How it all Began...
Dwayne With Our First Donkeys
As Marianne tells the story:
I was surfing the net one day when suddenly I cried out, "I want one of those!" I had backed into a picture of a baby Miniature Donkey and was immediately smitten. I spent the next several hours cruising donkey websites gathering donkey info, and quickly determined that they would be perfect pets for our small ranch. Dwayne just smiled. But I was VERY convincing. Soon Dwayne and I were donkey shopping.
I had a friend in Eagle, Colorado who told me about her good friend in McCoy, Colorado who was selling three donkeys as a package deal because her jack kept breaking out (actually swimming across a river!) and attacking this little group. (It is hard to keep two intact jacks on the same farm, unless you have outstanding fencing and some room.) The donkey seller was even willing to drive the donkeys halfway to meet us in the interest of getting them a good new home quickly. But before she could leave, her jack attacked again, this time biting off the tail of his son, Relax Your Ass Ranch's new herd sire! She tried to phone us to call off the sale until the group could be nursed back to health, but we had already left for the halfway point in Kansas. So she drove to Kansas from Colorado and arrived apologizing profusely about the state of the donkeys.
We spent a lovely evening in a lodge in the middle of nowhere in Kansas getting to know the donkey seller and her husband (Gala and Terry Ivie) and sharing some spaghetti. The donkeys grazed happily in a paddock right outside our door. The next morning as we headed out there were tears (we were taking Gala's very first donkey) and hugs and promises to stay in touch. We will always be grateful to Gala for giving us a great start in the donkey business!
Our next donkey was purchased from Carol Johnson and Larry Demster at Jacks or Better Donkey Company in Floresville, Texas (just outside San Antonio). We made this trip from Memphis in one weekend and still talk about it! By this time, I had backed into Pygmy Goats on the net, and had decided I wanted one of those too. Again, Dwayne was skeptical. But as fate would have it, Carol and Larry owned Pygmy Goats and Larry decided that I could have one with our donkey purchase "if I could catch it." Well, you know I did! But the spectacle was something......And then we drove all the way back home to Memphis with our new pregnant jennet--complete with a goat bungeed in over her head in a crate on the shelf of the horse trailer! When looking in the rear-view mirror, we could see longears sticking up and the bulging eyes of Maxwell Smart, the Pygmy Goat. It looked like an alien apparition!
Me trying to catch Maxwell Smart
We joke about the next donkey we purchased. She lived too close to home to be considered a worthy road trip! :) "Can't you find something maybe in Canada?," Dwayne offered. I just smiled. And we drove to Chapel Hill, Tennessee to pick up our new black jennet and to meet Dayle and Joe Haworth of Half Ass Acres. We toured their donkey farm and got lots of great ideas for improving our own. Then Dayle graciously offered to give us our first cart driving lesson, and I promptly ran over Dayle's new flowerbed! Some appreciation, huh?
This photo was taken just before I ran over the flowers!
Our donkey buying trips have proven to be great fun and great adventures! We recommend them to everyone! We hope to have many more "tails" to tell from the road...