Plotting the Next Great Escape

Martha and Mellie: "How to escape?  Where is the weak spot?
Keep looking.  I know we can find it!" 

Like the crafty penguins in the kids' film Madagascar, Martha and Mellie spend their days plotting their next great escape.  As far as I can tell, they are not trying to go some place in particular, just anywhere they are not supposed to be.

I seem to be able to contain Martha and Mellie in the chicken run - if I barricade the gate so they do not push it open and squeeze through - but beyond that, I am not sure their containment is possible.  They wear dog (goat?) tags with our address and phone number in case they ever really get away.  

This spring and summer I would like to let them (and the hens and ducks) out into the bigger run to graze and forage.  However, first I need to figure out exactly how they are escaping what seems to me to be a pretty secure enclosure.  Oh, the stress that a zookeeper must feel!  Just image the ruckus that would ensue if Martha and Mellie were man-eating carnivores.

Today Martha revealed at least one of their tricks.

A staple holding the fence to the gate must have come loose.
Martha exploits this defect by squeezing under to get out into the backyard.
Emily waits patiently for an unsuspecting chicken to follow suit.

The gate is an easy fix.  This, combined with a few wheelbarrows full of gravel under the fence line to bring the ground up past the bottom of the fence wire, and I am hoping that the larger paddock will become goat-proof.  Admittedly, I have my doubts.  I am not so naive as to think my goats won't outsmart me.  Escapism is their specialty and they seem very committed to their conviction that the grass is indeed greener on the other side of any fence.