COLDWATER, MI (WTVB) – It’s not your typical lawn mowing project. Munchers on Hooves from Coldwater has been hired by Western Michigan University following a bidding process to remove damaging invasive plant species from some of the woodlots on the WMU campus.
Rather than send in expensive manpower, the university wants to see if the goats can do the job less expensively and in a more environmentally friendly way.
The goats from Munchers on Hooves, which is owned by Garrett and Gina Fickle, are part of a pilot project that starts on Sunday.
Munchers on Hooves serves southern Michigan, northwest Ohio and northern Indiana. The Fickles have been breeding and raising Boer goats for seven years and have been using them in the last year to clear buckthorn on their property.
It’s hoped the goats can remove buckthorn, honeysuckle, oriental bittersweet and poison ivy from the less traveled portions of campus.
Horticulturalist Nick Gooch says they work on slopes, won’t destroy beneficial plants or compact the soil and leave fertilizer behind.
