AGH weights at one year

Pig in a poke · #1 05/19/14, 12:57 PM

Using the string method endorsed here, our one-year old Guinea Hog gilt weighs 227 pounds. I was wondering if that's in the range of what others here have raised. Also, how does that compare with a one-year-old of other faster-growing breeds?

(The 2 barrows we still have measured in at 176 and 189 pounds. The first one we had butchered was around 105 pounds at 6 months.)

Anyone willing to share and compare?

**highlands** · #2 05/19/14, 01:36 PM

Interesting. What was the feed?

We have Yorkshire, Tamworth, Large Black and Berkshire as well as our Mainline which is a cross and our Blackieline which is another cross. The boars hit about 250 lbs in the warm months by six months, gilts a month or so slower, winter another month or two slower.

This is on a diet of primarily pasture supplemented with whey and then occasionally other things like spent barley, pumpkins, apples, etc in season. (See: http://SugarMtnFarm.com/pigs for our breeding and diet info.)

My experience is that our Yorkshire genetics have the fastest growth followed closely by Berkshire which tops out sooner followed closely by Large Black followed a fair bit back by the Tamworth which is the slowest growing in our genetics. (I have the Tamworth as I'm transferring their 18 teats into my other genetic lines - no, that isn't GMOing!

)

-Walter

Pig in a poke · #3 05/20/14, 09:44 AM

They are on mixed grass + clover pasture and get a varying amount of commercial feed, depending on season. Last summer through fall, they were fed lots of cucumbers, melons, and squash from our garden; pears, persimmons and prickly pear cactus fruit from our property. From fall through late winter, lots of acorns, winter squash and pumpkins. I ran out of pumpkins and acorns mid-February. Since then, I've relied on the feed, a 14% pellet that is actually for horses, and I add a little calf manna for extra protein and lysine. The main ingredients of the feed: wheat middlings, rice hulls, distillers dried grain, alfalfa meal, rice bran, soy bean hulls and meal. For 4 of them, I feed about 8 pounds per day.

They are at the point I think I could back off that amount of commercial feed, especially with the grass growing again. But we have the one young Berkshire boar. He is small for his age. I know he needs more. But the AGHs will just get fat.

18 teats! Is that common for Tamworth? Is that a sow/gilt or a boar?

**highlands** · #4 05/20/14, 12:22 PM

I have two sows and a boar who have 18 as well as several who have 16 in that line. I don't think it is common in Tamworths. I just happened to luck out and get some at one point where were 16 teated and I've been breeding them up as well as crossing them into our other lines so we're now at 18. Our other lines are up in the 14 to 16 range. 12 teats is standard. More is good.

GreenMomma · #5 05/21/14, 12:05 AM

I am a little jealous, lol. I was going for "smaller is better" because large hogs scare the heck out of me. I know I might just be a wuss, but pork was not in the cards for us any time soon unless I could raise little guys. For a while I even felt like our boar was too big and was thinking of trying a pot belly boar with our sow to see how that would go.

Our boar is about 250 and our sow is about 175. Now that I am used to them and have made modifications to our set up, I am glad I didn't go smaller and am comfortable with our boar's size. Thinking about sow shopping for slightly larger....

Our first litter will be a year in July and are almost as big as mama now, still have one more growth spurt to look forward to from what I hear. They will be no where near as big as your hogs though. We were told that this pair throws hogs that get to be around 100 lbs by butcher time. We have to be there about now...

**highlands** · #6 05/21/14, 09:49 AM

I was intimidated by the size in the beginning too but they grow on you.

Pigs start small and gradually grow big at about the same rate I got used to their size so in time I was okay with it. Taking a 1,000 lb boar at the beginning would have been quite scary. Now, I have raised them up to that size, know them as individuals and know how to work with them as groups.

The advantage of the breeds we work with is that they do grow very fast. From the point of view of producing product for market this is important. Coupled with that is that they grow big.

