Goats
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146 free Goats trivia questions with answers — nature quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
50 free goats trivia questions with answers. Think you know everything about goats? Put your knowledge to the test with our challenging 146-question trivia quiz. From ancient goat history to modern dairy breeds, this quiz covers fascinating facts about one of humanity's most useful animals. Whether you're a farmer, animal lover, or just curious, see how well you score!
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Q 01Which French word for goat is also the usual name for cheese made from goat's milk?
Chèvre
Chèvre means goat in French. Its tang comes from fatty acids so tied to the animal that chemists named them caproic, caprylic and capric, after capra, the Latin for goat.
Q 02Which of these fibers is primarily harvested from Angora goats?
Mohair
Mohair is the Angora goat's long, lustrous fleece, usually shorn twice a year; confusingly, the fibre sold as angora comes from Angora rabbits instead.
Q 03What shape is a goat's pupil?
Horizontal slit
Horizontal slit pupils give a goat a panoramic view of approaching predators, and when it lowers its head to graze, its eyes rotate in their sockets to keep the slits level with the ground.
Q 04What is a group of goats typically called?
Herd
Herd is the usual word for a group of goats; older collective nouns such as 'trip' and 'tribe' also survive in word lists, while a pride is lions, a gaggle geese and a pod whales.
Q 05Goats were among the first animals humans domesticated, mainly in which region?
Middle East
The Middle East: villagers at Ganj Dareh in Iran's Zagros Mountains were herding wild goats about 10,000 years ago, swapping the hunt for a ready supply of milk and meat.
Q 06Which goat breed is well-known for its exceptionally long, pendulous ears?
Nubian
Nubian, or Anglo-Nubian, goats are a British creation despite the name: 19th-century breeders crossed native prick-eared goats with large lop-eared imports from Asia and North Africa.
Q 07In temperate climates, most goats come into heat during which season?
Autumn
Autumn: shortening days set off the breeding season, and with a pregnancy of about 150 days the kids arrive in spring.
Q 08Which wild animal of the Zagros Mountains is the likely ancestor of nearly all domestic goats?
Bezoar ibex
The bezoar ibex, a wild goat that still lives in the Zagros, was first herded there about 10,000 years ago; genetic analysis later confirmed what the bones suggested, that nearly all domestic goats descend from it.
Q 09What is the common term for a castrated male goat?
Wether
A castrated male goat is a wether, a word it shares with sheep; a wether with a bell round its neck led the flock, which is where 'bellwether' comes from.
Q 10Which goat breed is famous for 'fainting' when startled?
Myotonic
Myotonic goats inherit myotonia congenita, which delays their muscles relaxing after a sudden movement, so a startled goat stiffens and may keel over; the breed traces to a few goats in 1880s Tennessee.
Q 11Which dairy goat breed is known for typically producing the highest volume of milk?
Saanen
Saanen goats, named for their home valley in the Alps, are the classic heavy milkers and have been exported to more than eighty countries; being pale-skinned, they cope badly with strong sun.
Q 12By their eating habits, goats are classed as which type of feeder?
Browsers
Browsers pick leaves, twigs and shrubs rather than cropping grass; the goat's eat-anything reputation comes from curiosity, since it will nibble cardboard or clothing just to test whether it is food.
Q 13What are the fleshy appendages that dangle from each side of the neck on many dairy goats called?
Wattles
Q 21Like cattle, goats lack which teeth?
Upper front
Upper front teeth are missing: the eight lower front teeth bite against a tough gum pad instead, and because the adult ones come in a pair at a time over the first years, keepers read a goat's age from them.
Q 22A shortage of which trace mineral causes white muscle disease in young goats?
Selenium
Selenium shortage, alone or with too little vitamin E, causes white muscle disease, named for the bleached look of the damaged muscle; where soils are poor in selenium, goats' feed is fortified with it.
Q 23The Oberhasli dairy goat breed originated in which country?
