It Doesn’t Get Better Than This!
by Mark & Pat Endry
Our journey into becoming donkey owners started with an acquaintance who had llamas. She had adopted 2 donkeys from Longhopes and thought they were wonderful so we decided look.
We met Wiley and Coco on the first trip to Longhopes. Wiley was described as needing a job to stay out of trouble. If Wiley “needed a job” that sounded like work for us so we kept looking. After several trips, Kathy said, “what about Wiley and Coco, it doesn’t get better than this”. They moved in a few days later so now Wiley has a job, supervising the jobs he gives us!
Wiley was born at Longhopes and was used to interacting with humans. It is a real treat when he rolls over on his back, spreads his legs and lets us rub his belly while he makes an indescribable humming sound that must mean happy donkey. Wiley loves to watch us work in the barn, especially if we’re working in a stall or the paddock where he can actually lean his head over our shoulder and look at what we’re doing. It always takes longer to work on things when Wiley is “helping” but it is also worth a lot of laughs.
One day Mark noticed Coco off in the distance hiding under a tree and he found she had injured her eye. She needed eye drops three times a day and an eye patch. We were amazed that we could walk up to a huge animal like Coco, take off her eye patch, tilt her head and put in eye drops then put her eye patch back. She seemed to know we were helping her and after a few days she would tilt her head on her own. She has healed completely and the ordeal has made her almost as friendly as Wiley.
When Kathy delivered Wiley and Coco she said there was a problem. Our barn and pasture were too big for just 2 donkeys. She was right, of course, so Sandee and Suzee joined them in a couple of months.
Suzee is very friendly and loves to be hugged. Sandee is more like Coco originally was. When approached she used to stand behind Suzee and only recently started to come up for hugs and to have her head and ears rubbed. They all line up when it is time for carrots and generally behave as the treasures are handed out.
We’ve all learned a lot, but one question still haunts us. If you have two large donkeys and you get two smaller donkeys, why do you have more than twice the amount of donkey poo?
