Monday, September 1, 2008

Goat-wrangling!

Well, we had an interesting weekend! We went to our neighbor's farm, which is about 35 minutes from our house. The drive is nice, once you're in the country. We had one plan for the whole 3 day weekend...catch the goats.

About 3 weeks ago, we were at the farm, and decided to go purchase 4 goats to put in the pasture with the horses. There are a LOT of things in the pasture that the horses won't eat, but the goats love. They're really good at keeping the fences clean and free of vines and weeds. So, we picked up four Briar goats...three nannies and a billy. The billy is Tyler's goat; his name is Leo. He's a cute little bugger, too. Tyler is in love with this goat. We had to get Leo brushes, a halter and lead rope, a feed scoop, and apparently Leo needs his own feed dish. Tyler likes to feed the goats dried corn, and the goats gobble it up like candy.

So, the goats settled in for their first night, and did fine. They were in a pen seperate from the horses, but could see the horses, and were interested in them. The next morning, George and Deborah attempted to move the goats from their pen into the pasture with the horses, and the little creeps escaped! They got spooked by the horses suddenly appearing from down the hill, and off they went...across the street and into the 3000 acre ranch over there. Ugh. Now we had goats on the lam. Hee hee...

Deborah and the guys went out looking for them, and managed to catch the biggest nanny, whom we think is pregnant. We shoved her skinny furry butt into the horse pasture, and set out to get the other three. They had by then buried themselves deep in the woods, we think. They were probably really hiding in the brush watching us walk around calling "here goats! Here goaties!". Creeps.

So, the project this weekend...the only thing we HAD to accomplish...was get the two youngest goats back...Leo and Lucy (who is Lydia's goat...she's Deborah and George's daughter). George was serious about this mission...he came out of the farmhouse completely clothed in camo. He said he even had his facepaint out! We loaded the kids up in the truck, and drove up the street a bit to the last place they'd been spotted. Deborah and George know everyone in the area, including someone in the Sheriff's department, so there was an APB out in the community regarding these wayward beasts.

After about an hour in the sun, LOTS of running and diving to the ground, we managed to get the two little ones rounded up against a wall of dirt in an excavation pit. Deborah body-slammed the female and got her in a head-lock, and I managed to shoulder the little guy in the ribs and knock him off balance...and into George's legs. George snatched him up off the ground, and that was that! It sounds kind of violent, but let me tell you...the littlest one is about 30 pounds, they're experts at escaping, and they have four sharp little hooves. You have to be aggressive when you want to catch one, or you won't catch anything but a hoof in the face.

So, here's Deborah holding the female, George holding the male, and Marc in the middle holding the rope that's tied around each goats back leg, in case they break free of the human's grasp. We're about a quarter-mile from the truck, where the kids are locked in the air conditioning. I'm standing there, out of breath and amazed that we actually caught them. We were going to walk the goats back to the truck, but everyone was so blasted tired from being a goat wrangler that it was decided to bring the truck to the goats. Quickly, lest they escape again. Guess who had to go get the truck???

Yes, I ran a quarter-mile, without stopping, over uneven terrain and down a hill with a sharp left turn in it. I'm surprised I didn't trip and kill myself, and I'm really surprised I was able to run that far without passing out for lack of air! When I got into the truck, Tyler was asking me questions, that I couldn't answer, because I had no air in my poor screaming lungs.

We drove the goats back to the farm, put our hands all over them to get them used to humans, put a neon-rainbow halter on Lucy (we didn't have one small enough for Leo!), and released them into the pasture. They quickly found the farthest back corner possible, and stood there staring at everything. They saw the horses, and that there was another goat in there, so they started bleating a little. The older goat (Bessie) bleated back, and then everything was fine in the pasture. As of our departure today, all three goats are hanging out with the horses, the horses could care less about the goats, and the goats know that people bring corn. It's all good.

Tyler is happy because Leo is back. My thighs are sore from my quarter-mile sprint. George is hurting from the roll he took on the ground. But dammit, the goats are back!!

In other news, the hurricanes are currently NOT predicted to hit Alabama. Our 10-day forecast on the weather channel shows nice weather and very little chance of rain. Yay! Maybe our mud at the barn will dry up...that stuff is sticky and nasty.

Marc got his new arch supports for his chronic foot pain. The doctor thinks the pain is coming from the main tendon on the underside of his foot being pinched and irritated. When he lays in bed, there's no pressure on the tendon, and that's when the swelling starts and wakes him up with extreme pain. That's the theory, anyway. We both still think it's something else, but what do we know?! The doctor made custom molds of both of his feet, and he was told that the orthotics would take quite a while to come in. That didn't surprise us, because Marc's had custom orthotics made before. What did surprise us is that they showed up in the mail less than two weeks later. When we opened the box, there were two pair of what appears to be off-the-shelf shoe inserts. What's custom about that? They came in plastic sleeves with labels on them saying "Mens 10-10.5". Sounds like off-the-shelf to me. So, Marc took a pair in to his doctor's office and left them with a note asking if this is what the doc wanted for him. We're still waiting to hear back from the doctor. Of course. I'll let you know how it comes out, but let me tell you what...someone needs to figure this out and fix it. Poor Marc has been through the wringer with tests and doctors, and still has this horrid pain that wakes him up most nights. Not good for a guy who has to get up early and go to work in the morning...

Well, it's time to turn off "Animal Cops" and shut down the computer for the night. I'm bushed. And my thighs are still protesting this weekend's Olympic trials...

2 comments:

Kat said...

heeeheeeee!!!!! I can just see you all running around like idiots chasing goats. Too, too funny! Thanks for the laugh.

txranger93 said...

Idiots is the key word. I can't believe we spent that much time trying to catch those little buggers.

Oh, the things we do for our children...