BTW, yes, the little goats do seem like your own "kids" sometimes.
I always picked up the baby ones and hugged them a lot, so that they would grow up to be easy to work with. What is funny though is that they would get so that they loved to be picked up and hugged. After awhile, as soon as you came into the barn, and no matter what they were busy doing,.... as soon as they saw you, they would point their ears forward and come tearing towards you and want to be picked up. It's quite something to have 30 goat kids roaring across a field...each of them trying to be the first one to get to you to be picked up and hugged....
The other thing that they would do that seem so "kid-like" is that they liked to show-off whenever I was around. I would see them looking at me to see if I was watching them, and then they would take off and leap off the highest part of the wooden cable spools that we kept out in the field as a play structure. Then they would come racing back to me after...doing their funny little sideways leaps...capering...
"Look at MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!"
Used to make me LAFF!!... (-:
They never quite lose any of that when they get older. When my herd was quite large (about 25 adult milk goats and all of their kids), we would go for walks back through the fields and forests here at the farm. They would move as a herd, but they stayed with me wherever I went... a few of the oldest goats were females that I had hand-raised 14 or 15 years before...and they were quite bonded to me. They would just about walk through fire to be next to me....not that I asked it of them. I have an interesting little story about that, but I think I'll save it for another post.
The few remaining goats that I have now aren't really like that... well... one is. I sold all of my goats about 5 years ago, except for 2 old ones... I still have one of those. Then a friend asked me if I would take her 4 goats when she had to give them up for health reasons. I brought them here, but they've never been the same as the goats that I hand-raised.... These goats are a bit dorky...
Anyhow, yes, animals can become a lot like children depending on how you raise them. |
