How much is too much

[mattie2011]

I have two goats right now and a 1 acre pasture. Everytime I let them off their lead (50 ft lead) they escape from the pasture. Do I need more goats in order for them to be comfortable or do I go back and refence the entire pasture?

 

[Chickerdoodle13]

Goats are great at escaping enclosures. More goats will just mean you will have to catch more escaped goats. I would definitely go back and fix your fencing so that they cannot escape.

 

[waddles99]

The number of goats isn't the problem, the problem is the fencing. As mentioned above goats are escape artists, and will get out if given any weakness in the fence. I have found the best fencing is RedBrand 4x4 goat field fencing. Attach it strongly to wood posts or a post and rail fence and string a strand of electric wire on the top. Make sure that the bottom doesn't have any gaps to squeeze out, nor does the gate have any space under the bottom. Remember goats can fit in spaces that look much too small for them.

 

[mattie2011]

Thank you both for the great advice. I will try replacing the fence becuase the post are still solid. What do you think about barb wire at the top instead of an electric line?

 

[MeepBeep]

Some goats just like to escape and they will need to be confined with better fencing, more goats won't change their habbits...

Others could care less about escaping, I was all worried about my goats getting out after reading about their escape antics in general and worried about several areas of my fence that are less that perfect, but my goats have never shown any inclination towards escape... Even if I leave a gate open during pasture maintenance they won't venture beyond maybe 50 feet of the gate opening, and will return to the pasture when I direct them to...

If you have goats that like to escape you will need to invest in knotted or tied goat fence or horse no climb fencing, avoid cheap welded garden fence as they can bust the welds and push out if inclined...

 

[Chickerdoodle13]

Thank you both for the great advice. I will try replacing the fence becuase the post are still solid. What do you think about barb wire at the top instead of an electric line?

I would stay far away from barbed wire. That is always a disaster waiting to happen with farm animals! If you fence the property well enough with field fencing (make sure it is tall enough that they cannot get out) you shouldn't even need electric wire. It is a nice addition, but we never needed to use it with solid field fencing.

 

[mattie2011]

Meep beep and chickerdoodle13 thank you both for the advice. I cannot currently afford to refence the whole acre so I am going to refence a quarter acre for the two goats and hold off on getting anymore until I can refence the rest. I am hoping a 5' fence will dojust fine.possibly even go into thr woods and grab some rock to put around the base on the outside.

 

[oldhenlikesdogs]

Mine will only stay in if there is electric fence in some form involved, any woven wire will be climbed over and trashed without electric, I run a strand half way up, if you have real trouble makers than two wires, once they are shocked they will respect it, but the do know if it's not plugged in.

 

[donrae]

When we couldn't afford to re-fence the entire pasture, we instead bought portable horse/cattle panels. They're 41/2 or 5 feet tall and I think 16 feet long. We bought 4 of them and tied the corners together with baling twine. Zip ties would work also, but baling twine was abundant

. 16x16 was plenty of room for our 2 or 3 goats with moving them every few days, depending on how the browse was in the current area. We were using them to clear blackberries from our pasture so were happy to concentrate their efforts in a specific place for a few days. The fence was high enough, and the space small enough, they apparently couldn't get enough room to get over the fence. Or maybe they were just content goats, who knows?