Sunday my Mom and my sister returned early as with so much stuff left we decided to go a second day. With the ad in the paper and all my signs saying different I had to at least go find my signs and add Sunday to all of them. There was an estate Sale up the street so this would have the customers travelling this way again, now i needed a way to get them back down here.
Although i could barely walk from being on my feet so long that last three days i too wanted to go to the estate sale and see if there were any wheel barrows for sale. The nicest girls were working that and i was told to come back after there sale ended at 2:00 and i could have the carpets, all the blankets and the sleeping bags if they didn't sell.
We weren't as busy but we are all exhausted and by 2:00 Mom called Diane to come on down and get what she wanted for the Hospital Thrift Store and Nancy and i raced up to the estate sale.
Tortilla who is 16 years old now and like all hoofed animals is having trouble getting up in his house. Hard flat surfaces don't have any grab for hooves no matter how much bedding is in there and he just doesn't have the strength he once had. So a small roll of carpet will be divided today between Tortilla and Carport Penny that we netted from the estate Sale.
We came home with the carpet and a bag of blankets and half dozen sleeping bags, sheets that will be cut up for misc rags and wipes and i lucked out on three good barn coats .
By then it was time to start tearing down the sale and the four of us worked till 5 and until we could do no more. Dianne left with a car load , we have a load to go on the street for free and lastly one for the Women's in Need Thrift and nothing will be saved for another one this year.
Thankfully when Maggie and Jerry came yesterday they brought enough yams and apples for everyone dinner and today there is a good days work with what is left to do, take care of the two special needs pigs and get my feed and produce we need for the week.
There will be no time to waste here as I have 12 more pigs coming in and with there foster Mom visiting yesterday and hashing out options of where to build i have decided once again to put them up front. We need a shed STAT for these kids!!
I am still pulled emotionally with this bonded family and may have to revisit the sanctuary principles if we do get any fantastic people who want to adopt once they arrive here. The truth is we, who truly love pigs are rare and hundreds of miles apart. Finding any home is easy finding ones who understands pigs and love them for who they are is not. The SPCA with a huge net work and advertising know this too and since we opened the shelters have learned the pigs will only be taking up there precious space with no adoptions in sight and contact us immediately now.
Pigs like all animals deserve to be loved and taken care of no different from our cats and dogs. They like to be brushed, praised , treated and covered up at night. They wag there tails when they are happy and cry real tears when they are sad. But with that comes the fact they fear restraint and closed spaces ,will not stand on a vet table to be examined and yet need the same care as any animal does. This puts a whole different dimension on how you have two work with these guys and this is one of the pigs biggest threats to quality care when families adopt with out educating themselves totally first hand.
I am alone pretty well during the week and adding to the current herd by almost 25% will require a serious look at how I run this sanctuary. Another 50 lbs of feed a night, bigger shopping lists and 40 lbs of apples or 25 lbs of carrots a night will not be enough any more. I will have to adapt and my routine is about to change BIG time and so will everyone around me.
Well back out there i go , the farm pigs have been kept in there paddocks since Wednesday when i started setting up and today will be there day all day as i promised them!!
3 comments:
Hi jan,
hope the garage sale brought in some much needed funds for you.Where are the 12 new pigs coming from? That will stretch your resources a lot wont it? what a shame you have no helpers during the week.its hard to get good people though even at weekends.
Take care, love lesley
A huge amount of labour went into this and i still have a day of cleaning up here and my truck is loaded for a dump run. We made a little over 500.00 which pales compared to any of the cat/dog rescuers takes when they have them. Pigs just don't tug on the emotional heart strings or pocket books like they do for other companion animals. People have cats and dogs in there homes but most eat pigs. However I know as we chip away here many of our visitors will walk away with a new udnerstanding of them and that will change tomorrows.
The pigs have been under our blanket for over a 1 1/2 now at a foster in Mission. The SPCA did a 160 animal seisure and two pigs were brought in both intact and the sow loaded. We had no idea what trimester she would of been in, so a shot to terminate could of gave birth to premies or worse ..we let nature take its course. She had ten babies.
In that 1.5 years of trying to advertsie, find homes , and putting up posters i only have 4 completed pre- adoption questionaries on file. The way the shelters have presented animals over the years and adotpions makes it hard for the general public to hear we will do home checks. That you cannot simply come over pick one, pay the fee and be off with them. We will not feed the whim of the general public wanting one for all the wrong reasons so be abandoned once the novelety wears off. The percentage of pigs being placed in a good home is about as hard as it is to win a lottery. I have been doing this for 8 years and the pigs we have placed are still in there homes or were loved until they crossed over in them. Out of all the pigs who have come here all these years only three came in who were loved and arrived because there family crossed over, because of a bylaw or an illness in the family. The rest were abused, starved, beaton, abandoned or seized by the SPCA.
I should add THANK GOODNESS for those of you who do love them all and support us every way you can! When speaking of the general public i am of course talking about the baziilions who don't understand what we are doing or even knows what torture, fear and tears of what lay on there plates. Daring all who visit to google gestation crates and look at the images.
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