Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Variation in piglet size at birth


All of the piglets in this picture were born about an hour ago, from The Black Pig. She's a 500lb sow, 3 years old.

4 comments:

Robin said...

Wow, I didn't realize that you would get that much variation. That is one tiny spotted piglet up front. Will the smalls ones like that not grow as fast or will they all be caught up at the end when it comes time to butcher?

Bruce King said...

Unfortunately, when they're that small, they often don't survive to be weaned. they'll die in the first 24-48 hours.

Craig said...

Bruce,how are the farrowing crates working for you so far? I know little piglets can have trouble finding their teat and are good candidates for getting crushed but the crate should minimize these problems. Right?

Bruce King said...

Entry on the crates tommorow at 4pm pacific time