Post by WindyRidge on Sept 4, 2015 0:22:59 GMT
Well, as of last week I'm officially in the pig business so I thought I'd go ahead and introduce myself. 
My husbands family raised hogs years ago on a small scale. That ended before hubby really learned much about it. For a long time we just bought sausage from local butcher shops or had a friend that butchers pick us up a pig at auction. Every year it seemed the sausage got leaner and leaner. Finally we decided there must be a better way and I started researching heritage pig breeds. In the end I decided I wanted to try either old spots or large blacks. As luck would have it, I found a breeder of blacks just 15 miles down the road. We only got one to raise and try the first year and oh my was he delicious! Hubby was also amazed at how docile he was. With young kids that was a big factor to us. The next year we got just one again and then last fall decided to get 2 - one for us and one to sell.
To be honest, pigs have yet to grow on me. I know some people really love raising them. My daughter really likes the pigs (but she's 5 so not much help on caring for them just yet). Me, not so much. But pork - I can't get enough lol. Raising one or two each year isn't so bad. But never did I intend to get into breeding them. And then life takes you where you never thought you'd go...
In an unexpected turn of events, we ended up starting a farm stand this spring. Our main focus is organic dairy and beef but everyone started asking about pork. So we went ahead and butchered one of the two hogs I had and the sausage is selling like crazy. I'm already out of links and my ground sausage supply is dwindling fast. We're still trying to grow the business and only have about 1/4 of the total number of customers we ultimately hope to sign up. Raising one or 2 pigs isn't going to cut it anymore.
Unhappily the breeder just out the road went and sold her black boar and got a hereford to start crossbreeding. I really like the blacks and want to stick with them. Herefords may be very nice but I'm familiar with the blacks and don't like change. The marketing aspect comes into play too. We've pushed the purebred, heritage aspect of the blacks and established a premium price partly based on that and we don't want to deviate.
I have some friends that have pigs, but they're breeding random crosses and I couldn't talk them into doing the blacks. That was my last hope, and since it didn't pan out we've decided we'll have to start breeding the blacks ourselves. We have enough of a market that I think the cost of buying that many piglets (I'm figuring 8-12 per year once the business is in full swing) would end up being more than the cost of keeping a boar and a sow or 2. I can source local grain easier than large black piglets.
Anyway, as it happens the pig I have left is a female. She's somewhere around 10 months old I think so in good shape to go ahead and breed. This is Naomi:
Last week we drove 430 total miles to come home with 4 weaner pigs and a big ol' boar. The big fella we got is around 5-6 years old so we'll be keeping the nicer of the young boars to replace him. We're almost sold out of sausage so needed to get rolling on raising more pigs quickly and he's what we could find. He seems to be a nice boy and we only paid $150 for him. My daughter named him Boaz.
We originally tried putting Boaz with Naomi in her lot figuring he'd want to stay with her and that would keep him in. Shows what we know. Boaz didn't give one little hoot about her. I do have electric around that lot but as the weeds have grown up this summer it's grounded out pretty badly. Boaz has lived in a barn his whole life so has no concept of wire fence. He just walked right through it. Twice. The first day he wouldn't be herded anywhere else and put himself back in the lot with Naomi. The second day he wandered over to one of my calf lots that has really good electric on it. So right now he's locked in there. He's a huge boy but docile as a puppy. There's a natural spring in Naomi's lot for a good wallow hole, but this calf lot is totally dry. His favorite thing is when I come run water every day and run some in the hole he dug. He may turn me into a pig person yet. Here's our big boy:
I still hope to get the fence cleared and get him back in the lot with Naomi. He's so lazy I'm not sure he'd notice she was in heat unless she backed up under his nose. Plus with the spring in that lot it saves me running him water.
The four youngsters are about 12 weeks old, 2 gilts and 2 boars. We had quite a time loading them (an adventure that including me diving on and tackling one of the boars when he escaped off the truck!) but in the end made it home safely. They're locked in part of the heifer barn right now. It adjoins the lot Boaz is currently in and my plan is to let them out there once I get him moved back with Naomi. I also need to go around and put a strand of electric lower - right now there are places they could duck right under since it was originally designed for 6+ month old Holstein heifers.
We're making this up as we go. We're clearly pig newbies but are learning as we can and figure we'll get there. Let the adventure begin!
