Go Slow England

17 April 2008

The Hog Blog – February 2008, part 2

Posted by Thomas under abattoir, Alastair Sawday Publishing, England, food, Go Slow England, hogs, pigs, Sawday's, slow, slow food, Special Places to Stay
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I realise that I’m posting very late in the day today but having been at the London Book Fair the past 3 days I’ve been frantically catching up on a backlog of emails. Sorry to make you wait! Some good news that I found waiting for me is that our July release What About China? will be getting featured in an influential book trade publication. More about What About China? later but in brief it is a book about how to answer awkward questions about climate change such as “What is the point of doing anything when China opens a new power station every week?”

But for now here’s another instalment of Nicola’s Hog Blog. Have your tissues ready.

Cheers, Thomas

The Hog Blog – February 2008, part 2

The Hog Blog - February 2008, part 2

We arrive early at the abattoir and I go in to sort out the paperwork. Three forms for one pig. A pig movement form, a transportation form and a what she has been eating form. One of the forms is three pages long and I understand none of the questions. They are in code. The guy who manages the abattoir is about 65, with the ginger grooved wrinkles and the deep, watery chested voice of the dedicated smoker. His ‘office’ is a sort of freezing cold garage with a tiny electric fire at one end and a small wooden table and chair at the other. He is an old hand. He is not overly friendly. He’s seen it all before. I feel like an idiot. I am behaving like a ridiculous townie at a cocktail party, enquiring about his job and whether he ought to have a bigger fire, and oh gosh, these forms, how on earth does one make head or tail of them? He groans and lights another fag.

Help is at hand from a lovely young man in a white coat and white wellies: the man from DEFRA. He helps me fill in the forms, then helps us get Porker down the ramp and along a long, stone corridor. He is so gentle and sweet with her ‘Come on lovey, come on sweetie’, patting her gently and encouraging her down. Pigs don’t like going downhill much. I instantly like him and trust him and there is a lovely, straw-filled pen waiting for her with a drinking bowl and everything. I give her a pocketful of pignuts and stroke her nose for the last time. She is next in line. I walk away. Turning once I see her just rooting about in the straw like normal. I am not worried.

I make arrangements to collect the carcass in three days and return to work. Feel strange all day. Quite grown up.

Nicola

10 April 2008

The Hog Blog – February 2008, part 1

Posted by Thomas under abattoir, Alastair Sawday Publishing, Go Slow England, hogs, pigs, Sawday's, slow, slow food
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Goodness! It looks like the end is nigh for dear old Porker. Nicola shares her thoughts…

The Hog Blog – February 2008, part 1

The Hog Blog - February 2008, part 1

Bitterly cold with a strong easterly wind, but the sun is shining and there’s a frost on the mud, so not claggy, but sparkling. I meet Tom in the field, he’s already reversed his Landrover and trailor up to the gate and is asking me which pig? I point to Porker, feeling like Judas except I didn’t get the 30 pieces of silver. No, I had to pay much more than that for this particular act of treachery. Porker, as usual, is at the front of the queue so it’s easy to open the gate and let her out and start shutting it on Mabel. The new little ones escape too, though, and rush up the straw-ridden trailer ramp as if they are just sooo excited about a trip to the slaughter house. Tom puts them back in the pen and Porker is alone. He loads up the ear tag thing and advances up the ramp to insert it. I walk away and look over the fence, dreading the moment I will hear her scream. How unfair to have to have this shock and pain and then go to the abattoir with nothing nice happening in between. I resolve to tag the next one at least two weeks before slaughter and then give him treats in between so he’s forgotten all about the ear when the trailer time comes. A pineapple I am thinking, or some kiwi fruit, their favourites. No scream comes at all. Tom comes down the ramp and says he dropped the tag at the last moment because she moved her head. He loads up another. I think maybe 50 wasn’t enough? Second attempt resoundingly successful judging by the terrific noise. Pigs are the most dramatic creatures on earth. They should all be on the stage. If you don’t believe me pick up a piglet, gently and kindly, and they’ll make the sort of noise that is only heard during the last few minutes of a Jacobean tragedy when all on stage are tortured and killed and there’s a lot of fake blood.

Nevertheless the sound produces fear in me. The same sort of fear one feels when holding out your precious baby to the surgery nurse for a jab. I immediately give her an apple to cheer her up. She eats it happily. Good.

Off we go then in the Landrover to Frome. Cross country – through Chew Stoke and over hills and down dales. Sun bright and low, flickering through hedges, blinding round bends. And Tom talks. We chatter about family, animals, bloody paperwork, how things have changed. I’m getting old: I enjoy it.

Nicola

8 April 2008

The Hog Blog – January 2008, part 2

Posted by Thomas under abattoir, Alastair Sawday Publishing, food, Go Slow England, hogs, pigs, Sawday's, slow, slow food, Somerset, Special Places to Stay
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It’s time for another Hog Blog and I think you will agree that it’s starting to get a bit dramatic!

Cheers, Thomas

The Hog Blog – January 2008, part 2

The Hog Blog - January 2008, part 2

Rang abattoir in Nailsea today. Porker has only four weeks or so left to go. I need to hire a trailer and also get her an ear tag or slap-mark of some description. Not sure how to go about it, but I phone the North Somerset council man and he tells me which company to order them from. He is also, he says, coming to inspect me in February. Blimey. Order ear-piercer and tags with my herd number stamped on them over the internet and they arrive in the post. Fifty ear tags minimum order. Oh well, I shan’t have to order again in a hurry.

I have a mad two weeks trying to get out of going to the Nailsea abattoir (I hear gossip from Steve the butcher at the farm shop that a mate of his sent some rare-breed pigs to Bakers and didn’t think he got his own pigs back; and there were bits missing that he had specifically asked for). But I’m worried about not having any alternative. People keep telling me about nod-and-a-wink travelling folk who come with a small gun and do it in the field. On research, they don’t appear to exist, or only do it secretly.

Steve says there’s another abattoir in Frome which is smaller and less commercial and gives me the number of a mate who knows them. The mate recommends them and I worry about the fact that it is 27 miles away rather than eight. My address book, which used to be filled with city numbers, is now criss-crossed with numbers for trailer hire folk, ark builders, mates of mates who shoot pigs in fields on the sly, farmers and hedge trimmers, oh and abattoirs. Weird. It is make my mind up time. Every time I look at Porker I feel like a traitor.

Later that month…
Time up. I opt for the Frome abattoir. But how to get her there? Ring Pete the hedge trimmer as he is a Long Ashton local. He tells me to ring Tom James who keeps cows in the field below me. Tom is brilliant and agrees to help (for £60!) We talk pig on the phone and I like him. He meets me in the field the next day and we check to see he can get his trailer in and every question I ask (there are many) he answers patiently and kindly.

Nicola

2 April 2008

The Hog Blog – January 2008, part 1

Posted by Thomas under Alastair Sawday Publishing, B&Bs, British Bed & Breakfast, British Bed & Breakfast for Garden Lover, Go Slow England, hogs, pigs, Sawday's, Special Places to Stay
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It’s time for another instalment of Nicola’s Hog Blog! (Nicola’s the editor of our British Bed & Breakfast and British Bed & Breakfast for Garden Lovers books you know).

Cheers, Thomas

The Hog Blog – January 2008, part 1

The Hog Blog - January 2008, part 1

I collect two little Berkshire boys from the farm, one to be Mabel’s husband in the summer, one for the table. Elvis (the breeder) has a quiff, and Trotter is a bit friendly. He already knows what sex is about because he keeps trying it on with Elvis, who wriggles away. They seem much smaller than the girls when they arrived, and less robust. Just taken away from Mum they view the girls as something bigger with nipples and so rush about them madly trying to get cosy. The girls behave like teenagers who have just discovered their little brother in their bedroom, going through their things. They charge into the ark as one and use their snouts to hurl the boys up into the air and out into the cold. But they don’t care! They rush back in again, sometimes between the baffled girls’ legs and just snuggle in the straw with each other. I suspect their own mother has treated them thus for a few weeks, bored with the constant breastfeeding. Can’t say I blame her. This circus continues until nightfall and I have to leave – worrying about the murderous, jealous look in Mabel’s eyes and Porker’s strong snout. Could they kill the boys?

