Last Sunday, Harold came home from tooling around and a trip to the store with an announcement. "You have a photo shoot at 3pm." He proclaimed gleefully. "What am I shooting?" I asked with a bit of trepidation. "Oh, you'll see. You're going to need a lot of film though." He replied.
During the next few hours he teased me with bits of information, like 'We're going to need the horse trailer', and 'I bought something'. Having been around Harold for quite a while, I knew that something was up, obviously, but I held off getting too excited or trying to dig any more information about what I was shooting or what he had bought. At one point, he hinted that it could be a potbellied pig, but I knew better. We don't have a containment area good enough to keep a pig. So that was out. But also knowing Harold, it could be almost anything. So I adopted a wait and see attitude.
I've been around animals of all sorts, both domestic and exotic, all my life and have been studying animal behavior and training animals privately for over 30 years, so I wasn't too worried about what ever kind of critter Harold might have bought. What ever it was it would have a home at our farm. And Harold is aware of the permitting requirements for various exotics, so I knew I didn't have to worry about that. Truth to tell, I was kind of excited. I love working with different animals, you learn something new with each individual and with each species or breed you work with. Harold knows it's OK to bring anything home, as long as it's legal to have. If the animal doesn't fit in, I'll find it a home where it will.
Anyway, around 2:30 we head over to Bi-Mart to pick up film and batteries for the film camera. I usually shoot digital, but not knowing how many pictures I was on the hook to take, I figured lots of film was the order of the day, given the fact that my digital will only hold a bit over 100 high res images. And then we headed off to the shoot.
A couple of miles from our farm there is a farm that raises rare livestock and a few exotics. As I was to find out, they have the most impressive herd of Zebu cattle I've ever seen. This was our destination. The Zebu have to be seen to be believed. Their largest bull looks like he just stepped off the wall of an Egyptian toomb, he's absolutely breathtaking, and a big baby doll to boot.
But getting back to the story -
We pulled up to the gate and one of the owners let us in. The first fellow to greet us was an adorable young llama who's name I was to find out, is Niki-Nik. Niki was all over us as soon as we came through the gate. Not pushy, but polite and inquisitive. He was absolutely charming, he still is in fact. Harold looked at me and asked if I liked him. I said 'Sure', where upon he said, "That's good because he's yours".
Was I surprised? You bet. Was I happy? Right again.
The owners of the farm gave us an extensive tour, which lasted around an hour and a half, and I have to say, I was very impressed. As I mentioned before, they have 3 of the 4 main types of Zebu, from the huge bull I described above, to the diminutive miniature Zebu. These little cattle are smaller than the calf our Angus/Jersey cow had, and the calves are absolutely tiny. They also have other interesting animals. I'll see if they will allow me to write something about their farm. They are a wealth of information on a wide range of animals both rare livestock to exotics.
After the tour it was time to load Niki into the truck. The fellow reached down and lifted Niki up, placing him on the tail gait of Harold's truck and we ushered him in under the canopy. Closing the back of the truck and securing it, we got in and headed home. Niki quickly took to the experience and laid down. When we go him home we let him out into a lock up area we have between the emu compound and the back yard. He go out of the truck and made himself at home, exploring and sampling the vegetation in the back garden.
The horses, were, to say the least, fascinated by him. Especially Melora, my Lipizzan mare. Melora is a sucker for any baby, and Niki being only 4 months old fit the bill just fine. Even Gizmo, the Lipizzan stallion, was intrigued by him. Rocky, the Paint stallion was curious, and the emus just didn't know what to make of him.
Niki browses as Melora looks on.
Gizmo, the first horse to meet Niki.
The emus just couldn't figure him out. Emus are funny that way, they'll flare out and run and dance about, then come back all full of curiosity.
