March 1 2010

Received my power bill yesterday ( Sunday ) and had a rather unpleasant surprise or two . Perhaps it is indicative of how the “system” works here for those that might be considering retirement .

First of all , no , the postal service doesn’t operate on Sunday but the bill posters do .  What that means for those not familiar with the system here is that the power company sends out one of their staff who reads your meter then generates your bill which is then taped to your gate or wherever .

This applies to all of your utility bills so apparently its cheaper to pay someone to drive by and post it than it is to buy a stamp . On second thought maybe its more reflective of a general distrust of the postal system .

On behalf of the postal service we have always had good service from our scheduled “mailman” on his little motor scooter despite the fact that there is no address number on the outside of the property . This is not that uncommon in the Philippines as many times roads & streets don’t even appear to have names . 

He knows the last name of course so not sure what happens when we move .Will also state that service level depends on area you live in as we have had mail pillaged or tampered with in one location or another .

You got to admit they can be fairly innovative when you receive a card from abroad that has been opened , something removed , remaining contents re-inserted and delivered as if nothing had happened . It’s always Manilla’s fault of course . 

SO , the guy from the power company shows up , reads the meter and tapes to the fence . I happened to see the bill flapping in the breeze as the gate door was open . On days when its closed or raining , well , you may or may not get a bill .

And , of course there is nothing to prevent the neighborhood kids from using it as ? or neighbors from knowing your utility costs or who is sending you mail from abroad . Reminder , pay close attention during Christmas season . 

Now , because the guy reads the meter then generates the bill at least i have an updated bill reflecting my two recent brownouts . Hence , i am naturally thinking my bill should have dropped a little since i was minus electricity for 10 hours .

Interpreting the Power Bill

Now , state side my  power bill was a little square thing that you could basically  hold in the palm of your hand . Here , when you proceed to read your power bill it unfolds like a parchment of Dead Sea Scroll . Not enough to just put the date , KWH used ,rate per KWH , total , due date , etc.

My bill has 18 separate charges on it with room for 5 more classifications of charges that are blank . Following are some of my favorites , or not so favorites .

1. Generation Charge     ( People who bill you don’t actually generate the electricity )
2. Power Act Reduction
3. Transmission Charge
4. System Loss Charge   (This is one of my favorites as apparently they charge you for their inefficiency )  
5. Distribution Charge
6. Supply Charge              ( Apparently not the same as Distribution charge so maybe it reflects the cost of paper towels & toilet paper )
7. Fixed Metering Charge   ( They charge for delivery of the bill ? )
8. Metering System Charge   ( They charge for you having a meter so they can charge you in the first place )
9. Lifeline Rate Charge/Discnt   ( Say what ? )
10. Local Franchise Tax

Value Added Tax   ( 12% )   Payable on everything , including food

In the end we used 40KWH less power but my bill increased by 11 pesos .  And , just to add insult to injury they charged us a 290 pesos “late charge” despite the fact that we payed our bill on the 4th and it was not due to the 6th .

So , how did they justify not crediting our payment on the 4th ? Good question but i suspect because that was a Thursday and giving 24 hrs to credit your account made it a Friday and we all know what Friday means .   Just a supposition on my part but can’t think of another reason . 

The Power Situation

Cagayan de Oro is now included in the “rolling brown out” scenario having started this past Thursday Feb 25 . As of now loss of power is staggered with different parts of the city being affected on different days of the week .

Power outage is supposed to be for four to four and a-half hrs per event but in our house outages have been five hrs ( so , probably Philippine time ) .  Days of outage are projected to be four per week per neighborhood .

Unfortunately our outage comes at an inconvenient time starting about 6pm and lasting until 11pm . So , by the time the power comes back up this old guy is probably sleeping . To make matters worse , no power , no water . 

Brownouts are scheduled to exist until June but frequency will increase if rainfall does not occur soon as all power generation here on Mindanao Island is hydro-electric and dam water levels are extremely low . Which may mean i need to find my “save water , bathe with a friend” sign . 

The loss of power also means no outside telecommunication via Tv or Computer for us as both are carried by the local cable company . Again , unfortunately on days we lack power the cable company also lacks power from 9am – around 2pm for our section of the city so on those days we have no tv or internet for about 9 hrs per day .

No , it is not the end of the world but it would be nice if the local cable provider or power company would deduct the missing 32 hrs a week plus from my bill . That , however , is highly unlikely . At least the outages started before i upgraded to Digital and increased my monthly bill almost double .

