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Friday, April 8, 2011

Very nice quality boar piglet

I run a herd of 40 sows and 4 boars, and produce around 1,000 pigs a year. There are very few male pigs that I see that I consider to be top-notch, and this guy is one of them. Excellent conformation, good, wide stance. Gaining weight faster than his siblings in the same litter. Really nice hams, perfect in all respects. This is one that I'm considering keeping.


I only get a keeper male about every year or so.

If you have been considering replacing your existing boar, or having a new boar to breed your sow, or starting a pig herd of your own, this would be a good pig to pick. This is a top-notch piglet. Health guaranteed, vaccinated, he'll be ready to go in 2-3 weeks.

You're welcome to come and look at him in person, or I can email you more pictures. He's a beauty.


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11 comments:

  1. MelApril 8, 2011 at 11:16 PM

    This is totally off topic, but I'd love to hear your thoughts on this: http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/08/cracking-down-on-croparazzi/?smid=tw-nytimes

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  2. Bruce KingApril 9, 2011 at 12:45 AM

    Mel, I wrote this comment in reply to that blog entry:

    We are so removed from the production of our food that common farming practices are alien to the majority of the US population. Less than 2% of the population farm, and even fewer run animal operations (pigs, chickens, turkeys, beef, etc).


    This bill is designed to protect farmers from the (potentially huge) costs of negative publicity about some practice that gets filmed or photographed and then publicized.

    I write quite a bit about my farming operations, and I've had a taste of this. I wrote an entry about feeding fruits and vegetables to my pigs. Seems harmless, right? Read what happened here:

    http://ebeyfarm.blogspot.com/2011/03/put-yourself-in-my-shoes.html

    And I wrote a long blog entry with more pictures and details in reply

    http://ebeyfarm.blogspot.com/2011/03/question-i-didnt-get-from-email.html

    And all of this from a completely legal and common practice -- recycling food.

    I'll write an entry about this bill in particular tommorow, but take a minute and figure out what the other side of the story is. Learn where your food comes from, and how it is produced.

    Bruce / ebeyfarm.blogspot.com

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  3. AnonymousApril 9, 2011 at 5:10 AM

    Wow! He is a handsome fellow! I wish you weren't all the way across the country!

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  4. Nancy Olympia WAApril 9, 2011 at 8:05 AM

    Wow!!! He is HUGE in comparison to litter mate buddy in the pics.

    If I was ready to raise pigs, I'd be interested. My 4 acres of clay in NE Olympia is a mud pit. I'm moving my horse to a co-op barn down the road that has a covered arena and direct access to the Western Chehalis trail so I can get some training and riding in. I won't be happy with my horse getting put in a stall at night, as I think it's important for the health of the horse to move 24/7, however he will have dry footing at the new location.

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  5. Bruce KingApril 9, 2011 at 8:23 AM

    The size difference is part of what makes him a standout pig. I'm pretty hard to impress.

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  6. MelApril 9, 2011 at 10:14 AM

    Bruce - my concern about that bill is that it makes it illegal to photograph legitimate examples of animal abuse. I first heard about it through (sane) animal welfare advocates. They have many, many examples of abuse by private individuals that were ignored until evidence became public and the outcry forced law enforcement to act. This would make it a worse crime to photograph your neighbor's starving animals than it is for the neighbor to do the starving. Likewise for big name 'trainers' beating horses into submission, or dog fighting kennels.

    I understand the desire to protect farms from harassment by the ignorant, but making photographs taken from public land a worse crime than manslaughter is obscenely overbroad IMHO.

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  7. AnonymousApril 10, 2011 at 4:47 AM

    Hmmmm, me thinks you don't have a lot of understanding of the principles of genetics. The chances that this animal is going to breed true for the traits that you are looking for are very low. In other words, it's phenotype and it's genotype are very different. You should read a book about genetics or pig breeding before you try to pass off crossbred boars to people. Starting a breeding program with this boar as the sire would be - as one book puts it- the height of folly.

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  8. Bruce KingApril 10, 2011 at 4:07 PM

    Ok, I'll bite. Please tell me what your experience and/or training in genetics is. Your degree, graduate and postgraduate work, if applicable.

    Since you mention books about both genetics and pig breeding, I'd like you to tell me the title and author of each of the books that you advise me to read.

    And please do give me the author, book and page number of the quote: "...the height of folly".

    I'm pretty tired of issuferably arrogant folks that assume that i'm some guy who has no idea what I'm doing in my operations, no training, and that whatever experience I've got is immaterial.

    I'm sure you're not one of those people; I'm looking forward to seeing you teach me how to be a pig farmer.

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  9. Bruce KingApril 12, 2011 at 8:54 AM

    Anon, thanks for the reply. I'm not going to publish it here, or anything further from you on this subject. When you can keep a civil tongue in your head write again.

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  10. robinApril 28, 2011 at 10:10 PM

    Wow I had no idea that you produced a 1,000 pigs a year. :)

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  11. Bruce KingApril 28, 2011 at 10:18 PM

    I think last year I sold 773 pigs. This year I'm on track to sell over 1,000.

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