Keeping a goat is a big commitment in a lot of ways.
As with any animal, one of the biggest is how long it will be around.
Alpine goats are one of the most common and popular breeds in the world, whether for milk or just companionship.
Before getting one, then, you really ought to know how long they live—so let’s find out.
Alpine goats will be around for up to two decades, then, so you’ve got to be prepared for this commitment.
It’s always best to assume that the animal will live as long as it possibly can, so you can prepare to be there for it its whole life.
Let’s look further into this.
How long do domestic alpine goats live?
It’s going to depend on a wide variety of factors.
Firstly, their environment.
Alpine goats are quite hardy, but they’re still likely to live longer in more mild climates than in harsher, colder ones.
They do better in less extreme temperatures.
The other main factor will be their diet.
There are a wide variety of ways you can feed goats, but they will definitely do better on a more varied and balanced diet.
Many goat owners tend to default to a pure hay diet, with perhaps the occasional kitchen scrap thrown in.
This really isn’t adequate and will shorten their lifespan.
Given the best possible conditions in terms of climate and diet, you should expect your alpine goat to live for up to 18 years.
In many cases, they may well exceed this and reach the ripe old age of 20 years or more.
This, though, would be an outlier.
So, if you’re thinking of getting an alpine goat, you should prepare yourself for the long run.
As I said, though they might be perfectly healthy and still only live to be around 15, you should be ready for them to live longer than this.
As I’m sure you can imagine, the lifespan of a domestic goat, or indeed any domestic animal, is going to be a lot longer than its feral counterpart—so how long do they live in the wild?
How long do wild alpine goats live?
There’s not a great deal of solid data on wild alpine goats specifically.
However, we can make some reasonably good estimates based on a variety of data.
Firstly, of course, wild goats do not live as long as domestic ones.
This is due to less availability of food, water, higher stress, and other factors.
Wild alpine goats are likely to live around 9 to 12 years.
This is a common average for wild goats, and is a good benchmark for the alpine goat, too.
Of course, alpine goats have spread to many corners of the world even as wild goats, and climate and local conditions will have an effect on this, too.
Goats are sexually mature at quite a young age, so they don’t really need to live that long to maintain an established population.
Even in the most ideal climates and conditions, though, wild alpine goats are unlikely to live longer than 12 years.
On average, it’s probably closer to 9-10. It’s not easy being a wild animal when compared with a domestic one!
That said, 12 years in the wild is still reasonably good going for any animal.
Do we know the oldest alpine goat that ever lived?
What is the oldest ever alpine goat?
Unfortunately, we have no solid data on this, either.
But as far as records show, the oldest goat that ever lived of any breed was 24 when she died.
This, then, would be an extremely old age for an alpine goat to reach, but it is not out of the question.
They have just the same capacity to reach such an age as any other breed.
Alpine goats are remarkably hardy and weather resistant, compared to other breeds.
So you might expect that they tend to live into old age more than other goats do.
Unfortunately, we just don’t have any solid and reliable records to prove this.
How old can an alpine goat breed?
If you are wondering the earliest age where an alpine goat can breed, it’s usually somewhere from 7-10 months.
This is true of alpine goats, too, of either sex.
Males reach puberty a bit earlier, but still can’t be bred until they’re around 8 months old.
On the upper age than an older alpine goat can still breed, they generally can breed for most of their lives.
Males can certainly carry on virtually forever.
Females, on the other hand, do struggle later on in life, if only because the process of labor takes such a toll on their bodies.
Does are usually retired from breeding around 7-10 years old.
Alpine goats have a pretty typical lifespan, then, as goats go. 20 years is probably the simplest benchmark to expect, though they may well live more or fewer years than this.
The most important thing for you is to be prepared for it to live as long as it possibly could.
You are making a big commitment by taking on a goat, so be sure to prepare yourself for that.
More in Alpine
- How Long Do Alpine Goats Live?
- Are Alpine Goats Good For Meat?
- How Much Does An Alpine Goat Cost?