To Generate Or Not

As might be suspected there is a wealth of conservation going around the local expat on – line forums regarding generators and the purchase thereof . Unfortunately , being poor , i am not so inclined to shell out $3,000 plus for a generator .  So , for us its learn to live with it or find somewhere else to live . 

Like most things sold in the Philippines there is a lot of “junk” here primarily imported from China and i am told by those who know such things that it is not wise to invest in Chinese generators ( or much of anything else for that matter ) . 

Long – Term Outlook

Some folks suggest just riding it out until rainy season starts of course but truth is Mindanao in general and this area of Mindanao in particular are heading towards larger power issues in the future regardless of rainfall levels .

The simple fact is all of the Philippines suffers from a lack of generating capacity when it comes to power requirements as of today so one can only guess how bad things might get in the future .

Primarily based on increased population growth and increased demand on resources of all types but also in large part due to a lack of sufficient long – term planning on behalf of those who should know better .  Many suggest that “they” know better but simply don’t have the will to do anything about it .

Perfect example is the fact that a new airport is going up just west of us here in Cagayan de Oro but the local power distributor will not be able to supply the airport with power because it doesn’t have the capability .So , power will have to be drawn from another area much further from the city no doubt generating additional charges for transmission , etc .

Another example is a plan for a power plant to be built in this area that was first conceived of as far back as 2001 . So , what goes on with that project ? Nothing apparently as it never got off the drawing board based on a recent article .

Reasons given  are , well , not given ,  so i think you can deduce the fact that the Philippines is not exactly known for it long-term planning projections . 

Stay tuned , as i will up-date from time to time .. IF , I have power ..  

Primary Rice Producing Countries

Forget the numbers as the data is almost ten years old but what the map does show is the biggest rice producers in the world and it’s doubtful that has changed much .

So , what is the biggest common factor regarding the map above other than the fact that most of the world’s rice producing countries are in Asia ? They are all considered to have tropical climates ( excluding  parts of China ) .

They are also relatively close to the equator and there – in lies the crux of this posting . Fully aware of the fact that many of my Expat friends are poo-pooing the idea of climate change ( or more specifically , global warming ) I draw your attention to the following article extractions .

Discovery Channel

Global warming will likely lead to dramatic poleward shifts of Earth’s wettest storm-laden weather patterns, according to a remarkable 56,000-year-old stalactite found in a New Mexican cave.This means some places, like New Mexico, could dry up while others, like some parts of China, will become very, very wet.

This remarkably specific climate change forecast comes from the careful study of a record contained in the mineral layers of a stalactite (a mineral dripstone) found in Fort Stanton Cave of southeastern New Mexico.  The stalactite provides an unusual glimpse into the past because of chemical signatures in the calcite layers.

Different forms of oxygen within the minerals make it possible to distinguish water that rained or snowed down from wintry jet stream-powered Pacific Ocean storms versus the state’s annual summer monsoon rains from the Gulf of Mexico.

What the stalactite reveals are big shifts in these precipitation patterns over the millennia .It wasn’t until the researchers compared the mineral record to temperature records extracted from Greenland ice cores did it start to make any sense in the bigger picture .

The researchers also discovered a remarkably similar stalactite precipitation  record from Hulu, China (a suburb of Shanghai). That record mirrors the New Mexico pattern of dry/wet periods but in reverse: When the climate is warmer and New Mexico dries up, Hulu gets drenched.

What it suggests is that not only is the jet stream forced poleward during bouts of global warming, but the equator-straddling bands of moisture that keep tropical regions green also shift poleward, enveloping Hulu, China, among other places.

This regional picture of change is something that climatologists had suspected from previous analyses of decades of meteorological data. But they could not confirm it, until now.

Article 2

A prominent band of rain that circles the equator has moved hundreds of miles north over the last few centuries, probably because of a changing climate .

While much of the shift appears to be from natural swings in the strength of the sun, continued warming from greenhouse gas emissions could push the rain band even further north.That might deprive some tropical regions of freshwater and jeopardize the subsistence lifestyles of more than a billion people.

“So much of the world’s population lives a lifestyle that’s so incredibly dependent on rainfall,” said Julian Sachs, a chemical oceanographer at the University of Washington, Seattle.Sachs was digging through mud on Washington Island, a tiny atoll in the central tropical Pacific, when he was struck by an “aha moment.

