This website is made possible by the members of the Mountain States Meat Goat Association
Mountain States
Meat Goat Association
Mountain States Meat Goat Association
No Goats, No Glory!
No Goats, No Glory!
Kidding Barn
MSMGA
Raising and Marketing your Goats
By: Fred Rothleutner
Five Lazy Heart Boer Goats
For those of you who don’t know, or, are not acquainted, with me; let me give you a small introduction of myself and how my very small scale Goat operation; Five Lazy Heart Boer Goats got started, and how I prefer to manage my operation in an effort to make it a profitable endeavor.
I have been raising Boer meat Goats for nearly 8 years, here in Douglas Wyoming; before, the goats, I, raised and showed, Registered Appaloosa Horses and Rambouillet Sheep; I was born and raised the youngest son, of Frank and Clara Rothleutner, on a ranch they Homesteaded on in 1912, located 65 miles North and East of Douglas. I worked on the ranch with my brothers and Dad until I was 16, then worked on a ranch near Harrison Nebraska, for a few years, before returning home, to help out with the work, while my Dad recovered from an illness; after that I worked in about every field of employment you can imagine; most everyone, that knew me at all, called me, a, “Jack of All Trades and a Master of None”. After that, I returned home, to manage the ranch for the last 5 years my folks were alive.
The family then sold the ranch and I started leasing places running horses and sheep and working any job that came along just to keep the wolves away from the door. So basically I have been associated with raising and showing livestock all my life and, have learned through many trials and errors, some of the things that need to be considered when trying to establish a viable Goat operation.
I got started in the goats when I broke my back in 2002 and after they bolted a metal plate in my back, to hold me together, they informed me that I could no longer do any of the kinds of work, I knew how to make a living at. So I’m setting around the house going insane with boredom, driving my wife mad, and just generally feeling sorry for myself; So, with my wife’s blessing, I decided to get a few goats to take care of, before, I went completely stark raving mad and drove her into a similar state of mind: So my introduction into the Boer meat goats was a necessity not only for me, but, for my marriage!
My intention and reasoning for writing this article came about quite simple. I have been getting a lot of inquiries the last few years to share what information I could on how I approach and handle my small Meat Goat business. I am usually, a bit humbled by these request, as I do not consider myself a good solid source of information on these subjects. However, most of the inquirers appear very thankful for my two cents worth. Then I read, with much interest, the recent post over the Goat Shipments coming out of the MSMGA, and, the other posts inquiring about various areas of concern from members of the group, and from folks just thinking about the possibility of starting a goat herd. I am a bit more confident in the businesses future, in and around Douglas, as I get more and more inquiries from potential newcomers in close proximity to the Douglas area. Goats appear to be a growing industry that is slowly taking over most of this country. So let’s kick this thing off and see where it leads us!
The most important information I can start you off with, is, to do your homework; You will be doing the right thing by researching, any and all, of the information that is out there, before you get started: this includes searching the internet, acquire as much information as you can possibly find from Universities and Veterinary labs that have done studies on Goats. Go to any and all Seminars that you can, listen to the speaker carefully and take notes for future references. Make arrangements to visit as many goat operations that you can, ask questions, look at and evaluate the stock, look at the facility’s, ask questions about how each of them feed, medicate, and care for their stock; You will find there are many, variances and differences, in style, stock, and operational practices, on each farm, that was made by their operators, and, how they have adjusted these operations to the climates and available supplies of goats, medications and feed sources in each of there locations. All this is good, even though at times, you will become a bit confused, but, you cannot ever get enough information, if you want to succeed in this business. This information will become very valuable, as you sort through all the information you gather, in order to pick and choose through them, as you make adjustments to operational and management decisions, and, find those that will work for you and for the type of operation you decide is right for you.
