Margaret's legions of fans have been clamoring for an update on our adorable goat, and truth be told, I have been delinquent in posting about her. That's mostly because Margaret and her two sisters, Daisy and Scarlet, have spent most of the winter in a stall in Lena's Barn, and the weather hasn't permitted much material in the way of "goat follies."
But with the snow finally gone, last week we moved the girls out to their new "caprine condo," otherwise known as a portable pasture pen. (More on their new accommodations in a minute.) Today was hoof-trimming day, a great opportunity for some new photos of Margaret.
How do you trim a goat's hooves? With very sharp garden shears. Yep. Nothing more complicated than that. Holding the goat still for the trimming can be far more complicated, though. I was able to hold Margaret by myself to trim her front hooves, but when it came to her back feet, Alayne had to hold her so I could get those done.
In this first set of photos, I haven't started to trim her hooves but Margaret knows what's coming, so she's going to practice having a fainting spell. (There actually is a breed of goats called the Tennessee Fainting Goat, which may be what she's pretending to be here.) First, she goes up:
Then down:
Next, she throws her head back, as if it's all too much to bear:
Finally, she considers that maybe a display of affection might convince him to skip the hoof trimming:
When that doesn't work, Margaret decides to pose for another formal portrait while I inspect her hoof:
Then it's down to business … please notice the headlock:
Here she's trying to push my face away with her forehead:
Margaret was a little put-out that we didn't take her to the PetsMart groomers, like we did for Molly and Priscilla. I told her, "Margaret, I know Poodles, and you're no Poodle. Besides, you're livestock, and they don't do livestock at the groomers."
Which brought up the lingering question in her mind — is she mere livestock or cherished pet?
I told her that depends entirely on how well she and her sisters do with weed control this spring and summer. "If you get good at it," I said, "you can become, well, cherished livestock."
Which brings us to the portable pasture pen. You see, goats like to browse on just about everything — except what you want them to eat. Thus last summer Alayne spent a lot of time chasing them away from the young trees she had just planted. And goats don't like to get wet, so leaving them out on pasture confined by electric netting left us running out to bring them in every time a summer thunderstorm rolled in.
The answer, we realized, was this — a 10' x 12' (3 m x 3.6 m) movable confinement system with built-in shelter:
The wheels are attached to levers, and when we're ready to move the pen, we raise the levers which lowers the wheels to the ground … and then we roll it forward another 12 feet to new grass or off to a new weed patch. The goats just stay in it during the move, since it will be rolling slowly. On very smooth ground, we can push it by hand; on rougher ground, we can simply pull it with our Kubota utility vehicle or a tractor using a chain hooked to the frame. It has skid plates on the
bottom of the frame, so if we use equipment to pull it, we don't even have to drop the wheels.
If we need to move the pen to another pasture, or a longer distance than we want to roll or pull it, we can pick it up with the tractor using a pallet fork slipped into those two cable loops welded to the top of the frame. (Yes, we'll take the girls out before we move it that way!)
After we've moved it to the new location, we drop the levers and the wheels rise up, lowering the steel frame to the ground. This way the girls are completely safe and secure inside it. There are 25 gallons of water on board in that big plastic pipe under the peak of the roof that we can use to fill their water bucket. When we need to refill the tank, we'll pick up the pen with the tractor and carry it over to the nearest hose.
Our contractors, Kevin and Guy, built the pen for us this winter after we sketched out what we were looking for. We had the rough plan, but they came up with all the great ideas that made this very practical. Because of the sturdy construction and welded frame, this thing will last for decades.
All of which convinced Margaret and her sisters that we were, in fact, quite serious about the weed control thing. Cherished livestock indeed!
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Don't forget, you can vote every day for us in The Animal Rescue Site/PetFinder's Shelter Challenge.
Enter
"Rolling Dog Ranch" and our state postal code, MT for Montana,
and it will bring up our listing so you can cast your vote. We won
$1,000 in this online contest last year because of your help and would
like to win it again this year. Thank you!
Rolling Dog Farm Blog 