This little piggy is scrambling no more

A long-standing farmingtradition has come to an end in New Brunswick.

After complaints from an animal activist, theWestmorlandCounty Fair inPetitcodiachas decidedto discontinue its pig scramble.

"It makes me very sad," said county fair president Lee Burgess."Most people in the country understand it all, and people whoaren't familiar with the farms and how things work, theysee itdifferently."

• Pig scramble game 'outrageous,' says animal rights advocate

In a traditional pig scramble,children, most of them from farms,chase and catch piglets inside a corral, whilefairgoers watch. Afterward, the children take the animals home to raise.

The New BrunswickSPCAhas said it is dealing with more significant problems of animal abuse in New Brunswick than a pig scramble.

But some animal activists called the pig scramble outdated and cruel because it forces pigs to exert themselves for the entertainment of people.

A squeal doesn't mean pain

"They don't really understand it," said Burgess, who has been farming for more than six decades.

"They see a pigsqueal, and think it's in pain, but you can't touch a pig without itsquealing. That's what they do."

Board members voted 71 to end the event, with many saying they simply wanted to end bad publicity for the fair.

TheWestmorlandfair was the last in the province to hold a pig scramble.

"I don't support the pig scramble, myself," saidTeriMcMackin, the liaison for the Village ofPetitcodiac."But in theinterestof the fair I think we could still have an event with pigs and kids, like having the pigs in a pen and the kids have toenticethe pigs over with food, or something like that instead."

Burgesssaid cancelling the event willfurtherdeepen the gapof misunderstandings thatsurroundfarming practices.

"I wish people better understood how the farm animals work, and how they work with the kids," she said. "But my biggest problemis how am I going to tell 40, 50 kids that we're not going to have it."