In order to have a non-vendor source for oats, it'd be neat if the chickens dropped them occasionally, similar to dirt piles dropping loam occasionally.
Not sure if you already know this, but I occasionally get oats from my crop garden. I think you might need Croppery II or some other gardening skill, though.
Or perhaps a knife-and-board recipe to turn grain (wheat) into oats as well as flour. It doesn't even have to be a different ratio, just a different byproduct.
I think I favor the roll option :) A new knife and board recipe would kill me. Making flour is already incredibly time consuming. I think the max should be boosted to 80 at least for such a simple recipe. In the same way that you can grind 100 salt at a time.
I saw elsewhere in the forums somebody suggesting narwhals, manatees, and platypuses. I'm not sure why those creatures specifically (and I'm too lazy to look), but maybe oats could come from one of those. Or maple syrup. Or olive oil. Or whatever. I don't know what the hell I'm talking about. French toast, please.
If you make Oats from Goats, what do you do with the left over G's? 8)
If we had a spigot tool, different trees could be used to gather Olive Oil, Syrup, Oily Dressing and Honey. This seems a very Glitch like solution to me. And also takes us one step closer to a vendor free economy.
I believe the "spigot" is an unused item in the game and its intended use was for "gum" trees, which were removed but I believe stoot said not to be surprised if they made it into the game at some point.