Those nasty billy goats

When Heather said the Billy goats were raping the nany goats again I thought that was a bit of a strong use of terminology - I'd never thought of animals raping one another, I just thought it was a human condition.
However, now I have well and truly seen it for myself. As soon as a nanny goat comes onto season the billy goats go mental, they hang out as a group anyway so then they just attack her as a team, one after the other. I mean thats fairly normal for animals I guess, I mean I saw a female dolphin have sex with 3 different male dolphins in the space of 2 minutes once... except dolphins are meant to be the only animal species that does it for fun. But the billy goats chase the poor nanny goats into corners and just surround them like a gang, they try and ram them into fences so they get their heads stuck and cant move and she'll be desperately trying to get away. If theres too many billys to the females or the paddock is too small they will rape the nany goats to death.. as it is in this hot weather if the nanys cant get their heads out the fences again their a gonna, I've been round rescueing them, twisting their heads round to get them out of the fences.. but all too often your not fast enough.. I've never seen so many dead animals or animals get killed since I came to the outback... and my god they smell bad in this heat, if a sheeps died the day before if its not been eaten by eagles and foxes them it stinks so so so bad.
Some wild horses came through the land the other day which was pretty amazing, especially as I'd seen this Aussie film "The Snowy River" the day before about wild horses.. Heather let a horse go a few years ago that was a pain in the arse so it was nice to see that one in the pack..
I had an amazing horseride today... we were bareback which is weird to get used to, I never realised how much balance a saddle gives you, I felt like I was going to slip off.. but not as much as I did once we'd jumped into the river...! Being on a horse that is swimming is the weirdest sensation, their legs not being on ground and paddling along, just their heads poking up... you being deep in the water with them... but Bugshot went completely under so Heather had to push herself off as he was taking ages coming up again.. I didnt notice myself as Be Happy was leaning to one side and she was so slippy and at such an angle I was just hanging on for dear life!! if I thought it was slippy before we got in the water it was like sitting on an oil slick on a bull trying to buck you after...! I have to admit i was a tad scared but it was also amazing and I'm eager to go out again!! and at leats it was a sweltering day so being soaking wet felt great...!
If I'm reincarnated as an animal in the next life I reckon a horse would be a good choice, not that many nationalities eat you and your expensive so people look after you! However as for being a sheep I reckon that would be the worst... we have been doing a lot of sheep work this week. alot of farms either have gyrocopters (small helicopters) or rent them out for this but as over $100 an hour its bloody expensive so we did it by cars and motorbikes, dogs and running around on our own 2 feet, it was hot and bloody exhausting, and then to get them to the shearing sheds it was about a 50km drive so we had to squeeze them into trailers 25 at a time which took days... then once they were at the shearing sheds they had to be shorn, but they were dodgy wool blind (wool grown over eyes so they are literaly blind) wethers (male sheep with balls chopped off) that had lice and worms and some had big scary horns, and Terry hates shearing even though he used to do it for a living, lots of them got vbig cuts getting shorn, and then they had to have worming medicine and lice medicine before they could be let free again... all this process taking more than a week and still not all of them shorn yet.. poor things... the worst ones and the fly blown have been done, the rest are waiting in a paddock.. Being fly blown is disgusting.. the flies get in the matted fur and lay maggots which eat away at their flesh...
also fact for the day.. I dont know if you've ever wondered about the size of sheeps horns? why do some have them and some dont?
Well it depends on how early you chop their balls off of course!! if you do it when they are teeny they will hardly have any horns at all..
Australians happily you use the terminology "You Dag" regularly. its a term of endearment to someone they like... but when you think about it the literal translation of what a dag is, is the shitty bit on a sheeps arse.. so when someone calls me a dag I'm really not sure what to think!
Heather also has a kayak which one night recently I went out in on my own.. I admit I was a tad scared, going off down a river to go knows where all on my own!! It was a beautiful sunset but since my sense of direction is rubbish I was a bit worried about finding my way back.. and I did nearly get lost getting strnded in some trees in the shallow water and having to get out and drag myself out again... but I was proud of myself anywayhow for getting myself there and back safely, enjoying the amazing tranquilness, birds flying overhead (cockatiels and big green parrots are common here). I also went out another night with Zoe and Heather as its a 2 person kayak and we just bought Zoe a life jacket.. that was cool too and at least Heather knew where she was going!
we went into town the other day which was pretty exciting since I havent been in a shop in a month and I hadnt explored Bourke yet. I told you the reputation Bourke has and I have to say it lived up to it!
Many of the houses were flattned to the ground, glass everywhere, surrounded by burnt out cars, the houses with people in had holes in the walls, the windows smashed in and drunken aboriginals outside... i would have loved to gte soem photos of the locals but it was a tad scary so I had to make so with those of empty houses and graffitti, didnt really facny getting stoned to death.. the locals round here party and trash their houses until their uninhabitable and then the government gives them a new one. In the supermarket their were fights and arguements between drunken aboriginals. Heather says the best fight shes ever seen was in the Bourke supermarket, 2 aborigine women going at it, one pulling out the others breast, twisting it round and biting it.. all in the frozen food aisle!
If I thought this was bad I saw a documentary on Wilcannia wich is not that far from Bourke, basically between here and Broken Hill. This is basically a very dodgy aborgine town... nobody could sell their shop or house their because no-one would everwant to move there. statistic of child sexual abuse are so high that they can categorically say every single child has suffered sexual abuse. the children do not get fed Sunday through to Wednesday, benefits come out on Thursdays so by Sunday its run out.. (all been drunk away). 3 teachers tried to change the town, as only 8 children went.. by providing 3 meals a day, working hard and providing a fun atmosphere so that 180 children ended up attending school, until they did a 20-20 docemtary on TV and spoke of the statistic of child abuse, and the locals stopped sending their children to school and ran the teachers out of town.. this is a town where the average life expectency for a male is 33. (no that is not a typo that is 33). depressing and scary. Racism is huge in this area, but its unfortunate that it is this portion of the aboriginal society that the local white peopole have any experience of. I hear that up North the aboriginals are very different and I look forward to seeing that. As it was I got alot of stick for chatting to the one aborginal guy who came into the bush pub (who was drunk as skunk but fairly harmless) for me it was fascinating seing him march in with his digeridoo!
Thankfully my ear infection has (touch wood) cleared up... it has been so so painful.. and I've had to avoid swimming.. and even now I'm swimming very carefully without getting me ears wet!
It hasnt rained now in a couple of weeks (basically since the first week I arrived) so the dirt is drying up and whirlwinds come through these whirls of red dust come up... and in a dust storm its like this red wall coming towards you... insane!!