Actually, anyone who keeps pigs knows they will eat almost anything, including your homework! We have one, Blue, who is an escape artist and seems to have decided that he doesn’t like his home pen. He’s supposed to live on the other side of the road, in a nice big pen with several pretty girl pigs. He, however, thinks he should be allowed to roam at will.
I went out to feed animals around dusk yesterday. While I was filling feeders for goats and small cows, I heard my little dog, Daisy, start barking like crazy. I knew this wasn’t her “let me bark at the chickens” bark, but more like her “I want to protect my humans” bark.
When I walked around to the front of the house, I looked up and saw Blue up on the porch. He had flipped over the dog food bin and was eating 40 pounds of dog food! The dogs weren’t too thrilled about Blue being on the porch OR about him eating their food. I should admit that I’m a little afraid of Blue because of his size. Any animal that is the size of a small VW is worthy of respect, I believe!
So, there I stood at the foot of the steps, with a pig between me and the front door…a pig who was eating two weeks worth of dog food at warp speed. I had to find a way to make him leave the porch, both to preserve the dog food and so that I could go get another cup of coffee!
We always have a rake, or a pitchfork, or some kind of stick laying around outside. We use them for a million different things daily… so I grabbed the rake and used the handle to beat on the wood along the outside of the porch. While doing this, I’m yelling at Blue to get off the porch. Let me paint you this picture so you can really appreciate it. Here I am, standing outside the porch, chickens surrounding my rubber-boot covered feet, with a chihuahua barking and prancing around, while I bang on the porch walls with the handle of a rake. Make sure you imagine me with my hair up in a crazy ponytail and add in the sounds of goats screaming because I haven’t fed them yet.
Now that you have the full chaos mode in mind, imagine that this is the scene the neighbors see as they pull into their gate to access their property. Yeah, that was exactly what happened. It wouldn’t be so bad if it were the folks who actually farm…no, this had to be the city people who have a rural property as a get away. They come out one or two weekends a month and ride their 4-wheelers, or have a BBQ with friends. And, as they pull up, Blue, the pig, saunters down the steps of the porch and across the yard to go back to his pen.
Yeah. I’m pretty sure the neighbors think I’m the crazy lady who has pigs hanging out on the porch for fun.
