My six piglets will be 15 days old tomorrow and according to my wife's papa, it will be time to castrate the males. He will, of course, do most of the work, but I will assist in any way I can.
As I've mentioned before, there were originally eight piglets born to this sow - four male and four female. Two piglets have since died. I know that the first to die was one of the spotted male piglets. I'm don't know if the second piglet was male or female. I don't know if we'll have two or three to castrate in the morning.
In April of 2007, we came to Philippines for a visit, staying with my wife's parents and those siblings still at home. I wrote in an earlier post about my wife's papa castrating piglets one morning while we were here.
There was quite a commotion outside behind the house. The pig were squealing loudly and even the dog and roosters were in some sort of stress. My wife told me that Papa was circumcising the piglets. My first thought was that,perhaps,if what she said were true, then it might be possible to make pork Kosher.
After I had explained the difference between the definitions of circumcision and castration she admitted that her choice of words had not been the right one.
Out of basic curiosity, I had to go outside to witness the job for myself. My brother-in-law, Eugene was seated, holding the poor piglet upside down and gripping tightly it's four feet. Papa was seated directly across from Eugene with a third chair next to him. His "surgical" equipment-scissors, needle and thread, a hypodermic needle and bottles of something or other-lay on the chair.
I asked Cathy how many of the eight piglets were male. Just three, she said. It wouldn't been long, I thought, until there would be three fewer males in the group.
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