Feeding time for the animals

As I have mentioned on several previous occasions, goats are not slow in coming forward when there is fresh hay to be had.  After milking all the hayracks are refilled with fresh straw and hay and when the gate is opened, it is like the first day of the January sales!  It is always wise to stand well back and wait for the crowd to dash past. 

One of the first books I ever read on goatkeeping contained a section on housing and the author mentioned that all doorways should be wide enough to accomodate even the largest goat entering at speed.  This always comes to mind when I see the girls running to their hay racks, udders swinging.  Even when they are hugely pregnant, they do not seem to slow down at all - those poor kids inside must get thrown around and squashed all the time!

David and I always joke that it's almost as if they have never seen hay before.  To a visitor, it would certainly look like we never bother to feed them as they are SO eager to get to those hay racks.

This morning, after I had survived the onslaught of a mass of large hungry goats pushing past me, I decided to take a few pictures.  And so here they are, stuffing themselves at the various hay racks:

There's that naughty black goat in the hay rack again!

I still have a number of little meat boys waiting to go to the butcher.  But, as our butcher has recently burnt his arm very badly and is currently off work, it looks like they may well be spending Xmas with us.  I could take them to another abbatoir but that would mean a longer journey for them and I am not particularly happy to take them anywhere else.  And so we wait!

Here are the little chaps eating their breakfast this morning:

Look at those lovely horns!  We don't bother having the meat boys disbudded like the other kids (no point and saves on the huge vet bill!) and so they grow the most beautiful horns.  I do love my little men - they are SO handsome!