Funny story

I found this post on another site and thought you guys would get a kick out of it.

I castrated a 120+lb hog today, and I can tell you, I'll never do that again. I did it by myself, and it was one of those things, it needed to be done, so I went ahead and did it. But, I will never wait to do it that late ever again. Use this information as you see fit, and please learn from my mistakes.

We had planned to not castrate him, and sell him as a butcher hog at 220lbs. Unfortunately, the feedback we have been getting from potential customers in our area is that they would never buy a non-castrated hog for butchering.

So, I decided we should do it. Being a bit stubborn and living 2 miles from anyone, I thought I would try and do it myself.

I got a few ropes, some rubbing alcohol, a razor blade, and off I went to the pig pen early this morning. I separated out the other hogs into the pasture, and I had him in the pen. I took 2 ropes, and made a slip-knot on the end of each. One, I slipped over and around his snout, pulled it tight, and tied it off to a post along the fence of the pen. The other rope went around a hind leg, and to another post. I pulled him out tight, so he really couldn't move at all.

Needless to say, he was screaming pretty loud by now. He didn't like this at all.

I straddled his rear end, and lifted it up a bit off the ground. I took some alcohol and cleaned the whole area really good. I held one testicle taught against the scrotum. With the razor blade, I made a vertical slice through the skin, and the inner membranes. He flinched during this part, but I did it fast enough that it did cause an issue. I squeezed out one testicle, and pulled it off.

I pushed the other testicle towards the slice, and cut its inner membrane. I squeezed out this testicle, when I felt some bite my leg. I flipped around, and the other pigs had broken through to the pen and were defending their brother! Yikes! At that same instant, another sibling hog was chewing the nose rope, and it broke free.

So, I had a half-castrated male that was no longer contained (and a bit mad), with a testicle hanging out. I had 2 other hogs biting at me, raising up a ruckus,, and generally trying to get me out of the pen.

I dove towards the male, grabbed his hanging testicle, and yanked it out. I splashed some alcohol on there as he made his way into the shed. I managed to wrangle the ropes off him, and jumped the fence, with the other 2 hogs at my heels.

I was kinda shaken up by all this, and just really got cleaned up ad proceeded to watch him periodically throughout the day. He bled some for a while (about an hour) and moved around a few times in the afternoon. I never saw him eat, but he did drink water, so I think he'll be ok.

Now, I've castrated lots of small pigs before, and it was never like this. Usually it is quick, easy, and relatively painless. I will never wait on one again, it is too stressful, for everyone. And if you must do one late, like this, get 2 people in there.

Note: DH and a friend castrated our pig, Spare Rib, when he was that big or bigger and had no problem. Pork chop, the sow, was in there with them but she didn't offer to help him a bit. We seperated them for 2 or 3 days after so she wouldn't chew at the wound. We made sure to cut him with the signs of the moon so he wouldn't bleed.

Cajun you were lucky. I think most pigs would have behaved like the ones in the story.

Wow, Cajun! I am really impressed you did that. I on the other hand would never attempt even castrating a little one. I'm such a wuss....

I LOL when I was reading that poor guy's post. It was something like you'd read in a James Herriot novel. LOL

I've never had pigs but had two male Type B mini horses (a little smaller or larger, I can't remember, than Shetlands. I got them at ages 1 & 1.5 and by a year or two later, after waiting for their testicles to descend (they were late), decided they'd need to get neutered. No chance to get a vet out here in the boonies, so I arranged to take them into town on a day when a vet would be there. The vet started on the older one, Koli, who was pretty docile -- he had no idea what was going to happen. The younger one saw what was going down and when it was his turn, he said No Way! I was holding his lead and he bolted towards the street (with lots of traffic on it).

Would you believe a woman can't fly? I took off and landed flat on the hard-as-cement ground, bloodying my nose, knocking my glasses off, and breaking my arm. My DIL said she hadn't seen such a play since the recent New Year's Day football game. Can't remember who caught poor little Ingemar because I went into the vet's trailer to wash the blood off so I could see again.

They called me Queen of the West for quite awhile. LOL

A regular Dale Evans, huh! LOL That is too funny. I can see it all. Did you get him gelded that day?

