When can dad be introduced to babies. He is now fixed.

Question
My sow just gave birth 1 week ago & I removed the father to avoid any problems. When can I introduce him to the babies. He was fixed a few days before she gave birth, so I'm not worried about any accidents, but I do worry about hurting the babies. Do boars attack or hurt their babies? I have heard of stories where the male did. I feel bad that I had to move him into a smaller cage & he is all alone.
Thanks in advance for your help.

Answer
Hi Dorothy,

The babies will have your sow's scent, and so if the boar comes into contact with them, he will be confused and try to mate with them. This is obviously not a good idea as there's a chance that he could impregnate the females, and he could easily crush both the males and females as they're so tiny.

The best thing to do will be to move the father's cage to where he can see the others. Once the babies are two weeks old you will easily be able to tell the genders apart. At three weeks they will be weaned from their mother, and between three and four weeks you need to take out any males or you'll have lots more babies! At this stage, you can introduce any males to their father. If you do this right, he will take them on and look after them, and they will live happily with him as they grow older.

If you aren't keeping any of the babies, you will have to wait until you've sent them to their new homes before you put the father back in with the mother. Don't do this until they are six weeks of age (but remember to separate the males at four weeks).

Hope this helps and if you have any other questions (particularly about introducing boy babies to the father when the time comes - as I have recently successfully done this) just ask!

Jenny.