Just Kidding, Commissioner Stewart!
Lauren Ritchie has an entertaining column about Linda Stewart's pet pig Violet. Violet sounds pretty fun. Looks like Ritchie's article will publish in the paper on Wednesday but was released early today.
If Violet visits, greet her, don't eat her
Lauren Ritchie
COMMENTARY
December 30, 2009
Violet prefers her bologna sandwiches with mayo, not mustard, thank you. A stack of them a couple of feet high would hit the spot.
And she'd like to wash them down with a case of Mountain Dew — and not that nasty diet stuff either.
Diet is not a word in Violet's vocabulary. At 350 or so pounds, this Piney Woods Rooter likes most anything edible, except for baked potatoes, which she despises. However, she'll eat even those if you slather them in sour cream and butter.
"She hates green vegetables unless you turn them into a casserole. She loves anything bad for her," said Lake County Commissioner Linda Stewart, Violet's "mom."
And does Stewart cook for this portly porcine unit?
She looked a little guilty.
"Well, sometimes I make a little extra because I know she'll get it," Stewart, 58, acknowledged.
At the moment, Stewart is worried about Violet's life expectancy. Now that she has become kind of a community pig in the neighborhood off Will Murphy Road in north Lake, Stewart fears Violet's lifespan could be cut short by a hunter in quest of barbecue.
That's why she spray-painted the word Violet on one side of the pig and Pet on the other.
Recently, the pig learned that she could use her bulk to push through fences, and now she goes visiting. Her favorite destination is the home of sheriff's Capt. Todd Luce, who lives within waddling distance of Stewart's horse barn.
Recently, Luce was throwing an afternoon barbecue, and Violet came to call. Some of his guests found it a little disconcerting when a 350-pound wild pig stuck her snotty snout toward their plates and snorted for a handout.
"I swear, she's just like a begging dog," Luce said. "It can make people a little a nervous, but we just tell them, 'Hey, y'all, it's just Violet. She's all right.' "
Not typically pets
Piney Rooter hogs are not pets. No. They are typically mad and mean. They are big. They will gore you with their tusks. They are excellent eating, and hunters in Lake County and all the way through Georgia prize them.
Don't tell that to Stewart.
"I'm the only one standing between Violet and my husband and son and all his friends," she lamented.
Violet came to the Stewart household as a byproduct of the quest for a cookout.
Stewart said her son Bill, now a 29-year-old marine-biology teacher at Leesburg High, went to South Florida with some friends and trapped several wild pigs. They brought the animals home and built a sturdy pen in the woods. The pigs were so angry and dangerous that Stewart climbed a tree and watched from her perch above as the boys wrestled them into the pen.
Mission accomplished. On to the barbecue.
The fellows started planning, but then one of the sows had a litter of pigs, and one of the piglets had a bum leg. The guys were afraid that the little girl would get trampled when she couldn't get out of the way, so they plucked her out and gave her to Stewart.
The family started feeding the piglet with an eyedropper, figuring that she'd be well enough to return to the pen in a few days.
That's where a bear comes into the picture. No, I am not making this up.
Apparently, pig smells good to plenty of predators, not just two-legged ones, and this particular bear showed up one night and ripped the pen to shreds. Stewart said there was no evidence that he'd gotten a meal. But all the pigs were gone.
Except Violet.
That's when she became part of the Stewart clan. At a family gathering several weeks later, Stewart's daughter-in-law Danielle dressed Violet in a baby outfit with delicate little purple violets all over it. She plopped the pig, who by this time had all four legs functioning perfectly, down in the midst of a get-together of more than 30 people. For hours, Violet in her darling little dress roamed between the legs of family members, rooting out tasty little scraps and grunting in contentment.
There was no turning back.
Violet goes visiting
All of that was three years ago. Now, Violet roams freely, foraging for horse food, cat food and dog food. (She hates hog food — surprise, surprise.)
Once, Stewart got tired of her eating the cat food and stowed it atop a picnic table, where Violet couldn't get at it. Wrong. The pig hefted her porcine self up onto the table and snagged the treats. The table went to the dump shortly afterward.
One of Violet's favorite treats is ham. Or pork chops. Or, for that matter, any part of a pig.
"We just don't tell her," Stewart explained apologetically.
The county commissioner and some of her friends ride Violet. (Can anyone be sober at such an event?) Their kids sit on her. She doesn't seem to mind, but Stewart never totally trusts her.
When a cold front is coming, Violet goes into the woods and drags branches back to her stall, where she makes herself a little bed to stay warm.
"Somehow, she knows," Stewart said.
When she is in season, Violet looks for male companionship, and her choice is … a horse. She sidles up to Pooh-Bear and runs her snout up and down his back legs, moaning. But that's as far as things go. Even if there were more, we would tastefully refrain from telling you.
Her days are pretty simple: lie in the stall, wait to be fed, eat. She doesn't care about being petted or scratched. She is one seriously food-focused creature.
Now, however, Violet is starting to roam farther afield. Luce's wife, Angela, caught her about a half-mile from home recently, just strolling up a dirt road toward County Road 439. That could only spell disaster, so she chased Violet home.
Stewart is hoping that no one will harm Violet during hunting season. She realizes that the pig is a tempting delicacy — but she's also a family pet. So, if you see Violet ordering a pulled-pork sandwich at the Sonny's in Eustis, please just look politely the other way.
"Really," Stewart said, "she doesn't even know she's a pig."
You can read the complete story at http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/lake/os-lk-lauren-ritchie-pet-pig-20091226,0,6063877.column
I wish Violet would visit me. I would feed her something good. She sounds funny.
Posted by: Lisa | 12/29/2009 at 11:43 AM