The livestock business, goats or otherwise, is always a bit of a gamble; you have many ups and downs that are dictated, if not dominated, by several different sources, weather, economy, feed, veterinary ETC.; Goat meat is an up and coming commodity that there isn't enough of in the United States, at this time, to meet present demands; however, these higher demand areas, are also very regional here in the States, being, more popular and abundant, the closer you are located to one of the Ethnic market outages for the product; these, higher demand areas, are most often found/located nearer to the larger metropolitan areas of our country, as that is where most of the Ethnic populations are located. These target populations used to be considered as being on the East and West coast and in the upper Middle East States; however, these target populations are now in about every major metropolitan area of this Country. The main problems with targeting these populations is the vast differences in the types of goats that are preferred to fit this market, size, age, sex, and weight are all very important to these groups of people; therefore it is nearly impossible to structure a program to target these markets only. Therefore I just raise goats that fall into the areas of breeding and kidding that best suits my other schedules and try to hit a market date that is as close as possible to an Ethnic Holiday; the last available sale prior to a Holiday is the one to hit. Sometimes my goats are right and sometimes they are not, but, if I hit one of these markets at the right time and my goats are expectable they usually draw a premium dollar that has been equivalent to some of my Seed Stock sales!
Wyoming, Montana, North and South Dakota, and some of Northern Nebraska, are still, a bit isolated, from any of the high demand market areas associated with raising goats, so the investment into the industry, in these areas, needs to be even more carefully evaluated as you step into your project. However, that does not mean that you cannot have a profitable Meat goat operation in these same areas! Right now, the better Markets in these areas would be, Centennial Livestock in fort Collins; there is also very good market in the Gothenburg sale barn in Nebraska: these markets in the last few years have delivered prices from 1.00 a pound to as high as 2.75 a pound depending on the quality of the goats and the closeness in proximity to an Ethnic Holiday. Someone once referred to Douglas Wyoming as, the Center or the Crossroad to nowhere, which is pretty well true; but, with a lot of effort and mistakes, over time, I have successfully carved out a niche for me and my goat operation right here in Douglas!
Several breeders have been working hard, trying to get a decent market started in the Northern Colorado, Idaho, Utah, Southwestern Montana, and the Northwestern Wyoming areas: This market is a direct truck load market that buys the goats off the scale at designated pick up sites and delivers these goats to California for direct slaughter or to feedlot: they occasionally have calls for the older cull does and Bucks also. This is a very good idea and marketing advantage tool, for many of the smaller type operations to utilize, because, it gives them a viable, dependable, outage for their stock. However, the downfall of this type of market is that it requires consistent, multiple, breeder cooperation, in order to get a synchronized truckload of goats together of the right age, size, and, quality, at a given time to fill the truck; it is not viable nor profitable to the breeder or the buyer to ship part loads of goats, that distance. So if these orders cannot adequately be filled, on a continual basis, when the supplier in California needs them, you are at risk of these buyers dropping their orders and taking their business, down South, where there are ample goat numbers and larger breeders to insure availability of goats to fill these loads. I have watched this endeavor very closely for several years now and have seen it go up and down in its effort to keep going. Synchronizing these loads, time wise, with breeders and loading locations, as I see it from my window, continues to be a major problem in keeping this endeavor going.
This would be a very good market, for all of us in most all of Wyoming, Montana, Nebraska, and North and South Dakota, to utilize, if we could ever get enough goats and cooperation in these areas to establish pick up points somewhere around here, and in Cheyenne, Scottsbluff, and/or in the Rapid City areas along with several other locations spread around several other towns: the pickup points presently established are just not cost effective to transport the goats that far from these more isolated areas. The costs of getting the goats to these present locations, due to the far distance, along with having to pay further transportation costs to get them delivered to the delivery points, very simply, would eat up any profits you would stand to make, in many cases even if you were to car pool. These pickup points must be within, no more than 100 miles from the farms location, or it just is not a viable market tool to profitably utilize. The cost of fuel, health inspections and other related charges alone would absorb any profits available from this type of marketing. If you could pool a very large trailer to some of the meeting points you could probably go a bit farther than 100 miles, but, not much more.
I personally use, Fort Collins, for the goats I raise that do not make the seed stock grade. Those that do make the seed stock grade I sell privately from here at home, but, this is also a bit restricted by the distances to the other breeders that are presently in the business. So when we market we either have to reduce the prices a little, which is what we prefer to do, to help in the transportation costs or deliver them part way ourselves. These are some of the things you need to have in mind and evaluate thoroughly, as you develop your plans to get started in the Meat Goat business.
A lot of, potential new breeders, read some of the books and articles that are put out, and, look at some of the prices advertised in the goat magazines, and get the, false impression, that they are going to, get rich quick, raising goats; Those folks, are usually, going to get a bit of an awakening, as they get started, and most of them will probably fail in their endeavor; realistically, If you manage to get anywhere from 10 to 15 % of your production into the higher end, Seed or Show Stock market, you are doing pretty darn good; So it is imperative that you base your, Marketing Financial Model, on the Meat Goat, and Commercial Markets first, as that is where the majority of your production will probably go.
