I remember the winter of .....

Folklore is framed by memories and memories are tinted by perspective: "Where were you when Kennedy was shot?/The first man stepped on the moon/Elvis died/During the Gales of '87/When The Tsunami struck?" people will go on asking for years to come.

Likewise, different people will remember the winter of 09/10 for the longest cold spell since records began/the worst forest fires for decades/the most horrendous mudslides/the deepest snow for 70 years etc etc etc.

Piglore develops like that too.....

Ask Mangal and he will tell you of the day he put extra feedbowls in his ark and Ginger returned to him. He will reminisce about the summer he taught horses to love pigs...... and the warmest winter on record when he lay in his pen watching the primroses waving in the November breeze. "I remember the winter of 2007" he used to say to the little piglets.

Today though he will tell you of the wettest and muddiest winter since pigs first trotted on this earth.. More snow and rain than ever pigs have lived through. More dreadlocks than can ever be called attractive. More mud than would be needed to sustain a 100-strong herd through the driest summer. And it's not over yet.

They may not be able to fly - yet - but the RectoryReserve herd have elevated swine swimming to a new art.

Luckily Ginger's last litter had a few dry days after they were born in November otherwise their only knowledge of the world would be of endless mud and gloop. Delila's weanlings got so fed up with swimming round in their pen (first photo) that they managed to persuade Nigella next door to open up the fence between them so that they could get to higher ground! It was drier but with 6 extra sets of trotters running around, not least at feed times, it's now just as bad as ever theirs was.

We used to have a little joke here that whenever we put fertiliser or seed down on the pastures we got no rain for 6 weeks....... So, we stopped doing it. Next month, however, we are definitely going to put some fertiliser - no, lots of fertiliser - down....... it'll take far longer than 6 weeks to dry out the pigs' quarters...................

Failing that.... swan husbandry sounds a very attractive alternative..... This photo was taken on the last day of the shooting season.... the swans will doubtless remember the winter of 09/10 as the one when all their favourite ponds and rivers were deliciously full................