[ARCHIVED THREAD] - Pigs 2009 (Page 2 of 5)
|
Quoted:
Ok, so this year you went with a mix, but last year did you like the Hampshire or the Duroc more? Which breed would you recommend for a first time go 'round? I wouldn't get too hung up on the breed. Genetics do matter, but these are feeder pigs, not the progeny for for a dynasty of swine champions. 
Last year we had two Hampshires and a Duroc. I can't tell the difference in the meat. I'd suggest just getting healthy, vigorous pigs that have some sort of attractive bloodline. Then feed 'em out, process 'em and enjoy. 
|
|
Quoted:
Quoted:
Ok, so this year you went with a mix, but last year did you like the Hampshire or the Duroc more? Which breed would you recommend for a first time go 'round? I wouldn't get too hung up on the breed. Genetics do matter, but these are feeder pigs, not the progeny for for a dynasty of swine champions.
Last year we had two Hampshires and a Duroc. I can't tell the difference in the meat. I'd suggest just getting healthy, vigorous pigs that have some sort of attractive bloodline. Then feed 'em out, process 'em and enjoy. I agree it's not rocket surgery. Get a darker one if you have a lot of sun, otherwise, doesn't matter much. we ended up a lot of mixes but the pork all tastes the same. (although I have heard that Berkshires taste totally different, but expect to pay a lot for one) |
|
Quoted:
Skunkum, Do you know an appropriate swine dosage for piperazine? My feed store has it but it's labelled for dogs and cattle. Sorry but I didn't know the correct dosage. These guys do: FDA Do a basic search for Piperazine. Looks like 50 mg per pound of body weight. Piperazine also is approved for chickens. |
|
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
Ok, so this year you went with a mix, but last year did you like the Hampshire or the Duroc more? Which breed would you recommend for a first time go 'round? I wouldn't get too hung up on the breed. Genetics do matter, but these are feeder pigs, not the progeny for for a dynasty of swine champions.
Last year we had two Hampshires and a Duroc. I can't tell the difference in the meat. I'd suggest just getting healthy, vigorous pigs that have some sort of attractive bloodline. Then feed 'em out, process 'em and enjoy. I agree it's not rocket surgery. Get a darker one if you have a lot of sun, otherwise, doesn't matter much. we ended up a lot of mixes but the pork all tastes the same. (although I have heard that Berkshires taste totally different, but expect to pay a lot for one) I was more interested in heartiness, weight gain, temperament, ect. I take it they were pretty similar in these respects? +1 on the darker skin, we live in the San Joaquin valley, its sunny and HOT here, which is why I'm hoping to run my first bunch through the winter and have them butchered in late spring. I'm hoping we are able to close on the new house sometime in November (Its a short sale, and the bank has to approve our offer which takes time.) It would be great if we could be in the house by Fair, which is early October, but I think the odds are against that. |
|
Quoted:
Quoted:
Skunkum, Do you know an appropriate swine dosage for piperazine? My feed store has it but it's labelled for dogs and cattle. Sorry but I didn't know the correct dosage. These guys do: FDA Do a basic search for Piperazine. Looks like 50 mg per pound of body weight. Piperazine also is approved for chickens. Thanks, skunkum. That dose agrees with one that I dug up elsewhere, so that's what I'll go with. 
|
|
Well, we had our first jailbreak.
Friend of mine lent us a skidsteer and I was in the front part of our property, moving some dirt. Mrs. Feral was in the garden with the baby. I looked over and there were three pigs cantering through the front yard. 
Hopped out of the skidsteer and yelled "PIG EMERGENCY!" Mrs. Feral sees what's going on and grabs a handy squash: "Here, pig pig pig." They slowed down about 30 feet from the busy road at the front of the property and decided that they liked the sound of "Here, pig pig pig." Mrs. Feral tosses me the squash and runs up to put the baby in the house. The pigs folllow me back to their pen (about 100 yards) and Mrs. Feral comes back out. Now, the pen doesn't have a gate––it's all hog panels and T-posts. So I'm trying to figure out how to get the hogs back IN the pen when Mrs. Feral comes back. She passes me her multitool and I cut some of the zip ties that are holding the panel by the drinker. Seemed the best place to try to open up the pen as that's where there's no hot wire running on the inside of the pen. Except that the shielded wire is interlaced at the bottom and I can't pull the panel open. So I kill the power to the fence, cut and pull the wires out and open the panel....... But the pigs are gone again. Mrs. Feral is back out in the front yard with them, trying to coax them back toward the pen. That's working pretty good when the baby lets herself out of the house and comes toddling over. I'm 25 yards away from the baby and one of the pigs is right in her face: "Please Lord, don't let that pig take a chomp out of the baby!" I yelled "HEY PIG PIG PIG!" and he decided I was more interesting than the baby. So off they all come and we lure them back into their pen. I then spend an hour fixing the damage to the fence and wiring the feeder in properly so they can't push it out and squirt out again. ––––––––––- Lessons learned, and re-learned, here: 1) I'm thankful they headed in the direction they did. If they headed the other way we'd be less three pigs right now. 2) I'm thankful they broke out when I was home. 3) I'm thankful they look at us as a food source. If they didn't look at us that way, there's no way we'd have got them back in their pen. Bringing them food every day pays off. 4) Pigs are really smart. 5) It never pays to not fix something when you know it needs to be fixed. I looked at that feeder a couple times and thought "I should fix that" but didn't. 
