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.

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