how to get started raising pigs

1. Small
Scale
Swine
Success
Jason Detzel
CCEUC

2. Recipe for Success
Patience
Redundancy
Sustainability
Enjoy the Work

3. Recipes for Failure
Not Enough
Planning
Burnout
(not sustainable)
No Records

4. How to Get Started
Why are you doing this?
What is your advantage?
What have you already got?
Marginal lands
Area to clear
Supplemental feed

5. How To Be Successful
Why?
Choosing a System
Choosing Breeds

6. Choosing A System
Seasonal (any season)
Year Round
Make it easy,
labor
planning
etc.

7. Choosing
Breeds
What to look
for when buying

8. Housing
 Why do pigs need housing
 Heat
 Cold
 Rain
 Social
Deep Bedding

9. Free Range Housing Options

10. Feed
Total Mixed Ration
(TMR)
Alternative Feeds
Bakery waste
Milk/ whey
Fruit wastes
Restaurant/ grocery
waste

11. Stage Amount of Feed
Weaner 2.5 lbs daily
Growers up to 60 lbs 3.0 lbs daily
Growers up to 100 lbs 4.5 lbs daily
Growers up to 140 lbs 7.0 lbs daily
Growers over 180 lbs 8.0 lbs daily
Breeding boars or sows 6.0 lbs daily
Suckling sows 6 lbs plus 1 pound per piglet
Feeding Scale
You can either limit feed or free feed….what will
work best in your system???

12. Water
Redundancy is key
Water is heavy
Pigs Require Fresh Water to Grow
No Pigs in Waterways
Good
Not Ideal

13. Fence  1. Pig panels
Sturdy, does not short out,
semi permanent
buried because pigs root
 2. Woven Wire
Sturdy, does not short out,
semi permanent
 3. Electric
Low input, portable, only as
good as the person monitoring
it

14. Handling Facilities
You are going to need to treat and or load pigs

15. Breeding…not for the beginner
Breeding Facts and Figures
Estrus 1-5 days
Heat Period 18-22 days
Gestation 3-3-3 (114 days)
Breeding age 7-8 months

16. Marketing
is 50 percent of your farming business
So what are you going to sell?
Where are you going to sell it?
How will folks know about your
products?
And what is your advantage?
TO ANSWSER THESE QUESTIONS YOU NEED A BUSINESS PLAN

17. Before you choose your product you need to understand
your marketing modality
Ranking the Marketing Modalities of Farmers
Criteria= income
time
exposure
costs
travel
Modalities by Rank (best to worst based
on criteria above)
1. On farm store
2. CSA
3. Web sales
4. Farmers Markets
5. 3rd Party Retailers
6. Wholesale
There are pros and cons to each modality, the key is
maximizing the benefits for your particular enterprise

18. Whole or Halves
alive or butchered
½ or ¼ quarter shares (how small
can you legally go?)
As Retail Cuts
USDA slaughter
Custom slaughter
Value added and wholesale
opportunities
How Many Ways Can you Sell A Pig?

19. Get Yourself a
Copy of
Direct Marketing
Livestock and
Poultry from
Cornell Small
Farms

20. Working with your processor and
Setting up your cut sheet
Every butcher has a different cut sheet
Every butcher has different prices
(look on the web for both)
Talk to other producers prior to
making your appointments
Schedule your appointments
at least 6 months in advance….and be patient!

21. YOU NEED A BUSINESS PLAN

22. Lets talk about boar taint…for a sec

23. Perils and Pitfalls of Outdoor Based Swine

24. 1.Pigs outside need to be hardy breeds

25. 2. You must rotate pigs outside, pigs will quickly
denude your land and your trees

26. 3. Pigs outside have higher caloric
requirements…Pigs Require Shelter

27. 4. Feed usage is less efficient, so supplementary
feed is integral to profits

28. 5. You can only supplement not substitute

29. 6. Must market as premium product in retail modalities

30. 7. Train the pigs to the fence
YOUR
ANIMALSWILL
ESCAPE!

31. 8. Schedule processing dates one year in
advance

32. 9. Monitor your land, make improvements as
necessary
Species Succession in Disturbed Soils
(2 year cycle in healthy soils)

33. 10. Become sustainable
“Able to be sustained at a certain rate”
If you run out of money you are
not sustainable
If you run out of energy you are
not sustainable
If you run out of land you are
not sustainable
If you run out of product you are
not sustainable (unplanned)

34. Jason Detzel
Cornell Cooperative
Extension of Ulster
County
jbd222@cornell.edu