When Pigs Fly: Transporting Wilbur Pig to England

Hello. I am fundraising to help Wilbur Pig stay with his human family as we relocate from the United States to England.

YES! We know it sounds nuts! Why would you fly a pig from the United States to England?

Wilbur has lived with us for over 8 years but now the whole family is moving overseas. We love Wilbur very much and can't imagine starting our new life without him. We are doing everything we can to take him with us and we are asking for your help to make the dream come true.

Pigs are very bonded with their herd (even if their adopted family are human and/or furry), and can die from a broken heart if they are abandoned. At nearly 9 years old, Wilbur would not tolerate finding a new family well, so it is even more important to help him make the journey. Can you help?

Mounting Relocation Costs

As you can see ... the expense is considerable. While we expected to pay several thousand dollars to transport our 5 animals to England, the strict import regulations for "agricultural" animals have ensured the costs have skyrocketed.

When we set out, we received a $5,000 estimate from a professional animal transport company. As complications mounted the original sum ballooned to over $15,000. Despite the growing pile of red tape and expense, we are determined to keep the promise we made to all our pets. You can help ease the financial burden and help us keep Wilbur with his family.

Are we crazy? YES! But we hope it's a good kind of crazy.

WILBUR'S STORY

We adopted Wilbur in May 2015. At only 15 weeks old, Wilbur had already had two unsuccessful homes. The little piglet soon settled in amongst our dog and cats, and we committed to providing him a safe loving home for the rest of his days.

Wilbur thrived and grew ... A LOT! He split his time between being outdoors enjoying the sunshine and other piggy pursuits, and indoors sleeping in his blankets and hanging out with us.

In 2019 we moved across the state of North Carolina, and of course, Wilbur came too. The years passed with Wilbur living his best life and enjoying naps, eating strawberries (his favorite treat) and lots of belly scratches.

In 2023, we decided to relocate to England - I'm English and have wanted to move to be closer to family. In January we found a lovely little cottage in rural Lincolnshire perfect for us and with a big yard for the animals. We knew that for our new life to work, Wilbur, the dog, and the cats would all need to come along ... which is where we started to hit roadblock after roadblock.

While pet cats and dogs wing their way across continents quite regularly, pet pigs do not! At every turn red tape, expense, and government agencies on both sides of the Atlantic weighed in. USDA-APHIS, CDC, DAPRA, IATA Import/Export, transport agencies, and the Department of Agriculture, all held a piece of the puzzle and required fees.

In addition to the astronomical animal-related expenses, we also had to split the family when a delay in closing on the English house meant the weather became too hot to transport animals. I moved with the kids to England to establish our new home while Ruben stayed in North Carolina to take care of the animals. For four months we lived apart while we waited for the weather to be cool enough for animals to travel. That meant two mortgages, two sets of utility bills, and two cars to maintain. In September our English car was totalled when I was rear-ended while waiting at a stop light. In October, the 300-year-old kitchen ceiling fell in at the cottage. The expenses kept piling up. While we don’t regret keeping our promise to Wilbur and our other pets, we have depleted our savings and stretched our resources to the max.

6 months of planning and thousands of dollars later, the date for the big trip was supposed to be November 8th. Unfortunately, the day before we were set to fly, the USDA let us know that a whole chunk of his Health Certificate was missing. We had been given some inaccurate information and Wilbur would not be allowed to leave as planned. We were totally devastated!

More expenses piled up as the USDA required us to have property inspections and yet more health exams and blood work for Wilbur. Our new date is 14th December so we are putting all our efforts into getting Wilbur home for Christmas.

This is where you come in. We are asking our friends to help us out with the final crunch of getting the whole family successfully reunited. If you've enjoyed Wilbur's journey over the years on social media, if you would like to help us make sure Wilbur stays with his forever family, or if you would like to see a happy ending to our story, please consider giving a few dollars to our project.

We are determined that we will succeed but we could use a little help in these final weeks. We are scheduled to fly on November 8th, we're exhausted with jumping through all the necessary hoops, we are stressed to breaking point, and we are so ready to finally be all together as a family.

We need your help to make our dream come true and keep our promise to Wilbur.

Many thanks

Alison