![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dragonlady7via http://ift.tt/2e4ayPf:
So maybe the most amazing thing about the baby piggies is how FAST they change! The ones born Sunday are already so sleek and fat and big compared to the ones born today! They were born all different sizes (and there’s one from today who, poor thing, probably isn’t going to make it, he’s so little and weak and confused and we tried to get him hooked on to a teat but he just can’t figure it out; conversely, some of his siblings are twice his size and some even larger), but in just two or three days they’ve put on so much fat and become so much more ambulatory!
Red is a different breed from Cookies, and her breed isn’t as prolific. In spring (I was wrong, they weren’t born in January, it was March) she only had five, and Cookies had 14, 12 of whom lived. (Red’s a Tamford, I believe, and Cookies is part Old Spot. I have no idea what PB, the boar, is.) So B-I-L had said a couple days prior, you know, if Red only has a couple this time, maybe I’ll breed her once more or maybe I’ll send her out and process her for meat, she’s just not cut out for this, and maybe Red heard him, but she actually farrowed NINE. The little runt had crawled the wrong direction and was trying to nurse on her back, so I (carefully) went over to retrieve him, and found ANOTHER ONE hiding back there, all tangled in the umbilical cord– most of them, it’s broken off pretty short, but this one was longer and had tripped on his, I suspect he was actually born last so the placenta was right there. Anyway– we’d thought eight, but really nine. That’s a lot, especially for a Tamford.
So that’s 22, probably 21 (my sister wants someone to bottle-feed that runt piglet but she’s not going to do it herself, she’ll get too attached; brother-in-law says no way, it’ll become a pet, no way, it either lives or dies on its own, you have to be a little ruthless in this job) pigs, and that’s a lot.
While we were admiring Red’s babies, one of Cookies’ lot came scampering out of the pig house (Cookies is in the house, Red made herself a nest in the straw near PB’s pen, and is really cozy in there) and came tottering over to us, and then suddenly realized he wasn’t anywhere near his momma, and started making the funniest little grunts. I went over and followed him as he tried to go back into the house, and got confused and burrowed into the straw. I’m a little afraid of the sows (as I should be, apparently), but I could see Cookies was still lying down– watching me, but lying down– so I picked him up and put him into the house, and she grunted at him and he went running to her.
I guess the rule is, just don’t get between them and their babies, and if you’re going to do anything that makes the babies squeal, be ready to run. Sows get aggressive when they have very young pigs, and at this point they’re about five hundred pounds and can outrun you over short distances. They’re not all that nimble but they’re also utterly undeterred by violence or shouting. So. You gotta kind of be careful with pigs.
I’m just nervous because I don’t know their body language at all. Horses, dogs, cats, I can generally tell when they’re upset or getting agitated. Pigs, I don’t know– they don’t pin their ears, they don’t lash their tails, they don’t see well so they don’t do anything with eye contact. They just kind of grunt and run around a lot.
So maybe the most amazing thing about the baby piggies is how FAST they change! The ones born Sunday are already so sleek and fat and big compared to the ones born today! They were born all different sizes (and there’s one from today who, poor thing, probably isn’t going to make it, he’s so little and weak and confused and we tried to get him hooked on to a teat but he just can’t figure it out; conversely, some of his siblings are twice his size and some even larger), but in just two or three days they’ve put on so much fat and become so much more ambulatory!
Red is a different breed from Cookies, and her breed isn’t as prolific. In spring (I was wrong, they weren’t born in January, it was March) she only had five, and Cookies had 14, 12 of whom lived. (Red’s a Tamford, I believe, and Cookies is part Old Spot. I have no idea what PB, the boar, is.) So B-I-L had said a couple days prior, you know, if Red only has a couple this time, maybe I’ll breed her once more or maybe I’ll send her out and process her for meat, she’s just not cut out for this, and maybe Red heard him, but she actually farrowed NINE. The little runt had crawled the wrong direction and was trying to nurse on her back, so I (carefully) went over to retrieve him, and found ANOTHER ONE hiding back there, all tangled in the umbilical cord– most of them, it’s broken off pretty short, but this one was longer and had tripped on his, I suspect he was actually born last so the placenta was right there. Anyway– we’d thought eight, but really nine. That’s a lot, especially for a Tamford.
So that’s 22, probably 21 (my sister wants someone to bottle-feed that runt piglet but she’s not going to do it herself, she’ll get too attached; brother-in-law says no way, it’ll become a pet, no way, it either lives or dies on its own, you have to be a little ruthless in this job) pigs, and that’s a lot.
While we were admiring Red’s babies, one of Cookies’ lot came scampering out of the pig house (Cookies is in the house, Red made herself a nest in the straw near PB’s pen, and is really cozy in there) and came tottering over to us, and then suddenly realized he wasn’t anywhere near his momma, and started making the funniest little grunts. I went over and followed him as he tried to go back into the house, and got confused and burrowed into the straw. I’m a little afraid of the sows (as I should be, apparently), but I could see Cookies was still lying down– watching me, but lying down– so I picked him up and put him into the house, and she grunted at him and he went running to her.
I guess the rule is, just don’t get between them and their babies, and if you’re going to do anything that makes the babies squeal, be ready to run. Sows get aggressive when they have very young pigs, and at this point they’re about five hundred pounds and can outrun you over short distances. They’re not all that nimble but they’re also utterly undeterred by violence or shouting. So. You gotta kind of be careful with pigs.
I’m just nervous because I don’t know their body language at all. Horses, dogs, cats, I can generally tell when they’re upset or getting agitated. Pigs, I don’t know– they don’t pin their ears, they don’t lash their tails, they don’t see well so they don’t do anything with eye contact. They just kind of grunt and run around a lot.
