With pink spandex sheep socks, polka dot blankets and purple shampoo, wether goats came in a rainbow of colors as exhibitors prepared them for the Muskogee Regional Junior Livestock Show on Tuesday.

But all the different colored things had a purpose — to help the goats look their brown and white best in the show’s opening day. Livestock competition runs through Friday at the Muskogee County Fairgrounds with the premium auction set for 6 p.m. Saturday.

Tuesday’s goat show featured 71 doe kids and 298 wether goats.

Exhibitors from Gans in Sequoyah County spent part of Tuesday afternoon shampooing and rinsing their goats in the fairgrounds washroom. Raina Ireland had her goat lathered in purple after using Quic Silver Exhibitors Color Intensifying Shampoo.

Brad Ringgold, father of one of the Gans exhibitors, said the goats get a thorough shampoo before nearly every show.

“It depends on how dirty they are,” he said.

“Usually for about 15 minutes,” Brook Ringgold said as she lathered up her goat.

Brad Ringgold said, “They wash them, rinse them off, dry them and put a blanket on them.”

Bradon Berry, a fourth-grader from Haskell, said the blankets help keep the goats warm after being washed. Bradon’s two goats wore different colored blankets as they waited to be shown.

“If you have two goats, you want to separate them in different weight categories,” he said. “You feed them a different amount of feed, depending on which one is bigger.”

Bradon said one goat weighs 87 pounds and the other weighs 82 pounds. He said he wanted them in separate classes to keep them from competing against each other.

He said he’d have to get someone else to show one of the goats if they ended up in the same competition.

“You’ve got to set their feet right and show their muscles and their back side in the arena,” he said.

Bradon helped put a sheep sock on another Haskell exhibitor’s goat.

“It’s to protect their hair from getting dirty,” he said. “It’s called a sheep sock, but you can put it on goats or sheep.”