Say, a little brayer!

By STEPHEN SIFF
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
BRISTOLVILLE -- It was the ears that grabbed her.
Pointy, more than 6 inches long and full of hair inside and out, a miniature donkey's ears have nothing miniature about them.
"I wanted one for the ears," said Karen Oviatt, who bought her first miniature donkey eight years ago because there were no full-sized donkeys in the classifieds.
"I fell in love with the personality."
After she took that first miniature donkey, Aladdin, home in the back seat of her car, it was only six months before she went looking for a female to join him.
"One donkey is a lonely donkey," she said.
And so a herd was born.
Oviatt, 39, has nine miniature donkeys now. Seven of them are pregnant.
Oviatt, who lives on a 65-acre farm on state Route 45, is one of about 200 miniature-donkey breeders in the United States, according to Mike Gross, publisher of Miniature Donkey Talk magazine.
Dimensions: The animals, first imported from Sicily to the United States as pets 60 years ago, are miniature only in relationship to other donkeys.
About 3 feet tall, they typically weigh between 250 and 400 pounds, which puts a lot of heft behind every affectionate nudge.
They are too small to ride, but they can pull carts. Owners generally have them do that, though, just for show.
"Every animal does not have to be used for something," Oviatt said. "The donkeys are just for us to enjoy."
And more and more people are doing just that, Gross said.
Catching on: The number of people keeping miniature donkeys has grown steadily since he started Miniature Donkey Talk as a newsletter 16 years ago.
"What a lot of people said was that this would be a three-year thing, like the pot-bellied pig, ocelots, hedgehogs," said Gross, of Westminster, Md. "People got tired of those because there is nothing there except the novelty."
Not so with miniature donkeys, he said.
"People just fall in love with miniature donkeys," he said. "I call them dogs with four hooves."
There are some differences.
Donkeys can't be reliably house-trained, and despite the big ears, few come when called.
Stubborn? They also have a reputation for stubbornness, though that is undeserved, Oviatt and Gross say.
"They are just reluctant to do anything they are not sure of," Gross said.
They surely are affectionate.
Visitors to a donkey barn on Oviatt's farm find themselves swarmed by the animals, which nudge with foreheads and present backs for scratching, gently tugging on clothing with their teeth if they feel ignored.
The occasional hee-haw sounds like a scream in the night, but for the most part, the animals maintain a relaxed demeanor.
"I love them," Oviatt said. "They are my babies."
They are only tolerated by her husband, Bob, who does not appreciate being mobbed when he tries to fix a fence in the donkeys' pastures, she said.
But to others, the donkeys are irresistible.
"You don't really understand until you get close to look them in the eye," Gross said.
"They understand you."
siff@vindy.com