Blind Goat Forms Unbreakable Bond With Fellow Farm Animal

The two goats are inseparable.

ByABC News
March 2, 2016, 1:50 PM

— -- Marcia the goat is blind. Her fellow goat companion, Maurice, is not only a great friend but a great help.

“It was actually perfect,” Susie Coston, national shelter director at Farm Sanctuary, told ABC News about the special friendship. “They both wanted somebody and they were crying and crying to get to each other.”

Marcia was born blind and was rescued by Farm Sanctuary in Orland, California, on May 3, 2015, when she was about eight weeks old. “She was constantly wanting somebody and crying a lot,” Coston said.

Farm Sanctuary has been rescuing abused and unwanted farm animals since 1986.

Goats are herd animals, Coston explained. They panic when they are away from their herd and Marcia was never with anybody, “so I knew she needed somebody,” Coston said.

A couple months later Maurice came along.

PHOTO: Maurice was rescued by Farm Sanctuary on July 21, 2015 at six weeks old. He helps guide Marcia, who is blind, into new areas and is always by her side.
Maurice was rescued by Farm Sanctuary on July 21, 2015 at six weeks old. He helps guide Marcia, who is blind, into new areas and is always by her side.

He was only six weeks old when the sanctuary rescued him on July 21, 2015. Coston explained how Maurice was “perfect for Marcia” because he was still young and wouldn’t dominate her and he did not have horns. “Goats play really rough, but they can be bullied if they don’t know each other,” she added.

But the two meshed together right away and have been inseparable ever since.

Maurice will guide Marcia, who leans on him every step of the way whenever they go into a new area. Coston explained how the two goats “talk back and forth a lot.”

“Marcia will follow Maurice wherever he goes,” Coston said. And “he just loves her,” she added.

The two goats are not the only companions at the sanctuary. Coston said it is very normal to find animals becoming buddies with the other rescued animals. One case is with a female goat that always hangs out with a herd of sheep, and is “obsessed with them,” Coston said.

“They don’t have a rhyme or reason,” for choosing these companionships, Coston explained. “They’re kind of like us. They pick out who they want to hang out with.”

As for the two goats, they “live around 10 to 15 years, so they can live a nice long life together,” Coston said. “It will be nice to see how their relationship grows.”