Goats are a must. They are a multipurpose animal. Great for brush control on your land, can be hitched up and used for light chores on the property. They are inexpensive to maintain. They don't require elaborate housing and don't take a lot of space.
You can raise goats for different reasons. I would prefer the future farmstead to be no-kill or low kill. So I am not interested in raising goats for meat. However milking goats are right up my alley. If you raise dairy goats, each doe will give you about 90 quarts of fresh milk every month for about 10 months of the year. Goats milk can be used for drinking, to make yogurt, cheese or ice cream. Each doe you breed will produce one kid or more annually. Furthermore, every day, each goat will drop a little more than 1 pound of manure which makes great fertilizer for the farm.
My choice for a dairy goat breed would probably be Nubians. They come in many colors and are the most energetic and active of the dairy breeds. (Basically they are fun as pets as well.) I might also consider miniature goats which produce a sweeter, richer milk due to the higher fat-content. They produce less milk based on their size, but if you don't have a need to produce a lot of milk, they can be a great option. If I purchased a miniature goat, a Nigerian Dwarf would be a good choice.
This video is of my friend Kjersten's three goats. Peaches, Annie and Cookie are not raised for milk or meat, but merely as pets. They are great with the kids, the horse and the dogs. They are truly her pets, a great addition to her acreage and her family. They are certainly an inspiration for the future farmstead.
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