05/03/2026
✨✨Long Story✨✨
My best laid plans, did not consider bears.
Catching you up on our little goat adventures!
We had a few hiccups with milking, Honey Momma was so used to her routines, and wasn’t feeling comfortable at first with my set up!
Were slowly were getting there. The little ones are sooo playful loving and happy.
However, last week, catastrophe struck us.
I woke up to terrified goats, with the top of their temporary spring/summer nighttime enclosure all busted up.
I couldn’t fathom how the momma could have done it but knowing that goats can climb brick walls, I assumed she tried escaping at the sounds of fireworks the night before. And little Milk seems the worst, she’s a little foamy and very shaky. So I wondered if momma landed on her during her attempted escape.
Off to get drench, a medicine to help calm down panicking goats, a little rescue remedy for them.
On my way back my neighbor flagged me down, telling bears had destroyed their deck fence and made a mess of their yard. 2 bears.
Click click, it all makes sense.
Bears. They were scared of the bears.
While I’m preparing a bottle for Milk Thistle and getting the medicine set up, my goats realized the weaknesses the bears placed on their nighttime area, and off they go, deep into the woods and down the trails.
Luckily they come out somewhere safe and public, kind strangers help keep them safe till I arrive.
However little milk is now looking awful. She’s vomiting black liquid. One lady shares that her little goat looked like this last week after eating Mountain Lorrels, a beautiful woody shrub that grows all over the forest around my property.
We treat for a belly ache and put them in their daytime enclosure, where they have more space and sunshine, and food to nibble.
Thats when I realize how much damage was done.
The bears played in all the fencing, crumpling it in many spaces. Neither pen I have is safe for them. A gate destroyed. Pulled down fencing around my geese (I think for their fresh water/grain). Artemis, my sweet goose has just passed away on her nest, just looking like she’s sleeping.
At this point I am feeling sooooo defeated. So incredibly lost. Now both baby goats are vomiting, probably having eaten a ton of Mountain Lorrels on their little freedom stroll.
I’m completely overwhelmed and feeling like I have failed to provide a safe space for these little lives. 😭😭😭
A beautiful friend and mentor agrees with me it’s time to bring them to the vet, and graciously offers her farm as a safe haven until I can fix this whole mess, and get back on my feet 🙏
So off to the vet, for a super traumatic visit, that left these poor little goats screaming and crying 😭😭😭 My heart just breaking over and over.
They settled in on my friends farm, safe and sound. We were not sure if little Milk would make it, but she did. Momma Honey started getting sick from the Mountain Lorrel the next day, but God put my goats in the right place, because they had everything on hand to help momma out.
I’m grateful, to so many people for helping, or for offering to help in the days to come. I’m still shaken, this was a lot, and I’m feeling so nervous about bringing them back home, wanting nothing to happen to them.
In this moment, we are coming up with plans to build their permanent shelter, a little goat barn, as well as fixing all the fencing, and finding a way to deter bears from wrecking so much havoc again (thoughts?) and figuring out what the best life will be for my windowed Gander, Gabriel.
Praying to find my best path through all of this. For a moment I wondered if the best thing to do would be throw in the towel and find them a new home. And maybe that is the best? But I keep hearing the message to stand back up repeating over and over in different ways. I can’t let this defeat me from my dreams. I have to stand, even if my legs are shaky, I have to keep going.
Thank you 😊 for hearing me and supporting me.
