Friday, January 13, 2012

The goats here have it tough....seriously

January 11, 2012.

It's been a bizarre week as far as the local goats are concerned. Most of these southern cays are overrun with wild goats. Once in a while the locals will drop off a guy with a shotgun while they go out fishing. The guy will hunt and then meet them back on the beach at the end of the day with a harvested goat or two.

A week ago one of our friends was out walking with his wife and they came across a goat in trouble. It had one of its back legs caught in the crook of some thick brush. It was lying on its side bleating repeatedly. Only after creeping close enough to try and help did they realize that the goats leg had a compound fracture. It had been trapped for so long that the leg was rotted and had completely fallen apart. After freeing the animal it became apparent that there was no hope for recovery so he used a large rock to dispatch the animal as humanely as possible. He did the right thing but that doesn't really make it any easier.

It's the first time I've heard of something like that taking place down here so imagine my surprise when Christy had a similar experience yesterday. She and Leta were out walking and they were drawn to the small voice of a tiny goat. They found him similarly wedged but with both his back legs caught in the crook of a small bush. Christy said he was only half the size of our miniature Schnauzer, Tucker. She was able to work him out of his predicament and held him while he continued to cry. He seemed fine and once she put him down he headed back off into the undergrowth.

Then today, bizarrely enough we were walking down a path we had taken only yesterday when we were overwhelmed by a stench. It turned out to be a dead goat's entrails, that were completely covered by hermit crabs. The locals must have killed and gutted the goat right there.....

We were still kinda creeped out and when we reached the ocean side beach. One of the first things we saw was a dead baby goat rolling in the surf. I think tomorrow we'll stick to swimming.....

1 comment:

The Admiral said...

We went out to dinner last night and there was actually goat on the menu. Yah, here in the USA. (Well, sort of. We were in SOHO, NY City.) So glad I had the fish.