Hi Melinda,
The size of long bones is a good help but to be quite confident in using
that criterion you have to relate them to the size of the adult. Therefore
it can be tricky to use measurements of modern larger sized pigs.
One thing that develops after birth is the line of stress in the tooth
enamel (I know that it is a general trait in human dentition). I don't know
how many days after birth that is needed for the line to develop and be
visible. That is something to investigate. What you can do is to section
some teeth in your sample (if you have teeth in it) and look for suck lines.
I have some unborn pig foeti from a sow trown into a well in 1612 AD (city
Ny Varberg in province Halland in western Sweden (then a part of Denmark)).
I can measure the long bones and give a note on tooth crown development.
Leif Jonsson
Gothenburg Museum of Natural History
|