Description of a Pig

Descended from Eurasian wild boars, pigs, of the Suidae family, are mammals that have domesticated for food consumption, but they also occur in the wild. Pigs also are called hogs and swine, in general. The term boar is used to denote any male pig. Female pigs are called sows if they have given birth to piglets and gilts if they have not.

  1. Physical Description

    • Pigs are broad, stocky animals with four short legs and cloven hooves. Each hoof has four toes but the pig uses only two toes for walking. Pigs have coarse, bristly hair. Their snouts are cartilaginous and are used for digging. They have short tails, which can be straight or curly. When full-grown, a pig has 44 teeth. Some pigs, most commonly those in the wild, develop tusks.

    General Characteristics

    • While pigs have a wide field of vision due to the placement of their eyes on the sides of their heads, they have poor eyesight. However, pigs have a highly developed sense of smell, which they rely on instead of sight to find food. Pigs are very social animals. They develop close bonds with other pigs and other species, including humans. They sleep lying next to each other and communicate with each other through grunting. Pigs are very clean animals. They move far away from areas where they eat and live to relieve themselves. Intolerant of heat and without sweat glands, pigs cover themselves in mud to keep cool and to protect their skin from the sun's rays. They are good swimmers and will go to water instead of mud to keep cool if the option is available.

    Intelligence

    • Pigs are highly intelligent animals. It is not uncommon for pigs to learn how to open the gates of their enclosures to obtain freedom. Sometimes they work in pairs to do this. For quite some time, the French have trained pigs to sniff for truffles, a fungus worth a lot of money in the gourmet trade. At Penn State, pigs have been taught to use their snouts to move a joystick so that a cursor moves on a monitor.

    Piglets

    • A sow gives birth to up to 12 piglets. A piglet's birth weight normally is a little over 3 pounds but they double their weight in about a week. Piglets stay with their mothers for some time after weaning.