The Time Just Flew By!

March 30, 2020

The little AGH's are TWO months old! It's crazy to think that the past two months went by in a FLASH! They were just born...We watched them grow right before our eyes! Fiona did such a good job raising them up!! We were concerned since litter number 1 was not successful. In so many ways. We are better informed now and have a very suitable space for her to farrow in the future. In fact, the whole structure is still in the early stages of becoming a pig palace of sorts.

So what has been happening in the last two months?

Well, until last Tuesday (day after Memorial Day) I was working remotely. There were a handful of days that I was asked to come in to the station for specific projects. Otherwise I was home working and taking breaks to check out the kids. 

After a couple of weeks they started to explore outside of the stall that we had them set up in. THEN  they were exploring a lot of the farm with momma supervising (sort of). They explored a lot of the field next to the area where they spent the first few weeks. Then as time went on they explored further and further. This included the big garden space all covered with a silage tarp the back yard, Big Daddy's area. Their most favorite area was the Mushroom Compost pile. They would spend a lot of time playing in the mound and pushing around the dirt and stuff. They even work on a depleted pile that was next to a pile of sand. They worked it so much that I was able to shovel up a wheelbarrow load of soil for planting. 

Good Piggies!

Last week when we had a couple of days in the 80s and low 90s Tom put out a small pool for them to cool themselves in. It was a slow process of figuring out that there was water in the pool, then they slurped up some water and then figured out that they could step into it with not too much trouble. 

May 28, 2020

One of the boys decided to try out the duck's pool...

A lot has happened from the time that they were born until now. I'm back to working in the office full time - no more of that working remotely nonsense. For now at least. Who knows how things will shake out this fall. In the past nine weeks we have spent so much time learning about the piggies and momma and trying to determine which we will sell and WHEN. 

Last week it became pretty clear that it's time for the jr. swine to move on. They are getting bigger, duh. But they are also becoming harder to handle at meal time. They know the routine, but they don't allow for their human parents to get things laid out for them. It's craziness!

So, by Thursday I had drafted up an ad for Craigslist. Tom approved of the ad and then I decided to post it on Friday. Since selling livestock is a new thing for me, I wasn't sure what to expect as far as interest. On Saturday it occurred to me that maybe I should add some key words and phrases to make our ad more findable. THEN by the evening, I thought that maybe we should pray about selling the pigs and asking for the Lord to prompt a suitable buyer for the piggies.

Things happen when you pray - sometimes it takes a while. Other times - less than an hour! Yep, within an hour I had an email waiting for me to read. 

After a few email exchanges we have ourselves a buyer! AND she said she would buy all FOUR of the boys! So out of the six we are keeping the female, also know as Bridgette for breeding purposes. As well as the male who had some problems with his front legs we call him Victor. He will be our feeder pig.

The fact that they are all going together makes me so happy and thankful. They will be together at their new home together so that will be something familiar and they will get to know their new place and new routine together. Let's just hope that they the transition doesn't freak them out too much. 

This is pretty much forced weaning. We had hoped to try to separate Fiona from the brood the weekend before we listed them, but the instinct was pretty strong at that point. The babies cried and she made her way from her old paddock with Rex over to them. She didn't leave any evidence as to where she escaped. That is still a mystery. The babies also busted out and were wandering around. 

We have noticed since then that she is not allowing them to nurse nearly as much and is doing her own protest by not allowing herself to be available to them. Soon they give up and start grazing or playing somewhere together. Once that happens she pops up and wanders out to the field or goes to the front yard where the clover is nice and thick. 

Today is Tuesday so I will be spending as much time with them as I can. Our buyer had a change in her plan for Thursday and will be over much earlier than she first thought. I decided to take the afternoon off so I could meet her and to help with loading up the kids into the kennel that she will be bringing...

To Be Continued...