CORINTH, Vt. (AP) – A goat farmer who converted his house into a barn to keep his animals warm during the winter has had another run-in with the law.

Vermont State Police are investigating an incident on Tuesday in which Chris Weathersbee struck a school bus that had stopped in front of his house with an aluminum tube.

Weathersbee told the Valley News that he hit the bus with the tube, which he was using to herd about 60 goats that were returning to their pen.

He also said he had yelled at the bus to hurry up because he feared a “major goat escape disaster.” Weathersbee said the bus scared the goats, and some ran off. When the bus did not move, he said, he “slapped the bus with his bare hand and whacked at it” with the tube.

The bus had stopped to let off some children.

In a statement he said he made to state police Weathersbee apologized for the “abusive language” but said he believed the bus driver should have gone around the goats in the road. He said he later spent two hours rounding up the animals.

Police are considering whether to file a disorderly conduct charge, said Lt. Walter Goodell of the Bradford barracks.

In a letter to parents on Wednesday, Waits River Valley School Principal Carole Freeman said the bus driver had stopped to let off two children near Weathersbee’s farm. Weathersbee “approached the bus, hit it repeatedly with a stick and screamed profanities,” she wrote.

Weathersbee’s one-man goat operation attracted the attention of state and humane society officials earlier this year when he turned his house into a barn to keep 70 of his sickest and youngest animals out of the cold weather.

He said at the time that his Buddhist philosophy kept him from slaughtering any of his roughly 300 goats and that he lacked the money to give them “optimal” care.

In February state police and the Central Vermont Humane Society seized 44 of the animals, and police were weighing animal cruelty charges against Weathersbee. Police have since passed the decision on to Orange County Prosecutor Will Porter.

Weathersbee said he still has a few goats in the house. He said this week that his plans to have a Buddhist group live and work there – and allow him to remain with the goats – have fallen through.

School officials have moved the bus stop down the road to avoid any future incidents.

AP-ES-05-30-04 1243EDT