Gear Gets Goats In Shape For Shows

Gear Gets Goats In Shape For Shows AG WORLD 31-2-24 Getting Grand Champion at the fair with any animal requires a lot of work. Sometimes the right piece of gear can make all the difference. When Jon Evans' 12-year old daughter Ashley started showing Bohr meat goats, she needed to build up the hindquarters on show wethers. "The back end is hard to build up, but if Ashley could walk them on just their back legs, it would build up those muscles," explains Evans. "I built a goat exerciser that would do just that." The exerciser is a 4 ft. wide, two-wheel cart with a tie bar on the front of a 10-in. deep platform. When the goats (up to four at a time) are tied to tubes on the bar, they naturally step up on the platform and walk on their rear legs. Ashley then tows the bar around the farmyard, a little more each day. "By the time of the show, she is working them for 30 min. a day, five to six days a week," says Evans. "We picked up an old riding lawn tractor without a mower for her to use so she didn't wear out our good one." To make the exerciser more useful, Evans made it as adjustable as possible. The platform can be raised up as the goats get bigger, and the hitch can be removed and the cart reversed. The tie tubes the goats are secured to can also be reversed. That puts the tie bar on back of the platform so goats tied to it don't climb up, but walk on all fours. "The females need exercise too, but Ashley doesn't want their hindquarters built up," explains Evans. "By reversing the cart, she can use it to exercise them, too." Another handy piece of goat gear is the 4-ft. long, 20-in. wide prep stand where goats are readied for the show. Evans built it out of angle iron and expanded metal for the platform with legs and tie bar made from 1 1/2-in. square steel tubing. Again, he used tension bolts and pieces of 1 3/4-in. tubing for housing sleeves in the corners of the platform and at its front for the upright tie bar. To adjust the platform to the height of the goat or the person working on it, Evans can replace the 2-ft. legs with 30-in. legs with wheels attached to the rear pair. The wheels, which only come in contact with the ground when the front end of the platform is lifted, make it easy to move. The front tie bar has two chains attached, one to go over the goat's muzzle and the other behind its ears to hold it in place. Sidebars made from round tubing bent in a U-shape can also be adjusted up or down or removed. "I made it so it can be completely broken down and hauled in a car," says Evans. "Even the 6-ft. ramp is hinged half way so it can be folded up and carried." The goat gear appears to work. Ashley has won two Grand Champions in the past four years of showing. Evans also reports the prep stand is popular with other goat owners at the shows once Ashley has finished with it. Most of the steel tubing he used for the cart and the prep stand are recycled from four-wheeler crates delivered to a local dealer. Round steel tubing is recycled oil well sucker rod. Evans has used both to frame gates for kidding pens, using sections of a steel horse fence panel inside the frame. Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, Jon Evans, 2410 Raintree Rd., Harrisburg, Ill. 62946 (ph 618 252-4318).

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