Post by Mitra on Oct 16, 2006 9:53:25 GMT -5
A quick recap of the original: Pigs drink beer. One pig loads easily up an 8ft ramp, one does not. Pig rodeo. Jaws bashed and head slashed (the human's). Major adrenalin but in the end the pigs get to the abbatoir's. We have one month to figure out a better way to load the other two before their date with destiny.
Great advice from Forum Members followed.
Last Saturday, Max's sister Marcia brought her palatial horse trailer and it was backed up to the pig enclosure. Max undid a section of fence as wide as the back of the trailer. The ramp was lowered down into the enclosure. As the ramp touched the ground, the pigs, who apparently had waited their ENTIRE lives for this, ran up the ramp and dove into a nice bed of pine shavings! They frolicked, sniffed, snorted and cavorted in the trailer. They ran down the ramp and and went zig-zag galloping around their enclosure and then back up the ramp into the trailer. Then they decided that the rubber mat on the ramp needed to be chewed and bitten. At that point Max closed up the ramp. He thought that since they'd gone in so easily, that he'd withhold that "treat of a trailer" until Monday. He wanted them to "pine for" the inside of that trailer and those shavings. He proceeded to secure the fence on both sides of the back of the trailer and we hoped that his plan would work.
This morning I made them a bucket of organic oatmeal cooked with a gallon of milk, 3 duck eggs, and 5 pounds of chopped apples. Max got in the enclosure, lowered the ramp down and they did just as we'd hoped - RAN into the trailer. He quickly lifted the ramp and closed the back. Max went into the trailer from a side door and fed them their oatmeal breakfast. After a few minutes we opened the side door and took pictures of them relaxed and still eating breakfast. About a quarter of an hour later, Marcia showed up with her Jeep and expertly backed it up and hitched her horse trailer to the vehicle. (You could tell she'd done this a few hundred times). We opened the side door for one last look and Junie Beast and Bonzai were just hanging out.
It was pretty anti-climactic which is exactly what I was going for. If it were a movie sequel it would have been pretty boring compared to the first but as a pig wrangling sequel, it was WAY better ;D
Great advice from Forum Members followed.
Last Saturday, Max's sister Marcia brought her palatial horse trailer and it was backed up to the pig enclosure. Max undid a section of fence as wide as the back of the trailer. The ramp was lowered down into the enclosure. As the ramp touched the ground, the pigs, who apparently had waited their ENTIRE lives for this, ran up the ramp and dove into a nice bed of pine shavings! They frolicked, sniffed, snorted and cavorted in the trailer. They ran down the ramp and and went zig-zag galloping around their enclosure and then back up the ramp into the trailer. Then they decided that the rubber mat on the ramp needed to be chewed and bitten. At that point Max closed up the ramp. He thought that since they'd gone in so easily, that he'd withhold that "treat of a trailer" until Monday. He wanted them to "pine for" the inside of that trailer and those shavings. He proceeded to secure the fence on both sides of the back of the trailer and we hoped that his plan would work.
This morning I made them a bucket of organic oatmeal cooked with a gallon of milk, 3 duck eggs, and 5 pounds of chopped apples. Max got in the enclosure, lowered the ramp down and they did just as we'd hoped - RAN into the trailer. He quickly lifted the ramp and closed the back. Max went into the trailer from a side door and fed them their oatmeal breakfast. After a few minutes we opened the side door and took pictures of them relaxed and still eating breakfast. About a quarter of an hour later, Marcia showed up with her Jeep and expertly backed it up and hitched her horse trailer to the vehicle. (You could tell she'd done this a few hundred times). We opened the side door for one last look and Junie Beast and Bonzai were just hanging out.
It was pretty anti-climactic which is exactly what I was going for. If it were a movie sequel it would have been pretty boring compared to the first but as a pig wrangling sequel, it was WAY better ;D
. They were dropped off around 10:30 a.m. and they were the only two Yorkshires there at the time. Max says he noticed these "reddidh" colored pigs in the adjoining pen! Those must've been your Tamworths ;D.
