The Wrath of Ernie

Wednesday evening we came home from being out, and the goats were out. When I leave in the morning, I crack the barn door a bit for some fresh air, but not so much that it gets cold. It was open about 12". The kids noticed the goats peeking out, and laughed and of course, the goats squeezed through the opening and through the fence and came running over. I called their names and they came running to me like dogs. "The food lady! The food lady!"

Apparently, they had head-butted each other and played rough enough that the gate to their pen came unlatched and there was a large opening between the edge of the gate and the gatepost.

Previously, we had made them a keyhole feeder. It's a piece of plywood cut with "head holes" in it so that the goats can only have enough room to get their heads inside. Ernie is mean to Bert and tries to keep him from eating. But, if his head is occupied in the feeder, he won't be as likely to fight. Also, they waste a tremendous amount of alfalfa, only eating the leaves (because they can). They really won't, instinctively, eat soiled hay. Once they have walked on it, or slept on it, it's as good as straw. The keyhole feeder was supposed to alleviate that.

We wired the wood into the corner, so that it cut off a triangle section of the pen, and we put the hay behind the plywood.

We didn't count on Ernie jumping behind the wood, and into the sweet little alfalfa bed that we made for him. Of course, this served many of Ernie's ulterior motives, such as keeping Bert from eating alfalfa, ruining copious amounts of good hay, and making us steaming mad. Oh, add into that our worry that he would cut himself on the wires that were behind the wood (holding it to the pen).

This past weekend we decided to fix Ernie's wagon. I took the plywood and constructed a heavy box, with a lid on it. B even shored it up, as the first thing that Ernie did was jump onto the box like it was his throne. We also added a locking latch to the gate, so they can't push the gate apart from the gatepost anymore. Oh, and because the box puts Ernie another 3 feet off the ground, we added another length of fence on that side of his pen. It's probably at least 10' high now! He can't jump it.

I swear that Ernie is angry with me now. He is making this angry little baaa noise when he sees me, and he doesn't answer when I call his name.

I'm sure I'll be back in his good graces soon. After all, I am the food lady.