The content of pigs at home

Keeping pigs at home is profitable, although somewhat troublesome. But, as they say, you can’t easily take a fish out of a pond, and even more so, you won’t grow a healthy, well-fed pig. There is no need to talk about the taste of pork for a long time. This product is tasty in any form: boiled, fried, smoked, salted. Pork is well suited for homemade canned food and freezing.In addition, pig meat is characterized by a high content of complete protein, iron, amino acids, and B vitamins.

Pig care and care

Content features

Benefits of raising pigs at home ia hardly need any additional comments.

Compared to other meat breeds of domestic animals, pigs are highly fertile and have relatively fast weight gain.

So, provided that it’s good content from a healthy sow for only 1 farrow is quite realistic to get up to 1.5 dozen piglets. And if we take into account the fact that with proper care and timely weaning of piglets from their mother, the sow can pig twice a year, then after simple arithmetic calculations, we can say that in 12 months the responsible pig breeder will surely receive up to 3 dozen piglets.

To obtain the optimal result from fattening a pig, you must determine its breed.They choose it, depending on the desired result, the climatic conditions of the location of the farm and the personal preferences of the pig farmer. For example, the Hungarian Mangalitsa is suitable for those who prefer meat with large layers of fat, but the meat of Korean and Vietnamese pigs is more lean. In order for novice pig farmers not to get into trouble and make the purchase profitably and wisely, it is better to contact specialized pedigree farms or farmers with a good reputation.

They transport freshly acquired babies in bags or baskets to a short distance and in special cages to a far . Upon the arrival of a new pet in the farm, he needs to allocate a separate room in which the piglet will have to stay for several weeks. These precautions help in time to identify possible diseases of the baby and prevent infection of other inhabitants of the farm.

In order to raise a healthy fattened pig, you must observe some of the necessary conditions for its keeping:

• specially equipped room;
• providing conditions for walking;
• proper care;
• balanced diet;
• prevention and treatment of diseases.

Premises for keeping

Now we will consider how to properly keep pigs in utility rooms households.Before you bring piglets to your farm, its owner will have to go through the construction of a pigsty or refurbish existing sheds, which is troublesome for beginner pig farmers.

According to sanitary standards, a pigsty should be spacious enough, warm and dry.

Particular attention should be paid to ventilation. To ensure proper ventilation, it is enough to use a conventional household exhaust system and do not forget about ventilation, which requires windows in the room.

The optimum temperature in the pigsty should be at around 20 ° С. To ensure a favorable temperature regime in the winter, it is necessary to insulate the roof, floor and walls. Also in winter, you can use electric heaters. For additional heating of small piglets, it is recommended to use infrared lamps.

It is better to make the floor in the piggy concrete, followed by warming it with straw, sawdust or hay. In no case should animals be allowed to slip on the floor and high humidity of the floor. To facilitate cleaning in the pigsty, the floor is made with a slight tilt towards the back wall. In the same place should be located recesses for the flow of urine and manure. In the front sector of the pigsty it is advisable to make containers for feed and water.

In order to ensure the pig has normal maintenance and care, in the pigsty it is necessary to equip machines in which pigs will be kept.For sows and boars, veterinarians recommend allocating individual machines. In the photo and video of the large pigsties it is noticeable that up to 25 young animals can be accommodated in one machine. In general, the norm of the area in the machine for an individual weighing up to 100 kg is a little more than 1 square meter. m.

Features of walking

To maintain health and ensure normal weight gain, pigs need outdoor exercise – walking.

Depending on the climatic features of the region and the personal preferences of the pig breeder, there are several basic ways of keeping pigs. In regions with a mild climate, a free-walking method of raising animals predominates. To do this, the machines are equipped in such a way that the livestock can be freely selected on the walking platform. The site itself is divided into several sections, each of which is connected by a passage with a specific machine.

In regions with a more severe climate, easel-walking pigs prevail. Its technology consists in the fact that the main time of the day “pigs” are in machines, in which there are special manholes with small doors. These manholes lead to a walking area where livestock are released in the summer or when the weather is favorable for walking.

After walking, the pigs are driven back to the machines.On large pig farms with modern technologies of multi-tiered or tiered-cell keeping of animals, a non-walking mode of keeping prevails.

In order to carry out repairs, disinfection and other hygiene procedures in the pigsty, its inhabitants are often temporarily transferred to the so-called summer camps. They are pens with shelter from the sun and rain. In pens, special paved areas are equipped to house drinking bowls and feeders. In the photo and video of such camps it can be seen that the walking areas are areas covered with young grass, where animals are on free pasture. Such maintenance is called camp-grazing and is carried out mainly in the summer, but by no means in the cold season.

