Last butcher trip of the year

has come and gone, thankfully.  We did have issues with the load up of the 4 animals that were scheduled to go, as we should have known!  Always a problem when you least expect it.  Our son usually comes over the night before and he helps get the animals hoisted into the back of our F-350 one-ton pickup.  It sits very high off the ground, so that when I stand at the open tailgate it’s above my waist height.  Not really convenient for me, and probably less than helpful for my husband.  I hate the whole height thing… being short to begin with means that age has brought me down almost two inches.  Yikes!

Anyway, our son hurt his shoulder and we didn’t get things organized very well (is that another sign of age?), so it was pitch dark Monday evening and the mud was incredibly squishy out there.  I didn’t even want to begin hauling animals around in the mud and the dark, when the possibility of one getting past us was even more on our minds.  So we decided to do it in the morning when there was actually some natural light happening.  Much easier.  It was a good choice, although the hoisting is still an issue.  Halters are a wonderful thing, though, so we were able to tie them as we got them in, letting us keep the tailgate open for business.  Phew!

SnowPea testing the new snow

I was quite down about having to let two of our three doelings go, but they will provide us with some good meat this year and we won’t have to feed animals that I probably won’t be milking next year.  My only worry is that our one remaining doeling will be missing her friends.  It’s a bigger issue with goats than I ever thought it would be.  She was crying when I got home, but after I milked her mama she calmed down and they were quiet last night.  Hopefully being with SnowPea will be enough for her.  Ah yes, you never expect to see this with farm animals, but the goats make no bones about their feelings!

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