The goat business, just as is any livestock endeavor, takes a lot of hard work, sacrifice, and planning to make it work; If you are just working on a meat only type operation and have access to some reasonable grazing to help keep the expenses down, you can do well by breeding at the right time of year to hit the higher markets; however, many of these high market areas are in the spring which means you have to kid in the late fall and into the winter; which then translated into more expenses with extra stress, extra feed and medications, better shelters and other types of protection for these young kids, just to keep them warm, alive and growing; if you breed for the fall markets you then fall into the area where much of the markets are overloaded with goats, for a period of time, therefore, the price usually reflects this with a lower ceiling. These lower prices will sometimes be offset with kidding in the better and warmer conditions, that tends to lower the death loss, lower the feed cost, less medicating, less labor intensive; the kids also usually, put on weight and grow faster, and are healthier, because, of the less stressful warmer temperatures and the better milking ability if the does, especially if they have access to fresh green pastures.
The goats that are living in more of a confinement type situation, where most or all of their feed comes either from hay or from manufactured feeds, would, in my opinion, be better served to work for a late fall or early winter kidding program, to reach for a marketable product in, late March, early April through mid-May, and even into the first of June, at the very latest, in order to take full advantage of the higher prices during these peak months of lower available marketable kid numbers. This statement is quantified, because, these types of operations are already, dealing with, and, have already incorporated into their operation models, the operational cost factors, that take into consideration the higher costs associated with, feed, medication, Shelter, labor, and several other more intensified operation costs associated with an enclosed herd operation. Most of these types of operations, in my opinion, especially the smaller type operations, could not exist on a profitable basis, without a certain percentage of their reproduction being sold as Seed Stock, either Commercial, or, into another Registered Seed Stock or Show type of operation; the cost of doing business in a confined type operation just cannot stay afloat and survive in a meat market only environment, and, show a clear profit!
I'm not trying to scare you off, but, these are real facts that you need to consider as you develop your plan and get started; there is a real and viable market for goat meat here in the States, but, as in any livestock business it is, a seasonal and an ethnical based market, that you need to work with and develop into your plans if you are going to survive.
Fred
By: Fred Rothleutner
Five Lazy Heart Boer Goats
For those of you who don’t know, or, are not acquainted, with me; let me give you a small introduction of myself and how my very small scale Goat operation; Five Lazy Heart Boer Goats got started, and how I prefer to manage my operation in an effort to make it a profitable endeavor.
I have been raising Boer meat Goats for nearly 8 years, here in Douglas Wyoming; before, the goats, I, raised and showed, Registered Appaloosa Horses and Rambouillet Sheep; I was born and raised the youngest son, of Frank and Clara Rothleutner, on a ranch they Homesteaded on in 1912, located 65 miles North and East of Douglas. I worked on the ranch with my brothers and Dad until I was 16, then worked on a ranch near Harrison Nebraska, for a few years, before returning home, to help out with the work, while my Dad recovered from an illness; after that I worked in about every field of employment you can imagine; most everyone, that knew me at all, called me, a, “Jack of All Trades and a Master of None”. After that, I returned home, to manage the ranch for the last 5 years my folks were alive.
The family then sold the ranch and I started leasing places running horses and sheep and working any job that came along just to keep the wolves away from the door. So basically I have been associated with raising and showing livestock all my life and, have learned through many trials and errors, some of the things that need to be considered when trying to establish a viable Goat operation.
I got started in the goats when I broke my back in 2002 and after they bolted a metal plate in my back, to hold me together, they informed me that I could no longer do any of the kinds of work, I knew how to make a living at. So I’m setting around the house going insane with boredom, driving my wife mad, and just generally feeling sorry for myself; So, with my wife’s blessing, I decided to get a few goats to take care of, before, I went completely stark raving mad and drove her into a similar state of mind: So my introduction into the Boer meat goats was a necessity not only for me, but, for my marriage!
