Welcome to a new blog about mini pigs

Welcome to It's a Mini Pig Life!
You will find posts and articles about Mini Pigs here and fun stories and facts about Mini Pigs too.
My name is Robin and I will take you on my journey with mini pigs.

As you can imagine, life with mini pigs can be an adventure. When we first decided to get a mini pig, I was rather nervous after reading about how head strong they can be and that they often will boss you around if you let them. She has tried to push us around but we established ourselves as Alphas which took care of that. We also used "Move the Pig" techniques I will tell you about in a separate article.

8 months old - Day 1

I did have realistic expectations of size when we first got Karma, a 8 mth old potbelly & Juliana mix. She was 40-45lbs when we picked her up Oct 2016. Hard to weigh a piggy, they don't stay still for long, so I am guessing at her weight. At full adult size potbelly pigs can weigh up to 150lbs and Juliana mini pigs are typically under 80lbs. Now that said, mini pigs are dense so they are only about as big as a medium to medium large dog.

From day 1 we could look into Karma's eyes and see she was thinking.

Much more than a dog or cat. Often people say "Cats look down on you - Dogs look up to you - Pigs see us as equals". So true. Smart they are. Jeez, starting to sound like Yoda. But they are super smart and if left to their own devices they will run your life and get pushy. Owners must take control and establish Alpha status or forever suffer a stubborn piggy.

At first Karma was shy. Kept to herself while she sized us up. We gave her some space and a private room to call her own. She quickly got comfortable and was roaming about the house investigating everything. She also quickly discovered that she liked to watch TV. One of her favorites is Kung Fu Panda movies. So I would play it on loop in her room which was also my office at the time. She would sit in her bed and focus on the screen watching and I know I heard her giggle at parts. She would grunt at certain scenes and huff and others. So cute and always at the same parts of the movie.

After getting comfortable with us she would demand attention and petting and time on the sofa with us. We were so freaking happy she was a love bug and wanted to be pet and cuddled and loved on. Took time though so don't expect your piggy to warm up the first day or even sometimes the first week at home with you, but be patient, your piggy will come around, they are social creatures and love to be loved. But don't we all want love?

Pet piggies have emotion and they will show it. Sad and they will cry. Happy they will swing their tails and pop their mohawks up ( a ridge on their backs and necks), angry they will get irritable. Every pig has his own personality I have learned.

Not too long after getting Karma we noticed she was getting heavier, thought I was feeding her too much, but turns out she was pregnant when we got her. Oh boy. Pigs are pregnant for 3 months, 3 weeks and 3 days. We were gonna have babies. She came to us in Mid October and it was now Mid December.
She had babies Christmas Eve morning at 12:30am. 5 babies. All healthy - all up and able to see, walk, run, scream, eat. They come out with eyes open and teeth.
Milk teeth but teeth none the less. Crazy huh?


That's when the adventure really begins, lol.......