. Especially by children. We restrained them by their horns when we needed to trim feet, check eyes, worm, etc. and they never became head shy or agressive at all. Bucks are a different matter entirely. Handling them by the horns initiates an instinctive response. I trained my buck from an early age to lead with a collar. And carefully avoid his sizable horns as much as possible when working around his head but I still do occasionally have to grasp one to hold his head steady to give meds/wormer orally. If I don't, I could end up with a nasty jab when he moves his head in avoidance.

I think the biggest danger of developing agression with horns comes when people play with intact bucklings during their head butting stage. Mine get a squirt of water in the face if they push on me. They quickly learn, I'm not another goat and I don't want to spar.

[Clovers_Clan]

Oh, I think its important to add, never, ever, leave a collar on any of your goats if you have any with horns. Or if you absolutely must, use the plastic chain collars that are designed to break.

[hiddensprings]

Originally Posted by Clovers_Clan

Oh, I think its important to add, never, ever, leave a collar on any of your goats if you have any with horns. Or if you absolutely must, use the plastic chain collars that are designed to break.

I agree 110% with this. I learned the hard way. I purchased a young Nubian buck and put him in a large pasture with my Angora and Boer bucks. The Nubian was the only hornless one. He did, however, have a collar on. No sure exactly how, but one of my angora bucks got his horn through the collar and if I had not been around, the Nubian would have died. The Nubian actually passed out by the time I got the collar off. Very scary. I think you can run Horned and non-horned goats together just fine with a few precautions.

[Awnry Abe]

Our herd queen is a large hornless LaMancha. She easily dethroned the previous queen, a horned Boer doe. I am so glad, too, because now both are more mellow.