Goat barns should be thoroughly cleaned every 6 months, usually in the fall and spring.  Face masks can be worn over your nose and mouth to prevent dust from getting into your lungs while you use a broom to dust off cobwebs from the walls and ceiling. Using a pitchfork, you can lift out the old straw off the ground that is mixed with nanny berries. This is rich in nitrogen, so you can haul it to a pile to be used for compost.  Make sure you cover the pile with something like a large tarp or else the rain will wash away all of the useful nitrogen, making it almost worthless for the garden.  It takes about one year for it to turn into rich compost that will be wonderful for your garden. After cleaning out all the old straw off the ground, put a layer of fresh straw down. We used to spend all day cleaning out the goat barn, but since that seemed so tiresome and overwhelming, we decided to spend about one hour each day cleaning out small sections of the barn.  Doing small sections over a period of several days makes the job much less wearisome and monotonous.  The barn our goats used to be in had a dirt floor, but the one they are in now has a cement floor; either kind of floor is fine. When we finally get all the old straw out, and get down to the bare cement, we scrape off any stuck-on straw, and wash the floor with soap and water and make sure it is thoroughly dry before we put down a fresh layer of straw and let the goats back in their barn.

Every day we wash out the water containers and the mineral containers and give them fresh water and minerals. Once a week or more we wash their water and mineral containers out with soap and water.

Mark your calendar to clean the barn thoroughly again in 6 months.