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Outdoor Pig pictures

andybob

Well-known member
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Sow housing.

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Sow housing.

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Farrowing hut.

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Farrowing hut with piglets ready for processing.

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Central hub.

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Central hub with sows for sorting.
 

Soapweed

Well-known member
Pretty pudgy in pink, wink. :wink:

Stock tenders use cow dogs and sheep dogs. Do you ever use pig dogs to help move your stock?
 

Jinglebob

Well-known member
Now that there, boys and girls, is a passel of pigs! :shock:

Or perhaps a haggle of hogs? :???:

Or simpley swine. :)

Thanks for postin' these pig pictures, andybob. :)
 

andybob

Well-known member
Been struggling for some time to scan some pictures of the outdoor pigs for a while, have some seasonal help now :wink:
This herd was 1000 sows at 10 to the acre, the sow barn huts take 20 adult sows, and dismantle for moving in 15 mins, the 'tent' type house 24 adults and take 30 mins to dismantle.
They were moved onto ryegrass mix underplanted to barley as soon as the barley is harvested, corn is grown on the field after the pigs are moved.
Soapweed, one of my sheep trained boarder collies, Skip, was an exelent 'pig dog' a big help as only two fulltime workers, with two students on the weekends, ran the whole unit.
 

nr

Well-known member
andybob said:
Been struggling for some time to scan some pictures of the outdoor pigs for a while, have some seasonal help now :wink:
This herd was 1000 sows at 10 to the acre, the sow barn huts take 20 adult sows, and dismantle for moving in 15 mins, the 'tent' type house 24 adults and take 30 mins to dismantle.
They were moved onto ryegrass mix underplanted to barley as soon as the barley is harvested, corn is grown on the field after the pigs are moved.
Soapweed, one of my sheep trained boarder collies, Skip, was an exelent 'pig dog' a big help as only two fulltime workers, with two students on the weekends, ran the whole unit.

Do you have to fertilize the cornfield or have the pigs covered that detail for you? And what did Skip actually do, herd them just like cattle? all I know about pigs is...they cry wee,wee,wee! all the way home.
 

andybob

Well-known member
The field is well fertilised with the pig manure and straw from the deep litter in the huts which when spread, provides the potash to grow an exelent silage crop for the dairy, the soils are poor and stony, and need regular breaks under livestock to keep the structure maintained for the cropping, rotation.
 

nr

Well-known member
andybob said:
The field is well fertilised with the pig manure and straw from the deep litter in the huts which when spread, provides the potash to grow an exelent silage crop for the dairy, the soils are poor and stony, and need regular breaks under livestock to keep the structure maintained for the cropping, rotation.
Quite a clever and perfect cycle you have.
 

Jinglebob

Well-known member
I saw a story some years back about being self sufficient on a small farm. One of their ideas was to have a portable pen, say 16 ft by 16 ft, that you kept pigs in. Then you moved it every day while throwing seeds on the ground. This way the pigs would "farm" the ground and you would rotate them thru' a place. Sounded like a good idea, but I never had much luck with pigs. I got one for a graduation present and to my knowledge, I am the only person in the world who got a free pig and lost money on the deal. :cry:

To this day, I don't care much for pork.
 

Northern Rancher

Well-known member
Are those Yorkshire cross sows? when I was first married we ran quite a few hogs-now when Ty manages to sneak one by his Mom we get the odd sow in the spring. Farrow them out then before it gets too cold sell the pigs off and butcher the dry sow to make deer sausage with. When they used to thresh in this country alot of hogs were raised in the straw piles-those old sows were pretty self sufficient. I kind of like hogs to be honest-but I like anything with four legs that gets in the neighbors garden lol-jkin'.Those are pretty healthy happy looking porkers for sure-beats what you see in the hothouses.
 

nr

Well-known member
Northern Rancher said:
Are those Yorkshire cross sows? when I was first married we ran quite a few hogs-now when Ty manages to sneak one by his Mom we get the odd sow in the spring. Farrow them out then before it gets too cold sell the pigs off and butcher the dry sow to make deer sausage with. When they used to thresh in this country alot of hogs were raised in the straw piles-those old sows were pretty self sufficient. I kind of like hogs to be honest-but I like anything with four legs that gets in the neighbors garden lol-jkin'.Those are pretty healthy happy looking porkers for sure-beats what you see in the hothouses.

Weren't they bothered by bear in your area?
 

Northern Rancher

Well-known member
Contrary to popular belief bears aren't that bad to be around-I suppose they'd kill a pig if they were hard pressed but most would rather eat berries from what I've seen. In the spring they graze in the meadows just like cattle-trying to get their stomachs back in order after hibernating. If a guy went a big scalepasture hog deal like that I'd run some Pyreness dogs with them to keep the yotes out. Mind you any electric fence that can keep pigs in would keep any predators we have out. Back in the day that home grown pork supplemented with skim milk was yummy stuff. I don't really miss milking cows that much though.
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
Used to be several guys around here 40-50 years ago that "ran" hogs...Some were out on the Missouri-- One of our neighbors on the river was one that had over 1000 hogs at times...Let them run up the creek and on his grain fields in the summer and fall...Whenever he got a little short on money or had a note come do, he'd call me up to hire me to help him round up some....Take horses and dogs up the creek and start gathering up hogs out of the creekbottom and the brush...