Nice thing though is there are many different breeds so you can pick what ever you are personally comfortable with. Something I like about pigs. Same goes for cattle I guess as they have the mini Dexters and the giant Holsteins...

haypoint · #7 05/21/14, 12:25 PM

Over the last few years, my pigs were butchered at 6 or 7 months old. They weigh between 260 and 300 pounds. They have free access to timothy/clover hay bedding, fresh water out of a cow drink cup, and a blend of ground GMO corn and ground GMO soybean, ground organic oats and mineral salt. I have had groups that kept their pens dry and groups that learned to flood the pen by holding the paddle down in the drink cup.There was no difference in rate of gain or feed efficiency.

Pig in a poke · #8 05/22/14, 09:39 AM

Haypoint, what breed(s) are you raising?

There is very little corn in our pigs' diet (it is a ground ingredient in Calf Manna). I've stayed away from corn, as I really didn't think it offered much in the way of nutrition. But maybe it promotes fast growth?

GreenMomma,
I think I managed to select the best gilt as our keeper. But now I am wishing we'd kept all 3 from our first litter, if this one is any indication. Her temperament was what I noticed first. She had an extra pair of teats compared to her dam, as well. As she and the barrows we kept grew, I noticed she had a different conformation, with longer hind legs and more of an arched back.

It sounds like your litter will outgrow the parents. That's good! If they are 10 months now and in the range of your sow's size, they've improved on their parents' weight. What do you feed them?

GreenMomma · #9 05/22/14, 06:52 PM

I am hoping she outgrows our sow, at least in build. Our sow is on the smaller side and she has a hard time keeping weight when she is nursing. She always has litters of 6 and one is usually small/runty. I am thinking i would like to replace her but still not sure. She is reliable and that is worth something to us at this stage in our little farm's growth, lol.

We feed a combination of a million things. Mostly stock grower (cattle feed) from TSC. It says "all natural protein" and is cheap... But not the highest quality feed and not where we want to be in a year. I also feed alfalfa pellets, "all stock", ryegrass hay and I get expired milk, produce and stale bread from a local church's food bank (throw aways that they can't give to people). Most of those scraps are organic- they spoil quickly. Bad for people but the piggies love it.

This gilt is built more like our boar and is more meaty than mama... we're planning on breeding the gilt to her papa and see what we end up with. I am not sure if the best plan is to replace mama or if I should be replacing them both now that I am getting a better feel for raising hogs. I think I will have a better idea of which way to go after I see what the experimental litter looks like.

I would LOVE to have hogs that are either ready to butcher a few months sooner or so much heavier at a year! Do you have any pics of them at that size?

haypoint · #10 05/22/14, 09:02 PM

Just commercial hogs.
I buy them as 40 pound feeders when the weather warms up, late May. They are ready to butcher just after Labor Day. Our County Fair ends on Labor Day, so our Butcher is busy with fair pigs, lambs and finished steers. If I failed to reserve a time to butcher, I end up feeding them beyond 240 pounds and they weigh nearer 300 in October.

Philosaw · #11 05/23/14, 11:49 PM

We just finished slaughtering a Berk/York cross this evening. I pulled out my spring scale to see if my measuring weight of 400 plus was correct. She broke my scale just before her head was off the ground and was just under eight months old. I should have bred her, but she was slated for my sons wedding so it would have been a little tough to explain the lack of pork for their dinner.

Pig in a poke · #12 05/26/14, 11:16 AM

Green Momma, I took these pictures a couple days ago. (Hope I attached them correctly.) The gilt is the largest. She is in the foreground in each of these shots.

M88A1 · #13 05/29/14, 09:31 AM

Pig in a poke,

Nice looking AGH, here is last fall pic of our oldest sow and a couple feeders that were bunking with her. we have 2 other sows and a boar that floats between pens. now im curious as to weight, they have really grown since we got them..... More to follow so we can compare.....

