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- - Pigs (http://goldismoney.info/forums/showthread.php?t=347010)

Not all people would be ready to take on such an animal but maybe a few out there would.

These animals are strong.

Although their confinements dont have to be to tall they have to be strong,and they can actually dig or "rut" underneath a fence.

They will eat almost anything.

They can survive in almost any environment.

A sow can easily have around a dozen piglets and they will reach slaughter weight (100 pounds ish) in a few months.

They are also the most personable and entertaining of all barnyard animals hands down.

Not counting horse or dog,which are not barnyard animals but partners in crime.

I wouldnt recommend pigs over any other animal,but i havent seen many posts on them so i thought i would bring it up.

Plus who doesnt like bacon?

You would probably want the berkshire breed.

And I was thinking, "Not another cop thread". :signs14:

I kinda like pigs but their crap has this nauseating sickly smell. Nearly makes me gag.
And I actually kinda like the smell of cow crap. Very strange.

Berkshires are an excellent breed, but for anyone just wanting a couple (or more) for the freezer any good crossbreed will be more than suitable. DurocXHamshire, DurocXYorkshire, DurocXBerskshire, or any combination would be fine. Buy whatever you can find in your locality.

It's good idea to start by buying a couple of feeder pigs, and raise them off while you are learning. If you want to buy breeding stock and raise your own later, then that's fine.

If you want to only raise them to 100 pounds that's certainly fine. The nice thing about raising your own meat is that you can do it however you want. Some like to butcher them smaller, because they can handle them easier. But it takes about 4-4 1/2 months to get them to 100 pounds, and only 6 to 8 more weeks to put another 150 pounds on them. I prefer to take a little longer and get them to 250-300 pounds before slaughter.

I like horses and dogs, but if it came down to real hunger, they would definitely go in the pot. Meat's meat.

As far as the odor from the pigs, if they're in a large enough enclosure the smell is not offensive. It's when they're confined too closely that it really gets bad. Even then, spreading lime (not hydrated, that can cause irritation to the pigs skin) on the area cuts the odor very well.

I agree with the first part ty,but getting them up to any slaughter weight in teotwawki will be tough.I guess options are open as time progresses.

Eat throught the seasons and store for winter,like most things.

Quote:

Originally Posted by tyusclan (Post 1556003)

I just don't eat that much pork.
I kinda got weaned off it for good when Smithfield started selling all their fresh pork with salt added.

They can keep that salty crap.

Pigs do not have sweat glands. Therefore any carcinogens they eat are stored in the fat.

I sure like ham and bacon though.

Untrue, Mark. Pigs excrete urine and feces like any other animal - they don't just grab those carcinogens and store them away.

I've raised them before.....buddy of mine raised two this year, and dadgum they made some fine eating. If you have a good sized garden, couple of pigs are the way to go....they will clean up anything you don't want, and love pumpkins and most any greens.

I raise heritage breed pigs to 275 lbs on pasture using only an 8" hot wire to contain them. Input beyond pasture, seaweed and waste veggies is minimal. Smell is less than minimal. Meat is superb.

Quote:

Originally Posted by CANUCKFARMER (Post 1556015)

Yes, I agree, in a survival or SHTF situation, you would have to alter a normal procedure. Smaller slaughter weights would be easier to handle under those circumstances.

We had pigs for a couple years. The first season was spent mostly hardening the pig-pen, those pigs were getting out every week.

The meat was great, the smell not so much. They were no more work than the cows we had at the time. However the final nail in the coffin for the pig project, was the flies. Once we got rid of the pigs, the amount of flies in the area went down considerably.

Quote:

Originally Posted by GreenSpirit (Post 1555984)

I kinda like pigs but their crap has this nauseating sickly smell. Nearly makes me gag.
And I actually kinda like the smell of cow crap. Very strange.

Me too :565:

"Grab a sow by the tail and she'll pull you through hard times."

- Depression era proverb

.

