Do Pigs get Moody - Feed them Seaweed

The terrible three with their tails

Lady Lavinia is pregnant again. Not by choice, by accident, thanks to Irish weather. Last May bank holiday it pissed rain all weekend. I woke on the Monday to find the electric fencing lying in a puddle. Lady Lavinia, Laertes and the terrible three all sauntering from the far field to the field behind the house looking for their breakfast. Laertes had a very satisfied, smug expression. He had got his bit. Later we saw him relieving himself. Pigs share so many characteristics with humans....

Well anyway back to the title. Do pigs get moody? I can categorically tell you they do. Lady Lavinia is in one hell of a mood ever since. She's narking at her rapidly growing piglets. She's narking at Laertes. She is even moaning to me. Maybe I should give her seaweed?

I have been following Ireland's Farmers Twitter account since it first started. In fact I was one of the first tweeting farmers. Don't laugh. I told them I wasn't a farmer, more a very, very small smallholder but they weren't deterred. So I did my stint. After that it was taken over by different organisers and each week a different farmer did their week, explaining to the great unwashed what they do. Then one "farmer" who is a very, very big butcher did his week and used it to promote his business (not his farm). Just this week another "farmer" took over to tell us how he raises thousands of pigs.

When any of the great unwashed expressed concern at any of the intensive production methods, the reply was "well we feed seaweed!" Gosh, if only all of life's problems could be solved by eating seaweed.

You dock piglet's tails. Well we feed seaweed.
You keep sows in farrowing crates. Well we feed seaweed (and apple juice.)
The pigs can't root. Well we feed seaweed and they play with a dangling football.
The pigs are always inside. Well we feed seaweed and they have skylights.
The sows are moody. Well we feed seaweed.

Incidentally (what I did learn this week) if you keep more than 80 sows together they won't fight as they don't recognise each other and they don't remember which one pissed them off. Have to say if I was stuffed into a maternity ward with 80 other women I probably wouldn't remember either.

While I have to admit that if pigs have to be raised intensively (inhumanly as far as I am concerned) this system is not the worst. In fact it is probably outstanding in a bad lot. The pigs are raised in purpose built housing with natural light on rubber matting and with Radio Kerry to keep them entertained. That would be torture for me but hey, maybe pigs don't mind bland. The fact that normal pigs and piglets spend probably 80% of their day rooting and nosing about is totally irrelevant here.

Well they are fed seaweed and they have a dangly ball to play with and they can listen to Radio Kerry and they don't get sunburn. The boar was barred off from the sows but he could see them and he had a ball game to amuse him and he could listen to Radio Kerry. Wish that could have done it for Laertes who did his very best to murder me as I kept him from his woman with a strand of electric fencing.

The fact remains that they never get to stick their nose in soil, they never get to eat fresh grass, they never get to wallow, they never get to lie in the sun or get sunburned, they never get to leg it into their house when the heavens open, they never get to watch ESB workers climb poles or delivery lorries trundle down a laneway.

They never get to be pigs.

So you get to buy a €1 chop.........

Pay €4 for a chop that will knock the socks off you with taste, juiciness, flavour, moistness and you know the poor bastard that died to give you this experience had a life.

It's your choice.


Signed:  A Bitter Woman.

The Terrible Three

Look daddy, same as you!

So my first effort at pig breeding is going swimmingly. The piglets are now 12 weeks old and enjoying a lovely outdoor free range existance being fed naturally with barley, organic pig nuts and lots of fruit and vegetables. As well as having access to a large area to run and root and graze.

I am down to the terrible three and believe me they really are terrible. We have Brutus who is a bully and a brute. Literally heaves his brothers out of his way at the trough. He is also a supreme escape artist. He darts between two strands of electric fencing to escape. He has in turn taught Jockser (neck like a jockey's - well you know,) seen here in the picture mounting Redser. If you are not careful at feeding time they will trip you up dashing in front of you and between your legs. Plus they love to slobber you with muck particularly if you run down to feed them before leaving for work. They seem to have the ability to detect clean clothes.

