16/08/2025
Our heartfelt condolences go out to everyone at the wonderful Eden Farmed Animal Sanctuary Ireland 🙏💔🐾
“We lost our beautiful Emily this week. Emily developed arthritis a few years ago so she had several episodes of being unable to walk. Rehabilitating a 'downed' pig is not an easy task for them or for us but on every occasion, she was able to overcome her health issues and we were able to nurse her back to recovery.
Just over a year ago she developed weakness in her back legs. These episodes were more serious. Miraculously, she responded to treatment on the previous two occasions and was able to live a normal life for a few months. It was inevitable that a time would come when she stopped responding. These kinds of joint and spinal problems are secondary to pigs being bred for the pig flesh industry. Their weight renders them helpless and makes it very difficult for their human carers to help them.
Although it is anathema to us, we acknowledge that most people think of pigs in terms of their use; a quickly forgotten sandwich, an unnecessary breakfast. But to us Emily was a person with a unique personality, someone we loved.
Emily was an incredibly sensitive pig who felt everything intensely. She required the most gentle touch. Shortly before her death, she cried when our vet examined her with a stethescope. We can only imagine how over-sensitive she had become.
She came to us when she was a tiny piglet along with her friend, Charlotte. They lived in our house until they were old enough to join George on the sanctuary. From the outset Emily's strong personality was evident. She was playful, enormously energetic and fun. She and Charlotte formed a bond of companionship that was to last throughout her life. When Charlotte became very ill with peritonitis when she was young, Emily was concerned and watched over her until she recovered. In recent years, whenever our vet visited Emily she was vocal in her objection, despite the fact that his intervention relieved her problems time and time again. Whenever Charlotte heard Emily's roars, she herself became incredibly distressed, tossing everything in her path in an attempt to save her friend. When Emily was confined to her barn due to mobility issues, Charlotte used to gather dock leaves and line Emily's bed with them. We have hundreds of photos of the two of them lying in their cosy bed, cooling off in their mud bath, resting in the sun, chatting together, and digging in their field. Charlotte will be bereft without her.
Each of us at Eden is grieving at her loss. She was a member of our family for all of her nine years and an integral part of our sanctuary. She has appeared in countless Go Vegan World ads.
When we think of her beautiful, friendly face, her eyes that resembled human eyes, when we remember the gentle way she would chat to us, how she treasured the many pleasures in her life, and how exquisitely sensitive her nature was, we know she would have broken if she had spent her life on a pig farm instead of at our sanctuary. Her mind and body could not have coped with being used as a commodity, being artificially inseminated, spending time in a sow stall or farrowing crate, witnessing the mutilation of her precious piglets and facing the loss of them when they were slaughtered. She would not have coped with the overcrowding, noise and competition. We have no doubt that she would have been a shell of the person she became at our sanctuary.
The appalling conditions of the lives of over three million pigs in Ireland end in brutal slaughter every year. Each one of them had a unique personality like Emily. Each of them is as sensitive, affectionate, as interested in enjoying life and avoiding pain, as Emily was. The only difference between Emily and the billions of pigs killed worldwide every year is that we knew and loved her and told her story. We were privileged to share in her life and we are utterly heart broken without her.”
