It’s the 26th April 2022 and two of our committee members (Paul and Sally) are heading north east from New York City to visit one of our international members.
We sit on the express train through White plains and Hawthorne, Dover plains, Tenmile river and more rural parts of this interesting state.
Our intention is to meet with George, and to spend a couple of days talking about goats, how goat keeping in the US is different to the UK and Sally is tasked with assessing George’s harnessed goats and offering advice, guidance or both.
We arrived after a couple of hours on the train at a station called Wassiac – deep into the state of New York, to be met by George. He drove us the short distance to his lovely home to meet his chickens and most importantly,for us, his eight goats.
His home is a lovely; a quaint, quirky and homely wooden house with a gorgeous wooden barn right next door and the house looks over his three acre pasture and small vegetable garden. George explained that growing food is a challenge, not just due to the large snow fall in winter but also because he has to defend his veggies from deer, raccoons and groundhogs which love to dig up anything he plants!
We move on to the stars of our trip.Two entire males, a wether, two females and three adorable kids that Sally and I stated within five minutes that we both intended to steal!
George’s herd is made up of toggenburgs and a breed that neither Sally nor I had encountered before – Lamancha, a breed Spanish in origin, George informed us. These goats are a joy and delightful, curious looking to begin with but soon totally captivating. They are marked in a manner similar to an English but also have what we would describe as the Swiss stripes down their faces. They are large in size, same size, if not slightly taller than a Toggenburg. But the thing that makes them stand out is their total lack of ear pinner. They have ears, well, ear canals, protected by hair but no other obvious sign of an ear. This is a genetic perculiality of the breed. Striking and different looking they most certainly are, but the kids especially (Thutmose and Nefertiti) just melted our hearts.
George’s aim is to get his male lamancha (Rodrigo) fully in harness and working to collect groceries. His entirety however is causing George problems in ‘attitude’. Any of the members who have shared their holding with an entire male will know exactly what is meant here!
George has two other male goats one entire and one wether.
After meeting the goats and George prising Maximilian (a single toggenburg kid) and totally gorgeous, from my hands as I was now smitten, we hatched a plan for the following day. Behind George’s lovely home is a bike trail. Our plan was to harness up the male lamancha (Rodrigo) and walk both him, the male toggenburg (Heinz) and the wether (Nijinsky) and walk along the trail with them.
Day two
After George collected us from the cottage we were staying in, Sally gave George an instructional session on harnessing using Rodrigo. George has a cart (he called it a wagon) for him. He was concerned that the shafts of the wagon, though designed for a goat were a little short. When he and Sally brought the cart to the goat, as she explained… goat stands and cart brought to the goat, not goat backed into the cart’, it was clear George’s suspicions were correct.
Therefore Rodrigo was relieved of his harness and we all set off to both George’s garage and the hardware store with lashings of plans and excitement of how to solve the problem.
I felt this was like an episode of macyver (a tv program from the eighties) but no one else knew what I was talking about!
To cut a long story short, we found bits and pieces to lengthen the shafts by around fourteen inches (35cm – for those in the UK!).
Rodrigo was duly re-harnessed and this time attached to the wagon. Rodrigo is a very large,strong and opinionated goat but slowly under Sally’s guidance and George’s vocal commands within forty five minutes he was pulling George in the wagon around George’s garden. Now we all know ‘one
swallow doesn’t make a summer’ so let’s not pretend Rodrigo took to his workload with grace and acceptance. There would still be work to do for George, lots of it, but Rodrigo did go in harness and he did pull George, whilst he sat in the wagon.
So first job successfully completed.
Next it was the turn of the wether Nijinsky. Being a wether this was a far calmer, easier (he is a smaller toggenburg) experience and most importantly safer. Both Sally and I immediately impressed our opinion on George that Nijinsky is potentially the better goat to work with as is both calmer and consistent, but it is neither our goat or decision.
Nijinsky being a little smaller fitted into the wagon slightly more easily than Rodrigo, and again with Sally’s guidance was soon pulling George around the garden. It must be said without the enthusiasm of Rodrigo but Sally stated to George she could see massive potential but he needed work to build confidence.
So second task successful.
The last job of day to was to walk Rodrigo, Nijinsky and the other entire male (Heinz) up the trail, just for fun, but of long reining and browsing some verges and hedgerows.
Both Rodrigo and Heinz were very pleased to be out, Nijinsky though, being less confident, slipped his head collar less than ten metres from home and calmly walked back! (I ask you, who’d have a goat!!!).
The other two however had a grand time and Sally suggested that Heinz would make an excellent pack goat as he was so stable, yet strong, and would be able to easily carry George’s groceries from the store.
So task three of the day successful (well partially).
A plan was hatched for the final day of our time with George to re-harness both Rodrigo and Nijinsky. A second training session under the tutelage of Sally should build some confidence in both Nijinsky and George in his harness technique but also to try to focus Rodrigo on his new role at home.
Day three
Wow, what a difference a day makes?!
On day three Sally and George harnessed Rodrigo and attached the wagon. The wild and strong minded goat had ‘reflected’ over night and was far less ‘enthusiastic’ and more willing to listen and seemingly understanding of the task. He pulled George in a circular route around his garden when following Sally. He did struggle still with cornering but that will come. George said he would work on Rodrigo moving in straight lines to begin with , getting of the wagon to turn until Rodrigo is confident and will then work on turning.
Nijinsky however was a different story, we were hoping that his ‘reflection’ would have built a little confidence. He is however still very unsure, He walks well but is occasionally spooked into running, or nervously stops. Sally and myself still think that he has the potential to be n excellent harness goat, he just needs time, consistency and treats to build his confidence.
Our final task with George was to put a pack on Heinz. Sally showed George how the pack should be fitted and where it should be sited.
George declared he would like him to work as a pack goat, using him to pick up and collect trash along the cross trail (a public footpath/bridleway/cycle track).
Heinz was duly brought into the barn and the pack fitted…Heinz barely reacted and continued to walk graze and be completely normal, seemingly not even noticing the pack.
By this time, and sadly, Sally and I had a train to catch so needed to leave George.
The Harness Goat Society 