We used to have goats.

I'm a city boy. My wife, Jean, is from Montana but she's a townie all the same. So why, at 50 (each, that is) did we become ranchers? The reason, at least my construction of it, starts in 1980 in a rented bungalow in Englewood, FL. Sara, our main child, was 1. A local dog, the "mother puppy" to the locals, had a litter of puppies in a culvert on our street. All the people in the neighborhood (except the guy who ostensibly owned the MP) would feed the puppies. Sara loved to go out with a handful of bread crusts. All the puppies would jump around and yap -- except the runt.

This litter actually had a runt. I'd never seen a real runt before, but this puppy was half the size of her siblings. Whenever they would go charging around the street, she would hide in the "birth culvert". When the others would get food from the little girl, the runt would hide in the bushes. When the others would chase the old lady's cat, the runt would hide in the garbage cans. So, when the old lady with the cat called animal control and the guy with the net came, the runt was hiding under a car. That's how Gimli the Dwarf came to live with us. Sara, Gimli, and eventually, Joshua all grew up together. Then, when all 3 were teenagers (in human years), Gimli died. We didn't have a dog. For the first time in 16 years. It was wierd.

(But what has this got to do with the ranch?)

After what she considered a decent period of doglessness, a friend alerted us to a dog in extremus at the PG County (Maryland) pound. An unwed mother was about to be executed if no one claimed her that day. Joshua and I went to take a look. We found a mixed border collie who was skinny, dirty, and generally pathetic. As it turns out I'm incapable of walking out of the pound without a dog (more on that later). Anyway, she cleaned up real good.

Mandala, or Mandy, is very different from Gimli. For one thing, she's not a paranoid runt. For another, she's got herding in her blood.

Now, bear with me; the story of the ranch is a dog story, so I have to tell you about the dog.

For about a year after our father died, my brother kept his (Dad's) ashes waiting for inspiration as to what to do with them. Finally, I think he decided it was unseemly to dawdle any longer. He had me meet him in Albuquerque from where we drove to the Escalante region of Utah where some friends of his had a llama ranch. I brought Mandy (much to the distaste of the llamas). The day before we took Dad on his last hike, Mandy and I were up before anyone else (we were on East Coast time) walking along the creek. Mandy started barking at a clump of river birch and out trotted a yearling bull. Mandy went into a frenzy. She ran around and around that bull until he started moving. She had him up in the corral before she lost interest. Of course, by the time anyone else got up, the bull was long gone. Mandy was no help the next time we tried to get him (being just as interested in the horses as she was in the bull) but it was clear she had the right genes.

So I figured I had to get her some animals to herd. But what animals and where and how? The way I see it, sheep are just too much work. Cows are too big. So goats. Turns out, goats don't really take to being herded very well, but how was I to know?

Since about the time we got married (1977) my wife, Jean, and I have talked about buying a piece of land somewhere. We kept looking for the perfect deal: forest, creek, isolated but accessible, 2 cents/acre; you know the dream. We almost did it a couple of times but the road was too bad, or the price was too high, or something.

We moved to Colorado from Maryland. Sara was away at college. Joshua had 2 more years of high school so we lived in a house that wasn't so far out of town that there was no school. We had the idea that we might move farther out when Josh graduated. In 1999, Jean started looking at rural properties. We both worked in Colorado Springs so that was the fixed point in our search. We couldn't really look to the west of town. For one thing, the mountain property is way too expensive for us. It's also intensely subdivided and covenanted - the horsey set isn't fond of "real" livestock. For another thing, I would dread the idea of driving up and down Ute Pass in the winter.

Whether we had good reasons or not, we looked to the east., out on the prairie. We found 280 acres just outside of Calhan, about 30 miles from the Springs. From a recreational perspective, our place is pretty pathetic. It's shaped like a tetris piece with one tree near the middle (if there is a middle). From a goat's point of view, however, it couldn't be better. There are coyotes occasionally but they're not really a threat except with small kids. There are no lions or bears (as there would be in the mountains). There is plenty of grass and lots of variety. They'd probably prefer some rocky escarpments to "bound" on but all in all, it's a good goat ranch.

