Content
Fattening pigs is one of the main tasks of a pig farmer. Only the best individuals are left for breeding; the rest need to be raised and sold as quickly as possible. The longer a pig grows, the less profit its owner will receive after selling the meat. Diets for pigs have been developed that allow them to produce meat or lard.
What do pigs eat?
Pigs are omnivorous mammals. In the wild, they eat whatever they can find:
- roots;
- mushrooms;
- grass;
- acorns;
- insects and their larvae;
- bird eggs and chicks;
- carrion.
Wild boars will not refuse to come to a potato field and conscientiously plow it, eating the entire harvest. Domestic pigs are no different from their wild relatives in this regard. At home, no one will feed pigs “forest delicacies.” The exception is acorns. But even here, pigs leading a semi-wild lifestyle often feed on acorns.This method of pig farming is practiced in Hungary.
Typically, pigs are fed at home with grain concentrates, root vegetables and kitchen waste. Pigs rarely get meat. Regulated feeding of pigs allows obtaining products of different quality:
- lean pork with lard;
- fatty meat and soft, spreadable lard;
- lard with layers of meat.
In this case, the diet of pigs is strictly standardized and regulated. Such animals cannot be sent to freely graze in forests.
What not to feed pigs
Contrary to the saying “a pig will eat everything,” you can’t feed piglets with all foods. The principles for determining feeds that are unsuitable for pigs are the same as for other livestock. When giving fresh grass, you need to make sure that poisonous plants do not get there. There are quite a lot of such plants and there is no point in listing them, since “herbariums” differ depending on the region. Each owner will have to independently study the flora near his farm.
Other pig feeds are “standard”: grains, root vegetables and animal feeds. Pigs should not be given:
- compound feed with a moldy odor;
- “burning” grain;
- rotten root vegetables;
- sprouted potatoes.
Such feed will lead to poisoning of animals.
Types of pig fattening
They fatten pigs, wanting to get 3 types of products:
- meat;
- salo;
- bacon/lard with meat streaks.
It is impossible to get everything from the same pig, so you need to choose how to feed the piglet to obtain one or another product.
No matter how funny it may sound, the types of food for any direction of cultivation are the same. Their ratio and feeding time vary. There is no miracle food that is best to feed pigs so that they quickly gain weight.There is the right balance between protein, fats, carbohydrates, amino acids and minerals. Without lysine it will be very difficult to fatten a pig for meat, and without vitamins not a single piglet can be raised. At the same time, the feeds differ in efficiency and the results obtained. Therefore, when feeding, you must also take into account the properties of each type of feed.
How to feed pigs correctly
The growth of muscle or fat mass is influenced by the protein ratio in the diet. Protein ratio is calculated using the formula:
PO – protein ratio;
NEV – nitrogen-free extractive substances.
The pig obtains digestible protein from feed containing nitrogen. A narrow protein ratio is a ratio of 1:6, meaning on the right side of the formula the result must be 6 or less. With this protein ratio, the pig builds muscle mass. The lard yield is small, the product is solid.
With a wide protein ratio: 1:8-1:10, the pig becomes fatted, gaining a small amount of meat. The lard is soft and smearing. The quality of such lard is considered low.
The quality of pork is also influenced by the feed itself. They are all divided into 3 groups:
- improving;
- worsening fat;
- deteriorating meat.
When feeding the second group, the lard turns out to be watery, soft, smeared and tasteless. When feeding the third group, the meat acquires an unpleasant taste and a watery consistency.
Improving feeds include:
- peas;
- wheat;
- rye;
- barley;
- carrot;
- beets;
- buttermilk;
- return;
- meat flour.
Table pumpkin is not very suitable as pig food. Therefore, young animals raised for meat are usually not fed it.The production of fodder pumpkin is underdeveloped. But studies have shown that pumpkin is one of the best feeds for pigs, not only during fattening. It was fed to breeding stock in quantities of up to 19 kg per head per day. Feeding pumpkin in the amount of 30% of the diet led to an increase in daily weight gain of up to 900 g in six-month-old gilts.
But feed pumpkin is more suitable for fattening pigs for lard and bacon. When feeding raw and boiled pumpkin in an amount of 15-20 kg per day, weight gain of 500 to 800 g was obtained.
Group of foods that degrade fat:
- soy;
- corn;
- bran;
- oats;
- cakes;
- potato;
- fish flour.