They are still sneaking in to have a quick feed with mum and she, the silly ass allows them. The three of them are almost the same size as she is. She is totally fed up of them.

Redser, Jockser and Brutus

Brutus, Lady Lavinia and Jockser

They loved the warm weather we had recently and spent most of it stretched out. So far they have not taken to wallowing but it won't be long.

I was taken aback at how quickly their daddy Laertes and his brother grew (well gone at this stage) so I decided it was time to cut down to feeding once a day. I want them to reach weight slowly and not pile on the fat. They are understandably not a bit pleased about this and complain loudly every time they see me. Recently though I have been getting sacks of fruit and vegetables and the other day they made short work of figs, avocados, grapes as well as all the other more common stuff. Lots of very satisfied slurping.

Love Redser's "eye makeup"

I am waiting for them to grow a little bit before letting them into a new field as the fencing is slightly higher in it. Not keen on them ducking under it and out onto a busy road. But hopefully in a couple of weeks they will be on a full acre of lush green grass.

Can you imagine how good they will taste?

Operation Weaning

So the final five. Five about to become three. Actually if a friend hadn't bought them this would have happened long ago. But I being a softie and not a hard nosed business woman I agreed to keep them until she organised herself.

Operation Weaning had to commence. Mamma was still full of milk but starting to get narky with the babies. A Croatian who rented a property belong to my ex. had left a very solid, well-built dog house behind. I had mentally ear marked it. My pig house builder agreed that it could be converted for the purpose. He had done so months ago so it was just a question of getting it moved by a tractor with forks.

It was moved on Saturday last and the fencing was extended. The piglets were tempted in with food and were secured. Or so I thought. So far it's been a pantomime. One or two keep risking getting zapped and with blood curdling squeals make the mad dash under the fence. The first morning after the move, they had all made the dash of death and I found them back in with mamma. Last night before I went to bed I could hear lots of commotion but just ignored it. Then when I went down this morning, found one poor soul who hadn't been brave enough and was alone all night in the dog box.

There is a pig behind that snout in the straw

This photo was taken earlier after they had breakfast and went back to bed (in the dog box) for a snooze. I thought to myself, success at last. But only five minutes later three of them skipped back into mamma upon waking.

Now I have mamma in their run but she's too big for the dog box. But at least they are separated from her for most of the day.

However, I wonder should I just give up and let nature take it's course. Especially as just now when I was dropping the fence to tempt the babies back in with food, momma skipped over to freedom and I had a hell of a job to tempt her back even with a bucket. The grass really is greener on the other side of the fence.

I used think horses were a lot of work. They are a walk in the park in comparison to free range pigs who while they hate the electric fence are always willing to take a chance. 

First Sale

Sandwiched between mammy and daddy

So six weeks have literally flown by and today four of the babies left for their new home in Bettystown. I had been dreading this moment. Not because I was sad to see them go, I actually was delighted. Their poor mother is a shadow of her former self and I am pumping feed into her. But I was dreading catching them and risking getting eaten by an angry sow. 

As with everything you worry about, it all went off relatively smoothly in the end. Oh but by golly there was a lot of ear piercing squealing. My son reckoned if a health and safety officer was about, we'd all have had ear muffs on. Add to this the first one caught and put into the back of the straw-filled jeep attempted to jump back out. Thankfully the new owner was deft and caught her mid-air getting zapped by the electric fence in the process.

The second was thrown in and the new owner by now ready and waiting almost decapitated me slamming the door shut.  My son who has the gentle, patient hands of my grandfather caught the next two and slowly (with me screaming move, move, MOVE.....I tend to get a wee bit stressed on these occasions) added them to the boot.

Momma was concerned at her babies' squeals but her love of her grub was a stronger lure. So she left her trough, grunted a bit and acted agitated but then remembered her food. Daddy was just wondering why he had been fenced off again and was unable to rob his misses' grub. The babies by now buried in deep straw murmered a few times and then there was silence.

