For almost 30 years, the Riquet family has been specialising in goats on a 60 hectares of land south of Poitiers, the region's main city. The majority of their land is used to raise maize, corn and alfalfa to feed the goats. Some 20 people work on the farm, and up to 30 people at the birth period (in winter).

Each member of the family is responsible for a particular product : milk, meat, cheese and delicatessen. The "permanent" flock consists of some 2,400 goats of two distinct species : the Alpines (brown) and the Saanen (white). The goats are bred indoors, for hygienic reasons : the dried litter is changed twice a week and a regular cleaning-out assures perfect hygiene of the complete flock (since open air breeding would cause sanitary and logistical difficulties and would require land of 342 hectares, in addition to that needed for food growing!).

The goats are milked and fed twice a day, they eat only maize, corn, straw and alfalfa (part of this food comes from neighbouring farms). Each goat eats an average of 3kg per day.

The farm activities : 25,000 young goats (0 to 30 days old) born on the farmland or in the area are fed with milk in the fattening house. From 30 to 60 days old, they are called kids, and their meat is of highest quality. The meat of those who are 4 to 5 weeks old is essentially for the Italian trade and those 8 weeks old are for France.

Each goat gives an average 800kg of milk a year in the milk house. Breeding young she-goats is more difficult and is part of the Riquet family know-how. They are intended to develop or create new breeding in all Europe because many breeders have not mastered that skill. The cheese plant, which is a recently developed activity, sells its products to co-operatives, manufactures of cheeses and small food stores. Riquet products are present at fairs and local markets too. The delicatessen plant never uses "unfit" animals. The meats selected for canning or meat-curing are thus of highest quality. The manufacturing process is carried out under very stringent hygiene conditions.

You can visit the Riquets' farm, which takes part in many regional festivities (such as "Welcome to farm"), from the 1st of June to the 15th of September.

Learn more about the region, its specific gastronmy and products : visit our partners' web site at Franceartdevivre.com