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by culi 761 days ago
The argon tree (as in the argon oil in your shampoos and soaps) is also known as the "goat tree". Please peruse these phenomenal photos of trees completely full of goats. Everyone of them looks like an album cover for some mid-00s indie band

https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/tree-goats-of-morocco-argan...

https://www.google.com/search?q=argon+goat&udm=2

2 comments

I’ve seen both chickens and goats in trees in Germany. It occurs naturally if the owner doesn’t care to much. Of course the goat will eat all the leaves and the tree will die eventually.

I really like the pictures from Morroco though, thank you!

It's argan, not argon. And the whole goat poop thing is just a urban legend guides like to repeat to naive tourists.
Thanks for the correction. Not sure what myth you're talking about. Goats are one of the main seed dispersers at this point and overgrazing can even be a problem. Goats do also climb argan trees naturally for fruit, but I looked it up and there is an issue of herders purposefully trying to put many goats into a tree for tourists to take pictures. I'd imagine you wouldn't see a whole dozen of them in a tree like this if they're just grazing alone but they certainly can and do climb trees for fruit. Argan isn't even the only tree they're known to do this with
The article you linked has a section about goats eating the argan fruit and pooping the nuts which are then supposedly collected to make argan oil. That's pure BS.
I see. Thanks for the clarification