GreenMomma · #14 05/29/14, 09:49 AM

Pig in a Poke- thank you for the pics! They do look great. I like the shoulder on your gilt. Did you find they had a growth spurt just before the 1 year mark?

Pig in a poke · #15 05/29/14, 12:25 PM

M88, she's fresh from her mud spa! I'd love to see more pictures.

GreenMomma, I can't say I noticed a recent growth spurt. Since the first of March, though, I've relied almost exclusively on commercial feed. I think the acorns through the winter helped them grow incrementally. Maybe if they hadn't done so well through winter, I'd have observed a spring spurt?

Something I remembered last night: our first butchered pig was right at 6 months old. Doing the math I've read here, he would have been at 105 pounds live weight. I think he was a little larger than the gilt at that time, so she more than doubled her weight in her 2nd six months.

GreenMomma · #16 05/29/14, 08:29 PM

How big are your breeders?

Pig in a poke · #17 05/30/14, 10:24 AM

Do you mean the parents of this group? At the time we bought them they were 2+ years old. And the sow was pregnant with her second litter. The seller (a newbie pig raiser himself) guesstimated the boar at 400+ pounds. At the time I was skeptical, but I didn't know better then. He was probably right. My memory says the sow was only a little larger than her daughter (our gilt) is now.

We sold the breeding pair to people with more experience. I can relate to your comment about wanting to raise them from a small size and being intimidated by large pigs. The boar was becoming too aggressive, and the sow became unnecessarily crazed at feeding time. I was miserable. Their offspring that we raised are much more mellow and docile. I'm pleased with the female we kept.

Is your sow re-bred by the boar?

GreenMomma · #18 05/30/14, 06:06 PM

Yes- we're expecting our 3rd litter in September.

I finally think I have the hang of measuring with the string and doing the math for weight... Our gilt should be just over 100 lbs and the barrow 108. We were hoping for 100 by butcher time at a year old, so looks like we are dong ok.

Right now I think it sounds like there is a ratio to figure out how large offspring will be by roughly a year based on the sow/boar size. I just don't quite get it yet, lol. I think we will stick with our plan for this coming breeding season and breed this gilt once, see what we have... then decide if I just want to find a larger sow (but still a small breed) or if I want to replace them both.

Finding a new boar is a rough idea for me- for exactly the reasons you got rid of your guy. Mine is about as large as I can comfortably manage by myself and is so docile. If he were aggressive I just don't think I could enjoy taking care of him anymore and that's kind of a deal breaker around here.

Thanks so much for sharing about your hogs- it really helps me in making these choices as time goes on. And hopeful that I can find a larger sow of the same breed... I think I just need to look further from home.

**highlands** · #19 05/30/14, 07:14 PM

It's very important to eat mean people. Cull hard. Temperament is largely genetic. Eat the mean ones and you're left with the nice ones. Don't let mean ones get big. Sucklings, roasters, finishers, etc.

It is also important to interact with them. To tame them. Start this at a young age. More frequent interactions are more important than longer interactions.

Genetics and training go hand in hand.

Pig in a poke · #20 05/31/14, 04:29 PM

I completely agree on culling for temperament. That was the main factor for selecting this gilt for keeping. Fortunately, she also turned out to have good size, as well. She and the original 4 barrows we kept were/are all quite gentle and smart. They have learned to walk ahead of me and wait at their feed pans, instead of bumping and jostling against each other and me. I so appreciate this! Their quiet nature appears to be a good influence on the younger Berkshire boar we added. He's much more active and energetic, but good-natured. I know he will grow much larger, so I'm hoping we are putting a good foundation on his temperament.

GreenMomma,
I enjoy comparing notes with others who have AGHs. The whole pigs thread here is informative and helpful, but sometimes it's tricky to apply hog basics to a smaller breed (i.e., feed amounts, growth times). I like to hear experiences from others with AGHs.