What did you do today?

[Taffy]

Today I watched Little Man be an absolute goof!

I was sitting on a stool in the goat pen giving Joules scritches.  Little Man was standing next to me with his head stuck through the gate that goes into the hay storage.  He just stood there - chewing his cud.

   

Then things got crazy.  He took his head out of the gate, backed up and tried to crawl under the gate to get to the hay!

   

After a couple minutes he just flopped over onto his side and laid there!

   

He is the goofiest of all my goats.  A true character.  He's the one who always sticks his head through the fence to eat because the grass is always greener on the other side.

Who needs a regular tv when you can watch GOAT TV!

[Charlie Horse]

Hornless lamanchas are always the best at sticking their heads through fences.

[Nanno]

Little Man is hilarious! What a ham!

[Nanno]

Well, we HAD two stanchions. I got a big metal stanchion a few years ago because the wooden stanchion we bought from a friend in 2013 was a little too small for our full-grown girls and (hopelessly small for our boys), but the wooden one still got used on a daily basis and was a good little workhorse. 

Not any more. 

Yesterday Pluto and Daisy came in with porcupine quills in their faces. Daisy's weren't too bad and since she's smaller I was able to pull the quills out while Phil held her down. Pluto was another matter. Not only did he have a lot more quills, but they were more deeply imbedded, and he had scratched and clawed at them to the point where quite a few of the ones inside his mouth were broken off. There was no way to hold down a dog that size by force, so I put him on the wooden stanchion, locked his head in, and got to work. We were doing pretty well but the pliers I was using were too clumsy to grip some of the smaller, broken-off quill stumps. I ran into the house to grab my assortment of needle-nose jewelry pliers and some hemostats. I thought I could leave Pluto safely on the stanchion for a few minutes, but apparently I was wrong. 

I came outside to find Pluto running loose and the headpiece on my little wooden stanchion turned to matchwood. He had literally gnawed his way out of it. It looked like a werewolf had got hold of it! I knew he had powerful jaws, but the way he splintered my stanchion in just a few minutes has given me new respect for those teeth! That board was almost 4 inches wide!      
   
   

We finished the operation on the metal stanchion, and I was very careful where I put my hands! I got most of the quills. There's still one in his muzzle which is broken off inside and I can only just feel the tip coming through inside his mouth. Hopefully it will work its way in a little more and I can pull it through later today or tomorrow. Silly dogs! Never thought I would have reason to put a dog on the goat stanchion!

[Taffy]

Today the goats got to enjoy some of the pumpkins my youngest son grew this year.  They all dove in.  Bourbon tried to CLIMB into the pumpkin!  He loves it!

   

[Taffy]

Today I took the goats out to the tree row to browse.  I always hear about how goats love to eat wild blackberry bushes.  Mine take a bite of the leaf and move on.  I guess they wouldn't make good brush clearing goats!



Their most favorite items when browsing are the black locust leaves (how do they eat around those thorns?!) and cottonwood leaves.  They especially like eating cottonwood leaves and small branches that have fallen off the trees.  The tree row is in between 2 orchard grass hay fields.  They could graze on the fields but will stand in the tall grass and eat the cottonwood leaves that have fallen instead!




   




Little Man is a master browser.  He knows how to rear up, lean on branches, bring the branch down then stand there and eat the leaves and small branches.




   

[Nanno]

Nice photos! Finn and Sputnik (but especially Finn) also like to rear up and bend the trees down. The girls love it and often take advantage of the opportunity to sample branches that they otherwise could never hope to reach. It's fun to see a whole group of them rearing up around Finn. The other day was particularly funny because when cute little Coral saw Finn on his hind legs bending down a branch, she had the audacity to rear up and put her front feet on his back so she could reach the branch! Her bravery did not last long. Finn waved his horns at her and she immediately leaped off. She approached him a second time and started to go up again but then thought better of it.    

Bourbon eats pumpkins the way Cuzco ate pumpkins. 
   

[Nanno]

It's not yet Halloween and winter has already started with a bang! I think we got around 14 inches on Wednesday night! Oddly enough, we're actually slated for a lot more stormy weather starting tomorrow and going through Wednesday. I'm not sure how enthusiastic I feel about Halloween this year... it's supposed to in the 20's that night. 

Hi Sadie!
   

The change in weather has got Rita and Coral up in arms!
   

Cupcake says, "What all this wet white?" 
   

TinCup isn't sure she wants to plow through all this. "Is breakfast really worth it?"
   

Petunia says, "Breakfast is always worth it! I'll break the trail, wimps"
   

[Kat]

Wow that's a lot of snow! Just finished getting my heated hose & bucket in place for the goats today, we are due for a dip into the high 20's this coming week.

[Nanno]

And it's snowing more today! We had six inches when I went out 3 hours ago and it hasn't let up since. I think we get a small breather this afternoon and then it will be hitting us some more tomorrow and Wednesday. I don't remember ever having an October like this! In years past we've had some big October storms, but they were one-off events not followed by days of more snow. Good thing I cut firewood last week!