This morning I told my wife that it’s time I butchered the hog. She looked at me like I was double bat crazy. “Kill Bubba? No way!” she says. She tells me that if I want pork, go out and shoot a wild pig. I tell her that I haven’t seen a wild pig on the place since spring.

I don’t raise hogs but I got this one when it was a piglet. My intention was to butcher it in late fall for pork and use some of the meat to make venison sausage.

Somewhere along the way my wife took a liking to the pig and named it Bubba. That did it, when a critter around here gets a name its home free. To my wife’s way of thinking, it becomes part of the family and enjoys all the privileges of a resort. In Bubba’s case that’s corn, acorns and mud.

When my wife’s outside Bubba will bark and sometimes escape, something he’s particularly good at, and come over to where she is. I don’t believe Bubba thinks much of me, he knows I would rather see him on the grill or in a frying pan.

So, it looks like Bubba is safe. I’m not going to upset my wife over one hog. I’ll take some of Bubba’s corn and put it in a feeder down by the creek and see if I can lure in a wild pig. If that doesn’t work I’ll just buy a hog, one without a name.

This evening I told her that if she starts giving names to all the critters on the place we might as well pack up and move to the city where she can shop at the local market.

Any of you folks out there who raise livestock ever have this problem or is it just me?