Pigs: The Man Returns

Our goals in our little family farm have never been to upset anyone. We raise animals for the sake of a better product- an exceptional (yet affordable) food source. We do it as an assertion of our independence and proof of our ability to survive. And yes, we do it because we can- for bragging rights. Of course we always knew that there would be some upturned noses by the people who prefer not to know from where their food comes, but the kind of persecution we have faced lately goes far beyond the consternation of the squeamish few. This is personal.


Sunday evening, while walking the dog we were babysitting, I saw that one of the slaughter pigs was grievously injured. She had somehow gotten her hip hung up on a protrusion in a fencepost and tore a foot-long, two inch deep gash in her ham. The slice went through skin, fat, and meat. It was too deep to use the liquid bandage and too wide to sew. So, to cut our losses to a spoiled ham versus a completely spoiled pig, I delayed our dinner guests, and we prepared to put her down immediately.

It screamed. The process is usually quick and quiet. A single, small caliber round to the head, followed by a cut in the throat, a couple squirts of blood, a few kicks, and it is over in a minute or two. This pig, however, screamed. It screamed loud and long, during dinner hour, on a mild-temperatured evening, on a holiday weekend. Someone called the police.

When my parents and several of Pennsylvania's Finest arrived, I showed my guests inside to relax before dinner while Mr. Farmer apologized for the noise and explained what had happened. Once they saw the animal and heard the explanation, they seemed satisfied and went on their way. We had a lovely dinner and my mother seemed pleased with her birthday tulips. The adrenaline wore off sometime well after midnight, and I was finally able to sleep.

Sadly, it was not over. Two days later, more law enforcement arrived. This time they were investigating a complaint of animal cruelty. Mr. Farmer confidently showed the officers to the well-maintained pen with large water barrels being filled constantly with fresh running water. They could easily see that the pigs had ample space, food, water, and shelter. Then, out of nowhere, one of the six-week-old piglets wandered out into the open with a severe gash in its belly and entrails hanging out. We fear that the sudden disruption from the arrival of the unexpected visitors while the pigs were eating may have caused it to get trampled. That surely did not help our case any.

Later that night, the police arrived again. This time they were questioning us about a hysterical neighbor. Cars had been racing around our usually-quiet neighborhood. Someone leaned on a car horn at 9:30 at night. The neighbor was repeatedly screaming, "why are you on my property?" to no one in particular. The whole thing was very strange, and we assured the officer that we didn't know anything about it, except that we had been outside because we were helping a friend move into a new house up the street. We were being targeted because of the previous days' events.

So, the pigs are on the move again. Some are off to the Beta site where they spent last summer. Others are are on their way to what we'll call the Gamma site, another suburban farm where a few of our other pigs currently reside as a result of a previous sale. We're downsizing. There are still four to slaughter and the three breeders whose fate is still unknown. These are dark times for us; I am thankful that we have friends and supporters who stepped up to help us with this catastrophe.

Pigs: Wilma's Second Litter

We were pretty close on our estimation of Wilma's due date. We had been on piglet watch all week. All the signs were there. She was very hungry and thirsty. Her milk sacks were full, and her belly nearly touched the ground when she walked. The day before she delivered, she bit two other pigs that were contesting her supreme rulership of the water barrell. We had predicted that Wilma would deliver the second week of January; she gave us 10 piglets on January 8, 2012.

Piglet Cuddling with Wilma

Wilma is proving to be a fine, solid breeder. Her first litter came in the night while we were home relaxing. Mr. Farmer and Young Master Farmer went to feed and water her and there they were! This second litter came with just as little excitement. She just settled into a corner of the hut and started popping them out, one after another. I watched many of them being born, including a breach that was out and on the ground before I could say, "Oh, no! That's a foot!" The entire process was drama-free and incident free.

The only difficulties came from the remaining pigs from the first litters. They were only mildly curious while Wilma did her thing, and they did not bother her. Still, Mr. Farmer was concerned; so as I watched the little piggies come out one by one in the freezing cold, Mr. Farmer closed off the larger pigs into a separate part of the enclosure. By nightfall, however, they became restless and unhappy. Pigs are social animals and do not like to be separated from one another. So, to keep the peace, he allowed them to be together for the night. He closed in the third side of the hut and put up fence rails on the fourth. He fed and watered Wilma inside her cage, and it seemed to be working well to keep the others out without making them feel separated.

