Joy my boys are home!!

Congrats on the new pigs! It's a good thing they have you to take care of them. Hopefully they will live a long life.

Awesome what beautiful pigs, I'm sure they'll have an awesome life with you! I'd love a vid of how the get around and stuff, it must be awesome to watch. And to think they've never saw or heard or possibly weaked really loud.... Anyways, I hope everything is A OK!

My goodness those lips!!! What cuties!

What adorable piggies! I'm sure they're going to have a fantastic life now that they're with you.
May I suggest some names? As soon as I saw the first photo I instantly thought of the Swedish/Finnish cartoon Moomins! You can google image it if you want to see what I'm talking about. A list of character names can be found on the Moomin wikipedia page. Just a thought I used to have a stuffed Moomin as a kid haha

Lethals looooooove to snuggle. I think it's because they can't be social any other way.

Wheeking is an instinctual behavior in pigs. Einy was completely deaf and a total motormouth. The best test for hearing that I've found is actually to isolate each pig and play a bunch of annoying cell phone ringtones near them. Since the noise has an electronic source, that removes any other cues they could be picking up, e.g. feeling your breath as you talk to them, or feeling vibrations from some more mechanical sound, or feeling/smelling that another pig is upset. If they can hear, they will respond to the cell phone, usually by making the scared brrrr sound. If they just keep wheeking away, they're deaf.

WaxButterfly said:

As soon as I saw the first photo I instantly thought of the Swedish/Finnish cartoon Moomins! You can google image it if you want to see what I'm talking about.

Click to expand...

Out of curiosity I googled Moomins and I totally see why these piggies reminded you of that! I love the name Snufkin! lol

the boys had a uneventful night. i brought their favorite pigloo home with them - full of their own funky smells. i know where i want their dishes to go eventually, but for now, i placed them fairly close to their pigloo and left a little trail of pellets and veggies from their pigloo to the dish. they found their veggies and the food dish and ate a bit. i was most concerned about water however, since they'd have to find that really on their own. i didn't want them to get dehydrated tho. i sat with them for awhile, and whenever they wandered near the water bottle, i tried to squeeze out a few drops so they'd get the sense that water was there. i also wet down their veggies so they'd get some water that way. i put 4 water bottles in their cage, to increase the odds!


the only way they'd come out of their pigloo to explore was if i lifted the pigloo up and out of their cage. that really came from their foster mom - that was always what she did with them to get them out for veggies or grooming, etc. that's one of the things i'll work on

this morning, after i lifted up their pigloo, they burst out full of energy! they found two of the four water bottles, so at least they're getting water., they found the pillow under the fleece forest and thought that was a comfy spot! they're munching hay and veggies.

and, much to my surprise they are squeaking and rumblestrutting and mounting each other (yes, they really are both males!) acting like any other males.

of course THEIR squeaking is setting off my other boys - they're wondering who the new guys are! it doesn't work the other way, tho since the new guys don't seem to hear the others squeaking.

@salana - thanks for the tip about testing their hearing. i will try that soon, after they settle in. i just assumed that animals that were deaf wouldn't make quite as much noise as these boys are.

still working on names. . .

all's well in lethal land today!

@jacqueline, the boys are very handsome! I can't wait for you to find out their names from them.lol

Picckalo, who is hard of hearing but not deaf, actually wheeks louder than our other pigs. A lot louder. Kind of reminds me of me (hearing loss) -- I never know whether I'm shouting or talking too softly!

We have a NOAA weather alarm and all of the pigs except for Picckalo brrr or bolt when it goes off for tornados or thunderstorms. Picckalo just sits there and munches hay.

I told you all those noises and behaviors are instincts! Einy used to rumblestrut as much as Jackie when they had playtime with boar friends or spayed sows. Einy was actually better than Jackie at avoiding angry-sow pee... of course they were usually angrier at Jackie because he was such a socially challenged little twerp.

i find this all soo fascinating - and humbling - and inspiring. animals don't "think" about what's wrong with them - they just figure it out - the make what works work harder and smarter. they come down to the essentials first. i have several disabilities myself, including a condition that causes constant, intractable widespread pain. the boys cage is right next to my couch. i just watch them and feel that there presence is somehow special.

i know this all sounds a little "airy-fairy", but having them here is such a different feeling from the other 5 pigs i have. i love them all as well. but this just feels different.

in some cultures it's believed that pure all-white animals or people are somehow more god-like, spiritual, mystical. that's how i feel about these boys. their names will come when it's time, i'm sure. right now, i'm absorbing them into my home and heart

@jacqueline, when my maternal grandmother was dying of cancer, a snow-white cat showed up on her doorstep one day. I was helping my mother to care for mama (my g'ma) and I can tell you, she was not at all a cat person. Ever. But this snow-white cat appears out of nowhere. No one in the area knew whose it was. So mama started to feed her. And of course the cat came back every day.

A few weeks later, mama became bed-ridden and one night passed away. The cat did not show up after that night. I don't mean that the cat went away after a few days of realizing it wasn't going to get food again. We'd been feeding it. The cat just disappeared the morning after she died.

There are a few other mystical things that happened at the time of my mama's passing, but the white cat is one of the two most striking.