Spring Fever

     It is spring on the farm. The gilt remaining from Penny's fall litter is certainly feeling frisky. The morning routine is she is one of the first animals to see me as I leave the house to do chores. She begins to talk to me and the horses also knicker as I walk toward the barn. The morning chore routine is typically pretty quick (especially now that the water has thawed in the barn). I fill the hens dish with layer pellets, feed Boris and the sows, toss a bale to the horses, check all the water levels and then head back outside with a scoop for Penny's gilt and grain for Pica, Flicker and Maysa.

     This morning the gilt certainly did not want to wait for her breakfast. As I was feeding the sows I noticed her running into the barn. Thankfully she went right past Boris' pen and into the chicken coop. With grain it was easy to entice her back into her pen. Due the fact it was early in the day and I had not yet had a cup of coffee I did a quick fix to her pig paneled enclosure and went back inside to prepare for the day. Needless to say before I could dress for the day I noticed her working the soil at the base of the panel. She was out for a second time before I got outside. This time she had great fun. She visited the sows in the barn, ran around the back of the barn into the horse paddock. She is not the first pig to escape from a pen or pasture so I know not to chase or get upset, you simply have to think ahead of her. I decided she should go in with the sows. A little extra grain to lure the sows into the outer pen allowed me to open the door to the inner pen. I put up a couple of simple barriers to direct her toward the open pen once she went back into the barn and presto she walked right in. The sows will take a little time before they accept her but there is plenty of room for her to gradually work her way into the herd. I am sure I will go into the barn later and find her laying in the pig pile.

     Sparkler's piglets are now three weeks old and also feeling frisky. Earlier this morning Mike notice they had wiggled under the lowest strand of polywire into the horse paddock and were chasing the laying hens. Soon they will be big enough to be shocked by the fence and learn to respect the fence but for now it is spring on the farm so why not be frisky and chase chickens.