Paperwork completed, money exchanged and a bit of a chat about feeding and they were off.  Immediately the talk turned to - will we do it again?  I being a bit more cautious said wait until we get the rest sold. I'm keeping three for myself, family members and some friends. And Lady Lavinia needs a bit of a rest now, lolling about in the sun and gaining some weight. But I would be very tempted to buy a Gloucester Old Spot sow and breed her with Laertes. 

Watch this space.

Having fun in the snow

Snow pigs

Laertes, Lady Lavinia and the Little uns

The happy family

Laertes the boar (son of Oldfarm's Polonius) and his misses, Lady Lavinia produced nine lovely, healthy piglets on the 28th January. It was one of the coldest days of the winter so far with snow on the ground. I saw her in the morning briefly before leaving for work as she was dragging in wet, dirty grass into the new house we had moved into the field for her (nesting). It was to be the designated maternity wing. 

We had awful trouble with the last house as neither would sleep in it for days. They actually slept out in the cold rather than go in. This was despite me climbing in to show them it was safe and desperately hoping they wouldn't decide to come in on top of me. But they just looked in at me as if I was mad (which I probably am.)  So I was surprised to see that she accepted the new house so readily. Laertes was much more wary and didn't venture in at all. 

When I got home that day I sneaked down to have a peep. I could see her back and just assumed she was still in labour, so I went to get her some more straw as it was freezing.  When I came back and started to put the straw in, I saw a piglet peep up from behind her. At that point she jumped up and there was a lot of squealing as she blundered about, not being sure where to put her feet down without standing on a baby. But don't worry; those squeals. Even new born they were well able to let her know if she had hurt them.

She started to nose up the straw in a pile around them to keep them warm and then came out for some food and a drink. She was surprisingly relaxed with me being close but I didn't tempt fate and try and get a photo of them until the next day. 

One day old

They reminded me of guinea pigs I had when I was a child who grew to number 24 from two. Their colouring and markings resembling Dolly Mixtures. Lady Lavinia is half Irish Grazer (Tamworth) and a Gloucester Old Spot cross. Laertes has Saddlback, Duroc, Hampshire and Landrace in there so you can see they are a good mix.

Then I was given all the old advice, so much that my head was in a spin. I consulted Oldfarm and was reassured that I did not need to pull their teeth, dock their tails, keep Lady Lavinia in a cage so she wouldn't squash them or carry out any other barbaric practices. I was even told they would need an infra red light. Actually, if I had had one that mightn't have been a bad idea but I'd say mum would have over heated. But no, they are a hardy outdoor breed and when I put my hand in gently on them when they were asleep, they were as warm as toast. She hasn't any cut nipples although she is a bit bemused at my inspecting them when she's eating and she hasn't squashed any. And this is despite her being a new mum.

I separated Laertes for the first few days just by a strand of electric fencing and he was thoroughly miserable and stood looking over it at her and his babies. So when he actually stopped eating I let him in and he just did a lot of sniffing about. He seemed to know what was going on and was very gentle with his babies as they cavourted underneath his 300kg frame. The big softie lies outside the house during the day and then at night quite happily returns to his own house in the next field.

Playing in empty buckets

These piglets are unlikely to see their first birthday as they will probably be ready for slaughter around 8 months or when they reach 75kg. But, they will have a lovely life outside as nature intended, rooting and wallowing and sunbathing and living in a family group. And they will produce the most amazing tasting pork and bacon, the like of which you have probably never tasted before.

If we eat meat then we should raise animals with dignity and respect. They deserve no less.

Buy free range, buy organic, pay a bit more for meat from animals that have had a decent life and haven't been kept in the dark in a concrete shed their entire life prevented from behaving naturally. How can meat from pigs raised like this be healthy?

Life is Good

Since Laertes is a lazy article - to quote herself, I'm taking over our social media accounts. I'm getting bigger and stronger every week. Only trouble is so is himself and he is able to head butt me into the middle of next week.