The lard tastes worse, is soft and smearing. It is better to feed these products at the first stage of fattening.
Feeds that degrade the quality of meat include waste from the production of wine, alcohol and sugar:
- pulp;
- pulp;
- bard.
The meat acquires an unpleasant smell and taste.
Compliance with the regime
All animals are conservatives who do not like change and violation of the established regime. Animals very quickly get used to the established daily routine. Violation of the regime causes anxiety and stress. It’s even better to clean pens at the same time, but unsystematic feeding impairs the digestibility of feed and can lead to gastrointestinal diseases.
Therefore, it is better to feed pigs at the same time. “Knowing” the schedule, the pig will wait for food, and gastric juice will begin to be produced in the stomach in advance. The frequency of feeding is determined by the owner. The minimum amount is 2 times a day. If there is someone to look after, then they feed three times a day.At enterprises, fattening pigs are often not limited in their access to feed. But in this case, dry feed is usually given.
For a private owner with a large livestock, it is convenient to use bunker feeders into which dry concentrates or compound feed are poured. The feeder prevents pigs from throwing feed on the floor and does not limit access to feed throughout the day.
Although the pig is an omnivore, it digests whole grains very poorly. Her teeth aren't really designed for long-term chewing. The animal swallows food in large pieces. Because of this, the whole grain passes through the intestines undamaged. It is better to feed grains to pigs in crushed form. For better digestion of food, porridge is cooked for animals. In winter, warm porridge also helps piglets warm up.
Separate feeding of piglets
Up to a month, the piglet’s main food is mother’s milk, although they begin to try “adult” food after 10 days. Piglets are accustomed to vitamin and mineral supplements from the 5th day of life. After 7 days, roasted cereal grains are given little by little. 10 days after birth, piglets are fed fresh cow's milk or milk replacer. From this time they begin to feed concentrates.
From a month to two months, piglets can eat together with the sow, and she will not drive them away from food too much. But while feeding the piglets milk, it is better to separate the sow. Also, the pig still allows the piglets to suckle, although from a month on it is advisable to feed the brood with skim milk and milk porridge separately from the mother.
From 2 months, the sow believes that the cubs are able to obtain food on their own, and begins to aggressively drive them away from the food, keeping them away from the nipples. From this point on, the piglets are separated from the sow and fed separately. The diet of a piglet up to 3 months must include dairy products.
The division of the diet by type of feeding is done from 3-4 months of life of the piglets. At this time, pigs are put on fattening. The diet is calculated based on the type of desired product.
Fattening pigs at home for meat
In theoretical pig farming, to obtain lean pork, you need to take elite meat breeds: Landrace, Duroc, pietrain. In practice, everything is more complicated. The listed breeds really produce high-quality meat with a minimum of fat. But due to their thin layer of fat, these pigs are very picky about temperature conditions. It is difficult for a private owner to maintain a narrow temperature range year-round, so in practice they use a large white breed of pig. This breed is officially considered a meat-fat breed, but it has meat lines. When crossing large whites with meat breeds, the hybrids inherit good climate resistance. The quality and yield of meat from the carcass of hybrid pigs also increases.
Piglets are fed for meat fattening from 3-4 months. Fattening is completed when the piglet reaches 100-120 kg. With the start of fattening at 3 months and daily weight gain of 550 g in 6 months, you can grow a pig up to 120 kg. With the meat option of feeding, it will not be possible to fatten pigs as quickly as with lard, since the meat grows more slowly, although it is heavier than lard.
When feeding 100 kg of piglets for meat, 4.2-4.8 feed is required. units in the first fattening period and 3.5-4.2 feed. units in the second.In the first period, you need 90-100 g of digestible protein per feed. units, in the second – 85-90 g.
The average daily weight gain can be increased or decreased. For rapid growth of pigs, you need to feed them properly, that is, give them foods that contain as much energy as possible in the dry matter and as little fiber as possible. When fattening meat, the fiber content in dry matter is considered optimal to be no more than 6%.
Pig feeding rations
The basic principle when feeding pigs for meat is: in the first period they give more protein feed, in the second – carbohydrate feed. There are 3 types of diets for winter fattening. They differ in the presence or absence of potatoes and root crops in the feed.
Feeds are indicated as a percentage of feed unit requirements.
