Computerworld’s Seth Weintraub reports that in California, it’s a legal requirement that landowners remove excess brush from their land to help reduce the likelihood of brush fires. In response, Google hired the goats from a company called California Grazing to handle the job. And the benefits over traditional lawn mowers are multifold. As Google’s Dan Hoffman explains in the Google blog:
A herder brings about 200 goats and they spend roughly a week with us at Google, eating the grass and fertilizing at the same time. The goats are herded with the help of Jen, a border collie. It costs us about the same as mowing, and goats are a lot cuter to watch than lawn mowers.
While it won’t do much for California’s unemployment rate or its landscaping firms, it does underscore Google’s commitment to green solutions. And it’s a lot like Google’s floating data center idea: green and cute.
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