My name is Lady Lavinia. I nibble herself's boots and she shouts "stop nibbling" at me.  I suppose we can relax here now and enjoy the sunshine as herself says she's keeping us for breeding (whatever that means).

We are loving this warm sunny weather and spend a lot of it sleeping.

The ground is dry and dusty now. It was awful in winter. I hated getting into bed with mucky trotters.

This is himself and this is where you find him most days now. He gets sunburned but he doesn't seem to care. I don't because I root up a big hole and surround it with dried grass and mud and snuggle down into it.

We get fed twice a day now. Breakfast is barley and organic pig nuts. She's been adding garlic powder for a few days now. We are not keen on it but are usually so hungry we eat it.

I try to nibble the grass under the hurty white stuff. Herself keeps saying she is moving us to the next field. Wish she'd hurry up.

Then in the evening she wheels out the wheel barrow and gives us fruit and vegetables. Laertes love avocados, beetroot leaves and tomatoes. I love tomatoes too so we fight over them. We both like melons, grapes, in fact everything sweet.

We get another bucket of barley and pig nuts with more garlic powder in the evening.

Every time a human appears we gallop over because you never know what you might get. We are always on the look out for food.

We have to learn how to wallow yet. Herself keeps saying she'll show us how to do it. Can't wait to see that.


Pigs have the life.

Give me an oul follow over on Twitter. I'm @rasherandsausag and I will be a lot better than Laertes at twittering.

Laertes, son of Polonius

Allow me to introduce Laertes. He is the son of Oldefarm's Polonius. He is a gentle giant. I also had his brother who was black with thin brown stripes. I actually preferred the colouring of his brother but he was a cranky character. Laertes is the exact opposite. We realised that once he was separated from his brother that he had been bullied by him. He now has the luxury of leaving his food until later. He never had that opportunity before.

When the day came for them both to go to the abattoir we loaded his brother relatively easily.  But Laertes was cute and evaded loading. Because of this he got a reprieve. My son convinced me it was an omen and anyway he had "Lestat" eyes. He was full of reasons as to why we should not kill him. I was between two minds but, having already killed a sow I wished I hadn't, I was dithering. Later that day I got him into the horse box but something stopped me from closing the ramp and rather sheepishly I walked back up the field.

Now we have decided to keep him as a breeding boar. He has a lovely gentle nature and even as he gets fully grown I can't see this changing. And although he was not unduly lonely I decided to get him a companion. Mini me arrived and he was so gentle with her it was really heart warming.

She is the boss. She learned the routine so quickly. The only time I have seen him get mad at her is when she tries to eat his veg. Today he head butted her through the electric fencing because she tried to steal something he was eating. I don't think he intended to do this but he is so much bigger than her she's easy to send far.

She's a real squealer. She never stops and sometimes I think he looks at me as if to say "can you take her away before she wrecks my head?"

But I think in spite of himself he is happy with her company.

Laertes, son of Polonius. You were lucky.

Rusty and The Bandit

Sadly Mrs Pig hurt her back and had to go to the Abba concert (abattoir) so we are now the new residents.

Herself has named us Rusty and The Bandit. We are a Saddleback/Duroc cross. We are growing very fast. We love all the space in the big sunny field. We also love our little house. It gets really warm when the sun shines into it in the morning and we like to go back for a snooze after breakfast. It doesn't leak even in the heaviest rain.

The pesky dogs are really scared of the hurty white stuff so they leave us alone although one decided that she liked the look of some of our food so she jumped through it. You should have heard her squeal. We laughed our heads off at her.

There's a big fella that calls into see us. He can speak pig language. It's really confusing because it sounds just like us but it really makes no sense. We come out every time to see him though because he gives us a rub on the belly or behind the ears and we love that.

It's getting very cold at night now but we just bury down into all the straw and snuggle very close together so we are quite comfortable.

Life is good.

I'm All Alone

This is Harry the pig, he left a few weeks ago in a horse box. Herself tempted us all up the ramp with a bucket. She pushed me out the jockey door and I thought she was going to push the boys out as well, but she didn't.

