Do you keep livestock? Having any problems? Want to talk about it, whether it be sheep, goats, chickens, pigs, bees or llamas, here is your place to discuss.
just a general inquiry at the moment but doesanyone know what sort of space a pig needs ?
i ask because i may have just about secured the tenancy on aprox 3 acres and the is some scrub wood land attached which i want to coppice and keep some pigs in but know not a lot about pigs so any advice, ideas,thoughts greatfully recieved
i will get my happy place one day and i may even own it. i dream on as its all we have at times and they cant get me here
Just been reading a bit by Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall - pigs need to be in pairs and need 150metres square for a pair - Sourced from last months Country Living magazine ( passed to me by a friend ). Hope that's a help!
Two roads diverged in a wood
And I took the one less travelled by
And that has made all the difference.
(Robert Frost)
thanks for the size the wooded bit may just about cover it(will have to measure or pace it out) and i would never keep a lone animal as we all need freinds who talk our language
Out first pair of pigs were kept for 6 months (2 months too long!) on a piece of ground about 150m2 as mentioned and they were perfectly happy.
In the woods, we have kept 4 pigs on a piece of ground 25m by 25m (100m roll of electric wire fence on a double strand!) and they were as happy as pigs in the proverbial.
One thing to bear in mind is that its not advisable to keep pigs on the same land for more than two years in a row. We have done two years, but 6m on, 6m off, 6m on, 6m off. Of course, like veg, the longer the rotation on land, the better.
really 150m2..... hmmm.... I can hear the bacon sizziling as we speak...
We have a big garden but I had never really considered it big enough for piggies... 150 is about a tenth of our space, in a few years we could have them snuffling under our apple trees.... hmmmmmm...
It is going on the list
Ann Pan
"Some days you're the dog,
some days you're the lamp-post"
mmmmmm am definatly going dto get going with the negosiations and just for my info what sort of costs are we talking about cause may have to bribe with a pig for free to get permision ( and maybe rent reduction)
happyplace, I can't get the pdf file, I am a SA member, but not a 'food and farming' member, I don't know if that matters... anyway it looks like a great brochure shame
its really hard to get advice on what ideal for pigs - if you go to defra they only quote minimums and thats basically the ability to turn around - and we are alot better than some other countries
we have yet to get our pigs.. but we have gone on a one day pig course, which was great for answering my two main questions.
how bad do they smell?
do I like pigs?
answers: not so bad, and yes
Red
I like like minded people... a bit like minded anyway.. well people with bits of their minds that are like the bits of my mind that I like...
I think the best thing you can do is 'suck it and see' We have a 7.5 acre croft on the west coast of Scotland with a couple of hundred acres of rough grazing. We keep the 4 breeding sows and the boar on the croft most of the time and the piglets on the hill once they're weaned and even then the place turns to the 'Somme' every winter. If you just get a couple of weaners and you've got hard well drained land then you be surprised how little ground you need. If it's turning to a swamp and you can't get rid of the pooh then just eat the wee darlings one thing for sure if it works out you'll never be without the delightful creatures. We started with 2 weaners 3 years ago and have never looked back.
Good luck, Paul
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please bear in mind when reading this post that i'm a taurus so prone to talking bull.
Wow. Camillitech they look like some eevil little piggies! I know its the red eye but they look like they'd be the ones eating you! If they could just get through that darned gate!
I'm considering getting some Pigs for a bit - as I have some land that could do with a darned good clear over. Scrub bushes, saplings, couch grass, all sorts of stuff and plenty of old apples and mushrooms and all sorts of stuff to snuffle over.
But how hardy are Pigs? (I'm in Sweden and I don't yet have a shelter for them. I gues they'd need something. But what? And how warm would it have to be?)
Also, fencing. I want them to clear as much of my woodland as they can manage. But I dont think the Forestry commission here would want them to do the same thing on their land which borders mine... Are Pigs like Goats and desperate to break free at any opportunity? Or are they OK with a lightweight electric fence and kind of think "hey, this bit of land will do for us"?
Part of how the pigs will be kept is dependent on breed type, but they ALL need shelter in the form of some kind of shed, to get in out of the weather when necessary. Even with all the fat they can carry around, they get chilled easily, and then you end up feeding them mountains of food just to keep their weight on.
I wouldn't suggest getting pigs to rear for eating just heading into winter, because all the eat will just go to keeping them warm; very little will actually go to growth/keeping of condition, so it will end up costing quite a bit more (50% at least) from pasture to plate.
In our experience, pigs highly respect the smallest of hot electric wires, and we put up just one at piggie nose height, and make it adjustable to allow for their growth (we just use old alkathene irrigation pipe for fencing outriggers and screw them into the fence posts so it's easy to raise as the pigs grow).
We keep our breeding kunekune pigs on pasture (free ranging), as well as each litter till is reaches approximately 3 months of age. At that age, the weanlings get penned in much smaller areas, as that's when they will begin to work over the soil when they've finished eating all the grass. Kunekunes don't get down anywhere near as deep as do the larger pigs with longer snouts.
Every year we get a pair of Large White/Duroc X for rearing to eat (different taste and nature to the kunekunes), and intentionally put them where we need to be cleared. Start small, and gradually enlarge the area as they work it over. It's brilliant, and they do a great job getting at the smallest weed roots. Wish we'd thought to do it in our vege patch before establishing it, as it is the last area overrun with twitch grass.
I take the point about winter and feed - I think I'd probably aim to get some weaners in in spring and keep them for six months or so. They get to scoff everything in the woodland and clear it all for me. They get fuss and attention. And at the end of it I get my land lovely and clean and, presumably, well manured..!
The more I look into it the more they sound ideal as land clearing tractor-ploughs. With the additional bonus of bacon at the end of it.
so any advice, ideas,thoughts greatfully recieved 
150m2..... hmmm.... I can hear the bacon sizziling as we speak...
shame
