Pig Day

What the day is

Pig Day is observed on March 1. It was started in 1972 by two American sisters, one a teacher in Texas, as a day to give the animal some credit.

Origin and background

The credit is deserved, and the research is the interesting part. Pigs perform well on tasks used to assess animal cognition. They have been trained to operate a joystick with their snouts to move a cursor toward a target on a screen, a task requiring them to connect their own movement to a symbol on a display, which is not trivial and which many species never manage.

They also use mirrors informationally. In experiments where food was visible only as a reflection, pigs turned away from the mirror and went to the actual location, indicating they were using the reflection as spatial information rather than reacting to it as another animal. They learn individual names, distinguish between people, and show evidence of remembering where and when they found things.

The cleanliness reputation is exactly backwards. Pigs cannot sweat effectively and wallow in mud to cool down, which is thermoregulation rather than filth, and given the room they keep their sleeping area strictly separate from where they toilet, which is unusual among farm animals.

That capacity is the uncomfortable part of the day. Intensive pig farming keeps a highly exploratory, social animal in conditions offering almost nothing to investigate, and the behavioral problems that follow, including tail biting, are widely understood as consequences of barren environments. Enrichment requirements exist in some jurisdictions for exactly that reason.

Pigs are also close enough to humans physiologically to be used in valve replacement and organ research, which is its own strange kind of tribute.

How to take part

• Read about the joystick and mirror experiments, which are genuinely striking.
• Buy higher-welfare pork if you eat it, and know what the label actually certifies.
• Visit a farm or sanctuary where pigs have room to root.
• Stop using dirty as a synonym for pig.
• Think twice about miniature pigs as pets. Most grow far larger than promised.