farmdoc's blog post number 338

On our Mole Creek farm we’ve never named a sheep – probably because all ours look similar, and to us their personalities appear homogeneous. But on both counts not so with our goats, so we’ve named some: Cathy, Doreen, Mrs T, Otis, Dynamite, Buckley, Rosie, Beau, Randall, Audrey, Cindy, Spotty, Slippery Sam, Davis, Tinker and Bell. But most of our goats remain nameless, and identified only by ear-tag colour and number. Whether or not a goat gets a name is not something we consciously decide; if it happens, it happens. In late January the (UK) Newcastle University reported that a survey of 516 British dairy farmers revealed 46% named all their cows, and the annual milk yield per cow on this 46% of farms was 258 litres higher than on the other 54% of farms. The researchers didn’t look at whether a number rather than a name, increased the milk yield. Us? We don’t milk our goats. Our named goats live longer. But that’s because we’d rather not slaughter and eat goats with names. And so as not to limit our choice of goats to kill, we haven’t named any goats for the past 2-3 years. Probably we won’t name any in the future, either – unless it’s a particularly special goat in some way.