The following morning, one of the rails was down and one of the piglets had a cut on its head from being knocked by it. Wilma had forced her way out (or a younger pig forced its way in). Mr. Farmer repaired the rails and added a door to let Wilma in and out. The younger pigs found there way in anyway (over the rails this time), and sometime over the following night, two piglets were lost. Crushing deaths are not unusual with pigs, but we were pretty upset since we didn't lose any at all from the first two litters in the summer.

Several days later, we had another casualty. One of the piglets had a significant injury. A flap of skin covering a quarter of its belly was hanging loose. We brought it inside to see if we could stitch it up, but the wound was too far healed to sew and appeared to be infected. It could not be saved, so we put it down so that it would not die of starvation or further maiming. That leaves 7 piglets.

The babies are starting to wean now, and all but one of the males have been castrated. They are putting on weight quickly, as they should. And, of course, they are cute...

Piglets Pestering Mamas

Hillbilly Ingenuity: The Roto-Flogger

Inspired by mechanical chicken-plucking machines, Mr. Farmer was determined to invent a device for easily removing the bristles and outer skin from pigs. The design was similar to the standing poultry-plucker, which has a revolving drum embedded with rubber fingers that beat and pull the feathers from a chicken. However, you can't just pick up a two to three hundred pound hog and lean it up against a rotating drum; that would be a bit much to ask of even Young Master Farmer, who is brutishly strong. Out of necessity, a mechanical pig stripper would have to be portable.

The scaled-down, portable design began with a 4 inch, PVC pipe end cap. Mr. Farmer drilled 4 equally spaced holes in the sides of the cap and inserted 4 rubber bungee cords as a replacement for the rubber fingers. The reinforced ends (with the hooks removed, of course) held the cords in place.

He drilled another hole in the center of the cap, inserted a long, threaded rod, and capped it off with a nut on each side. He attached the device to a hammer drill, and was ready to rock and roll!

We call this the ROTO-FLOGGER because of the long, whip-like rubber ends.
Other names we kicked around included the Hair-Whip and the Squealer-Peeler.

As usual, the hog was dispatched, and a 55 gallon drum of water was brought to a boil. Since Mr. Farmer and the Boy were handling this one alone, the old setup with the large, flat rock and metal A-frame were employed for the processing. The pig was dipped for the prescribed amount of time, and the Roto-Flogger made its maiden voyage:

(WARNING: I took this video of the second attempt, the side and back end of the pig, so it is less disturbing than the head view. BUT it is still a video of hair and skin being torn off a hog's hip with a homemade, miniature weed-whacker. Discretion advised. )

Ok, so maybe seeing the dark bristle and skin turning pretty pink looks impressive, but after the first minute, and the second, that small patch of pink was still the only progress that was being made. In fact, this was faster:

(If you were ok with the first video, you will be fine with this one, too.)

Actually, even THIS was faster and more productive than the Roto-Flogger:


(PG at best)

So, in the end, a couple clean patches on the side of the face and a couple cool-looking test patches on the hams were all that the machine produced. The rest of the processing was done the old fashioned way: Dipping in hot water, scraping with a knife, soaking towels in hot water, and picking off hair by hand. Even Mr. Farmer's attempt to improve the process by cutting notches in the rubber bands to grab the hair a bit did not help much.

We are not giving up, however. We are working on the design a bit. We may add more flails. Perhaps we will change the length or shape of the whips. Perhaps a leather whip would be more effective. We'll be doing a bit of research and testing, and I will report back.

Back to the drawing board...

Pigs: More Fun with Castrations

WARNING: PHOTO BELOW IS SOMEWHAT GRAPHIC. (Post is not.)

Mr. Farmer: Aww... you ruined your yoga pants!
Mrs. Farmer: Nah... it's just a little blood. It will wash out.

That's right, it's castration time again. Wilma's second litter was 18 days old today. Since I was off work and Young Master Farmer had a short day because of mid-terms at school, we finally got down to the business that various emergencies had caused us to put off. We castrated 3 of the 4 males, leaving the last for possible breeding stock for another location.

Averaging 12.5 pounds each, the piglets were, once again, very strong for their size. I held the first, a white, spotty, splotchy little guy, while Young Master Farmer assisted and Mr. Farmer performed the operation. But the process was a little slow, and I soon tired. My right arm, holding the critical back feet, started to ache, then go weak. I could feel the blood draining out of my face as I held on as best I could, and dizziness soon set in. In the end, I had to ask Young Master Farmer to take the back feet while Mr. Farmer finished up, cleaned the wound, and applied the liquid bandage. It was exhausting!

