Start-up costs for dairy goats??

[yourbadd]

I am (by this I mean my hubby) is very handy and then barn and fencing is the least of my concerns, from the finance standpoint. I have been watching local breeders and craigslist and know that we want 2 does from a good milking line but they don't need to be registered or anything. Just clean!!


Thanks everyone for sharing how you manage your goats, it has definitely helped me see that I don't have to go crazy buying everything the books suggest!! I feel compelled to have all my essentials in order before getting any animals and now know I can relax...it's not going to break the bank!!


If anyone knows of a source of clean, not too expensive milking does in central Ohio, please let me know!!!

 

[lwheelr]

You'll also need disbudding equipment before the kids are born if you plan to disbud. And you'll want castration equipment if you intend to do that.

Our goats are out in two pens - not real big ones. We used existing fence, and build out from that to save. We used a large doghouse for the one goat that has to be isolated, and we have a 4X4 ft shed for the other two - it is big enough for two goats plus the two kids now. They'll outgrow it by spring, but we hope to be out of here by then. This is in Wyoming - frigid winds, sub-zero temps, fine blowing snow that blasts your skin off. They do ok. I wasn't sure they would. We did make sweaters for the kids, which they used 24-7 for the first week (we kept them entirely in the barn for 4 days), then only at night (still in the barn) for the next week, then we took them off. Don't know how long we'll keep them in at night.

We milk them in the garage (hey, it is what we have).

Currently we have three goats milking. One is barely producing anything, we're only keeping on with her because I need the milk so badly until Bonnie is no longer nursing her kids. Another gives a little more, but Bonnie gives the most, even though she's got two kids on her. She eats a LOT though - about three scoops of mixed feed morning and night (when she is milked), plus veggie scraps and oats in the middle of the day. Her feed consumption is higher than the average milker though, because she is half Boer. Very easy good milker though.

If you have good forage, the feed requirements can be lower. If you don't, you have to provide it all.

We got two goats that were already milking, and one that was already bred. We bred the other two this fall, toward the end of the breeding season.

In our experience, when they are milking well, they more than pay for themselves, IF you compare the price of the milk with something of the same quality. If you compare with plain old 2% cows milk, they won't. For us, it was a no brainer, because I have to have organic milk.

 

[ohiofarmgirl]

hey! how did i miss you were in central ohio!?!?!?

have you seen ksalvagno's thread on ButtnHeads herd over on the herds site? if you want good mini's it might be your lucky day

keep your eyes peeled on CL and then do a search for breeders in your area. i got Debbie - the best milker of my lot - from a breeder i randomly sent an email to asking a question. later i asked if she had a doe in milk for sale and we scored - for $200 Deb has more than paid for herself. Deb was not advertised and was the black sheep (ha ha) of her former herd. that breeders 'problem' became my blessing.

as with everyone else, start up costs depend on where you are and whatcha got. housing will be a big expense unless you have somewhere to put them. fencing is next.

i highly recommend a milking stand - we built one with materials on hand and a $2 carriage bolt and its invaluable. you can get the plans from the fiascofarm site. we built it in an afternoon.

here's i pic of Vita on the milkstand:
http://adventuresinthegoodland.blogspot.com/2010/02/how-not-to-milk-goat.html

my other big expense is the bucket. it grinds on my that lehmans has a great bucket for $85!!! for heavens sakes. so we got a cheap one but this year i'll splurge. you'll use that bucket every darn day, twice a day so its worth it.

get the big strainer so you dont have to stand and wait for the milk to do down. i think i got it a Hoegger - they are great for all things goat.

i strain into WIDE MOUTH quart jars (easier to clean) and then put in the freezer to chill.

the other thing you'll need is the biggest stainless steel stock pot you can find - for cheese making. you'll never regret it but they are either hard to find or expensive. next week i'm going to the Wasserstrom Restaurant supply place to get a bigger one. really - just take the plunge and you'll be eating goat cheese all summer. whooot!

around here the bagged feed is about $8/bag. during the summer/milking season we go thru 2 bags in 10ish days with 3 goats (small, medium, and large sized). good alfalfa hay costs between$3.50 - $4.50 a bale. when they can graze (and when i cut weeds for them) we use about a bale a week. at least that in the winter when they cant graze (but i only have 2 goats in the winter).

and... another cost is breeding. either you'll need a buckling to 'take care of business' in the fall or you'll need to take your ladies to be bred. around here its $50 - $75 (and up) for buck services. sometimes you have to pay boarding if your lady needs to stay over for a while.

last, dont overlook feeders, buckets, latches and all that jazz.. you can see pix of what we use here (scroll down) this also talks about how our goats have already paid for themselves:

http://adventuresinthegoodland.blogspot.com/2010/02/goat-paloozamore-on-goats-for-homestead.html

good luck!