I haven't seen them since and I presume they have gone to that "Abba" concert Rasher was on about before she left to go to it herself.

I sulked for days and refused to get up. I pretended to starve myself but it's all being in vain. Herself has still not got me any new friends.

She says she's trying. I kind of believe her because she is out every day muttering about "no pigs".

 She decided to send Harry to Abba when she took this picture of him and saw his big ham!

I'm trying to hide mine but every now and again I catch her checking it out.  She says if I don't smarten up she's getting that horse box again next week.

She used to call us the runts but Hock never really grew. That's him beside me on the right. I'm not much better because Harry bullied us both and ate the most.

She said the butcher said he was only fit to make sausages with. Herself says he'll make the most expensive sausages on the planet because he was fed so well. 

This is me now. Herself said I was so fat I had to be pregnant but I'm not.

I wish she would get me some friends but I'm very worried she's booking that Abba concert again.

Summer So Far

We didn't know quite what to make of the recent hot summer weather here recently. We found it quite uncomfortable but we just decided to spent the main part of the day sleeping. Herself was amazed to find us still up at eleven at night.

Herself took this photo while we were having a nap. Our house is in a shady part of the field so it was quite cool in there.

In the afternoon Hammy figured out how to slop our water out of the heavy barrel and make a pig wallow.  It took me a while to get the hang of it. Herself was a bit rude and called me stupid.  You can see a video she made of us all having a good old wallow on her vine post under name MMG.

She took this photo from her bedroom window.  You can see we have rooted up the grass but as it's old and needs reseeding, she says she's not bothered; as long as we don't make a mess like in the other place.

We've Arrived

Looking at this photo you would have to admit we've arrived. Sorry for not keeping you all updated but honestly, haven't had any time guys. Been rootin' - you know how it is?

Anyway it's cooled down a bit now and I have a few minutes before hitting the hay. Well it's straw actually. Silly saying really.

Since we left the hell hole with all the rocks we have been really busy making this green patch brown. It's been so hot though we have to spend a lot of time in bed.  We get up early and have a bit of a root about. Herself is never up, so then we go back for a kip and eventually she sticks her head over the fence and says we are always in bed? Kettle calling the pot black methinks.

Herself complains we are too fussy. We just don't like apples, carrots, pears or, well lots of stuff. She says we need to be starved for a while. 

We love to scratch ourselves on the big silver thing she insists on filling with water. But the stupid Hammy mixes me up with the water barrel sometimes.

Today herself started cutting all the grass down opposite us with a noisy stick. She was swinging it about like there was no tomorrow.  She says she's going to give us some more space to root up. She says we are the porcine earth movers.

Do any of you guys know what she's on about because she has us baffled?

I promise to keep you all updated from now on. It's just been - well you know how it is?

We're on the Move

My name is now Harry.
Herself has stopped calling me Little Pig at long last. I was really lucky, I could have been called Hamish if the visitors from Scotland had their way.  The runts are Hammy and Hock and they have got a lot bigger. They have lovely shiny coats now with no bare patches.

We are moving soon, up to herself's back field.  We think it will be great and really easy to escape from. We are waiting for her to get some fencing repaired and to build us a house. We think we may be waiting.....

I don't miss Rasher anymore now that the runts are getting a bit more interesting.  We are outside all the time now but we don't much like the rain.  It's been great for a few weeks now but it has been very cold.

Herself gives us extra straw when it's cold and we bury down into it, snuggled up beside each other.  She laughs her head off sometimes when she comes down and we are still in bed. When we get up we have a load of straw still on our faces. I don't even notice to be honest but for some reason she finds it funny.

We still get lots of visitors and we like when they come in and give me a scratch. I love an old scratch.

When Harry met Molly

This is Molly pup. Herself was minding her and her cat-hating brother, Mac.  Mac hated us too and tried to bite me.  I soon sorted him!  Molly was sweet though and I even let her steal some of my food.

Rasher and Sausage hated all the dogs but I don't mind them at all.  In fact I like everyone.  I'm a very happy pig.

