The Accidental Smallholder Forum
Livestock => Pigs => Topic started by: Mel on September 06, 2011, 08:39:23 pm
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Hello :wave:
I took some more pics of my pigs yesterday,thought I would show them off-I am very proud of them,after all,it is my first time,a friend of mine keeps telling me to feed them potatoes,but they are not very keen on them but when it comes to carrots,they are in absolute heaven! ;D
They are 6 months on the 11th!
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Adorable! :love: :pig: They do indeed look very pleased with their carrots! You mention they're your first pigs, so how many do you have? Most people start with 2, but you seem to have quite a few more. :D
Don't feed them raw potatoes, btw, only cooked ones otherwise they can get very ill. All else can be fed raw.
:wave:
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I have six,four boars and two gilts. The boys should be ready very soon-so I am told. I do boil the potatoes up on a burner near their feed shed,I do not think it is worth the effort being down there waiting for them to cook if they turn their noses up at them! The carrots win every time :D
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Don't feed them raw potatoes, btw, only cooked ones otherwise they can get very ill. All else can be fed raw.
:wave:
Is there a reason why they get ill? I didn't know that and mine have been fed raw spuds along with any/all other veg i can get my paws on
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Lovely piggies, lovely piccies! Thanks for posting.
I noticed one pig with a hole where a tag has fallen out - sooooo annoying, doesn't matter what species, the bloomin' things come out. We have one all black heifer has to be identified by the slits and holes in her ears - she will not wear tags!!
Mashed potato and milk - gets them liking spuds and liking milk - and makes for cute dinner-all-over-my-face piccies!
Oh, back on the tags - usually the sticky-out bit is inside the ear; but maybe you find they get pulled out less if you do them the other way?
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Re raw potatoes making pigs ill: Hilarysmum mentioned some time ago what it was called, I can't remember right now what it was but a large amount (a bucket full a day or so?) of raw potatoes could kill a pig - so just a few doesn't hurt.
We used to boil potatoes when we only had 5 little piggies - they ate it all so quickly we stopped doing it and gave them all sorts of other fruit & vegetables.
Leghorn, are you boars and gilts together? In which case you need to separate them straight away or you could have baby piggies... Plus once the boars have mated, there's a hormone that makes their meat smell. The meat of an affected boar is often called 'pissy pork' because it does smell of wee. Only a minority of people can smell it but I'm one of them and it definitely puts you off eating it. The gilts don't get that problem, so you can keep them for several months longer, but boars usually go at 6 months.
Ours don't like carrots, but they're mad about plums and have eaten hundreds of apples already this summer. :yum: