The Austins, whom you met last week, told us in last week's clip how one has to be careful in picking a pig as a pet.
- First, they are noisy.
- Second, they are messy.
- Third, they are needy.
- Fourth, they are hungry—all the time!
- Fifth, you have to register them, due to farm animal licensing laws, and you'll need to put a microchip in the pig for locating, just in case.
- Sixth, vets are hard to come by, and you will have to travel to Santa Clarita, Santa Monica, or Canoga Park to find one.
Bill and Isabel Frischman, who purchased their pig from the Farmer's Market Petting Zoo in Studio City, tell us in this week's clip that their pig has grown considerably, slowed down a great deal, sleeps most of the time, and is "easy to care for."
Bill, a tax specialist, sometimes surprises his clients when Eloise (a potbellied pig) enters the consulting chamber and snorts a greeting to the guests. Then the pig snuggles up to Bill and lies down for a tummy scratch.
Most of his customers find it pretty endearing. Some find it a bit taxing. Again, pigs are a special and peculiar relationship.
Isabel, an educational specialist at Walter Reed Middle School in North Hollywood, finds everything quite breezy until Eloise goes into heat. The Frischmans made the error of not having Eloise fixed when it was the right time.
"She [Eloise] is too big now to be fixed. Every three weeks she goes into heat, and for a few days she chases after me and wants to jump up on me. I don't know what she thinks is going to happen!"
Decide for yourself if a pig is a possible pet for your family. Both of our sampled families are patient, flexible, very yielding spirits with terrific laughs. From what I've seen of the needs and demands of pigs, those are good qualities for a successful pig partnership.
Remember, only one out of three little piggies knows how to properly engineer its world to prevent big, bad wolves from breaking in. So think this through if you're counting on the pig to make any or all decisions of that nature!
But you can check the footage for yourselves.