 

[lorihadams]

Okay, I'll chime in cause we are just getting started as well. We already have a hay source at $3 per square bale and he will store it for us and sell it as we need it. We are finishing out the lean-tos on our shed (where I will milk when we get the garage built). One is for hay storage and the other will be split into two 10'x10' stalls. I plan on splitting them with a cattle panel in the middle so if I need to I can open it up into one big room. We are fencing in about 1/2 acre for 3 nigerian dwarfs (2 are preggers and due in April). We got our goats for $700 for the 3 females, 2 already confirmed pregnant by ultrasound. So I figure I'm getting at least 5 registered nigis for $700. I'll probably keep the original 3 and sell the babies at 2 months old cause I plan on letting the does nurse the babies.

I am still gathering supplies. I have 2 cases of wide mouth canning jars ready, feeders, water pails (several shallow rubber ones so no one drowns) and I have my eye on a couple stainless steel buckets at TSC.

I have to get some meds to have on hand but I am consulting my breeder for a list of what she uses.

Our biggest expense is going to be building everything from scratch. It will cost us a bit to get electricity to the "barn" too...I want to have lights in the barn and an outlet in case I need to put in a heat lamp. We are doing no climb 2x4 horse fencing for the pasture cause I need to keep the neighbors dogs out of the fence and they are oblivious to electric.

I'm also getting hubby to build me a milking stand.

We have access to a lot of wooded property so we can cut lots of branches and bring them to the goats. We also have access to some free hay through our uncle in a pinch.

If I were to tally it up I think I would probably have a coronary....

 

[Javamama]

I totally missed that you are in central OH too! Whereabout, if you don't mind being specific? I don't know of any full size breeders personally but I know they are around. My mini-manchas will put out plenty for my family - around a half gallon a day each according to my breeder. She was milking them before.
I think I remember someone telling me about a guy who raises lamanchas for family milking up north of Marysville - I can check on that.

Since kidding season is gearing up, you might have an easy time finding goats in milk. I noticed last year when I was looking that they were plentiful from early spring to early summer.

 

[yourbadd]

Javamama- I'm in Morrow county, little burg of Cardington.


I will start looking for a good deal on a stainless steel bucket and stockpot!
ksalgavno already shared with me about a doe due to kid in March so hopefully, if all goes well and there are any does, I'll have my goats soon!!

 

[Our7Wonders]

I just got started too, so here's what I've got going so far:

We built a 3.5 sided goat shed built sorta skid style. It has a dirt floor with a foundation of treated posts - nothing concreted or dug in, we wanted to be able to move it if we should ever want to. Walls are framed with 2x4s and we used T1-11 siding to sheet it all. The roof is sheeted and then we used metal roofing we got for free from Freecycle. So all that to say we had to buy about 30 2x4s and 6 or 7 sheets of siding. I could have made it for less but wanted to keep it from being an eye sore since it's very visible from our front porch as well as to a couple neighbors. Price will vary in a huge way depending on lumbar costs for you but we built it for about $200. We got half our fencing for $75.00 on craigslist (chainlink) and bought t-posts and horse fencing for another $250ish.

My 2 nubian goats were $350 each, bred. I bought them from an organic dairy farm that was down sizing. However, my husband and I both did trade work for the purchase price. I brooded chicks to laying age and my husband did some construction work for her.

Hubby made my milking stand from the same plans that Ohiofarmgirl used and it works well. I think he spent less than $50 for the lumber and hardware for it. Saved LOTS of $$$ there - the price of milk stands is crazy! I bought a 4qt ss milk pail from my local feed store for $10 and a mini strainer from Hoegger goat supply for around $15ish. It fits my canning jars that I use to store my milk. I do have to buy fiters to fit - the box of filters was about $7 and it has 300 filters in it. Twice a day milking means I'll go through 2 boxes annually.

Alfalfa/grass mix hay was $120/ton. We bought and stored 2 tons - so $240. We have a 20ft delivery truck so we were able to haul it ourselves.

My girls are dry so I'm not using grain currently, but when I do I get 45 pounds organic oats for about $11.00 and 45 pounds organic barley for about $12.00. Not sure how long a bag will last yet since my girls are dry. I've spent about another $50.00 on other feed supplements to get started.

I recently paid another $175 on some meds, kidding supplies and some other necessities (hoof trimmers and such) but much of this will likely last me a very long time. My does were raised *naturally* and I hope to continue, so I have not purchased vaccines but did get some antibiotics to keep on hand just in case. Some of what I bought I hope I'll never use but I figured it was best to have it and not need it then need it and not have it. If I had a bigger feed supply store around me I may not have needed to buy some of it, but we're limited and I didn't want to be caught with an emergency and not have access to what I need.

