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we have been getting really keen on the idea of having pigs. The obvious place to start is weeners..( and we plan to go on a 'beginnners pig keeping course soon.. just the minute we have a bit of time .....prolly after that winter festival thingy now...)

so - those of you that have done this before:

1. does it make financial sense? ie does the cost of buying the weeners + food for 6 months + slaughter and butcher costs come in at less than buying a whole pig in oven ready bits?
2. I have read that the obvious thing to do is have them in spring raise them over summer and bump them off before the cold weather truly sets in.. however that will make for freezers overflowing if we also have lamb, so a different time of year might work out better for us, also the plot of land we were thinking of keeping them on is under an oak tree.. which i think will be good for the pigs.. provided we have them at the acorn time of year (and acorns are bad for sheep) ... any opinions?
3 what is a reasonable amount of land to keep 2 weeners on, for them to live happy lives etc
4 is electric fencing the only way to go? we would probably have to put up stockproof fencing anyway to stop our sheep blundering through the electric fence (not electric fence trained and all that wool means they wont feel it....)


thanks in advance

Hi Red,
Having only reared pigs once so far I can only offer limited advice, but here we go anyway......set up costs can be big enough. with fencing wire and posts, troughs, housing, ear tags or slap markers all adding together to take a few pound from your pocket, but these are all once offs. You can cut down on these by building your own pig house, mine cost less than 60 euro to build.
I found fencing the main problem, they walked through my electric fence, it is adviced to bury your sheep/pig fence 6 inches into the ground, a lot of work, or you could do what I did....I cable tied old telegraph poles onto the bottom of the fencing, no piggie escapes after that.
I kept my 2 on a quarter acre, you could get away with less.
As far as food goes, see if there is a veggie farmer nearby who sells off surplus and unwanted veg cheap, this was a big help for me. You could also try veggie shops for over ripe fruit and veg. Hope this helps a bit. they are great fun to keep. Hope you take the plunge.
Keep us posted.
Shane

Hi
We have jsut slaughtered our two, that we bought as weaners in the Spring at 25k, they produced dead weight of 125k.

I have to say that as far as economy goes - raising and slaughtering in one year is very cash intensive. In order for them to be of a decent weight, you have to feed them up quite a lot to make the resultant yield worth it. We fed ours on a charcuterie complete feed, topped with veggies and fruit and went out and scavanged wild apples, plums, acorns etc as well as any other waste etc that we got from neighbouring farmers
(ie. waste from a potatoe crop nearby).

In terms of housing, we bought a very cheap second hand pig arc, which in actual fact was way too big for just the two, and then fenced them in with electric sheep fencing, about 20 m x 20m square. As they got bigger the fencing was no deterrent, but they did not bother to leave the square - which was in another much larger field of pasture with my horse in it, they were quite happy to wait for their food to be bought to them, and just plough that square up. We would scatter feed apples etc to them, and just trough the main feed - the same trough for water for the rest of the day. Just a big heavy metal tray about 20 cm deep. We kept all of our equipment portable, so that next time we have pigs we are not restricted to the same area.

They will plough quite deeply to create wallows especially after heavy rains and in soft soils so you may need to move them around the tree so that they do not do significant damage to the roots.

We loved having them, and the meat is excellent, and by the time you weigh up the costs, it is dearer than supermarket bought meat, but on a par with organic farmers produce! And there is so much meat, and you have all choice you can desire on what cuts you keep, and what meat you use in sausage etc etc. But - we are in France, and we did our own butchering on site, without the costs of an abbatoir - this may not be possible in the UK. It did mean that no ear tagging and pig slappers featured in our costs.

Next year we intend to keep one pig - more than sufficient for the three of us and guests, really two was too much. And we also intend to keep it over two years - cutting down on the feed costs in one year, and growing a greater amount of fodder feeds ourselves for the winter period.

Sorry it is an essay got a bit carried away with myself - any question you probably better pm me, so I dont bore everyone with my long answers.

red wrote:1. does it make financial sense? ie does the cost of buying the weeners + food for 6 months + slaughter and butcher costs come in at less than buying a whole pig in oven ready bits?

The fist year is obviously more cash intensive as you have the initial outlay on housing, fencing and a drinker. Thereafter, it is certainly cost effective. We buy organic Berkshire weaners at £65 each. Feed worked out at £4/wk each (24 weeks) and slaughter & butchering was £45 each. Killing out at 62kg worked out at approx £3.30/kg.

red wrote:2. I have read that the obvious thing to do is have them in spring raise them over summer and bump them off before the cold weather truly sets in.. however that will make for freezers overflowing if we also have lamb, so a different time of year might work out better for us, also the plot of land we were thinking of keeping them on is under an oak tree.. which i think will be good for the pigs.. provided we have them at the acorn time of year (and acorns are bad for sheep) ... any opinions?

