Her father sat in a folding chair beside the barn.
His right hand rested on a cane.
Speech remained slower since the stroke, but his eyes were still sharp enough to make her feel twelve years old.
He watched the trailer.
Then looked at her.
“How… many?”
“Forty-eight.”
He stared.
“Forty-eight.”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
“Less than the sprayer.”
“That is… not an answer.”
She smiled.
“Eight hundred all in.”
Her father looked toward the trailer again.
The goats pressed their noses through the ventilation openings.
One bleated.
Her father rubbed his forehead.
“You bought… problems.”
“Probably.”
“Fences?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Predators?”
“Guardian dog arrives Friday.”
“You bought… dog?”
“Borrowing.”
Her father looked at her.
Then suddenly laughed.
Not loudly.
His face still did not move evenly after the stroke.
But it was laughter.
“You’re crazy.”
“Everybody says so.”
He lifted the cane.
Pointed toward the pasture.
“You have… plan?”
“Yes.”
That answer mattered.
He lowered the cane.
“Then try.”
She nodded.
That was all the approval she needed.
The first week was chaos.
Goats discovered electrical fencing.
Then discovered how unpleasant electric fencing could be.
One jumped through rather than backward.
Three followed.
The young farmer chased them across the driveway wearing one boot because she had been halfway through changing when the alarm from the gate sounded.
Her father watched from the porch and laughed until he coughed.
The borrowed livestock guardian dog ignored the goats for six hours, then decided they were his entire purpose in life.
The goats initially hated him.
By the fourth night, several slept against his side.
The young woman divided the pasture into temporary paddocks.
That had been the range specialist’s recommendation.
Small areas.
Heavy browsing.
Short duration.
Move quickly.
Do not let the goats repeatedly attack desirable regrowth.
The system sounded simple when explained beside a desk.
On actual pasture, nothing stayed where theory placed it.
Water trough too far.
Move it.
Shade wrong.
Move fence.
Gate sagging.
Fix it.
One goat lame.
Trim hoof.
Two with diarrhea.
Test parasites.
Minerals wrong.
Adjust.
A doe learned how to duck beneath the lowest wire without shocking herself.
The farmer watched her escape three times before lowering the strand.
Her father named the animal Congress.
“Why Congress?”
he daughter asked.
He smiled.
“Finds… loopholes.”
The name remained.
By the second week, something changed.
Not dramatically.
The young farmer noticed first near the temporary fence.
The goats were not grazing like cattle.
They stood on hind legs to reach seed heads.
They stripped leaves from woody stems.
They worked from shoulder height downward.
The pasture behind them looked rough.
Messy.
Chewed.
But the desirable grass near ground level remained surprisingly intact.
The farmer knelt.
Ran her fingers through green blades.