Are you tired of carrying a 40 pound back pack? Why don't you let a good friend do it for you? An adult pack goat that is in good shape can carry a 40 to 50 pound load. Not only will they carry your load, but they will enjoy doing it for you. This leaves you free to take photos and stop and look around at your surroundings with a willing and pleasant companion. They take just moments to load and are even quicker to unload. You do not need, in most instances, to bring extra food for your goats though it would be nice to bring a small bag of grain for an occasional treat for a job well done.
There are six breeds of Dairy Goats that are registered with the American Dairy Goat Association. A pack goat can be any breed or cross-breed of goat. All the breeds have different personalities and different physical characteristics. If you are interested you should check out as many breeds as possible before making your purchase. A good pack goat needs to have long, good, strong legs. Personality is a major component of a good pack goat. Most pack goats are wethers (neutered males) because they tend to get larger than the females and do not have the odor and behavior problems of bucks. You want to get your kid from a breeder that practices Caprine Viral Arthritis/Encephalitis (CAE) prevention. This prevention involves taking the kids from the doe as soon as they are born. The virus is passed through the doe's milk so all milk going into the kids needs to be pasteurized, from a negative doe or a powdered milk replacer can be used. This is an important aspect of getting a good pack goat. You do not want to spend several years training and becoming attached to a goat just to find out it has viral arthritis and won't be able to pack. You want a willing, trusting, pleasant animal to be your companion. A good pack goat gets lots of early training.
A pack goat should be raised on a bottle so that it bonds strongly to humans and learns to trust humans as they would trust their mommas. We have found that by taking them all sorts of places as little kids that they get lots of exposure and are not as timid as adults. Goats are naturally frightened of crossing water because they can not determine the water depth. You should teach your baby goats to go in water before they are 3 months old. We start with giving them their bottle in a shallow, slow moving portion of a river or small creek. You need to be cautious in this training because you do not want scare the baby. You will work on up from there until the goat is making small stream crossings all on his own. As a baby, you can introduce a soft pack (dog pack) and let him get used to carrying it while you gradually add small amounts of weight. As they get bigger (8-12 months) you can add the real pack saddle, which they take to very easily.
Goats need to have a good shelter with ventilation. It needs to stay dry and draft-free in the winter and cool in the summer. Goats love to browse on a variety of vegetation, just like a deer. Your pack goats can live on a pasture in the spring, summer, and fall if it has a wide variety of forage with some good quality pasture grasses. In the winter you will need to feed hay along with warm water. An adult wether should not receive grain or high quality alfalfa on a routine basis. These will cause urinary tract difficulties which are life-threatening. An adult wether should receive a grass/alfalfa hay mix in the winter, as a major portion of their diet and grain only as a treat. In the summer, browse/pasture is best but if it is not available the grass/alfalfa hay mix should be continued. The most important portion of urinary tract health is good, clean, cool water in the summer and warm water in the winter. We scrub our water tanks once to twice a day and haul hot water from the house in the winter 2 to 3 times a day. The goats must also have access to a good salt and mineral mix either as granules or block. Fencing can be a major concern in keeping goats. A goat can jump or climb many fences so you need to make sure they want to stay home. This means you probably need to have atleast 2 goats because they are herd animals. Without 2 goats your single goat may try to break out to find a companion. If your goats have company, forage, and are content, you won't have much to worry about. We have electric fence for our goats. Each one has to be trained on the fence and it has been effective for us. If you use box wire, it needs to be tough and stretched tight because they love to scratch themselves along the fence. If you have chain link you may want to run an electric wire to protect it from the goats.
Goats need to have their feet trimmed on a regular basis if they do not get enough exercise on rocky ground. Any goat person or your veterinarian would probably happy to show you how to do this chore. They also need to be dewormed several times a year . You can take a stool sample to your veterinarian to determine the best worming schedule for your goats. They also need to be started on a vaccination program and check-ups. Also, different states require different paper work to bring our animals into their state. You need to check into this prior to your trip so you don't get stopped without the proper papers. Your veterinarian can tell you what needs to be done for different states. In some cases, blood work is required so give yourself plenty of time to get the work finished.
If you are still interested you need to get the book by John Mionczynski called The Pack Goat published by Pruett Publishing. This will give all the information you need to know prior to making your purchase.
