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Once I decided to move ahead my first step was research. I phoned several goat farms in this area, but since I live in South Carolina I was not able to find any that raised Angoras. Instead I contacted Misery Farm, they raise Boer, meat goats. What a find! They were very helpful and most informative. My youngest sister and I visited on several occasions for demonstrations on deworming, hoof trimming, administering medications and feeding as well as general care. I am very grateful to them for sharing this knowledge with us, and even though I continue to learn something new each day; I now feel, thanks in a large part to the McDonald's at Misery Farm, quite capable of raising healthy and happy goats. My husband built a beautiful goat shelter for my girls. Strong, sound and able to withstand any storm, a shelter any animal would feel safe in. Some advice we received and followed when building was to be sure the door was facing southeast as most of our storms approach from the northwest. We also placed the door to one side of the wall instead of the middle, this affords more room to be used as shelter from any wind, rain etc. We decided on a tin roof instead of wood since we live in the south and felt it would reflect the summer sun and make it cooler. We also made sure it was tall enough to allow a person to walk in without having to bend over, which I find very helpful when cleaning out the old bedding. There is no floor to the shelter as we felt laying hay on the ground would help absorb urine, making it easier to keep clean. To avoid any accidental poisoning I researched and identified poisonous plants on our land. We had to cut down all our choke cherry trees and pulled up the pokeweed. We will relocate our peach and plum trees to the front of the property away from their reach, fortunately they are still quite small.
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