Pig is living a dog’s life
PET DAYCARE: Wilbur watches TV at home, snuggles with pups at work
Wilbur is happy as a pig in a poke, and why not? He’s got the world by the tail.
At home, he sits on the couch watching the tube. At work, he lives a dog’s life, mingling with the 40 or 50 typically at Vancouver’s Canine Adventure Den at any one time and even pitching in by snuggling with puppies to keep them warm.
“I started bringing him to work with me and the dogs didn’t mind at all,” Kirsty MacGregor, owner of the den, said of Wilbur, the pet pig she rescued last fall in Edmonton. “He fit right in, he’s part of the pack.” He was a runt, barely 17 pounds at three months old, when MacGregor adopted him during a weekend visit to the Alberta capital.
“He was pretty mangled up, he had some skin issues,” she said.
Today, he’s a strapping one-year-old of 75 pounds. “He filled out fast,” she said.
There are four pet pigs now registered at the daycare, their owners dropping them off when they need to leave town temporarily.
Socializing with canines is good for lone porcines, MacGregor said.
The daycare also houses rabbits, guinea pigs, turtles, fish — you name it — and acts as a temporary shelter for rescued animals.
Soon, there will be a second-floor boarding house for cats.
Do pigs really make good pets? Keep in mind they are among the smartest in the animal kingdom, able to open drawers and backpacks, among other things.
“They’re so smart that we’ve had to childproof our home,” said MacGregor, who with her husband, Kyle, also has four dogs and four cats.
“Wilbur is spoiled. His favourite thing is to sit on the sofa and watch TV. He has a keen sense of smell and he’ll eat anything — though he shouldn’t.”
Wilbur is house-trained, first taking to the cats’ litter boxes right away, then learning to go outside with the dogs at the MacGregor’s place in Langley.
On the other hand, he can have his temper tantrums, too, if he’s not fed or not let out, or simply if he got up on the wrong side of the bed.
“It’s kind of like having a four-year-old child. You need a lot of patience and you need to outsmart them all the time.”
You can check out Wilbur’s Facebook page at Mr. Wilbur the Pig.