Free or outdoor maintenance has its advantages:

1. The pig chooses for himself food that is rich in vitamins and other beneficial substances. During grazing on the street, the need for special feed additives disappears by itself.
2. The movement positively affects the pig’s skeleton and its muscles, as well as prevents excessive accumulation of fat mass.
3. Free grazing has a beneficial effect on the fecundity of sows and the development of young individuals.

Care

Consider some features of the care of pigs and piglets in the household. First of all, it is worth noting that pigs are characterized by a fairly rapid weight gain.With an initial weight of a newborn piglet from 1 to 1.5 kg, during the first 7 days of its life, it becomes almost 2 times heavier, and with the correct and timely weaning from the sow, which is carried out at the end of the 2nd month of life of babies, the weight of weaners will soon be increases by 20 times. If you properly care for the piglet, then in 12 months you can raise an animal whose weight will exceed the original one by almost 140 times, and this is 140 kg. No less, no less.

To get such results, proper care is extremely important for pigs and for the room in which they are located. According to sanitary standards, the humidity in the pigsty should be no more than 85%, and its optimal indicator is at the level of 70%. Drafts, low temperatures and high humidity are categorically contraindicated both to piglets of the first months of life and to adults. The minimum temperature in the room where the pigs grow, should not fall below 22 ° C. For adults, this indicator is 16 ° C.

When raising pigs at home, special attention should be paid to the cleanliness of the premises where they are kept.

Pig cleaning should be regular and thorough. Once a month, it is necessary to carry out a general cleaning followed by disinfection and disinsection of the premises. After each feeding, it is necessary to clean the feeders well and rinse them every 7 days using lye.Drinking bowls should also not be forgotten: the water in them must be changed regularly.

Feeding

In addition to proper maintenance and good care for the pigs, it is extremely important to adhere to the basic rules for feeding animals. content is the optimal use of the resulting more than a third of pigs digest pigs, compared with sheep and cows, pigs spend 30% less feed per kilogram of growth, which is quite noticeable, especially for beginning pig breeders. The slaughter yield of the animal reaches 85%, which is a fairly high rate.

In order for pigs to grow and develop well, they need regular balanced nutrition.

They are fed 5 times a day until they are 3 months old. For young animals who are already 3 months old, it is enough to receive food 4 times a day. Adults and lactating sows eat three times a day.

Since pigs are herbivores, the basis of their diet is plant products.The calculation of the daily rate of feeding a pig depends on its age, breed and how much it weighs. In order for pigs to gain weight quickly, their meat was tasty, and the lard is dense and grainy, the following food groups should be included in the diet:

1. Cereals. It can be peas, millet, barley.
2. Juicy vegetables and root crops, such as pumpkin, sugar beets, potatoes, carrots.
3. Greens. You can use nettle, clover, alfalfa.
4. Rough feed. These include hay legume from legumes.
5. Meat waste and dairy products.

There are several ways to feed pigs. The dry pig diet consists of specialized dry feed. They include all the vitamins and minerals necessary for pig growth. The advantage of this method of feeding is its simplicity and quick weight gain by livestock. In addition, dry feed significantly saves pig farmers, has a long shelf life and contributes to the normal digestion of the pig.

The liquid feeding method is used in many private farms. The diet of a pig during such feeding consists of self-prepared feed mixtures with the addition of yogurt and liquid food waste. A wet way of feeding involves the use of dishes prepared by mixing boiled potatoes, herbs, vegetables, oilcake and food waste.Those pig farmers whose farms grow green feed and vegetables give preference to wet and liquid pig feeding methods.

Diseases

Pigs, like all animals, are subject to different diseases. In order to avoid them, and if this is impossible, then at least to reveal them at an early stage, it is important for pig farmers not to forget about hygiene measures in pigsties and regular livestock inspections. Consider the most common diseases of pigs:

1. Digestive disorders are most often found in small piglets.
2. Another disease that pigs are susceptible to is erysipelas. The carriers of the disease can be rodents or other pigs. Symptoms of the disease include fever, loss of appetite, thirst, constipation or diarrhea.
3. Leptospirosis is characterized by fever, a nervous system disorder, decreased appetite, and blood and pus in the urine. This disease is also dangerous for humans.
4. Swine fever affects the circulatory system, lungs, intestines. This is a very dangerous and virtually incurable disease with a fatal outcome.