The second and third castrations went better. Young Master Farmer took my position in the chair and held the squirmy piglets by the legs, while I assisted with the head and repositioned him as needed. The operations went fairly smoothly, and Young Master Farmer managed to avoid getting bitten by the sows when snatching the piglets from the pen.

Once again, when all was finished, we were tired and dirty- except for Mr. Farmer, of course, who was as clean as any vet would be after performing surgery. When I went for my shower afterward, I started by pre-washing the blood spots on my pants. I then found that I had a matching blood spot on my leg (yuck!) and dirt on me in places I couldn't believe those muddy little pig feet could have reached! I believe Young Master Farmer still has a muddy smudge on his face that I can't explain either. But the job is done, and we can move on to the next project.

It's a Dirty Job, but Someone's Gotta Do it!

Thrift: The Homemade Shampoo Experiment

Several months back, my dear friend Jenn posted a hilarious blog entry about getting sucked into purchasing an overpriced haircare product. At the time I seemed to be getting hit from all sides with haircare: she was bewailing how hers failed, and a number of other blogs I read were going on and on about homemade shampoo and conditioner. I'm a creature of Habit, but I am also a creature of Thrift. So when multiple blogs featuring women with many different hair types exclaimed that shampoo and conditioner could be replaced with water, vinegar, and baking soda, I just HAD to try it.

The recipe was simple:

Rinse out the last shampoo bottle you will ever buy. Add 2 tablespoons of vinegar. Fill the rest of the way with warm water. Shake. Rinse out the last conditioner bottle you will ever buy. Add 2 tablespoons of baking soda. Fill the rest of the way with warm water. Shake. Use as you would normally, skipping the lather step, of course.  That's Strike One for most people: You have to do a little work. It took about 2 minutes, so it wasn't really a negative for me.

The premise sounded too good to be true:

For pennies a month, your hair will be as clean and manageable as it was when you used commercial shampoo. There will be no chemicals on your hair or going into the ground. You will make less waste because you won't be throwing out bottles.

How it worked:

My hair was clean! I have fine, oily, poker straight, dark blonde/light brown hair. After using the homemade combo, my hair was as fluffy and oil-free as it is after using shampoo. I did not experience the static-cling fly aways that conditioner usually handles for me either. In short, it was pretty good! It did not leaving me smelling like vinegar at all. I did not tell Mr. Farmer that I was doing it, and he never knew until I told him.

Why I'm not still doing it:

I remember a very long lecture in high school about the American fascination with scented products. Some report or other determined that more than half of Americans choose their shampoo by scent alone. Another quarter or so choose them by other subjective factors, like how their hair feels while using it and after using it, the brand name sounding luxurious, and the like. In my case, however, it was largely a comfort issue.

It didn't take long for me to get used to squirting a runny liquid over my head instead of lathering. The results were good, and bubbles just end up in your eyes anyway. My problem was with Day Two, Three, Four, etc. You see, on the first day, when you make your products, you mix them with warm water, and go take a shower. After your shower, you stow them in the corner of your bathtub, or in my case, the floor behind the toilet (remember, I was trying to see if Mr. Farmer noticed a smell, so I didn't want to let on that I was doing it). Both the tub and the bathroom floor get cool when not in use. So, on the second day, I get into my hot, steamy shower, get wet and warm, then squirt a generous amount of freezing cold, vinegar-infused water over my head. EEK! Then I rinsed that out quickly, warmed up again, and had to repeat the process with freezing cold, baking soda-infused water.  The shock was terrible, and it made the chore of showering almost unbearable.

And did I mention:

...that for the past 17+ years, ever since Mr. Farmer introduced it to me, I have been using a shampoo and conditioner that top out at $1.29 a bottle? In fact, this stuff routinely goes on sale in my area for as low as $0.69 a bottle! I think it is OK to splurge on this less than two dollar a week luxury for the sake of not squirting ice-cold liquid over my head twice a day.

I can afford this small luxury.

Your mileage may vary, of course. But for me, it just isn't worth it. Of course, if I run out of shampoo, I am never out of luck!

Hillbilly Ingenuity: Replacement Parts

Well, it's that time of year again. Many of our friends have "bagged their limit" of deer, and those deer need processing. Since we're the only game in town when it comes to a large smokehouse, we became very popular just before Christmas. Friends and their families came by, some with bag after bag of chopped up venison, ready for grinding, stuffing, and smoking. We have made many MANY pounds of ring bologna and kielbasa (click meat-treat of your choice for a recipe).

