STORIES

Abandoned piglet is lost and hound: Giant farm dog saves baby pig's bacon by adopting it as one of its own

A giant farm dog and a tiny piglet cuddle up as if they were family after the baby runt was dismissed by its own mother.

Surrogate mum Katjinga, an eight-year-old Rhodesian Ridgeback, took on motherly duties for grunter Paulinchen - a tiny pot-bellied pig - and seems to be taking the adoption in her stride.

Lonely Paulinchen was luckily discovered moments from death and placed in the care of the dog who gladly accepted it as one of her own. Thankfully for the two-week old mini porker, Katjinga fell in love with her at first site and saved her bacon.

Motherly love: Baby piglet feeds on its new surrogate mum

And the unlikely relationship has made the wrinkly piggy a genuine sausage dog. In these adorable images Paulinchen can even be seen trying to suckle from her gigantic new mum.

The two animals live together on a huge 20-acre farm in Hoerstel , Germany , where Katjinga's owners Roland Adam, 54, and his wife Edit, 44, a bank worker, keep a pair of breeding Vietnamese pigs.

Nose place like home: The baby piglet nuzzles up to its new mum

Property developer Roland found the weak and struggling piglet after she was abandoned by the rest of her family one evening after she was born.

He said: "The pigs run wild on our land and the sow had given birth to a litter of five in our forest.
"I found Paulinchen all alone and when I lifted her up she was really cold.

Feeding time: Piglet's new canine mother has no problem providing milk for the youngster

"I felt sure some local foxes would have taken the little pig that very night so I took it into my house and gave her to Katinga.

"She had just finished with a litter of her own, who are now 10 months, so I thought there was a chance she might take on the duties of looking after her. "Katinga is the best mother you can imagine. She immediately fell in love with the piggy. Straight away she started to clean it like it was one of her own puppies.

Doting: Caring pooch checks up on her new addition

"Days later she started lactating again and giving milk for the piggy. She obviously regards it now as her own baby."

INTERESTING STORIES

Amazing Berlon Rhodesian Ridgebacks
- Send in by Nelius van Tonder -

We live on a 130ha farm close to Bronkhorstspruit where our four Ridgebacks have more or less free range. On our northern side we are surrounded by numerous smallholdings, an informal settlement, and just beyond that - a wild blue gum forest with all sorts of nice stuff for our Ridgies to sniff and chase about. To see them hunt as a pack at breathtakingly fast pace, covering vast distances is quite awesome. The oldest female "Avalon" instinctively does the flanking work while the male "Excaliber", finishes off the quarry as soon as it turns inside, with the 2 younger dogs Gotham (their daughter from a previous litter) and Rouge a rescued case both approximately 9 months old, bringing up the rear. When Gotham was younger the two older dogs would go out regularly hunting and bring back a partially eaten rabbit for her to feed on, their natural parenting and hunting instincts obviously very much alive.

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Mother instinct
- Send in by Adoree Louw -

Ch. Entle Sipho of Danntrig and Nyla of Danntrig had a lovely litter of 8 pups on 18 December 2006. Nyla is a very good mother and did not allow any other dog near her babies for the first 2 weeks. Another of the bitches, Demundeville Timone of Danntrig, was due to whelp on 25 December but this turned out to be a phantom pregnancy(she had milk and was constantly nesting, but no pups).Timone was very interested in and motherly towards Nyla's pups from the start but was not allowed close. At 3 weeks Nyla allowed the other dogs to get near the pups and Timone's mother instinct took over! She settled herself amongst the pups and within a few minutes the pups were sucking and drinking very contently! Nyla accepted the surrogate mother and all tasks are now shared - cleaning, feeding, protecting and all seem to be happy and content! On the photo you can see Timone in front with half the pups and Nyla at the back with the other 4 pups!