A Happy Ending for Rumi!!

Awhile back, I posted a blog entry about the Last Remaining Cockfighter (as I had taken to calling him) — about how we took him to what we thought would be a good home, only to have him turned away heartlessly because the woman found another rooster to complement her landscaping (you can see I’m still quite upset and angry about the whole thing, even now).

On any case, about a month ago we received an email from a woman who used to work at FARM and who now lives in Vermont, only about 35 minutes from us! This in itself was excellent news, since AR folks are incredibly hard to find here in VT. But the news got better: she was interested in adopting a rooster for her hens and did we have one we wanted to adopt out?

Did we? Wow. Without getting too convoluted, time-wise, in this story, please check out her place:

http://www.turtlehillfarm.net

Turtle Hill Farm Animal Sanctuary takes in rescued guinea pigs and horses (which I find absolutely fabulous and a bit adorable), and they also have a few hens running about. It’s acres and acres of gorgeous, secluded VT land where everyone has as much freedom as possible while having access to shelter, food, medical care, and so forth.

So, not only is a wonderful woman (accompanied by a wonderful husband and child) offering to take in this guy, but this is another sanctuary, right here in Vermont!

To cut to the case, they came out to meet Rumi (as they later named him, which was another wonderful occurrence as I happen to love Rumi and have a calendar of Rumi sayings hanging here on my wall). He was in a special area as he was still getting into fights and was having a bout of arthritis (a few of the last cockfighters who came have had periodic arthritis). They liked him, and so we made plans to bring him out to their place.

A few weeks later, everyone’s schedules worked and we brought him to one of the most beautiful places we’ve seen yet. I don’t mean the house or the buildings, although they are quite nice. I mean the animals. Turtle Hill Farm has taken in some of the most abused and neglected horses and guinea pigs imaginable, and now they are all the picture of health. Truly wonderful to see, and of course thrilling to us that Rumi would be in about the best possible place he could imagine.

When we first let him out of the cage, it was one of the hens who put him in his place. It was quite interesting to watch; we were used to rooster-on-rooster fighting, and hen-on-hen fighting, but not hen-on-rooster fighting. He gave up VERY quickly, but she kept at it until she was sure he was not going to make trouble. No blood was drawn, but she was making it clear (at least this is my interpretation) that he WOULD behave if he wanted to stay.

And he has. He got a bit of a mite problem from the stress, and it took him a bit of time to leave the barn, but he’s doing very well now, from what I hear.

So, thank you to Turtle Hill Farm Animal Sanctuary on behalf of Rumi, for providing a truly happy ending to a story that began years ago on the end of a tether tied to an oil drum. May he have many happy years of freedom to come.