We had our pigs all summer long and very rarely did the smell get offensive! Pigs are very clean and will usually poop in the same spot. We clean out the pen every week or two and did not have much of a poopy smell. Now my sheep are a different story, they poop in their food, on your feet and in their water! We raised our pigs to 235 lbs before butcher. When we took them in for butcher, we stopped by the pig lady's and got two more piglets. We have enough feed to finish them off. Hopefully, by the time they are ready to butcher in the spring, the butcher shop will still be in business! My pigs last summer ate all the weeds, veggies and anything else we thru in the pen. We had a hard time getting them to eat the pig pellets, corn or any other kind of grain. We did feed them left overs from the power bar company. They have to run so much power bar thru the machine to clean out the last batch, and it all goes to waste! A few years ago when I was milking goats, my pigs got goats milk. They loved it! We give eggs to the pigs too!
We learned the hard way about trying to load a pig in the trailer. Our first time to load, we had roped the pig and tried to drag it in. HAHA NOT!
after 1 hour of pushing, pulling and getting run over by the pig, we finally got it in the trailer. Over time, we learned to not feed the pig the night before, so it is good an hungry in the morning, we put the trailer by the pig pen, so it is use to it, we build a ramp out of plywood, (pigs dont jump to well)Our ramp also has side walls. We make a small pen behind the trailer. Once the pigs are in the small pen, we tease them with food up the ramp.
Our last load took us a total of 10 minutes to build the ramp and set up the pen, and about 10 minutes to get the pigs from their pen into the trailer.

I think it is important to be friendly with your pigs when you get them. They learn very quick. My pigs always like to eat my shoes or put their nose on the back of my leg when I walk in. I casually life my foot backwards and kind of lightly kick them. After two or three times, they stop doing that. Anyway, being their friend makes it much easier to get them loaded in the trailer.

Our first two pigs were Ethyl and Lucy. We had them for like 9 months. My hubby would not let me take them to the butcher, because they were his pets and he enjoyed watching them. I went away for a week and during that time, he had to take care of them. They got out of the pen and he spent hours chasing them all over our 40 acre ranchette. He finally got smart and got a bucket of grain and showed it to them and walked them in the pen. When I talked to him that night he told me he wanted those pigs butchered! I had to laugh! Since I never had pigs before, I had no idea what a 250 lb pig looked like. The scale at the butcher said one weighed 415 lbs and the other was 385. I guess it was a good thing, because we lived off pork for about 2 years! (times were tight)

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Quote:

Originally Posted by Lost_in_Samoa (Post 1556365)

Pacific island pork is the best pork hands down, IMO.

Humans rarely eat brown coconuts ,(called copra), here. People only eat the green ones with the immature gelatin like meat. Copra where the meat has hardened into a white nut is considered pig food.

We have pork here that has been raised entirely on banana's, copra, and taro. We cook it in an above ground oven made from hot rocks and banana leaves. Call it an Umu. Its like half steamed half baked.

The meat is so tender that we have a hard time picking it up. It just falls off the bone. And it's so sweet from the lifelong diet of coconut.

Suckling pig stuffed with mangoe's and cooked all day in an Umu. Nothing better.

Damn, that sounds really good! :ok:

Its funny how they generally enjoy human company,they will look you in the eye and smile.When you scratch them in the right spot they will do that stretch out manivour like a dog does.

When i was a kid we use to ride them for fun and the pigs enjoyed it as much as us.

The only pig I ever raised was a wild hog that I ran down and grabbed in my grain field, she was a few weeks hold and bonded to me within a few hours. I named her Roseann Barr , it seamed to fit at the time LOL. She was good with me and the family but hell on wheels to any one or any thing else, she was a helluva watch hog to ! she would routinely take on 2 or 3 of our dogs for their food.....and these were bad ass dogs. Roseann would attack anything that resembled a snake... a water hose, a rope or a piece of 1/2" pvc pipe. the other thing I noticed is even though they are very smart they don't have a reverse gear , I never saw her back up, not saying they don't but I never saw her do it.We never kept her in a pin (we rarely keep anything in a pin around her) one day she came up missing and a few weeks later I started to smell something dead in the yard that I traced to under the house. She had wedged herself into a peer block brace and died there partly because she wouldn't back up and partly because she had been chewed up bad from fighting with the dogs, this all happened while we were on a 3 day trip......and that's the story of Roseann

PS, she was about 2 when she died.

Quote:

Originally Posted by nub (Post 1556551)

PS, she was about 2 when she died.

RIP Rosanne
:cry1::cry1::cry1::cry1:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lost_in_Samoa (Post 1556365)

That sounds awesome! Can I come to the next party?

My folks used to raise a yearly hog on leftover goat milk, grain and garden veggies when I was younger. A couple times I would pour two beers in the trough on a hot day and that hog was real grateful for it. if times get hard the little pot belly pigs might be good for backyard farmers.

L.I.S. while I'm sure it was tasty I can't bare to look ,it reminds me of Roseann :bawling:

Quote:

Originally Posted by nub (Post 1556679)

L.I.S. while I'm sure it was tasty I can't bare to look ,it reminds me of Roseann :bawling:

And the avatar reminds me of Donald Duck....that said, I'd try it with hot sauce.