Practical Angora Goat Raising

by Unknown

s to the origin and early history of the Angora goat little is known. It is supposed that the Angora variety descended from one of the classes of wild goats, and different writers have contended that different genera were the foundation of the Angora species. They have based these claims upon the characteristics of the horns, the covering of the body, shape and size of the animal, and various other details. Several agree that Capra Ægagrus is the class of goat from which the Angora species has developed.

KNOWN FACTS.

Present history traces the Angora goat to the vilayet of Angora, in Asia Minor, and to the country immediately surrounding this vilayet. Some have set a date over two thousand years ago, claiming that the Angora goat was introduced into Asia Minor at that time, but the only authentic history is that given by Tournefort, a French naturalist, employed by his government, who explored Asia Minor about two hundred and fifty years ago, and who described and pictured the Angora goat about as he appears to-day and by Evliya Effendi, a Turk, who wrote in 1550 of the goats, and by a few other writers. That they have not changed more is due to the fact that the Turk is quite content as he is, and he has no ambition to breed a different goat from what he has had for at least the past three centuries.

ASIA MINOR.

Before we consider the migrations of the Angora goat, we will investigate the physical conditions of their native province. The interior of Asia Minor, or the Angora goat country, is from one to four thousand feet above the sea level. Low, rolling hills and broad plains, treeless and almost waterless; dry, hot and desolate in the summer, and covered with more or less snow in the winter, form the habitat of the Angora. A small fine fibered sage brush is the principal diet of the goat, both summer and winter, but in the spring this diet is supplemented with weeds and some grass, and in the summer some of the goats are driven to the higher mountains, where there are some scrub pines and other varieties of brush. There is no winter feeding. The goats make their own living on the tops of the sage brush, which protrude through the snow.

The indolent Turks do make some provision for the shelter of themselves and the goats in the winter. If a cave can be found it is divided so that the goats share the quarters with the humans. Sometimes an adobe house is so arranged that the goats and other livestock occupy the lower part of the house and the natives the upper part, or if there be but one floor, a low fence is run across to keep the livestock out of the living quarters. Great greyish-white wolfish looking dogs, wearing formidable collars of sharpened spikes go with the shepherds during the day and watch the flocks during the night. They are used as a means of protection from thieves, and not as an aid in herding. The flocks camp around the cave or hut, and are not confined in corrals. Fences are almost unknown in the Angora country. There are probably four or five million Angora goats in Asia Minor. Much of the central plateau region of the United States is very similar to the Angora region of Turkey. A peculiar fact is that the mohair produced in the different sections of Asia Minor varies a little, and the mohair merchants of Constantinople readily recognize an appreciable difference in its market value. Even the smaller merchants in the country recognize a difference in the mohair grown within a few miles of their town. Some try to explain this by a difference in food, others by slight climatic changes, and still others by the soil formation. Some of the goats from the locality of Geredeh, in the province of Kastamouni, have fleeces which are filled with grease. They are as black and gummy as merino sheep. This mohair, however, scours white. The most marketable mohair comes from Beibazar and Eskischehr. That this difference in the quality of the mohair is not entirely due to climate or food conditions is evidenced by the fact that Angoras taken from Beibazar to California still retain the same qualities in the mohair after four years in California. However, it has been noticed that different parts of the United States produce different qualities of mohair.

SCENE IN ASIA-MINOR.
Turkish owner, his herder, holding an Angora buck kid and the grey-wolfish-looking dogs wearing collars of sharpened spikes. This picture was taken on the range and one can see the fine fibered sage brush on which the goats feed.
Photo taken by Dr. Bailey, 1901.