The note on our gate read: "Are the goats in my front yard yours.or not?" Then followed the description of where this front yard was located. So we backed up and drove to the only house on the mile-long road that borders one side of our goat pasture. No goats. Instead there was one lone heifer calf on the roadside running back and forth trying to remember how to get back with her herd. We reported her to her owner and returned to watch that no speeding car would run her down. By the time he came she had bolted and jumped right through the barbed wire fence, kicked her heels, flicked her tail and rejoined her herd.

Then he said, "By the way, did you know your goats were out?" Babies, too I asked? "Yes and all the dogs were with them." Then he showed us where they had exited. And we saw how the fence, which had never had a problem since it was new, had debris against it from the May storms which weighed it down and it was low enough for the goats to walk over. Then my neighbor helped my hubby pull the fence back up and re-tether to the posts.

Three weeks later as we were leaving for my doctor's appointment a pickup stopped in front of us and the driver said, "Are those your goats that are out over the hill there?" and he pointed. So we drove over the hill and sure enough, one third of my Boer does were across the road eating the same weeds and grasses that are on our side. I couldn't see anything wrong with the fencing, but did discover that someone had been messing with an outside gate we had for a tractor entrance into the next pasture as one end of the gate was loose entirely and the other side was off of one hinge, making the whole gate stand ajar. We really didn't have time to investigate further so we opened that gate wider. I found several loaves of day old bread in my car and tore chucks of that bread and dropped them behind me to lead the escapees back across the road and into the other pasture. I felt much like a storybook character. Then we wired that gate securely and left for my appointment.

The following day we decided to check on that fence again and discovered the goats had been climbing on the mesh fence to bring it down low enough to jump over and out. And as we fixed it two does did exactly that, and the rest wanted to follow. I quickly grabbed more day old bread from my car and tossed chunks into the goat pasture. As the other good Boer goats butted each other and grabbed the delicacies the two goats on the roadside lowered their heads and in a flash jumped back into their pasture just as easy as the cow that jumped over the moon. I gave them more chunks of bread at an area away from the repaired fence then we left. We drove past 20 minutes later and they were headed back to their shed. Another hour passed and we were back putting more repairs to that fence without the goats in sight.

If the saying about throwing a bucket of water at a fence and if the water goes through then the goats will follow is true, then I had better keep more bread in my car and learn to play a flute.