Anyone with Goats?

Unnuetered male goats are usually just plain nasty. Goats can be great, and are good for milk, and for meat.
Does I've never really had issue with, but males.... ewww. They pee on their own face. Wethers would be much better.

My fiance likes the Nubians. I have heard they are hard to fence and I've been looking up many different ways to keep them in. I am used to escapees. We used to have a pony that would get on on a regular basis when we lived out in the country. From what I've seen, woven fencing works best. As far as horns, it has been recommended by many people I've been talking to, to de-horn them. It looks brutal, and I'm not sure if thats something I would do.

Boers are really sweet natured too and don't get too big(ok.. the males do). You could easily buy some wethers from an FFA participant and get some quality, healthy animals.

We like the Nigerians since they only get about 2ft high at the shoulders. Anyone have experience with these? We'd like to keep them as pets in a few years. (Maybe even use them for milk)

Unneutered males also STINK TO HIGH HEAVEN. Eww.

We had goats when I was growing up, an adult female for milking and a couple of kids we raised for butchering. They were great. =) Fresh goat meat is so tasty!

I don't remember them escaping much, but we had electric fence. One thing I didn't see on the lists above is that they like to chew. On everything. And they can strip bark off trees faster than you can blink. Our goats' fence backed up to a small row of sapling sassafrass trees. The goats loved the sassafrass leaves, bark, braches, whatever they could get their little lips and teeth on. =)

But basically, our goats were basically, funny sounding, hoofed dogs whom we milked; very friendly, very social, "oh yes please give me some hay and a scritch between the ears". =)

Woven wire does snag legs as well as horns...they stand up on their hind legs, a front leg pokes through the wire up high, they stumble and *snap*. Worst case, they dangle for a while before you find them. Trust me, not pretty. My favorite doe did the same thing on a forked tree limb and caused a horrible splintered open comminuted fracture. Go with horizontal strands of hotwire, or at least electrify the woven wire so they don't get up against it. They are climbers...if you don't believe me, look on Youtube for "goat" and "tree".

There are a couple of ways to dehorn.. the one I like best is "disbudding"...a small cautery tool is used to burn the horn buds before the develop into horns (it's been a while, but I think younger than two weeks). Yes, it hurts. They scream, and kick, and as soon as it's over you plug them onto a bottle of warm milk and they forget it ever happened. The amount of harm done to them is less than the potential harm they can do to each other down the road.
There is also a horrible caustic paste than can be applied...causes chemical burns...I think it's much worse.

My friend had some goats on her farm which she recently sold; they are more of a pet-type animal to her and were not earning their keep on the farm like the beefer cows and breeding-stock horses do (sometimes heh..).. didn't have time to milk them, etc. But I used to love going over there and watching them bicker amongst themselves! There'd be a pile of straw bales in the aisle and they would play "king of the mountain" on it for hours.. she had a neutered male and two females. They seemed to have a good pecking order but then again, unlike horses, they were always scuffling amongst themselves like someone mentioned before. She said that she would never have an intact male around because they have a strong nasty smell.. and yes you have to stand up to them and not me a sissy or they will dominate you, much like a horse would, but they have a weird mentality all their own and are really intelligent. Hers did escape regularly from a white-ribbon electric fence; they just hopped over and the neighbors brought them home all of the time.. not something I liked hearing about..
I might get 0.2 in the coming years, if I find two that strike my fancy..

Pygmy goats are THE best. Smart, funny, and can learn to walk on a leash like a dog. You can also show them.
The downside to them is they're not really used for anything aside from fun, breeding and showing.
If you're looking for meat goats, boars, nubians or a cross.
Dairy goats I haven't had much experience with, meat goats and pygmy's I've spent several years raising. They can be a lot of fun! :D