LOL tooooooo funny, im crackin up over here .....

Hi guys, I've been lurking around. Love this forum. I'm 70 and no longer able to farm and DH passed 8 yrs ago.
We used to raise feeder pigs. and since i was an EMT I was told that was as good as a surgeon and i got the job of castrating the pigs. I did'nt think i'd quit laughing at the story.Think i'd have given that hog a good dose of valium.LOL
Brought back some fond memories.
Vickie

Hey Vickie. So nice to meet you! Hang around and join in. We'd love to hear your stories.

Can't imagine a whole farm of pigs. We just had the two. Unless you count the boar we borrowed from a friend to breed our sow. I wish I had a film of when he came back to collect his hog. We had all three pigs in a stall in the barn. He backed his truck up in the barn hall to load the pig. We made a ramp into the truck bed and an alleyway of sorts. Used a pipe gate to block the pig from going past the truck and our friend's job was to hold the gate tight so the pig couldn't push past. We let "Obama" out into the makeshift alley and I had the job of keeping the other two in the pen. The stall gate made one wall of the alley so I had to fend them off with the buggy whip. I could hear the commotion behind me as DH tried to get the black boar up the ramp. Obama must have been afraid of heights cause he was having no part of that ramp. He went past it and hit the gate our friend was supposed to be holding. Our brave friend dropped the gate and ran up the barn hall screaming like a little girl. My 6yo DGS turned the pig with a dog leash to his nose. DH put a rope on him and drug him up the ramp into the truck. And don't think I have ever let our friend forget that day! LOL

Do you do any gardening at all? I have a muscle disorder and I'm losing ground but I keep plugging away at it. God blesses me and I still enjoy life.

Yeah, Cajun, both ponies got gelded. They & I spent the next 2 or 3 weeks at my son's house, in town. We made a temporary pen in their backyard. No neighbors complained. I had to exercise them every day. When my broken arm was okay for me to drive again (drove left-handed, couldn't even sign my name for weeks) I loaded them into the trailer and brought them home. They were adorable ponies, sweet natured & friendly. I always sang to them, "Here I come to save the day, that means that Super Mom is on the way ..." Guess you can tell I miss them, but by the time they were 4 or 5 I realized they needed more training & human companionship so I sold them to an Apache family with 5 kids!

Next time maybe I'll try raising pigs, maybe get little pot-bellies? You're never too old to do what you want to do, Vickie, I am 72, a widow, and just keep plugging away. I think I was 70 when I sold the ponies so about 68 when I had them neutered (and broke my arm!).

I'll bet the kids loved them. I have 2 ponies. One is 36". He is a chocolate which is actually kinda muted gray with a silvery mane and tail. He has dapples too. His name is Max A Million and he is my cart pony. Then I have Tug who is quite a bit bigger. He is a racking pony. I am going to break and train him to ride this Spring and he will be my saddle horse. I can no longer get on my big horse anymore because my legs are too weak and he is a handful. A rescued show horse who was horribly abused. We worked through most of his problems but he is still a lot of horse to handle and I don't feel up to it anymore.

Thanks cajuninky,
There was'nt too many exciting things with the pigs. Other than having to chase them all ovr the country.
My hog adventures were mostly with wild feral hogs where we camped in Okla.
I loved to hike and was always coming across them. We would stare each other down than go our own way. There was never a real confrontation,tho i was a little concerned a couple of times. I have heard they can be dangerous but never heard of anyone getting hurt.
Vickie

yeah wild hogs can get kinda mean at times, number one rule is dont hem them up. another thing ..wild hogs cant climb a tree.. LOL

No but you'd be surprised how high they can jump!

