The family. We are a strange little band of characters trudging through life, sharing diseases and toothpaste, coveting one another's desserts, hiding shampoo, borrowing money, locking each other out of our rooms, inflicting pain and kissing to heal it in the same instant, loving, laughing, defending, and trying to figure out the common thread that binds us all together.

- Erma Bombeck

Monday, July 23, 2012

Loading the Pigs, Part Two


This morning we went to court to talk with our landlords about moving out.  Although we have already moved out, they had started the eviction process and so we had to come to court to give them the keys to the house.  Unfortunately, our boar pig, Jaws, didn’t get the memo.  We tried to load him again this morning, but he was unwilling to leave.

In mediation, we explained that we were completely moved out of the house, the shop, and the property with the exception of a 600 pound pig.  We happily handed over the keys and explained that we have no intention of staying any longer than necessary but that pigs load when they want to and Jaws isn’t ready to load.
The landlord waivered between anger and understanding.  Initially, he complained that he wanted to take possession of the house NOW and that we had postponed this too long.  I asked him if he would like to try to load the pig for us as we had no solution other than to wait for Jaws to be ready.  He dismissed that and commiserated that it must be hard to get a very big pig to do what you want.  We left it with the understanding that we would only need access to the pig pen and would be out as soon as pigly possible.

This afternoon, we went back to the house armed with a six-pack of beer and a few new ideas that we heard from the owner at the local market.  We jacked up the front of the trailer so that the rear was closer to the ground and the ramp would be a gentler incline.  We rebuilt the ramp, this time making absolutely sure that it didn’t wobble.  We then – and this was the new trick – spread the pine shavings from the trailer down the ramp to disguise it.  We tried to make it look like the ground just sloped upward into the trailer.

Jaws was still very skeptical.  In fact, he was so disinterested in the whole trailer idea that it took nearly five minutes for me to wake him and get him up and moving around.  I walked over to him in his nest – all the time talking to him as I don’t like to sneak up on a large animal.  He didn’t move.  I bent down next to him and talked some more.  He didn’t move.  I rubbed his lower back (well away from his mouth in case he startled and snapped at me).  He didn’t move.  In fact, I could hear him snore.  I walked around to his face and lifted his ear up to look at his face.  He didn’t move.  I scratched him behind the ear and he slowly came to life, snorting and snuffling as he rolled into an upright position.

I took a grain bucket and walked him toward the trailer.  He stopped just short of the ramp.  J took over with the grain bucket.  He would let Jaws have a little bite from the bucket and then he would slowly move toward the ramp.  We had a couple of false starts but once Jaws had his head in the bucket, we could inch him up the ramp VERY slowly.  I stood motionless near the doorway of the trailer, ready to jump down and shut the trailer door as soon as J gave me the word.

Once we had Jaws all the way in the back of the trailer, J gave me the nod and I lept out of the trailer, swung the door closed, and latched it.  Without the latch, Jaws could just push his way back out of the trailer and I would be sitting on my butt where he dropped me.  Luckily, I am a little faster than a 600 pound pig.  Jaws was unhappy – a fact that we knew as he would rock the trailer and truck while we prepared to leave – but he was loaded and we could take him to his new home and his waiting lady.

At home, we unloaded him without incident into the new pen.  The piglets were free-range and didn’t seem to care that there was a hot wire, but Ruby and Jaws both respected the fence and settled down comfortably in their new digs.  They don’t have a shelter yet – and since we have no trees, that means no shade – but we are making sure that they have a nice wallow and lots of water all the time.

Next project, fence in the goats.

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