1876 .] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST, 
373 
The Angora Goat. 
BY 15. PETERS, ESQ., ATLANTA, GA. 
Introduction into the United States. —Dur¬ 
ing the administration of President Polk, the Sul¬ 
tan of Turkey requested that a suitable person be 
sent to that country to 
experiment in the cul¬ 
ture of cotton. Dr. 
James B. Davis, of S. 
C., was selected and 
commissioned to per¬ 
form this important 
service. On his return, 
in 1818, the Sultan, de¬ 
siring to reciprocate the 
courtesy of the Presi¬ 
dent, caused nine head 
of the choicest fleece¬ 
bearing goats in his 
dominions, to be select¬ 
ed and presented to Dr. 
Davis. These doubtless 
were selected from the 
herds of Angora, a dis¬ 
trict of country lying 
among the Taurus 
Mountains, which tra¬ 
verse Asiatic Turkey, 
and which derives its 
name from its principal 
city, situated about two 
hundred miles east of 
Constantinople. In the 
year 1854 I visited the 
farm of Dr. Davis, near 
Columbia, S. C., and 
found his stock of 
pure - bred Angoras, 
(these goats are called by the Arabs Chamal, or 
Camel-goat, meaning “soft,” or “silky,”) to con¬ 
sist of seven females and two males. Besides 
these he had one pure-bred Thibet ewe, several 
head of one-half Thibet and one-half Angora, and 
quite a number of grade females, bred from the 
common short-haired ewe goats of the country, 
and his Angora bucks. I purchased all the pure¬ 
bred Angoras, and several of the Thibet-Angoras. 
Dr. Davis had fallen into error as to the native 
country of his goats ; 
and, believing them to 
be Cashmere, quoted 
their fleeces as being 
worth from six to eight 
dollars per pound, 
while in reality they 
were Angoras, whose 
fleece, known to com¬ 
merce as “ mohair,” 
has been an article of 
import into Great 
Britain and this coun¬ 
try for years, and held 
at from sixty cents to 
one dollar per pound. 
Characteristics and 
Habits.—I have own¬ 
ed Angoras selected 
from six distinct im¬ 
portations from Asia, 
and have found them 
to differ greatly in size, 
fleece, and horns, and 
the shape of the ears. 
It is easy to trace sev¬ 
eral varieties of cross¬ 
es in many of the im¬ 
portations, occasioned, 
doubtless, by the fact 
that stock-breeders, in 
their native country, 
are ignorant of the 
system prevailing here, of breeding up from point 
to point—and more generally to the admission of 
stray bucks from distant localities into the various 
flocks. In fact, it may be safely asserted that we 
have in this country, any quantity of grade goats 
far superior to many that have been imported. In 
the absence of any other standard than that sug¬ 
gested by my own judgment, founded on my ex¬ 
perience with these valuable animals, I have for 
twenty years observed the following rules in select¬ 
ing a stock buck. 1st. Pedigree dating back to 
ancestors imported from Asia. 2nd. Weight and 
length of the long, silky, ringletted, white fleece, 
and its freedom from kemp and mane on the 
back and neck. 3d. Form, size, and vigor. 4th. 
Long pendent ears, and upright, spiral horns. 
By a persevering and studious adherence to this 
system of selection, I have obtained a flock of great 
uniformity. The Angora is a hardy, industrious, 
and nearly self-sustaining animal—subsists in its 
Asiatic mountain home almost entirely by browsing 
—and mav be classed as herbivorous. Being active 
and vigorous, they roam over wide ranges of wild, 
rugged country, in search of food, utilizing and 
giving value to worthless vegetation refused by 
most other animals, and will feed and fatten double 
the distance from water that sheep can, as they 
travel much faster and can endure more. The 
Angora seems not to succeed well in the Mid¬ 
dle and Eastern States where they are imprison¬ 
ed (as it were) in small [enclosures, and kept on 
grass in summer, and in closed barns in winter. 
Although from a locality on the fortieth parallel of 
latitude, north, they thrive best below that line on 
the Atlantic coast, 
though they do sur¬ 
prisingly well on the 
Pacific coast, as far as 
introduced, but especi¬ 
ally in California, New 
Mexico, Colorado, and 
• Arizona, whose climate 
: and topography is said 
to closely resemble that 
of their Asiatic home, 
with its wet and dry 
seasons. It can not 
brook—scarcely endure 
— confinement, but 
loves to roam at will 
over the highest moun¬ 
tain peaks, thriving and 
yielding its rapid in¬ 
crease of progeny, and 
its ringletted, silky 
fleece, where other 
stock will starve. It is 
a singular fact that 
while the Angora will 
live in the snow all win¬ 
ter, in the southern 
latitudes, and do well 
on browse, they will die 
in a northern latitude, 
housed and fed, or in a 
very wet climate. Ef¬ 
forts have been made to 
acclimate them in England, and signally failed; 
while in France, after an expenditure of $350,000, 
they are likely to succeed in but one locality of 
limited extent. If not sooner sheared, the Angoras 
shed their overcoat of “ Mohair” in March or April 
of each year. Their winter coating then grows 
slowly until about July, when the “ mohair ” starts 
and grows very rapidly, until January, when it 
gains its full growth, averaging about nine inches 
in length. The Angoras live to a greater age than 
Merino sheep, and are 
more prolific. 1 have 
three ewes in my flock, 
numbered by the Ran¬ 
dall system of notches 
in the ears, so there 
can be no mistake as to 
their identity. No. 53 
was dropped in 1861. 
She has raised 21 kids, 
brought her first in 
1862, and her last in 
1875, is now very feeble 
and on the decline. 
No. 68 was dropped in 
1862, and No. 69 in 1863, 
both brought fine kids 
in March, 1876, at the 
age of 14 and 13 years. 
Average Annual 
Clip. —Pure-bred An¬ 
goras will yield from 
five to eight pounds of 
“mohair” per clip, 
with one notable ex¬ 
ception of a ten-pound 
clip from a celebrated 
no-horned Costamboul 
buck, the property of 
Mr. Landrum, of Cali¬ 
fornia. The general 
uniformity of the yield 
is indicated by the 
fact that in 1854 I sheared six and a-lialf pounds 
of “mohair” from a buck of the Davis importation, 
referred to above, and in 1876 I sheared exactly 
the same quantity from one of his descendants. 
(to be continued.) 
female angora goat. —Belonging to R. Peters, Esq., Atlanta, Ga. 
