08/21/2026
Since my previous post was apparently previewed as offensive towards someone it had zero to do with, I have re-worded my first paragraph it to make it less offensive? 🫠
I will say this. I am a very straight forward person. If I had something to say about someone or something, I will speak my mind openly about it. My post is not and was not about anyone or any feed in particular. It was to bring awareness to the fact that bullying and shaming people has became far to normal in our industry. And the fact that someone felt like they needed to take time out of their day to message me to accuse me of "bashing" them because they automatically assumed my post was about them is a prime example of how quickly people are to try to bully someone over an opinion.
Four things I will always stand by:
1.) You don't have to feed a $20-$30 grain to be successful. I have a good friend that fed a $7/bag 13% Bull feed and won at several majors years ago. 🤷♀️
2.) You're goats don't have to be obese to be successful.
3.) Bullying and "politics" in our industry is out of hand.
4.) I wholeheartedly want people to come into this industry and do it because they love the Boer goat breed and want to better it and preserve it.
I am honestly embarrassed that I even have to write this out and justify myself over a post that was not offensive at all... That says more about the state of this industry than I care for it to.
Anyway, the revised post is as follows. If you take offense to this, I'm sorry? Maybe that is a wake up call to do some self reflection if anyone takes this post as "bashing" towards them.
"Saw a post of someone kindly sharing a picture and analysis of the feed they were using and in the comments they were accused by several people of using a knock off of a commercial brand based on the ingredient list and analysis. Which it might have been a knock off? Maybe they couldn't get the commercial feed where they live so asked their local mill to make something similar? Maybe it's something their mill already makes and they just buy it? The point is, why even belittle someone over what they feed regardless? Odds are, they don't have the exact formula as any of the commercial feeds anyway even if they did have the feed custom made...
As someone that has tried almost all of the trendy, commercial feeds at some point over the last 15 years, a hill I will die on is that expensive feeds don't mean they are best and cheap doesn't mean they are bad.
We use a feed that costs $9.50/bag. The goats love it and look great on it. It is milled locally. We can get it fresh anytime we need it.
Our favorite of all of the commercial feeds we have tried is Evolution Full Throttle. We unfortunately cannot get it in our area since moving to Missouri.
With that being said, our best results have come from the 16% protein/3% fat LOCALLY milled feed we currently use.
I am not sure when it became the norm for people to shame people for choosing to feed something other than the newest "fad" feeds.
I also don't know why it has been normalized to feed a 5-7% fat feed and get these goats obese. Why wouldn't you want to promote true, red meat and muscle growth vs just getting them so fat they cannot hardly walk let alone live a healthy life while being productive?
All of these goats pictured are on the 16% protein/3% fat local feed. I personally think they look far better and are far healthier than when I thought they needed a 16/5 with an added fat supplement and thought they had to be disgustingly obese to be competitive on the show ring.
The biggest issue with a lot of breeders getting goats too fat is they are trying to make a thin made goat look bigger instead of just breeding for true, big bodied, hard muscled Boer goats. Same with boning the legs and long body hair...
People tend to think that when I say these goats don't need to be obese when showing, that I want people to show them in pasture/breeding condition. That's not the case. Any species of animal that is being shown should be prepped but they DO NOT have to be obese to look or show well. And they don't have to be fed $20-$30 feed to show well.
All of ours get free choice alfalfa hay (except open brood does) and free choice Sweetlix Meat Maker loose mineral.
Sorry for getting on my soap box rant for a moment. 🤦♀️"
