One small ball against boredom – life in the pig pen
X15 is now in a pen with his siblings. Piglets are brought here when they are three or four weeks old. They are taken away from their mother and live in a group with no contact to older pigs. They mostly live on slatted floors. Piglets live in these usually bare pens which are, in [...]
Differences after the separation
People are already asking about X15 and how he is. The following pictures show X15 and how differently the two piglets now live. You’ll be able to watch the next film of X15 next Tuesday You can see all the other pictures of how the two are living in the “after the move” album on [...]
The piglets are getting more independent
Aged three weeks, X15, X11 and their siblings are drinking from a water dispenser fixed in the wall. They are trying the food from time to time as well . But they still suckle. This piglet is curious about what is being held in the stall and show interest in the camera.
X11 and X15 have to learn how to live without their mother
The little piglets are now labelled
To identify who is X11 and who is X15 on the pictures, they are now labeled. They wear tiny collars – actually made for cats – which suit our piglets as well. X15 is blue and X11 is red.
The castration without local anesthetics – for livestock industry purposes
X15 and his siblings aged 4 days on Tuesday. The farmer and his wife are preparing for the so called “piglet-service”. The “piglet service” usually includes the castration of male piglets, injection with an iron-supplement, teeth clipping as well as tail docking.The farmer is allowed to carry out these surgeries himself if the piglets aged [...]
X11 and X15′s first few days
Young Pigs Video
What will life be like for X15? In around three weeks we will start to find out, when our two piglets are born. Until then, we bring you images of what it’s like in another typical Austrian pig farm.
X15 is alive – a industrialised procedure
X15 is a male piglet. His existence began on 2.3.09 as his mother was artificially inseminated. In pig breeding farms sows are used as reproductive machines. Their natural cycles are controlled on mass by hormone injection which ensure the timing of their fertility and which are used as little as 4 to 7 days after her [...]
The Timeline
On our website you will find a timeline. You will see that it has not changed yet, that’s because the piglets, whose lives we want to follow, haven’t been born yet. At the moment you can see pictures of how people imagine the life of a pig, the timing of these stages is real enough, but [...]
