Calf With A Drinking Problem....

Ever since we got the two calves, I've had to fill their "water bucket" once, twice, sometimes THREE times a day. In reality, the "bucket" is half of a plastic 55 gallon drum, and holds about 20 gallons - give or take.

Now, I know that a good sized Bovine can down about 30 gallons a day but, these aren't exactly huge beefers - they're only 7 and 4 months old. Another thing is, the youngest one usually drinks from a tank in a different pen.

So that leaves the blind guy. HE'S GOT to be the one with the drinking problem.

I never put two-and-two together but, maybe being blind isn't the only reason he walks around in circles all of the time.....Hmmmmmmm....

I usually go out a couple three times a day to check the water and make sure he has found it. He's getting pretty good at figuring out where it is on his own, though.

Evidently, he finds it all TOO often....

Or maybe not.

One thing I've found about goats - they are pretty darn good at hiding things, and good at blaming others for stuff THEY do. Goats NEVER want to take the blame for ANYTHING - even if you catch them red .....er....HOOVED.

Sometimes, they do things right in front of you - then act like it wasn't them.

Back to the calf with the drinking problem.....

I filled the bucket last evening, figuring that it would last until this afternoon, since everyone was supposed to be asleep at night, instead of hitting "the sauce".

WRONG.

The bucket had about 2.487362 cups worth of water in the bottom.

Oh, yeah - YES, I've checked the bucket for leaks....

So I get the garden hose, then trudge down to the house to turn on the faucet, and head back up the hill to the the calf pen. I wait for the bucket to fill, then trudge back down and shut the water off. Then I head back up the hill to remove the hose.

My morning was filled with lots of "trudging"...

Since Stevie was done with his breakfast, I figured it was safe to open the gate and let the goats into the pen.

These fine upstanding citizens of the goat barn waltz RIGHT BY their own water tank and proceed to try and empty his!



I thought stealing a blind guy's food was bad enough - now they're trying to dehydrate him off the farm.

I figured there had to be something "shifty" going on out there - of course - far be it that the goats had anything to do with it, They're NEVER guilty...
Darn goats, they think they own the place.

And to think, I was about ready to send Stevie to some sort of meetings where they deal with Bovine drinking problems....