Baby goats.

Not one baby goat, but two....... and they're twins. That was the surprise in the pasture on the neighbor's hill. He has been raising goats for years, so the other neighbors tell us, and the goats get out from time to time, which we've seen for ourselves. I have chased those goats down our hill and up their own on a lot of days last summer.

The adult goats are a bit of a pain, but the babies are as cute as puppies. (No, I do not want one.) The twin babies, born just a week or so ago, are all white, with brown spots on their heads. Totally cute, totally identical, and their sad little cries can break your heart. (No, I do not want one.)

The saddest part of the neighbor's goat herd is that he raises them for the meat. The large brown goat that was always getting his head and horns stuck in the fence-- he's no longer in the pasture. I guess the neighbor got tired of pulling him out from between the fencing. The grass is always greener on the other side, even to a goat. Except I think that particular goat ended up on the grill, poor thing. I try not to think about that part of the neighbor's goat-raising.

You can always tell when there's a new baby goat on that hill because you can hear it crying... and you would swear that there's an abandoned just-born baby in the field out there, when you hear those tiny goat babies calling to their mama. (No, I do not want one.)

The other day, as the mama goat was feeding her twin babies, there were five vultures sitting on the fence posts, just keeping an eye on the tiny goats. Were they waiting for one to fall over and take its last breath? The mama goat kept her eyes on the vultures, all the while keeping those babies underneath her. I was tempted to walk down the hill and shoo away the vultures, but there's a huge pecan tree out in that field and the birds would have just flown into the tree, getting them even closer to the baby goats. Then I thought of calling the neighbor and telling him that vultures were too close to the twin goats. I nixed that idea as soon as I thought of it.... he's not exactly sympathetic to his animals and their daily doings....... all he's interested in is the meat that comes from them. And he's not the only one up here.... more people than I can count are living off of their land and everything either growing, hatching, or walking on it.

I watched the vultures through my binoculars. They eventually got tired of being pranced at by the mama goat, and I guessed they realized that the twin goats were both healthy and not likely to be bird-food anytime soon. The vultures were huge, by the way... nearly the same size as the baby goats.

I could never eat an animal that once walked on our pastures. I can't even eat meat that comes out of a package in the supermarket. Forget the fact that it had been living and breathing and walking.... heaven only knows what they were feeding it from birth till death. The meat in your supermarket wasn't exactly once roaming freely around a green pasture gobbling up healthy greens.

But... the baby goats. As I type, I can hear them. The entire herd is in the neighbor's pasture right now, and I can see them all from our front porch. With the binoculars, I can watch the new twin babies as they follow their mama around the pasture and into the shade of the trees. So cute. Like tiny puppies. (No, I do not want one. Neither a goat nor a puppy.)