When it does, it’s usually not mine.
Moving the steers and sheep on Saturday morning I was struck by the how much grass they left standing. It seemed that we should be following them with some other critter that not only ate the grass but also crushed it, rolled it, and squished it into the ground.
Something like a pig?
After all, wasn’t that why we had bought meishans in the first place, so we could pasture them? Now, true, they don’t eat grass enough to get big and fat, but they do love grazing and they will supplement their feed a little with some roughage. Since they are not long for this world (we have a butcher scheduled at the end of next month) they may as well enjoy their last few weeks on this earth as a pig should.
All these thoughts ran through my head in the blink of an eye at 5:30 in the morning, which is a great time for thinking if you’re up for it. But there were some logistical considerations that needed to be worked out. For one thing, they needed some shade, some food and some water.
A shade-mobile we already have, which wasn’t suitable for cows, but had not yet been modified for chickens and so would do for pigs in a pinch. Ideally you don’t want to have pigs in a pinch. Pigs in a pinch are unpredictable, but if you find yourself with pigs in a pinch, at least you can provide them with some shade.
Unfortunately the shade mobile was not equipped with a feed trough, but then I bethought me of the old wooden trough I had made for the chickens which was now too small and was to be replaced later that day. Would it fit?
Like a glove!
A quick tap into place and a half dozen decking screws and voila! Like it was made for it.
Whenever my woodworking comes together like that in ways that I could not possibly have foreseen, I am pretty sure St. Joseph and my dad are busy behind the scenes.
Then to move the pigs, all by my little lonesome. They don’t mind being in the pasture, but they are not used to being herded. They have very poor eyesight, and they cannot stand the site of the white electric netting (one of the reasons all our electric netting is white is so that it forms a more effective psychological barrier. It creates a conditioned response, they see it and they instantly avoid it.)
So after several unsuccessful attempts with a shepherd’s crook, I decided to use the netting to my advantage to create a path to funnel them into the paddock. The first funnel setup was too narrow, and the pigs balked as soon as they saw the netting in their limited peripherals. Esmerelda refused to be contained and I rode backwards on her brawny shoulders for a few feet as she pushed between my legs towards freedom. So I reset the funnel making it aobut 16 feet wide, and then waited.
Very soon they wandered into it, munching on grass and weeds, and I simply pulled up the step posts and gradually closed it in behind them until…
They were in!
It’s a hog’s life!
They have been following the ruminants for 5 days now and enjoying it immensely if their happy grunts are any indication.
I really like the wheel lift kits from eggcartn. I only wish they came stock with larger wheels, the smaller ones are not great on our rough pasture. But it works. We will probably end up gradually buying more of them to build one or two more shade-mobiles (we will see how this one modified works for chickens and turkeys in July), and eventually put the water and maybe a bale feeder on a mobile platform as well.
Ideas. Overcaffienated Daddy at 5:30 AM is full of them.
Little Farm in the Big City 