Sorry, no pics. 
|
|
Quoted:
Sorry, no pics. MS Paint??? Glad you got them back in. I ran a hot wire ALL the way around the inside of the pen. about 4-5" up. Wife and kids (OK, and me) learned REAL fast to open the gate OUT, instead of letting it swing in. Metal gate going in contacts hot wire almost instantly. Hilarity (and profanity) ensues! 
|
|
Sounds like you were lucky you were home at the time, although I am surprised that it has taken this long for an escape to occur due to Murphy's Law. It also sounds like the pigs aren't completely wild, probably due to the tidbits you feed them from the garden. And it sounds like you are lucky they didn't head for the garden. Lots of luck going for you!
If there is a section of your pen that isn't wired with electric fence (at the feeder), you might be able to run the wire a few inches on the outside of it so that if they happen to get that far an electric fence is still in front of them. Your pigs seem to understand what that wire is. |
|
Quoted:
MS Paint??? Glad you got them back in. I ran a hot wire ALL the way around the inside of the pen. about 4-5" up. Wife and kids (OK, and me) learned REAL fast to open the gate OUT, instead of letting it swing in. Metal gate going in contacts hot wire almost instantly. Hilarity (and profanity) ensues!
I have our feeder poking through the fence. Downside to that is there's a hole in the fence if they push the feeder out and there's a span with no electric on the inside of the pen. Here's how it looks after a bit of repair work: 
Quoted:
Sounds like you were lucky you were home at the time, although I am surprised that it has taken this long for an escape to occur due to Murphy's Law. It also sounds like the pigs aren't completely wild, probably due to the tidbits you feed them from the garden. And it sounds like you are lucky they didn't head for the garden. Lots of luck going for you! If there is a section of your pen that isn't wired with electric fence (at the feeder), you might be able to run the wire a few inches on the outside of it so that if they happen to get that far an electric fence is still in front of them. Your pigs seem to understand what that wire is. We got lucky here all the way around.
Like you said, the pigs are fairly accustomed to us which saved our bacon here––literally.
Don't want to run electric on the outside of the pen because of the baby. |
|
At least it was a pretty day when it happened.
Glad it all turned out well. R. |
|
Why doesn't that first pig have any black outline. Is it a different breed of pig than the other two.
|
|
Quoted:
I vote you get the "Best MS Paint" award! I especially like that you remembered to give them all curly tails. You should post the pic and story over in GD and have an MS Paint "The PIgs Are Loose" contest! I'm more impressed with how he spent more time/attention on the Mrs's bosum, than her hair. 
|
|
My God! That is priceless. I will think of that and laugh for at least the next 12 days. |
|
Quoted: Quoted: I vote you get the "Best MS Paint" award! I especially like that you remembered to give them all curly tails. You should post the pic and story over in GD and have an MS Paint "The PIgs Are Loose" contest! I'm more impressed with how he spent more time/attention on the Mrs's bosum, than her hair. The man has his priorities straight!  |
OMGOSH, I'm SO glad that pig didn't decide to investigate the baby!  You were much calmer than I would have been with the baby-pig face-off.Feral, I think that should be your new avatar. FWIW, I did notice the large blue blob in the center of Mrs. Feral, but I did not recognize it as a bosom. Must be a guy thing..... OH...and your squash are growing much faster than mine.  I showed uxb the pic and he said, "Why was Feral chasing the pigs with a big stick of yellow dynamite?"
|
|
Quoted:
OMGOSH, I'm SO glad that pig didn't decide to investigate the baby! You were much calmer than I would have been with the baby-pig face-off.
That was a little hairy. Could've turned out much worse.....fortunately these pigs are still pretty small. The baby wasn't really fazed by it though. She's used to seeing the pigs in their pen. She'll climb up on the hog panels, stick her foot through and yell "NO! NO! NO!" when the pigs snuffle her feet. Mrs. Feral made pretzels today and the baby throw an absolute conniption when one of the pigs stole her pretzel.
|
|
Quoted:
One of my boys just asked, "Why don't he just push an old car up against the feeder, so they can't push it out?"
