As promised, I went to go visit the Google goats today — you know, the goats that were brought in to replace lawnmowers in Google’s ever-expanding quest to go more green. I was told the goats would be in the big field at the corner Rengstorff & Amphitheater (on Google’s campus in Mountain View), and sure enough, I found a few hundred of them there. Apparently, the area was previously covered in 4-foot tall brush, but within a few days, the goats had eaten it down to basically nothing (as you can see in the videos and images below).
These goats, which were being picked up today and transported to their next gig (at Morgan Hill), will do this field-clearing once a year for Google, the herder on site told me. He was a bit concerned for the goats because a few of them got sick due to people feeding them flowers (which, apparently, are poisonous to them), he told me. PETA, would no doubt be concerned about the lack of shelter for when it was raining, and the electric fence that encircled the goats.
But all in all, it looks like the goats did the job they were brought in for, and were very efficient in doing so. Now, the question of if it cost Google more in both money and fuel to have the goats shipped over to the site versus what it would have been to pay some people to mow the lawn, is a different question. But hey, nevermind that, cute friendly goats!
Check out some pictures below and two videos below that. The Qik video has some more substance, but is much longer and is pretty hard to hear at points due to the wind.
[PSGallery=191i4kt10e]
Watching this was really cool.
I plan to raise goats one day. Thank you for reaffirming my belief in the goat industry.
Yeah I saw your comments coming in live Jay, but there was no point in directly responding due to the damn AT&T buffer.
Not even AT&T’s buffering network can keep me from my dream. Thank you MG and thank you TechCrunch.
those electric fences look dangerous. I can’t believe PETA is rolling over on this one. I thought they even fought against animals as pets.
Was mutton tasty?? Red meat is not that good for health though.
“I thought they even fought against animals as pets.”
PETA isn’t against people having pets. They are not too keen on the whole pet breeding industry though.
PETA is gonna go nuts about the electric fences….
PETA killed over 2000 dogs, cats, and other animals last year instead of finding them homes.
So I don’t think they’ll care about a few electric fences…
Those electric fences have virtually no charge. Funny story – I was watching a bunch of goats cleaning up the area next to Laguna Honda Hospital, wondering about the shock I’d get if I touched the electric fence, when a car pulled up and a little girl jumped out, ran up to the fence and grabbed it with both hands. Naturally, it then occurred to me that, for exactly this reason, there couldn’t be much charge on the fence. It’s just a mild tingle, which is apparently enough to keep the goats inside.
They’ll be okay as long as they don’t whiz on the electric fence.
yea… human skin should be able to resist small electric charges. but probably the concern is when goats attempt to lick/bite/mouth the fences.. lolz…
probably its like you or me licking the leads on a 9V battery. try it out and you know what i mean…
Lovin it
Completely pointless
But I am loving it
i think MG is just trying to make up for the whole MySpace fiasco.
I REALLY wanted to have a contest where we gave a free iphone to whoever kidnapped a Google goat and brought it to us, but the lawyers really frowned on it for some reason. Which is ridiculous, because we definitely would have probably returned it.
That sorta sounds like when 101.3 radio station brought a chain saw into a golf tourny as a joke
Great stuff let me tell you
HAHAHA I’m in!
Being an ex-lawyer, I love the way that you have used ‘definitely’ and ‘probably’ in the same sentence.
Gotta lol that.
Once someone brings one to you, then you can contact me so that I can bring my spit roasting gear so that I can skin the goat, then put it on the spit roast , which takes a minimum of 4 hours to be cooked really well. TC readers can then have a dinner party (goat meat).
Stop consulting your lawyer(s).
I’m Lovin it, Goat Industry ^_^ interesting
God, I cannot believe this. Allen Stern and I jokingly came up with @alexsgoatfarm… Google, you kill me sometimes.
I beat them to a trend once!
The goat market is hot. Most start a business selling goats to corporate companies. Make millions!
The goat story? Really?
Good in-depth reporting, wrong story to do it on.
Would love to see more coverage like this on other news stories.
Well, we tried to do something similar with MySpace…but I failed to get as close as I got to the goats.
Arrington sitting in a field with goats? Hillarious!!! LOL
What the heck? Don’t goad PETA into becoming hysterical over nothing.
Wow. This is classic. It makes subscribing to TechCrunch for the past 2 years totally worth it.
the city of oakland has done this for awhile. you will see the goats on the hillside when you are on the 580.
now google into drama?
come on you can feed cut grass to the goats, need not play this much drama of bringing goats etc, seems like all smart people are leaving google, only drama queens left there!
Its a nice idea. Why not take a more eco-system approach with the right mix of plants and animals it would be green and easy to manage. you may even be able to produce some fresh food to supplement the kitchens. Install bio-reactors on sites to process poo / waste biomatter into methane, convert all flower beds to veggy patches, if your going green you might as well go large. Or am i getting a bit too serious?
A Google goat did conjure images of a goat with “Google” painted on the side
Goats are cool. They should be genetically engineered or modified. There needs to be stem cell nanobots that can auto-assemble and augment the skeletal structure as well as the external elements through some kind of programmable interface linked to a synthetic genomic assembly device.
