Feral Goats Move In

• Brydee Gray, Grade 6
• Short Story
• 2018

That day had started just like any other day. As the sun shined brightly though the valley in between the hills, Red crowed an ear-piercingly loud morning call. Time to wake up, get dressed followed by a quick breaky. Time to feed the baby poddy calves their morning milk. Through the gates, we made the trek up the hillside before turning the corner into the glorious morning sun, pounding its full heat on the eastern side of the hill.
The mischievous sheep and their lambs had escaped like usual. I grabbed the grain bucket and they quickly followed me back to the safety of their pen. Mum started feeding up the milk. The hillside country was so dry. The drought was really starting to take its toll on the landscape.
We had a new baby calf so it was up to me to start her drinking on the feeder. Patience. Finished feeding the rest of the calves, Mum had washed up the drums and loaded them on the back of the gator just as the new little calf finished off her first feed.
We drove to the gate and I shut it securely behind us. I glanced across the paddock and something caught my eye. That wasn’t a black and white heifer grazing out in the distance. But what was it? Mum suggested perhaps one of the heifers had calved but quickly disregarded her first thought. It didn’t look like wild pigs. We headed for a closer look. I grabbed the phone, ready to snap whatever we came across. Through the barbed wire fence gate, our eyes widened in disbelief. Right there in front of us stood four feral goats, mouths full of grass. I started clicking as Mum got closer to capture these creatures.
I called my uncle. We needed the little feed that remained in the paddock for the heifers and didn’t want these feral animals to be devouring it. Time to build a trap. Luckily, we had some portable yard panels we could set up. We put out a small trail of feed to help coax these horned animals into the trap yards. School was about to start. We headed for home and I quickly logged into my online lesson. My mind drifting to the trap yards throughout the day, eagerly waiting for the lessons to be done.
I grabbed my hat and sunnies, pulled on my boots and with Mum, finally headed for the gator to head up the hill. Across the paddock, in the trap I could see movement. As we got closer, my anticipation grew. I counted one, two, three…four, five, six! We had caught all of the adults we had seen that morning but we had hit the jackpot. Two kids were there suckling from their mother. Our first thought had been to eradicate these feral pests but now I had a whole new plan!
We had a spare goat-proof pen, now I could start dreaming of a breeding programme.