Saturday, February 16, 2019
Who knew, almost ten years ago, when I acquired a mama goat, Sego Lily, and also, her young twins, Breeze and Poppy, that they’d be lovable and fun? How about the dozen baby chicks that around the same time came to live with me? What made me experiment while having only moderate expectations about animal species new to me?
Truthfully, almost everything was new except what I’d already learned from dogs and cats. After obtaining a long-dreamed-of small property, and wanting to expand my learning, I unwittingly combined the practical and impractical. The practical: chickens lay eggs (none of mine would end up as meat on a table!); and the impractical: my goats weren’t for breeding, and so comparatively speaking, aside from being cute, they’d be useless.
At first, goats and chickens inhabited separate spaces but over time this changed. I always reserved space for chickens to escape and eat without competition (goats love chicken feed), but otherwise, allowed chickens to be with goats. Their community exhibited lots of interactivity and cooperation among species. The chickens fly onto goats’ backs and ride in safety and comfort. They also pluck matter, with absolute accuracy, from the corners of goats’ eyes. And to the last animal, goats and chickens are completely attuned to environmental changes or threats.
They ignore my dogs’ barking, unless the sounds are particularly harsh, like when strangers appear on my property. The sounds make chickens still and alert; the same for goats, their hackles rise, eyes and noses work to understand what’s different. I enter and exit their common area and they rush to meet me; but if I show up with a new person, the goats and chickens disappear. That’s a little about living with these species, and also, very little of what I’ve learned from and about them.
Today’s mass chickens aren’t bred to live as long as wild birds. Over the years, I’ve lost hens to natural causes, even after struggling to keep alive some near the brink. I miss their little personalities. My mama goat, Sego Lily, is arthritic and struggles to get around but she’s tough. I keep an eye on her, as she and her twins are incredibly bonded. I’ve learned from my bonded horses that it’s very hard on a survivor when its other passes away.
I’m awed by how much we can learn from animals. A big wow is their similarity to humans in areas like alertness, mutual bonding, interactive capacities, and individual characteristics.
As time passes, if money and property become too difficult to obtain, many people might fall away from experiencing the loveliness of species that we still have opportunities to know intimately. For the sake of humans and other species, let’s hope that opportunities to interact closely always are available.
Dear Readers, have a wonderful weekend. Diana
Diana's Morning Blog 