Meet Bounce, the Bay of Plenty goat who thinks she's a dog

Bounce and Toby in the backseat of the truck on the way to the beach. Photos / Supplied

Bounce the Bay of Plenty goat thinks she's a dog. She has no reason to believe otherwise.

She lives in her own kennel, eats dog biscuits and her four best mates are dogs.

"She bosses them around and lives with them," Bounce's human-mum Natasja Boon told the Bay of Plenty Times Weekend yesterday.

Boon and her family, who are organic dairy farmers in Awakeri, were out hunting about five years ago, culling goats, when they came across baby Bounce.

"We had said no mother goats with little ones, because that's a bit mean. But by mistake the mother got shot. I got the kids to catch her and then she got left with us."

Boon hand-reared Bounce, who was eventually tied up outside with the dogs.

But one day her chain got caught up with a dog chain.

"And instead of eating her, the dog cuddled up with her for the night," Boon said.

She said this was met with total surprise when the family eventually came across the two new mates.

"You would think, because they were locked together, somebody would have got hurt. But the goat didn't do anything either, and she's got horns."

Ever since then, Bounce has roamed free and spends all her time with "the wolf pack", as they have come to be known.

The four dogs are not small. Three are pig dogs – lockley crosses.

The other is a big bull mastiff-labrador cross.

"If you would see them, you wouldn't think, oh, I'll leave my goat here," Boon said.

When the dogs start barking, Bounce starts bleating. Visiting friends find it hilarious.

When the dogs go out for walks or runs, the goat joins them. In fact, she gets a bit upset if she's left behind.

"We've never tried to take her hunting with us but I'm sure if we take her pig hunting, she'll join in and follow us," Boon says. "She's just one of the dogs."

Earlier this week, the story of Lucy the four-week-old lamb came to light.

She lives in Tauranga with six dogs, a cat and an older sheep named Coco.

Born last month in bad weather, Lucy suffered joint-ill, an infection in the joints that meant that she couldn't walk or even lift her head.

Lucy needed three weeks of antibiotics to clear the infection which had left her with arthritis in a front knee and her back hip. So she still sleeps in the house.

"She has no idea she is a sheep at all. She eats and sleeps with the dogs and comes out for walks now that she's a bit older," owner Katrina Thompson told the NZ Herald.

Every night, Lucy cosies up on the sofa with the family's six dogs.

She is nearly fully toilet trained (the nappy stays on just to prevent accidents) and obeys commands such as "come", "stand" and "wait".