Are you familiar with the old children's song about the woman who swallowed the fly? Below is the final verse, in which you can see that the old lady has clearly gone way too far in order to kill a fly.
I know an old lady
Who swallowed a rhinoceros
Isn't that preposterous!
To swallow a rhinoceros
She swallowed a rhinoceros
To catch the minister
She swallowed the minister
To catch the goat
She swallowed the goat
To catch the dog
She swallowed the dog
To catch the cat
She swallowed the cat
To catch the bird
And she swallowed a bird
To catch the spider
That wiggled and jiggled
And tickled inside her
And she swallowed the spider
To catch the fly
But I don't know why
She swallowed the fly
- I guess she'll die!
I'd like to tell you a similar tale about our lives, and (hopefully) explain why we had to pickup a goat last week...
It all started when Christie decided she liked birds. We got some chickens from a local rescue and I mentally checked that off as a Mission Accomplished. The next Easter, we got a handful of chicks and ducklings from a family who thought they would be cute in an Easter Basket. After that it gets fuzzy, there were some geese and ducks from the rescue, and maybe some other critters, and then suddenly I was awakened by a terrible clatter. I realized immediately that we had just crossed over from Mission Accomplished to Mission Impossible.
OK, it wasn't that sudden, but it felt that way when early this spring Christie's shipment of 40 chicks, 15 ducks, 15 geese, and 15 turkeys arrived. It was around March/April, and it was too cold to have them outside, so we setup a hatchery for each species complete with heat lamps. For those of you who have never had an impromptu hatchery in your living room, these birds were noisy and stinky! In late May we finally released them all to frolic and play. It was sometime in June before we got the house to smell normal again.
What we didn't know at the time [cue sinister music, perhaps a selection from Peter and the Wolf by Prokofiev] was how brave the coyotes were getting. At one point we had a coyote taking a nap in one of our pastures, less than a hundred yards from the house, in broad daylight, with three of us yelling at him!! This spring we lost at least 6 ducks and an untold number of chickens to the mangy, flea bitten, varmints. Some protection was in order! We adopted a one-year-old, 100 lb., Great Pyrenees named Louie. He was bred to protect the small and innocent (sheep, goats, etc) from the cruel and heartless (wolves, mountain lions) and the low-down, dirty, and rotten (coyotes). He's a great big, fluffy, white, ball of love to us, and a terror to any predator who dares to step on his turf.
Louie's instincts were strong. Too strong, in fact, because he started spending all of his time at the neighbor's house protecting their sheep and goats! It seems that horses didn't need him, and birds were beneath his notice.
Oh, what to do? We started driving over to their house to pick him up each night. He would come home easily enough, but by morning he would be gone again. We made a deal with a local butcher for meat scraps to feed him. Bribery worked a little, instead of having to go get him every night, a couple of times a week he would come home on his own! Now this was progress, but he was still spending most of his time at the neighbor's house.
As a scientist -- OK, I'm a computer scientist, but you've got to work with me here! Ahem ... as a scientist, I figured we had to get to the root of his behavior. If he likes to guard small animals ... then ... if we had some suitable livestock ...
I never got to finish the thought. In a flash, Christie was on the phone researching where and how we could cheaply acquire sheep and goats. Within a week we had begged, bought, or adopted three goats and a lamb. The lamb was a bottle-fed orphan and we named him Oliver Twist. Oliver is very personable and makes a fine addition to our petting zoo. Two of the goats were adult, lady goats. They will provide us with meat goats and milk in years to come, right now they are comic relief. They have been raised to be tied out in a field during the day, and sleep in the barn at night. They are named Clara and Annabelle.
The final goat is Chico. We only just picked him up last week because we wasn't weaned yet. He is "The Man" because he is (or will be) our stud goat. At present, he is only about 6 weeks old, and is the cutest little bugger you'll ever see. The ladies don't take much notice of him yet, but I can see he'll grow into a handsome young man.
So, to recap...
We got the goats (and Oliver) to keep the dog
We got the dog to protect the birds
But I don't know why we got the birds
-- I'm at a loss for words.
;)
All in all it is working out well with Louie now. He is spending the majority of his time at our place and just visiting the neighbors sometimes. He has chased off the coyotes more than once, and they tend to stay gone for a few weeks before getting their courage up again.
I'm a little worried about the rhino, though, because we already have a minister here (Janice), and once Christie gets an idea in her head ... look out. If we get any packages from Africa, I'm going to Return to Sender, unopened!
3 comments:
I'm so glad you have this blog to share these stories, but I still miss hearing them in person. Just when you think the saga has reached its conclusion...there's more!
Oh, there's more alright, I feel like I could post all day and not tell all the stories.
Seems like you can find a reason to justify the adopting of just about any animal.
Besides, lets here the real stories, like about how you fell off the horse, or how dangerous it is to run up the hill, ...
-Randy
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