It all started Friday after Thanksgiving. I got home from work and nothing appeared unusual so I went about my usual routine. Went next door to Moms for Thanksgiving left overs. Shortly after getting comfortable back at the house the dogs started barking and when I looked outside the horses were running around acting strange. Thinking there was a fox or coyote I grabbed the rifle and header out to see what had everyone riled up. I didn’t find any vermin but I followed our youngest horse into the woods and she led me right to one of our AGH sows. She had 10 little piglets. Instead of using the shelter I set up for her she chose to have them in the woods right next to the property line fence. It wasn’t too cold out but I was a little worried about the piglets so I found an old blanket and threw over the sow and piglets and checked on them every few hours during the night.
The oddest thing was how the horses acted. Several times I would look up and they would be only a few feet away watching. The older horses eventually lost interest but the younger one was always right there. Almost like she was standing guard all through the night.
After getting the sow squared away I went up to the barn to lock up Bobbie Jo. And found that Marla had finally had her calf. Brand new little bull. We named him Porter, as in Porterhouse. Don’t want to make a mistake and let anyone get the wrong idea about him. He is cute now but he will be delicious later.
Saturday we decided to move the sow and her piglets into a shelter and get them away from the fence. We were just too afraid a fox or coyote would hop the fence and pick off a piglet. Moving the piglets into the pig house wasn’t enough to get her to follow. She kept going back to where she had them. We ended up forcing her into the house and nailing a pallet up in front of the door. After a little while she settled down and we thought all was well.
Then we went up to check on Porter. He looked weaker than he should and Marlas udder and teats were swollen to the point that he may not have been able to nurse. Let the rodeo begin. Marla has never been handled but we wanted to strip some of the milk so Porter could nurse. We got her into the milking stanchion and tied one leg back, after going around and around the barn. I proceeded to milk her and then helped Porter get a good drink. Only getting kicked once and having the bucket knocked over half a dozen times in the process.
Sunday we went to remove the pallet and check on the piglets. Unfortunately one had died. It probably got rolled over on. The rest of the piglets were fine and the sow has accepted this location.
We went up to check on Porter and he was still acting a little more lethargic than we were comfortable with so back in the stanchion Marla goes. It was harder to get her in this time but once there she was much calmer. I milked about a quart from her and put it in the freezer just in case we need colostrum at some point in the future. We left Marla and Porter penned up away from all the other animals all day and I saw him drink a couple of times.
Monday morning. Woke up feeling like I had been run over by a truck from the weekend pig and cow rodeo. Managed to get out to feed everyone and found another young sow had given birth and one of the piglets was about 3 feet away cold as ice but still moving. When I picked it up is started to squall so I stuck it in my shirt and headed for the house. I gave it to Lisa. She sat down in front of the heater with it to warm it up and the yorkeys cleaned it up. Surprisingly by the time I had the sow and piglets moved and was just starting to milk the cow Lisa came out with it and it was doing fine. She put it back with its mama and it started nursing. Pigs are sure hardy animals. I told her that 2 of our Kune Kune x AGH sows were missing so after I got the cow milked we went searching for them. We found them way down into the woods away from everything. One has 6 the other had 7 piglets. We still have one AGH sow that should be pregnant but she hasn’t shown any signs yet. We knew the others were but didn’t expect them all to pop at the same time.
All total for the weekend we have 9 AGH and 20 Kune Kune/AGH cross piglets and one bull calf. And 2 very tired people.
