First time farrowing for all concerned

I can remember thinking at the time I did the AI on the pigs that the gestation period (roughly 3 months, 3 weeks, 3 days) seemed to be such a long time. Despite the apparent success of my first ever, amateur efforts I still somehow couldn’t imagine that the end result would actually be some healthy, active piglets one day.

As it turned out, my early planning and preparation for the event particularly relocating them both to an outbuilding near the house well before the due date really paid off. Yesterday (a few days ahead of schedule) the first pig – Sissy – got down to the business of farrowing with no encouragement from me.

Settling in to the farrowing shed
Settling in to the farrowing shed

In the time it took me to do the rounds of a few mole traps (no moles were hurt!) and get back to the house, she had already produced the first piglet. Although there had been no obvious signs immediately beforehand, the piglet was fortunately spotted wandering among the straw so I could move the other sow back to the woods. This allowed the new mother (and me) the space to ourselves so we could concentrate on the task at hand.

This first piglet arrived at about 5:15pm and we eagerly waited to see more, expecting them to arrive at roughly regular intervals. However despite lots of huffing and grunting the minutes ticked by until a couple of hours had passed with nothing appearing so we started to fear the worst.

Obviously the first one piglet wasn’t aware of this concern and it must have thought that 1 piglet to 12 teats was a pretty good deal!

Free choice at the buffet
Free choice at the buffet

Thankfully around 2 hours later, nature decided it was time to get things moving and she eventually delivered 4 more piglets between about 8pm and 10pm. All were delivered with no help from me apart from a quick wipe with a towel and a spray of iodine on the navel just to be safe.

In no time they were all clamped on to the “milk bar” and a little peace descended interrupted by the sound of wet sucking noises and contented grunting from the piglets. Equally important to me was that the mother has handled her first litter well and seems to be providing for them while staying calm with me bumbling around in the background.

While I might have liked to see a few more in the litter, I’m happy that all 5 were born healthy with no problems and everyone survived the first night. They probably got more sleep than I did…

Feeding time!
Feeding time!

Elvis is alive and well

After what seemed like many weeks of waiting with far too much time spent examining the back-end of a cow, our second Dexter calf arrived on Thursday morning (18 Feb). On reflection we were a little over zealous in trying spot signs of the imminent arrival especially as the first calf arrived with relatively little fuss.

It’s a second bull calf that we have named ELVIS and after just 48 hours he seems to be settling in very well. The tense moments over the first 24 hours are all in the past now, he has suckled well and is getting much steadier on his legs every day.

Mother and calf on a frosty first morning
Mother and calf on a frosty first morning

At the start there was a little rather rough play from Oscar, who is 9 weeks old already, and it’s not easy to learn to walk while an energetic calf is jumping all over you! However the new mother (Daisy) was very quick to see this and soon put a stop to that sort of behaviour.

After a few head butts from Daisy I think that Oscar has finally got the message because he went looking for fun elsewhere. I’m sure there’ll be plenty of time for the two calves to cause havoc around the place but for now peace has been restored.

Oscar investigating chickens instead
Oscar investigating chickens instead

Everything with the cows can return to normal now – the next day it was time for another silage delivery from the neighbouring farmer. This has proved to be one of the most successful aspects because they take around 3 or 4 weeks to get through each bale and when we need a new one I just need to prepare the space ready for the tractor delivery!

All set for a bale delivery
All set for a bale delivery