We recently purchased a Nubian Buck goat.
For those of you that may be unfamiliar with the term “buck”, it is a male which is capable of breeding. If it was a “fixed” male, it would be called a “wether” – but, I digress.
This young buck has discovered a certain scent in the air – the young does that have come into heat.
Now, we have electric fence to keep the goats contained in their own paddocks. The boys have their own paddock, the girls have their own paddock, we have another paddock for them to “browse” or “graze” in, and they are all contained, safely, away from our fruit orchard, bee yard, etc.,. – You get the picture.
Anyway, since this young buck has discovered the young ladies in waiting, he has decided that to be close to them is worth the sacrificial shocking of his life.
I have found him, numerous times, in the girls’ paddock and have had to literally drag him out – back to the boys’ yard. I now have to re-fence the boys paddock to avoid this inefficient use of my time. Once that is accomplished, I should not have this issue.
In order for you to fully understand this young buck’s attitude and persistance, I must, however recall the day we brought this young buck home. He instantly ran through the electric fencing, so I put him in a 4 foot high dog kennel so I could better determine what to do with him.
I was given approximately 3 minutes time to make that determination, since he jumped over the 4 foot high fence. There he was – hanging by one foot – caught in the fencing. I had to run down, hold his foot with one hand ( to keep him from ripping his hoof off), while attempting to free his foot from the entanglement. I yelled to Sam, my youngest, to get wire cutters off of my workbench as quickly as possible.
By the time Sam arrived with wire cutters in hand, I had freed the fleet-footed mad-deer and was holding him.
My next brainstorm was… let’s tie him to the tree! I took a 24 foot dog chain ( wire cable) and attached it to his collar and wrapped it around the tree.
“That ought to hold him” I said with a victorious shout. Within 15 minutes time, he had broken the collar off of his neck and I had to catch him – again – with nothing to grab onto!!!
By the way, at this point, I should describe what bucks are like during mating season – they are in, what is termed, “rut”. They will pee on their beards and front legs – to give them that distinguished, and irresistible scent that all the lady goats would die for ( or maybe from, considering the stench).
Anyway, here I was, holding this extremely smelly goat which – oh, yeah, by the way – did I tell you he is really lovable and friendly? Yes, this whole time, he is rubbing against me much like a cat – with that scent rubbing onto me and my clothing – and all the while, I’m trying to think what to do with him as dusk and nightfall were approaching. I had visions of standing, all night, holding onto this beast because I didn’t want him to escape, run down the hill and get killed in the street by a fast moving vehicle.
I wasn’t worried so much about the financial loss, as I was of having to tell our friends that sold him to us – their goats are a part of their family and I’d hate to have one of their close relatives get hurt and then have to explain that. They would never forgive me – let alone sell us another goat. And we had already planned to buy 2 nice Nubian females from her in the next week or two!
I yelled for Sam and Nathan (Nathan had just arrived home with his mother, after selling at a craft show all day) to find me another collar. I caught the buck, and wrapped the chain around his neck choker-chain style to hold him until they returned.
They did return – with a collar that would hold him. I found a dog tie-out stake (2 feet long to be driven in the ground), drove it into the ground inside the boys’ paddock, attached a big nylon rope to the ring of the stake and tied it to his collar.
After a night and day tied, just within reach of the electric fence that the boys’ paddock shared with the girls’ paddock, he had learned his ‘lesson’ (or so I thought) of the electric fence. He had stuck his nose into the fence a few times and did not want to go within 6 inches of it.
Of course, that was before the girls’ started calling to him and he smelled their wonderful perfume. He is a teenage boy goat through-and-through, and would gladly take the shock of his life for a closer look – and touch!
Fence posts, fence wire, here I come – and I will top it off with a strand of high-tensil electric fence wire – to shock him if he tries to climb over!!!
That ought to hold him! My famous last words….