All Changed

It's all changed here, changed utterly and from now on it's Little Pig blogging as sadly, Rasher is now hanging in the butchers.

Rasher became quite famous as a blogger and a twitterer and had built up quite a following.  She was also in the Sunday Independent but sadly she didn't get to see it.  You can read about Rasher here.


Sausage was the first to leave. I never met her but Rasher told me she used to bully her terribly and eat all her food.  When I came along Rasher tried to bully me but I'm tough.  I had to be, I came from a family of nine.  And believe me it was dog eat dog when it came to feeding time. 

Then just before Rasher left, herself arrived with the two little runts.  She said afterwards never mind a "pig in a poke", she was sold two pokes.  They are Irish Grazer or Tamworths but to look at them you would just see pot-bellied scabs.  Now that they are here with me and getting lots of lovely barley, oats, potatoes and cabbages they are starting to look a bit better.  I don't bully them as much but they make me angry eating my potatoes and we have a bit of a scrap.

Because they are runty herself comes down every evening to close the door and she has given us a big deep bed of straw.  We do NOT like being disturbed too early in the morning.  We think herself has finally got the message and stopped arriving down while it is still dark.  We think that Honest2Goodness market was to blame for that.

So anyway it will be a while before any of us little piggies go to market.  We are looking forward to the spring when herself says she is going to move us to a nicer, less mucky place.  She says there is no point now while it is wet all the time and cold, she forgot the cold.  We do not like going out in it anyway. 

We have to think of good names for the two little runts.  We can't keep calling them that. But honestly Pinky and Perky and Sacco and Vanzetti have been some of the suggestions so far.  Please advise herself sensibly because I'm not going to be a little pig forever.





Tags: Sunday Independent Honest2Goodness PinkyandPerky Sacco and Vanzetti Free Range Pigs

Heebee Geebees

Herself says we get the heebee geebees when she goes near us with a measuring tape. Well I do anyway. She tells me to stop buck lepping around.   Sausage is cool about it.  She likes having her belly rubbed and when herself rubs her behind her ears she falls over on her side and closes her eyes so she looks like she's dead.

It's got cold here now.  Some mornings the hose is frozen and we don't get fresh water until afternoon.  We like the sun when it streams into our stable and we lie in it basking like whales according to herself but I'm not sure what's a whale.

There were men down our lane cutting the hedge recently.  They came and had a look in at us and laughed.  We get lots of visitors these days and they all laugh.  I'm not sure why they think we are so funny but they all say that they have never rubbed a pig before.  Then they tell her she can't eat us.  We hope herself listens.

Our laneway

Our neighbours

She has been doing a lot of muttering about a boypig for us. I'm not sure about that because from what I remember in my last place they are a bit bossy and smelly.  Plus we need to move to a new garden so we can dig it up.  We have made a right mess of this one.  It's too mucky even for us now.

Now I have spent enough time on this computer. Have lots of rooting to do today.  But I will keep all you lovely humans updated.

Rasher x

Herself's brother visited

Ready for Christmas

We know herself thinks we will be fattened and ready for Christmas.  Honestly, she thinks we are turkeys. 

We have been busy for the last few weeks sorting out our bedroom and getting it all nice and cozy for these cold nights.  Herself got us more straw. There was an old bale of hay in the corner which we opened and spread it into a nice big hollow.  We both lie in it now side by side and it's really warm and comfy. 

The food hasn't been too bad lately.  With Halloween coming up we have been getting lots of grapes.  Herself said the veg man looked a bit green handing over a big tray full of grapes.  He had reduced the price by half but they didn't sell.  So we got the lot.  We love grapes.

We still get barley - big buckets full of it.  Sausage is very greedy and sticks her big jowls into mine but I have got very good at defending myself and now she has a bit of respect for me.

We are surprised that we haven't got any spuds yet but we heard herself muttering that they can't dig them with all the rain there has been lately.  Speaking of rain, we don't get out as much anymore because we really don't like it.  In fact when herself comes down to feed us these mornings we haven't even got up and we have to do our stretching and yawning rituals (which she disturbs).

