experienced pig people please.....

[itsmecindi]

Fred and I went out to do castrations yesterday on a litter of pigs. Eight in the litter, six males, four weeks old . Four of these little pigs are spoken for and the new owner has given us a two hundred dollar deposit on the four. We got the first one done, disinfected, worm shot, tail banded, turned loose.

Picked up victim number two and, per routine, I was holding him upside down and Fred was searching for the plumbing. Finally after five minutes with a perplexed expression on his face, he says....

"I can only account for one." I say...

"Oh..... bummer."

This is not a unique situation. Not unheard of for a little boar to be holding an ace in the hole so to speak. We didn't get nervous until we turned him loose and got another just like him. We didn't become alarmed until the third one proved to be holding out as well. Naturally it's the three other pigs that have been half paid for already.

Now before anybody says...well, put yourself in THEIR place....ha ha, this is not voluntary. If that was the case, only one male from every litter would be castrated, right?

Questions as follows:

Is it common to get more than one cryptorchid pig per litter?
Is it genetic?
Will the other one eventually drop?
If so, at what point do we give up waiting?

 

[Egon]

Methinks you better be looking a little bit harder.

Egon

 

[itsmecindi]

How do you mean.....I'm one of those dense people who need pictures. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[Egon]

Shoulda said "start digging in deeper with your fingers". Should be able to locate them.

I always disliked it as the squeal was terrifying to me as I always got to hold the little fellows down.

Egon

 

[MDNick]

Cindi,

I grew up on a 150 head hog operation. Been the holder for lots of 'operations'. It does seem like you have far more than the average number of hold outs. When we found one we always pushed around a bit further forward, like between the legs. It usually appeared. How old are they? We always castrated at about 10 days. At that point they are strong enough to stand it, the objects are large enough to find (usually), but they are small enough that the shock appeared to be less severe (not that we ever asked or consulted with them). With a thumb, we pushed up from between the legs pushing the testicles against the skin, then cut a slit over each with a pair of SHARP stainless diagonal wire cutters. Nope, not kidding. A slit over each with the cutters, reach in, grab 'em and pull. I think we always found 2. Which is the generally accepted number to find.

Good luck. Oh and if you have some cats, look out, they love piggy oysters.

Nick

 

[itsmecindi]

Terrifying! Lol! Try ear-splitting, drum damaging, nerve wracking, pigacidal thoughts prompting! I just wanted to wring their little....err....ahem. Anyway.

Okay, I did that last night, much to the dismay of the kids, whom I had recruited to help with the catch and release. I was called every kind of pervert in the free world.

"What are you....hey that's not.....ewwww....that's disgus.....moooom.....oh gross!"

I tried to explain as gently as possible as I poked prodded massaged manipulated maneuvered etc. I was rewarded with one possible maybe could have been what I was looking for on one of the little fellers.

My kids have lost all respect for me, I walked away smelling like a litter box and you know what went through my brittle fevered mind? My 'ode to pigs' here the other day. HAH! I laugh at that~!

Never mind.

 

[itsmecindi]

MDNick......Right now they are four weeks. We usually castrate at three to four weeks, they are generally still fairly easy to handle and we hoped to avoid these situations by waiting later.

I have been wroking on them, massaging the lower belly and trying to find that inguinal canal to see if I can manuever them on down. I hope by this weekend I will be able to make enough progress that we can finish the job.