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Call this a sequel to She’s “Girl, Just Keep Your Legs Together, And All Will Be Well!” She just turned 70. When I turned 50, I thought nothing of it. I didn’t feel old, and actually, I still don’t. All the years between 50 and 60, I never
I started watching Holy Schmidt on YouTube. He is a financial guy with the perfect amount of dorkiness. Great guy with a lot of good advice. I came up with a financial plan that works for me. I won’t be driving a new Teletubby Jaguar but I’ll be fine. I hear they have TRANSmission problems anyway. I’ll get by but I’m looking for another line of work that has nothing to do with programming or managing people. I’ve had enough of both. Except for people I actually want to talk to, and using my computer to send invoices will be okay, too.
Why did I get goats? I still don’t really understand myself. I guess there are multiple reasons. I grew up on Teneriffe Farm here in Podunk. We had one of those farms that never made any money. My parents bought the place in 1968. We were city folk from south Worcester. At five years old, I made my rounds around the hood. Karls’s candy store, jumping between the stacks of lumber at the lumber yard, smoking cigarettes behind Mum's chair. Good times.
Our farmhouse was built prior to 1720. That’s when the old Brookfield town hall burnt down, and they created new records. At the highlight, we had 2 ducks, 8 cats, my best friend Prince (horse), the stupid pony, fish, a jerk goat that I wanted to kill, 2 rabbits, a crop of potatoes, 11 St. Bernards, and a partridge in the apple tree. We didn’t have pears. This is apple country.
I was fortunate enough to end up with the property that I loved. I have one brother and four sisters and never thought I would end up back here. I cut off two acres for the dilapidated farmhouse and sold it to my niece. She is a historian and is restoring it with her husband and two great little girls. My parents wanted it to stay in the family, and it is.
I built my log house on the rest of the property as far back as I could get. I think it’s the grouchy old-man-anti-people thing. I said two cats is my limit. Nothing else. Now we have three cats and three goats. That’s really the limit. Nothing else. Except, I’m adapting the old plow and harrow to my new tractor. But that’s it. Nothing else.
There was a local story this spring about an obviously mentally ill woman in Ayer, MA who had mostly goats. Mostly goats in her bedroom, in her kitchen, in her living room. She was raided by the MSPCA, state police, and local police. They took 49 goats out of the woman’s house. We visited Nevis farm where they were being cared for and ended up first on the list.
I know the real story and have seen pictures from the raid. It was gruesome. Personally, I think the most humane thing to do would have been to take each goat out behind the shed. But that’s me.
The community came together and raised tens of thousands of dollars and tons of hours keeping these goats alive. Here is a link to the Great Goat Rescue story. What is not public information is that when the raid happened the crazy women’s children were visiting. How messed up is that?
They needed a few months to nurse them back to health. That was good because I had nowhere to put them. I used the time to slice up some trees to make a barn. The sawmill is a great escape for me. My wife just doesn’t understand when she says, “How can you say it’s relaxing when you come back in the house all sweaty and gross?”
I took the responsibility to care for these three out of respect for the money and dedication so many people put into this.
I’m trying to teach them to free range. I have water on three sides so they are naturally contained for the most part. They have work to do, brush to eat, and fertilizer to spread. My friend Ashly owns Beyond Yoga & Wellness. She had a special event this summer in the field with yoga, cheese, wine, and hiking with the goats. It was a big hit.
I started a YouTube channel, Yellowfin. I have a few shorts with the goats. I’m going to upload my wife’s Christmas music with the piano and some raw video of one of my dives in the Caribbean.
Discussion (25)
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They're beautiful. Good for you! I adore goats. They're just a bit too energetic, and a bit too smart, for me at this point in my life. It is possible (I think) to actually reach goats, in the way that one can reach dogs and (but only if they so choose) cats. Sheep are quite dumb, and not nearly so relatable.
I hope you have good fence.
Pico looks a bit like Lady Ada Lovelace, my first goat (we're talking 1987 or so). She was a Nubian, and was donated by a friend. I've told the story of how she gave my mother-in-law's yappy little terrier "a flying lesson," after Pepper had tested her patience beyond endurance one day--in Ada's face, "yip, yip, yip," back up three or four paces, "yap, yap, yap!" Eventually, Ada put her head down and charged (she was naturally hornless, which was a good thing) and Pepper was thrown backwards into the electric fence. He never bothered her again.
We raised Angora goats for a while. They're lovely, and their skeletal structure is more sheeplike than deerlike (I'd call your three more "deerlike") so they're not given to jumping the fence, and aren't quite such good escapologists. They have to be sheared, though, which I did myself, and I had ongoing problems with their feet, because I think my pasture was too wet and the soil too heavy to drain properly. People around here do raise them successfully, but I think they're better off in the south and southwest.
My critter population has been pretty stable for the last few years, but I have the word out for a couple of rescue donkeys. That might be my next challenge.
Your second photo reminds me of a couple I took of "Boo" (the accidental lamb) sometime in the Spring. I also have a block retaining wall (mine's only one tier) and a set of steps (mine are concrete with brick on top), to solve a steep slope problem on the way down to the barn, and also to hold the soil back so the roots of the shade trees don't become too exposed. It was on my way back up from the barn, on my steps, that I fell and broke my wrist. All I can tell you about that sort of thing as it relates to livestock is that once they have enjoyed the landscape, dancing like Nadia Comaneci on the balance beam across and between the plants, munching as they go, they'll never lose their sense of entitlement or their belief that it's where they rightly belong.
Looks like a beautiful property. I am glad you're keeping it in the family. Best of luck!
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Also, a belated Happy Birthday!
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Pico is the one that usually escapes however, as I mentioned in your post yesterday, Gretchen got her head stuck in the netting and almost choked herself to death. Well, she did it again because there's a patched up hole there. I had to put a board in front of it. I've seen all three of them bop over the wooden fence in the pic. It's taller than the netted fence but they don't know that.
I moved them up from the field a couple weeks ago along with the barn. It's projected to be a snowy cold winter and I don't want to plow them out all the time. The electric fence has been off because it's so dry and the house is in the woods surrounded by oak trees. That means 4" of dead dry crunchy oak leaves waiting to burn. I have to get it working soon to keep the bobcats out.
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Thank You! You too.
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