If you’re too young to remember, Babe was a movie about a pig raised by sheepdogs who learns to herd sheep. Like any movie that involves real animals, multiple animals were required for filming. Because the pigs kept growing too fast, a total of 48 real Yorkshire pigs were used during the production of the movie.
One animatronic double was also used at some points. Each pig had a toupee and eyelashes added by a makeup artist. Because there were so many animals used and so many different kinds used, 56 animal trainers were on set, handling a total of nearly 1000 animals.
Why so many animals? Much of them were young and kept growing too fast because of the productions schedule. Pre-production lasted eight months, shooting took six months, and post-production took twelve months.