Noisy nannies are very unladylike!

TOM NOCHI, 44, is a photographer, and lives in Essex with his wife Laura, 40, an operations delivery manager, and their sons (pictured left to right) Yoav, 12, Guy, five, and Oz, nine. They have two pygmy goats called Millie and Bertha. Tom says: OUR PET pygmies — named after Laura’s late grannies — might be nanny goats but they’re not ladylike, and burp constantly.

We bought them four years ago for £125 each from a farmer at 12 weeks old. He was overrun with kids after his billy goat escaped and impregnated every female in his herd! They’re classed as livestock, so we had to get a Council Parish Holding number from DEFRA.

Laura was a riding instructor and I worked in a zoo, but it’s still been a learning curve. At first, we kept them indoors, worried they may be tempting to foxes. If any of us crouched down they would climb onto our shoulders. You’d find yourself stuck in a funny position, with a goat nuzzling your face. And, my goodness, they were noisy.

As they became more robust, we put them into a pen in our 80ft garden, with a shed to sleep in. They love to come into the house for cuddles, but they’re not potty trained so they have to wear baby nappies with a hole for their tails.

However, they are escape artists. A man knocked on our door and asked: ‘Do you have goats?’ When I said yes, he replied: ‘Oh, that’s nice . . . they’re in my garden!’

They’d managed to tunnel through and invited themselves round for a graze. Thankfully, he saw the funny side.