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Goats get chilly, too
Sweaters keep the Eberly goats warm on their Lower Frankford farm
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Naomi Eberly, 10, of Newville slips a homemade jacket on Pip-Squeak, one of the Eberly family’s goats on their farm in Lower Frankford Township. Matthew O’Haren/Special to The Sentinel
Eberly family’s male goats sport their homemade sweaters made by the Eberly’s children (not pictured) Erin, 14, Cadie, 12, and Naomi, 10, inside their pen on the Eberly Farm in Lower Frankford Township. Matthew O’Haren/Special to The Sentinel
Misty walks around the pasture like any ordinary goat, eating grass and looking for a little attention from her people. But unlike most ordinary goats, Misty, a black-and-white LaMancha, pads through the pasture wearing a fuchsia sweater.
Misty and the other 12 goats owned by the Eberly family of Lower Frankford Township all wear sweaters.
“They were shivering,” said Cadi, 12.
“We didn’t even know they could,” added Erin, 14.
Cadi came up with the idea to warm the shivering goats by making them sweaters.
“We get really emotional about our goats,” said the girls’ mother, Donna Eberly.
The girls, along with their sister, Naomi, 10, first thought of knitting or sewing sweaters for the goats, but then they found a more immediate solution: “We thought of our old sweaters,” Cadi recalled.
They scoured all the closets in the house for old sweaters and sweatshirts and got to work.
“You have to cut part of the sleeves off,” Cadi explained.
Once the sweaters were tailored, the girls entered the pasture and began dressing the goats. Each goat was given a sweater of a different color.
“You can locate who’s who from the window,” Donna Eberly noted.
Whether the sweaters are put on with the “front” of the sweater on the goat’s back or belly is determined by how the collar is made.
“Misty loved hers,” Naomi recalled. “She was waiting for it as the other goats were getting theirs.”
By the time the girls’ father returned home from work, all the goats were dressed. And Dad was in for a surprise.
“I pulled in and saw the goats and thought, ‘Is that my sweater?’” recalled Norman Eberly. “Then I realized, ‘That is my sweater.’”
After about a month of wearing the sweaters, the goats are still sporting their outerwear.
“I thought they’d all be ripped to shreds,” Norman Eberly said.
A few of the goats, like Misty, are on their second sweaters, while one of the goats struggled to remove hers.
“It was all ripped up. We had to throw it out,” Naomi said.
Dahlia, dressed in a yellow sweater, didn’t like her first sweater but feels better about her second.
“She’s fine with it,” Cadi said.
The sweaters will be removed periodically for washing and then in the spring when the weather gets warm.
The Eberlys didn’t set out to have goats when they moved to Central Pennsylvania from Long Island, N.Y., four years ago. They got their first goat from a neighbor, picked up a few more here and there and have now become educated goat farmers, learning from neighbors, books and the 4-H.
“We had a lot of mentors,” Erin explained.
Their farm has grown to include rabbits, chickens, cats, dogs and a horse.
The goats, however, have proven to be quite entertaining.
“We used to have a swing set out there,” Donna Eberly said, pointing to a corner of the pasture. “The goats would put the chickens in swings and push them.”
The goats also enjoy riding to shows in the van Norman Eberly uses to run his Eberly Cleaning Service business.
But the girls weren’t the first in the family to dress an animal. Donna Eberly admitted she made a coat for the horse last year.
“Before I knew it, he was out of it,” she said. “I have no idea how he got out of it. I gave up and bought one.”
The girls said they are satisfied with their goat-warming project and have no immediate plans to delve into haute couture for animals. But they have tossed around another idea for the goats:
“Pajama pants,” Cadi said with a grin.
