Trampoline-loving Goats Spark Curiosity, Interest

By Kim Siebert MacPhail

Major Marshmallow and Scones have only lived on the Yannoni-Powers’ center-of-town quarter-acre since September, but they have already attracted plenty of fans. Drawn by the sound of an occasional plaintive bleat or by a glimpse of the two goats on top of the backyard trampoline, many people have paused at the School Way garden gate to meet the pair or to merely “goat-watch” for a few minutes on their way to the playground or public library.

“I’m happy to have people come by and ask questions about the goats,” said owner Janet Powers. “I love the fact that kids love them and that’s one of the things I like about having them here at this location. I like sharing information about what we’re doing here on our property.”

Powers and her husband Chris Yannoni are suburban homesteaders and have made productive use of their land in a number of ways: planting fruit trees, vegetable and flower gardens, raising chickens— and now—tending goats.

Powers first contemplated adding goats to the mix when one of her daughters expressed interest in learning about the animals. After doing some research, she decided to see whether she could add milk, cheese, and yogurt to the ways in which the family sustains itself. When deciding which kinds of goats to work with, Powers chose Scones—a  female Nigerian red dwarf —for that breed’s proven high-level milk production and then chose Major Marshmallow—a neutered male white pygmy-angora, or “pygora”— for the fiber his fur will provide.

The goats originally came from two different farms and are intended to be companions for one another. Powers is waiting for them to become fully accustomed to their new surroundings before she makes arrangements for Scones to be bred so that milk production–for her family’s consumption only—can begin.

On the topic of what the goats eat, Powers said that, as with people, they like what they like and not what they don’t. Scones and Major Marshmallow will eat green vegetation but will not eat brown, dry, late-summer hay so, lately, Powers has given them cuttings from her fruit trees, vegetable scraps and peelings. Recently, a group that used the Town Center kitchen to make eggrolls for the Lowell Summer Folk Festival gave her a bucket of cabbage trimmings which the goats liked— until they tired of the bucket’s contents. Powers said that this has been true with other foods as well: the goats crave variety, and are not willing to eat the same thing over and over again.

Some of the plants around her property that Powers hoped the goats would like, they don’t, such as bindweed. Happily, however, they like buckthorn—an invasive scourge in the northeast; in fact, they will— if allowed— browse almost every plant growing from ground level to about 5 feet in height. Because of this, Powers has considered taking the goats to other locations in order to help with land management, especially in areas where buckthorn is pervasive. But, she said that, at the moment, she is reluctant to try to put a harness on Major Marshmallow because he can be skittish as he continues to adjust to new surroundings.

“To get him on a lead so I could take him somewhere would be hard,” Powers said. “I feel like I have finally gained Major’s trust so that he lets me pet him and I don’t want to mess that up at this point…. And, like the other things, I wonder [once I got them some place] if they’d just stop eating [the buckthorn] after a while.

“I’m trying to learn about them in these first months,” Powers added. “They are very curious and fun to be with. I love having them around.”