I promised the vet I would try to castrate the final two boar piglets myself (with Scott holding them). So Monday was the day. Now of the 5 pigs, one is a girl, and two have castration scars already, but none of that is easy to see when they are on the move. After a chase, I had both correct boys in the cat carrier. Scott held the first guy up-side-down by the back legs; I cut and found NOTHING. Failure again. We released both pigs and rescheduled with the vet.
Now, other mammal boys keep their testicles in a conveniently accessible pouch, but boars hold theirs up in their body cavities. Because of that, they can't be banded like bulls, but have to be cut. Once you have a slit into the body, you still have to palpitate the testicles and manipulate them out of the hole individually.
At the vet again, we processed each pig in the parking lot shared between the vet office and the local diner. He made the first pig look so easy, but the second pig- the one I had tried- only yielded ONE testicle! The side I had cut had nothing to find! I felt somewhat vindicated that my second failure was not all my own. Check back with me in six months to see who cuts the next batch of baby boars.
Also, the one pound babies born 7 weeks ago are now close to 20 pounds each according to the scale at the vet.
No comments:
Post a Comment