NYC family fights to keep dying pygmy pig at home during its final days, but city threatens to send pet packing
Their pet should die with pignity.A Staten Island family is fighting to keep its dying pet pig at home in its final days but the city wants the animal out – even if it means taking it by force.The Gannone family said 15-year-old pygmy pig “Lucy” has lived in their home in Tottenville for years until a neighbor recently called 311 to report the portly pet to the Department of Health.The family is now facing thousands of dollars in fines for having an exotic pet as Lucy receives treatment at a local veterinary clinic.“They’re not allowing her to stay here.
After her treatment she has to get out of here,” Lori Ann Gannone told The Post.Lucy likely only has days before it heads to the pig sty in the sky.“I just want her to stay with us as a family as long as she can here.It’s not like it’s going to be for long,” Gannone said somberly.A DOH official told the family that they must remove Lucy, and until they do, fines could range from the range of $300 up to $10,000, Gannone said.
And if they don’t remove it themselves, the city may remove it by force.But the family’s hams may be tied with options for the elderly pig which is mostly bedridden in its “pinky twilight” years — having trouble walking with its skin covered in possibly cancerous sores.“I don’t understand.How is this a problem? My pig is sick.
I’m renovating my home upstate.So, she needs to be here because she’s pretty much, you know, on her way out,” Gannone told The Post.The Gannones — Lori Ann, her husband and two adult children — said that Lucy has been like one of their dogs or cats and only travels when the family visits a second home in Davenport.“There’s no way of protecting her from the bears and coyotes right now,” Lor Ann Gannone said, adding that Lucy would be “bound to die” if brought upstate now.
“If she was younger, yes, but now, no.”“With the house up there, look what just happened with that squirrel and the raccoon,” Gannone said,...