This story
was in the March, 1983 Countryside Magazine – a magazine for serious
homesteaders – people who live beyond the sidewalks.
The Three
Little Piggies
We bought
our five acres in 1975 and immediately proceeded to plant an orchard – which
died, plant a garden – on rocks, built a chicken coop, bought chickens, built a
pigpen and bought three little pigs.
We bought
the pigs from a friend and moved them into an area, not yet completed. Their pen was next to our chicken coop, also
not completed. The chickens and pigs
were separated by a fence that we thought was secure but was not!
One night we
heard a lot of noise from the chicken area and my husband and I ran out to
investigate. To our unhappy surprise,
the three pigs had gone through the fence and were eating our chickens. Dead and dying chickens surrounded the pigs
and old Mr. Rooster, apparently in shock, walked back and forth as in a
carnival shooting gallery.
We improved
the fencing and added a strand of barbed wire to the bottom which cut one of
the pigs when we tried to catch it. We
decided to try electric fencing, which scared one of the pigs causing it to run
wild, became tangled in it and caused an injury which required a vet.
The electric
fencing finally worked out, but our problems weren’t over. I remember the time I walked out to check the
pigs, and they were all acting strange.
They staggered around the pen and looked drunk. I took a whiff of their mash, it smelled like
whiskey so I’m sure they were but I have no idea how the mash could ferment in
one day. The “pig gods” were against us.
My lack of
pig expertise led to a tragedy. I fed
the three pigs “pigweed” that I pulled from an area near our neighbor’s
garden. They really enjoyed it and I
decided for a treat, I’d give them a wheelbarrow full of the weed. Our largest pig, Mr. Glutton, ate so much
that he bloated and then died. Ugh!
Finally, the
day came to load our remaining two pigs to transport them to the slaughter
house. My 6’4” brother and my 6’2”
husband chased those pigs around the pen for two hours. There was a new snow on the ground which
complicated the whole process of getting the pigs up a ramp and into a
trailer. My husband was dragged through
snow, mud and manure; my brother climbed up the ramp into the trailer to
demonstrate to the pig what he should do – the pig wasn’t impressed or willing
to cooperate.
Finally one
pig went into the trailer but the other was still loose. What to do now, ah-ha, a solution: Mix one
bottle of Boone’s Farm Apple Wine, two shots of whiskey and one dash of corn
mash. Pig ate, pig staggered, pig was
pushed into the trailer!
Our problems
were over – well, not quite. My husband
delivered them to the slaughter house, our pig got loose in the parking
lot. It took all the butchers in pursuit
to finally capture the poor pig, who was then taken in to meet his maker. The two pigs returned to the farm in the form of bacon, hams, pork roasts and chops, ribs,
sausage and fat to be rendered into lard.
We didn’t think we’d raised any more pigs but with the passage of time,
we tried again and had success – loading time eventually was reduced to ten
minutes.
We still
have a great deal to learn, but we heat 90% of the time with a woodstove, our
new orchard is beginning to produce, our garden soil is rich and productive, I
preserve our bounty, my husband butchered four lambs last fall and we are
raising a cow to be butchered next fall.
Little by little, we are becoming more self-sufficient – it’s work but
worth it.
