Keeping a Sow

[mainelady]

Hi there,

I'm starting to really consider keeping a sow. With the goats and the cow, I need an outlet for milk/whey for most of the year, and we usually supply pork to our friends and family, so we end up buying around 6 piglets each year. Finding available piglets (especially in the spring) has been a pain in the butt. So, I'm considering keep a sow, and selling extra piglets as feeders. 

I'm looking for advice about if this is a bad idea, how expensive it is to keep a sow year round, what breed would be best, and management suggestions. 

Some situation specific stuff:

- I don't have a lot of space. I have about 1/4 acre that Elmo (my boar, I'll explain more later) lives on. I suppose I could rotate any pigs- but 
         I'm not excited about the idea of the whole farm getting dug up, or trying to "pig-proof" much more of the farm. 
- I have 4 does and a cow that will be in milk (the does kid in the spring, and the cow is due in October) 
- I have a few fruit trees that produce tart apples and very hard/small pears that I feed out 
- I have a 7 year old (registered) Large Black Boar- Elmo. Elmo lives on the 1/4 acre and has a three sided 8x16 house. He was bought as a
        piglet was and supposed to be part of a breeding program my parents were going to start- the program fell through, but Elmo remained.
        He's a wonderful animal and I would love for him to sire piglets. 
- One thing I love about Elmo is that he is VERY good about electric (and other) fence. I attribute this to his giant ears blocking his face some,          and his generally cautious nature. Animals that don't test fences are highly coveted around here. 
- We don't (at this point) make our own sausage or charcuterie, or use very much lard.
- We ended up eating a Large Black sow that was a few years old (she ended up being infertile), and I was NOT a fan of the meat. It was dark         and gamey(?) I am not certain to what extent this was related to the age, what she was fed, or the breed. Generally I would prefer a more
        mild pork. 
- Last summer our batch of pigs were berkshire, old spot, large black mutts (I don't know what proportions) and they were quite tasty
- When I raise feeders they usually live 2-3 in a 25x50 enclosure with a small house and get fed pellets         (https://www.poulingrain.com/products/219/swine-grower-pellets), dairy excess, and food waste from the house.
        (this space is completely separate from Elmo's space)
- I would say that it takes 700 lbs (roughly $210 worth) of pellets to raise each pig when pellets are all we have. 
- Our climate is very cold and windy from Oct - Apr
- feeder pigs are roughly $125 around here- though I wouldn't be surprised if they get up to $150, and I have seen several people posting
        about organizing to haul in trailers from PA, and even TX 


Some immediate questions come to mind: Will feeding a sow be so expensive that it isn't worth it? Is it totally unreasonable to try to use Elmo as a sire? I am thinking maybe he will be too big (he's actually pretty trim, but he's still a 7 year old boar). I am also worried that I just don't like to eat large black hogs, and crossing him with anything will make not-tasty pigs. If I DO cross him with something, are there breeds I should avoid because the piglets will be too big? Then there's the concern that he is infertile at this point (the last time he sired a litter was 6 years ago). Is it unreasonable to keep a sow and a boar on the same 1/4 acre year round? Elmo has a patch he was pretty permanently turned into a wallowing spot, but theres a good bit of grass that he will graze, or sleep in when it's sunny. Is there a breed of pig that would be best for me and this situation? 

[mainelady]

sorry about the awkward text formatting - it looked so nice when I was typing it...and then the spacing fell apart when it posted :/

[mainelady]

Elmo

[rosalind]

What a stud!!

We butchered a 2 year old Large Black sow, the meat was just fine. Pretty fatty, she was a biiiig gal! I preferred the Mulefoots, which are a moderate-size breed. There are so many cool breeds, you really don't have to stay purebred if you don't want. The offspring of a cross can sometimes be even better than parent breeds, if meat is what you're after.

Already having/keeping a boar is the biggest issue you'll deal with - and you already know what year-round pig living is like, so that should be fine. I think Elmo would love to have a woman to keep him company! Can he breed? My guess would be yes, but no way to know til you try. (Do they do semen tests on pigs??)

A downside to keeping pigs where I'm at is we have rough winters and I could rarely sell fall piglets. If I had the inclination, a smart option would be to sell all the spring litter to 4-Hers and raise up and butcher the fall litter and try to calve in cows to match the timing of when you need to feed pigs.

It's getting harder to find piglets, so there should be some demand, at least in spring for sure. Same with meat, if you have a decent processor you should be able to sell all you raise.

Cost wise, if you have the cows and the milk, raising pigs can be affordable. We fed up pigs without any grain because we had so much milk (and some pasture/weeds).

[mtchick]

I just have to say Elmo is super cute.

[mainelady]

Apr 29, 2021 21:03:47 GMT -5 mtchick said:

I just have to say Elmo is super cute.

He’s a hunk of love ❤️

[northstar]

You've already done the hardest part-keeping a boar. Why not just keep a gilt from your feeders this year? I'd make sure she didn't have any part lard hog as I seem to get plenty of lard from any hog. What would you do with Elmo if he isn't fertile? You'll want to have a separate pen for him for when the sow is farrowing and until you want to breed her again.
Marsha

[Kelsey]

I don't really know anything about keeping breeder pigs, but just wanted to say that Large Blacks are a wonderful breed and produce amazing pork. I believe your experience before was likely due to age, not breed.

