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["Marie McHarry" <mmcharry AT gmail.com>]

On 10/20/06, Clansgian AT wmconnect.com <Clansgian AT wmconnect.com> wrote:
> > I'll take any other goat advise you have also, cause I'm just getting
> > started with goats. I love these animals!
> >
>
> Rob,
>
> This is the flip side advice on goats, you might as well have all sides, eh?
>
> People who are "in to" something detail it to death, splitting infinitely
> smaller hairs over things that don't make the slightest bit of difference.  As
> you Google advice on goats, or get it from us old goat people, keep this in
> mind.  Goatiana details are entertaining to goat people, what fun would it be 
> to
> say, "Oh, it doesn't matter all that much what you feed them."  Yawn.

I have a strong feeling that I'm being mocked, James or Denise (you
didn't sign the e-mail). I do know something about goats, having had a
dairy for some years.

The bottom line is that it costs no more to feed a good producer than
it does a pint-a-day one and that CAE will reduce milk production to
zip. Right now, I'm not commercial and my goats do well on pasture
with some hay in the winter when the pasture is deep in snow or frozen
under ice.

It doesn't cost much to breed any female goat to any male goat, but
the difference in milk produced by the offspring can be spectacular.
There are lots of good goats around, and they don't cost much -- if
any -- more than the culls that are barely worth milking.

It matters to some extent what dairy animals eat (which you'd know if
you ever drank the milk of cow that got into hedge apples or young
rye) though goats, left to their own devices, are browsers and are
very good at cleaning up a woodlot. Commercial dairy goats are
generally heavily grained, but they don't have to be to produce decent
amounts of milk if they have access to good pasture and hay.

The people at the Clansgian address can get ugly, and I for one, don't
much appreciate it.

Marie