Wednesday, September 4, 2013

Pigs of color and the vegetable garden



Tammy, our favorite pig breeder in Smyrna, allowed us to visit the new piglets today. They were born to 2 different sows, on August 30 and 31. Because I only like "pigs of color"—no white or pink pigs for me, thanks—she was pleased to show us pigs of all different colors. The boar (Mr. Burlington is posing for his close-up) is a red/white belted pig. Moms are both black, one of them in the photo with her babies.

I am used to seeing either belted or spotted or solid color pigs, but not belted/spotted together, and not pigs with socks! Of course those are the ones we chose, the little oddballs. We got the 2 red/white belted pigs with spots (the darker red one a girl, the lighter one a boy) and the black one with long white socks in front, and white toes in the back (also a girl).

They are not even a week old yet, so we can't take them home until mid-October, but that's OK because we have vegetables still growing in the pig yard. By mid-October the plants should be pretty much done.

The rest of the garden had a rough start with the crazy spring weather and the deer and rabbits eating everything as it came up. I think The Husband has saved a single ear of corn from his usual 10' x 30' corn planting, but the pumpkins and tomatoes are really doing well. We haven't had much luck the last 2 years with the yellow and green Zephyr squash that usually does well here, but The Hub did find the big baseball bat squash out there with a few smaller ones. The cantaloupe is not from our garden, but we have a few thousand more apples to match the one on the table. Maybe the first year we can make some cider...