[mainelady]

northstar I think at this point Elmo is a permanent part of family. Someone mentioned something to me about boars needing to be a comparable size to the gilt/sow, is that a real thing? Should I be worried about a gilt being too small? Also, Is there a “calving ease” sort of equivalent with pigs, where crossing a Large Black boar over some breeds of gilt would be a bad idea?

[suzorse]

Apr 30, 2021 9:05:45 GMT -5 mainelady said:

northstar I think at this point Elmo is a permanent part of family. Someone mentioned something to me about boars needing to be a comparable size to the gilt/sow, is that a real thing? Should I be worried about a gilt being too small? Also, Is there a “calving ease” sort of equivalent with pigs, where crossing a Large Black boar over some breeds of gilt would be a bad idea?

as long as you are doing normal size pigs, I had a blue butt sow ( York Hamp cross ) you will be fine , I bred her to Berks and Durocs, and got really nice pigs , I would not breed him to smaller breed pigs , the one thing you want to look at on a sow is number of teats as you want 7 to 8 per side , as they are not like dogs or cats , you need to have a teat per pig , as piglets pick a teat in the first couple days and stay with that teat till weaning , so that part is important
Suzanne

[farmel]

Lactating sows eat lots of food - our Berkshire could eat up to 10lbs of chow a day while nursing a litter.
Farrowing inevitably comes with piglet loss. Some losses can be mitigated by management (lots of space, bedding and shelter) but gilts in particular can be horrible moms the first time. This is just farming but it can wear you down the first few times.
Sows can be dangerous and lightening fast to attack. Again, management will mitigate this but it's definitely a learning curve.

A big, heavy boar can injure a gilt if she's young or small....most sows are strong enough to bare the weight if he's experienced/gentle.

Avoid show genetics because, for the most part, they're heavy boned which can lead to problems from both the sow and piglet perspective.

[mainelady]

farmel right now I’m basing my math on a paper I saw somewhere where they estimated a sow are about 3000 lbs of grain in a year, does that sound reasonable?

[northstar]

I think that's way too much, as they also estimate that a weaner takes 700# to butcher weight (six months). My feeder pigs seem to eat way more than a sow (except when she's lactating) and since you're feeding a boar anyway. Have you estimated how much you're feeding him?
Marsha

[mainelady]

Apr 30, 2021 18:34:28 GMT -5 northstar said:

I think that's way too much, as they also estimate that a weaner takes 700# to butcher weight (six months). My feeder pigs seem to eat way more than a sow (except when she's lactating) and since you're feeding a boar anyway. Have you estimated how much you're feeding him?
Marsha

It’s hard to say for Elmo because he gets table scraps and whey quite a bit. I think if he ate just grain he would end up eating maybe 2000 lbs per year?

[farmel]

Apr 30, 2021 18:16:35 GMT -5 mainelady said:

farmel right now I’m basing my math on a paper I saw somewhere where they estimated a sow are about 3000 lbs of grain in a year, does that sound reasonable?

Sounds a little high but probably not by much. It's going to vary on her litter size, weaning age, temperature/weather, her living situation, etc. My math says it's over by about 800lbs but we're in the southeast where "winter" generally lasts 3 weeks.

[jerseyrose]

I don't know the cost, but we kept a gilt out of a batch of feeder pigs we bought and raised her up to breed. It went amazingly well. We lived in MN at the time and she had a part dirt, part concrete run and a 3 sided shelter which was also under roof of our barn.

When we bought the boar we just halved her pen down the middle and put them together during the most frigid months for warmth and breeding.

It is no way near as expensive to feed a maintenance ration as it is to feed out pigs to butcher.

Our sow got 2 grain meals a day, some milk, table scraps and garden bounty when we had it. Of course you will feed more when she is pregnant/nursing but you just want to keep her at a consistent, healthy weight through it all.

I loved having our sow.

I would just use electric fence to divide your existing boar pen and divide the shelter with a more permanent wall.

[josiegirl]

Hey this is anold thread but I've got pigs on the mind haha!!

Did you ever get a sow? I was just gonna say that if you already have a boar a sow isn't going to be much more work and I would think you'd end up saving keeping a sow vs buying piglets. If you buy 6 piglets per year at $125 that's $ 725 on piglets. A sow should eat around 4 lbs grain per day if I remember correctly. They need much less food than a growing pig. so 4lbs per day x roughly 320 days per year would be about 1,280 lbs. Now the rest of the year shed be nursing piglets and I think a larger sow it'd be closer to 14 lbs per day for that 60 day period which gives you 840 lbs. Together that'd be a hair over 2100 lbs per year if you only want one litter per year. So that's 42 bags per grain if that costs you roughly $13 per bag that's $551 per year. So if you also had extra piglets to sell youd be ahead a few hundred dollars. Of course that doesn't include the boar, but you already have him anyways lol.

So I guess it just depends on whether you think all the work(and potential disasters like losing a litter or the sow or whatever) is worth that savings. Personally I think pigs and piglets are pretty darn fun(even tho we have too many atm lol) especially if kiddos are involved.

[mainelady]

josiegirl I did not get a sow 😞

It’s frustrating not to be jumping in, since I see this as an inevitable direction for us, and buying piglets this year was a disaster. Unfortunately this spring we realized the barn needs some big work, so adding a sow just won’t happen this year.

I appreciate all your insight and math though! It definitely makes me feel like a sow will happen one day

[josiegirl]

Oh that's too bad, it'll happen when the time is right I'm sure! I know better than anyone most of the time it's best to have infrastructure before the animal haha!