After years of tough returns in the hog business in Canada, it looks like a complete loser? Despite being "super efficient" hog producers just can't seem to make a buck?
What got me thinking about this was something grassfarmer said about making some pretty good money on "pasture hogs".
When I was a boy, my Dad raised a bunch of hogs in a pasture type situation. He had two pastures about 5 acres each, all well fenced with page wire. Every spring he planted these to an oats/barley mixture. There was another smaller area where he had these little wooden huts and some self feeders. There was a runway from this area down to a cribbed spring that never froze.
The sows only had babies once a year, usually in early June....probably averaged about 8 babies a year. Everything lived together (except the boar).
Now I don't know if he made any money at it or not? They sure seemed to eat a lot of ground barley, as well as all the skim milk from the milk cows and all the junk from the garden and kitchen. He used to throw them a square bale of alfalpha one in awhile in the winter.
The pastures grew an unreal crop and by fall they had her pretty well all rooted up and chewed down. I guess they were sort of rotationally grazed.
I don't remember those pigs being a lot of work (except for always grinding grain). My Dad would let the sow out of the little hut she had her babies to eat/drink and then he'd get in there and work the babies over.
Anyway he never really liked those pigs very much and one day we just loaded the whole works up and shipped them to town!
I often wonder though if that wasn't a healthier way to raise pigs? I know the ham, bacon, pork was sure a lot tastier than this junk you get today!
What got me thinking about this was something grassfarmer said about making some pretty good money on "pasture hogs".
When I was a boy, my Dad raised a bunch of hogs in a pasture type situation. He had two pastures about 5 acres each, all well fenced with page wire. Every spring he planted these to an oats/barley mixture. There was another smaller area where he had these little wooden huts and some self feeders. There was a runway from this area down to a cribbed spring that never froze.
The sows only had babies once a year, usually in early June....probably averaged about 8 babies a year. Everything lived together (except the boar).
Now I don't know if he made any money at it or not? They sure seemed to eat a lot of ground barley, as well as all the skim milk from the milk cows and all the junk from the garden and kitchen. He used to throw them a square bale of alfalpha one in awhile in the winter.
The pastures grew an unreal crop and by fall they had her pretty well all rooted up and chewed down. I guess they were sort of rotationally grazed.
I don't remember those pigs being a lot of work (except for always grinding grain). My Dad would let the sow out of the little hut she had her babies to eat/drink and then he'd get in there and work the babies over.
Anyway he never really liked those pigs very much and one day we just loaded the whole works up and shipped them to town!
I often wonder though if that wasn't a healthier way to raise pigs? I know the ham, bacon, pork was sure a lot tastier than this junk you get today!
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