The Salty River Farm goats
The Salty River Farm goats roam our hill paddocks. We keep gates open so they can freely adventure 3 or so paddocks as they wish.
Goats are browsers, and don't mow the grass nicely like sheep do. They might chomp a mouthful of grass here, strip some seed heads off there, then delicately nibble new shoots off a gorse bush.
We have a few different families in our herd.
The Toggenburgs are the cool kids of the herd. They don't do stuff they don't want to do. They tend to stick to themselves. Big framed and shaggy-coated, they're hardy with attitude.
Ginger and her girls have a bit of French Alpine in them. They are slim and elegant. Ginger is a favorite of ours, maybe because she's one of the first goats we got. She'll run up to us and smooge up against our legs. Ginger and her girls are athletic and nimble. Even in her old age of 12 years, Ginger trots up and down the hills and happily goes head to head in goat-fighting younger members of the herd.
Black and white Sooty and her daughters are friendly, rule abiding, bossy, and a bit goody two shoes. Sooty's daughters left to live on another farm when they were kids. They came back to us two or so years later as grown-up goats. As we watched the re-introduction, it was fascinating that Sooty appeared to recognize them almost straight away. She started hanging out with them, a distance away from the rest of the herd. Slowly, over the following two weeks, she seemed to be introducing the other goats to her daughters. Then, eventually, they had become part of the herd.
At the end of our work day, as we're heading inside to rest, we see the goat herd ending their day, too. Each evening, the herd climbs to the top of the hill to spend the night together. At the top of the hill is where they feel safest.
There are other quirky personalities and stories to tell of the Salty River Farm goats. I'll leave those for another time.
Goats are browsers, and don't mow the grass nicely like sheep do. They might chomp a mouthful of grass here, strip some seed heads off there, then delicately nibble new shoots off a gorse bush.
We have a few different families in our herd.
The Toggenburgs are the cool kids of the herd. They don't do stuff they don't want to do. They tend to stick to themselves. Big framed and shaggy-coated, they're hardy with attitude.
Ginger and her girls have a bit of French Alpine in them. They are slim and elegant. Ginger is a favorite of ours, maybe because she's one of the first goats we got. She'll run up to us and smooge up against our legs. Ginger and her girls are athletic and nimble. Even in her old age of 12 years, Ginger trots up and down the hills and happily goes head to head in goat-fighting younger members of the herd.
Black and white Sooty and her daughters are friendly, rule abiding, bossy, and a bit goody two shoes. Sooty's daughters left to live on another farm when they were kids. They came back to us two or so years later as grown-up goats. As we watched the re-introduction, it was fascinating that Sooty appeared to recognize them almost straight away. She started hanging out with them, a distance away from the rest of the herd. Slowly, over the following two weeks, she seemed to be introducing the other goats to her daughters. Then, eventually, they had become part of the herd.
At the end of our work day, as we're heading inside to rest, we see the goat herd ending their day, too. Each evening, the herd climbs to the top of the hill to spend the night together. At the top of the hill is where they feel safest.
There are other quirky personalities and stories to tell of the Salty River Farm goats. I'll leave those for another time.