CHARACTERS OF THE FARM - Episode 1 - Fawn and Cali, the Goats
For the next week or so I’d like to just give you a short intro to each of the characters on the farm. In some cases these posts will be focused on individual characters and in some posts they will be groups of animal characters. For this episode I want to introduce to you the goats.
Please meet Fawn and Cali!
Fawn is the larger of the two goats. Both goat characters are female but Fawn has clearly taken on the role of the male. She keeps Cali in line like a bossy big sister. She also shows dominate male characteristics like humping (we call it dancing when the kids are around). Another thing that the billy (male) goats do is to smell their urine and the urine of others. Gross! They curl their lips up in a weird way to enhance the sniffing experience. What a weird subject! LOL I’m not sure why I led with that, but it is a very obvious trait of Fawn.
Both goats come from a herd of mixed goats. The two dominate breeds in the herd are Nubian and Nigerian. Fawn and Cali are likely a mix of those two breeds. They were both dam raised, which means that they were born in the field and raised by their mama goats. This makes them a bit skittish and not terribly fond of being handled or touched, but they are nice enough… especially when you have food in your hand!
Cali is the smaller of the two goat characters. She is named Cali because of her colors. My kids thought she kinda looked like a calico cat so we just shorted that to Cali. Cali has a bit of limp. She had an unfortunate accident when she was very young. While standing up on a very narrow ledge in the goat pen she got her hind leg foot caught in the fence then fell. It was several minutes before we heard her calling for help. By the time we got to her half of her foot was tore off and her lower leg was broken. We rushed her to the vet to help her. The kind doc offered that we had two choices. One was a very expensive amputation or the other option was to let nature sort it out. He assured us that many goats have recovered and led normal lives after such an accident. We figured it would be better to heal and have a leg, then to take one off. She did recover and most people can’t even tell that she has anything wrong! Nature is amazing.
Right now Fawn and Cali live in a Goat Pen with Run (fenced area) with 5 large ducks. We’ll meet the ducks tomorrow. Until then, have fun on the farm!
Thank You for telling us the story of them and looking forward to hearing about the rest of the critters on your farm!
I have heard it said that goats wake up everyday and look for a way to hurt themselves and/or be destructive. Have you experienced this with these two? Not including the injury you already mentioned above.
Lovely goat
What a great idea for a new series. So many animals with so many personalities! I like it!
Goats are just the best! I work with West African Pygmy Goats at the zoo and my boy is called Basil who I spend time training. Hopefully you might enjoy some of my stories? Heres a follow and a vote from me!