By Diana Hensley –

You can’t help but smile when you see the goats at the VanMeeteren farm near Adrian in Nobles County. Does and doelings bounce around inside the barn, and climb on anything they can access outside. They playfully butt heads, and a couple of bucklings munch on hay, looking at people curiously.

Dan VanMeeteren, a southwest Minnesota native, and his wife, Laura, have had goats since 2014, one year after returning from living overseas. They found their property before coming back home, had their parents look it over, and made their plans. They spent the first month back in the United States working on the property, preparing it for their family, and the coming winter. The following year they purchased their first goats, a small herd they found available on Craigslist.

“Sixty five percent of people in the world prefer goat meat,” said VanMeeteren, but many Americans just can’t get past the idea of eating goats. “We ate a lot of goat meat overseas,” Dan stated.

The VanMeeterens started out with just a few goats, but experienced a steep learning curve. Not many people in the area know much about goats, and since Dan and Laura were new to the area, they didn’t know who to turn to for advice about caring for them. They lost more than they would have liked, and spent much time researching to gain more knowledge. “We’ve learned through a lot of scenarios,” VanMeeteren said.

Dan connected with an acquaintance in northwest Iowa who is more familiar with goats and their care. For a while they lost young ones at weaning time, but found a treatment protocol to help the kids as they adjusted to no longer getting milk from their mothers.

VanMeeterens also learned that a wet season can wreak havoc on the goats. This is due to an increase in parasite population in moist environments. Parasites climb vegetation and they can climb higher when things are moist, which means goats get more of them because they eat the tops off of plants as they browse. In dry years the population of parasites decreases.

According to VanMeeteren, goats are excellent for land management, and in addition to selling them for meat, they can be rented out for grazing, and are particularly helpful when used to restore native prairie land. Generally, there are four options to manage invasive species- manual cutting, chemical application, controlled burning, or grazing. Dan and Laura used their goats to clean up their acreage, which had been neglected for years before they purchased it. They have been renting their goats out for a few years now.

Dan and Laura VanMeeteren with their four children, photographed recently by LO Photography and Events