Goats Help Property Owners Clear Land of Unwanted Brush

Property owners are finding a new creative way to clear their land of unwanted vegetation: Goats.

The animals are hungry and they work cheaply.

"Who doesn't want some goats to wake up to every once in a while?" Greg Kalldin said.

Kalldin has a herd of them and recently started a company to rent them out called Goats on the Go Weatherford.

A few days ago he unleashed 15 goats on this land just outside town. A property owner nearby worried about potential fire danger and wanted to clean things up. He hired Kalldin and his goats, who are fenced in to keep from running wild.

"They're light on their feet, they're agile, and they don't really hurt the soil very much,” Kalldin said. “They also leave fertilizer behind."

The biggest attraction is that goats like to eat just about anything. So much so, that they have four chambers in their stomachs.

"Goats are designed to eat weeds,” Kalldin said. “They will eat grass but it's a small portion of their diet. They love the thistle and broomweed and ragweed."

They even eat poison ivy, which doesn't affect them.

Experts said a single goat can clear about a quarter-acre of land in a day. They work year-round on any terrain and even enjoy climbing steep hills.

"People are just curious about it because it's a different way of cleaning their land that they haven't thought about,” Kalldin said.

The goats will be on the Weatherford land for about three weeks until their job is done and they're ready for their next assignment.