Texas Equine Veterinary Association

www.texasequineva.com • Page 23 BO BROCK, DVM, DABVP From "Crowded in the Middle of Nowhere" written by TEVA Founding Member and Current Vice President, Bo Brock, DVM, DABVP. Available for purchase on Amazon. Have you ever been through one of those days when everything that happens just gets on your nerves? You know, those days when even the things that should deliver a smile kinda make your teeth grit between the lips of a forced grin? Well, when those days come upon me, I think back on the most frustrated critter I have ever known, and it seems to make whatever made me tense seem so incredibly small. We called him Gomer because that is what he was. During the process of embryo transfer, we must know when the goats are in the right stage of heat in order to know if the synchronization of the donor and recipient are correct. In order to find this out, we need a boy goat. This boy goat must fulfill a few essential requirements. First, he must not be too big. This is because we don't want him to hurt the females or us. Second, he must be able to detect a female goat that is in heat. This means he must be intact. Third, and most importantly, he must not be able to breed with the female. So how is one to accomplish all these things? Years ago, someone came up with the "great idea" to create a gomer goat. This is done by surgically moving his "boy part" to where it exits on the side instead of straight ahead. This fulfills all of the requirements. It leaves the goat intact, yet it prevents the billy goat from getting the female pregnant. So, we went about making one of these creatures. The surgery is not hard. After the procedure, we let the gomer goat have about two weeks to recover, and then we fasten a harness that has some colored marking chalk on it between his front legs, and when he mounts the female, he will color her back and miss her "girl part." This is how we know when the female goat is ready to be used in the embryo-transfer procedure. I must say that it is a very good idea and works extremely well for everyone involved except Gomer. You should have seen the look on his face the first time he mounted a prime female specimen and saw his "boy part" come scooting out the side. Not only that, but you should have seen the look on the female's face when she saw it. He hopped off her and just froze. I think he suddenly realized why he had been hitting himself in the ear with tee tee for the last two weeks. He looked to that side and then to the other. I think he was checking to see if he had two. He jumped up in the air and then ran about, making a tremendous "mad goat" sound. He went over and butted a couple of young males as if to make sure it wasn't they who Frustrations had done it. And then, as if he thought perhaps he had awakened from a bad dream, he went over and tried the female again. The result was the same. He just stood there and looked at it. It looked to me as if his expression was saying, "Can you believe this? Of all the bad luck. I went to sleep, and when I woke up, my 'boy part' was pointing east. What am I going to do?" The breeding season went on, and eventually we were having to get the goats up every day to check them. This was a difficult task. There was a fellow in the clinic one day watching us who suggested that we get a dog to help round them up. I told him that ol' Gomer, there, wouldn't put up with a dog in his pen. The man replied, "That little goat couldn't hurt my dog." So, I said, "Bring him on." And he did. By now, Gomer was frustrated. He had tried every way possible to work around the problem. He would stand on one foot, mount her from the side, put both front feet on one side, and lie on his back. He would try to talk the female into moving her fanny over. Nothing would work. At times, he would be surrounded by thirty or forty goats in heat, and all he could do was mount and watch. His frustrations accumulated until he was just downright mean. When this fellow showed up with his dog, it was quite a sight to behold. He told the dog to go get the goats. This dog took off like a shot. It ran around to the back and into Gomer. Ol' Gomer tore that dog up like a sow's bed. Gomer hung his horn under the collar of the dog and carried it around, butting it on everything in sight. The dog was yipping and screaming, and for just a moment, I thought I saw Gomer smile. The breeding season came to an end, and we no longer needed Gomer. Of course, we moved his boy part back to the intended position. I have often wondered about him. If he is still alive and happily breeding nannies, what do you think he tells the boys down at the barbershop about the year he spent in Lamesa?

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