Time Wasting

I don't know why it is, but people seem to waste a lot of time doing completely unimportant things.

Take Emma for instance. She spends a huge part of her day at school, supposedly learning 'important things'. Well that's clearly not necessary. She already knows what we like to eat. She knows when to feed us and how much to give us (though she could do with a little more instruction in this area). She is also well educated in housing and accommodation as she regularly tops our arks up with straw. She's even pretty good at tummy tickling and back scratching So what 'important things' could she possibly need to learn at school.

If you think that's crazy then you really won't believe what those mad humans have done now. For no particular reason at all they decided to paint the sky red yesterday evening. Yes red!

Why can't they just snuggle up in their straw when they have finished eating like us intelligent pigs?

Acorn and Berry

Beautiful wooden pig arks.

I don't believe it! Not content with feeding other peoples pigs, Emma and her family have now started making beautiful houses for them! Not only are they making standard arks like ours, but they are also making, delivering and assembling palacial farrowing arks.

(Like the one below, being assembled)

It's not fair - why can't I have one?

Emma says I don't need a farrowing ark as I haven't got any piglets. I told her I would have some if it meant I got one of these delux pig arks, but Emma says it is too late now as Peter Lad has gone home.

What's that got to do with it?

Acorn

Scandal!

I think Emma has gone mad. Seriously. You’ll never guess what she’s done. She’s feeding other people’s pigs! No, sadly I’m not joking.
We’ve had some new arrivals recently you see: some more Gingernuts (Tamworths), and some Spotty Hogs (Gloucester Old Spots). So naturally we were asking Emma about them and she said they belonged to other people! She is letting them eat OUR food, snuggle to bed in OUR straw, eat OUR food, root around in OUR grass, eat OUR food, wallow in OUR mud and eat OUR food! And she’s not even their pet!
Acorn asked Emma if we could have extra rations seeing as we have been such great owners, but like the cheeky pet she is she said that judging on the size of our stomachs we didn’t need any more food! It’s a scandal!
Berry

TV fame for the Berkshire Pigs

At last, we got the fame we deserved, we knew they'd come to their senses in the end.

It was very dark when they came, first thing in the morning when we were expecting our breakfast. Then out of the mist came cameras and reporters. It was the BBC Midlands Today crew. They had heard about Us Berkshire Pigs and they wanted to meet us and to film us, so that all the world could see how special we are!

They had a quick tour of the other pigs as well but it was only us the viewers were introduced to. We looked modestly away, but there can be no doubt that everyone thought we were wonderful. Claire and Ben (Emma's sister and brother) even filmed the filming so that all their friends and relations would be able to see us too!

Such excitement could have put us off our breakfast, but like the true professionals we are we munched on!

Acorn and Berry

I Don't Believe It...!

Sorry we haven't posted a blog recently, but we've both been terribly traumatised by the Country Life article. Not only was the main picture in the article one of the Middle White Pigs, but the only Berkshire Pig featured was Peter Lad who doesn't even belong here. IT'S OUTRAGEOUS!

Emma took some photos of us to put on the blog - but as you can see we couldn't force a smile!

It's only our devoted fans like Demelza who have persuaded us to keep writing on the blog!

Acorn and Berry

Country Life

It's ever so exciting, a photographer from Country Life has been here taking photo's of us pigs (and Emma?). Apparently we are going to star in this weeks Country Life magazine which comes out on Wednesday. I'm a little bit concerned that he didn't seem particularly interested in us Berkshire pigs and spent an equal amount of time with the other breeds. I just hope the Middle Whites don't steal the show again!

This is one of the many photos taken. I think Emma had been in our wallow!

Peter Lad (in this picture) was extremely lucky to be included in the photo shoot as he really isn't one of Emma's pigs at all, he is just visiting. He's a bit smaller than Barky who came to see us in the spring, (which is good as he doesn't pinch so much food) but he's not so Hunky either!

Acorn and Berry

Floods

Great news, Berry's no longer too fat to be separated from me and Cocoa.

To celebrate her return I chased her round and round snorting loudly and trying to bite her.... well she needed to know that she couldn't just come back and pinch all my food as before.... I'm not letting her get obese again! Emma says that I am the fat one now. OUTRAGEOUS!

Having put us back in together, Emma seemed to think that she'd be able to have a lie in without us noticing. She couldn't be more wrong! Cocoa and I got up early to make sure Berry didn't pinch our food and then Emma didn't arrive until 10am. That's worse than Grandad!

Emma did have a pretty good excuse though. It has rained so much here recently that the road was flooded.

Emma, Claire and Ben had to canoe through the floods to get here!

We'll let her off - just this once!

Acorn

Emma's Holiday

I don't know what the world is coming to, Emma decided that she needed a break and disappeared off with her family.

We don't get holiday's you know!

What's more she left the most important job of feeding us to her Grandad, and sometimes he overslept 'til 9am!

I was really cross with her and thought of sulking and going off my food, but then I had a much better idea. I tipped my really heavy Belfast sink trough right over. I had never managed this before as it really is very heavy. (Grandad will confirm that as it took him ages to put it back again and refill it with water!)

The next day one of the All Sorts managed to dig out of her pen, so I really enjoyed watching Grandad get her back in again and reinforce the fencing. For a complete novice he did quite well really.

After that we pretended to be starving and shrieked for our food twice as loudly as normal. I don't now whether it was the noise or Grandad's desire to make us all too fat to escape again, but we got lots of extra tit bits!

Just before Emma returned we got a postcard from her, telling us to behave or she would put us on a diet. We've been angelic since then so I think we'll get a good report.

Berry

British Saddleback Pigs

Hello, my name's Babe. I am the smallest of all Berry's Piglets but that also makes me the cutest! Mummy said if I gave her all my dinner she would let me put a posting on the blog so I readily agreed, as I really wanted to tell you all about my news. I thought my brothers and sisters would be jealous but they just shook their heads and said something like "No wonder she's the smallest!"

Anyway the first thing I want to tell you about is Auntie Acorn. She's no longer all by herself in a paddock, one of the 'Little Scraps' has joined her. The not so little Scrap is called Cocoa and Emma says one day she and Acorn will have piglets like Mummy. Acorn says she's quite happy being an Auntie and she doesn't want to share her dinner with lots of piglets, but Emma hopes she will change her mind.


The other thing I wanted to tell you about was the 'All Sorts'. These pigs have been with us for ages but Mummy and Auntie Acorn keep forgetting to tell you about them. They are stripy pigs (Like licorice All Sorts according to Emma) and they have floppy ears like the Plum Puddings. Apparently their real name is British Saddleback Pigs but Mummy says this is a rather grand title for these odd looking animals.


I must go now. Mummy's just gone to lie down in the Ark and that means only one thing - Milk Time. I may be happy to miss my dinner once in a while, but I'm not missing my milk!

Bye,


Babe.

Recognition at last

I told Berry she needn't worry about the Middle Whites and I was right. It was us Radio 4 wanted to talk to! Unfortunately Emma kept talking over my grunts, but if you click on the attached video you should be able to hear me and Berry. (Just try not to get too distracted by Emma's ramblings!)

Acorn