Packing Goats

I've heard of people packing with llama's, but goats? The other day one of my old college roommates sent me a picture of him and his hunting buddy, that's right a goat. Being the jokester that he is, I thought there's no way he is hiking around the mountains with a pack goat. I've never heard of such a thing. So I gave him a call the next morning to get to the bottom of these pack goats.

Nolin "You just set them up like a donkey or a horse, and they can carry about 20 or 25 lbs and you just set their pack frames on their back on a blanket and then throw the little satchels on there. Beyond that, we had lead lines for them but we never used them. You start walking and the just follow, it was kind of neat the place we were hunting there was actually some trails up there and these little fellows stayed on the trails and they would just follow along. What's kind of neat about them is they can't pack a lot of weight but what I like is you don't have to pack anything for the goat. Essentially it's like a deer or and elk, and that's what the guy that owned them told us, if elk can live there, the goats can live there. They just ate whatever forage they had up there, and at night time we'd go to bed and they'd just stand there and we'd wake up and they'd be in the exact same spot. It was the neatest thing. The only time they ever made noise was if we were all hiking together and we separated. It was like having a big calm dog. I think it's a heck of a deal, I've never done it before but after doing it I don't think I'm going to go back to hunting without them."

I guess it's true what they say, you learn something new every day. Packing goats, why not?