Taking Care of Mini Goats & Mini Sheep

Right when you think you’ve seen enough adorable content in one game, The Sims 4 Horse Ranch enters the chat. Horses are of course the namesake of the pack, but let me tell you why the pack brings something even better; Mini Goats & Mini Sheep! First of all, they are cute. Second of all, they are mini. Third, did I mention they are cute yet?! Yes? Oh, well… Either way, let’s see how to acquire these little fluff-balls, shall we?

How to Get Mini Goats & Sheep

There are a couple of ways to buy yourself Mini Goats & Sheep in The Sims 4. You’ll need to contact the Ranch Animal Exchange in order to buy yourself these cuties. Find the Call Ranch Animal Exhange – Buy Mini Goats & Mini Sheep interaction here:

• Under the Home tab of your Sim’s cellphone.
• Under the Household – Adopt tab on PC’s.
• On the Ranch Community Boards. Find one in each neighborhood of Chestnut Ridge.
• On the Hay Now! Animal Feeders.
• On the Hay Now! Horse Beds.

Now you can pick any Mini Goat and/or Mini Sheep your heart desires. Given you have enough money to adopt them, of course. How many it costs is determined by how many you adopt – no amount limit! – and by what color you choose.

Mini Animal	Adoption Fee
Brown, Dalmatian, Spotted, Chamoisee, Gray, Black, White Belt or White Mini Goat	§150
White or Cream Mini Sheep	§150
Dalmatian Mini Sheep	§200
Pink, Brown, Orange, Green, Red, Blue or Mocha Mini Sheep	§400
Black Mini Sheep	§2.000

After you’ve purchased the Mini Animals, they will appear in your Sim’s inventory. Click on their portrait to be able to place them in the world. To pick them back up later on you can use the Actions – Put in Inventory interaction, or recall a bunch of Mini’s at once by Actions – Collect Goats & Sheep to select which ones to pick up. This way you can easily take them with you to the Ranch Animal Day Social Event too!

Tip! It’s important to note that while your Mini Animals are in your inventory, their Needs will still decay. Which brings me to the following…

Taking Care of Your Mini Animals

Mini Goats & Sheep have four Needs that have to be met by your Household: Happiness, Hygiene, Hunger and Attention. You can hover over the Animal to see the status of their Needs, but also whether or not you can Milk or Shear them. But more on that later…

Happiness

This is the overall Happiness of your Mini Goats & Mini Sheep. If their other Needs are full, you probably have a – very – Happy Animal hopping around! Even being mean to them could not make it lose Happiness, but they did wake up hangry; with their Hunger on Starving and Happiness immediately down to Unhappy.

Hygiene

Sims should groom their Mini Goats & Sheep regularly; which you can do with the Care – Clean interaction. Using this interaction daily keeps their Hygiene up quite well. Neglecting their Hygiene Need long enough will result in green stench fumes following the Mini’s around.

Hunger

Your Mini Goats & Sheep will be hungry from time to time. Luckily you can feed them in various ways. They will eat hay from the bottom of a feeder or you can Care – Bottle Feed them for §4. Sometimes you can also spot them grazing on prairie grass. You can place some around your lot in Build Mode or activate the Wild Prairie Grass Lot Challenge for it to grow naturally.

Attention

Mini Goats & Sheep are social creatures. They will interact with other Animals on your ranch, but you can also do some cute social interactions with them yourself. Nearby Mini’s will also gain Attention if you successfully interact with one of them. Try to gather them first by using the Actions – Call Over Goats & Sheep interaction for more efficient Animal Care.

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As you can see, your Mini’s won’t need a lot of your time to be content little Animals. That said, try to keep in mind that they will eventually run away if you do not take good care of them. You will first get a warning in your Notifications to show they are Unhappy, but if you won’t change anything, chances are they will – sometimes temporary, sometimes permanently – disappear.

BUT! Luckily you do not have to do everything by yourself. If you ever need help taking care of your Mini Goats & Sheep, you can also Hire a Ranch Hand. This is an NPC who helps with your ranch-duties. You can hire one via Home – Hire a Service on your cellphone.