And the dogs work good on them- he had two collies and I had a couple of heelers and you'd send those dogs into the creek bottom and the brush and have hogs of all sizes coming out of everywhere-- definitely not a place to ride a colt, as I had a couple of old broke horses even blow up on me when those hogs started coming out between their legs and everywhere... :lol:
 

nr

Well-known member
Northern Rancher said:
Contrary to popular belief bears aren't that bad to be around-I suppose they'd kill a pig if they were hard pressed but most would rather eat berries from what I've seen. In the spring they graze in the meadows just like cattle-trying to get their stomachs back in order after hibernating. If a guy went a big scalepasture hog deal like that I'd run some Pyreness dogs with them to keep the yotes out. Mind you any electric fence that can keep pigs in would keep any predators we have out. Back in the day that home grown pork supplemented with skim milk was yummy stuff. I don't really miss milking cows that much though.

I remember reading a pioneer account in either Washington or Oregon where they'd let their pigs run wild in the woods and hated hearing the scream of one in the night when a bear took it.
 

nr

Well-known member
Northern Rancher said:
well it's not quite that pioneer here any more-we've even got the talking pitcher boxes like in the big cities.
:lol: :lol: I didn't mean to imply you were pioneering still, just responding to your statement that bear don't seem to bother pigs. Maybe it is the type of bear like a grizzly more than a black bear. I don't know, just guessing.
 

andybob

Well-known member
Northern Rancher, the sows are Landrace cross Duroc, Large White terminal boars are used. When I eventually leave the company I will test the profitability of Tamworth in the woods, selling to a niche market, untill then, I have a long way to go building up my new Tuli herd.
Jinglebob, I have used pigs to clear and fertilise land behind electric fencing for vegetables and once to establish stargrass pastures for a friends dairy herd in South Africa.
NR, I have kept outdoor pigs in several variations of this system, on my farm in Rhodesia, I had leopards, African lynx, jackals and hyienas. all were controlled with electric netting type fences, birds after piglets were a bigger threat, always keep a shotgun on hand.
In England, domestic dogs, foxes and ravens (protected) were a threat, the European fox is the only non avian preditor that managed to get through the defences.
Here, no bears nearby,bobcats foxes and coyotes are kept out by perimeter fences, enough voltage should keep out bears, feral pigs are a bigger threat as they harbour diseases.
 

nr

Well-known member
andybob said:
Northern Rancher, the sows are Landrace cross Duroc, Large White terminal boars are used. When I eventually leave the company I will test the profitability of Tamworth in the woods, selling to a niche market, untill then, I have a long way to go building up my new Tuli herd.
Jinglebob, I have used pigs to clear and fertilise land behind electric fencing for vegetables and once to establish stargrass pastures for a friends dairy herd in South Africa.
NR, I have kept outdoor pigs in several variations of this system, on my farm in Rhodesia, I had leopards, African lynx, jackals and hyienas. all were controlled with electric netting type fences, birds after piglets were a bigger threat, always keep a shotgun on hand.
In England, domestic dogs, foxes and ravens (protected) were a threat, the European fox is the only non avian preditor that managed to get through the defences.
Here, no bears nearby,bobcats foxes and coyotes are kept out by perimeter fences, enough voltage should keep out bears, feral pigs are a bigger threat as they harbour diseases.
this is so interesting- how high did the fencing have to be to keep out leopards?!
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
Really interesting Andybob-- looks like that is some pork I would like eating... After seeing some of the hothouses that were operating up here with the cubicle pigs, I lost a lot of my appetite for pork... Those confined hogs didn't look like they had any solid muscle on them at all- as they never hardly moved....Most have gone belly-up--except some of the Hoot colonies are now using confined feeding...

I know when Grandpa used to raise a few hogs for home use, he had about 10 acres fenced in that he ran a few sows on-- give them some room to move around...And when the kids were raising everything under the sun for 4-H they used to excercise their feeders every day- made them firm up better....And they got some carcass of merit awards...
 

andybob

Well-known member
NR, leopards can jump quite high up trees and rocks, and climb security fences, I used two rolls of 4 ft mesh to give 8 ft of mesh fencing, then topped with two more hot wires offset at 30degrees to the verticle outward. They never tried this fence though frequently went over security fencing of similar height, topped with barbed wire, taking pets from gardens, dogs being a favourite.
 

Judith

Well-known member
Tamworths are great if you want pigs to move earth for you. But if you want a pasture pig get the Large blacks. They are good grazers and are very easy to work with. I hated the Tams, just too hyper and wrecked absolutely everything.On the plus side they are great foraging animals. Just depends on what you want your pigs to do for you. If I ever get pigs again, I'm going with the blacks again. Really hard to find though as they are still heritage status. I know there is a fella in Alberta with them and there are quite a few breeders is the States.
 
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