Pig page

Porkchop

January 26, 2009

Hello Nancy,

My name is Pat B. I am looking for a home for a Yorkshire pig. He is approximately 8 months old. I have about a week left to find him a home or he will have to go to slaughter. I have called many organizations with no results as of yet. Many places have told me "no" and some places are still trying. Please contact me either via e-mail or phone to let me know if you could possibly provide a home for him. Thank you for your time and assistance.

Sincerely,

Pat

So began a connection which has become an ongoing friendship with the family making regular visits to this beautiful boy.

Porkchop, like so many FFA “project” pigs, worked his way into the hearts of his human family and when time came to “put him on the truck,” none of them could bring themselves to take that particular step. Pat had not really realized what was coming when she gave her daughter leave to raise a pig for her FFA project.

Like all the other sanctuaries, I am “overrun” with pigs and gave Pat every good reason I could think of to turn down her request but something in me refused to listen to “reason.” It was clear that Pat had bonded to Porkchop in a way that caused her to know that if at all possible she needed to find him a lifetime home where he could live freely as a pig among pigs and the other animals. Reluctantly I agreed to take him.

Porkchop is a lovely animal, intelligent and gentle. He has made many friends here at Dreamtime Sanctuary and will spend hours on end allowing himself to be given belly rubs. At the same time, he has all the habits of his kind which tend to the destructive side. They create passageways straight through barn doors, can destroy stall gates, make mud holes wherever necessary and gleefully root up pasture land. Nancy Jensen-Case

Should I have a pet pig?

Dreamtime is home to some 18 pigs. This represents an assortment of Pot Belly Pigs, Porkchop, a Yorkshire Pig, Daisy, a Hampshire Pig, as well as several feral pigs. These animals love to follow visitors as they walk around the property and on one occasion joined a visitor as she practiced her Tai Chi routine on the bank of the sanctuary pond. The various pigs get along quite well with one another as well as with humans.

Pigs will freely carve out muddy wallows at inconvenient places of their choosing. This is because they lack the sweat glands which would allow them to cool off in the way of horses and some other mammals. A pig who lacks access to water and mud would die of heat stroke in these Texas summers, especially this one with days on end of triple digit temperatures. That said, they are naturally clean animals who have a horror of using their sleeping and dining spaces as bathrooms. While there are certainly people who make house pets of them, pigs much prefer to live outdoors. I suspect that if we were to ask them they would indicate that they take a dim view of wearing costumes, tiaras and sunglasses.

Pigs have become the new throwaway pet. Many people are drawn to piglets thanks to the cuteness factor and soon find they are sharing their living space with a precious baby. The precious baby grows and then grows some more, far surpassing the 35- 50-pound size so often considered to be “normal” for a Pot Belly pig. A healthy adult Pot Belly can weight from 75 to 250 or 300 pounds and is strong beyond imagining. Their hooves need regular trimming and their tusks, if untrimmed, can sometimes grow into the flesh around their mouths. Such an animal can be a bit vindictive if it finds itself without the attention to which it has grown accustomed since like many other animals, pigs are herd animals and do not do well in isolation.

I have had countless telephone calls from pig owners who got a pig only to discover that their homeowners’ association does not allow pigs or other “livestock” in the neighborhood. I had a call from one woman who wanted me to accept her pig because she had to “get rid” of him. When I asked why, she stated, “Well, he was cute when he was young. Now he’s grown up.”

I would like to urge potential pig owners to think twice, three times, even a hundred times before taking a pig into their home. You AND the pig will be far happier if you leave them on the farm. You can always come for a visit to enjoy them in the environment they love best!

Farrier’s corner

I have been taking care of the many hooves at Dreamtime sanctuary for a few years now. When Nancy first asked me if I could trim pigs feet I thought she was joking, until I saw the feet of some of the pot bellied pigs she had. Her description of lobster claws was perfect.

Armed with only my horse trimming tools and a vague idea of what a pig's hooves should look like, we got to work. I say we, because without Nancy as my pig wrestler the task would be impossible. She had the great idea of using the half round feed troughs to lay the pigs in on their backs. It worked like a charm because the pig really can't do much but squeal, the first five minutes is ear splitting and earplugs are definitely recommended, after that they seem to relax and the screams turn to snores. The smaller pigs can be carried by their feet and placed in the trough. The larger ones require a different strategy. We tip the trough on its side then get the pig alongside it, one person tips the pig, while the other tips the trough, all in one fluid motion. As you can imagine, this takes a little practice.

So now we have our pig contained, what to do with these feet? For a start pigs have four toes. Two main ones that they walk on and two smaller ones on either side that don't seem to bear much weight but probably help in soft mud. Although these look similar to cows' or goats' hooves, they are much harder, with a hard-layered sole not a soft pad. This sole builds up in layers and follows the growth of the hoof wall forming a claw rather like a dog's. This means you have to "trim blind," with no obvious guide as to where the quick is. The exception here is with the white feet, where the quick shows pink through the translucent horn. With the black feet, I just have to nip a little at a time and admittedly mistakes were made at first, but luckily no long-term suffering ensued. I also discovered that the sole part of the hoof flakes off easily with a hoof knife, until you reach a solid layer and that is a good stopping point for trimming the hoof wall.

Nancy tells me the pigs seem much happier and are walking a lot better, but if anyone out there can give me more advice on this subject I'd be glad to hear it. I have not come across any books or articles on trimming pigs' feet yet, and didn't learn about it in farrier school either.

That's all for now, Joe

Tai chi with pigs

“When Nancy first asked me if I could trim pigs feet I thought she was joking, until I saw the feet of some of the pot bellied pigs she had. Her description of lobster claws was perfect.”

A few of Dreamtime’s pigs nap in the barn

556 Roemer Road

Elgin, Texas 78621

email: nancy@dreamtimesanctuary.org

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“Porkchop, like so many FFA “project” pigs, worked his way into the hearts of his human family and when time came to “put him on the truck,” none of them could bring themselves to take that particular step.”