Switzerland
Switzerland's Oberhasli district, in the Bernese Oberland, gave the breed its name, but in America these goats were simply called Swiss Alpine and bred with other Alpines until breeders split them off in the 1970s.
Wattles, also called tassels, are fur-covered tags of skin, one hanging from each side of the neck; keepers call them goat jewelry, since some goats have them, some do not, and they serve no purpose but adornment.
Q 14What is an adult female goat commonly called?
Doe
An adult female goat is commonly referred to as a 'doe' or 'nanny goat'. 'Ewe' is a female sheep, 'sow' is a female pig, and 'hen' is a female chicken.
Q 15Mr. Tumnus, the goat-legged creature Lucy meets in Narnia, is what kind of mythical being?
Faun
Faun: C. S. Lewis said the whole Narnia story grew from a single picture in his head of a faun carrying an umbrella and parcels through a snowy wood.
Q 16How many chambers does a goat's stomach have?
Four
Four chambers, the rumen, reticulum, omasum and abomasum, make a goat a ruminant; a suckling kid's milk bypasses the rumen through a groove, so at first it digests like a single-stomached animal.
Q 17Dairy farmers say a goat has done what when she gives birth and comes into milk?
Freshened
Freshened is the dairy word for giving birth and starting to milk; the birth usually passes without trouble, and the mother often eats the placenta, removing a scent that would draw predators.
Q 18Which president, himself a president's grandson, chased runaway White House goat Old Whiskers down Pennsylvania Avenue?
Benjamin Harrison
Benjamin Harrison, grandson of William Henry Harrison, was seen holding on to his top hat as he ran after Old Whiskers, who had bolted through the gates pulling a cart full of his grandchildren.
Q 19Which of these goat breeds originated in West Africa?
Pygmy
Pygmy goats descend from West African Dwarf stock; they reached America between 1930 and 1960 as zoo exhibits and research animals, and only later caught on as pets.
Q 20What is the average lifespan of a domestic goat?
15-18 years
A domestic goat's life expectancy is 15-18 years; difficult births can cut a doe's to 10 or 11, and the stress of going into rut each year can cut a buck's to eight to ten.
Q 24What is the scientific subfamily to which both sheep and goats belong?
Caprinae
Both sheep (Ovis aries) and goats (Capra aegagrus hircus) belong to the subfamily Caprinae within the Bovidae family, indicating their close biological relationship.
Q 25What characteristic lets goat's milk go without homogenizing?
Smaller fat globules
Smaller fat globules stay suspended, so the cream takes days to rise; cheesemakers go further and avoid homogenizing goat's milk at all, because it harms the curd.
Q 26Which fast-growing meat goat breed typically has a white body and a red-brown head?
Boer
The Boer goat, white-bodied with a red-brown head, was selectively bred in South Africa's Eastern Cape in the early 1900s to thrive on thorn veldt, and is used worldwide to improve meat goats.
Q 27What is the common name for the fine, downy undercoat fibre combed from certain goat breeds and sold as luxury knitwear?
Cashmere
Cashmere is an old spelling of Kashmir, whose shawls made the fibre the height of fashion in 19th-century Europe; the down still has to be separated from the coarse outer coat before it can be spun.
Q 28A healthy goat can run at 103°F, a fever in a person; which animal normally runs hotter still?
Chicken
Chicken body temperature normally sits at about 105°F or higher, against a goat's 101.3 to 103.5°F; having no sweat glands, a hen sheds the surplus heat by panting.
Q 29How does the lactose level of goat's milk compare with that of cow's milk?
About the same
About the same: goat's milk has only slightly less lactose than cow's, so despite its reputation it is no fix for lactose intolerance.
Q 30What is the distinctive sound a goat makes?
Bleat
A goat's cry is a bleat, a word it shares with sheep; goats moved into a new social group shift their calls to sound more like their companions, a hint that they pick up accents.