Engaging with your Fluffy Companions

Sims of all ages love interacting with these cuties. And with all ages, I do mean ALL ages. Yes, you read that right. Even Infants can interact with nearby Mini’s, given they have the right Milestones unlocked. Toddlers & Children have a few basic interactions – such as Hug or Pet – to form bonds with the Animals. 

There are many interactions – for Sims aged Teen & older – with the Mini Goats & Sheep, but which ones become available differs a little bit per species. Sheep can make your Sims fall asleep with the Count Mini Sheep interaction, which Goats can not. Here are a few other examples.

Goat-only interactions:

• Ask Who is the G.O.A.T.
• Ask about Simulation Games
• Hug the Anger Away – requires Friend relationship
• Hug the Tension Away – requires Friend relationship
• Ask to Play Dead – requires Friend relationship
• Ask to Yell – requires Friend relationship

Sheep-only interactions:

• Talk about Cotton Candy Life
• Ask Who is the Fluffiest
• Hug the Fear Away – requires Friend relationship
• Hug the Sadness Away – requires Friend relationship
• Ask to Roll Over – requires Friend relationship
• Ask to Shake – requires Friend relationship

Interactions between Goats, Sheep & Other Animals

Horses can interact a little bit with your Goats & Sheep and might get a better Mood from hanging out with them. The Animals from The Sims 4 Cats & Dogs and The Sims 4 Cottage Living will also be able to interact with your Mini’s. The integration with the other packs isn’t mind blowing, but at least the Animals will acknowledge each other’s existence. Dogs might bark at a little Goat passing by, a Rooster and a Sheep might hold a bit of a non-verbal conversation, you get the idea. You can encourge Horses with the Good Friends Relationship status to interact with the Mini’s, but other than that you can’t really control how often Animals interact with each other. It is fun to observe and let it play out though. 

Goats & Sheep are Productive too!

Each day your Sim will have the opportunity to Milk their Mini Goats or Shear their Mini Sheep. You can choose to directly sell the products for profit by using the Milk/Shear for Simoleons interaction OR loot the products into your Sims’ inventory by using either the Milk or Shear for Wool interactions. The Happier your Mini Animals are, the better the quality of their produce. Hover over them to see whether or not they are ready to be Milked or Sheared.

Milk your Mini Goats

With all the types of Milk introduced with Cottage Living, you’d think that different types of Goats would produce different kinds of Milk. Sadly for Goats this isn’t the case. Each Mini Goat will produce two Bottles of Milk on a daily basis, no matter the color of their fur. The Bottles of Milk can be held fresh for longer by putting them in the fridge and can be used in recipes for Cooking and Baking.

Shear your Mini Sheep

Unlike the Milk from your Mini Goats, the Wool your Mini Sheeps produce will actually correlate with their appearance. More exotic colors of Wool will bring in more profit as well. As shown above, there are plenty of colors to pick from, but there are some more natural colored Sheep as well, with the Black Sheep being the rarest of all. Putting Wool in your inventory will allow your Sim to use it as materials for Cross-stitching and Knitting.

Tending your Garden

Interactions with Mini Goats & Sheep are not only adorable to watch, befriending them can be mutually beneficial! Once the relationship between you and your Mini Animal is good enough, you can Chores – Ask for Gardening Help. If they agree they will eat away the weeds and bugs from your crops, which in turn will also fill their Hunger Need. A win-win situation if you ask me.

Trading Away your Mini’s

If you want to part ways with any of your Mini Goats or Sheep you can do so by using the Actions – Trade interaction. You can then go ahead and pick whatever it is you want to have in return. You’ll get three options to choose from.

• Simoleons – this always brings in less money than the adoption cost.
• Animal Treats – Probably similar to the ones from Cottage Living.
• Ingredients & Produce – Get a couple of random Harvestables.

Both the Animal Treats and the Ingredients & Produce options were bugged for me. I did get the notification, but nothing appeared in my Sims’ inventory or mailbox.