In this case, concentrates mean:
- corn;
- peas;
- barley;
- wheat;
- wheat bran;
- compound feed (2-3 kg per day);
- meal: soybean, flaxseed, sunflower.
In the first half, you can feed with any concentrates, but a month before slaughter you need to exclude those that worsen the quality of pork.
The category of succulent foods includes:
- silage;
- beet;
- potato;
- feed pumpkin;
- kale;
- fodder beet;
- carrot.
Cabbage has the ability to stimulate the secretion of gastric juice. When feeding large amounts of cabbage, the stomachs of animals swell. Root crops and vegetables are fed in an amount of 3-5 kg per day. They give 1-1.5 kg of silage. Since silage is a fermentation product, you shouldn’t get carried away with its quantity either.
From animal products, pigs are fed:
- reverse (1-3 l);
- buttermilk (1-3 l);
- meat and meat and bone meal;
- blood meal;
- low-fat minced fish and fish flour (20-40 g).
Herbal flour made from legumes is given 200-300 g per day.Flour should be soaked in cold water before feeding. It is often sold in tightly compressed granules. When flour swells in the stomach, it can clog the intestines.
In the summer, instead of grass flour, the diet includes 2-4 kg of legumes per day. At any time of the year, mineral supplements must be mixed.
Vitamin-mineral premixes are added in the amount of 10 g per 1 kg of dry matter of feed. If necessary, balance the ratio of protein and carbohydrates using protein-vitamin and protein-vitamin-mineral supplements. The lack of lysine in the diet is compensated with lysine feed concentrate. The pigs' need for this amino acid is 5-10 g per day.
Pigs are fed for meat for about 6 months with a daily weight gain of 550 g. More weight gain usually means that the pig has begun to fatten.
Final fattening period
Before slaughter, the pig must gain at least 100 kg of live weight. At the second stage, it is undesirable to feed products from those groups that worsen the quality of pork. It is better to abandon fish products immediately after the start of the second fattening period, replacing them with meat flour or dairy products. Also at this stage it is better not to feed feed that worsens the quality of lard. A month before slaughter, you need to stop giving food that worsens the quality of meat.
How to Feed Pigs for Bacon
Fattening for bacon is considered a type of meat; meat breed pigs are also often called bacon pigs in the West. In Russia there has been a certain division of concepts. Bacon began to be called lard with meat streaks. Meat breeds and their hybrids are also chosen for bacon. Sometimes you can use meat-fat piglets if the breed is not very prone to obesity.In Russia, most often and for these purposes, they prefer to choose a large white breed.
Gains when feeding bacon can be even higher than when feeding meat. No wonder it is considered intense. But weight gain increases when you gain fat, not meat. Fattening for bacon is considered the most profitable with a daily weight gain of 600-700 g.
Piglets are selected more strictly for bacon than for meat. The piglet should have a long body and a straight underline. No belly sagging. Pigs are preferred for fattening bacon, as they produce bacon that is not as fatty as hogs. Piglets are put on fattening from 3 months of life, after reaching a weight of 30 kg.
Animals not suitable for bacon:
- older;
- pregnant or pigleted sows;
- uncastrated boars;
- boletus neutered after 4 months of age;
- late maturing breeds;
- pigs with signs of injury;
- animals with signs of disease.
Features of feeding and maintenance
Pigs gain fat through a quiet lifestyle and feeding with carbohydrates with high energy value. The meat grows with a lot of movement and protein-containing feed. It is not enough to feed a pig so that there is lard with layers of meat. She must also be forced to move during the period of time when she must build up meat. That is, they combine 2 factors: food and lifestyle.
But for this, during the “greasy” period, you need to provide the pig with a quiet life in the barn, and in the “meat” period, force it to walk. The ideal option at this moment would be to “walk” the animal to a distant pasture.
In other words, “convenient” keeping a pig in a barn and giving it food is not suitable here.If we are talking about bacon in the foreign sense of the word, that is, about pork cut from the ribs, everything is simpler. Most often, for these purposes, they take the same meat breed and put it on more intensive fattening than when obtaining meat.
3-month-old piglets are first fed in the same way as for meat, receiving 500 g of daily weight gain. In the second half, they are transferred to fat fattening with a daily weight gain of 600-700 g.
