We relocated all but about a dozen chickens and a half dozen ducks today. It was quite a show but nothing that any family farmer wouldn't think of doing...just a little unusual.
J and I went over to the old house with the intentions of loading the goats in the trailer and the chickens in two dog crates that J would drive home in his van. Well, when I got to the house with the trailer, it seemed like Jaws might be interested in trying the trailer again. So I backed it up, set up the ramp and got out the grain. He was certainly more receptive, but still shy of getting those back feet into the trailer.
The thing with moving a pig is that there really isn't any way to man-handle them into a trailer. They have to cooperate or nothing is gonna happen. Remember, Jaws is a full-grown boar pig. He weighs somewhere in the neighborhood of 500 pounds and is really all muscle. He moves tires with his nose. You're not gonna push him into a trailer.
So, we coaxed him into the trailer finally. I jumped into the car and started to inch forward so that J could swing the door closed...but Jaws got cold feet and backed out before he could shut the door. Not only that, but Jaws took the liberty of sauntering out around the trailer and into the open. We tried to convince him back into his pen, but decided to give him a break and work on the chickens.
We managed to catch about a dozen chickens, dividing them between the two crates. We also got both of the geese...I'm sure that they were less than thrilled to be stuck in a dog crate with a bunch of chickens, but that was the best we could do.
By the time we caught the chickens, Jaws had wandered into the chicken coop and we had shut the door. J cut the fence between the coop and the pig pen so that we could try the trailer again without having to move Jaws through the open. Again, we got him interested in the trailer, but not far enough to get up all the way. He would reach his nose into the trailer and try to grab the bucket out of our hands, pulling it with his teeth. This time, we set up the trailer so that the door could swing shut without having to move it. We used some chain link panels on the opposite side of the door to create a chute for him to travel in.
Several times he got into the trailer, only to back out as I slowly swung the door shut. We knew that there was no point in trying to shove him in with the door. He would just push his way out. We needed to have a clear shot to the latch on the door for the leverage it would take to keep him in. Finally, he made his way into the trailer and I was able to swing the door shut. J was yelling at me to pull down the latch before Jaws pushed back out...which he was trying to do. We got it latched, and Jaws was ready to transport.
Only thing is, we were trying to bring over the goats. And there was no way we were going to open that trailer until we had Jaws at the new house. So, we looked at our options. Instead of loading the crates of chickens into the van, we loaded them into the back of the Expedition. That left the van empty. So, we decided to load the goats into the van.
All of our goats have been in a car at one point or another, but not actually all at the same time. One by one, I brought the goats to the side of the van and J would open the door. We would push/lift each goat into the van (passed J who was acting as guard). By the time I loaded the seventh goat, I wasn't sure we were going to be able to keep them all in. But we did.
So, J took off with his load of goats (including two very stinky bucks) and I took off with my load of chickens, geese, and a large pig. I had to stop at the bus to pick up the boys, but other than that (and the stink of chicken poop in the car), the ride home was uneventful. We got all of the animals unloaded and they are now happily exploring their new digs.
No comments:
Post a Comment