Goats
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Chuck Denney
Tennessee is big on goats - more than 100-thousand of them here - making us second only to Texas in the production of these animals. Credit the landscape for making Cannon one of the state’s biggest goat-producing counties. Bruce Steelman is UT Extension director there.
Bruce Steeleman
“We’ve got the terrain here in the county where we’ve got a lot of hills, areas with lots of brush and goats just thrive on that type of environment. We’ve also got a very good market right here in Cannon County. They sell in excess of 10-thousand goats a year.”
Chuck Denney
Years ago, farmers kept goats around simply because they ate brush and kept the land clean. But in recent times, there’s been a growing market for their milk and meat - and Tennessee’s goat population has roughly doubled in the past decade. Much of that increase is based on immigration. Tennessee’s growing Latino population drives the market here, as well as other nationalities who traditionally eat more goat meat and drink the milk. Those new markets prompted producers like Ken Smithson to take goat-farming a little more seriously. He has 70 head now, and would like to bump that up to at least 100.
Ken Smithson
“The goat business has come a long way. I’m going to be 48, and when I was a kid you could buy a goat for $10 or $15. That was high back then. Now you’re in the hundreds of thousands for goats.”
Chuck Denney
Goat farming has gotten so big in Cannon County, it’s also increased the number of
4-H’ers showing these animals. Here’s Agent Heath Nokes.
Heath Nokes
“We started here in Cannon County - we had two participants in the goat project. Now we’re looking at probably 15 or 16 coming on for this year. So it’s really flourished as have all the livestock.”
Chuck Denney
Many of these animals on the Smithson farm will be sold at auction soon. Look for goat production to continue here and in other hilly, rocky areas.
It seems a good fit - an industry that can be profitable for farmers, and animals who don’t seem to mind where they stand as long as there’s something good to eat there.
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NOTE: You can learn more about goat farming at www.tngoatproducers.org.
This is the web site for the state’s goat producers association.
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