Curiousfarmer

The English Style Farrowing Huts are working pretty well so far.  Four of the five sows farrowed, each in her own hut.

I probably should have spaced the huts farther apart.  I’m having some trouble with sows returning to the wrong hut after they leave to eat and drink.

It’s also going to be a challenge to process the piglets away from the sow.  Sows can be aggressive defending their young, and a squealing piglet sets them off.

I’m glad I purchased the optional roller which fits in the doorway.  I’m able to leave the door to the hut open so the sow can come and go as she likes, but the roller keeps the piglets in until they are big enough to jump out.  The roller is the blackish thing in the bottom of the photo below.

I learned a lot these past two months, and ended up with some live piglets.  Nine sows averaged seven piglets weaned per litter.  Two sows lost 18 of 20 piglets when they farrowed in below zero F weather.  So the total average is just under six piglets weaned per litter.

I found that if the temperature was 20 F or above, temperature wasn’t an issue.  My plan for next year is to avoid farrowing in December through February.  This will insure decent temps.

The pens I built worked fine.  I kept the litter confined for 7 to 10 days, letting the mother out for feed and water twice a day.  After that, I just took out the wire panel and let the litters co-mingle.  You can see that in the photo below.

The pens were about nine feet by nine feet.  I just purchased ten English style farrowing huts from Port-A-Hut.  I fear they may not be large enough, measuring nine feet by 5 and a half feet.  Time will tell.  The huts will give me more flexibility, allowing me to farrow outside of the hoop barns.

I do three procedures on the baby piglets when they are a couple of days old.  Pictured above is a freshly notched ear.  Pictured below are the castration incisions after pulling the testicles out.  The third procedure, not pictured, is an injection of iron into the neck muscle of the piglet.

The first procedure is done to individually identify each piglet.  The notch is easily readable for the rest of the pig’s life, so no other identification is needed.  I use the international system, with the right ear designating the litter, and the left ear designating the piglet within the litter.

I castrate the piglets to prevent “boar taint” in their meat.  Boar taint is an offensive odor, released when cooking pork which has high levels of androstenone and skatole.  Castrating piglets nearly eliminates the chance of boar taint.

Boar taint doesn’t occur in all males.  Some producers use genetic lines with little incidence of boar taint.  Some countries butcher intact males at a young age and lower weight to reduce boar taint.

I’m unwilling to risk selling the meat from an intact male because of the potential to lose so many customers at one time.  I also like to butcher my hogs larger and older than the industry average, believing this contributes to taste and marbling.  If I didn’t castrate, I would have to keep the boars separate from the gilts, or the boars would be breeding the gilts before marketing.

Sow’s milk is deficient in iron, so piglets will suffer from anemia if another source of iron isn’t available.  On pasture, that source can be soil.  Since my piglets are on bedding, I decided to continue to give an injection of iron.  Iron injections are ok under organic protocols.

I’ve given vaccines to my swine in the past.  It’s best to wait until piglets are three weeks of age or older to administer the vaccine, as this is when the passive maternal immunity is wearing off, and the piglet’s own immunity is developing.  As this would require catching piglets, I think I’m going to try not using any vaccines.

I would like to make a video of my piglet processing protocol and post it on Youtube.  I’ll let you know if I ever do.

I knew sows make nests before they farrow.  I didn’t know they spend so much time and effort on their nests after they farrow.

Look at this gilt raking the bedding with her front foot.  The bedding was more or less even, but she took one side of the pen down to the lime chip layer, and elevated the other side a foot or more.  This had to take hours.

I watched one gilt tear bedding off a bale with her mouth and carry it to her nest.  All of them do it to some extent.  Below is another picture showing a litter in an elevated nest.