LOL you guys make me look forward to these nasty, rainy days. brings back lots of memories of the hog raising and hunting days. another story you might appreciate: a city couple decide to become homesteaders. they buy an old farm, fix it up, and start getting the usual farm animals. the man buys 2 young sows from a farmer across the county at a bargain price with the first breeding free. 3 months later the sows come in season so early the next morning the man makes a ramp, gets a rope, and loads the sows into the pick up. he then makes the trip across the county, and unloads the sows into the old farmers boars pen and waits for the courtship to end, loads the sows back into the truck, and heads for home, unloads the sows, and goes straight to the fields to work since it's so late in the day. when he finally comes to the house way after dark his wife asks about his day. just horrible he tells her and i may have to do it again tomorrow. why? she asks. well the old farmer said if we wake in the morning and the sows are laying in the mud, they're bred but if they're standing in the sun it didn't take and i need to take them back. so the next morning the city man looks out and the sows are standing in the sun. with a sigh and slumped shoulders he heads to the hog pen and repeats the events from the day before.this goes on for 3 more mornings. the 5th morning he staggers into the kitchen exhausted, falls into a chair and declares "honey i just can't bear to look. will you please look and tell me, are they laying in the mud or standing in the sun? she looks out and says neither one. well what are they doing he asked? she smiled and said sitting in the truck waiting for you.

LOL flsusie,
i almost spit out my coffee when i read that. hahahaa

ROFLOL!!!!

Oh my goodness ROFLOL!!! lOVED IT.
Vickie

Hilarious!

Now that's funny!

I'm surprised it took the pigs so long to learn the drill. Good story!

happy to return one of the many laughs you've all given me.

Caj-Thanks for the chuckle-desperate for humor these days and the hog story did the trick. S.

LOL...thanks so much for the funny stories. I loved them!

We had two hogs named Goodybite and Yumyum. They were delicious! We do not have hogs this year, as they are hard for me to handle.
I lurk the homestead forum often, and thank you all for giving me such great information.
We are pretty self sufficient and raise or shoot most of our food. My DH (the hunter) is disabled now, so our sons have been good at providing us with venison. Goodness knows, the deer eat everything in the yard, and would get my vegetable garden except for the fence.

My Nubian dairy goats are even a handful for me, so I am planning to fence a little pen and have Dwarf dairy goats instead. We have chickens for eggs and rabbits for meat and fertilizer.

Vickie, never give up! Just think smaller instead of thinking it is impossible for you to at least have a garden.
I will be 78 this spring and have had to find lots of ways to do things differently. I can not do nearly as much as I used to, but I love to work hard in the garden until I am worn out ,and then crash in my recliner for a power nap.

Caliche is right, even the little things you do or grow in a garden, a window box even a few pots an buckets will reward you with better an tastier veggies an herbs etc than you can buy.

My Mom made 80 last year and she still amazes me with all she gets done in a day. She irons for extra money. And I mean, she irons. All day most days. She also has a small garden. She loves gardening. Her and my Dad were commercial strawberry farmers back in the day. He passed when I was 8. She also has a small flock of hens and sells eggs. She babysits the great grands and keeps the grands on their toes. LOL I tell her she has earned the right to slow down. She says she'll do that when they throw dirt in her face. She is just like her Dad. I hope I can be that way myself.

I am always encouraging people to grow a bit of their own food even if it's no more than a salad in a few window boxes and 5 gallon buckets. Aside from the good food it gives a sense of satisfaction that you can't get anywhere else.

Thanks for the incouragement. I do grow some things in containers. Tho mostly daylillys. My tomato did pretty good last year but my sweet pepper and cuke did'nt do so well.My strawberrys did fair, They'll get more sun this year,which should help.
Vickie

I have grown my cukes in hanging baskets the last 2 years but they take a lot of water.

Need to move my strawberry bed. I have some in one of those hanging topsy turvey things. Hope they come out in Spring.

The vines grow so well, I might have to try one in a hanging basket.That would be pretty.
Vickie

Great for conversation and the cukes stay clean. I have grown pickling and lemon cukes this way.

sounds easier than mulching to me .. i mulch with pine straw bein i got tons of it everywhere .. LOL an its FREE .. helps keep the squash an cuke's, mushmellons n such off the ground and somewhat cleaner

My folks used to farm strawberries way back in the day. It was before black plastic and they strawed the berries. The woods were all pines and they would hitch the horse and the mule to the sleds and drive them to the pine thickets to gather straw for acres of berry plants.