Pets have a tendency to ‘Hog’ all the attention!

Modern life is full of stress and everyone needs at least one pet they can call their own. Personally I use to have a fat old cocker spaniel named ‘Fergie’ that kept me going for years. Consequently, in the 1980’s it became very fashionable to own an unusual or exotic pet. First it was pet rocks, then couch potatoes, and not surprising pet pigs.

Not the barnyard variety of pigs that are full of steroids and pig pellets, but smart, table mannered miniature porkers that one enterprising Orange County pig breeder is reported to be selling for as much as $2,000 each.

Pet miniature pigs were so popular that one was even featured in a major magazine. It was reported that this pig (Sir Francis Bacon by name), was so intelligent that he would put most newspaper editors to shame. Admittedly knowing newspaper editors as well as I do, I’m not overly impressed by his intelligence.

Anyway, it was reported that Sir Francis was not only housebroken and slept at the foot of his master’s bed, but he also had his favorite TV shows, and was even a Los Angeles Laker fan.

Personally I can understand this fondness for pigs. Remember that great film titled ‘Babe’ about a cute little piglet who gave an Oscar winning performance. Also when I was growing up in Oklahoma, we always had a large pig population on our family farm. If fact some of my earliest memories are of pigs. My Grandfather could always forecast the weather by watching pigs wallowing in a mud hole, and I had the distinction of being one of the pioneers of modifying pig behavior patterns.

It happen this way: All pigs like to scratch themselves. My brother Dillon Jean and I found this out when we were boys. Pigs scratch because they have pig lice. The more the scratch, the more the lean, and if anything leans far enough, it will fall over.

Dillon Jean and I tested this clinical principle out by scratching one fat old sow with a broken hoe handle. Our subject reacted as we had anticipated. She began to lean. It felt wonderful, the pig lice scurried under his bristles to safety and he grunted with relief. Encouraged I scratch harder until, heaving a blissful sigh, down he went.

Pleased with the result, we scratched another, then another, until every pig in the pen was lying down. If one started to get up, one of us flew over with the hoe and scratched him a little, and down he would flop. Being active little devils, we could keep a herd of pigs supine for any length of time. To us, there was no greater sense of power than seeing ight or nine pigs stretched out flat. Scratching pigs was so much fun that it soon became a daily routine.

This sport would probably have gone on indefinitely if my great-aunt Lil hadn’t found pig lice in Dillon Jean’s hair, resulting in a family crisis and both of us being treated with coal oil, now commonly know as kerosene. After that, the magic of playing with pigs faded for us.