Pig Farming in South Africa or 'The Animal Box'

Mum is planning to fly over from Australia to help us while Wren is having surgery. While I was talking to her about her plans she was wondering whether there were any toys she could bring the kids, in particular, whether Wren needed any more animals for the animal box.

Now I don't know whether every family has an animal box, or if this was one of the many peccadilloes of my ancestral line, but David and I grew up with a big box of Britains animals and my children have one too. The current box contains some of these original animals and many many more. It is a much, much larger animal box collection made up of animals made by Papo and Schleis as well as a few Made in China bugs and snakes that came from party favors over the years.

Unfortunately, of the original animal box that I grew up with, few animals survived. The plastic became brittle and parts have broken off. We have the carcass of a black rhino (I think that is what it is) with only stumps remaining and the elephant has one foot missing.

The hardiest animals which remain are a family of pigs. These 6 pigs are deeply treasured because they come with an amusing anecdote of how my father's mother, Muriel Adams, went shopping at Musgrave Center one day and found that our local toy store was going out of business. It was offering the remaining toys at very low prices. Thinking of us, she purchased an entire bin of Britains pigs

giving us a sizable herd. David and I used to fence them in with our green zoo fences and play Pig Farms (we didn't have many cows). While adults tend to buy one of each animal - as a kind of vocabulary building exercise - it was very satisfying to have many pigs - so I always try and buy at least two of the same animal when we add to Wren's collection. That way, they can be a family, relate, hunt for each other or be lost and reunited.

We have so many different kinds of animals that it is possible for a bored adult with dark sensibilities to be creative. This morning I created a snake pit in which a cobra, a python and a few arbitrary wrigglers were fighting over an oversized cockroach. I also enjoyed this rearing horse being devoured by a hungry fly? Ant? I can't recall.

Anyway, when mum asked if there were any animals we needed, the word "needed" had me stalled for a while. Wren certainly doesn't NEED any more animals unless we are trying to form a complete catalog of fauna for each ecosystem BUT he absolutely loves his animals at the moment and spends more time
carrying them around in baskets and setting them up than he does with his diggers. He knows the names of all our animals - including: flamingo, lion, peacock, big-dog, wolf, octpus, panda bear, polar bear, giraffe, cicada, beetle - basically every animal we have, bar a few small ones that keep falling into the debris at the bottom.

So, I told Mum not to go and buy any more animals but to feel free to pick one out when she was visiting. It has to be guided by curiosity, by impulse, by the desire to play. The same feelings which are guiding me to buy 5 more pigs next time we go to the toy store!