I get home, cook supper, sit on the sofa and worry. Then I borrow a torch and drive back to the field to creep up on them and make sure that Mabel and Porker are not lying in their cosy bed, with Elvis and Trotter shivering outside. Instead I find them all asleep. Mabel and Porker curled up in a huge heap on one side of the ark, Elvis and Trotter entwined in a tiny heap at the other end. In between them is a pig-made hillock of straw.
These are the boundaries then, as well-defined as a long-married couple who sleep in the same bed but manage never to touch each other.

Over the next few days there is one bitten ear. Victim Trotter; biter unknown. Other than that, and a few shrieks at feedtime when the boys are roughly pushed aside to eat at the edges, there is little trouble. All is calm.

Nicola

28 March 2008

The Hog Blog – December 2007

Posted by Thomas under Alastair Sawday Publishing, Go Slow England, hogs, pigs, Sawday's, slow, slow food, slow travel, The Guardian, The Observer
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It’s been rather info heavy on the blog this week so I figured that a new Hog Blog instalment was well overdue. Don’t forget to pick up The Guardian on Saturday and The Observer on Sunday for the Go Slow England supplements (see yesterday’s post) and have a great weekend!

Cheers, Thomas

The Hog Blog – December 2007

The Hog Blog - December

Weighed them with Jackie’s son Alex, who didn’t have any wellies so wore carrier bags over his shoes and tucked into his socks. Unfortunately the pigs thought there might be something interesting to eat inside these strange bags and so tried to eat his feet. Very funny.

So… how to measure a pig. You take a piece of string (two pieces of string) and measure once around the tummy, just behind the front legs and then from the middle of the ears to the end of the bottom. Then you have to get the calculator out and do a weird multiplication and division thing and you get, apparently, the approximate weight.

Mabel weighed in at 110.7 lbs, and Porker 115.9 lbs. The right live weight to be ready for the chop is about 140 lbs. No wonder she didn’t like me measuring her!

They are standing in so much muddy water now that the ark really may end as one.

The whole of December is cold until Christmas. Iced up water that needs to be cracked open with a welly, biting northerly wind, then the water pipe freezes completely. They have enough to keep going for a few days like that but if it doesn’t thaw soon I don’t know what to do. Now worrying pipes might burst. No more long, lazy walks through the field, more like a quick whip round then straight back into the pen. No greenery now there for them though and they need to have some grass, so they do like their walks. So cold I can’t stand still with them and have to keep jumping about. Pete the hedge man actually phones me to say that the open door to the ark is facing east and that’s where the wind is coming from. He says I must open the back door and leave the front door in – they will be cosier. He is right!

Nicola

17 March 2008

The Hog Blog – November 2007, part 2

Posted by Thomas under Alastair Sawday Publishing, Go Slow England, hogs, pigs, Sawday's
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The Hog Blog – November 2007, part 1

The Hog Blog - November 2007, part 1

Pete has cut all the hedges and I can see for miles! Pete is a lovely chap, probably in his sixties and lives down the road but on this side of the railway – as he was at great pains to point out. He does all the hedges round here. I might ask if he can do fencing as well – we need more pigs and more fences. But not at the price of the last lot. £1,800 for the pen and the surrounding fence, the hard standing and erection of the ark – which was nearly £400.

Mabel will need a companion soon. I can’t believe Porker is nearly half way through her life. Saw lots of dunnets today, this autumn has been the best I can remember, and the putting to bed time of 4pm is stunning just now: pink skies, amazing cloud formations and that winter twilight which is so special.

