A Mole of What?

We just enjoyed a week-long visit from my youngest sister, a nomadic biologist who constantly traverses the globe in search of new botanical knowledge and opportunities...she hasn't been to our little corner of the world in over a year so it was great to see her again. One of the best parts of her family's visit was introducing the goats to my 7-year old nephew.  Micah lavished lots of attention on Em and Ellie, climbing onto the roof with them and imitating their play with each other by "pushing" them on the deck (which they loved, always coming back for more). Micah also earned points with me by being a very adept "poop scooper" and would eagerly grab the nearest dustpan and brush whenever needed (usually about every five minutes...) I love that kid!!

Having driven twelve hours to watch her son clean up goat excrement, my sister finally gave her opinion of our "No Poop Left Behind" philosophy. "I don't know why you have to clean it up all the time," she remarked (clearly noticing that the scooper has become a natural extension of my right hand and our conversations were constantly interrupted to attend to this task). "Why don't you just let it dry up and biodegrade, or simply scoop it all up once a week?"

WHOA, WHOA, WHOA. This is the stuff of nightmares! Emily and I just looked at each other, both envisioning the yard overcome with higher and higher mounds of "nannyberries" until only the shed roof was visible (picture a National Guard rooftop rescue, like in flood zones) - of being unable to open the sliding door to the deck for an avalanche of poop - my goodness, if we waited a week the entire town could be covered...It is beyond comprehension, the potential disasters averted by my little scooper - a small sacrifice for the greater good.

Emily recently learned the concept of "mole" in Chemistry class - a number represented by 6 followed by 23 zeroes (or for you math geeks, 6 X 10 to the 23rd power). Apparently a "mole" of marshmallows would cover the earth in a layer twelve miles deep (ok, that's a lot of smores potential!) So an interesting question - what about a mole of goat droppings? Well, they are significantly smaller than marshmallows, but I'm still imagining a pretty unpleasant situation. I think I'll keep up the frequent scooping - just my own little effort to save the planet!

It also occurred to me that my sister is an educated scholar - how could this not be evident to her? Then I realized - her field is botany, and the waste product of plants is...oxygen! Now I know what we did wrong! Instead of goats, we should have gotten a pair of cute little houseplants.  (We probably could have even figured out a way to bottle-feed them!)