In an attempt to document how Earth’s tropical climate had changed before satellite technology existed to document it, he and colleagues were looking at layers of sediment beneath a freshwater lake on the island, which lies about 5 degrees north of the equator .

The team hit a layer of strawberry jam-like goo that stretched down for 12 or 15 feet. They knew that the jelly got its color and consistency from cyanobacteria , which only live in super-salty water. That meant that, even though the island gets tons of rain today and researchers sat in an inflatable boat on top of a pure freshwater lake, the island was once much drier.

Then they went to Palau, which is at 7 degrees north of the equator and very wet today ( Due East of the Phillipines ) .They dug down as far as 40 feet and as far back as 1,200 years. Their results, which they reported in Nature Geoscience, suggested that the band of thick clouds and rain that circles the globe hovered right near the equator during the 1600s.

During that time, Sachs said, sunspots were rare, and the sun was putting out about 1/10th of one percent less solar radiation than today.Over the centuries, as the Sun heated back up ever so slightly, the band (also called the intertropical convergence zone) moved northward as much as 500 kilometers (300 miles) — turning dry regions into wet ones and wet regions into dry ones.

The rain band moves towards whichever hemisphere is warmer, said Wallace Broeker, an earth scientist at Columbia University’s Lamont Doherty Earth Observatory. As global warming continues, he said, the Northern Hemisphere will warm more quickly because it has more land than does the Southern Hemisphere, where large stretches of ocean buffer some of the heat. That will likely push the intertropical convergence zone even further north.

What’s more, shifts in the tropical rain band coincide precisely with precipitation and climate changes in other areas around the globe, including China and the United States.

Article 3

From 1979 to 2001, the Northern Hemisphere’s jet stream moved northward on average at a rate of about 1.25 miles a year, according to the paper published  in the journal Geophysical Research Letters. The authors suspect global warming is the cause, but have yet to prove it.

The jet stream is a high-speed, constantly shifting river of air about 30,000 feet above the ground that guides storm systems and cool air around the globe. And when it moves away from a region, high pressure and clear skies predominate. Two other jet streams in the Southern Hemisphere are also shifting poleward, the study found.

The study looked at the average location of the constantly moving jet stream and found that when looked at over decades, it has shifted northward. The study’s authors and other scientists suggest that the widening of the Earth’s tropical belt — a development documented last year — is pushing the three jet streams toward the poles.

A rate of 1.25 miles a year “doesn’t sound like much, but that works out to about 18 feet per day,” Caldeira said. “If you think about climate zones shifting northward at this rate, you can imagine squirrels keeping up. But what are oak trees going to do? ( And Rice Growers ) ?

Summary

The fact that climate change is occuring on Earth is not debated . How much man is contributing to that change is debated .  And despite the recent record snow storms in America and the global warming argument it is obvious that rain fall patterns are changing world – wide . I suspect that does not bode well for a country like the Philippines which struggles as it is to produce Rice .

Electricity generation throughout the Philippines is periously close to “Brown Out” status because of low water – levels in dams .  And , how many are aware of the fact that the Philippines is now seeding for rain ? Bottom line is i don’t think you have to be a climatologist to read the writting on the wall .  

So , here is my annual ( or to be annual ) State of the Union address for Cagayan De Oro , the city in which i live here in the Philippines .

So , here we are on this fine Feburary day ( I could actually see stars at dawn this morning ) surveying the local landscape and it ain’t all that pretty and i am not refering to the weeds in my front yard that pass as grass . 

Like every location in the Philippines , Cagayan de Oro has its strong points and its weak points but i woke this morning to one of its weaker points . A quick glance at the on – line edition of the local newspaper ( Sun Star – Cagayan De Oro ) had an article that immediately caught my attention , excerpted in part below .

Power Shortage Looms

CAGAYAN Electric Power and Light Company (Cepalco) is reportedly preparing for the worst energy power shortage, which is expected to happen in Mindanao in the coming days.

Ecilio Sumaoy, Systems Operation Department manager of Cepalco, said there will be a possible shortage of electricity for the whole year since supply from existing sources will not be enough for the year.

Sumaoy said power consumers in Cagayan de Oro would experience brownouts this month “if we will not act as responsible consumers.” He said rotating brownouts will start this month and will last until June which is the peak of “thinning power energy.”