They are eating so much now I am constantly at the feed place, but now that the shed is up I can buy in bulk assuming I can borrow a bigger car.

Nicola

14 March 2008

Alastair at the Journeys Festival, Alastair’s blog and more Hog Blog

Posted by Thomas under accommodation, Alastair Sawday Publishing, England, food, Go Slow England, hogs, holidays in England, pigs, Sawday's, slow, slow food, slow travel, Special Places to Stay, travel
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I know it’s a bit last minute for me to be announcing this but if you are near Bristol on Sunday morning then pop over to The Pierian Centre for the Journeys Festival. You’ll be able to meet Alastair in person as he’ll be there as part of the Books & Buns morning from 11:00am to 1:30pm. You can find details of the whole Journeys festival (which starts tonight) here and download their flyer here.

While we are on the topic of all things to do with Alastair, click here to have a look at his personal blog where he has recently started a discussion about whether or not people in their 20s and 30s are still able to enjoy the simple things in life.

But for now, time to end the week with a new instalment from The Hog Blog.

Cheers, Thomas

The Hog Blog – November 2007, part 1

The Hog Blog - November 2007, part 1

They continue to grow. I wonder whether they are frightened of fireworks? They don’t seem to have fear really – the only time they freaked out was when I went into the field wearing a hat. Have read lots of stuff, mainly from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, about how much pigs love greens. Well mine don’t. They don’t like, or won’t eat: cabbage, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, carrots, onions, celery or swede. They do like eating seasonally however, blackberries and apples in abundance when they arrived, now they like nothing better than pumpkins and squashes. Bananas and melon are also a favourite. They adore pig nuts.

They still like to run around in the field whenever they can, rushing about tearing up grass (they will eat that), and snuffling their snouts into everything, sometimes coming up with an acorn or a beech nut and cracking it between their teeth happily. Bobbie continues to bark at them now and then but nothing like before. Occasionally they nibble at her. She rather likes sniffing their bottoms and stealing the pig nuts.

So, we have settled into a routine. Which is fine. Except my petrol bill is soaring because of all the extra trips to the office. Julia and Joe coming up with business plan apparently but still no plans to extend.

We were going to get a couple of pigs from another farm where there are also cattle, but they texted me to say they had just had a positive TB test and couldn’t move anything for months. Back to Devon then I suppose, but I quite wanted to get a couple of girls of a different breed for a bit of variation. Julia and Joe are going to attempt the fencing so I won’t hold my breath. Must get more before February though when Porker will be off. Cannot have Mabel on her own. Research for other pigs necessary, but what type? More Berkshires? (not so good for bacon) …or a Gloucester Old Spot or a Saddleback. Maybe a Large Black, but would it matter to only have black pigs?

Nicola

7 March 2008

The Hog Blog – October, 2007

Posted by Thomas under Alastair Sawday Publishing, England, food, Go Slow England, hogs, pigs, Sawday's, slow, slow food, slow travel, Special Places to Stay, travel
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What a week! We started selling Go Slow England and have already had a tremendous response that has kept us all very busy. But now it’s Friday so I’ll going to take it easy and will leave you with the next instalment of The Hog Blog.

Have a great weekend!

Thomas

The Hog Blog – October 2007

The Hog Blog - October 2007

Clocks back, routine changed. No more getting here too early as pitch black till 7.30. And now they have supper at four. Lots more straw in the ark to keep them warm. All the blackberries are finished – too many to pick – so they wither on their stalks like neglected old ladies. It’s sad. I feel generous with the pigs and buy them a pineapple. They adored it, the whole thing including the prickly bits, and got covered in pineapple juice, so they’re sticky to stroke for a whole day.

