Why Goats Are Grazing at the Capitol Graveyard
They're used to clear brush every summer.
— -- Congress has left Washington to the goats.
Some 30 goats will spend the next two weeks grazing on the grounds of the Congressional Cemetery in Washington, DC, the final resting place for more than 65,000 Washingtonians, including former FBI director J. Edgar Hoover.
Whiskey, Cleopatra, Cinnamon, Peanut and the other goats will chomp their way through weeds, poison ivy and debris in an effort to clean up the historic graveyard, where former presidents William Henry Harrison and Zachary Taylor were briefly interred.
Carrying a price tag of just $5,000 for two weeks -- roughly $30 an hour -- the new groundskeepers, who were last leased to the cemetery in 2013, are a steal.
"You can’t get labor cheaper than that,” said Paul Williams, director of the Historic Congressional Cemetery. “It’s also an alternative to using chemicals to get rid of those invasives.”
Goats are frequently used for groundskeeping around the country.
Chicago O’Hare International Airport, for example, relies on 40 grazing goats, sheep, llamas and alpacas to maintain 8,000 acres of property.