About Us
We are Derek and Meagan Skinner. We met while serving in the Army. Derek is now retired after 18 years as a CH-47 chinook helicopter pilot and Meagan has separated from the army after 10 years as a logistics officer. After returning from Iraq In 2017, we purchased a home and a 15 acre lot in East Texas. Some day we will build our dream house on the ranch but, for now we live a few miles away.
After some slow beginnings, our projects and improvements have been moving along quickly. We had a barn built in 2020 and purchased Nigerian Dwarf Goats that summer. The goats were a dream of ours for years. We would talk about our crazy goats and how special they would be. Hence, the name Special Place Ranch came about. If you have ever entered Ft Hood (may God have mercy on your soul) they great you with, "welcome to the great place". We have adopted the phrase but mean it literally here, "welcome to a special place".
Our main goal for our ranch is to be a place to entice family and future grandkids to visit often. We also love our farm and goat babies, sheep, cows, pigs, turkeys, chickens, quail, ducks, bees, and of course our spoiled dogs Maile and Kaepu.
The best way to keep up with the ranch is to subscribe to the You Tube channel "Special Place Ranch".
You may notice from time to time we have an active facebook page, but most times it it deactivated. This is to help with animal advertisements but then to quickly leave. We do not believe in the communistic censorship of that platform.
STAFF
Kaepu
Kaepu (Samoan for flatulent) is our Anatolian Shepherd mix. He keeps an eye on things on his regular patrols when he's not sleeping on the hammock or inside on the couch. He enjoys squeaky toys, chicken treats, snuggling momma, and being weird.
Maile
Maile (Samoan for dog) is our Golden Retriever and resident swimmer. If anything needs to be swam in, she's our girl. She also ensures that we live in a squirrel free environment. She loves sleeping, digging up the yard, being with daddy, and pig ear treats.
Walker
Walker is a Tennessee Walker Dog mix, he was found as a 3 month old puppy in the bar ditch near the farm. He enjoys playing with his siblings, chewing, and destroying toys. He‘s a complete maniac puppy but is sweet when he gets tired enough.