95 | A Simple Self-Sufficiency Strategy: Build Food Storage Based on What Your Family Actually Uses

Today we're talking about how goats eat what they eat. We'll cover the anatomy of their mouth, how they select forage, what they do to a pasture that cattle and sheep simply can't replicate, and what all of that means for weed control, irrigation ditch banks, and vegetation management on a working ranch. The biology and the practical application are the same story. Let's get to it.

Last week we talked about how goats see the world. Today we're talking about what that means when you have goats on a cattle ranch. The behavior realities, what you can actually control, what to cull for, and how to set yourself up to succeed instead of selling them in frustration. Let's get to it.

Today we're talking about how goats actually see the world. Horizontal pupils, panoramic field of view, a reflective layer in the eye that makes them glow at night, and color vision that runs closer to red-green colorblind than to anything like ours. We'll also get into what all of it explains about behavior in the pasture and in the working facility, including a few things that used to look like stubbornness and now just look like physics. Let's get to it.

Today we're talking about electric netting in winter. Why we use it, which fence types we use and why, the setup details that actually matter when the ground is frozen, and whether virtual fence is going to replace it. The short answer on that last one: not entirely, and I'll explain why. Let's get to it.

Today I'm giving you the 2026 commercial meat goat kidding report. We'll go through the numbers, how they're calculated, how they compare to previous years and to industry benchmarks, what the death loss stories are, and what eight years of culling toward a self-sufficient, low-input herd looks like when it all comes together in one season. I’ve been sitting on these numbers for a little while because I’m still amazed at where the numbers settled. Let's get to it.