This company brings goats to mow your lawn. Will Columbia allow it to operate?
Pumpkin is an individual, but she’ll get her work done, Jacob Porter assures.
“You hot, honey? Your water is over here if you want it,” he coos to her.
Pumpkin’s colleagues — Sage, Paisley, Sally and Hot Mama — are already fully engrossed in consumption. As Pumpkin lazes under a tree to escape the mounting heat, Sally and Hot Mama are focused on the full, rounded leaves vining out before them.
The five goats will eat day and night for the next five or six days, working to clear weeds and overgrowth from a backyard on a residential street in Gaston, S.C.
Porter’s Green Goat Land Management promises to be an alternative to traditional landscaping. Hire goats to clear your weeds naturally, rather than using pesticides and heavy equipment, the sales pitch goes.
The idea has resonated, and Porter’s business has grown. But for Columbians wanting the Green Goat treatment, there’s a slight problem.
A lack of clarity in city code has meant operating in Columbia is a gamble for Porter. Goats aren’t technically allowed. He’s been allowed to operate by city officials, he says, unless someone complains.
On two recent jobs, somebody did. He had to pick up the goats, refund the customer and lose a day of business.
Now, he wants something written down. He’s asking the city to create new language to allow either a temporary use permit or some other consideration in city code that would allow his goats to work in the city.
A new idea
Marilynn Fitzpatrick knew her yard was getting out of hand. So did the city — she was racking up Columbia code enforcement violations because of the overgrowth.
She needed an undeveloped lot and her backyard taken care of. She called a landscaping company and was quoted $1,800 for just the lot.
Dismayed, she hit the internet and stumbled across Porter’s website. She was quoted $500 for the whole job.
“I loved the idea, and as I shared it with other people, they loved the idea,” Fitzpatrick said.
She liked the idea of the goats for more than the reduced price tag. The goats were not loud, they didn’t smell, and they created an opportunity for a new experience, she said.
Porter is adamant on this point. The goats make little noise and don’t smell like a barnyard, two common fears of prospective customers. The animals also neutralize seeds once eaten, Porter explained, meaning their waste isn’t contributing to a new crop of weeds once they go.
“Goatscaping” is a growing industry nationwide. It’s been written about by academics and advertised by big businesses. Companies similar to Porter’s are popping up all over the U.S., and Porter’s isn’t even the only goatscaping company in South Carolina.
“Everybody tries to reinvent the wheel. ‘Oh, there’s a newer, better way. Look at this fancy chemical I made in the lab.’ Well, nature designed (goats) to fight invasive species,” Porter said.
Porter and his employees are fastidious about the goats. They have mineral water, and customers are given activated charcoal just in case a goat gets sick.
Before the goats came to Fitzpatrick’s property, two of Porter’s employees showed up to measure her yards and make sure there wasn’t anything poisonous to goats. The company also sets up fabric netting with a low-wattage electrical current to keep the goats corralled and to protect any trees or plants the goats aren’t supposed to eat.
Fitzpatrick was excited for the goats to arrive, and so were her friends, who were eager to come by and meet the animals.
On their first day at her house, she brought them Saltine crackers. She’d never interacted with goats before and was surprised to find they each had their own personalities.
Fitzpatrick doesn’t know who complained, but Porter was told the city received a dozen calls about the goats. A day after dropping them off, Porter had to return to collect them.
The goats did not have the time to finish Fitzpatrick’s yard, but she’s still eager to hire Porter back.
“He wouldn’t even have to call me,” she said.
Code concerns
Green Goat Land Management has around 500 clients — Porter gives this estimate by recalling that he sends each client a Christmas card and a square of goat-milk soap each holiday season, and this year he sent about 500.
He didn’t plan to run this kind of business. When he retired from the military, he planned to buy and flip property. He had some land he planned to tidy up and flip first. He bought eight goats to take care of the overgrowth, but before his property-flipping dreams took off, one of his neighbors noticed the goats.
“As soon as I sold that land, before I could buy some more, somebody asked me, ‘Can I use (the goats) for my backyard?” he said. Then another neighbor asked, then another.
“Then somebody in Camden said they needed 15 acres cleaned up, and it just never stopped,” he said.
Most of Porter’s business growth has been from word of mouth.
He’s worked steadily in Columbia for years, despite the murky city code. But not knowing if he’ll have to cut a job short due to local complaints has complicated accepting jobs in the area, he said.
Porter has a business license, liability insurance and an LLC, but city ordinance doesn’t allow goats or other farm animals. It also doesn’t expressly allow the type of electric netting he uses to keep his goats contained.
He said he’s been allowed to do business in Columbia as long as he informs animal control of his location, how many goats he’ll have and how long they’ll be there. But, if neighbors complain, he has to collect the animals.
About a year ago, he dropped his goats off for a job in Columbia, and then the next day he was called to collect them — the neighbors had complained.
He tried to get momentum then for an ordinance change, but nothing happened. This July, he dropped his goats off at Fitzpatrick’s house, expecting them to take several days to clear her property. Instead, neighbors again complained, and the goats had to be retrieved.
So, he started a petition to publicly ask the city to change its code. As of Aug. 1, the petition had just under 200 signatures. Over the last few weeks, he’s also been in touch with city officials, including City Council members. He has at least two members of council in his corner.
Council members Howard Duvall and Will Brennan plan to co-sponsor an ordinance change to unambiguously allow Porter’s business, Duvall said. When reached by phone Monday, Duvall said the city’s legal department was already working on the language.
Porter plans to go before City Council Aug. 15 to plead his case to the rest of the body.
This story was originally published August 2, 2023 at 10:53 AM.
