SUSTAINABILITY Keeping a few pigs

Keeping a few pigs


Growing your own
Chris Brown

If anyone tells you that pigs are clean animals, tell them that they lie! This scurrilous rumour will be put about by someone that doesn’t clean out pig sties.
Let me tell you, if you keep a few you pigs, somebody (almost certainly yourself) will have to put a shoulder to a shovel and fill a wheelbarrow with material that comes from the end that doesn’t squeal. Clean it isn’t, but on the bright side, this valuable animal manure is good gear; it will help plants to flourish and is excellent for weighing down the sheets of carbon (cardboard) used to cover the soil while it rests. It gets even better than this when, after you’ve finished work, you come indoors to a mixed grill of free-range pork chops and sausages that taste wonderful.
Pigs are likeable animals, and it saddens me greatly the way the pig industry treats them. Kept indoors in dark, cramped confinement, the evidence of their awful existence is clear to see at the abattoir, where factory pigs are covered with bite marks and contain flaccid lungs and other organs due to a lack of fresh air.
It is less than a year ago that all product from the Irish pig industry was recalled due to dioxin contamination that was up to 200 times above the permitted amount, because contaminated industrial waste was yet again found in the animal feed. Little has since been reported on this fiasco (typically) which also showed clearly that those in well-paid positions hadn’t a clue what to do, or what pork came from where.

Is pig-keeping difficult?
It is easier to keep pigs than keeping an alligator in the bathroom or a really bold dog, but it is more difficult than keeping chickens, because they need feeding twice a day.
The housing is straightforward enough and can be quite small because pigs huddle together to sleep. The shed needs to be draught free and the floor is best made by pouring concrete on top of insulation boards to keep the cold away. An Muc likes to keep warm. The shed should have an enclosed yard or small paddock adjacent to it which should be built stoutly or the porks will get out and cause some mischief.
You will want gloves, wellies and an apron to put on when feeding swiney. Be careful where you keep these, because if any member of your house-hold smells them, they will moan, big time. So, to avoid earache, a lobby or ‘dressingshed’ is pretty essential.
Bought-in pig feed (if you can get it) is expensive – especially when you consider all the food we currently waste – so saving money should not be the driving force behind operations, as the meat you produce will cost you more than the stuff you can buy. Therefore, having access to “surplus requirement food” on a regular basis, is a serious advantage. 
The quality of the food you deliver and the vast improvement in the animal’s welfare are good reasons to keep pigs, and a community sty on the edge of town, village or city would be marvellous. There would be great potential here to help a waste-management strategy, if we were to actually have one (the Council seem to have washed its hands of all things in this regard).
The real difficulty in keeping pigs is when it comes to the slaughter time.
Over the past number of years there have been times when you can’t get a pig legally killed in Mhaigh Eo, a shocking state of affairs.

Next time Bringing home the bacon