I saw this big girl at Farm Sanctuary last weekend (the woman pictured is a stranger; I wanted her in the photo to show scale). I didn’t know pigs could be this big, then I learned that they’re usually slaughtered before they reach full size. This one is almost 1000 pounds, and gentle as a manatee.
She escaped the fate of most modern breeding sows, who are treated like piglet-making machines until their productions slows, at which point they’re slaughtered.
Here are some more porcine acquaintances I made over the weekend. They generously let me into their home and even let me lie in their beds.
All the pigs in this particular barn were fine with being touched. They looked and felt like pink elephants: thick, wrinkled skin with bristly hair. And their snouts that were more expressive than their eyes.