Research has shown that goats learn their eating habits from their herd early in life. Therefore, try to purchase goats that have been raised under a similar feed management system as your own. Although most goats will make the switch from pasturing to a feedlot system easily, the reverse is not true. Goats that are used to a feedlot system can usually be switched to browsing on brush without much trouble. However, many feedlot-raised goats will not acknowledge that grasslands and abandoned hay fields are in fact edible. This is especially true if you are planning to have them graze in rain, sleet, and snow. Making the transition to pasture grazing can be eased by bringing in a few older dominant does that already know how to graze to take the lead and teach the others how to do it. Another option is to sit in your pasture every day for a week reading novels while your newly purchased goats make the discovery that the green stuff under their feet is the same stuff they used to see dried up in mangers. In reality, few of us have the leisure time to justify this (plus, you end up with chewed pages).

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