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01-23-2026, 12:01 PM
Tito and the Rubber Chicken
I thought I’d post a funny goat story (originally posted on my substack @julialupine where I post stories on goats, homesteading, and many other things). It may eventually be part of a book of short stories about goats; Tito is proving to be a comical character who’s always doing something that’s worth a story).
Out here on the edge of nowhere, ii've been researching new and exciting uses for the rubber chicken. It’s not an ordinary rubber chicken. This one is a particularly hideous specimen, devil-red and covered with nobs on its skin, and wearing a Santa Claus hat. Also, its neck appears to be much longer than that of your average rubber chicken (but, I’m no expert on the subject; I haven’t come across many rubber chickens in recent years). Oh yeah, and I almost forgot to mention the noise it makes when you squeeze it. It’s a cross between an old man’s dying gasp, a hyperventilating cow, and a New Year’s horn.
It was a gag gift from my mom this Christmas. But I’ve found a purpose for it, and it’s become an essential item around the farm.
Tito my pack goat lives in his own big pen and the three girls have a pen next door. I’m constantly moving the girls around, because the milk shed is in between the two pens, and when I’m done milking each one (Olive-Coconut-Sunflower is our usual order, because that is the order of how pushy they are) I shove her in the pen with Tito. Then, I go in the pen myself, open another gate that leads to the outside, and shoo two of the goats outside (usually Tito-Olive, and Coconut-Sunflower, are the buddy groups). Two at a time only, that way they won’t run away, and whoever’s left in the pen will have a friend so they won’t scream for hours.
I mention all this because Tito likes to foil my careful system, by either standing in the doorway to the outside so the girls can’t get out, or ramming them as I open the gate to let them in. He gets bored sometimes, and he also feels left out because he knows they’re eating alfalfa pellets and he doesn’t get any (too much alfalfa isn’t good for boy goats. The girls need the extra protein for their milk production). Also, although Tito’s neutered he still likes girls, and he thinks they’re his girlfriends so he doesn’t want me to take them away (but he also likes to pick on them, and gets especially jealous of Coconut, the littlest one).
I’ve had some screaming fits I’d rather forget, prompted by Tito’s ramming the gate so I have to let go for my own safety and then all the goats get into the yard and start destroying everything and eating my trees. I am a patient person but a goat will take you to the edge sometimes. Like a computer, or a dentist, you can’t reason with it. But, you can outwit it. And that is where the chicken comes in.
Now, when I go to Tito’s pen to move girl goats in or out, I come armed. If Tito gets that crazed look in his eyes that means trouble, or worse, starts bucking up and and down like a bronco in excitement, all I have to do is squeeze the chicken and he stops immediately. If he doesn’t back off enough for my liking, I squeeze the chicken again, closer to his ear. He used to run into the barn; now he’s getting used to it but still backs off, and forgets all about whatever bad thing he was previously doing.
The girls aren’t particularly phased by the chicken, so I’m still able to move them through the gates as needed. Olive does her own pushy thing when I put the littler girls into the girls’ pen; it is less dangerous because she doesn’t have horns, but still annoying. I’ve found that, while she isn’t scared of the chicken noises, it does sometimes work to bonk her on the nose with it to make her back off.
Just life around the farm as usual. There’s always a solution to every problem.
I thought I’d post a funny goat story (originally posted on my substack @julialupine where I post stories on goats, homesteading, and many other things). It may eventually be part of a book of short stories about goats; Tito is proving to be a comical character who’s always doing something that’s worth a story).
Out here on the edge of nowhere, ii've been researching new and exciting uses for the rubber chicken. It’s not an ordinary rubber chicken. This one is a particularly hideous specimen, devil-red and covered with nobs on its skin, and wearing a Santa Claus hat. Also, its neck appears to be much longer than that of your average rubber chicken (but, I’m no expert on the subject; I haven’t come across many rubber chickens in recent years). Oh yeah, and I almost forgot to mention the noise it makes when you squeeze it. It’s a cross between an old man’s dying gasp, a hyperventilating cow, and a New Year’s horn.
It was a gag gift from my mom this Christmas. But I’ve found a purpose for it, and it’s become an essential item around the farm.
Tito my pack goat lives in his own big pen and the three girls have a pen next door. I’m constantly moving the girls around, because the milk shed is in between the two pens, and when I’m done milking each one (Olive-Coconut-Sunflower is our usual order, because that is the order of how pushy they are) I shove her in the pen with Tito. Then, I go in the pen myself, open another gate that leads to the outside, and shoo two of the goats outside (usually Tito-Olive, and Coconut-Sunflower, are the buddy groups). Two at a time only, that way they won’t run away, and whoever’s left in the pen will have a friend so they won’t scream for hours.
I mention all this because Tito likes to foil my careful system, by either standing in the doorway to the outside so the girls can’t get out, or ramming them as I open the gate to let them in. He gets bored sometimes, and he also feels left out because he knows they’re eating alfalfa pellets and he doesn’t get any (too much alfalfa isn’t good for boy goats. The girls need the extra protein for their milk production). Also, although Tito’s neutered he still likes girls, and he thinks they’re his girlfriends so he doesn’t want me to take them away (but he also likes to pick on them, and gets especially jealous of Coconut, the littlest one).
I’ve had some screaming fits I’d rather forget, prompted by Tito’s ramming the gate so I have to let go for my own safety and then all the goats get into the yard and start destroying everything and eating my trees. I am a patient person but a goat will take you to the edge sometimes. Like a computer, or a dentist, you can’t reason with it. But, you can outwit it. And that is where the chicken comes in.
Now, when I go to Tito’s pen to move girl goats in or out, I come armed. If Tito gets that crazed look in his eyes that means trouble, or worse, starts bucking up and and down like a bronco in excitement, all I have to do is squeeze the chicken and he stops immediately. If he doesn’t back off enough for my liking, I squeeze the chicken again, closer to his ear. He used to run into the barn; now he’s getting used to it but still backs off, and forgets all about whatever bad thing he was previously doing.
The girls aren’t particularly phased by the chicken, so I’m still able to move them through the gates as needed. Olive does her own pushy thing when I put the littler girls into the girls’ pen; it is less dangerous because she doesn’t have horns, but still annoying. I’ve found that, while she isn’t scared of the chicken noises, it does sometimes work to bonk her on the nose with it to make her back off.
Just life around the farm as usual. There’s always a solution to every problem.