Now , let me preface what i am about to say by stating that i have lived in this area for 7 years and have yet to have a single “brown out” . That does not mean , however ,  that i have not any “black outs” . Those i have every month and assume everyone else does as well . 

Now , Cepalco might consider them as “brown outs” because they reduce ( turn off or shut down ) power to some in order to provide to others . But if i have no power then i don’t have a damn brown out , I have a black out .

“Brown – out is a condition of lower than normal power – line voltage  being supplied by your local utility or generating equipment . Black – out is a power outage or power loss of the electric power to an area” , or so goes the standard definition .

Why Filipinos insist on calling “black – outs” , “brown – outs” is apparently one of those cultural distinctions , perhaps having something to do with “saving face” , another cultural distinction . 

Regardless of what they are called the obvious question is “Why” . The obvious answer is because the demand for electricity is ballooning faster than the capacity to provide it . Ok , simple enough . So , that begs the next question . So , why have the powers that be ( the utilities & the politicians ) not seen this coming for years ?

Actually , they have and just haven’t done anything about it . More power plants need to be built and that takes long – range planning  of which the Philippines in general is not known for ( said as an opinion with the knowledge that i will most likely be attacked as being “insensitive” to Filipinos ) or something to that effect .

Truth is , has more to do with lack of funding ( read as investment) either from domestic or foreign sources . Given the fact that the Philippines has one of the highest KWH rates for electricity in all of Asia , if not the world , one has to wonder why investors aren’t getting in line to make money .

Even with my limited understanding of investment ( because i have no money to invest ) investors want and except a fair return on their investment . Given the rates here that would not seem to be the issue . I can understand the reluctance of foreign investors given the Philippine limitations on same but that would not explain the lack of domestic investors , would it ?

As for the suggestion by Cepalco to “act as responsibile consumers” i have a suggestion . Engage in some long-term planning ( there is that phrase , again ) and discuss with the various barangay captains the possibility of replacing street lights that burn 24 hrs a day with timed devices . And , yes , that would mean more short – term investment for long-term savings . 

Barangay

For those residing abroad and not familiar with the term Barangay i will attempt to confuse you even further with an expat explanation .  Having lived in the southern  US i really have no adequate comparison or example of a US equivalent .

Similar to a neighborhood , but much larger , with some by population count being big enough to be considered as towns , they are political units unto themselves . The city of Cagayan De Oro has about 80 if memory serves me correctly .

The Barangay Captain is the person in charge of the local gov unit and trust me , they are in charge .  Now , if you can imagine having about 80 mayors in a city of just over 1 million maybe you begin to see some of the potential issues involvved in making changes , including street – lights or garbage pick – up .  

Conclusion

I will not go into any of the other areas of concern i might have regarding the State of the Union locally at this time as i might be here far to long .  Actually , i just added the (Part 1) to the title of the article because i know there will be a Part 2 , ? , ?   

Thank You Mr President

This image sent to me by my sister living in Florida , USA got me to thinking about the challenges facing all people , everywhere . Living in a third – world culture poverty is more visible than perhaps in a first world country but may soon be coming more visible in a country near you . 

With Obama having announced a 3.8 trillion plan to restart the American economy i suspect the numbers on the little girl’s sign will rapidly increase . Just wondering what the numbers might be if the child pictured were a Filipino ?

There are , of course , vast differences from being a citizen in a debtor nation like the US versus being one in the Philippines . First and foremost i suppose would be the fact that America has a tendency to print it’s way forward ( as in money ) but someone has to cover those printing obligations at some point in the future .

The US official Unemployment rate is now 10% + and the Philippines rate as 7% + though obviously the American rate is much closer to the reality of everyday life than the Philippines figure. Playing games with the numbers by using ambiguous references such as “under – employed” or “not seeking” doesn’t really fool anyone  except the people who put out the numbers in the first place . 

And , there is a huge difference in being unemployed because you can’t find a job that you really want to do versus not finding a job simply because there aren’t any or aren’t enough to go around . Also , obviously first world countries have much more extensive social networks for folks to fall back on than does the Philippines .

Just wondering if the economy in the US gets bad enough if people will start taking jobs simply because its a job and not because it meets their standard of financial reward ? Some already are of course but the longer this drags out i suspect the larger the percentage will get . And , if that happens , how does that impact the Filipino OFW ?

I have often heard/read the complaint that the only reason illegals are acceptable within American culture is because Americans won’t work for low wages or perform certain types of work but that argument is wearing thin . Have also heard that America  will never close it’s doors to those from abroad but the fact is that the doors not as wide open as it used to be .

