A few years back I had an assignment to photograph a small
goat dairy near Winona, Minnesota. I happily documented the owner and family with
the milk goats and even managed to get some nice images of their massive billy
goat who was the undisputed leader of the herd.
They also had many adorable baby goats and I had fun feeding
them bottles and watching them play. I noticed that three little white goat
kids had escaped from their pen and mentioned this to the owner. She laughed
and told me not to worry; those three are always getting out. I finished
shooting and was beginning to load up my gear when a small white kid goat
jumped into the back of my open mini van.
“Hey!” I shouted, and was reaching towards him to pull him
out, when the other two kids goats jumped in one right after another. They were
duplicates of the first goat. All white with big perky ears, and short wagglely
tails. “Hey!” I said again,
laughing. The owner came over and stated, “You may as well take them. They are
too small for the butcher. “
She explained that they were triplets, and although weaned
and ready to go, they weren’t worth anything at the sales barn because they
were on the small side. They were males and although she’d like to, she can only
keep the females or does for her dairy.
I remembered my husband, Kevin’ s prior agreement with me that
sheep were ok, but no goats! Goats, from our experience, were nothing but trouble.
You can’t keep them in their pen, they like to jump on cars (at least the pygmy
goats do) and they eat everything in sight.
But when their three little faces peered out at me as if to
say. “Well? Let’s get going,” I knew I was done. Being an animal person, I always have an empty crate in the back
of my van, so I loaded the goats in it.
My four sons were thrilled when the goat kids jumped out of
the crate and ran right up to them to be petted. Kevin… not so much. “Goats,”
he sighed, shaking his head. “I thought we agreed. “
“They were going to be butchered.” I told him. “I couldn’t let
that happen.” As if on cue, the goat kids ran to Kevin, pushing on him with
their heads and wagging their short tails. “Ok.” he said to them, while he
scratched their heads. “You’re here. You may as well stay.”
The younger boys promptly named them Marcus, Aralias, and Tiberius.
They tend to name animals after what they are reading and it happened to be
about the Romans at the time.
I set the goat kids up in a horse stall with an old calf hut
for even more shelter. It wasn’t
long before they figured out that they could crawl under the bars of the gate
to freedom.
They became our constant companions. Whether it was chore
time, where they insisted on stealing corn from the chicken feeders, or haying time,
where they jumped on and off the bales as I tried to move them around, or just
hang out in the yard time, where they tried to nibble on the book I reading,
they were always part of what we were doing. When a crew came to insulate the
house, the goats managed to sneak into the back of their open truck and had to
be locked up for the duration.
We have learned that we can forget
about trying to keep them in their pen. There is an old saying, that if your
fence can hold water it can hold a goat. We have found this to be true.
Just when I thought I had closed
all the gaps large enough for a small goat to crawl under, they learned to jump
right over it. I watched in amazement as they jumped straight up and over, one
right after another, like small deer. I wonder why nobody has started the sport
of goat agility like they do for dogs. I think goats would be excellent at it.
And forget about having a garden;
although the goats do eat weeds, they also eat all the good plants and shrubbery
as well. I remember the first spring we had them, I had a lovely plot of tulips
that were just about ready to bloom. The goats had escaped again, and it only
took them moments to eat the tops off of every tulip.
I won’t say they’re all bad
though. Now that they are full grown, topping out at 75 pound each, they
protect the sheep and will drive away dogs they don’t know. They are good
company and are always curious about what we are doing. Being white, they photograph
well, and are easy to find in the dark. And finally, they are always guaranteed
to make me smile.
all images © Barbara O'Brien Photography We are located in the beautiful rolling hills of western Wisconsin but have camera and will travel. Images are available for reproduction. Please e-mail or call with intended usage, size of print run, distribution. Barbara O'Brien Photography 612 812 8788 cell 715 448 3456 home barbara@barbaraobrienphoto.com