My husbands family raised hogs years ago on a small scale. That ended before hubby really learned much about it. For a long time we just bought sausage from local butcher shops or had a friend that butchers pick us up a pig at auction. Every year it seemed the sausage got leaner and leaner. Finally we decided there must be a better way and I started researching heritage pig breeds. In the end I decided I wanted to try either old spots or large blacks. As luck would have it, I found a breeder of blacks just 15 miles down the road. We only got one to raise and try the first year and oh my was he delicious! Hubby was also amazed at how docile he was. With young kids that was a big factor to us. The next year we got just one again and then last fall decided to get 2 - one for us and one to sell.
To be honest, pigs have yet to grow on me. I know some people really love raising them. My daughter really likes the pigs (but she's 5 so not much help on caring for them just yet). Me, not so much. But pork - I can't get enough lol. Raising one or two each year isn't so bad. But never did I intend to get into breeding them. And then life takes you where you never thought you'd go...
In an unexpected turn of events, we ended up starting a farm stand this spring. Our main focus is organic dairy and beef but everyone started asking about pork. So we went ahead and butchered one of the two hogs I had and the sausage is selling like crazy. I'm already out of links and my ground sausage supply is dwindling fast. We're still trying to grow the business and only have about 1/4 of the total number of customers we ultimately hope to sign up. Raising one or 2 pigs isn't going to cut it anymore.
Unhappily the breeder just out the road went and sold her black boar and got a hereford to start crossbreeding. I really like the blacks and want to stick with them. Herefords may be very nice but I'm familiar with the blacks and don't like change. The marketing aspect comes into play too. We've pushed the purebred, heritage aspect of the blacks and established a premium price partly based on that and we don't want to deviate.
I have some friends that have pigs, but they're breeding random crosses and I couldn't talk them into doing the blacks. That was my last hope, and since it didn't pan out we've decided we'll have to start breeding the blacks ourselves. We have enough of a market that I think the cost of buying that many piglets (I'm figuring 8-12 per year once the business is in full swing) would end up being more than the cost of keeping a boar and a sow or 2. I can source local grain easier than large black piglets.
Anyway, as it happens the pig I have left is a female. She's somewhere around 10 months old I think so in good shape to go ahead and breed. This is Naomi:
Last week we drove 430 total miles to come home with 4 weaner pigs and a big ol' boar. The big fella we got is around 5-6 years old so we'll be keeping the nicer of the young boars to replace him. We're almost sold out of sausage so needed to get rolling on raising more pigs quickly and he's what we could find. He seems to be a nice boy and we only paid $150 for him. My daughter named him Boaz.
We originally tried putting Boaz with Naomi in her lot figuring he'd want to stay with her and that would keep him in. Shows what we know. Boaz didn't give one little hoot about her. I do have electric around that lot but as the weeds have grown up this summer it's grounded out pretty badly. Boaz has lived in a barn his whole life so has no concept of wire fence. He just walked right through it. Twice. The first day he wouldn't be herded anywhere else and put himself back in the lot with Naomi. The second day he wandered over to one of my calf lots that has really good electric on it. So right now he's locked in there. He's a huge boy but docile as a puppy. There's a natural spring in Naomi's lot for a good wallow hole, but this calf lot is totally dry. His favorite thing is when I come run water every day and run some in the hole he dug. He may turn me into a pig person yet. Here's our big boy:
I still hope to get the fence cleared and get him back in the lot with Naomi. He's so lazy I'm not sure he'd notice she was in heat unless she backed up under his nose. Plus with the spring in that lot it saves me running him water.
The four youngsters are about 12 weeks old, 2 gilts and 2 boars. We had quite a time loading them (an adventure that including me diving on and tackling one of the boars when he escaped off the truck!) but in the end made it home safely. They're locked in part of the heifer barn right now. It adjoins the lot Boaz is currently in and my plan is to let them out there once I get him moved back with Naomi. I also need to go around and put a strand of electric lower - right now there are places they could duck right under since it was originally designed for 6+ month old Holstein heifers.
We're making this up as we go. We're clearly pig newbies but are learning as we can and figure we'll get there. Let the adventure begin!
of course I raise ours from a youngin and ain't nothing cuter then a baby piglet 