So, ok, we bought the ranch. My first worry was water. If we had to go too deep, we wouldn't be able to afford to do anything else. We sweated where to put the well (i.e., house): not too close to the road, not so far that it would be prohibitive to bring in electricity. I hired a "witch" to tell me where, in the general vicinity we picked, we should drill. Now, it's not that I really believe this old coot could actually feel (as he claimed) the water through a copper pipe as he drove around in a Dodge pickup. On the other hand, he was a retired well digger who had seen productive holes and dry holes all over El Paso County for the last 50 years. He had to have a better idea of where to drill than I did, no matter what he was holding in his hand! I drilled where he told me to and got water at 250 feet. That was a relief.

After the well was in place, everything else more or less happened like clockwork. There was a bit of unpleasantness with liens and lawyers but let's not go into that now. By June-2000, we had a barn, a house (well, a trailer really but quite nice), a deck, electricity, propane, septic system, and water. Jean was out of town attending school. Joshua was working nights so I hardly saw him. I took the dogs and moved in.

"Dogs??", you say, "What dogs? I only know about Mandy". Well, there are 2. It was before I was living at the ranch. Everything was set up: trailer, barn, water, gas, electricity; no phone yet but that's a different story. One rainy day, in June, I realized that my day job (the one that isn't "rancher") put me as close to the Pikes Peak Humane Society shelter as I was ever likely to be accidentally. So, after work one day, I dropped in to see if there was a border collie-type dog in need of a job. Well, there wasn't. But, as I had found when I got Mandy, I was absolutely incapable of leaving without a dog! I think it has something to do with my mindset when I go in that I'm open to getting a dog. Then, regardless of whether "just the right" dog (whatever that means) is there, there are so many that need a home. They're like in jail just for being alive. Anyway, I guess what I don't understand is why I don't take them all. For reasons I don't fully comprehend, I went home with a 9-month old, solid black, non-descript dog whose rap sheet had him listed as a "mixed Australian Shepherd". He came with a name, Java, and I saw no reason to change it. I consider him to be Mandy's dog and she seems to think so, too.

As it turns out, neither Mandy nor Java, genetics not withstanding, is worth a bucket of warm spit when it comes to goat management. Still, they're good dogs and I guess that's all that matters.

The weekend of July 4th (2000). I was living on the ranch with the dogs. I had been planning on getting my first goats when I had a week off, later in the month, when I could spend some time making sure they knew where home was. I still thought the dogs would be pretty tight with the goats but I figured they'd need several days to settle on terms. The 4-day weekend started for me on Saturday. The week before, I had gotten a lead on a goat farm from my vet and I had arranged to look at a couple of does. I was planning on arranging to buy them a few weeks later when I would have a whole week to look after them. Meanwhile, I already had a deal on 2 whethers and a buck for that same week; I was looking for does to show up around the same time. I took the dogs with me to the farm. They stayed in the car while I went to look at the girls.

This particular farm had a pretty elaborate setup. They had a whole building of chickens and guineas. Then another building and an outdoor enclosure for goats, cows, and llamas, and another building for bucks. According to the owner, they were switching from milk to meat so they were trying to change over their goat herd to a mostly Boer goat population. Anyway, the two does they wanted to sell were a Nubian, Maggie, and a Swiss/Angora, Goldilocks. I explained that I didn't really want to take any goats home with me right then. They explained that they didn't want to keep them any more (something about feed and I don't know what all). I said I was concerned they wouldn't be acclimated by the time I had to go back to work; I didn't have a way of closing them up; I wasn't sure I had what I needed to get started... Now, the vet had assured me that these people were meticulous goat ranchers and wouldn't even let me buy a goat unless they were sure I was able to care for it properly. So I was expecting they would at least tell me what I needed to do. Far from it. They packed those 2 goats into my little Subaru so fast I didn't even have time to get the dogs up into the front (that was exciting).

Well, Maggie and Goldie were, understandably, nervous. I managed to get the dogs quieted down and pulled back onto the road. The goats kept snorting and stomping (as best they could, being a bit scrunched up in the car). I stopped at a feed store and bought a bale of hay. Fortunately, I had prepared a little stall for them in the barn. It gave me (if not them) a sense of a place of their own to live. The trick was getting them from the car, into the barn. I drove up close to the barn and backed up near the opening. I let the dogs out. When I opened the back of the car, the goats didn't want to get out. When I finally prodded them out, they bolted.

