smol-stardust · 1 year ago
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catboyrightsdefender · 6 years ago
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What do you think of the opinion that generalizes goats as assholes and sheep as stupid? Is there some truth to it? Or is their behavior determined by how they are kept/genetics/interactions? My dad had sheep and goats (about 20-30 of them altogether, smaller amounts at once) He was talking about goats doing jackass things all the time like being assholes to each other, climbing/jumping through fences and pooping everywhere. Part 1
On the other hand, sheep were sometimes too stupid to get the food which was given to them on a slightly further away, and were generally not able to make themselves sheltered from rain (even if there was place for them to go under, etc.) So my dad decided not to keep goats anymore because they were too high maintenance and also people who were professionally working with goats told him that goats are jackasses. He only keeps sheep now. I'm curious what your opinion is, can you tell me? Part 2/2 
first of all id like to say that i dont have a lot of experience with sheep and goats, the only sheep and goats i know are the ones at the rescue i volunteer at, which are for the most of them either a bit feral or traumatized (because hey being violent towards animals is such a fun activity right? smh)
gonna put the rest under a cut, potential trigger warning for mentions of violence towards animals
that being said, i must say that i kinda agree with that generalization (even tho i dont really think that sheep are stupid, they just seem to be a bit simpler than goats). most of our goats are too scared to try to do any jackass shit, but there is one (he’s called gaston and i love him) who seems to be more intelligent than the others and wont hesitate to attack you if you refuse to give him what he wants (be it food or attention). one of our other goats, frédéric, once ran away from his enclosure and ended up in the horses field, chased by ponies, and he never tried to run away again. i still have war flashbacks from when the farrier came to trim their feet and i had to hold them down, i made good use of my muscles that day haha! the sheep (we only have four of them, three adults and a young one who was rescued right after 2019 began) are less chaotic, they have their routine and if that routine is suddenly broken (having to take a different path to the pasture, a random object sitting where it shouldnt be, ...) they start to panic and go everywhere.....they are scared of the goats, who steal their food when they are together in the pasture. The only thing the sheep arent scared of is, strangely enough, the geese (who terrify the goats). when the geese arrived they tried to attack everyone (they are in the same pasture as the sheep and goats), the goats surrendered but the sheep attacked them back and now the geese leave them alone haha! they did try to attack the youngest sheep when she arrived, but the other sheep protected her.
i do think that the way an animal is kept will heavily influence its behaviour, but they are some traits that seem to appear a lot. i do think that goats have more chaotic/jackass potential than sheep, but that doesnt mean all goats are like that, same goes with sheep being simpler creatures. animals are strange sometimes. the little goat that recently gave birth, lila, was found with a male goat, left alone on a field with nothing to eat and no water. the male is still scared of humans, they most likely never had real positive interactions with humans, but lila is the most friendly goat, she acts almost like a dog,demanding to be pet and all. the sheep that arrived recently (shes called merry), despite having been heavily traumatized (her skull was almost fractured by the hits she received, she was living in a place with no food and water), is really sweet and you can see, apparently (i havent seen her yet), that she wants to trust humans again.
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