THE AISTGOEA GOAT. 29 



trimming. To clear the worst bi-ush do not cut anything that the goats can reach or 

 bend. The tallest or largest is better not cut. All trees and saplings should be cut, 

 and the goats will keep all the sprouts down. If stumps are allowed to sprout one 

 year before the goats are turned in, the sprouts need not be cut. About 200 goats 

 for 40 acres of brush will in two or three years make the land as clean as a garden. 

 If the pasture has only patches of brush, turn in a few goats and it will make more 

 grass for other stock than if the goats were not in. They eat very little grass when 

 they can get leaves. Goats even like weeds better than grass. In clearing brush land 

 in the old way liy grub and plow there are always left many eyesores in the way of 

 brushy nooks and bends and steep places which can not be plowed. 



There are millions of acres of land in nearly every State in the Union which might 

 be much more than doubled in value by the use of Angora goats at no cost at all. 

 Commence and count the worth of your land, then the fencing, and see if you can 

 afford to leave your brush land so nearly worthless for all time. Then count the 

 cost of grulibing and i^lowing, if indeed such land is susceptible to the plow. No 

 man can afford to grub and plow brush land in this day and age of the world any 

 more than he can afford to plant a large field of corn without a planter. In hilly or 

 mountainous portions of the country the Angora goat can be made to do a great 

 service in the way of clearing the underbrush, when the land will bring grass after 

 the brush is gone. It would surely be a paying business to buy up large tracts of 

 rough land in the mountain districts, or indeed any brush land in the United States, 

 and clear the brush and set in grass. Afterwards, if the owner liked other stock 

 better, he might dispense with the Angoras. In many places where the country is 

 too bare to furnish sheep with sufficient feed goats will do exceedingly well. In 

 many places where leaves are abundant and there is scarcely any grass, making it 

 impossible to profitably keep sheep, goats will do admirably well. 



While Dr. Standley's experience is that goats will not to any appre- 

 ciable extent peel the bark off shrubbery, the experience of others is 

 quite the reverse. Mr. H. T. Fuchs, of Tiger Mills, Tex. , writes in the 

 Farm and Ranch of October 6, 1900, that one summer he purchased 

 some Angora goats which came from a range where they had killed 

 out all the tall sumac trees. On his own i-ange was much of this brush, 

 and his goats had never touched it. It was a treat for the newly pur- 

 chased goats, and they "peeled the bark nicely and cleaned off every 

 sumac tree in the pasture as high as they could reach (about 6 feet), 

 and in a few days you could see the white, smooth-peeled trees with 

 their dead tops for miles all over the pasture. " He adds thaA fifty 

 men with hatchets could not have done the work so fast or with so 

 nuich pleasure. Further, he says the goats that had all along been in 

 the pasture "took the hint and went at the bark peeling also." All 

 of which goes to show that the goat is an intelligent animal and is 

 capable of learning much by observation. 



Mr. Q. M. Beck, of Bear Grove, Iowa, writes that he had goats on 

 a 23-acre tract, fenced, in one corner of which were 5 acres of clover 

 suitable for hay. The goats not only cleared the way for the clover, 

 hut ate the browse instead of the clover. The goats were turned into 

 this piece last June (1900), when they could hardly be seen on account 

 of the brush, while now (September) the\' can be seen anywhere in it. 