OK. There's me, a 50 year old city boy. Two dogs whose only real interaction with non-dogs had been limited to chasing and barking. And there are 2 goats, full grown, with horns (did I mention horns?) who have no idea what's going on but are reasonably sure they don't like it. Amazingly, I managed to catch them. Whether it was with the dogs' help or in spite of them I don't know. To this day there is a barely contained mutual hostility between Maggie and Mandy. Java is a mere irritant but Mandy gets Maggie's back up (literally).

I finally got them into the stall, put a bucket of water near them, put some hay down, and closed the barn. It was hot but not too bad in the barn. This was Saturday. I had 3 more days to convince them that this was home. On Sunday, I put collars on the goats and took them for a walk with 2 10-foot lengths of rope. It was then, after 1 day in the business, that I made a discovery: I had thought I would "herd" my goats, much like one herds cattle, that is, from behind. You don't herd goats, you lead them. So much for the dogs (but not quite).

By Monday, I was concerned that Maggie wasn't eating. My son had come over Sunday night so I left him looking after Goldie and took Maggie back to the McQuatters'. There I learned that:
1. She'll eat when she's hungry,

2. Goats love rolled corn, and

3. I'm supposed to milk her!

Well, I tried milking Maggie tethered to a post. No deal. I tied all 4 of her legs to posts. No deal. Finally, against my better judgment (which, I was beginning to suspect, isn't all that good), I built a wooden stanchion to hold her head, tethered her back legs with bicycle inner tubes, and managed to milk her for a couple of months. I didn't like it. She didn't like it. Finally, she got mastitis. I don't know whether it was from my bad milking technique or what, but the vet said to dry her up cold turkey. I would have done that in July if I hadn't believed I couldn't.
Anyway, Maggie and Goldie became the elders of my herd and, for better or worse, exercised the perogatives of Alpha and Beta, respectively. They are mean, greedy, and jealous. But they're mine. I say "exercised" because now I have a big male (buck) who is clearly the Alpha. He came to the ranch with 2 whethers when I took that week off.

Back in April (or was it May?) I had arranged with a man I work with to buy some of his goats. He has a milking herd. As such, he needs to have periodic births so that the milkers keep producing. He keeps the does (up to a point) and slaughters or sells the bucks. I told him I wanted a buck for breeding, and 2 whethers for the stew pot.

In April (or was it May?) I went over to look at the goats he had picked for me. To be honest, at that point I had no idea what to look for in a goat; I still don't, really. He wanted me to decide which goat to keep as a buck. In the end, I acceded to his recommendation.

So it was that on 27 July, I went over to his house after work and picked up the 3 Billy Goats Gruff (technically, 2 of them were no longer actually billy goats). These guys were only about 4 months old and, at least compared to Maggie and Goldie when I brought them home, quite affectionate. They were a little shaken up about being manhandled into the car (same old Subaru) but they were even more curious than scared about me and where we were going.

When we got back to the ranch, I learned about herd integration. Goldie and Maggie were from a different herd. Maybe it was my herd, maybe it was still their original herd, but definitely not the same herd as these newcomers. Consequently, the 3 bucklings were shy and obsequious. When I took the herd for a walk, Goldie would butt them out of her way, even if they hadn't been in her way before she decided that she wanted to be where they were.

Taking the herd for a walk. By now, Maggie and Goldie, and soon the 3 guys, would follow me wherever I went. In fact, in order to go to work in the morning, I had to distract them with corn, run to my car, and get to the gate before they saw me. I would lead them to the pond, or the hill, or the ravine, and sit on the ground and read while they browsed. Sometimes one of goats would come over to me to get an ear rub or chew on my book. If one of my billies come over, it wouldn't be long before Maggie or Goldie would come chase him off and take his place.

I was having fun with my little 5-goat herd. But I only had 2 breeding does. Given Maggie's indeterminate age, I didn't know how long it would be until I only had 1. So I went back to my friend at work (he of the 3 billy goats), to see if he knew someone who wanted to sell some young does. He did. One Saturday morning I went and bought 3 little girl goats. They were altogether different from the others. They had obviously been handled tenderly. They would climb into my lap like puppies. Now that they were the newcomers, the 3 bucks and 2 OGs (original goats) treated them like outsiders. Maggie and Goldie were still aloof from the 3 B's G, but now I had 3 herds. In some respects, however, OGs and the 3B'sG, as longer standing residents, would lord it over the 3 new girls. They, the pearly goats, were pretty intimidated. For one thing, they were a lot smaller than any of the others even though they were roughly the same age as the 3 boys.

