Pygmy Goats Find Home At Tomball Antique Shop

TOMBALL, TX -- A local family is looking to change a city ordinance in Tomball that will allow them to keep three pygmy goats at their business. Three pygmy goats that are known as Hershey, Casper and Ramsey have lived in a fenced pen behind Nana’s Main Street Cottage since the end of May.

The goats, which are less than knee-high to the average adult and weigh about 15 pounds each, have brought smiles to visitors stopping to Nana’s -- an antique store at 314 E. Main Street.

The goats were purchased by Tiffany Romero and her husband Darryl, for their 15-year-old daughter Caitlyn, an FFA student in Klein ISD. Last year, Caitlyn raised a goat for an FFA project. The goat was sold during an auction in March 2018.

Although selling the FFA projects for college money is the goal, Caitlyn was heartbroken and lobbied her parents for a pygmy goat, knowing the larger goats couldn’t be kept in the city.

“She won me over quick,” Tiffany Romero said.

They began building the pen in the back of the business, which included swings for the small goats. Before long, customers who were coming to see the 12-foot metal rooster in front of the shop would come to the back of the business to see the goats, too.

Tiffany said they thought having the small goats would comply with the city ordinance since the area is zoned commercial, but several of the neighboring businesses didn’t agree and filed a complaint, citing the pygmy goats as a violation of the city ordinance against livestock.

“We didn’t know we were doing anything wrong,” Tiffany Romero said.

Tomball’s ordinance bans goats, horses, sheep, hogs, cows and goats. The ordinance does make an exception for potbellied pigs that weigh less than 200 pounds and are shorter than 36 inches.

The Romero family went to the Tomball City Council meeting on Aug. 6 to plead their case. They presented letters and the signatures of nearly 200 visitors who begged for the goats to stay.

“The kids [baby goats] are not smelly; they’re not noisy. They are not dangerous,” said Dan Howes, part owner of Nana’s Man Street Cottage. “They bring happiness to everybody they come in contact with.”

Monique Dermaux, who owns Tomball Goat Yago on Cherry Street, said allowing pygmy goats in the city wouldn’t be a bad thing and could help bring more business to the growing tourist town.

“When you walk in, they welcome you there. You walk to the backyard, you see the goats and they let you pet the goats and they don’t charge you. All I want to do is go back to Tomball to see goats. How can this be bad?” she said.

The council voted 5-0 in favor of changing the ordinance to allow the pygmy goats and will vote on the second reading of the ordinance on Aug. 20, which is likely to pass.

Tiffany Romero said they are thrilled the first reading of the ordinance has passed and plan to add a fourth and final goat to the pygmy clan when the ordinance is changed.

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Image: Bryan Kirk/Patch Houston

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