Meet the Porkers

Bye bye fence.

There has been a lot of action on the farm lately.  The garden lies in repose but we cannot afford to remain idle.  There are fences to be demolished and ironically, mended and installed.  The chicken coop has been moved which is more of a feat than it sounds.  The coop probably weights at least five hundred pounds.  In hindsight, it should have been built with lighter materials and wheels.  Skids were added under the coop.  My neighbor graciously let us borrow his tractor to haul it fifty feet to its new site which is closer to water and electricity.  Moving the coop gave me serious tractor envy.

Hello greenhouse hoops.

Speaking of toys, our farm could really use a full-sized pickup truck.  A week and half ago we brought home three little pigs from Bruce King http://ebeyfarm.blogspot.com/.  In addition to the pigs, the car was loaded to the gills with five by five by eight foot long juniper timbers and a full keg.  The timbers will be the base of a greenhouse and the keg is for all-grain beer brewing.  The juniper smells like cedar while the pigs smelled like pigs.  In fact, to this day the car still smells piggy.

Marigold, Piggy and Petunia eating out of a handcrafted trough.

The pigs are predominantly Berkshire, hence the black markings.  Berkshire pigs are a heritage variety known for higher marbling and darker flesh.  My father-in-law, who has raised his share of animals and pigs, says that they have more of a “dish face”.  Not sure what that means but they do have a more upturned snout than our previous pigs.  Their backs appear more humped too.  They are much calmer than the two Durocs that we got last year.  

Hmmm, brussell sprouts or an old gingerbread house?

The two little ones are siblings.  They were in a paddock with about fifty other pink pigs.  They were the only ones of their type and Piggy had scars on his flank.  Not sure why the other pigs would have beat-up on him but I have noticed discrimination amongst the different chicken breeds that we keep.  It is true that “birds of a feather flock together.”

The third pig, Petunia, was still in a farrowing pen with her mother and siblings.  Her red coloration mostly likely indicates that she is part Duroc though I am no pig expert.  She was by far the largest of the litter.  She likes to ham it up by running laps around the pig dome and standing on top of Piggy.  Poor Piggy.  All he can do is squeal mercy until something else catches Petunia’s whim.  She has broader shoulders and more condensed hams but still manages to prance.  Petunia is without a doubt queen of the roost and will probably outweigh the other animals by twenty pounds.

Pig plows and the stately pleasure dome.

We opted to get the pigs earlier this year than last because we intend to develop a new vegetable patch on the side of the old fenced yard.  The new vegetable plot will have a greenhouse.  We wanted the pigs to break up the sod prior to the greenhouse being built.  In one week the pigs rooted and manured their pen which is sixteen feet by sixteen feet.    The pen was moved recently and within an hour the pigs had torn up the sod which would have taken at least 15 minutes with a tractor or a day by hand.

"I'm worth only a few bags of grain." -Lucinda Williams

Tonight, I bought 1360 pounds of pig feed.  Feed prices are really high right now which will no doubt equal higher food costs for everyone.  Buying in bulk brings down the price to roughly $.22 per pound versus $.34 per pound if purchased in single bags, like we did last year.  You may think that ten cents is minor but over the course of raising three pigs it can add up quickly.  There is a razor thin margin of profit when it comes to hobby farming which is why most people hold a full-time job to support their farming habit.

Xanadu

The low profit margin per animal gave rise to factory farming where volume equates to profit.  After reading descriptions of industrial pig farming, we are all the more happy knowing that our pigs will have a pretty decent run even if it would be cheaper and easier to buy pork from the supermarket.