I bought a bucket for watering - about $15 bucks for a 4 gallon flat back rubber bucket that's weather proof. I spent $5 on a 2 compartment mineral feeder and another $8 on the feeder that attaches to my milk stand. My hay feeder is modeled after a version that Freemotion made and posted on backyardherds (Thanks Freemotion!) and aside from a couple hinges and ball-bungee cords, it was made with material we already had lying around.

Ok, so there it is. Now that it's all listed I should go back and tally it up, though I'm not really sure I want to know.

FWIW, for our family size, when we're NOT buying organic milk, we spend about $50 per month on milk. Double that cost when we have room in our budget because we prefer to use organic milk. That's JUST milk, and we don't "drink" our milk anymore, can't afford to. That's just what we use on our breakfast grains, for baking, and for coffee. We'd go through twice that if we all were drinking it - which hopefully we will be come milking time. And this doesn't include other dairy products that we use (yogurt, cheese, sour cream, cream cheese, ice cream, cottage cheese). That's another EASY $100 per month. So what I'm getting at is my goats should easily pay for themselves in milk. I have a few friends that are interested in buying milk if I should ever have extra (strictly for pet use, of course because you can't sell raw milk to drink in WA). It may take a little bit to pay for the shed and the fencing, but not long if we don't have to buy anymore dairy products - except butter.

I know there will be surprise expenses along the way (vets, etc), but to have good quality, healthy, clean, raw milk - PRICELESS!!!!

 

[nmred]

OK, I'll jump in here and add my 2 cents worth We just got our two goats last Feb. so have had them almost a year. Actually, they were given-FREE!!! along with a supply of hay and grain, a hoof trimmer and other miscellaneous stuff-to us the previous fall, but a friend offered to keep/breed them for us while we got ready to bring them home (what a blessing--also for free--he wouldn't even let us pay for the feed!)

We already had an empty hoop house that we had used for chickens so we just had to set it up for the goats (separate the back for hay/food storage and the milking stand, make a hay manger and a water bucket holder, run an extension cord for lights). The biggest cost was fencing in a yard for them so they could go outside. We had to spend $200.00 for that. I should add here that all the wood for the manger, milking stand, waterer, etc was scrounged stuff that we had laying around. If you had to buy it, it would have been a lot more.

After we got the goat house and fencing ready, we had to wait another 3 weeks to get the goats because of weather (we got DUMPED on and had to wait for the snow to melt a bit. Even then we had to shovel out the yard.)

After we got them home we got by for several months just the way things were, but, before the babies came we bought a disbudding iron $70, birthing supplies $120 (we ordered a kid survival kit and a kidding kit from Caprine Supply and never really needed/used any of it. Fias Co Farms kit is much better), a crimper for wethering the boys $40, herbal wormer from Molly's Herbals $28, two hand milking machines (just to see which we liked better ) $200, and, a complete waste of money as we can't seem to get it to work, a cream separator $400. I really wanted to make our own butter!

Once the hay and grain ran out a few months later, we purchased some good alfalfa hay (we were milking by then) and more grains. I would love it if our hay was only $3.50-$4.50! We have to pay anywhere from $8.50 to $15.00 depending on the time of year. Wish I had enough storage to buy it in the summer and store a whole years worth. Our grain is called Goat and Dairy by Onate Feed (a "sort of" local company) and runs $13.00 for 50 lbs. It's the cheapest, and best, we can buy around here. A bale of hay lasts about 12 days for the two does, and a bag of the grain lasted about 3 weeks when we were milking. One of our girls is dried up now as she is due in 7-8 weeks, and the other has really dropped production since we bred her, so our grain now lasts about 5-6 weeks since we aren't feeding nearly as much.

I don't have any meds and have never needed them. I did purchase Vitamen E tablets from Walmart to give them for 2 months before they kidded as per Fias Co Farms website, and am doing the same this year ($4 a bottle). I am also giving them Selenium tablets this year, just to see if that makes a difference. They get one tablet a week with their wormer. It is also $4.00 a bottle.

After using the hand milkers for quite a while, I now prefer to do it completely by hand, the old-fashioned way. I milk into a plastic ice-cream bucket with a lid--no cost as we bought it for the ice cream. I use a drop or two of Basic H in about a quart of warm water and Bounty paper towels to wash their udders. I don't use a teat dip afterward and have never had any problems. I also use a Bounty towel to strain the milk. I then use the container of Basic H water to wash everything down afterwards and have never had any milk scale or any other problems. Everything is very clean. I store the milk in quart to gallon sized jars that I either already had or have scrounged from different places. I did have to purchase 1/2 gallon jars for customers who wanted that size. They were $12 for a case of six.

As everyone else has said, your actual costs are going to depend on what you already have and what all you want to get. My advice is to do your research, then add about half again as much as you think. Then you might be in the ballpark.

Have fun. Goats are the best!