MEDINA, Ohio -- When Christopher Miller needed troublesome thistles and nettles cleared from his property in a Medina subdivision a year ago, he found a rather unique alternative to weed whacking: have goats eat the overgrowth.

"I figured I could get in there with a machete, or just let the goats do it," Miller said.

He contacted James and Heather Kovach, who own Haulin' Goats. The couple has eight adult goats that they lend to homeowners who need weeds and other overgrown fauna stripped from their property.

The Kovachs erected a fence around the roughly 200 square feet of overgrown weeds surrounding Miller's house, and set their goats loose.

"I think part of it was the novelty," Miller said when asked why he decided to use goats to clear the unwanted fauna. But he said he also enjoys some peace of mind from not using pesticides.

The idea of renting out their goats came to James and Heather Kovach a little less than a year ago when they first acquired several of the animals that they house in a small shed adjacent to their rural two-story house in Valley City.

"Friends started sending us links to articles (about goat rentals) on Facebook," Heather Kovach said.

The stories piqued her interest, so she poked around the Internet and found that homeowners on the West Coast were renting goats to clear unwanted shrubbery from their backyards.

"I just thought it was such a cool idea," Heather Kovach said. "Last summer we decided to just go for it."

After they took on a few customers, news of their services began to spread through word-of-mouth, the couple said.

They eventually became successful enough that James Kovach quit his day job to focus on the new business.

The couple sets up a fence around the area their customer wants cleared and then releases the goats to do what they do best: eat.

"We did a lot of work last summer for a couple who bought a house on a lake, and their entire lake front was covered in poison ivy," Heather Kovach said. The husband was allergic to poison ivy, making it impossible for him to clear the invasive weed himself.

A single goat can usually clear 800 square feet of unwanted fauna per day, Heather Kovach said, but added that it can take longer if the weeds are especially thick.

"They'll eat poison ivy, thistles, and things people definitely don't want to deal with," she said.

"We really wanted to do this because we believe in the process, being able to do something that's natural and non-chemical," James Kovach said. "It's animals doing what they do in nature for a purpose."

Goats are a good alternative to weed whacking as long as you don't mind that they're indiscriminate, said Emily Rauschert, a professor of plant ecology at Cleveland State University.

"Basically, they eat all the vegetation on the ground," Rauschert said.

Customers should use goats when they want nothing left after the creatures have done their job, she said.

Rauschert also cautioned that goats might not eat the roots of the invasive foliage a customer wants to get rid of, leaving the possibility that it could grow back.

The only environmental concern that she raised was over soil erosion. Rauschert recommended against using goats on any deep slope near a river or stream, because vegetation can keep soil from washing away.