[Gpdd] RESCUE - a story about rescuing piggies

Penny Charlesworth piggyfriends at tesco.net
Fri Nov 10 12:46:37 EST 2006


Joan is nagging me about posting the story of my earlier visit to what I called the Village of the Damned to collect piggies. I believe that Susi has asked for this too so here goes.

Some of you may have read my tale about collecting piggies recently and judging by the number of emails I received, you might like this story.

Several years ago one of my clients met a strange woman in her vet's waiting room and was asked if she knew anyone who could rehome some piggies. She gave this woman my phone number ( and later asked if I minded ). The woman eventually called me with the usual story that she had mixed up boars and sows and had several pregnant piggies and could I help with rehoming the babies as and when they arrived. I gave her as much help over the phone as I could and told her to ring me again if she needed more help or had babes needing homes.

I didn't hear from her for some time and thought that she must have forgotten about me ( I didn't have her number as she was ex-directory - unlisted?- you know what I mean ). Eventually she called to say that she had thirteen babes all needing homes. By this time they must have been about 8 weeks old and I sincerely hoped that she had taken my advice about separating them. I arranged a day to go and collect them ( what was I going to do with them all?).

My son, Sean, was home at the time and bravely volunteered to go with me and following some very vague directions we found the village. Up an unmade road, we found the house on a hill, rang the bell and the door was opened by a man who I will forever think of as Lurch. He shambled off and an elderly woman came to the door followed by an assortment of startlingly alike children. I explained who we were, waved the boxes we were carrying and light dawned. She set off down a track, followed by the children and we reached, at the very muddy bottom of a garden, what I can only describe an an igloo, built of poles and bubble-wrap, with a small tunnel leading into it. 

One of the girls crawled inside and returned carrying a guinea pig. "They are all boys " the woman said " I've had them checked by an expert. I was going to keep the girls " The first two were put into one of my boxes and the girl crawled out again carrying a little sow. "Why are you putting that one into a different box" she said. Wondering how I was going to extract the little sow safely, I told her that as I had a long drive home, there would be more room for them to move if they weren't all together.

The next trip into the tunnel didn't produce any more piggies. The woman said that she must have found homes for the others. I asked her to make sure and one of the girls disappeared into the tunnel but no more piggies were found. I wondered how many adult piggies were in there as I couldn't see them through the bubble wrap. I tried, tactfully, to explain that this was not a very good environment for them, that they could develop skin problems as the igloo must have been damp and couldn't they be kept in the house or at least in a hutch off the ground. Blank stares all round. Lurch returned and looked menacing so Sean and I beat a hasty retreat with the 3 babes that we had.

This is far too long a post ( sorry ) but I am trying to cut it short.

Part 2 tomorrow.

Penny and the Piggyfriends.


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