'Family shows up to animal sanctuary with a cage. Demands goats.'
"Family shows up to animal sanctuary with a cage. Demands goats."
Important background: I work as a tour guide in a dairy farm turned animal sanctuary (specifically formerly farmed animals; you’d be surprised how many people buy cute baby animals and then mistreat them when they commit the crime of growing up).
At the time we had a bunch of goats and chickens. It is also important that when we were a dairy farm we sold the baby goats every summer, but in order to buy from us we had to examine a person’s property to make sure sure they could properly care for the animals they were getting. Our animals’ wellbeing will always come first.
It is also VERY important to know that the switch to a sanctuary was a very public ordeal. The sanctuary posted it absolutely everywhere. We even threw a big party to signify the change.
So cut to summer a few years ago. The transformation was made months before, and we were still getting used to the new way things were running. Tours had been paused for a few months, so I was happy to be back in my role.
We only had a single tour that day, and it was a family of four. I’ve done hundreds of tours so it sounded like a piece of cake. Until they pulled up in a truck with a large dog kennel in the back.
I was instantly put off my this and sent my coworker a text to make sure he was nearby and aware of the situation. Then, I put on my best “I’m in a public facing job” face and went to greet the tour.
It was four people (a father, mother , daughter, and son), and they all looked genuinely excited to be there. I started to hope I was just overthinking things and it would be a nice, normal, tour. Oh how wrong I was.
(Me = Me, EF = Entitled Father. The mother was pretty quiet, and the kids were just happy to look at some goats. Like I said, this was a few years back so I’m doing my best to sum it up as accurately as possible. Forgive any of it sounding clunky)
Me: Hi there! Welcome to (sanctuary name). I’m Hammy and I’ll be your tour guide!
EF: Great! We’re here to buy some goats :)
Me: Oh? I’m sorry, are you (last name)? It says you’re signed up for a standard tour.
EF: Yes, but we also want to buy a few goats.
At this point I’m not fully sure what to do. Like I said, we were still getting used to the new way of doing things. I knew I wasn’t the one running any sales, but I was pretty sure there were no sales… at all. Still, I knew it was possible I just wasn’t in the loop on something.
Me: Did you email (boss) about wanting to buy a goat? I haven’t heard anything about-
EF: No it’s okay! We bought two wethers (fixed male goats) from you a few years ago! They’re doing great, but we want to start milking to make cheese. We need to get at least two females and a male.
I’m just sort of nodding along at this point, very much aware that this definitely was not going to happen (and that all our intact males were scheduled to be fixed very soon).
Me: Well, unfortunately I don’t have the ability to make this sort of sale to you - I’m just the tour guide. You’ll have to get in contact with (boss), but I want to make it clear that we aren’t a farm in the way we were when you bought from us in the past. As a sanctuary, we don’t sell any form of product.
EF (still grinning like everything is going right for him): Oh that’s alright! While we’re on the tour today maybe we can pick out the goats we want to buy.
All I could do was just… stare.
A lot of the stories here have the EP explode with anger or frustration, but it was the total opposite here. EF was just completely unable to comprehend that they would not be going home with a new herd of goats.
The mom and son weren’t paying attention, but the daughter was looking at me in a way that made it clear that she, the seven year old, understood the situation more than anyone else. I felt a bit sorry for the kids (goats are awesome and I know it’s sad to not get something you were looking forward to) but like… those are our goats??
I ended up just repeating that I’m not able to sell them any goats and then starting the tour. I was the only guide at that point so I had done many, many tours, but this was absolutely one of the most uncomfortable.
The mom was totally checked out, but the dad spent the whole tour asking questions about fencing in which he revealed that he planned on housing the females and males together.
He didn’t understand why I said that was a horrible idea, going so far as to ask why females can’t just constantly breed and birth all year round… that alone would’ve preventing us from selling to them. At each new section he would point to a few goats and go “oh maybe we’ll get those!” To his kids.
Needless to say, at the end of the tour they left goatless. I sincerely hope that, if they did find a farm that would sell, they at least listened to me when it came to penning males and females separately.
I don’t have high hopes but… oh well!
Happy to report that our goats are continuing to thrive and we will always make the best choices for THEM!
Edit: I misworded something and need to clarify: they wanted to buy several females and an INTACT male and then house them together. This breed of goats goes into heat (meaning are able to breed) year round. That means a female would potentially be either pregnant or birthing constantly.
Thats: 1) unhealthy for the females, 2) a LOT of babies, and 3) a major increase in the chance of inbreeding. Sons and brothers will breed to their mothers and sisters. There is no issue with housing wethers and females. That’s what we do now that all our boys are fixed.
Here’s what people had to say to OP:
“At the end of the tour, they left goatless.”
Best line I’ve read today.
HammyBurrger (OP)
Im just glad he didn’t try and make an issue at the end lol. My bosses all have spines of steel, but I really didn’t want to deal with that.
you're kidding us, right?
HammyBurrger (OP)
Hey I’ve got no kids to give!
The level of entitlement to just assume you’re "shopping" at a sanctuary is staggering. Glad you stood your ground, those goats are definitely better off where they are.
I can understand that he expected to buy goats when he arrived that day, because he did in the past. The biggest entitlement comes from refusing to hear “We don’t sell goats anymore,” and STILL expecting that he would be bringing goats home.
I have met some billy goats who could convince them about separate housing in short order.
HammyBurrger (OP)
Heck, we had some of the nicest bucks ever at that point, and their stink in the autumn would be enough to convince them lol.
Those are just the kind of people I wouldn't entrust with any animal. They look at the goats as money machines, and won't care about the animals. I've seen this happen before. It's not pretty.
Showing up to a sanctuary with a cage already in the truck is wild. The fact that they heard “tour” and immediately jumped to “we’re here to buy goats” says a lot about how little they actually paid attention to anything the place was saying publicly.