My intention and reasoning for writing this article came about quite simple. I have been getting a lot of inquiries the last few years to share what information I could on how I approach and handle my small Meat Goat business. I am usually, a bit humbled by these request, as I do not consider myself a good solid source of information on these subjects. However, most of the inquirers appear very thankful for my two cents worth. Then I read, with much interest, the recent post over the Goat Shipments coming out of the MSMGA, and, the other posts inquiring about various areas of concern from members of the group, and from folks just thinking about the possibility of starting a goat herd. I am a bit more confident in the businesses future, in and around Douglas, as I get more and more inquiries from potential newcomers in close proximity to the Douglas area. Goats appear to be a growing industry that is slowly taking over most of this country. So let’s kick this thing off and see where it leads us!
The most important information I can start you off with, is, to do your homework; You will be doing the right thing by researching, any and all, of the information that is out there, before you get started: this includes searching the internet, acquire as much information as you can possibly find from Universities and Veterinary labs that have done studies on Goats. Go to any and all Seminars that you can, listen to the speaker carefully and take notes for future references. Make arrangements to visit as many goat operations that you can, ask questions, look at and evaluate the stock, look at the facility’s, ask questions about how each of them feed, medicate, and care for their stock; You will find there are many, variances and differences, in style, stock, and operational practices, on each farm, that was made by their operators, and, how they have adjusted these operations to the climates and available supplies of goats, medications and feed sources in each of there locations. All this is good, even though at times, you will become a bit confused, but, you cannot ever get enough information, if you want to succeed in this business. This information will become very valuable, as you sort through all the information you gather, in order to pick and choose through them, as you make adjustments to operational and management decisions, and, find those that will work for you and for the type of operation you decide is right for you.
The livestock business, goats or otherwise, is always a bit of a gamble; you have many ups and downs that are dictated, if not dominated, by several different sources, weather, economy, feed, veterinary ETC.; Goat meat is an up and coming commodity that there isn't enough of in the United States, at this time, to meet present demands; however, these higher demand areas, are also very regional here in the States, being, more popular and abundant, the closer you are located to one of the Ethnic market outages for the product; these, higher demand areas, are most often found/located nearer to the larger metropolitan areas of our country, as that is where most of the Ethnic populations are located. These target populations used to be considered as being on the East and West coast and in the upper Middle East States; however, these target populations are now in about every major metropolitan area of this Country. The main problems with targeting these populations is the vast differences in the types of goats that are preferred to fit this market, size, age, sex, and weight are all very important to these groups of people; therefore it is nearly impossible to structure a program to target these markets only. Therefore I just raise goats that fall into the areas of breeding and kidding that best suits my other schedules and try to hit a market date that is as close as possible to an Ethnic Holiday; the last available sale prior to a Holiday is the one to hit. Sometimes my goats are right and sometimes they are not, but, if I hit one of these markets at the right time and my goats are expectable they usually draw a premium dollar that has been equivalent to some of my Seed Stock sales!
Wyoming, Montana, North and South Dakota, and some of Northern Nebraska, are still, a bit isolated, from any of the high demand market areas associated with raising goats, so the investment into the industry, in these areas, needs to be even more carefully evaluated as you step into your project. However, that does not mean that you cannot have a profitable Meat goat operation in these same areas! Right now, the better Markets in these areas would be, Centennial Livestock in fort Collins; there is also very good market in the Gothenburg sale barn in Nebraska: these markets in the last few years have delivered prices from 1.00 a pound to as high as 2.75 a pound depending on the quality of the goats and the closeness in proximity to an Ethnic Holiday. Someone once referred to Douglas Wyoming as, the Center or the Crossroad to nowhere, which is pretty well true; but, with a lot of effort and mistakes, over time, I have successfully carved out a niche for me and my goat operation right here in Douglas!
Several breeders have been working hard, trying to get a decent market started in the Northern Colorado, Idaho, Utah, Southwestern Montana, and the Northwestern Wyoming areas: This market is a direct truck load market that buys the goats off the scale at designated pick up sites and delivers these goats to California for direct slaughter or to feedlot: they occasionally have calls for the older cull does and Bucks also. This is a very good idea and marketing advantage tool, for many of the smaller type operations to utilize, because, it gives them a viable, dependable, outage for their stock. However, the downfall of this type of market is that it requires consistent, multiple, breeder cooperation, in order to get a synchronized truckload of goats together of the right age, size, and, quality, at a given time to fill the truck; it is not viable nor profitable to the breeder or the buyer to ship part loads of goats, that distance. So if these orders cannot adequately be filled, on a continual basis, when the supplier in California needs them, you are at risk of these buyers dropping their orders and taking their business, down South, where there are ample goat numbers and larger breeders to insure availability of goats to fill these loads. I have watched this endeavor very closely for several years now and have seen it go up and down in its effort to keep going. Synchronizing these loads, time wise, with breeders and loading locations, as I see it from my window, continues to be a major problem in keeping this endeavor going.