The downside of doing all this work is that we are very hard on equipment. The average household grinder, for example, is not designed to handle a hundred pounds of meat each year. So, we should not have been surprised to find that the bearings in the grinder had worn down so small that they were falling out. When the other grinder that we had on hand for parts was disassembled and its bearing retrieved, we found this:

That is NOT going to work. Nope.

So, Mr. Farmer did what anyone would do: He went to the Auto Parts Store. He was sure that they would be able to sell him the right size bearings to get him up and running again. He was mistaken. So, undaunted, he went to the bike shop, just to find the shopkeeper locking the front door. She was sympathetic to his plight, however, and re-opened the store. She found the right bearings and rung him up. The total was just over a dollar. Mr. Farmer had no cash on him, and she had already settled out the charge machine. The Christmas spirit was in her, however, and she agreed to trust him to come back and pay her another day.

He did go back and pay her a few days later (much to her surprise) and the day was saved. Another hundred pounds of meat became another pile of treats. Now if only there were spare parts available for vacuum-sealers... (or coffee grinders... or many of the other items we have purchased and flagrantly ignored the warning, "For Household Use Only," printed on the box!)

Pigs: The Coughing Pig

I was really excited about going to the Pennsylvania Farm Show. I have watched it on television a number of times and really enjoyed it. Mr. Farmer looked at it as part research for a possible entry next year and part family vacation. I didn't even mind that the distance meant that I would have to get out of bed at 3 am to leave at 4 am so that we wouldn't miss the early morning pig exhibits that Mr. Farmer wanted to see. I even begged someone at work to cover my shift that day so that I could go. One of the pigs had other ideas.

A certain black and white pig started coughing about a week prior to the Farm Show. With Wilma expecting, Mr. Farmer wasted no time in finding the culprit. One morning, all the pigs came running out to be fed as always- except one. The last one wandered out, glassy-eyed and visibly thinner than the rest. So he did what any pig-farmer would do: He injected the sick pig with strong antibiotics, and he added a prophylactic dose to the drinking water for the others.

It was too late, however. The sick pig needed a second dose injected, and Mr. Farmer couldn't bring himself to potentially infect the prize pigs at the Farm Show if he himself carried the illness. So, instead of getting up at 3 am, slogging through a cup of tea and fighting to stay awake on a 4 hour drive to Harrisburg, I slept in until past 8 am and... well, that's the story I sat down to write for you just now.

Mr. Farmer's syringe looks like something out of a cartoon. It is an old-fashioned, reusable glass monster with metal rings on it so that you can keep a good grip. He told everyone how he bent a needle doing the first injection, so I figured that maybe those rings were a good idea. The large size allowed him to overfill it a bit, which also turned out to be a good idea...

You see, the first dose was a big help, and while the coughing continued, the pig was feeling better. He was so much better, in fact, that Mr. Farmer knew he was going to need assistance holding him still for the injection. So Young Master Farmer and I put on warm clothes, gloves for better grip, and gear that could get muddy, and went along to assist. Mr. Farmer dumped some food on the ground, we identified the sick pig, and Young Master Farmer grabbed him by the leg. The other pigs were too busy eating to pay any mind, and the sick pig wasn't well enough to squeal or scream. After some shuffling for position, I was able to grab the other leg and hold on. Once I had a good grab I dug my back foot in to keep the kicking from pushing me backwards, and I told Mr. Farmer that we were ready.

The rest of the process was a blur- literally. My hat slipped down over my one eye, but with both hands on the pig's ankle and Mr. Farmer already wiping off the ham with rubbing alcohol, adjusting it just wasn't an option. I held on as best I could, dug in, and waited for the all-clear signal. Out of one eye, under the bottom edge of my hat, I could see the medicine come back out of the needle-stick, then a little blood, then the bent needle going for a second stick, then more liquid running down the hind end of the pig. After what felt like five minutes, Mr. Farmer stepped back and young Master Farmer and I could let go. The sick pig went back to eating as if nothing had happened, in spite of the trickle of blood and extra antibiotic running down its leg.

As with any interaction that involves holding pigs still, there were the usual repercussions. The aching back kicked in just after we came home from the evening out, and I took a few pills before I went to bed. My clothes stayed pretty clean, but my rubber clogs have seen better days. They served me well, though, and I am pleased to announce that all pigs have a clean bill of health once again.

This Kind of Thing is Bound to Happen