[Buffy the eggs layer]

What are the pros and cons of arks with floors please?

[Caroline1]

Mine doesn't have a floor and the pigs seem to like the direct contact, they just have a layer of straw.

My goats have a floor which gets covered in pee and poo and requires lots regular cleaning.

[MarthaR]

All mine have floors - pros I think are that they mean dry flooring in winter even when it's wet (I live on a Welsh hillside) and the floors make it pretty easy to sweep out when necessary. They also tend then to be much heavier. Which on the plus side means the bigger pigs don't push them around but on the negative (and it is a real negative for me) it is hard to move them to other areas of ground precisely because they're heavy - I then need to tow them on their skids or borrow bigger kit to lift them over fences.
Martha R

[pharnorth]

My answer is exactly the same as Caroline's and I am also in Cambridgeshire so maybe this depends a bit on the terrain and amount of rain.  Yesterday we did an Ark for the goats with no floor, this one will be used as a day shelter rather than overnight accommodation though.

[Bionic]

We didn't have a floor when we had a first lot of weaners and the pigs seemed to be ok. They sort of dug out a bit of a hollow and put their straw in it. OH then decided he wanted a floor for the next set. The floor is about 4 inches off the ground and is not attached to the house so this get rounds Martha's problem of it being too heavy. We just lift the house off if we want to do a through clean but mostly we don't need to touch it before they go on their journey.

[devonlady]

I use stable mats.

[Tamsaddle]

Where we are on the south coast (Hampshire) with heavy clay soil, having raised floors kept the pigs above the level of waterlogged, gluey mud soup all round the ark.   Our floors also were independent platforms, and the ark just lifted off the top.

[IretonsFarm]

We don't have floors but we do have quite free draining soil.

If things get really wet we just pull out the worst of the bedding and top up with more straw every week or so, at £20 a bale you can use a lot of straw before the cost of a floor makes sense.

[Buffy the eggs layer]

Thanks everyone,


       we have very dry sand soil here but you never know how the ground will get with pooing and poaching so moving the arcs is a good idea. Like Martha I would have to pull the ark along with the pick up or the tractor.


    The separate floor sounds like a best of both worlds.


  

[harmony]

We are in the Lake District and so it is wet. I would say that more important than a floor is to have your tins sitting onto wood as the tins eventually rot in the wet. When the pigs are in residence they do a good job of housekeeping and you find an earth floor with straw will keep dry. Often you find once the ark is empty for a while it starts to get wet inside. However if the land around is poached then they will clean their legs off on the bed. Some type of hard stand outside the front door helps. Road planings are good. They are also good around gateways and feeding areas. Obviously topping up with straw in the ark creates a deep litter system so the heat generated keeps the bed dry. 


Given that it would be unusual for a pig to soil its bed mucking out on an earth floor isn't that bad. As they eat some of the bed you top up more than clean it out anyway.


If you go with a floor then make sure it isn't slippery wood or prone to splinters.


Depending on how often you intend to move or maybe you don't need to move at all railway sleepers make a good base to sit the ark on as they are strong and have a good depth. The down side is moving them to re site the ark.


I would have as least possible wood in any ark. Pigs will chew it.

[Bobforrangerpigs]

All outdoor pig accommodation needs solid wooden floors with plenty of straw, well off the ground on substantial timbers, this both keeps them warm & dry as well as removing mud from their bodies.


Also as pigs don't poo in there own nest there is no need to muck out except to remove the acumalated dirt once a year

[Buffy the eggs layer]

Thanks Bob.


  I have just been reading through my BPEX binder and apparently pigs raised on slats have a better K0% than those on straw........   Why would that be I wonder? Heat loss / stress?

[hughesy]

My experience is this. If you have a floor in an ark make sure it's separate from the ark as cleaning out is back breaking otherwise. We have several arks here some with, some without and in the drier months we don't bother with the floors just straw straight onto the ground. The advantage of a floor is when you need to move an ark onto a new bit of ground and the ground is wet. Otherwise we seem to manage pretty well without.

[john and helen]

this is our 1st experience….we have sloping land, so i did make an ark with a floor, and built a big door at the back for cleaning..we have only had the pigs for a week, but so far, the ark is spotless, we have been very surprised in how clean they are….but as i said, we have only had them a week

[Bionic]

John,
I am on my third set of weaners, due to go off at the begining of next month, and all have kept their home spotless.
This time I have cleaned it once but thats because the weather has been soooo wet that naturally the straw has got wet with them going in and out. Other than that its been as sweet smelling as they day they arrived. I have never known any of them to wee or poo in their ark