# An Interesting Conundrum



## groovyoldlady (Jul 21, 2011)

My daughter just pointed out to me that she learned that a goat's pin bones are in one location and the judge at the most recent fair told her it was elsewhere. So today we took some time to look it up and....they are both right? Or are they both wrong? Is the pin bone under the tail and slightly to each side or is it higher up, closer to the tail head? We're finding anatomy charts that put it (them) in both places!


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## kccjer (Jan 27, 2012)

Sounds to me that it's just a minute difference in position by opinion. How strange....


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## Dani-1995 (Mar 11, 2011)

You can feel them. Find the hooks and feel back until you feel a small round bone. At least that's the way I was taught


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## groovyoldlady (Jul 21, 2011)

Dani-1995 said:


> You can feel them. Find the hooks and feel back until you feel a small round bone. At least that's the way I was taught


What are "the hooks"? I'm not familiar with that term...


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## Nubian_Nut (Dec 21, 2012)

Here are some of my own personal pictures of my goats and I circled the pin bones in red. Hope these help


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## Little-Bits-N-Pieces (Apr 7, 2013)

groovyoldlady said:


> What are "the hooks"? I'm not familiar with that term...


Some people call the hips "hooks". Hooks are the hips bones.


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## Little-Bits-N-Pieces (Apr 7, 2013)

And the above photos are correct. The pin bones are only in one spot, they are circled correctly above


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## Dani-1995 (Mar 11, 2011)

Yep it's just the hip bone


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## Chadwick (Jan 24, 2014)

So why are dairy breeds so pointy in the top pin bone areas where others don't seem to be?


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## Dani-1995 (Mar 11, 2011)

They aren't made to produce meat or fat. Muscle is very low on their bodies priorities where as milk production is the highest... meat are opposite and focus primarily on building muscle and reaching market weight fast.


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## groovyoldlady (Jul 21, 2011)

Nubian_Nut said:


> Here are some of my own personal pictures of my goats and I circled the pin bones in red. Hope these help


That's exactly what we had learned, but the judge said the pin bones were ABOVE the tail and we found at least 2 "Goat Body Part" charts that agreed with her.

I think we'll stay with this interpretation. But I am curious why the judge and some charts refer to the pin bones as being elsewhere...


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## groovyoldlady (Jul 21, 2011)

Here's is one of many charts we found with the pin bones correctly identified.







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And here is a chart where the bones are, apparently, misidentified:







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## caprine crazy (Jun 12, 2012)

^^That's weird.^^


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