This little piggie went to the market....

[thetajmahalcoop]

we had two piggies last year and they escaped DAILY! we finally had to send them to the butcher a few months early when they went in the road and wandered down to the neighbors house. Let me tell you how yummy they were! We live on 17 1/2 acres and put them in the big fenced in garden and they tilled that garden up like perfection and man was the soil fertile this past summer let me tell you. When they escaped they had a grand old time in the woods and tilling up the front yard which my DH did not appreciate. I wanted to get piggies again this fall and he flat out refused to do it over winter again. I think we'll get them this spring and put them back in the garden but we'll have to buy electric fencing this time and GET HELP setting it up. He claims to know how but I have serious serious doubts! Maybe I'll have to say we're having the neighbors over for lunch and just spring it on him that Oh yeah, they're also here to help.....no garden for us this year, we got hit with the tomato/potato blight so the pigs should clear that right up! Your piggies are making me hungry, I pulled out one of the last packs of pork we have left (sob sob) and will cook it for dinner to convince my DH we need piggies again soon! Good luck with yours I know how stressful it is when they escape!

 

[TimG]

Continuing the veer off topic: how much space do a couple of pigs need? I'd like to fence in an area of the yard that the blackberries are attacking and put a couple pigs in there to dig up all the roots.

I'm also a bit surprised by all the mention of raising pigs over winter. I understand that they can survive the elements, but figured they would eat a lot more and grow a bit slower over the winter because they'd be burning a lot of energy to keep warm.

 

[thetajmahalcoop]

we had no issues raising them over winter, we bought them a few months old in sept and butchered in janurary bc they kept escaping. they seemed to love the snow but maybe that was the breed? we had them in an A frame shack with hay and they kept nice and warm! Not sure what size the garden is...um Big ? LOL

 

[dancingbear]

Quote:
Tim, we only still have pigs this late because family emergencies combined with uncooperative weather, interfered with our butchering plans. I will never have them this far into winter again, it's a PITA, and hard on the pigs, IMO. But I know a lot of people do it, and some manage quite well.

As for how much space they need, that depends. Some people raise them in very small pens, but the try to get out constantly, and it gets nasty and smelly pretty fast. The area we fenced in for ours (4 pigs, we have 2 left) is probably about 1/3 of an acre, about 1/3 open, the rest wooded. They cleared out all the undergrowth in the wooded parts, and almost all the weeds and grass in the open areas. They've run out of forage, pretty much, now, but it'll be great to replant with what we want, and easy to the get into the woods now and clear the very little remaining undergrowth, and remove trash from the previous owners.

For our next pig adventure, we'll use a solar fence charger, and have a larger area, but divided so we can move the pigs from one area to another. The larger area is nice, they don't get stinky, they don't (at least ours haven't) try to get out, and they get a lot of food for themselves while clearing the ground for you, fertilizing at a the same time. We have a lot of oak and hickory, and the pigs love the acorns and hickory nuts.

Our plan is to use pigs to clear different areas of the farm over the years, and grow meat at the same time.

 

[Burbs]

Wanted to bump this. How's the pig raising business going? We had three butchered at Christmas and figure I'll spend the next couple of months making sausage, bacon and hams. Home cured bacon is the greatest, sausage is to die for. Jury is still out on the ham, it's queued to be smoked this coming weekend. I'll try to keep good notes, and if your interested I'll post the recipes and results.

 

[Hillsvale]

Quote:
I am....

 

[Brunty_Farms]

Me too.....



The pigs are doing great, they can barely fit into the pen that I built them... and they tore it all apart. Seriously, I'm not sure how it's still standing. They have turned over every piece of soil in that garden looking for grubs, roots, and whatever else they can find. I'm trying to find them a new place to sleep along with new pasture. There is plenty of digging they can do in other places as it's getting kind of muddy for them.

The test the fence everyday and actually have escaped about 4 times, every time was my fault as I had the fence off. Smart little pigs.... I had the police looking for them one day as a lady was freaked out when she seen them running in the road.

Will keep ya updated as these things are growing like weeds. I may get some pics up today, I have a lot of picture taking to do anyways so I mine as well start with the pigs.

Also they are getting extremely friendly, almost too friendly, I have to shoe some of them away as I don't like that they get that close when I'm holding feed and water buckets. I'm no match for 6 strong pigs. However, I do manage to scratch their ears when they eat and one even lets me rub it's belly... she kind of rolls on her side when I do it. Very funny, almost like a dog.

 

[Brunty_Farms]

Quote:
The pen is big, I have two rolls of premier fence netting that I'm using which each one is about 166' so I have about 300' plus of fence that I enclosed them with. I pretty much fenced them into the garden which is like 60 x 200 and the fence didn't quite reach the whole thing.

I have no idea what breeds they are, they are black and white... and red and white. But they do test the fence all the time. They have yet to escape for a while so I hope they learned, but I have to go out daily and kick the dirt away from the fence to keep it from shorting out. They are strong when they root for food, flinging dirt everywhere.

 

[Burbs]

I'll get my notes together this weekend and post in the recipe section. When I get it compiled I'll link it in this thread.
By the way, my pigs ended up being really friendly. Glad I didn't do the butchering myself for several reasons. Getting rid of the offal is a little problematic. Much easier to have someone else deal with that. I was actually quite surprised how easily you can become attached to the silly things. Hard to accept the idea of slaughtering something that you scratched behind the ears every day. They are somewhat like dogs, wagging their tale when they see you, wanted to be petted, etc. Don't get me wrong.... I am not squeamish when it comes to these things......just glad I chose to have someone else do it.

 

[Burbs]

Had to start with bacon......

Here you go.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=290828