!Tubeless! Tubeless is a must! it will close most goat head holes. and no need to repair inner tubes all the time.
No idea how it is in Colorado
here in Spain Castilla y Leon there are many goat heads! Don't cycle on the side of the off roads. Axoloti´s is a good advice, same happened to me once when camping.
Before riding tubeless we a friend and me once had a funny day, we had to move to the shoulder of the road, they cut the road to move "torros bravos", so we rolled for some meters on the shoulder and had all 4 tires flated. All 4 inner tubes had several holes! We fixed them .... when finished two tires have been flat again 😂, the needles break and it's very very difficult to find them and pull them out, once found. we had 16 flats in two days
))
nothing of this will happen when using tubeless.
A good way to find them or anything left inside the tire is to lightly rub a cotton ball along the inside. It will usually catch on even the slightest of protrusions.