Relaxation?

Things have been crazy around here. Between taking care of the geese, chicks, chickens, cats, dog and horses, working multiple part time jobs, helping out my grandmother, upkeeping the house, working in the garden, studying for the GRE and prepping for the opening of VMCAS (Today!), there hasn't been too much free time present for me to sit down and pen something. In a little under an hour I will be heading off to take the GRE. I am certainly hoping to do well, and feel like I have studied my butt off for it.Whatever time I have left this evening will be spent starting on my VMCAS, revamping my personal statement, and possibly rounding up some chickens and cows to go to market at the farm.

Monday morning when I got to the farm, one of the hogs, Daisy, had just had her first litter. No one had expected her to have them so early (she was supposedly due tomorrow), so it was a surprise. She had ten little ones, and took to them right away. I have gotten a bit more used to both her and the other sow, Lillian. They are in the main barn in the farrowing pens. These are pens with an escape side for the piglets to go in when the sow gets up and moves around. This helps lower the amount of piglets that get squished! On commercial farms, they put the sow in very small cages, with bars too tight for the piglets to get anything but their noses in to suckle. This is portrayed by animal activist groups as being cruel, but in reality this saves the lives of many piglets.

ANYWAY... Yesterday I helped clip off the end of the piglets teeth (they are born with really, really sharp teeth and can actually damage the sow's teats), and give them iron shots. I was brushing up on my piglet grabbing and handling skills! In a couple weeks I will be helping with castrations on the gilts.

And now I'm on my way to go take the GRE! I have a ton of pictures stored up to post on here, so hopefully I will get to it soon.

~Melissa