A Center Grove neighborhood is using an old-time solution to confront a present-day problem.
Goats are helping the Waters Edge subdivision clear out nuisance plants, such as poison ivy, from around the neighborhood’s dam.
Waters Edge is located in northwestern Johnson County, just south of Center Grove High School. The subdivision was built along a dam located at a lake.
Last century, the area where Waters Edge is today was known by another name — Center Grove Lake. At this time, the area had a campground and offered county residents a place to swim and fish, which started sometime between the mid-1950s and early 1960s, said Jim Wikel, a Waters Edge resident.
The dam and the lake are still there today, but are now surrounded by homes. Special care has to be taken to clear the area surrounding the dam of specific vegetation, including poison ivy. Pesticides cannot be used, Wikel said.
Normally, just simple weedeating would accomplish this. But the spread of poison ivy in the area reached a point that anyone weedeating would be exposed to the plant.
With the neighborhood running out of options, they decided to turn to an old-school solution: goats.
The idea is not as far-fetched as it sounds, and is not a new idea, Wikel said.
Back in 2009, Google used goats to clear brush from an undeveloped portion of their California campus, and just this year the cities of Provincetown, Massachusetts, and Lenexa, Kansas, used goats to help remove weeds and overgrowth at a community garden and a city park, respectively.
Goats have a unique ability that allows their gastrointestinal tracts’ to completely break down the seeds of invasive plants. Because of this, the regrowth of plants that are eaten by goats is minimal to zero, according to the American Institute for Goat Research.
They also love eating poison ivy because they are attracted to its bright and thick leaves. Goats also do not suffer any medical conditions after eating the plant, according to First Time Farming, a farming website for beginners.
There are three businesses in the Indianapolis area alone that offer goat weed-eating services, including Goats On The Go Indy, the company the neighborhood went with. The company is run by Hannah Milano and Kaitlin Hossom, and serves portions of Johnson, Madison, Shelby and Tipton counties, and all of Marion, Hamilton and Hancock Counties.
Twenty-three goats, all female, arrived last Saturday to help with weed problem in Waters Edge. Since then, the goats have made a lot of progress, and there is visible difference in the number of weeds, Wikel said.
Less than half of the area with weeds is left for the goats to eat, include some taller weeds. Waters Edge residents main concern was the poison ivy, and the goats started to eat that earlier this week, he said.
There have not been any surprises since the goats arrived, and there has only been one minor challenge that the goat owners’ had to deal with. Due to forecasted temperatures in the high 80s, Hossom and Milano had to expand the fenced area to include some areas with shade so that the goats have a place to cool down, Wikel said.
When the goats arrived, the immediately went to work eating the weeds. The goats had just finished eating at another job, so it was pretty amazing for them to just go straight into eating again, he said.
“It’s amazing to watch them work,” Wikel said.
For Wikel, in addition to the uniqueness of the situation, his favorite part of the process is the progress the goats have made.
“I’m pleased with progress and hopeful they will eat the grass down to the equivalent (level) that using a weedwacker would,” he said.