You can only build one goat in the beginning and then you get more goat-currency as you invite more friends to create their own goats. Of course – if you don’t want to endure the natural accumulation of goat-currency through goatraising you can talk to the Goatgod and fill out offers in exchange for receiving Goat-Points which can then be used to refill your synthetic genomic parts. There would be a leader board and all.
Green Google: soon we will be hearing about goat flu in CA.
Yeah, first thing I did upon leaving the goats was wash my hands. Well, I tweeted first, then washed my hands.
You should have washed your hands first. I got Goat Flu from your tweet! Darn you MG!
Nothing better to do on a Sunday than hang out with the goats! Hope you bonded with some of them.
I’d just keep a smaller herd per area? let them roam free per area, build them a nice 100% recycle-able shack for when it rains and call it a day. No need to bring them off the grass unless it was a detriment to their health, then if the goats needed fed bring forth some lawn waste from the surrounding areas to feed the perpetual google goats..
Makes sense to me, but then again where I live they encourage the burning of lawn waste.
Really cool, i must say. But wouldn’t the goat pull the grass out by the roots, which means, Google needs to replant the grass again. I might be wrong.
They are cute, indeed.
Are these goats going to be eventually slaughtered for meat? Are they being fed to become a source of organic Mutton Chops?
Google should promote vegetarianism….
Oh I needed this. Wonderful and pointless article. Thanks for cheering my afternoon with flower-poisoned, electrocuted, wet goat pictures.
Are there no good tech news to cover out there anymore? What a waste of time!
PS: “good” is optional
I want one. I don’t think my neighbors or zoning will allow it though.
It’s really disappointing that they are not branded with the google logo!
@Mike just go steal one your self… you are a lawyer I’m sure you can get away with it
I have to get myself some of these Goats to mow my lawn
That’s just sooo cool. I want some for my garden. Well, one maybe!
thx for the video.
Now the lame publicity stunt is confirmed. Google-Nerds are in Apple-Fanboy frenzy while real life-stock owners and people who care about animals shake their heads.
The vast and rising amount of energy that is consumed by us, the internet-users rises 10% per year. Carbon footprint indeed.
No public-stunt will help to disguise that.
Anyone who can answer these, gets a thumbs up!
1. Is it legal to keep Goat and Lion ‘together’ as pets?
2. Is it legal to offer Beer to a Goat? Would PETA be upset over it?
3. Did the Goats know that they were at the mighty Google campus? Do they have consciousness?
4. Why Goats? Why not horses to graze? You can even ride them around for fun.
These are serious questions. Serious answers only please:)
Google Goats are the next big startup, what’s next? Need to check Labs for Google Beavers to help control the local river flow
I cant believe you actually went to PETA. Typical of someone to put a spanner in and try and get some cheap publicity from it..it takes innovation to do things the way google does!
your videos would be a whole lot more fun if there was a billy goat in the herd
OMG!! what a hell!! I had a different opinion regarding what we call “grass” — that something is green people, GREEN! this is just a empty rock ‘n’ sandy field… I thought it will be a beautiful garden you need to take care of. Why would GOOG even bother taking care of that part of their land.. there is nothing there!!
What about all the jobs they just shedded? Yay it’s greener they got Goats, but now a dozen landscapers are out of work.
Do the Goats get Google stock options?
You guys know Yahoo did this like 4 years ago, right? This isn’t something specific to Google, it was a company that provided the service to quickly clear large fields.
ya but Google got more media coverage with it – which is 100% why this was done, obvi.
To satisfy all your burning goat questions, check out eXtension (pronounced e-Extension): http://www.extension.org/goat
Top notch reporting. TechCrunch, great move on bringing over MG. Which now stands for “Mr. Goat”
Goatse?
I think google should build the goats a barn or goathouse ? to sleep in at night / keep out of the sun if they want or they might all get skin cancer from the UV rays and that won’t look very nice :O
Electric fences are fine. They probably use a higher voltage to train them but lower voltage after the animals are used to them.
i want to know how many trucks transport these goats! is that like a cavalcade of trucks?
Many plants are a bit poisonous, as a defense, because so many things want to eat them and plants can’t exactly run away. So if you’re feeding goats, stick to grass and anything that vegetarian people would eat. But goats are pretty tough, so people are not likely to kill them accidentally unless they feed buckets of the wrong stuff.
I’m cool with the whole “go green” thing, but isn’t this a bit too much?
Save the google goats!!! *lemon walks about with placard all over techcrunch*
MG,
Do you edit your own video or do you have someone who does that?
I produce short documentaries as part of an internship but never thought to ask if tech crunch has interns who do the same sort of thing.
Huh… wuh?
You think PETA would get upset because they’re outside in the rain without shelter? Seriously?
They’re animals. Animals live outside, and yes it rains outside. (Do you really not get this?)
Or maybe all you understand about the natural world is what you’ve learned from Pixar/Disney movies?
I could certainly do with one of these for my garden..
I could certainly do with one of these for my garden.