My sow has finally had a litter of piglets. The first two times that she had become pregnant none of the piglets had survived. I have since discovered that when a sow has a litter if there are to many other boars around they will kill all of the young. The reason for this is that the sow will then come on season again giving the other boars a chance to get her pregnant next time. When a sow has a litter they will go away from the other pigs and make themselves a nest where the can burrow into so that it keeps the young ones warm. For the first week the sow does not go to far away from her young. After this she will go out looking for some food but leaving the young ones behind for the next week. When the wee ones are big enough to keep up with her they will start moving around. When I first saw her coming up for food after a week of absence I could see by her stomach that she had obviously had her litter. At the time I had Jeff the possum dog not far away and he was wearing a tracking collar so I called him over and took the collar off him and put it on the sow.
Her initial reaction was to jump around and try to shake the collar off but she was quick to settle down. I gave her an hour to get back to her young and settle down before I followed the tracker in. She was laying on her side feeding her young and she even let me walk right up and take the collar back off her. The wee fellows were as cute as they always are, there were four grey ones, three boars and one sow as well as three white ones, two sows and one boar. These wee piglets are about three weeks old now and coming up when I feed the other pigs. Sinse they have been born I have put muzzles on any dog that have gone into the block and have not had any accidents yet. Twice I have had Fog go to the sow but just stand back and not go in and hurt anything.
So cute, but whats in store for them!