We have a shed! It is wonky and has bits of corrugated iron holding up the more ramshackle bits, but it is dry inside and I can keep all the food and straw and tools in there. I have romantic images of summer days on a deckchair. I will sit outside the shed on a deckchair, sipping tea from a flask and eating sandwiches (not ham) while the pigs gambol around. What actually happens is that we have terrible gales and the roof blows off the shed and two walls collapse, the rain pours down over four expensive bags of feed and two bails of straw, soaking everything. Not good.

I am depressed about the shed, thinking it will never be fixed. But I go up to feed the pigs on the Sunday after the storm and there is the shed, with a roof! It looks a bit like the shed that the Grandfather flew around in in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Perhaps that’s why I love it. God Bless Julia’s husband, Mike. I replace feed and straw and hope we are home and dry.

Nicola

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5 March 2008

Last day to pre-register for Go Slow England (and more Hog Blog!)

Posted by Thomas under Alastair Sawday Publishing, Bristol, England, food, Go Slow England, hogs, holidays in England, Long Ashton, pigs, Sawday's, slow, slow food, slow travel, Special Places to Stay, travel
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Hi everybody and yes indeed, today is the last day that we will be taking pre-registrations for Go Slow England. If all goes to plan (fingers crossed!) it will be available to buy from the Alastair Sawday Publishing online bookshop tomorrow and I’ll be emailing everybody who pre-registered a special code for a 45% discount. Today will also be the last day you can vote in our poll on the best place in England to go slow.

Also, in one week Go Slow England publisher and author Alastair Sawday makes his first promotional appearance at Stanfords in Bristol. Click here for details and click here for a full list of Alastair’s appearances.

Until then, I’ll leave you with the next instalment of The Hog Blog.

Cheers, Thomas

The Hog Blog – September 2007

The Hog Blog - September 2007

Back from a week’s holiday to find two enormously enlarged pigs and what was a dry, pretty meadow now like the Somme. It must have been raining here, then. Still no shed, no sign of a shed, all the straw under a tarpaulin (soaking wet) and the food in a dustbin (rather damp). Pigs standing in ankle deep mud, is this okay? Cleared the hard standing at least, which was covered in sopping sods of earth – bloody heavy to shift – used the fork in the end and then swept and swept. We have a hard standing again to feed them on (they’ve learned to go to the hard standing to be fed which is good – saving the fence from too much hysterical pressure). Other problem is all the straw and poo – not really ‘manuring’ the way I hoped, just sitting there looking larger and larger in pileage each day. How can we deal with it? Got my overalls out for the first time today. V. smart with ‘Dickie’s’ written down the side and padded knees. It’s enormous and navy blue and has all sorts of tremendously useful pockets and zips. I look dreadful in it, nobody will want to marry me now.

Tom coming down this weekend to meet them, Mum was down last week and fell in love with them I think. She bought them a frightfully expensive honeydew melon from Reg the Veg in Clifton and gave them most of it. They very much appreciated it judging by the snorting and squelching and chomping that went on. I surprised them really early on Saturday morning and they were still asleep, wrapped in each other and a straw nest – must be rather cosy, It cheers me that they’re are so deeply companionable. They are still a bit clingy with me, especially when I’m holding the blue bucket (the one they get their nuts in) but when I let them out into the big field now (at weekends and in my lunch hour) they run off, sometimes separately, and I worry that they won’t come back. I just have to move in the direction of the feed dustbin and they are there, streaking across the field like lightning. They feel warm and completely solid, with bristly long hairs and smooth skin. Porker still has a little cut on the back of one of her ears, not getting better, or seeming to get better and then appearing again. Could Mabel be nibbling on her? They are just eating machines really. Fantastic, evolved, omniverous survivors. Stopped worrying about sending Porker to the abattoir, when I suddenly realised that if I fell over and died in their pen they would have absolutely no hesitation in eating me. What a way to go! Anyway, if I am to carry on keeping pigs and learning more about it, I need to send some to the chop or I can’t afford it. Sad fact but there you go. Just hoping the meat will be good.

Nicola