What to feed my oinkers

[bonniethomas06]

Hi,

Gosh, SO excited, Oli has just gone to collect our first pigs!

They are 8 week old weaners, gloucester old spots.

Now we have bought some organic feed from a local farm, but of course will be adding scraps to it for some variety. Sorry if this has been asked before, but I have scoured the board and can't find what I am after. I basically need to compile a list for my neighbour (who is joining us in this project) to stick on her fridge which she can check before adding scraps to the communal feed bucket.

So far, of the type of kitchen waste we produce, I gather pigs cannot/shouldn't eat:

meat or fish of any kind
uncooked potato peelings or onions
eggs?


er...that is it.

Is there anything else anyone can suggest that we shouldn't feed our pigs from the table/kitchen? I think we will try and make sure their diet is fairly balanced - so not too much bread/carbs and milk every other day if there is some going.

Will have to post some photos when they are back! Not sure how I am supposed to get any work done this afternoon!

Does anyone have any other tips for us?

Thanks

[shiela_robins]

They're not pet pigs are they? My grandfather used to raise a few pigs to sell in the market. I know he fed them corn most. Oats and wheat too but mostly corn. Also a mix of protein supplement which he buys from the store. And yeah I don't remember him giving the pigs meat from off the table. Hope that helps.

[herbalholly]

My primary school had pigs and at lunch time all the scraps from each school dinner plate were quickly rinsed and the water (small amount just enough to make the food slide off) and the scraps (including pink custard, sponge cake and bits of cooked meat and potatoes etc) went into a big bucket. The piggies got all sorts. There was only one exception - we didn't feed them pork.

[bonniethomas06]

Hi Guys,

Thanks for this - did some more research online and BLIMEY! Talk about a legal minefield, there are VERY strict rules as to what you can and can't feed pigs, and if following the strict letter of the law, any food that has passed through a kitchen (whether you are raising your meat to sell, which we aren't - it is for our consumption only) of any description is illegal. So, if you take an apple indoors, chop it into pieces and then feed the cores to the pigs - you are breaking the law. If you stand in your garden and eat it, then throw the core to the pigs, you are not.

General consensus though is that meat products of any sort are bad - so we will make sure our pigs are strictly vegetarian.

This seems to be a very controversial subject, particularly on the river cottage forum, as to whether or not it is acceptable to break the law.

Will post some pics on a new thread shortly - the pigs are GORGEOUS!

[red]

yup you are right - you cannot feed them anything that went into your kitchen, certainly no scraps

and to be honest, as a new pig keeper.. i wouldn't either - its a hard enough task to get them to weight without being too fatty anyhow.


you can give them garden waste.. so get into the habit of podding your peas outside etc. and collect windfall apples from people.

We just got this years weaners too - we have four Berkshires in the run

[sortanormalish]

I come from a long line of farmers, all raising properly fat healthy pigs for many, many generations (pigs and people). Your laws were clearly written by someone that wants to make keeping a family pig as near prohibitively expensive as possible. They seem to think frustration will do the rest, keep you at the market that way. We have our own laws that are of that nature. Luckily, most of our local representatives are also farmers.

Pigs are not herbivores. Anyone that tells you they are is either delusional or plain ignorant. Set a pig free in a barnyard full of chicks and you will learn very quickly that they are not vegetarians. They will root out rabbit burrows and eat the babies, they eat grubs, they will eat carrion, they will eat puppies, kittens, strip the flesh off newborn kids, and even newborn calves. One of my great-aunts was eaten in her crib by a pig that had escaped the pen and gotten into the house while my great-great-grandmother was in the garden. In short they will eat almost anything given a chance. They actually become more aggressive when they are denied proper amounts of protein. If they have seen humans on a routine basis and still get aggressive at the sight of you, they are hungry. Every woman knows about dieting.

They are omnivorous scavengers, that is their role in nature, and provides the most complete nourishment for them if you can try to match that diet. I know that pigs are now domesticated, but they were domesticated for their ability to provide meat on foods inedible to humans and other animals, thus the omnivorous scavenger bit was kept. Their immune systems, digestive systems, and liver are designed for a rather nasty diet. They can glean nourishment from things that would kill many other animals, and thrive on it!

That said, you can feed them most anything that isn't putrid, which they will not touch anyway, so long as there are no large or hard bones. They will strip the meat off if the piece is big enough. When we have dead chicks or baby rabbits we feed them to the pigs.

We feed mostly corn, add to that any animal feed that has been rained in or the mice and slugs have gotten in so that the horses, goats, cattle, or dogs/cats won't eat it. Clearly you should not take this feed into the house because your clean home environment might dirty the pigs food.

That gives them a good foundation for their diets. Add some protein. If you have a cow or goat that you milk each day, give them the previous days leavings. Be sure not to refrigerate it, don't want to dirty it. Or eggs, they will crack them, but I have seen small pigs cut their mouths on the shells, so I ususally crack the eggs for them, naturally they must have been left outside to prevent breaking the law.

If that isn't an option for protein, try finding organic seed meals or pellets. I stongly recommend the organic because those crops are very heavily sprayed and nothing's liver is that strong. Of course, we keep breeders so I don't know if t would matter if you were just going to slaughter, but I wouldn't eat the liver anyway.

As a dietary supplement for your pigs you can give them food scraps. Eat all your meals outside, raw, or prepared on a grill (maybe?) and feed the scraps. Scraps are just a supplement. To be fair this may be where your law originated, but it clearly doesn't make any sense. Some people will try to feed a pig exclusively on scraps and you can't do it very well. It would take a heap of scraps to get to the daily requirements of a single pig. They would more likely be half starved than overly fattened.

Oh yeah, they will eat pork, but...yuck.

I just re-read my post looking for glaring errors. It seems I may lack respect for legislative authority. In my defense I offer, I have respect for all breeds of swine.

[red]

having seen ethical man and his report on the swill given to pigs in USA,, I'm more ok with the legislation - really puts you off eating pork when you see the putrid slop left over from food outlets that are given to pigs....

not to mention how hilarious it was when he stopped his pig swill truck too fast and it all went into the cabin!!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/n ... 091743.stm

[whirlowhallfarm]

Pigs are omnivores like us, so whatever you eat can pretty much be fed to your pigs. Like us the more balanced the diet the better the pork will be. Lots of foraging space with tastey slugs etc will help flavour the meat. apparently a diet rich in apples will gives fantastic roast pork.

[sortanormalish]

The feeding of garbage to animals is groteque. No arguments. But food scraps are not garbage. Garbage is, by definition, an object that has no further use or value. Food scraps are the leftover bites of a sandwhich, an apple core, the bits that people would eat if they tasted better or if we could chew them. They still have nourishment in them that we humans simply cannot access due to our biological form. I presume it isn't a crime if you share a meal or pass on food that you have an allergy to or just pass on food you don't like to another human. Feeding scraps to a pig is no different. It isn't feeding them garbage.

Here, in the states, CAFO's have nowhere near the legal limits that we smaller raisers do, that is, they can be cruel. They can feed garbage. If we tried to feed animals the way the commercial operators are feeding them (the afore mentioned video as evidence), we would be arrested and charged with animal cruelty. And rightfully so.

I just don't understand your law. Most of my food comes from the garden. Thus this food waste is garden waste. Garden waste is acceptable. Thus food waste should be acceptable. This is elementary logic.