5 Animals Found Dead On LI Farm After Bushes Tossed In Pen
(Warning: This post contains a photo that some may find disturbing).
AQUEBOGUE, NY — A local farmer was met with a horrifying sight this week when he found five of his animals dead in their pen.
Hal Goodale of Goodale Farms, located on Main Road in Aquebogue, took to social media Tuesday to share his shock and sadness.
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“At our farm, we provide food for you to feed our animals. Please DO NOT feed them anything else,” he wrote. “Yesterday, some thought it would be a good idea to toss the bushes that they ripped out of their yard into the goat and sheep pen. Contrary to popular belief, goats and sheep cannot eat everything. Now I have five beautiful animals that are dead. Three sheep and two pregnant goats.”
Goodale told Patch that he had “no clue” of what transpired. Whoever threw the bushes into the pen came up to the trailer at the back of the property, not the pens at the front outside, where there are cameras.
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“They went by that side and threw the bushes over the fence,” he said. “They were boxwood, and boxwood is deadly to goats.”
Whoever brought the brush had a “considerable amount,” Goodale said. “Each bush was probably 3 feet in diameter and 3 feet tall, and they threw about six in there,” he said.
Although he has crowds that come to see the goats and give them the healthy feed that Goodale provides, some don’t want to purchase the feed and just give the animals whatever they have, he said. “Even Doritos,” he added.
Goodale said he’s not sure if the culprits were trying to feed the animals “or just get rid of their garbage. I’m hoping it wasn’t intentional.”
His entire family is rocked by the loss. “We’e just devastated,” he said.
Although Goodale said that he has been working to give away some of his older animals, thin the herd a bit, the five animals that died were “pristine. These were five of the animals that I was keeping, good breeds,” he said.
Goodale said he posted about the incident hoping to educate. “People can look it up online, it comes right up, what plants goats can’t eat,” he said. “It’s a myth that goats can eat everything, but they can’t.”
Farmers always have to be aware, Goodale said: Even goats who have escaped in the past and hoofed it over to the nursery next door always manage to find the plant that’s deadly to them, rhododendron, he said.
And, Goodale added, because goats don’t have a gag reflex, when they eat something that’s poisonous to them, they can’t vomit, so they ultimately suffocate. Had the bushes been brought the front pen, where there are cameras, Goodale said the animlas might have been saved. “You grab them by their hind legs and hang them upside down, so whatever they’ve eaten comes out,” he said.
Goodale told the public that while he hopes they feed the animals with what he provides, there are some acceptable options. “If they bring some lettuce or carrots, that’s not going to hurt them, and not a problem. Use common sense.”
The loss was also an economic blow, Goodale said. “The farm is there for a reason,” he said. “It’s not easy to keep it afloat. The feed we have out there helps us stay alive. When we lose $3,000 to $4,000 worth of animals, it hurts if we have to replace them. And it’s sad, too.”
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