Thursday, January 24, 2013

Aspects that Hog Raisers Should Learn About

By Lianne Derocco


For those who are about to establish a small-scale swine farm, much research is needed before entering this venture. Proper swine care includes knowing everything you can about housing, swine waste management, feeding and veterinary care. In order to ensure that you give your animals the best care possible, consider the following.

If you have a good-size piece of property that is well fenced, you might consider allowing your pigs to roam free. While they will enjoy grazing and finding shady spots in which to relax, you still will need to provide them with access to food troughs and clean water, as well as some type of shelter. Typically, farmers who raise free roaming pigs will build one or more pig arks where the swine can escape from rain and heat. This ark, which typically is a half circle comprise of metals sheets and wooden supports, also will include fresh and clean bedding for your animals.

You may decide to build a pen or a sty. It is best that you construct a sty that is on a high ground that it would be easily flooded and it should be far from your home so that you would not have to deal with the bad smell it makes naturally. The floor of the sty should be concrete so that it would be easy to clean and it should be sloping also so that the urine goes directly to the drains. There should be beddings provided to the pigs.

Pigs absolutely love to eat, which probably comes as no surprise. Not only do they enjoy foraging around the farm for grass and plants, they love to nibble away at bits of food in their trough. Pig feed can be purchased and supplemented with grains and vegetable scraps from your own kitchen, but be sure to cook them thoroughly in boiling water prior to giving them to your pigs. In addition to food, pigs must have constant access to clean drinking water.

Veterinary checkups should be made regular so that you could make sure that the pigs are healthy and that the right vaccinations are conducted. Because of this, you may have to find yourself a veterinarian that could regularly visit your farm and do the necessary checkups as well as treatment for those pigs that are sick.

It is managing swine waste that may be considered as a huge challenge for you. All you need though is a deep pit containment system that would be suitable for a small pig farm. However, you still need to maintain this system well; making sure that no issues like top-level crusting and sludge increase would arise. If these issues do arise, you may have problems that affect the health of your pigs and the sanitation of your place.

To keep problems at bay, use a swine waste product such as the Agra Sphere. This is a biodegradable sphere that uses beneficial bacteria to reduce sludge and prevent crusting. It requires no mixing and contains no chemicals. Agra Spheres also help increase the nutrient value of your waste so that it can be used as fertilizer.




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