This Yoga Class Achieves Namaste With Goats

There is a very well known yoga pose called downward facing dog — which has been practiced with cats —  but now a new animal has joined the meditating exercise.

Yoga with Goats — or goat yoga as it is being touted – is the latest way to challenge your body and soul while navigating playful and adorable goats who jump on your back while you’re in table pose just for the fun of it.

Yoga With Goats is featured at a farm in Nottingham, New Hampshire called Jenness Farm where “the kids” are running around the class as you try to concentrate on calming your mind and strengthening your body. The poses haven’t changed, but there are slight variations to accommodate the goats as they balance on your back or nuzzle you.

In this YouTube video from Maine television station WGME, the instructor says, “if you have a goat on your back you can stay right in table top.”

If you take this class — be prepared to have goats everywhere. Don’t be alarmed if a baby goat just jumps onto your shoulders while you’re in yogi pose.

Or while breathing deeply in child’s pose, a goat might just walk onto your spine.

Owner Peter Corriveau began his business on the five-acre farm in 2001 making goat milk soap. Yoga goat classes, which began in April, have caught the world’s attention and now they’re booked through June.

“This was really kind of a fluke,” Corriveau told Reuters. “We did this dry run, posted some pictures and really hadn’t thought that far ahead. And it’s just exploded.”

The idea was inspired by people who follow the farm on social media and send him videos of goat yoga for more than a year.

The website for Jenness Farm has a blog dedicated to the farm happenings and goat yoga was the latest entry.

“We brought on 5 little Nigerian Dwarf babies, Tula, Lily, Lotus, Zinnia & Poppy!” they wrote on the website. “They are the sweetest little babies!”

How anybody manages to concentrate while these cute babies are jumping about everywhere remains to be seen, but they certainly put a smile on your face.

Adult classes begin at 14 years old and cost $22 per person. They are taught by instructor Janine Bibeau who was recruited from Peace, Love, And Applesauce — a holistic page on Facebook that “combines yoga, meditation, whole foods, and Ayurvedic principles for your fullest life.”

Goat yoga has even inspired new names for poses. Bibeau posted this video on Facebook that was coined “Goats Under The Bridge” — as the baby goat walks through several students doing a bridge of downward facing dogs.

“We do yoga with and alongside the goats in both the children’s and adult yoga with goats classes,” yoga instructor Janine Bibeau wrote to Your Daily Dish. “In my children’s class, we made a string of downward dogs so that they formed a bridge for the goats to walk under. The kids called it Goats Under The Bridge. Another thing that was particularly cute was that one little girl in my children’s class said that it looks like the goats are walking on high heels. We imitated that by walking on our hands and toes in a freeze style game.”

Bibeau told Your Daily Dish that she is familiar with yoga and goats.

“At home, I practice yoga outside on my lawn while my two Pygmy goats roam around,” Bibeau wrote. “They are older so they don’t jump on my back like the babies do — thank goodness because they weigh 45 pounds! They do lay down on my mat or nibble on the grass close by.”

They plan to renovate the 3rd floor of the barn above the shop by mid-June as a permanent yoga home.

During class, the energy level of the goats might mimic the activity, but other times it does not.

Or you can just embrace your Namaste — and a goat — for a cuddle.