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I hope I never have to be without at least 2 of them for the rest of my life. Joyful and fun and smart. 
but quickly since they are outside, fine in the cold but need their food! One of them has no molars, something happened to his jaw a few years back so I make them smoothies out of alfalfa and timothy cubes 
. He needs that several times a day.
They are very smart. Very cautious and very smart. I would say they are at least as smart as my dogs or horses. They can be trained to do things if you have the time or desire. Yes, they do come to you when you call them. They know their names and lots of words like cookie, pen, no, come here you silly etc. The petting depends a little. One of mine was raised by hand and grew up in a box next to the breeders bed at night. He can never get enough . The other was pulled out of a herd (not my choice, these were gifts) and it took him a while to get into things. He does love being scratched and brushed and rubbed but he does not look for it like the other does. Mine are both males, I will always have males because most of them go straight to slaughter as soon as they are big enough. I do not eat meat and it makes me sad so I will do this. The boys stink. As they get older they stink more. It is really horrible BUT, it stops once they are castrated. The vet school told me they would live longer if I lived with the stink about a year so their urinary tract would be big enough to handle stones as they get older. That kills a lot of them apparently. So they smelled really horrible for a while.
Except for the one with the jaw problems and the lost molars they have been easy to care for and so much fun. I have an irrational love for them, just a bond I think but it is solid. Sadly they are 10, getting toward the end of their lives.
I do not have full sized goats, I would assume they are much alike.
Wordy? I could go on and on. I dearly love my boys. If you have more questions I would be very happy to answer when I get finished with the mid day chores.
Have seen the videos with the cute baby goats non-stop jumping so I was intrigued as to what they're like.
Would love to own a farm with a few animals like horses, cows, goats and lots of dogs some day.
Oh yeah, and maybe a couple of elephants and a couple of cheetahs. 
That's what I did. Most of my family was dead before I was 50. There was not a lot of money but enough for me to buy a cheap but very nice 54 acres and build a barn for my horses. We now live on it with 5 horses, 2 goats, 2 dogs and 5 cats and numerous other creatures that I care for when they need it. It is one of the best things I ever did but at my growing age it is getting rather difficult. We have not replaced dogs when they have passed we used to have 5, I used to have 7 horses but 2 have passed, and the cats are all ferals who tamed down enough to come inside except for 1 (there is never a shortage of them) but I will replace the goats. Must have goats.
I used to be a zookeeper back when I was much younger. I think I would pass on both the cheetahs and the elephants. Elephants are wonderful, dear creatures but have you ever seen the volume of food they take in and put out? LOL, that is a lotta work there.
I was only half joking when I said elephants and cheetahs. I think.
Yeah, I wish I could afford a small farm in California, but land is more expensive there. May I ask where you live? You don't have to be too specific by the way. Do you grow anything?
You sound very happy, that's fantastic. Thank you for answering my silly questions. 
there is nothing silly about your questions.
We have them in an 8x10 shed with a 20x20 area fenced by chain link. We also added a top to the outdoor pen to keep bobcats from getting in and I dug in enough area on the outside and inside and put flat concrete blocks so it is hard for the coyotes to dig in. Been working perfectly. During the day when I am around to pay attention to them they are out running around. They stay close to the house (that is good and bad as you can imagine what my front porch looks like!) and are able to explore places that rarely have creatures out during the day that hurt them and close enough I would hear or the dogs would if there was a problem. I guess I would say to look around the Internet, there is lots of info there. The neighbor just got 7 of them and put them all in a pen the size of mine and they never get out. I am not crazy about that myself. Mine go on walks around the farm with me where I let my inner Sound of Music out and sing the goatherd song. Mine find entertainment by all of those things and I have a rock wall they enjoy jumping on and off of. Area would depend on if you have little breeds or big breeds. Again, on the Internet there are so many ideas for keeping them happy. The love to climb and jump. Mine have a children's playhouse in their pen that they like to hide in.
I think they need more than a lot of them ever get, it depends if you are using does for milk or not. There are not a lot of people with neutered males around here, the boys get slaughtered as soon as they are big enough unless they are good breeding stock. I got, and always will get the boys as babies and save as many as I can.
They are still awesome when they are older and grumpy. They make life worth taking a lot of crap. You can always come home and be with your goats.
over the eons of time
