[NH546]

The goat pack book is ordered and in it's way. I've a couple of questions. Our goats are 7 month alpines. They were bottle fed by the girl who raised them. Does the bottle feeding bond them to the person or just people? Will they consider us their new herd? While hiking and encountering other people what keeps them from hiking off with the other people? Thanks all have a great Thanks Giving

 

[MoKa-Farms]

Bottle feeding tends to make goats more sociable towards people, not just necessarily to the person who bottle fed them. It also depends on how much time YOU spend with them. The more quality goat time (I know few people have time to!) you spend with them, the more they will accept you into their herd.
Hope that helped, Happy Thanksgiving!

 

[Bambi]

What MoKa farms said is spot on! The key to having a great working goat is the amount of time you spend with them. The more time spent the better a working goat becomes.

Happy Thanksgiving to you and your herd.

 

[Trickyroo]

I have noticed that when friends would come visit , most of my girls wouldn't go too close to them , and if I moved away , they would follow me instead of staying with her , even when she had cookies.
Maybe its just my silly girls , but they were bottle babies and are very attached to me , lolol. So , with all thats been said about the time you spend with them , i totally believe that is the key to get them to want to be with you and only you. Another thing you can do is just don't let anyone else feed them at all. You are their main person , their feeding , their loving time , their one and only Just my :2cents:

BTW , I would LOVE to see pictures of your goats

 

[ksalvagno]

You are going to have to spend lots of time with them. Initially you will need to keep them on leads until they understand to only follow you.

My goats are very friendly to me but not others. But they pretty much only see me. Very rare for people to come and see the goats. Not even my husband spends any time with them so they run away from him too.

 

[NH546]

I have 2 daughters 9/11 so we all take part in feeding. We do go for family walks almost everyday of the week and they stick right with us on the trails. We have not encountered other people yet. We feed grain at night and 2 of the 3 act like the grain is greener in the other dish and they end up butting the more timid one out. If I stand down there while they eat they behave very nicely but as soon as I turn my back. Honestly they are like having little puppies. We just have to make everybody more consistent on the behavior that is exceptable. Thanks again I'll post pics soon

 

[Trickyroo]

Aint that the truth ! They are worse then puppies , lolol. Believe me
I know , if I stand over them , all is peaceful , if I don't you may see goats a flying , lol. Nah , they aint that bad , but I do see the same ,
"she has more then I do" arguments :eye roll:

 

[saph]

I am beginning to think that bottle-feeding is a bit overrated, when it comes to bonding. I have seen pack goats that definitely weren't bottle-fed, and they would were extremely bonded to their owner. We just adopted a "rescue" goat, & I am pretty sure he wasn't bottle fed either. He is clinging to us like nobody's business! So, I agree with everyone else that says it's "quality time" spent with your goat, rather than bottle-feeding, that promotes bonding.

 

[Jessaba]

All my goats were dam raised and wild when we got them.

I spent several hours with them everyday for a month til they started coming up to me. Now I can't even walk without half of them following me.

It's all about how much time you spend with them.