By the way, the boys had names. I had read that it's not a good idea to name animals that are destined to be eaten so I called the 2 whethers by what I intended to do with their hides: Slippers and Bodhran. I named the buck for the Greek paragon of masculinity, Testicles (pronounced testikleez). On my daughter's suggestion, I named the 3 pearly goats after the 3 principal Hindu goddesses, Lakshmi, Saraswathi, and Durgha.
That then, was my herd, until first blood.

In retrospect, it was probably sooner than was really warranted. Whatever, we thought around Christmas (2000) was when to slaughter one of the whethers (Slippers, as it turned out). I say it was too early because there was only about 45 pounds of meat (not counting dog food). Slippers was only 8 or 9 months old and would have been a lot meatier at a later time.

No matter, it was planned and done. Grandma Simpson was staying with us the day after Christmas so we would slaughter then so she could advise on the butchering. Now, I had by now established that a lot, if not all of my conceptions about how my goat farming would work were, in fact, misconceptions. The goat-dog relationship, the free-range = far-range idea. I should not have been surprised, therefore, that the actual killing would less than the dispassionate exercise I had envisioned. I chose Slippers because, of the 2 candidates, he was the least "tame". He wouldn't let me scratch his neck, as Bodhran would. I figured that, if I killed Bodhran, Slippers would get even more suspicious of me. That much was probably true.

Now my idea is that if I'm going to eat meat, the only honest way to do it is to do the whole thing myself. No distance. I don't mean this as a criticism of anyone else. It's just that, for me, letting someone else do the dirty work doesn't make it any less dirty. If I can't bring myself to do it, I can't ask someone else to do it for me. I like meat. A lot. But killing an animal is a serious thing. The meat cannot and should not be somehow disconnected from the killing. And the killing itself should be done with a realization of what it is.

First let me say, it wasn't any fun. It was, as I said, the day after Christmas. The herd was in the barn. I grabbed Slippers and hauled him out of the barn, up to the shed near the house. My daughter stayed at the barn door to keep the other goats inside. I had a shot of whiskey I tried to give Slippers to put him out of it. He didn't want it. I drank it. Probably best that way. I shot him in the head and he dropped. He twitched rather more than I expected. I shot him twice more although it was probably just my nerves. I slit his throat and bled him out. Then I went in the house for another drink. Gutted and skinned (Slippers, that is), I let him cool until the next day when we cut him up into freezable pieces and that was that.
We had a roast that night.So that was Christmas. There were soon to be some babies and we forgot about poor Slippers.

I didn't know it then but several of the ladies were pregnant. It would soon be obvious.

The first to give birth was Saraswathi. I had, naively as it turns out, thought that the goats would regulate their own "personal matters" so as to give birth in the Spring. When it was warm. Since then my experience is they invariably pick the coldest days (nights, usually) of the year. Saraswathi's first born was on Washington's Birthday, Feb. 22. Naturally, I named him George.

I came home from work that day and saw that all the herd save Saraswathi was out browsing. I looked in the barn and there they were. He was a creamy gold color (like a palomino horse) with a white blaze on his forehead. He had (as all baby goats have) little horn buds and clear alert eyes. He must have been at least a few hours old as he was dry, standing (walking in fact) and nursing. At that moment he didn't want to have anything to do with me but Saraswathi was glad to see me. I brought her some hay and water and rubbed her sides. By the next day I was little George's best friend. All the adults would go off to browse and he was all alone in the barn. I would go in there and sit in the straw with him and read. He would climb on me or nibble my jacket, or just sleep in my lap. A few weeks later he had a little brother/cousin but until then, I was the only one who paid him any attention.

In fact, the next birth, one week after George was a tragedy. Maggie gave birth on Feb. 26 to a brown spotted boy who lived around 24 hours; let's call him #2. I found them pretty much as I had found George and Saraswathi, in the barn with the herd (except for George) off on the pasture. But #2 wasn't standing and he wasn't nursing. I knew it was very important for him to nurse before Maggie re-absorbed the colostrum (a nutrient and antibiotic rich fluid that precedes the more caloric milk). I squeezed milk out of her onto his face; I rubbed his thorax to stimulate him. I took him in the house and tried to feed him warm milk with a dropper. And, finally, I took him back to his mother to die.
Maggie was quite upset, as you can imagine, for several days. She kept calling for her baby, and he, of course, kept not being there. He was, by then, dog food. In later kid deaths I was more together about it and took the skins but this time I was almost as upset as Maggie. I just chopped him up whole, skin and all, and boiled him down for dog food. It was pretty gruesome.

