piglets on porkchop hill

the piglet’s first few days on pork chop hill, my first birthing experience period, and it feels as if it’s off to a rough start.  after the first few hours four were living, and four and a half were dead (four squashed, one stillborn).  when raised in factories, mother pigs—sows—are kept apart from their piglets by a tightly packed crate.  these farrowing crates allow the hog to barely roll on her side so the piglets locked next door can access the teets.  a sow can be held in the crate for her entire gestation period.

for us, on pasture, the squash effect is always to be expected, and a survival rate of eighty percent would be good times all around.  our batting average with oprah is clearly a little low, which immediately calls her mothering skills, and her future in our herd, into immediate question. 

the runtiest of the four piglets, the one being stepped on in the video, looks like he may have under developed or broken legs, and may not survive.  the idea of pulling him from oprah and bottle raising him to hypothetical health in the backyard is one which doesn’t compute on our time, labor, energy, or financial balance sheets.

the ninety degree weather is oppressive and unrelenting for the recovering mother (which is why you wouldn’t ideally plan a birth this time of year).  her health is the key, and if this runt’s possible death is an indicator of oprah’s health challenges, and not his own, we will pull the three remaining piglet’s and tend to them ourselves.  

hopefully, however, as the heat gives way to night she will become active and nurse us some plump little milky piglets.  all of their nutruents, including hydration, will come from her for the first few weeks.  this little guy below is already looking ahead to the cornucopia ahead of him on pch, but hasn’t yet discovered what to do with it (despite the helpful demonstration above him).