Go, go gadget…goats?
Just above the fold in today’s Seattle PI is a piece about the growing trend of renting goats to clear brush. [pi] Slow news day, I suppose, since the Times ran a similar item last fall [times, mb], but also very cool.
When I was a teen, I used to go to great lengths to avoid what I saw/see as the most odious of chores: mowing the lawn. I developed many methods which included the incredibly lame (but effective!) technique of feigning an inability to start the mower. Of course, this left the lawn mowing to my sister who recognized my shirking for exactly what it was: BS. If only we had had a goat. Sibling hatred would have been averted for sure.
Oh, I know $450 is a LOT more expensive than relying on child labor, especially when it’s your own child, but eventually the market will see a demand for single goats and single lawns, right? And then our nation’s teens will be free of the horror that is lawn mowing. I’m only mostly joking. In this day where we’re all (or we should all be) measuring our impact on the global climate, isn’t eliminating one more potential polluter (gas/electric powered mowers) a very cool idea? Plus, maybe with more goats, there will be more goat cheeeeese. Yum.
On the not so positive side though, did anyone else catch this in the article:
“Accompanied by their border collies, the goatherds are with their critters 24 hours a day when on city jobs. They sleep in their trucks. Madsen has a guard dog to protect his goats from coyotes on rural assignments.
“But when I’m in the city, I worry about people,” he said.
Last month, 15 goats were shot near Oakland while they were clearing land for fire protection.
So far, Madsen and Dunakin have had no such urban problems. After setting up an electric fence to keep the goats from straying, they have little to do but keep watch over the herd and answer questions posed by curious neighbors. “
Who shoots goats and why? People are so weird.
Anyway, in other goat news, did you know there was a local goat rescue group? [pi] Now you do!
OMG, I have been dying of suspense all day since seeing this as scheduled on MT. It exceeded my expectations by far.
We finally bought our own reel mower last week, but it refuses to cut anything longer than a couple inches. I’ve been debating turning the bunnies loose on it, but now I want a goat!
Isn’t Who shoots goats and why? the sequel to ‘They shoot horses, don’t they?’
Holy wow! I was so excited about those goats last year and am stoked to hear that they’re back in action again this year.
Like you, I despised lawn mowing duties as a teen. Mostly out of spite, as my dad actually seemed to enjoy doing it and I imagined that he was forcing the chore to me as a means of “building character”. the character it built: me never wanting to have a yard of my own (that is, until I can afford a fleet of goats)!
Sheep–goats’ cousins–can be used for similar purposes (and also make a great cheese). I would like to have some goats and/or sheep out besides the freeway clearing out all that horrid Scotch Broom.
Also, anyone who shoots goats is nothing but pure dee evil.
We should all get goats! Yay! Or…maybe we can team up and get a Seattle.Metblog herd and share them as needed.
John: Hilarious!