With the current financial pressures being applied to the American citizen and given it’s aging population one wonders what the future might hold . No , America will never completely shut off the foreign pipeline because it needs foreign workers but to suggest that it will always have a high demand for such , especially the unskilled or casual worker variety , i suspect is just playing Ostrich . 

And , despite the fact that the Philippine government likes to tout the success rate of employing OFW’s as nurses or other health care workers the vast majority of Philippine OFW’s are classified as unskilled or casual labor . And , as any one knows that has ever lived in America , sooner ot later , the everyday person will have an increase in taxes and a decrease in services .

As the US government becomes more centralized and states continue to lose influence you have to wonder where it is all heading ? An article i read this morning says most Philippine OFW’s are re-hires and not new hires and that there is a 40% shortfall on providing Filipino OFW’s due to lack of skills . The article relates to OFW employment world -wide and not just in the US .

Here’s hoping that the next photo i see of a future generation child holding a placard regarding it’s debt obligation is not a Filipino .

Ok , so it ain’t Memorial day but you get the idea . I have managed to sit at the computer long enough (10am) till the skies cloud over and it looks like the daily rains are approaching which of course means no yard work . 

The wife is at another church function after having spent hours preparing for another presentation of some sort . Sounds like a “test” to me .  My step-daughter showed up last night from college with 3 roomates ( unannounced , of course ) .

Is the Philippines the only country in the world where practically everyone owns a cell – phone but never uses to inform someone of an arrival in advance ?  And how do you equate her and her friends being in front of the tv watching cartoons as a college field – trip . 

For that matter is watching cartoons indicative of the intellectual level i am paying for my step – daughter to achieve while attending college ?  Could be worse of course as they could be watching Wow – Wow – We .

Then there’s the 29 junk “adult” messages i received in my spam folder overnight no doubt courtesy of the guy/guys that were identified as trolls in a previous article .

Seems he is upset with me because i don’t play fair by publishing his comments . Never mind the fact that he doesn’t even have a valid e-maill address to send anything to much less publish a comment . 

And how is your weekend going ? 

Artistic Conception

According to Nasa’s Goddard Space Flight Center “black holes” are really just the evolutionary end point of of massive stars . According to Hollywood ( and Dr Spock  and the Enterprise crew ) black holes are ‘time – traveling” tunnels to other dimesions that permit one to go back or forward in time . Either way , i am convinced there is one hovering somewhere out there over CDO or at least over my neighborhood . 

Again , according to Nasa , if a star undergoes a supernova explosion it will collapse in on itself and in the process create a gravity field so strong that nothing can escape it , including light . And i am convinced that’s what happening to various items from our house .

Either that or the ET’S ( extraterrestrials )  are grabbing them though for the life of me i can’t comprehend why they would need localized maps , a book about age – regression , a Linux installation CD or bars of soap .  For that matter maybe they are coming through that very black hole to collect souvenirs out of curiosity .

Now , i can understand why the cement blocks in the wall running around the house disappear from time to time . Because this is the Philippines and because someone needed them and because this culture seems to have a “don’t ask , don’t tell” policy .  Or , if it were the rubber tongs left on the front porch i could blame it on the cats or even Larry , the lizard .

But cats and lizards don’t read , use computers or use soap bars to bathe so obviously that can’t be the answer . Besides , the missing items were all in doors and except for Larry on rare occasions or the cats when you leave the front door open and they smell food those guys don’t customarily visit .

Now , granted this may be a far out theory as when i mentioned a “black hole” to my wife she started talking about some hole “underneath” she heard about in regards to CDO . 

Ok , i know what’s coming next . Since we can’t see a black hole in the first place how do we know they exist ? According to Nasa , because as they pass through inter – stellar matter they pull matter in , heat up , gain kinetic energy and are squeezed by tidal forces they emit x-rays and x-rays are detectable . But the real reason i know they  exist is because the Klingons used to come through them . 

Klingon

Now , i don’t know about the book , the cd or the maps but this fellow does look as if he could use a bar of soap .  There are other theories of course such as “worm holes” , “wak wak”, “ascension” and various other types of dimensional shifts but i am sticking to the “black hole” theory because they are scientifically proven to exist . 

You , however , are welcome to submit other theories based upon no particular point of reference but please , no “pink elephant” jokes . 