This would be a very good market, for all of us in most all of Wyoming, Montana, Nebraska, and North and South Dakota, to utilize, if we could ever get enough goats and cooperation in these areas to establish pick up points somewhere around here, and in Cheyenne, Scottsbluff, and/or in the Rapid City areas along with several other locations spread around several other towns: the pickup points presently established are just not cost effective to transport the goats that far from these more isolated areas. The costs of getting the goats to these present locations, due to the far distance, along with having to pay further transportation costs to get them delivered to the delivery points, very simply, would eat up any profits you would stand to make, in many cases even if you were to car pool. These pickup points must be within, no more than 100 miles from the farms location, or it just is not a viable market tool to profitably utilize. The cost of fuel, health inspections and other related charges alone would absorb any profits available from this type of marketing. If you could pool a very large trailer to some of the meeting points you could probably go a bit farther than 100 miles, but, not much more.
I personally use, Fort Collins, for the goats I raise that do not make the seed stock grade. Those that do make the seed stock grade I sell privately from here at home, but, this is also a bit restricted by the distances to the other breeders that are presently in the business. So when we market we either have to reduce the prices a little, which is what we prefer to do, to help in the transportation costs or deliver them part way ourselves. These are some of the things you need to have in mind and evaluate thoroughly, as you develop your plans to get started in the Meat Goat business.
A lot of, potential new breeders, read some of the books and articles that are put out, and, look at some of the prices advertised in the goat magazines, and get the, false impression, that they are going to, get rich quick, raising goats; Those folks, are usually, going to get a bit of an awakening, as they get started, and most of them will probably fail in their endeavor; realistically, If you manage to get anywhere from 10 to 15 % of your production into the higher end, Seed or Show Stock market, you are doing pretty darn good; So it is imperative that you base your, Marketing Financial Model, on the Meat Goat, and Commercial Markets first, as that is where the majority of your production will probably go.
The goat business, just as is any livestock endeavor, takes a lot of hard work, sacrifice, and planning to make it work; If you are just working on a meat only type operation and have access to some reasonable grazing to help keep the expenses down, you can do well by breeding at the right time of year to hit the higher markets; however, many of these high market areas are in the spring which means you have to kid in the late fall and into the winter; which then translated into more expenses with extra stress, extra feed and medications, better shelters and other types of protection for these young kids, just to keep them warm, alive and growing; if you breed for the fall markets you then fall into the area where much of the markets are overloaded with goats, for a period of time, therefore, the price usually reflects this with a lower ceiling. These lower prices will sometimes be offset with kidding in the better and warmer conditions, that tends to lower the death loss, lower the feed cost, less medicating, less labor intensive; the kids also usually, put on weight and grow faster, and are healthier, because, of the less stressful warmer temperatures and the better milking ability if the does, especially if they have access to fresh green pastures.
The goats that are living in more of a confinement type situation, where most or all of their feed comes either from hay or from manufactured feeds, would, in my opinion, be better served to work for a late fall or early winter kidding program, to reach for a marketable product in, late March, early April through mid-May, and even into the first of June, at the very latest, in order to take full advantage of the higher prices during these peak months of lower available marketable kid numbers. This statement is quantified, because, these types of operations are already, dealing with, and, have already incorporated into their operation models, the operational cost factors, that take into consideration the higher costs associated with, feed, medication, Shelter, labor, and several other more intensified operation costs associated with an enclosed herd operation. Most of these types of operations, in my opinion, especially the smaller type operations, could not exist on a profitable basis, without a certain percentage of their reproduction being sold as Seed Stock, either Commercial, or, into another Registered Seed Stock or Show type of operation; the cost of doing business in a confined type operation just cannot stay afloat and survive in a meat market only environment, and, show a clear profit!
I'm not trying to scare you off, but, these are real facts that you need to consider as you develop your plan and get started; there is a real and viable market for goat meat here in the States, but, as in any livestock business it is, a seasonal and an ethnical based market, that you need to work with and develop into your plans if you are going to survive.
Fred