About 13 years ago, Hick decided he wanted a goat. Bought one at the auction. She followed him around, and he was smitten. Then he got another auction goat, and another, and traded for one from a guy who said he wanted a good home for his wife's pet Angora goat. We had quite a variety, and I think, after several crops of kids, we had 13 total goats. Hick grew disillusioned, because his original goat quit paying attention to him, and spent her time with the other goats. Leading Hick to say after work one evening:
"I looked it up, and goats are HERD ANIMALS! That's why Goatrude ain't followin' me around no more."
Well. It sometimes takes a while for Hick to discover what the rest of the world had known since near the beginning of time. Can't fault him with that. After all, news that England is an island rocked my own world.
Anyhoo... our second goat, Nellie, was a bit of a problem for Hick. She was continually getting her head stuck in the fence of the goat pen. Hick would have to free her when he got home. Or The Pony had to go try and release her if we noticed she was stuck during summer vacation.
Hick was not so much a goat-torturer as a misguided gadget-creator. Kind of like Hoyt Axton, that Mogwai-meddling dad in Gremlins, with his Bathroom Buddy and Juice-O-Matic. Hick's attempts to stop Nellie from catching her horns in the hog-fencing, and standing all day without food or water, resulted in this lovely chapeau of wood and yellow electrical tape. The other goats found Nellie's headgear to be not only charming, but quite tasty, as well.
Every day during summer vacations of his middle school years, it was The Pony's job to let the goats out for at least an hour of grazing time in the front yard/field. He'd open the pen, then sit on the front porch with his laptop while they wandered around the grounds. The Pony's main job was to keep the goats from eating my lilac bush and rosebushes in front of the porch. And make sure they didn't cross the gravel road. When it was time to go back to the pen, The Pony would step down into the yard, clap his hands, and the goats would come running! Led by Goatrude, followed by the rest. The Pony would trot over to the pen, and dump out a scoop of food. There were never any stragglers.
Hick enjoyed his time with the goats, proudly bringing in new babies to show me, while the mother bleated frantically in the front yard. As animals do, they grew older. Hick traded some away. Others went over the rainbow bridge to a big farm upstate. But Nellie couldn't find her way...
One Sunday evening, Hick came down to the basement where The Pony and I were watching Big Brother. He called me into my dark basement lair.
"Nellie is down in the woods. She's been there all day. I can't get her up. I've left her water and food, but she won't eat or drink. I can't let her suffer. I'm going into the workshop to get my pistol. You need to distract The Pony so he doesn't hear. It will break his heart."
Indeed, The Pony did have a soft spot for the animals. He was the main egg-collector for the 33 chickens. It always saddened him to find a carcass. I went back to my recliner. There was a light thunderstorm that evening. We were hoping it would disguise the sound of Hick's lead euthanasia. Also, I turned up the TV, saying I couldn't hear it. The Pony seemed to pay no mind as Hick went back up the stairs after retrieving some random tool from the workshop, while actually getting his gun out of the safe.
I heard the shot, but I was hoping The Pony thought it was thunder from a crack of lightning. Hick came back down to the basement to put away his implement of death. I went to my lair for innernetting. The Pony stayed on the couch with his laptop, vaguely watching another show. But then Hick was back AGAIN! A few times!
"I thought it was done, but when I went down to check, Nellie had moved! So I had to get my gun and do it again. But when I checked later, she was still alive!"
"That's terrible! Instead of putting her out of her misery, you're making her more miserable!"
"I think it's done this time! Buddy is helping me pull her up to the burn pile with the 4-wheeler."
That's the way Hick resolved assorted carcasses, other than cats and dogs. On a funeral pyre. No need to dig a big hole that the dogs might also want to dig later. With the little pets, he could put a wheelbarrow over the grave for a few weeks, to keep the dogs away.
Anyhoo... the rest of the story will have to wait until tomorrow. When hopefully, you can see the humor, after a little bit more horror.
I suppose the poor animal went down in the woods to die peacefully. Well, maybe she was lost. Poor thing.
ReplyDeleteNot lost. She was still within the fence of their large pen. Maybe her intention was to go down away from the food and water and shed area, to die peacefully. Which I guess would have come from lack of water and starvation, since she couldn't get up, and had been there all day. She was an old goat, not spry and feisty anymore.
DeleteI guess goats do the same as cats when they know it's time. "no-one's" Carter did the same, disappeared one day and was never seen again. We couldn't even find the body anywhere in the yard, we guessed he took himself to an empty lot somewhere.
ReplyDeleteOur old dog Grizzly waited all summer, then on our first day of school, went over to stretch out on Shackytown Boulevard. Found him when we got home. One of the cats was in the back yard by Poolio. Juno was in one of the spare dog houses on the end of the house, rather than in her lifetime dog house by the kitchen door. So yes, they go elsewhere when it's time.
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