Keeping Berkshire Pigs

[George Collins]

If memory serves, Joel Salatin's stuff isn't certified organic. He refers to his offerings as "Beyond Organic" I think.

Salatin goes on to say that the term "organic" is influenced/controlled by agencies of the US government. As such, to me, it is meaningless. As it relates to antibiotics, the workaday definition of organic, to me in the case of hogs, is those animals that have not been fed sub-therapeutic doses of antibiotics as an appetite stimulant and as a prophylactic against ever-present disease causing microbes which allows vast numbers of animals to be kept in inhumane, CAFO conditions.

The thought of not medicating a sick animal, especially my breeding stock, nauseates me. The thought of having to sell them at what would most likely be a tremendous loss nauseates me. The thought of allowing the government to get between me and a potential customer nauseates me.

So no, I am definitely not trying to be certified organic. The only certification I will look for is repeat business from my customers who will hopefully tell me that the pork I produce is the best tasting meat they've ever held tween their jaws.

My ultimate business strategy will thus be twofold:
1. Acquire those genetics that tend to produce amazing pork
2. Raise those animals intended for consumption from the time they wean to the time they finish without them ever consuming anything not produced on-farm with the vast majority or all of those inputs they do consume coming from tree crops.

[George Collins]

Manny, if you could get a video of an injection into the neck of an unrestrained hog, that might be helpful.

Keep us posted on your pig's progress.

[mannytheseacow]

Wish I could post a video, but that would require an extra hand. The first two injections weren't too bad- she was down and hardly moving. By the end of the day that penicillin was perking her up and we gave her one last 7-day dose of Draxxin. Their pen is pretty heavily wooded and that little Tamworth I'm estimating at about 250 now. It was all I could do to grab her back leg while my girl grabbed her ear with one hand and jabbed that needle into her neck with the other, thumb on the plunger. This all happened in about 3.5 seconds flat and Pork Chop (the Tam) didn't want any part of it.

She's much better today, hungry as ever, back to being her dominant self, and well in need of some food. I'm really surprised how thin she got in just one day. I guess as fast as they put it on they can take it off. I cooked her up a little venison, some mushroom stems, and broccoli stems out of the garden and gave it to her warm this afternoon with a little oats and wheat out of the yard. She wasn't sharing it with anyone! So far the others look like their just fine.

[George Collins]

During the recent illness which I described earlier, Lou lost her litter of pigs. Linda kept hers and is obviously "in a piggy way." Approximately 21 days ago, Lou tore out of her electric fence enclosure twice in as many days and injured Linda during an episode of heat-induced aggression.

I separated them into separate paddocks and all was well until this morning when I went to go feed. Lou met me at the road having yet again breeched her pen in an estrus induced act of bone-headedness.

I decided then and there, "If you want a man that bad, I will accommodate you."

Mr. Bingley was called up from the minors where he had been keeping Mr. Brewer company.

I secured Lou in Youngblood's cow trailer while two new electric paddocks were erected. The play we ran was to keep Linda and Lou separate while keeping Bingley and Lou together.

We pulled the move off without too much screaming, cussing and tears. Bingley was caged in a hog panel pen which was inside Lou's pen and Linda was kept adjacent to them both in a pen all by her onesy.

I had hoped to let Linda and Bing get to know one another for a few days with a little fence line contact - a little nose to nose kissing. Well, they were having none of that and the hog panel pen, stout though it was, was in danger of being torn apart such was their desires.

I relinquished my preconceived notion and turned them over to their lusts.

The gate . . . was opened.

The fight . . . was on.

Check it out:

[mannytheseacow]

Those are some mighty fine looking pigs you've got there, George. Sorry to hear you lost a litter, though. My Tamworth made a full recovery within 8 hours, so things are back to normal around my place. Earlier in the week the girls disappeared and I noticed they hadn't been cleaning up their rations... I went to investigate and found the red oaks in their pasture have been dropping acorns. Between the acorns and the mulberries, they pigs haven't been too interested in grains.

A week or so back I went and visited a major hog farm about an hour away from me. It's pastured pigs (landrace, big whites, and Berkshires) on a 4 year field rotation. They were doing some interesting things there. I can't say I agree 100% with what they were doing but it was really cool to see a farm producing 100,000 pigs a year that wasn't in confinement and most of their feed is being grown on the farm. I talked with the owner and he is really interested in incorporating some permaculture ideas into his farm and he's pretty well versed, but he has to be able to have it make sense to his business. Progress....
Check them out at:

[matt walker]

Nice George. Amazing the way they avoid the hot wire so well even when fighting.

[George Collins]

Manny,

Thanks for the nod of approval.

While I too was bummed out about the loss of the litter, it may actually work out pretty good from a timing perspective. The litters of the two sows can now be staggered such that instead of two litters every six months, we will now have one litter every three months. That means I will only need to construct one farrowing house.

Also, and I don't mean to be all woo-woo here, but I need to have a lot of learning experiences on the front end with only a very few pigs so that if I ever scale up (and I hope to), I won't be as apt to be overwhelmed by problems.

My ultimate system will hopefully be one that is WAY beyond organic. Optimally, the hogs will eventually be gaining sustenance entirely through tree crops. Failing that, from crops grown on-site. Since that goal is now contingent upon the maturation of the trees planted over the past few years with lions share being planted just this last year, I figure the system is five to seven years out.

That window of opportunity is where I will hopefully become a master pig raiser.

[George Collins]

Interest in Berkshire pork seems to be such that I am about to add a third sow to my operation. On or about August 17th, we will be headed back to Rayville, LA to pick her up. I'm hoping to get a full sister to Linda and Lou.

What's more, I have a couple friends that are interested in starting hog operations of their own who will tentatively accompany me to purchase their own breeding stock.

What's more, these two guys planted about as many fruit and mast producing trees last year as I did in anticipation of potentially following the advice of Russell Smith as articulated in Tree Crops.

[mannytheseacow]

That's great, George. I'm glad more people are getting into this. It's been a couple of weeks now and my girls are basically off of feed. It's hard to believe acorns and mulberries are keeping them full but I have no other way of explaining it. I just wish I could produce forage like this throughout the year for them.

Good luck with your new purchase!

[George Collins]

Manny, feeding hogs from tree crops year round has been something I've spent considerable mental energy on. The only viable sounding solution I've yet hit upon is off-site production of those tree crops that store well such as pecans, acorns, etc.

Towards that end, I planted 100 saw tooth oaks back in the spring and will hopefully expand upon that greatly during the next planting season. The intent is to harvest the mast of this exceptionally productive tree, which drops in August and September here, and store it until the hungry gap.

I've also experimented this year with one successfull crop of blue Hubbard squash and just prepared the field today for a second planting. Blue Hubbards are supposed to store for up to six months. A quality that I till test this winter.

I'm thinking that the combination of blue Hubbards and sawtooth oak acorns MAY go a long way towards helping us defray feed costs for our breeding stock during the months of January through April. The plan (subject to change) as of right now is to eventually farrow only once per year in April or May which is about the time trees crops start dropping here.

I've also played around with a second farrowing strategy that would be a more conventional, grain based approach. Since I'm doing my level best at letting economics have a 49% stake in all decision making processes (heart gets 51%), if customers are willing to pay for a humanely raised, grain fed hog, I would have no reservations in taking another bit out of Big Ag.