The Nugget Newspaper - News and Opinion from Sisters, Oregon

An unusual restoration team of 800 goats came to Sisters last week to help control a massive noxious weed infestation in the Eyerly Wildfire area.

A dense infestation of spotted knapweed threatens to take over thousands of acres of burned land in the beautiful and remote Fly Creek drainage on the eastern fringe of the Sisters Ranger District. The weed-eating goats have a taste for knapweed and quickly consume flowers, destroying developing weed seeds.

The Fly Creek weed problem was identified as a potential ecosystem emergency by a Burned Area Emergencey Rehab (BAER) Team evaluating the Eyerly Wildfire, which burned over 23,000 acres in July. The noxious weeds, which can take over native plant communities and reduce habitat for wildlife, were a particularly difficult puzzle because immediate action was required to remove seeds from already blooming plants.

Cooperation between several landowners was needed, the area was too large to pull, and it was too late to spray with herbicides. The only feasible solution was to eat the weeds. Enter 800 small ungulates, mostly Spanish goats with some mix of South African Boar goats.

The goats are owned by Caprine Restoration Services. Living in the remote valley was a tough and lonely job for the two herders, Rusty Childs and Jared Blake. The young men and their three dogs, Dave, Brad and Boof moved the goats quickly from one patch of knapweed to another in the Fly Creek valley.

Skilled herding was an essential part of the operation since the objective was to remove knapweed while minimizing impacts to native plants and shrubs. The scene was classic western: a big valley, a herd, cowboys with big hats. The only thing missing was the horses. These cowboys work on foot with their dogs.

Rusty Childs has been herding goats for about six months and discussed the difficulties of controlling 800 head.

A challenge with goats is "They never get full, they just keep eating and eating," he added. Goats like to run around nipping plants and had to be corralled onto dense infestation areas with temporary fencing so that most flowers are consumed. "It's been a good job. We've been able to move across it so fast, they just ate the seed heads, but we couldn't do it without the dogs."

As Childs stopped to talk, his faithful dog, Dave, constantly herded baby goats, who have a tendency to wander.

"Herding goats is this dog's life," Child remarked, "These are high energy dogs, they're not good pets, they are bred to work all day long."

Goats like variety in their diet but eat mostly broadleaf plants. This herd has been developed to have a particular liking for knapweed, which has high protein flowers.

Timing is critical because goats prefer blooming flowers but will not eat mature seed heads of old plants. Most seeds are destroyed by the goat's digestion process. There was so much knapweed that despite all the exercise, Childs remarked "The goats have put weight on up here."

In a little more than a week the goats consumed weed flowers from about 120 acres of highly infested ground within a 1,000 acre portion of the valley. Assessments of seed consumption showed that in most places over 99 percent of the flower heads were eaten and destroyed.

Since each knapweed plant can produce up to 20,000 seeds that are viable for up to eight years in the soil, billions of new seeds were prevented by the goat grazing treatment.

But the weed problem in the Fly Creek valley has taken years to develop and will need years of work to control because of the buildup of seeds in the soil. Goat grazing disturbs the ground around plants and sets up an ideal situation for new weed plants to start, so more work next year is critical.

Although Forest Service specialists were pleased by the goats' weed control work, their future on weed control projects is unclear and will be determined by public input and additional environmental analysis.

Maret Pajutee is the Sisters Ranger District Ecologist.