Luckily, it wasn't long before we had another baby to lighten the mood. Spot was born to Lakshmi in the wee hours on March 5. He was there in the barn when I went in to give them food and water in the cooooold morning dark. He was dry and standing and, while I thought it was too cold to be fooling around with giving birth and all, Lakshmi apparently thought everything was just fine. After a couple of days (really, it doesn't take very long at all), Spot was able to romp around and George abandoned me for his little brother (I didn't mind at all).

Durgha was next. She gave birth on March 26 to a little girl, Lambchop. This was another afternoon birth so whatever happened happened while I was at work. Lambchop was a little suspicious of me for quite a while (until the blizzard) but she really liked her brothers. As Lambchop got a little bigger she became principal leaper of the ranchocabron ballet. She liked nothing better than to jump up onto a car, or better, to leap up onto the little ledge that's formed where the window rolls into the door, and run all around the circumference of the car several times. She would hang out wherever George and Spot were. Now, George and Spot were seriously into head butting with the big boys Bodhran and Testicles. It was amusing to see how gentle the adult males would be with what amounted to some pretty obnoxious behavior. Well, it was a while before Lambchop was able to play in that milieu; even then it was never her thing. Anyway while the boys were butting heads, Lambchop would get so excited that she would leap straight up into the air.

So what are Testicles and Bodhran doing during all this birthing? Surprisingly, they were pretty well behaved during the actual births; they would just stay the hell away. I was worried they would trample the babies but they never did. Then, when the kids were able to hang around with the herd, the big males seem to like to play with the kids even more than the females. The mothers would fuss over their own kids but had little patience for anyone else's. The males however seemed to enjoy playing with them all. And, like I said, nobody seemed to think too much about poor Slippers.

In early April, we had a blizzard. I guess it's not all that unusual but I really thought winter was over. Anyway, the wind blew so hard the barn door was blocked with snow, one of the sheds blew down, and it was a real struggle to get out to tend to the herd. All three of the living 2nd generation were big and healthy so it was just a big sleepover for them. I had to dig out the doorway so they could get out when it was over (2 days). Then I had to collect all the shed pieces so they wouldn't get cut up. I guess it wasn't such a big deal but, since it was our first winter, it seemed quite dramatic.

Just one more blessed event that season, but it was a good one. I thought Goldi was too big for T that season but I was wrong. That is, I new he was stronger than the Pearly Goats and I wasn't surprised when they turn out to be pregnant. I was surprised when Maggie dominoed since I hadn't seen them together at all. I had seen him try to get to Goldie, however, and she was pretty persistent about running him off. One time she even broke one of his horns. That was a bit of nightmare. I had to separate him, take him to the vet, subdue him, change his bandage. All while he was at his maximum grossest!
Anyway, they must have settled their differences because on April 26 Goldie had twins. The timing couldn't have been better. Some people I knew from Maryland were in town and came out for a barbecue. I came home a little early to stoke the grill. I went to check on the goats and found Goldie in the barn puffing and groaning. I put a blanket down and petted her while she pushed out a little white baby. I ran to the house to get a towel and a camera and when I got back, there was another one. We called them Ken and Barbie. Barbie had a little trouble straitening her front right leg at the foot so I made a little splint out of shish kebab skewers and duct tape. I don't know whether that helped or not but in a couple of days she was walking fine.
So we settled down for the summer. Maggie and Goldie continued to be mean to the Pearly Goats. Bodhran and Testicles played with the kids (jumping up on spools and knocking off all comers). They could be surprisingly tender; they would let the little ones win and never hurt them. They would also intercede when an older kid (like George) was picking on a little one (like Ken). Then T would come over and lend his support to the underdog. It was something to see.

Then Fall came and it was time to think about killing another goat. It was, of course Bodhran's turn and so it came to pass. This time it was a cleaner death and a more efficient process, but I still didn't like it. I can do it, that's not the problem. I just don't find anything about it pleasant (except, of course, the eating).
Now, it must be said that I now had 2 hides, ostensibly with plans to make slippers out of one and a drum out of the other. No sign of that happening.