Love an old yawn and stretch

Life is really not so bad now.  We are going to keep on growing slowly and not getting fat.  This is the only way we will stay off the table at Christmas.  We will keep you posted.

Rasher.

Our Nice Friends

We have discovered that we have lots of nice friends following us on Twitter and also reading our blog.  I bet we are the first pigs ever to blog.  We are really getting the hang of it now and beginning to enjoy it.  The only problem is the mud on the keyboard from our noses causing some of the keys to stick.......

As a thank you to our lovely followers we would like to mention a few very nice people we call aunty and uncle. 

The first and most loyal is our aunty Cat.  She was the one who gave us the idea to start twittering. Then she said we should tell everyone our story.  So to aunty Cat, thank you and hope you had a lovely holiday and that Mr Don does not send anyone after you to get that photo you took of him.

Our next is uncle Lordy who even says he is going to fly over in his helicopter to rescue us before herself tries to turn us into rashers and sausages.  We heard that he did something silly on his holiday and has broken his *whispers* bottom.  We hope he gets better soon before herself does anything to us.

By the way, we would love to know what holidays are and how can Dons chase you or how can you break your bottom while you are on them?

Our next favourites are uncle and aunty Oldfarm.  They tell us all about Jemima and her babies.  We love the stories and the photos of the babies.  They also want to do something to make people aware of the horrible lives our brothers live in pig production units. 

We would love to become the spokespigs for our poor brothers who have a horrible life and don't have lots of nice aunties and uncles like we do.  So this is a small thank you to our lovely friends.  We hope you realise how happy you make two little pigs.

Feast or Famine

We are sorry we have not been keeping everyone updated lately.  We are getting nice and fat now; well Sausage is still fatter than me, but I'm catching up.  The food in this joint is for the most part not bad.  We get our barley every morning but it's the nice stuff that's a bit hit and miss.

By nice stuff we mean bananas (our new favourite), melons, grapes and pears.  We still get a few strawberries but not as many.  Our next favourites are apples, tomatoes, potatoes.  But we really don't like Broccoli, even herself says she doesn't blame us that she hates it too.  She says that when she has some of her lovely purple sprouting broccoli from her garden she will let us try it.  We are not keen on turnips, peppers, lettuce, cabbage or onions.  And worst of all - oranges and lemons.  We really can't see the point of them.

Herself got in a bit of a panic as there was no barley in the feed supplier.  She went over to get it when her daughter was at home to help her lift the bags.  It makes us laugh watching her lugging the bags up the steps and then trying to wrestle with it into the bin.  You should hear the curses - we cover our ears!

Well anyway this day she went over and Sylvester the big man in the office took her money and gave her the docket.  She drove over to the other yard and the man there walked around looking at pallets and scratching his head.  Then he rang the boss.  The boss man came down to talk to herself and said that the weather had been so bad they couldn't get in to cut the new barley.  But he thought they might have a few bags over in their other place.  He said he'd ring her next day.

To cut a long story short he got some bags in, but then told her it doesn't keep well at this time of year when it's freshly cut, so not to buy a lot of it.  He threw in two bags into her boot and the car was almost on the ground with the weight.  Herself then had no one to help lift it in.

Now she says she heard on the news that it's going to get very expensive as the weather has been so bad the harvest is poor and also they keep putting up the price of fuel.  She told us we will be eating a lot more potatoes when the potato people near by start harvesting.  She said we better get to like potato as much as melon - some chance!

We will keep you updated a bit more now as we are getting the hang of this blogging and it's making us famous!

Trespassers

We had lots of excitement over the last few days.  We woke up one morning to discover these looking in at us. They are Limousins.

They had broken out of their field and had got into the field beside us.  We couldn't figure out what they were but figured they were just big pigs that ate grass.

Then herself discovered that we were in a paddock not owned by her out laws at all!  She had to ring the farmer and ask him was it okay to leave us here.  Luckily he said, "sure what harm will they do".  He hasn't looked over the wall recently to see obviously.

