Sunday, February 22, 2009

Rototilling with pigs and machines!



Hi farm friends! Asinete and I have been very busy taking full advantage of the sunny weather to get our pig panels up and tilling in some of our cover crops to make room for snow peas, onions, spinach and next month potatoes.
I wanted to get a before and after shot of our pasture (before the pigs and after the pigs). Both of us were doing a bit of grumbling about how much work it would be to keep moving the pigs and the panels down the field in sections however I feel that in the long run the pigs will save us much more time by rooting the soil for us and in the process eating out the grass and roots (easier than us hand pulling them!) We are looking at raising a heritage breed of pig called the Tamworth. The Tamworth is one of the oldest breeds of porcine. The Tamworth originated in Ireland and was very popular for many years. Their populations dropped when it was discovered that they do not do well in factory farming methods of keeping pigs indoors and on concrete floors. The Tamworth prefers to be on open pasture and forage for much of its food~ sounds like a perfect match for what we need! We hope to start with one or two gilts (females) and when they get older and become sows breed them and help to increase their populations. We will set up a system where we keep the best offspring for breeding purposes and the ones which may not be suitable breeding stock will be sold as pork. I may become a vegetarian after this experiment- we'll see!
I will be posting photos in the next few days as we get our pigs out into their new field so keep an eye out!

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