The summer passed un-eventfully. That's a good thing; I'm not complaining. The kids grew. They interacted with each other and with the adults. It was like a long-running episode of National Geographic. I would sometimes watch form the house with binoculars so as not to be part of the "spectacle". One thing I have to say: goats are he most perniciously destructive animals I have ever dealt with. I must admit, I've never had any real contact with wolverines, but goats have to be pretty close. Most of my farm work (and I did a lot) was repairing damage the goats had done, or trying to keep them away from things I didn't want destroyed. I can see why people don't want to deal with free-range goats. It wouldn't have been a problem if they had wanted to stay far away from the house, the cars, and let's not even talk about boxes and crates. On the contrary, they were on the deck, chewing the screens chewing the siding jumping on anything that supported them (and leveling anything that didn't. So there's a thousand dollars worth of fence I had to build and repair after every storm. It was impossible to keep windshield wipers on the cars, or trim. So there's a garage. But it's just their nature. Needless to say the dogs were no help (nor did they try to be). So, as I said, the summer passed. It was Fall again, and I supposed that the herd was mating. As it turned out, they must have been.

Now, the alert reader will recall that at this point there are 2 dogs, Mandy and Java. Now, a woman I worked with had a dog that had been small as a puppy. As is so often the case, however, he was not small as an adult (around 1 year old). She called him Beethoven (since he looked a little like the St. Bernard in the movie). He is part shepherd, part border collie, and part boxer. I call him Beta, since he was bigger and more aggressive than Java but clearly subordinate to Mandy. [Ah, Mandy. It breaks my heart to write about this period but I must.] Anyway, as you must have guessed Beta came to live with us. It was in November of 2001. His then current owners just didn't have the room, the time, or, really, the interest to keep him.

Now, you may have sensed an implied resentment on my part that neither Java nor Mandy had any interest in the goats. Well, Beta took an interest. Unfortunately, his interest was largely military in nature, but more about that later.

So now we had 3 dogs and another kidding season was about to start. This time, the first birth was to Maggie, on the coldest night of the year, January 21. It was -4 that night but somehow, Maggie pulled it off. We named him Nanuck, but it wasn't long before we gave up the whole naming thing. Next to kid was, of all things, Lambchop. On 27-Jan, she had a little cream-colored baby that we named #7. Now things were pretty interesting. There were adults. There were last year's kids (one of whom was Lambchop). And there were (now 2, soon more) this year's kids. The big kids still thought they wanted a little Mommy time (including Lambchop)) but the Mommies were starting to get preoccupied with babies. As the babies got bigger, the 2 year-cohorts would interact just like you might expect.
OK. We're getting to the hard part.

On February 21, I got home from work around 4:00. As usual, I unloaded some hay bales, put some down for the goats, gave them some (liquid) water, and checked for babies. As it turned out, Saraswathi had had twins (8 and 9). It was pretty cold and there was snow on the ground, so I got some warm towels and rubbed them down. This time that would have to do.

I went back up to the house. Java and Beta came and greeted me. No Mandy.
I called to her and she came out from under the trailer, covered in blood At this point she didn't seem to be in distress and she wasn't dripping blood or anything. I looked for a wound but I couldn't find one (there was one). I was worried. I called the vet. He met me at his (closed) clinic and looked her over. He found the bullet hole. He told me to take her to town to an animal emergency hospital. I did.
She died about 4:00 the next morning.

I won't say any more about it because it's just too painful, but she was unequivocally the best dog I have ever known.

You may recall that, originally, the whole idea of the ranch, the goats, was for Mandy. First, that idea turned out to be bogus. Then, Mandy turned out to be dead. Things went downhill from there.

Shortly after Mandy died, Beta started killing kids. I still think he was just playing rough but dead they were none the less. I came home from work in time for 8 (or was it 9) to die in my arms.

Durgha had triplets one cold day. I came home and found them only minutes old. I had to suck on their ears to thaw them enough to dry them off. I mean, it was really cold! They all lived, though. That is until Beta killed one.
Lakshmi had twins. Beta killed one.

Goldilocks had twins (once again, she waited for me to be there). Beta ate one. It was getting to be too awful.

In April I had had enough. The drought was really bad. There was no pasture and no prospect of having any that year. If I kept the goats, I'd have to feed them hay all year. All, that is, except those that Beta killed. That was starting to get too depressing, too. So I called up the McQuatters and told them they could have them all if they just took them away. They did.
The experiment is over.
Conclusion: Dogs won't take care of goats (in any useful way) without, at least, a lot more training than I was able to supply.