Hiring a flock of sheep to clear dried brush and grass is also like getting a petting zoo for a while, one homeowner says.

Ira Hocherman remembers looking out his window in the Point Reyes area in 2020 and seeing the glow of fire a few miles away.

He and his husband spent a few smoky and sleepless nights — and they don’t want a future fire to get any closer.

And so Hocherman called in a herd of sheep to munch the meadow around their house, where grass can sometimes grow 6- or 7-feet high. In previous years, he and his husband used a crew of weed trimmers, but they found that, although the sheep were somewhat more expensive, they ate everything.

“There’s really no comparison to the machine,” Hocherman said.

As Californians grapple with ever-present wildfire risk amid a record-breaking drought, some are turning to a seemingly simple, and sustainable, solution: sheep and goats. The animals can easily get to spots inaccessible to people, and their hooves create small divots in the ground, naturally tilling the soil. Depending on how costs and benefits are tallied, some homeowners like Hocherman say, although costs of herds are rising, they are a better investment for clearing brush than paying for workers.

Taran Lewis creates a grazing pasture for his flock of 16 sheep behind Stinson Beach School. Sheep can easily reach spots in tough terrain, and their hooves naturally till the soil.

Hocherman worked with Taran Lewis, the Bolinas-based owner of a relatively small herd of 21 Navajo-Churro sheep. Lewis said his one-man operation is quickly growing, and while he is starting to work with bigger clients, he still loves the small yard-level jobs.

“It’s just really cool because you’re exposing people who actually haven’t had that much interaction with livestock ... to all the environmentally friendly aspects of it,” Lewis said.

Hocherman said he and his husband paid more for Lewis’ herd than they would have for a Weedwacker crew, but the results were better and longer lasting. Weed-trimming crews cost about $300 a visit. The sheep — which have come twice a year — were about $400 a week, with an additional $35 an hour to set up a fence to contain them. Each yard is different, but for Hocherman the total came out to $650. The weed trimmers did not remove everything like the sheep did.

“It was really kind of phenomenal, and we were just really happy doing it that way,” he said.

But sheep and goats are not a universal solution for reducing wildfire risk. Christopher Campbell, acting natural resources manager for the San Francisco Recreation and Parks Department, said they generally aren’t a good fit for fire abatement in the city. The animals’ eating habits are non-discriminant, so if they are introduced in areas with more sensitive plant life, they could do damage. Trampling could cause erosion in some areas. And then there are residents’ dogs, which strain to get at the animals, despite the electric fences around them.

However, San Francisco does use goats to help restore some of the natural areas throughout the city, Campbell said. Recently, goats were used to reduce Himalayan blackberry, an invasive species, in Glen Canyon Park.

For governments or private landowners looking to use herds, another issue is that costs are rising.

A recent California agricultural overtime law, AB1066, requires that herders receive pay for a 168-hour week because they are on call 24 hours a day. The law went into effect in 2019 for larger companies with 26 or more employees. Companies with 25 or fewer employees had until January to phase in the new rules.

Under the new law, the monthly minimum salary for herders with 25 or fewer employees — which include operations that raise sheep for wool, as well as for fire prevention — rose from around $2,300 to $3,444, starting in January, according to the state. By 2025, the minimum is set to rise to around $4,381 for operations of that size, according to the California Wool Growers Association.

Last year, herders told The Chronicle that the new law — which increased sheepherder pay by 50% — was forcing them to reduce the size of their herds and lay off staff. Additionally, changes this spring to the interpretation of minimum wage regulations appear to be causing costs to soar even higher for goat herders in particular.

Taran Lewis installs a fence to create a new grazing pasture for his sheep to eat grass and brush behind Stinson Beach School. Some homeowners say sheep are a better investment than workers for clearing brush.

Andrée Soares, owner of Star Creek Land Stewards, a company that uses sheep and goats for fire-prevention grazing in the Bay Area, said she’s had to raise prices but hasn’t had to let go of any employees or reduce the size of her herd. Still, she’s apprehensive, as the minimum costs continue to rise following the regulations.

“It’s frightening,” she said.

Soares is also vice president of the wool growers group, which is suing the state over the AB1066 overtime rules, arguing sheepherders should not have been included. Soares said the group did not prevail in district court but is appealing the ruling.

She’s not sure what herding groups might do regarding the additional goat-specific regulations that took effect a few months ago.

For herders, the job certainly can be round-the-clock. Lewis, for example, doesn’t have to stay overnight to watch the herd, but he is on call at all hours in case the homeowners need assistance. He sets up a portable electric fence to contain the sheep; the time it takes to clear a yard varies based on the amount of brush, the size of the yard and the time of year.

Lewis’ herd of sheep has cleared Hocherman’s meadow three times now. Unlike the Weedwackers, the sheep are quiet and come with their own set of personalities. Hocherman says the herd made it more fun to manage his home’s defensible space.

“You kind of missed them when they left,” he said. “They kind of brought a small little petting zoo to your yard.”

Emma Talley is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: emma.talley@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @EmmaT332

Emma Talley is a reporting intern for The Chronicle's metro team. She is a current undergraduate at Stanford University, where she studies communications and art, and writes for her campus newspaper. She is originally from Sacramento, California.