25th November: Day of the Pig

In the French Revolutionary Calendar, 25 November was the Day of the Pig, so here are 10 things you may not know about pigs:

1. There are estimated to be a billion pigs alive on the planet at any one time, making them one of the most numerous large animals. More than half of these animals live in China.
2. By contrast, there is only one pig living in Afghanistan, in Kabul Zoo. There used to be two, but one died.
3. A pig's snout is 2,000 times more sensitive to smell than the human nose.
4. The Latin name for the domestic pig is Sus scrofa, although some authors call it S. domesticus, reserving S. scrofa for the wild boar.
5. The pig's reputation for being dirty is entirely unfounded. In the right conditions, they are very clean indeed. They will not use their eating or sleeping place as a toilet, and they will bathe in water. It's true they sometimes like to wallow in mud, but this is to keep them cool (despite the term "sweat like a pig" pigs cannot actually sweat very much) and mud makes a very good sunscreen.
6. A pig has four toes on each foot, but only walks on two of them. The other two toes are for balance and rarely touch the ground.
7. There is an Olympic Games specially for pigs. The Pig Olympics includes pig racing, pig swimming, and "pigball" a game rather like football. The pigs which take part are specially bred "pig-letes".
8. European regulations require farmers to provide mental stimulation for their pigs, as they have been found to be highly intelligent (more intelligent than a three year old human child) and Dutch scientists have developed a video game especially for pigs.
9. In Hannibal's time, pigs were used against Hannibal's war Elephants. The elephants were found to be terrified of the sound of a pig squealing, and would run away, often trampling their own troops in the process. Being a war pig was not pleasant for the pig, though, for making the pigs produce the noise meant setting them on fire or piercing their feet.
10. Pigs are omnivores, meaning they will eat practically anything, including each other, and there have been cases recorded of pigs eating humans - an Oregon farmer was eaten by his pigs in 2012. It's not known whether the pigs killed him or if he died of natural causes and then became lunch for the hogs.