Stall size

[Phil V.]

How big would you make them? I'm making floor plans for a barn and not sure on how big to make them. The barn is going to be 80 ft. long and not sure on how wide yet and will have a hay mow in it. It will be strictly a goat barn with an area for milking and a loafing area.

[Alice In TX/MO]

You only need stalls for kidding and keeping the new mom and kids together for a couple of days or for a place to put a goat that needs healthcare.

At least 8' x 8'. If you could make a bigger one with the ability to divide it into smaller units, that would be good, too.

[SJSFarm]

I have minis and I know they don't need the same size as a standard goat, or even full size livestock stalls, but I made mine with the understanding I would eventually sell the property and thus the stalls needed to be standard horse size, as that would probably be my buyer. I have two 12x12, a 10x10, and a 12x20 that serves as a run in.

I will be dividing one 12x12 into two 6x6 and a milking area in the 6x12 remaining area. This will serve as my baby areas. The 10x10 stall will be for the bucks.

[msscamp]

Originally Posted by Phil V.

How big would you make them? I'm making floor plans for a barn and not sure on how big to make them. The barn is going to be 80 ft. long and not sure on how wide yet and will have a hay mow in it. It will be strictly a goat barn with an area for milking and a loafing area.

My kidding stalls are usually 5' wide by 5' deep. I have found that if I make them any bigger than that, the kids can get out of range of the heat lamp and become chilled.

[mygoat]

I use a single cattle panel bent in a U-shape for a kidding stall. I attach them at either end to the wall with 2 sets of 2 eye-bolts 4' apart. If you connect two pens together a common eye bolt rather like a rounded W shape, you can put hay between the pens so two pens can share it, as well as a water bucket. If you put up a string of pens, make sure to make the pen W's with a space between each W... so you can get into the side corners to put does in. (though the rest of the time I just climb the panels... :P So the setup would be:

W W W W etc.

The BEST part of this setup is that once kidding season is over, they come down and store very easily, expanding your space available for the herd, which is important if you dam raise.

[Clovers_Clan]

IF I had a spacious barn dedicated to goats I would do the temporary cattle panel stalls as well. Not only is it much cheaper, it gives a lot more flexibility, easier to clean and disinfect. And the goats can see each other and interact more naturally. The feed room and milk parlor on the other hand should be solid and secure to keep out dust and critters. Built more like a kitchen. Plumbing might be a luxury but at the very least easy to scrub down.

[msscamp]

I guess I should have added that my kidding barn is a simple 3 sided shed, and my kidding pens are either plywood panels wired to steel posts, or hog panels wired to steel posts then draped with heavy sheets/comforters/wrapped in tarps to keep the wind out. Regular, non-combination cattle panels don't work well for kidding because the kids can go through the holes and that defeats the whole purpose of separating a dam and her kids to allow them to bond, plus it really stresses out Mom.