How We Became Pig-keepers: Pig Tales Part 1

It all began with a fairy-tale and a three-year-old who loved pigs. We read The Three Little Pigs  to Mabel so many times that it became almost second-nature to look for books about pigs -- picture books, novels, we even bought her a book about different pig breeds. By age four, she had already settled on her preferred pig breed: the Kune-Kune, a breed from New Zealand raised with the Maori tribes to be sociable and love people. The Kune-Kune, which means “fat and round,” were known for their mini-size and long fur with characteristic waddles or “piri-piri.”  Unlike other pigs, they graze on grass instead of rooting up the ground.

As long as we lived in the city, pigs were just a dream, but when we moved to the country three years ago, Mabel insisted that the first thing she wanted was a pig named Arnold. She had a dream of walking Arnold on a leash. She was 9 by now and insisted that Arnold could live outside and she could take care of him. Our family really should come with a warning sign: “too easily influenced by books,” but charmed by our daughter’s passion for pigs, we said that she could get a pet pig when we moved to the country.

So it was, that a few days after we moved to our new rural home in 2016, Brent made arrangements to pick up Arnold from a kune-kune farm. Brent had first met Arnold as a tiny piglet while he was on a work trip in Greenwich, Connecticut, which is not where one expects to go to buy a kune-kune. He put in an order for a light ginger male. That farmer then sold out his last piglets to a farm on Long-Island, but the farmer from Long-Island agreed to drive Arnold to Connecticut and meet up with Brent and Mabel for delivery.

So, Arnold arrived and was loaded into the mini-van. He had shaggy, ginger fur. He looked like a mix between Mabel’s two favorite things: pigs and wookiees. On the way home, he sat beside Mabel in his crate in the van and shared her sour cream and onion potato chips.  He was so tiny, that Brent could pick him up and hold him in his arms. Arnold, however, was not a fan of this. It turns out pigs do not like to have their trotters off the ground.  

Brent carried him up to the pen they had built, and Mabel and Arnold got to know each other. Arnold had the cutest, high-pitched oink like a squeak toy, and he came running when Mabel offered him food. He climbed into her lap, and he loved to be scratched. When Mabel scratched his sides, he would flop over, close his eyes, and grunt happily. One time, he even rolled onto his back with all four tiny trotters in the air. When he was really happy, his tail would curl.

*Part 1 of Pig Tales*