This is the traditional method - my grandfather would have been part paid with a pig on farms. It would be butchered by him outside his cottage - doing this in November meant the meat kept better rather than in the heat of summer. If you have a hardy breed (such as Berkshire) you can keep them anytime of the year. It's probably better not to start with weaners in say December as more of their feed will be used to keep warm rather than converting it to meat. Otherwise, it's up to you! (We got a second freezer on freecycle for pork).

red wrote:3 what is a reasonable amount of land to keep 2 weeners on, for them to live happy lives etc

They don't really need much space - our first two had about 200 sqm. The time of year/weather/soil plays a big part - it would not take 2 pigs long to moonscape a small area of wet ground!

red wrote:4 is electric fencing the only way to go? we would probably have to put up stockproof fencing anyway to stop our sheep blundering through the electric fence (not electric fence trained and all that wool means they wont feel it....)

In my opinion, electric is the only way to keep them. 3 strands of wire on plastic posts when they are wee. This can be reduced to 2 if you need to use the wire to enlarge the run as they grow. The trick to keeping them behind it is to train them on it! We set up a wee training pen made with gates on the outside and electric on the inside. A young pig's initial reaction to getting a belt from the fence is to barge forward through it. Unless you stop them when young, they will always do this. by having something solid on the other side of the electric they can't barge through, get a second/third belt when trying and then realise the only way out is to retreat. A few weeks training is all it needs. It's best for you to be somewhere else when this happens

This pic might help explain:




In our first year, we did not have and ark and converted an old shed. Then we got the chance of an old ark from a farmer for £20. It needed some tlc though!

I thoroughly enjoy keeping our pigs. I enjoy eating them just as much. I always remember the saying: Cats look down on you, dogs look up to you, but pigs are equal.

I have a copy of Starting with Pigs I could lend you. PM me if you would like a loan.

thanks for the responses!
TG - thanks for the offer- but I already have the book.

they used to keep pigs here before - but in the intensive lots of concrete way, but where we have in mind is a field shelter already, used for pigs many moons ago, just need a little patching up and I think it would be fine.

good point about the roots of the tree... this is a huge old one in the hedges, and oaks are deep rooted, so I think it would be ok. Also it casts so much shade, there is very little in the way of grass anyway so no loss to grazing for our sheep, and not ruined if ploughed.

main costs would be fencing.. and it sounds like the best would be to put up stock fencing AND electric. (sheep out, pigs in), but we can at least do that ourselves.

hadn't thought of the more food goes on keeping them warm thing. good point. already bought a 2nd freezer with lambs in mind.. and filled it with veg!

anyway.. thanks for advice!

Hi red, I'm new here and just read your post. Everyone has given good advise so I wont repeat that but will add some bits that we do with our pigs which may be of some help. We have a cold winter climate and snow (although not heavy falls)and down to -18 degrees in winter.

A bit of background - We breed and process our own freerange/organic Berkshire or BerkshireDuroc cross pigs on site, make bacon, ham etc. (Husband is a chef so that helps ha!).

We process our pigs, when possible, before the winter and just carry over our breeding stock, planning (when we are organized enough ) to have a litter on the ground in spring to avoid both feeding costs and also losses due to cold. We have carried piglets through the winter though on occasions but definately find it better the other way. If we are making ham and bacon is then we choose colder months to process this - usually when the pig is between 10 months and 1 yr. old. We use girls for this or castrated males. Most of the males we kill around 3 or 4 months old which is a nice size to process. Don't know what your regulations are though in the UK.

Regarding feed costs - its works well to have a rotation (you can do this on a small amount of land with electric fencing and grow some extra food in these areas. We utilize our pigs on a rotation to clear/dig up and fertilize an area and then move them on. This not only assists in saving loads of work for us, it helps break any worm cycles (we worm with herbs by the way anyway) but gives them fresh food regularly. (Bearing in mind we also have breeding stock that require extra food as well). Things they love to eat and are easy to grow are - turnips, jeruselem artichokes, millet (we have goats as well so graze them first and follow up with the pigs, same with the artichokes, goats eat the top, pigs the roots)

We found with the electric fencing that the Berkshires (trained young as someone mentioned) are really good but the crosses are a bit (actually quite a lot harder on fences. We use goat fencing on the external areas and break up individual areas with electric - depending on the pigs - Berkshires will hold in with one strand but the others need three strands. The only caution with the electrics is that they are really smart and if the fences go down for any period of time they will know that and be out (hence why we have the other fences to external areas). Mostly though if they escaped they would only come up to visit us (our pigs are really quiet and very friendly

Anyway, hope this is of some help. Happy to talk further if you have any questions.

thanks for the advice!