SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - It sounds likes a late April Fool's Joke, but when Lawrence Lafferty got a text message saying a pig was in his yard on Tuesday, he didn't believe it.

A creature not likely seen on a regular basis in the North, this pot-belly pig scamped and tramped around Highway 4 and the Dettah access road numerous times over the past few weeks, including last Tuesday when the pig was found playing with Lawrence Lafferty's dogs. - photo courtesy of Lawrence Lafferty

Lafferty, who lives on the Dettah access road about a kilometre down the road from the Ingraham Trail intersection, was in Yellowknife running errands when his neighbour contacted him.

"I looked at the message and I just didn't believe it," he said.

Discounting the message, Lafferty went about his business in town for about an hour before heading back home.

Sure enough, one porky pig was waddling around his yard, seeming to enjoy the company of Lafferty's dogs. It doesn't bark though.

"It thinks it's a dog," he said, adding the pig was friendly and approachable.

The pig romped around the yard, happy to be free from his pen, while Lafferty tried to figure out what to do with it. He said after phoning his niece, he figured out the animal belonged to a neighbour down the road.

"'That darn thing keeps running away' the owner – a neighbour -- told Lafferty when he picked it up that day.

"He said they let it out while they were cleaning the pen and it took off."

Likely not looking for the market or roast beef and instead of going wee wee wee all the way home, the porcine critter went to the Dettah dump. Lafferty said a friend of his saw the the pig scampering on the road near there.

"It's been travelling all over the place," he said.

Apparently, the pig has been making the rounds as of late.

Const. Todd Scaplen with the Yellowknife RCMP said his detachment received a call about a pig wandering by the Ingraham Trail on April 13.

"Someone called and said they saw it on the highway," Scaplen said.

"We're normally the only pigs in town."

Scaplen said the passersby stopped to see the pig and it came at them, likely because it was looking for somewhere warm, Scaplen said. Not long after the first call came in, the pig was delivered to the police – without an apple in its mouth and still very much alive.

"It was cold so we put a coat around it," Scaplen said, adding it wasn't long before the "suspicious pig," as he called it, made its way home. "It was maybe a half hour later when we got a call about someone missing their pig. It was really odd." so, back in its pen, the little piggy finally made it home.

Calls to the pig's owners were not returned by press time.