I had a fairly good day yesterday as i have been in the process of downloading a series of videos for a research data base i am building . When i say a good day that means that a 2 – 3 minute download for those with a real cable connection was only taking 20 – 30 minutes . 

Those expats living in the Philippines will understand and for those that don’t understand then perhaps you haven’t visited/lived in a third – world country .  Anyway , just as i was dozing off while viewing the latest National Geographic episode of another upcoming Earth calamity my wife informs me that we were going to get a pig .

Being resolute and just wanting to crash i basically ignored that remark , or so i thought . Unfortunately , my subconscious did not ignore that remark as it spent the night running pig scenarios by me by the bushel . I should have known better as by previous research i was aware of the best time to make a suggestion to the unconscious is just prior to falling asleep . 

I won’t go into all the possibile scenairos my subconscious presented me with but will say they included everything from seeing myself sloshing around in pig sxxx in knee high waders to listening to the neighbors dogs barking all night non – stop to not being able to sit in the living room with the door open . And all of this for weeks/months just to sell for less than a hundred bucks ?

I will admit to not being totaly unprepared for such livestock options as reminded of the time some of my wifes friends dropped off a box of chickens one night by sitting them down in the front yard and making a beeline back to their vechicle . Not being the farmer type i left them in their box overnight near the front porch and the next day got to watch them running around the front yard doing what chickens do . 

Upon awaking i also remembered my wife saying something about 1500p so i am assuming that would be the amount required for the purchade of a piglet ? Doesn’t matter to me because if i want to invest $30 + in pork meat i will go to the grocery store and buy it . Now , don’t get me wrong regarding livestock as i do appreciate those folks that have an interest in such pursuits but i am not one of those folks .

This morning my wife goes to church early so we didn’t have time to discuss this latest “money – making opportunity” . Then , wouldn’t you just know it that while sitting at the computer downloading i start to feel guilty ( trust me , you have a lot of free time while downloading with my connection ) .  So , to provide relief for my sudden influx of grief regarding my attitude i take to the wonderful world of internet pig research .

Didn’t have to go very far as “pig raising in the Philippines” will get you alot of stupendeous advice . I know for instance that raising a pig/pigs in a back yard environment in the Philippines is pretty common . Partly because there are no neighborhood ordinances regarding such enterprises in the Philippines but mainly because that’s what Filipinos do . I mean you probably couldn’t do that in  Makati City but city anywhere else seems to be pretty much open game ( pun intended ) .

Along the way here are a few things i learned about raising a pig/pigs:

Pigs grow fast. They grow from about 3 pounds at birth to market weight at 225 pounds in about 6 months. It takes some 10 months from the time the sow conceives until her pigs reach market weight.

Now , i have nothing against reaching market weight but 6 months ? And besides , i have no intention of wrestling around with a pig that weights more than me at my age .  I can still remember chasing the little critters around on the 4th of July for the fun of it but there ain’t no 4th of July here . 

And here is what i learned about how to choose a pig for raising in the first place:

• Young female swine should have a minimum of 6 pairs of well-developed and properly spaced function teats. If not, they are likely to have poor milking capacity.  ( You milk pigs ? )

• Teats that are inverted do not secrete milk, so choose pigs whose teats are not inverted.  ( This i could determine )

• Long-bodied sows are desirable because of the more space created for udder development.  ( So , how does one determine what is long-bodied when the piglet is small bodied ? )

• Body width is uniform from front to rear.

• When selecting breeding-animal, see to it that it has well-developed ham, loin and shoulder.  ( I ain’t breeding )

• Well-placed feet and legs. Medium short feet and short upright pasterns are preferable.  ( What’s a pastern ? )

• Select the biggest among the litter.  ( What if you don’t see the rest of the litter ? )

• Do not select young female swine that fail to secrete milk.  ( So , i have to wait around for that ? )

• Select vigorous pigs from a healthy litter in a herd raised under good swine sanitation. Do not keep gilts or boars nor breed from litters that have physical abnormalities for these may be inherited.  ( Does this mean you have to run a DNA test ? )

• In selecting gilt or sow, these pointers should be considered: clearly visible and well-developed primary sex organs, equal-sized testicles, pigs that have been proven and tested with traits that can overcome the defects of the herd, and ignore the minor defects in the pig that are present, provided that they are not present among the sows. ( So , who’s gonna check for that ? )

In summary , i found all the reasons i need to just “say no” . Of course , moma ain’t home from church yet .