I was very happy to see my Teddy sow Alyssum had the single baby I knew she was carrying.

Alyssum is nearly all white with red and black eye patches. She has excellent conformation and coat, which is why I kept her despite her being mismarked. She's almost 2 and has had some nice babies. Allium, her daughter, is a very nice brindle who had babies a couple days ago.

I noticed this baby looked all white so I picked him up. If I didn't raise primarily roans I'd probably never even think to look, because Alyssum is a TSW, not a roan. She had been bred to a roan though. So I checked his teeth. Twice. Damn! NO teeth at all. I examined his eyes. They didn't seem unusually small, but were very red underneath, almost like a cherry eye. He was very docile, but then again he was only a couple hours old at best. Definitely a lethal. He was immediately euthanized.

I felt bad for Alyssum. She is a very good mom. One of Allium's three babies is a golden agouti, a color I don't care for and never keep, and to top it off he has a pinstripe blaze. Definitely not a keeper. I plopped him in with Alyssum. He immediately snuggled under her. What's he care? She's got two teats!

Alyssum seemed a bit taken aback. I'd removed a familiar-smelling white baby and gave back a dark funny-smellng one. Better clean all that off him, she apparently thought, LOL. He got a good tough-love cleaning for awhile but she seemed to accept him.

Later she went to the front of the cage and left him behind and he cried a bit. I think he probably missed having sibs around him. But he'll be well-fed. Then he went to find her and she stopped eating and went back to him. I guess they've bonded pretty well. Gotta love piggies for that. On any other day they might beat the pants off another sow, but give em a newbie and instinct kicks in and they'll clean the heck out of it and snuggle it. Of course this isn't 100 percent with every sow, but close enough that I didn't have to watch these two for very long.

I probably should have back-bred Alyssum but I just didn't get around to it. She'll have a bit of a break.

What's nice about this arrangement is that even if I forget whose kid this is, being as how he (or she, I haven't actually sexed it) is a mismark, it'll go for a pet without a pedigree anyway so it doesn't matter. I WILL make note of it though.

I had a mom die after giving birth last year and I gave her baby to another sow to raise. She'd had all boys and after they left home I kept the two sows togehter and I had to continually check and remember whose baby it actually was. You think you'd be safe raising mostly tri roans and brindles but this past year I've had several look very much alike. I had to tag all the suckers at weaning before I mixed them up. I even noted a couple ear tags on my Web site as another backup.

Or maybe I'm just getting old, LOL.