Goat-masters learn through school of hard knocks
Lance Bolton

Northeastern Junior College promotes and holds closely to the ideal of life-long learning. We offer opportunities for learners of every age, covering a huge variety of topics. As president of NJC, I try to uphold that ideal by also being a life-long learner. Over the past year since arriving here I have had tremendous learning opportunities in college administration, Colorado state politics and farming, to mention a few.

I thought it might be most instructive to the folks of this area to hear about some of my hard-won lessons and, with the great interest and economic base we have in agriculture, I thought my farming lessons might be appreciated.

We live on a farm just north of Atwood, which were it located in Delaware would make us among the largest farmers in the northern half of the state. However, the scale of operations is a little different here, so according to USDA experts, we have what is officially known here as "a pretty big yard." We arrived here in Logan County with just one small dog, but we've now populated our "pretty big yard" with a dozen additional barnyard critters. Among the most interesting and challenging are our goats.

Our goat herd consists of two animals we acquired for my son's 4-H project and though we are getting along well enough now, that doesn't erase the dark early days of our goat-farming life. On about the second day, we awoke to find the larger of the two goats had apparently leaped the fence and was loose in the "pretty big yard." He hadn't gone far, though, and the goats were bleating with great distress at one another through the fence. If you haven't heard a distressed goat bleating, then do the following: Try making a bleating noise yourself like this "bahaaa." Good, now do it again while sitting on a red-hot iron; you get the idea. So I fairly flew out the door assuming that some vicious varmint was chewing their legs off, only to find them standing stupidly on opposite sides of the fence bleating at one another.

Well, I sized up the situation and took control immediately; within five minutes I succeeded at both releasing the second goat and chasing them a quarter mile away over an adjoining corn field. My wife, the Mrs. Greenhorn, watched my antics and quickly arrived at a solution. She disappeared into the house and returned with brooms for each of us. She deduced that my short arms and lack of reach were the root of the problem and that by extending our arms with brooms we could easily recapture our recalcitrant goats. Five minutes later we had succeeded in chasing the goats another quarter mile - but no closer to the goal of their goat pen.

Now, I don't know about other goats, but our two would make Gale Sayers appear slow-footed and clumsy. They would head fake right, then twist to the left, and spin, turn and pirouette such that I never once even touched them with hand nor broom. This went on for an hour or more with the whole family enjoined in the fray, but those goats just plain made us look bad. It turned out that our brooms were just as effective in catching the goats as the insults that we hurled at those %$@@%*! goats.

At last, just as we were about to give up and shoot the goats, they wandered by pure chance into our barn. We quickly closed the door. Now, it was time to really do battle. Goats twisted, charged, faked, kicked, ran, and climbed, and I matched their every move with my own clumsy crashes, flailing flops, and graceless falls. At last, good fortune prevailed and I happened to fall upon one of the hapless goats. I returned said goat to its pen by physically carrying the animal where I tied him to a post with our new, greenhorn, touristgrade lasso that my daughter picked up at the Western Stock Show.

At last, I had them figured out. What goats want most is to be together. So after tying the one goat inside the pen, I left the gate open and backed away to see what would happen. Sure enough, the other goat casually sauntered back into the pen had a short drink of water and began munching at the weeds. Well, we may have spent two hours running across neighboring fields hysterically waving brooms, hurling insults at goats, and generally making fools of ourselves, but at least we learned something.

With that lesson under my belt plus a few more, I can now reclaim a loose goat in under 30 seconds. My son and I have, therefore, taken the momentous and bold step of claiming the long vacant crown and title of "Northern Atwood Goat-Masters." The other five residents of northern Atwood may rest easier tonight knowing that they are now fortunate and lucky enough to have their very own Goat-Master close at hand. Should a goat emergency arise we will without hesitation or fear take up brooms and come at once to their aid, charging like the cavalry in support of any neighbor threatened with a goat catastrophe (results may vary).

It is a good feeling to be able to share my vast knowledge of goat husbandry with all of you, my neighbors. It is also a great feeling to learn new skills in life. But most of all it is with tremendous pride in accomplishment that we carry our new title "Northern Atwood Goat-Masters."-- Dr. Lance Bolton is president of Northeastern Junior College in Sterling Colorado and the son of Ed and Ginger Bolton of Swainsboro.

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