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+--- Thread: Can a breeding buck goat be castrated and then trained to pack? (/showthread.php?tid=1869)
Can a breeding buck goat be castrated and then trained to pack? - igoat - 10-20-2016
So, I am looking for some good ober pack goats, and have come across a 1.5 year old Buck. The current owner tells me that he has bred her does two seasons now, and has been hitherto a very sweet and mellow boy. However, this current rut has left him quite aggressive. He is a very big goat, so she has decided to sell because of it. So, Im wondering if I had him castrated at the vet, would that tone him back down to his prior mellow self? Have any of you experience with wethers who had reached their sexual maturity, and even been allowed to breed before they were wethered? Any other issues that I might encounter? Will the smell go away? Will they tend to want to “mount” other goats more often? How will they likely interact with other smaller wethers? Any health issues to be considered?
Thanks for your time and input.
RE: Can a breeding buck goat be castrated and then trained to pack? - Nanno - 10-20-2016
I have one wether (Finn) who was used as a breeding buck for one season. He was wethered at nine months. My guy never got aggressive so I can't speak about the attitude, but all the nasty buck smell and most of the unpleasant buck behaviors disappeared. The smell disappeared almost immediately along with all the extra hair and dark buck coloration. The behaviors, on the other hand, took longer to go away and some have not entirely disappeared even though he only had one rut and it was two years ago. He took several months to stop spraying my husband every time he got excited. He has also come into "rut" during fall these last two years. Right now he's out there chasing and mounting girls, putting his nose under them every time they pee, swatting, and running around with his tongue hanging out. But at least he isn't spraying himself and he doesn't stink even if his nose is yellow from sniffing the girls' behinds. I doubt he would act this way if he were kept exclusively with wethers. He doesn't mount the other boys any more like he did when he was a buck.
We had one other boy (Pac-Man) who was a breeding buck for one season and he mellowed out very nicely. He came into a semblance of "rut" in the fall like Finn, but mostly it just meant he was suave with the ladies during fall and kept them from running down the road to my neighbor's buck pen in search of love. Pac-Man was never aggressive as a buck either, though, so I'm not sure if a buck with an attitude would settle down or not. I expect most would settle down pretty well, but I am sure some would retain a nasty attitude. If the goat is nice enough I say it might be worth the gamble. You could probably have him castrated with a burdizzo or a callicrate bander very inexpensively.