Emily Douglas, the Castleton’s women’s field hockey coach, decided the girls on her team needed a bonding activity outside of field hockey. And as out of the blue as it may sound, she was led to find goat yoga.  

Douglas is a Castleton alum who started her coaching at the University of New Haven in Connecticut. But she chose to come back to Castleton. “I do love the community at Castleton,” she said. 

Douglas loves her team and is always looking for different ways to bring the team together outside of Field hockey. “I mean field hockey is our one love and passion but being able to do things as a team that has nothing related to field hockey does help us on the field,” she said.  

Douglas found out about goat yoga by simply living in Castleton. “I played at Castleton but I am also a local, so I have a lot of friends in the area. I was on Instagram sometime this summer and saw that some of my friends did it so I message them they told me that it was a local in Castleton that did it.” Douglas thought this form of bonding would be a great way to get the girls together as a team outside of practice. Though they had to wait till fall break to be able to do it, it was worth it, and they all had fun participating.  

Douglas describes the goat yoga scene. You were first met with a line of yoga mats set out with hay between each row. There was a lot of hay but not one goat in sight. Douglas and the team got to do 30 minutes of regular yoga before the goats were let out of the barn. They trotted into the little pasture alongside the girls. The goats instantly made a beeline for the hay, and soon enough the field hockey team learned how food-motivated these goats were. These little goats would do anything for food, especially vegetables. The yoga instructor brought out multiple buckets of veggies so the girls could all feed the goats themselves.  

Douglas continues saying, “They are so food motivated that we were able to do the yoga poses we wanted to take photos or just pet them, and they were food motivated. They were obsessed and jumping on you  and it was fun.”

She added, “The goats were full of personality as well which is kind of funny and they kind of were attracted to similar personalities with the team which was kind of funny like the dominated the bigger goats that were like more dominating more powerful form were attracted to the girls on the team that maybe had that personality in them which was kind of funny to see.” 

All of the girls had a lot of fun doing goat yoga, Reilly Tennis being one of them. Tennis is a third-year player and has loved being on the team. She was ecstatic when she learned that the team was going to be doing goat yoga. 

“I was excited, I have always wanted to participate in some kind of animal yoga. I feel really lucky to be able to do it with my teammates and that coach set it up!” she said.  

Tennis, like some of the other girls, had never been around goats before but she loved every minute of it, and said that she would love to do it again! She tells us about her favorite parts about yoga. “The location of the farm was absolutely beautiful, especially with the fall foliage, it set the scene. But probably watching my teammates try to get a goat to jump on their backs was very funny to watch. There was a really sweet goat named Butters that I liked. And before we got started the instructor told us that there was a big goat named Latte and she tends to hang around people who are confident and leaders, so it was funny to watch who Latte chose to be around. No surprise she hung around coaches and our goalie Zoe,” she said with a smile. 

Hana Doria, a Castleton Freshman, comments on the experience saying “My favorite part was the end where we were able to feed them and take fun pictures. They would stand up on two legs and put their feet on your chest,” she said.  

Doria was excited to be able to do something with the team that was not related to field hockey. Like Tennis, Doria had never been around goats before after this experience she would love to do it again! 

Emerson Stamp, who is also a Castleton Freshman, has also never been around goats but had a blast! “I was really excited we were doing goat yoga as a team bonding activity. Yoga is one of my favorite activities, so goat yoga has always been something that I’ve wanted to try so I was glad we got to do it,” she said.  

Stamp describes her favorite part of the experience “when they all first came out from the barn. They all came running out towards us and it was super cute. Another memorable part was when we got to feed them. All the goats got super excited and started jumping up and climbing to get the food.” She recalls.  

All the girls on the team had a blast participating in goat yoga and they all would do it again. They loved the team bonding opportunity and got to take a break away from field hockey as a team. Coach Douglas and the team would love to support and advertise goat yoga. They recommend this unique and fun opportunity right outside of Castleton. For those curious, it is called the Castleton Flying Goat Yoga located at 1422 Pond Hill Road in Castleton, Vermont.