[Shawn]

We have two pregnant boer goats who have started eating the bark of a tree, just wondered if this is due to a lack of any specific minerals? Anyone got any ideas?

[wytsend]

Yes you are right !!   Give me a call this evening if possible and I will explain it to you.  I also have the very thing to correct the problem.

My number is 01647 231456

[katie]

I thought that's what goats do naturally? Mine love barking trees yet have minerals/vitamins coming out of their ears!

[plumseverywhere]

I thought that's what goats do naturally? Mine love barking trees yet have minerals/vitamins coming out of their ears!

ditto mine! In fact one came to me from the breeder (and she was obviously in tip top condition coming from that lady) and promptly set to work on all the trees and saplings in her new paddock 

[Hopewell]

As far as I was aware goats are primarily browsers and not primarily grazers, so they will eat leaves and at this time of the year bark as well. Our goats including the Boers all eat bark especially fruit trees if they get the chance and I am certain they aren't deficient in minerals.
The fact that goats are browsers rather than grazers also explains why they are more susceptible to worms than sheep or cattle. Cattle develop resistance to gut worms, which is why most adult cattle aren't wormed, and sheep also develop some resistance (some are better than others). There is obviously evolutionary pressure to develop resistance if you are a grazer, but no need to develop resistance if you evolved primarily as a browser.

[Anke]

And if they have finished all the branches they just start on the shed.... but I think that is more because of boredom....

Really, goats will eat fresh branches and de-bark larger ones - at some of the shows goatkeepers bring some seriously large branches/small tree trunks for their goats to "peel" the bark off - it increases the butterfats.

[cuckoo]

My goats - boers and boer crosses all eat bark given the opportunity - they had great fun this summer stripping all the bark off the small copse of elms in one of their fields - no problem as they had dutch elm disease and farmer wanted them gone.  Goats will be dissappointed next year as these trees have now been felled for firewood.

[Penninehillbilly]

Last year I cut some old willow and ash trees down and left them in the field, to be nicely trimmed and debarked by the goats.
What sort of trees were they? some should be avoided.

[Lesley Silvester]

I bring fallen branches home for my girls to strip the bark.  they love it.

[chickenfeed]

nothing wrong with your goats at all, as others have said its quiet the norm for goats to strip bark.

my parents have been breeding goats for well over 40 years now and they always pack a supply of branches when leaving for the shows.

[lachlanandmarcus]

I would be more worried about the goats if they werent eating tree bark -its normal goat natural behaviour. But you do need to check what trees they have access to (re: poisonous ones). If the trees are important they would have to be fenced off from the goats.

[jaykay]

Mine love bark too and then chicken houses if their 'mum' doesn't cut them enough branches