Darlings of the '80s, Orphans of the '90s
% Charles Town, W. Va.
CHARLES TOWN, W.VA.--For its 180 residents, it's hog heaven. On 5 acres amid a hilly forest, they live out their natural lives with no fear of being turned into bacon or barbecue. They snooze in beds of pine shavings, root in brushy pastures, wallow in mud puddles, soak in plastic swimming pools and mellow out to a mix of Haydn, Mozart and NPR while enjoying belly rubs from Dale Riffle and Jim Brewer, founders of America's chief sanctuary for homeless and abused pigs.
But not just any pigs: These are Vietnamese potbellied pigs, novelty house pets that sold in the late 1980s for thousands of dollars apiece. Increasingly, they are being dumped by owners who find they are not the perfect exotic companion animals that breeders promised. True, they are intelligent and can be taught to do tricks, walk on a leash and use a litter box. Unfortunately, they grow to 150 pounds or better--not the 40-pound minipigs that dealers touted. Hierarchical herd animals, they can be aggressive toward strangers and young children. Being pigs, they love to root, to the detriment of linoleum and furniture. (In Key West, Fla., animal control officers detained a potbelly named Chi-Chi last month after it scuffed up a Harley-Davidson motorcycle while allegedly trying to have sex with its front wheel.) Unlike other pigs, they aren't good to eat. Their meat is tough, stringy and heavily marbled with fat.
Drywall for dinner. Five years ago, Riffle and Brewer owned a large contemporary house in Maryland near the Chesapeake Bay. Then they "temporarily" took in Rufus, an unwanted 12-week-old Vietnamese piglet that local college kids kept in a bathroom. "We bonded with Rufus quickly," Riffle recalled. "I said to Jim: 'Wouldn't it be great to come home and have a bunch of them come running to greet us at the door?'" Riffle got his wish. Rufus grew and grew and never learned to use his litter box. After he developed a craving for carpets, wallpaper and drywall, Riffle and Brewer sold their home, moved to West Virginia and created their sanctuary.
Walking around the pens where the pigs are kept in small affinity groups--young, old, overweight, aggressive, sick--Riffle called each by name. Most came running. There was Annabelle, whose novelty as a San Francisco nightclub act wore off; Hope, mangled but healing after being tossed as a live dinner to a pen of hungry dogs; Dudley, once an aggressive attack pig but now a marshmallow, and Pork Chop, paraplegic after being beaten with a two-by-four.
Riffle tends PIGS--originally known as the Potbellied Pig Interest Group and Shelter, at PO Box 629, Charles Town, WV 25414 (phone: 304-725-PIGS)--while Brewer commutes to Washington, D.C., where he works as a legal secretary. The $3,500 a month needed for feed, improvements and veterinary bills (the pigs are spayed and neutered) comes from donations and Brewer's salary. With the sanctuary near capacity and scores of unwanted pigs on a waiting list, the men have their eye on a nearby 83-acre spread--if they can raise the money. "I think we're all put on Earth for some reason," said Riffle. "I guess pigs are my lot in life."
This story appears in the August 28, 1995 print edition of U.S. News & World Report.