My Goats have to Share

    With horses that is. It's more of an inconvenience to me than them. I'll try to explain. 
    My goats don't actually share their personal space with the horses, but in order to get to the goat pens, you have to either climb through the horse fence, go through the gate, or go through the horse barn. In a way, that's great to help keep people out. The barn, gate, and goat pens all have locks. Also, the barn is situated to where one door is inside the fence, and one is outside. However, the outside door is locked from the inside, so you have to go through the fence/locked gate to get inside the locked barn. So, that protects our hay, feed, tiller, etc. 
    So, the situation is great for keeping people out. Plus, the horses are between any dogs or coyotes that might want to attack the goats. Sure, horses aren't traditionally livestock guardians, but mine have been know to run off dogs. Of course, all of that is good. However, it causes some problems for me, too. I think it'll be easiest to outline them by walking through my routine. 
    First, I go into the horse pen. I unlock the doe pen first, because it's hard to unlock it when I come back with my hands full. Then I walk to the barn, which lately means practically wading through mud. The horses keep the area right in front of the barn very muddy whenever it rains. I feed the horses first, since they will try to steal the goat's feed if I don't. One is still in the way, though, since we only have one stall for them. Luckily, I have gentle horses, or I would be in trouble. Right now, I have two does and the buck I'm borrowing in the kidding stall, so I feed them next. I have to walk beside/behind one of the horses butts to do this - like I said, I'm really lucky my horses are nice! Then I take feed/hay/etc to the doe pen. Then I lock everything back up and climb back through the fence.
    Overall, the inconvenience of mud and horses being in the way aren't that bad, and I wouldn't really change much, because of the extra security it gives me. Today, though, I was reminded of how lucky I am that my horses are gentle and don't kick (knock on wood). Rumor escaped from the breeding pen and tried to make a break for it back to the doe pen. I caught her and "I led" her back to her pen (which almost resulted in a Rachel-goat-mud-pie. You realize just how slippery mud is when you're being led through it by a goat!) When I got back to the stall, I completely forgot about the horse until Rumor and I were both in perfect kicking range for my quarter horse, Sam. I was stooped down to hold Rumor, so if he had kicked, It would have most likely hit me right in the face.
    Thank goodness for kind horses! 

-Rachel in Wonderland