Tails from a farm: Meet the goats of our happy little farm

Brie and Bucky are probably the quirkiest characters out in the barnyard. Brie, am alpine/boer mix came to us at two weeks of age and was my first bottle baby. I enjoyed her babyhood immensely. She would come to bed with me every night and tuck her wee head into my neck until my husband would remove her and put her in her crate when he came to bed. Poor Brie would cry out when he took her out of our bed.
Considering she was a goat she wasn't all that destructive and I missed her when she was old enough to move out into the barnyard with the sheep. We have a bond, Brie and I. We understand each other. I realized that the sheep weren't enough company for her. She needed a goat friend. So I called the farm where we got her and was told that they had a one week old buck, Brie's nephew, and he was slated for slaughter because most people will not buy a plain white goat. The next day Bucky came home. Where Brie was an easy baby Bucky presented a multitude of challenges. He ate every plant in the house. He couldn't tolerate the milk replacer and almost died twice. Finally I called a woman who has a goat farm and over 160 goats, if she didn't know what to do who would I thought. She told me to stop the milk replacer and put little Bucky on plain old cow's milk that you get from the store. She went on to say that she has lost many a kid from milk replacer but never from cow's milk. Well, Bucky's health turned around after that. He began to thrive and had a special bond with our dog, now deceased, and would sleep on the couch with her all night. I'd come home from work and Bucky, hearing me come in, would jump off the couch and say "Maaa?" If we had a visitor, both Bucky and Missy (the dog) would go and greet them together. It certainly wasn't something you see every day.
We almost lost Bucky again this past Summer when we realized he couldn't urinate. After an emergency trip to the vet's at 1:30AM on a Sunday he had surgery which saved his life. I'm starting to think he has nine lives like a cat.