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While watching wild goats negotiate the most terrifying vertical cliffs and sheer precipices with such adroitness in places like Snowdonia, it is hard to believe that these hardy beasts only exist in some of our wildest places thanks to a helping hand from prehistoric man. These descendants of the original domesticated goat stock look as much part of the scenery as the drystone walls that weave up and down the mountainsides.

Wild goats

WHEN

October and November for the rut, although the goats will be resident all year round

WHERE

Snowdonia, North Wales; Lundy Island; Valley of the Rocks, Lynton, Devon

Since having been introduced, goats now seem part of the furniture in some of our wildest places.

Alan Williams

Feral goats in Britain are confined to mountainous districts, cliff tops and islands; they are widespread in Scotland, and occur locally in a few remote locations across northern England and Wales. Perhaps the best-known and most easily encountered population is the famous feral goats of Snowdonia. With the red deer long since exterminated from Wales’s most famous national park, it is curious that the only remaining large herbivore that is both tough and canny enough to survive in this unforgiving landscape, is an introduced goat.

It is thought that goats were originally introduced to North Wales when Neolithic man first crossed the Channel to colonise Britain from mainland Europe over 5,000 years ago, bringing his domesticated livestock, such as goats from the Middle East, with him. Then, around 1,500 years ago, during the Iron Age, the farmers are believed to have taken their goats into the mountains to feed and the animals’ descendants are thought to have stayed ever since.

For many centuries the goats held sway as they were used for their hair, hide, milk and meat; even up to the Middle Ages, goats were believed to have been more abundant than sheep, as they were able to graze the precipitous crags to the exclusion of less sure-footed and often more valuable cattle. It was not really until the 19th century that goat numbers began to decline as sheep numbers began to rise, due in part to the high demand for wool. By this time, however, many of the goats had become feral and the wild population was bolstered by escaped goats or those that were let loose once no longer needed.

The wild Snowdonia goats of today most closely resemble breeds that have not been seen in domestic herds for over 100 years, meaning they have considerable historical and cultural value, in addition to being an integral part of the local wildlife. The goats are in small clusters around the park, with well-known herds existing on the Glyders, around Beddgelert, on the Moelwyns and the Rhinogs; since these groups are largely isolated, this has resulted in subtle differences in appearance between the herds.

The feral male goat or billy is an imposing sight, reaching 90 centimetres at the shoulder and weighing between 45 and 55 kilograms, with the main difference between the wild version and the domesticated goat being that the wild goat has much longer hair, enabling it to tough out the worst possible Welsh weather. The females, or nannies, are much smaller, attaining a height of no more than 70 centimetres at the shoulder, with shorter hair and weighing approximately half the weight of their male counterparts. The coat colour of the males is generally piebald with black or brown blotches, but some can be entirely grey or black all over. The females, however, are usually much whiter and can be picked out among the rock scree at distance and can also be distinguished from the sheep as they only appear as pale as the goats when they are freshly shorn.

Apart from the obvious size difference, the sexes can be easily distinguished by their respective sets of horns: mature males have a large set of curled horns which can curve back towards the centre; the females’ are thinner, straighter and more pointed. Both sexes grow rings around their horns (although they are more prominent on the male) with each ring representing a year’s growth and the distance between the rings decreasing in the oldest goats. Unlike the antlers of red deer, which are shed after the rut and then regrown every summer, if the goat breaks its horns they will not grow back. Males that have lost their horns generally compensate of being heavier than the horned billies of an equivalent age. Both sexes also have the celebrated ‘goatee’ beards, although the tuft on the males is usually not to be as visible within their long coat.

The goats in Snowdonia tend to stay on the high ground most of the year, only descending during really harsh weather. The females spend most of their time in small groups of three to six within the boundaries of their home range, while the males will wander larger distances so they can visit and monitor several female groups. However, during the breeding season in September and October, much larger aggregations will form, making this the best time to look for these naturally wary animals as they drop their guard slightly while mating.

Brief fights are common between the males as they jostle for the right to mate with the nannies, but the most prolonged scraps occur when two males of a similar age and horn size meet hoof to hoof, with the reward of a group of receptive nannies going to the winner. In a scene more reminiscent of primeval fighting ibex in the Alps, the two evenly matched billies will then rise up on their rear legs before clashing their horns together with full force a number of times. In addition to the head-butting, they will also engage in wrestling and pushing matches more commonly seen among red stags, as each billy tries to assert control and gain the all-important mating rights.

After mating, the goats will wander much less during winter as they devote their attentions to searching out food, with their multi-purpose horns sometimes being used to scrape away snow to access the vegetation below. The goats will of course know their home ranges well and, when the weather is particularly inclement, they may well rest in favourite retreats in among the crags or scree slopes until conditions improve. The female groups stay together until the end of February, when the mothers will peel away to give birth to a single kid of two to three kilograms in among the rough scree or rocky terrain.

The kid is left hidden for the first couple of weeks, with the mother coming back several times during the day and night to suckle it, after which the kid joins the mother in the all-female group, where the two will keep in close contact by call until the youngster becomes weaned. It seems that climbing in the most precipitous areas is an inherent trait for goats and, in no time, the kid will have taken to the cliffs and the scree slopes like a duck to water. Very occasionally twins are born, but, in such a demanding environment and with the mother only able to produce a certain amount of milk, it is very rare for both to survive.

For good or bad, these hugely adaptable and resilient animals seem here to stay.

Bill Coster

The number of goats within the Snowdonia National Park has increased over the last 30 years from a relatively stable number of between 250 and 320 to around 500 goats, making them easier to track down now than for a generation. It is thought that this increase may well be due to the recent run of mild winters, and, with climate change affecting mountainous environments perhaps more strongly than elsewhere, their numbers are predicted to increase, causing a knock-on effect of too much grazing unless the population is kept in check.

Contrary to popular opinion, there seems little competition between goats and sheep for food, as the goats predominantly graze on woody, shrubby and coarse-leaved plants such as the bark from trees and the leaves of heather and bilberry in areas that the sheep may not be able to reach. The goats, however, are capable of causing considerable damage to trees by bark stripping and browsing, and, where this has happened in some of the important woodland sites on the lower slopes, they have had to be immediately removed. Undoubtedly, the goats have also caused resentment among local farmers as they steal the mixed-feed left out for the sheep and damage drystone walls. All interested parties, therefore, agree that the numbers of goats will have to be carefully controlled in order to achieve a healthy and balanced population that will harmoniously coexist with, rather than overgraze, the environment.

While unquestionably non-native, the goats have a place in both the cultural heritage and ecology of some of our most treasured wild locations. So, if you enjoy both high-octane wildlife behaviour and being in the mountains, then the feral goats could run the Alpine ibex a very close second!