Farm-Scape is sponsored by Manitoba Pork Council and Sask Pork Play Audio Farm-Scape is a Wonderworks Canada production and is distributed courtesy of Manitoba Pork Council and Sask Pork.

Farm-Scape, Episode 1332

The Prairie Swine Centre is preparing a fall promotional blitz to draw attention to its new one million dollar Pork Industry Interpretive Centre as a must see attraction.

Officials of the Prairie Swine Centre spent much of the spring and summer fine tuning the educational materials that will be presented at the Pork Industry Interpretive Centre...located at its Elstow, Saskatchewan research barn.

Information Services Manager Lee Whittington says the response of those who have already toured the facility, especially the youngsters, has been overwhelmingly positive.

"They're very surprised at what a pig barn is. Most of them have never been in a modern hog operation. They're usually, I think, entranced with the pigs especially in the farrowing room. Some of the tours happened to be there on days when we were actually farrowing and watching pigs born for the first time.

That was a big hit especially for the grade five class that was through. To watch the social interaction within the weanling rooms, to be able to see just how big a pig is has been a key message.

Most people have related their small understanding of pigs to either the Babe movie or cartoons or the three little pigs in the story books.

When they see how big a sow is or a mature boar and they can make that relative to the size of them or their classmates, they begin to understand the depth of these animals in terms of their size and their food producing abilities."

Whittington says tour guides are now being trained to make sure there is enough staff available to accommodate what is expected to be a large demand for tours.

He says the Prairie Swine Centre is planning to do a lot of advertising to promote the interpretive centre as a must see location.

For Farmscape.Ca, I'm Bruce Cochrane.