Then the handsome fruit and veg man started giving our strawberries and melons and all the other nice yummy stuff to some other pigs.  He gave her yucky broccoli that had gone yellow.  She said she wouldn't give it to us.

Sausage is a lot fatter than me and she bullies me so now herself has started giving us our own bowls.  It's very confusing though because I keep thinking that Sausage's food is a lot nicer than mine and she thinks mine is nicer than hers. 

You can see how fat Sausage is in this picture.  But at least I have the bigger bowl.

We have really rooted up all the garden now and even uprooted an ash sapling. We hide in behind the rest of it when the sun is out and we get too hot.  It's nice and cool in there.

Herself says we have to get our ears pierced and tattoos on our shoulders next, but she is just waiting until she gets the stuff sent out to her in the post.  This is for her herd number and so we won't get lost or mixed up with other pigs.  We think we are going to look like punk rockers.

Our Diet

Herself says that if you eat something do you ever wonder what it has eaten?

We are pigs so we are omnivores which means we eat basically the same as herself.  We love fruit, particularly sweet fruit like plums, pears and strawberries.  We eat them first and then later the other icky vegetables like carrots and potatoes and we are not keen on cabbage or broccoli.  Herself says we remind her of small children.

We also eat barley and we really love it.  Herself adds some water to it and we fight over who can keep their head in the pot longest.  Rasher usually bites me when I am greedy.

 Herself decided she was not going to feed us pig food because it has genetically modified soya and maize in it.  It actually says it on the label.  She asked a few feed manufacturers about getting GM free but only one even researched the possibility of getting some in.  It worked out to be about 4 times the price.

We have made a right mess of the garden and it's all mucky now with the rain.  But we root about under the grass and we find slugs, worms, grubs and roots.  This is why our noses are always dirty.  Herself says that people panic when they see the mess we make of land but we actually do a lot of good.  We turn the soil around very gently, aerating it and rotivating it.

When we become *whisper* "rashers and sausages" or even pork belly or ham we will taste more gamey because of our diet.  Our meat will be darker and have more flavour.  
diet
We are very happy with our diet so far and hope herself continues to get strawberries from the nice fruit and veg man.  He knows we love strawberries now and he always tries to give her some for us.

Tags: GM free feed  Pig rearing GM free  Pigs

Our First Post

This is our first post and we are very excited about it.  When herself first suggested we write a piggy blog, we didn't have a clue what she was on about.  But then she explained to us that there are lots of small people (and not so small) who haven't a clue that rashers and sausages come from us - shudder!  So maybe we should enlighten them.

She named us Rasher and Sausage (a bit unkindly we feel) however we are happy enough with our names now.  Sausage has a curlier tail and is slightly smaller than I am.

We were born in a lovely garden centre called Caragh Nurseries near Naas, Co. Kildare where Jo was our first "herself".  We had lots of brothers and sisters also called Middle Whites and we were a bit sad to leave them, especially as the new herself arrived down with a cat box to collect us.

When we arrived to Carpenters (the name of the old man who farmed in the traditional way with a cow byre, pig sty and stalls in the old barn for the cart horse).  Herself shoved us in a stable and shut the door so we couldn't escape. We had lovely deep straw and as we were tired we cuddled down into it and fell asleep.

After a couple of days she let us out into the walled garden full of lovely long grass.  We were very happy and straight away started rooting up all the grass searching for grubs and bugs underneath.  We get very dirty noses doing this, especially as it always seems to be raining here.

Now we have settled in and have turned our garden into what looks like a rotivated field.  But we like it like that.  We have permanently dirty noses and when we eat our barley bits of mud fall into it.  We love strawberries and when we eat them the juice dribbles down leaving rivulets through our muddy snouts.

We hope to write lots more posts about our adventures now and hope you will read them and make lots of comments.  After all we don't want to become breakfast really and we hope that you will help us stay as Rasher and Sausage.

Tags: Free Range Pigs  Middle White Pigs  Pig Farming