Mr Pig Goes A Courtin'

Spring is starting to roll slowly around.  The sun is peaking up over the horizon a little earlier and staying up a little later every night.  There are many times when the weather has been warm enough lately to even smell the warmth of the earth, but the biggest signs that lets us know that Spring is on its way is that love is in the air.  Valentine's day isn't just for the humans of the world....our pig gets to have her love affair as well.  Granted, her pool of eligible bachelors was somewhat smaller than she might like, but then a kept pig can't be choosy.

For the last four years, we have purchased baby piglets to raise and then eat, but in the last two we have thought about saving the gilt (that's the female) and have her bred so we could farrow and raise our own piglets.  Last year's gilt was fine except for one small thing....she liked the taste of chicken a little too much and whittled away our chicken flock significantly with her ravenous habits. 

Mr Pig

But this year's gilt?  She was taught at a young age by the local rooster, Dominique (which is both his name and his breed....we aren't very creative with names for the animals that we might one day have to stew in a pot..."Bob-noodle soup" turned us off to that practice).  Anyway, Dominique taught her not to mess with the two footed and feathered crowd.  She happily allows chickens (and cats) to partake of her bounty of cracked corn and kitchen scraps without so much as a proprietary grunt.  In short, she is a really nice pig.  And so, she was nominated to stay and hopefully pass on not only her beautiful chops, but also her winning attitude to a herd of small screaling piglets. 

The question, however, was where to find the boy?  Technically, we would most like a Large Black - this is a particular breed that is easier to raise on pasture since they don't rut it up quite as much, but we weren't  into spending the prices being asked for a purebred boar, not to mention that you have to be able to house them and feed them - no small task to be undertaken when they can reach approximately 700 pounds. We found a rather nice one that was due to go to market unless they could find him a home, but he was already full grown, exceptionally large and more than we were up to paying once again.  Craigslist has any number of fun and interesting items for sale....including pigs, and we contemplated these options, but none of them stuck out as suitable matches for our pig. Our breakthrough came with finally taking the time to meet some of the neighbors. 



First encounter



My husband had been told about a farmer just north of us that had cows and pigs and sheep - doing basically what we are doing, but on a much larger scale.  It had been suggested that we stop up and see him some time and finally, one chilly December day, we made the trip of six miles and found a resource for bottle/bucket calves, milking advice and .....you guessed it, a boar.  All too often we forget to look around and tap into local resources.  We get caught up with the idea that we are the "lunatic farmers" of the neighborhood amidst an ocean of "conventional farmers" and we forget that there are, in fact, more and more of the us lunatics out there all the time - small family farms that are starting to make a small but significant difference in how food is raised.  But we need to work together and depend on each other - just like farmers did in the past.  All too often now, conventional farmers are out there on their own - big fields, big equipment, big risk.  The competition to produce more and more soy and corn has led to isolation and a general lack of public interest in farming in general.  Ask any non-farming person if they would want to farm and most of the time the answer is "No - I don't have the first idea how to do that!"  Conventional farming is daunting - even for the farmers that do it, and unless you are born into a family that farms, it isn't likely to be something that you would want to jump into.   But small farms, such as ours, are do-able.  With a little time and sweat equity we have been slowly turning this old homestead back into a productive farm.  One adage that I have stuck to when it comes to trying new things is, "Learn by doing" - you can read all the books on a subject you want, but until you are up to your elbows in it, it doesn't sink in.  So we were up to our elbows with a gilt that needed a boyfriend and, in this case, all it took was making a neighborhood connection to provide us with the answer.  The Rent-a-Boar.

A purebred Berkshire boar with proven quality...essentially meaning that he has been with a pen of sows and proceeded to get them all 'with pig' as the case might be.  Originally, the plan was to take Miss Pig for a visit up to the other farm and let her hang with the rest of the pigs, but Bill (the farmer) was a little worried that his sows might beat her up, so it was decided that Mr. Pig should come hang out in Shangri-La at our house.

Any time that you mix two 350 pound animals together there is a certain amount of blind faith that goes along with it because you realize that if they really don't like each other, there isn't anything that you will be able to do to stop the ensuing battle until the smoke clears.  We didn't need to worry with Miss Pig, she was smitten almost immediately and we are fairly convinced that he was taken with her as well. 

If you ever hear a person say that an animal doesn't have feelings, do me a favor -first, kick them in the shins and then direct them to this post.  Our Miss Pig had been without her pig friends since about late September when we took them to market.  The first few days had been difficult and she had mopped around without her buddies, but her gregarious nature and love of food brought her around fairly quickly.  On Sunday, however...when Mr Pig showed up....suffice it to say that it was love at first sight.  If you have never seen a happy pig with her new friend smile....you really should.