Country Life

My farm vet dissuaded me from purchasing a boar to start my herd by sharing horror stories about their razor sharp tusks and unpredictable nature. He said he’d personally rescued a guy from being trampled to death by an angry boar. So I decided to start with a sow. A pregnant sow. Ms. Piggie, as I named her, was a chocolate brown duroc-Yorkshire mix, with a mane of black hair running down her back. She was beautiful, all 350 pounds of her. This may sound strange, but I think pigs have the most human-like face of any animal – if you discount the snout and focus on the eyes, you’ll see what I mean. Ms. Piggie had these incredible eyelashes, just like Jim Henson’s muppet. The economics sounded promising: Pigs average about 10 babies per litter, so for the price of a few weaners I would end up with 10 pigs, plus a mama that I could breed again the next year, and the next, and the next. As with my goats, I would just rent a boar when the time came. That day never arrived, however, as my time as a pig farmer lasted just one stressful year. Here’s a few of the lessons I learned along the way.