A farmer read a 'pig raising' book to court to defend his methods of looking after his herd.

Leonard Richard Fulcher, 61, of Ramblewood Farm, Pott Row, read extracts telling how often pigs should be fed.

Mr Fulcher, previously pleaded not guilty to nine cases of animal welfare laws.

They include causing unnecessary suffering.

In response to a video showing one piglet looking skinny and sick, Mr Fulcher told King's Lynn magistrates: 'If you are a boozer, you are a boozer. If you are a paedophile, you are a paedophile.

'If you compare the number of pigs talked about today to the hundreds I have had in my life, you would find that I am not the type of person who would purposely let pigs suffer.'

Prosecution have previously alleged that Fulcher's pigs were given insufficent food and kept in 'squalid' conditions.

The trial continues today.