The Original Ghote
By Dr. William S. Burton
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The Original Ghote By Dr. William S. Burton |
This is "Donald", our original GHOTE taken at "Windingdale" in 1960 - he was our pet goat and used to come into our kitchen.
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When we returned to the Shore in 1959, we rented "Windingdale" from Lucius Kellam. The place had been owned by Helen Mountcastle. I bought Donald, a neutered billygoat, and 33 sheep from Mrs.Mountcastle to trim the 10 acres of lawn. There was a cattlegate to the yard which kept the animals in the yard as they didn't know how to walk across it. Donald was the "leader" for the sheep.
My father decided our children needed a pony, so he sent down from Chincoteague 13 ponies to roam the yard. About 6 months later he decided we needed more goats to eat the brambles and bushes along the tall creek bank and in the woods - sooo he sent down 25 wild goats with a big rank billygoat.
When the 25 goats got off the truck - the wild billygoat spotted Donald and sniffed at "him or Her" and decided Donald must have been a "Her" as she didn't smell like a "Him" - the big billy took off after Donald and Donald started to run for his life with a very quizzical look on his face !!
Within a few days the wild billygoat taught all the animals how to walk across the cattlegate - including the
ponies, Donald and all the sheep !!! The farmers would call and say that my animals were eating their sweet potato beds !!
So we had to divest ourselves of our animal collection (;>(