Years ago I started with three Golden Guernseys and built up a small herd of milkers. The milk was used to produce cheeses just for our own use as the commercial market in that area of Scotland was non-existant.

I decided I wanted to continue with goats, but not dairy breeds and discovered a photograph of an older Boer buck and thought “I want one of those !”.

With the move to Wales we started to seriously think about the production of goat meat and purchased a Boer buckling to produce some crosses for carcass improvement. This worked well and after feeding various friends and visitors with the meat I decided to get  pure bred animals with even better carcass qualities.

The Boer goat is still quite difficult to find in this country especially females ready for breeding.

Eventually we imported pure bred Boers from Germany and started the herd of Cwmduad Boers with the view to increase the herd size to what ever we can comfortably and healthily keep on our land.

In the meantime we turned into Boeraholics and the herd is growing steadily with pure bread Boers and Boer based crosses.

I don’t want to get into the detailed history of this South African goat but it should be pointed out that they have a very calm, lovely temperament and appreciate contact with their keeper. Some of mine are quite soppy and regularly come for cuddles or a good scratch. They are hardy as well and with shelter can be kept outside for a great deal of the year.

As soon as the kids are over four weeks old the whole herd goes out in the woods browsing for the day. At the moment we get them in at night because the fencing has to be improved between our neighbour and us - goats are great explorers !

  We keep horned goats which a lot of people don’t like because of the  imagined danger involved. Personally after handling horned livestock for years we don’t regard them as more dangerous; the animal is aware of their horns and so are we. If a goat takes a run and hits your butt it hurts with or without horns.

But if handled with respect, the goat shows respect as well. Disbudding males usually ends up with bits of horn still growing which is painful while handling, ugly and a possible cause of infection or fly strike if these bits are knocked off. So we leave them as they are and we all are happy including the small children who visit once in a while  and happily mingle with the spiky little kids.

If you are interested in the meat please have a look at our Product page (not suitable for vegetarians). If you are interested in the Boers have a look at the gallery, and if we can help in any way please get in touch.

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Last update: 10-04-2008 © Goats ‘n’ Roses