Life with 5 Goats Is Never Dull

I remember it well. Shortly after moving to our two acres in Westhaven from LA, Michael said “Look at all that blackberry! We should get a couple of goats.” We had a barn and a pen and lots of overgrown yard, so it seemed a good idea.

After calling around, off he went in his truck and brought home an Alpine doe named Define and a La Mancha doe, Daffodil. We quickly renamed them Mimi and Tosca, after operatic heroines.

Pretty quickly, we found what we had gotten ourselves into. At the last moment, before procuring Mimi, Mike was told she “might” be pregnant as she had jumped a fence into a pasture that contained a buck. Ha! “Might”!

Goats are inquisitive creatures. Vanessa Kibbe photo.

I thought, “Maybe I could learn how to milk. And I could make cheese!”

Then there were many trips to the local feed store for advice and ideas about how to keep goats IN where you want them and OUT of a garden, and how to not spend big dollars on fencing, all of which left us trying to stake the girls out on a chain and a screw into the ground. Would that work? Would they enjoy all the forage around them? NO! All twisted up and unhappy.

And then we tried an electric fence, which required a copper ground rod driven into the soil and a charged battery to electrify the fence. It worked somewhat, but having to unroll the fence and stab the poles into the ground and keep it all within a certain distance from the battery meant I spent a lot of time hauling fencing through tall grass and blackberry.

Then, one day, when our family was sitting in the yard and the does were in the pen, our oldest son said, “I think Mimi is giving birth!”

Sure enough, she produced two babies, and suddenly I had to know more and more about goats and dairy goats in particular.

There is nothing like goats for odd behavior, superior brains and contrary nature. A few years ago, Mimi and Tosca found a permanent place under the earth in our pasture after a good lifespan, but Tosca’s progeny live on: Venus, Trixie, Jack, Ricky and Lucy.

I love every one of them and love fresh goat’s milk, chevre and feta. But I couldn’t recommend that anyone sane follow our example!

Vanessa Kibbe and the family goat herd chomp briars in Westhaven.