Bad day at the farm - part 1

Pasture farrowing is new to me; it works pretty well in the summer; it's warmer and a little drier. Some folks seem to be able to farrow pigs in the winter -- like Walter Jefferies at sugar mountain. http://sugarmtnfarm.com/blog/2006/01/winter-farrowing-ideas-1.html


So this is my first winter farrowing on pasture. I have been following the sow for the last week, making sure that she was bedded with clean, dry hay... and I lost all 9 of her piglets today.

Some of these didn't make it out of their unbilical sacks, others did, but were found dead around the sow. The scientist part of me says that negative results are results, but it sucks when you're carrying a bucket of piglets.

I took pictures of the piglets, but after contemplating this, I've decided not to post them. There's nothing you'd learn from them, and for me, I'd like to forget today happened as quickly as possible.

I think in winter, I'll be switching to a farrowing pen for the first week or so of the piglets life, in a barn. After being cited, threatened, fined and paying various fees to snohomish county, they haven't granted me the permit that they required me to get, or told me that they will not grant it, so I cannot finish my barn that I started last year, and that sucks as well.

Snohomish county says they want to preserve and enhance farming, but my experience as the only new farmer in several miles in any direction is that they are hostile to any farming or any other activity. If my barn were complete I'd have someplace to put my steer, and someplace to put my other pregnant pigs. As it is, I'm stuck with a bucket of dead piglets and a steer that's likely to die, too.

Giant milk score

I got a call from Charlie, who I'd done some business with earlier in the year. He is a retired postal worker who has a farm 10 miles north of mine.

One of your major costs in raising pigs is the feed. So if you're going to have any success at it, you'll keep your eyes out for free or low cost pig food. Quality is important, too. I'd rather not feed a pig something that I wouldn't eat.

So Charlie called me and asked if I was interested in 300 gallons of either expired or soon-to-expire cow milk. I was all over that, and picked it up Thursday morning.

Pigs love cows milk. The gallon containers aren't bad, you just slice them with a razor knife and they empty pretty quickly, but the little pint containers are a pain in the ass. Finally discovered you can treat them like grapes -- put them into a garbage can and stomp them flat, pour off the milk, repeat.

In cold weather the pigs cram themselves into as few shelters as can fit all of the pigs. So even though they have 4 shelters that are all bedded with dry hay, 2 of them will be full of pigs, and 2 empties. Guess it's warmer that way.

The shelter in the pictures above is the 2nd from the right in the next photo.

These are the new additions to the herd. They weigh between 80 and 100lbs right now. Some of these guys will go for christmas at about this weight, others will be held and grown out. A few will be bred, if they show good temprament, conformation and work within our system.

I am sooo pregnant

This is our boar. he's a handsome fellow, about 20 months old, and weighs around 500lbs. he's a berkshire boar. This is the animal that I am aware of when I'm working in their pasture. He'll sometimes see me on the other side of the pasture, and run all the way across. I'm pretty sure I can't outrun him. So while he's galloping at me I have to decide whether it's a backrub he's after, or if he's grumpy. So far he's been mostly itchy, but every now and then he'll come over and try to bite me. He's only half-interested in biting me -- he doesn't make any sort of followup, and I don't tolerate it, but it's a balancing act. I do not turn my back on this animal without having the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

Today I chose to step over the magic electric fence to safety. Shorty, one of our sows, greets him.
Shorty looks small in this photo. The boar is 40" tall at the shoulder. Shorty is 350lbs by herself.

This is the subject of this blog. This is Big Momma, my most experienced sow. She's been a great mother and has consistently weaned a high percentage of her litters. She's feeling pretty pregnant right now. I'm guessing that she's due this week. She's laying down like a dog would -- with her hind legs tucked underneath her, and her front legs straight out. She weighs about 450lbs and is roughly 5' long.

Moving around to the side, I'd like to take a look at her nipples. I can usually do this by rubbing her tummy and nipples. I'm guessing it feels really good to be rubbed. You can flip over a 450lb sow with your finger.

That's another pigs ear in the forground. The pigs tend to follow me around when I'm making my rounds. Towards the end of my trip I'll have the whole herd following me. It must look pretty funny from the highway. People honk sometimes.

She doesn't really want to move, so I'm about to move on, when the boar comes up.

He manages to get her on her feet, mostly by threatening to mount her, and as a result I can take a look at her nipples.

Yes, she's starting to get "bagged up" -- Birth soon. I try milking her -- but no milk is flowing, so not today. Maybe tommorow or the day after. Sows enjoy being milked.

Pigs at night

One of the things that you do every day on a farm is a welfare check of the animals; you look at each animal and at their food, and water, and shelter, to make sure that things are good. So tonight i was walking through the pasture and checking

This is a pretty typical pasture scene taken with a flash. The pigs sleep head to tail, next to one another. You can see the hay used to bed the pigs. I put a new bale in from time to time -- they eat some of it, and as it gets wet, they actually move it out of the shelter. Pigs like to sleep dry and warm. Each one of these sows weighs around 400lbs. The calf dome that we use for pasture shelters is 4' tall and 8' wide.
This is tank, one of my older sows, at 24 months. Shes calm, and good natured. I am not sure why she's taking an evening walk tonight, it's kind of rainy and cold, but she's out there pacing along the electric fence you can see in the background over her head and to the left. She is pregnant, so she may be looking for someplace to nest.
Her teats don't look bagged (enlarged, full of milk), so while she is pregnant it's not something that is close. So off she wanders.

Close behind tank is her sister and littermate, big momma. Momma has been rooting around -- that's dirt on her nose, and is just finishing raising a litter of pigs. Notice that she's still bagged. Must be the night for a walk. The pigs don't mind the rain in the slightest, although they do like to sleep in in the morning.

Over in the big shelter, the piglets are nursing and squealing; all is well there.

One last shelter to check.

This is a surprise. That's our boar, a 550lb berkshire boar, who generally is the animal we have to watch while we're working with the pigs. And that's one of our goats standing on the boar. Of all the animals that the goats could sleep with I wouldn't have picked this one. Goats have sharp little hooves. I'm suprised he's tolerating this.
Now there's two goats on the boar. Ok -- pretty funny, but I'm sure that the goats will be safe from coyotes tonight. All is well on the farm.