LOL, he thinks everyone has a bucnh of junkers/"future projects" laying around, like we do ! Send your boy up....we'll put him to work around here.
|
|
Quoted:
Why doesn't that first pig have any black outline. Is it a different breed of pig than the other two.
I'm pretty sure that is actually 2 pigs chasing a massive rabbit
|
|
The pigs are about halfway along, maybe a little more. Figured I'd update the thread.
They're accustomed to us bringing them food. They always greet us. 
A local orchard saves its unsaleable fruit for us. We;ve been getting several hundred pounds a week––this week it's watermelons. Pigs LOVE watermelons. 
I threw a few out to them while I shook out a few bales of straw in their sleeping quarters. It was an excellent distraction and kept them out of my way. 
Once they break through a melon, they just chomp-chomp-chomp until it's pretty much gone. 
They're getting big, but they still have some growing to do. 
I think they're in the 150-175 pound bracket about now. I've got about ten more weeks to feed them out so I should be able to put another 100 pounds on them. We'll see. In any case, they're starting to look like hams and bacons to me.
These guys have eaten a lot less feed than the prior bunch. They're MUCH more fastidious at the feeder than the last ones for some reason. They don't sling feed at all. We've probably fed 'em 600 pounds of summer squash over the past months and I'm sure that's kept them from the feeder somewhat. Plus the stuff from the orchard. I'm gonna start backing off on the supplements pretty soon as I want them to pack on the weight. There haven't been any more breakouts thankfully. But interestingly I found yesterday that they knocked down one of the panels dividing their paddocks. This stretch of fence isn't electrified and they just pushed right through it. It makes me glad I have a hot wire running the perimeter of the pen.
|
|
Quoted:
They look good. How much will they go for a pound when you sell them? Are you keeping 1 and selling the other 2? $2.25 per pound, hanging weight. Yep, we'll keep one and the others are already promised to people. I have more people interested this time around than I have pigs. Could've sold four. |
|
Update
Pigs are coming down the home stretch. Processing date is set for the end of the month. I'm bad at estimating pig weight, but I'd say these guys are ~200 pounds now. They're eating ~30 pounds of feed a day, so they better be pushing 275 in a month. Gonna try my hand at some pancetta this year. 
The way the money's flowing, I doubt I'll be smoking my own bacons or hams, but we'll see. The pigs are rough now......wouldn't put anybody short of an adult in with them for a split-second. They're aggressive and they bite––the kids know to stay away from them. Won't have any regrets about shipping this bunch. 
|
|
Beautiful hogs!
I wish that I could raise some more. My last feeder hogs were 10 years ago now. I wish you the best of luck on making pancetta. If you figure it out, please post a tutorial. I ended up naming one of my feeders Houdini...he'd escape damn near anything. |
|
LOL, and here I am a couple weeks away from starting again w/ 30 lb'ers!
But after the $0.50/lb DELIVERED deal last week, I may see how things go at this Saturday's 4H auction. They look nice, and every bit of 200#. (of course, I also am inept as estimating weights. I hung out during hog weigh ins the last two weeks, and guessed about 100 hogs BEFORE they stepped on the scales. Let's just say I ain't quitting my day job.) The steer of one of my daughter's friends decided to stomp my foot. I guessed it was %^%$*# HEAVY, and I was right!
(#1270 to be exact) |
|
Quoted:
Quoted:
I will (and have done so) face down a 2000 lb bull. But when a big hog comes at me? I move out of the way. Kitties does not like hogs. I've heard people say that the boar is the most dangerous animal on the farm. Don't know if that's strictly true, but it could be. It's good to have a good relationship with the boars. They aren't dumb, and they usually know which side their bread is buttered on. And they have long memories. I knew a boar that remembered that I gave him coconut donuts for most of a decade, and I probably saw him once a year. That said, pigs will eat you if they are pretty sure that they can get away with it and are motivated. Being seen as the food guy is a very good thing, because they will wait for you as opposed to snacking on you. |
|
Here is a handy device a lot of people don't know about- a hog weigh tape. There is also a version for beef and dairy animals. They are accurate enough to determine the live weight so you can figure medication or wormer rates, etc. They might have them at a local Co-op or feed store and they are pretty cheap.