Feeding rations
At the first stage, you can use feeding rations developed for meat products. From the second, protein feeds are halved compared to meat feeding options. The share of grain concentrates, on the contrary, should be greater than when feeding for meat. From the second half of fattening, pigs can be given feed pumpkin, which promotes fat gain.
In the first two months, pigs can be fed cheap high protein feeds:
- oats;
- bran;
- cakes.
These feeds negatively affect the final product, but at the first stage this does not matter. From the second period, cheap feed is removed and pigs are switched to barley, peas and rye. You can also feed millet, but it will be more expensive.
Another option for a more detailed feeding ration for obtaining bacon, in which animal feed is completely removed at the last stage.
The final stage
As with meat fattening, in the last month before slaughter, all feed that worsens the quality of the product is excluded from the diet. In general, pigs for bacon are fed the same way as pigs for meat. All pigs are prone to greasing. When feeding for meat, the ribs end up with the same bacon, but with a thinner layer of lard.Moreover, the thickness of the bacon often also depends on the individual characteristics of the pig.
Bacon piglets are fed for about 6 months. At the end of fattening, the pig should weigh 80-100 kg.
Technology of fattening pigs to fatty condition
For fattening pigs for lard, pigs are selected not so much for their breed as for their unsuitability for anything else. Typically, lard is fed to older sows and boars culled from the main herd according to age. This group also includes young but unproductive sows. For this reason, feeding for lard begins at the weight at which meat and bacon fattening ends. That is, to reach fatty conditions, pigs begin to be fed with 120 kg of live weight.
If the initial goal was to get lard from the piglet, then for fattening it is better to take the same large white one from lines prone to fattening. They also get good returns from Hungarian Mangalitsa.
The goal of such feeding is to obtain the maximum amount of high-quality lard and internal fat in the shortest possible time. Fattening lasts 3 months. During this time, the pig should gain another 50-60% of its original weight. The thickness of the bacon in the ridge area in the area of the 6-7th ribs should reach 7 cm.
Before fattening, pigs are examined. Those who are exhausted in the first month are fed as if they were meat, bringing them back to normal condition. Next, the technology of fattening is used.
This meat is used to make sausages. It is too tough to be eaten as steaks and chops.
What to feed pigs
Pigs are fed 2 times a day with wet nutrient mixtures.In the first half of fattening, up to 60% concentrates are given. The rest is supplemented with bulky feed:
- root vegetables;
- potatoes;
- silo;
- hay;
- other vegetables.
Oats, bran and cake are given in very small quantities. The need for feed units is calculated taking into account the live weight of the pig and the planned weight gain. On average, there should be almost 2 times more feed units in the diet than when feeding meat.
In the second half - last third of the period, the share of concentrates in feeding is 80-90% of the total diet. Juicy feed is reduced to 10-20%. The cakes and bran are completely removed and concentrates from the “improving” group are introduced: wheat, rye, barley, peas.
Practice shows that good results are obtained when feeding pigs:
- silage from corn cobs in milky-wax ripeness;
- corn turds;
- potatoes.
But these products are only suitable for the first stage of fattening. It is best to feed corn husk mixed with fresh grass or legume hay.
When fattening a large group of pigs for lard, not only feed is important, but also housing conditions. “Greasy” pigs are kept in 25-30 pigs in one pen. For a private owner with a small livestock, this issue is not relevant. But even a small farmer will be forced to comply with the conditions of detention.
What to feed pigs for rapid growth
It is beneficial for the owner for the pig to grow as quickly as possible. It cannot be said that the addition of vitamin-mineral premixes accelerates the growth of pigs. But without vitamins and minerals, the development of piglets stops. Therefore, premixes are required for normal growth of the pig.
Growth “accelerators” are antibiotics that fight pathogenic microflora.Without gastrointestinal infections, a pig grows slightly faster than one that spends energy fighting microorganisms. When growing for sale, it is beneficial to use such bactericidal preparations. They can usually be found on sale under the name “growth accelerators.” One of these drugs is Etonium.
The advantages of any antibacterial drugs are that fattened pigs get sick less and gain weight better. The disadvantages from the consumer's point of view are medications.
With accelerated growth, bones and joints do not have time to form. The animal grows up disabled. But for the future of meat this does not matter.
Conclusion
Fattening pigs for meat is more profitable in these days of promoted healthy eating. But lard provides a significant amount of energy and in some cases it is better to fatten pigs for lard than for meat.