It is a flexible measuring tape that you use to measure around the animal just behind the front legs. Instead of markings for inches they are marked in pounds. |
|
Quoted:
Here is a handy device a lot of people don't know about- a hog weigh tape. There is also a version for beef and dairy animals. They are accurate enough to determine the live weight so you can figure medication or wormer rates, etc. They might have them at a local Co-op or feed store and they are pretty cheap. It is a flexible measuring tape that you use to measure around the animal just behind the front legs. Instead of markings for inches they are marked in pounds. I'd like to have one of those but haven't run into one locally. I've used this formula in the past: Weight (lbs) = (L x G x G) ÷ 400 (inches) L = Length G = Heart Girth I don't think it'll ultimately make much difference in my management, but maybe I'll measure them this weekend just for yucks. Might be good for some cheap thrills as these particular pigs are very aggressive.
|
|
I'm just browsing through this thread and wow! It's pretty amazing how they looked when you first got them to now.
I've raised everything from rabbits, to turkeys and peacocks to horses, trout and cattle but never hogs. It looks like fun. I'm sure, lots of work as well. How do you keep them from rooting under the fence? Ignore it, if you already covered it. I'll catch up shortly. |
|
Quoted:
How do you keep them from rooting under the fence? Ignore it, if you already covered it. I'll catch up shortly. There's a hot wire running around the bottom of the pen––it keeps them off the fence. You can see it in one of the above pics. With this hog panel and T-post fencing, I think they'd destroy the fence in short order without the hot wire. |
|
Quoted:
Quoted:
How do you keep them from rooting under the fence? Ignore it, if you already covered it. I'll catch up shortly. There's a hot wire running around the bottom of the pen––it keeps them off the fence. You can see it in one of the above pics. With this hog panel and T-post fencing, I think they'd destroy the fence in short order without the hot wire. we don't run hot wire. we're on our third set of pigs and nothing yet. they want to get out, but they haven't yet. you have to keep them entertained. (bowling balls work great) |
|
Quoted:
Quoted:
we don't run hot wire. we're on our third set of pigs and nothing yet. they want to get out, but they haven't yet. you have to keep them entertained. (bowling balls work great) What kind of fence do you have them in? And how big an enclosure? We use chain link (it was FREE) and some kennel panels, with a hot wire,inside bottom, maybe 4" out and 4 or 5" up from ground. They hit it a time or two and AVOID it after that. Was no big deal to run it,as had a fence charged within INCHES of the hog pen. |
|
Quoted:
Quoted:
we don't run hot wire. we're on our third set of pigs and nothing yet. they want to get out, but they haven't yet. you have to keep them entertained. (bowling balls work great) What kind of fence do you have them in? hog panels T posts every 8 feet. |
|
Quoted:
Quoted:
Quoted:
we don't run hot wire. we're on our third set of pigs and nothing yet. they want to get out, but they haven't yet. you have to keep them entertained. (bowling balls work great) What kind of fence do you have them in? And how big an enclosure? 16x32 seems to be the right number for 4 pigs. they don't get too scratched up as they get bigger. |
|
Quoted:
hog panels T posts every 8 feet. That's what we use as well. Even if the hot wire isn't strictly necessary, I think I'll keep using it. I like that it keeps the hogs off the fence. I'll have to keep an eye out for some bowling balls. I couldn't agree more that happy, entertained hogs are far less likely to challenge the fence than bored hogs.
|
|
The pigs will get hauled on the long journey in two weeks. This is a good thing as they're currently eating 50+ pounds of feed a day. Just in the last day or so they've started needing two feedings a day. I can't fathom keeping them much longer at the rate they're burning through feed. I still have to rig up a loading set up with the fencing. I'm MOST envious of Bozeman's kill truck. I wish the processors around here would offer one––I'd pay a premium for it. We often walk out as a family in the evening to visit the hogs. "YAY, time to feed the pigs." Tonight I slipped in measuring them. They're all pretty close to the same size but measuring the middle sized one yielded a heart girth of 41" and a crown-rump length of 47". Using the formula, that suggests a weight of ~200 pounds. Not the biggest hogs, but they'll have to do.    |
|
Quoted:
The pigs will get hauled on the long journey in two weeks. This is a good thing as they're currently eating 50+ pounds of feed a day. Just in the last day or so they've started needing two feedings a day. I can't fathom keeping them much longer at the rate they're burning through feed. I still have to rig up a loading set up with the fencing. I'm MOST envious of Bozeman's kill truck. I wish the processors around here would offer one––I'd pay a premium for it. We often walk out as a family in the evening to visit the hogs. "YAY, time to feed the pigs." Tonight I slipped in measuring them. They're all pretty close to the same size but measuring the middle sized one yielded a heart girth of 41" and a crown-rump length of 47". Using the formula, that suggests a weight of ~200 pounds. Not the biggest hogs, but they'll have to do. http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v40/FredFeral/IMG_2216.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v40/FredFeral/IMG_2225.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v40/FredFeral/IMG_2224.jpg MMmmmmmmmmmmm that is some good looking bacon......
|