Pigs 101 (A Start)

[OBCMO]

In early days I kept buying piglets and gilts and eventually got PRRS infecting all animals. After losing some I sold all and cleaned up whole farm. My learning is that I will bring pigs from outside only to an empty farm. If I go to monthly operation I will build more houses and get more emploiyees.

What comes to mixing feed I am very interested. Wife shot down the idea because buyers will require commercial feed to be used in our area. Another challenge is the culture where all additional work is seen as unneccessary.

We started to look for feed mills who would sell directly to us. I know some wont sell and will just point to local agent. Any pointers anyone?

I found this old topic and got some pointers: www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/82866-animal-feed-manufacutures/

-OBCMO

[pigeonjake]

we buy from the same farm all the time,

when we bring in new piglets they go to quarantine for a month in a pen on there own,

we clean after they are out and the pigs that leave the pens are cleaned,

touch wood we have had no problems, im from farming stock so understand about keeping animals, do your workers go to other farms??

i dont have people visit here, when the buyer comes, they get cleaned also, trucks ect,

jake

[OBCMO]

Hi Jake,

I think you misunderstood my latest post. You are way ahead what I am doing. I am not telling anyone how to run their business. We all have our unique environment to work in and we need to adapt. I just highligted why I am stuck in our all in all out scenario.

Do my workers follow rules? In general I do not think so even I feel they are handlings the pigs very well.

Do I trust farms selling the piglets? No, but I need live with that until I decide to breed my own again. Maybe some day or just dreaming.

Keep up the good farming!

-OBCMO

[kiwi kev]

Hi im new to pig farming and would like a bit of advice ifeed lamtong food and would like to know at what weights i should change from number 1 feed to number 2 feed

[COXYATCITY]

Hi im new to pig farming and would like a bit of advice ifeed lamtong food and would like to know at what weights i should change from number 1 feed to number 2 feed

hi Kev,i don,t know this brand,,with our feed,number 1 is up til 15 kilo.s,, number 2 to 30 kilo.s number 3 is to 60 kilo,s, number 4 to 90 kilo.s.. number 5 and 6 ,,waiting to sell.. when you change numbers from 1 to 2 and so on,mix the 2 together for a while,hope this helps

cheers Ian.

[COXYATCITY]

Hi im new to pig farming and would like a bit of advice ifeed lamtong food and would like to know at what weights i should change from number 1 feed to number 2 feed

hi Kev,i don,t know this brand,,with our feed,number 1 is up til 15 kilo.s,, number 2 to 30 kilo.s number 3 is to 60 kilo,s, number 4 to 90 kilo.s.. number 5 and 6 ,,waiting to sell.. when you change numbers from 1 to 2 and so on,mix the 2 together for a while,hope this helps

cheers I

hi again,it should say on your bags,or ask your supplier

cheers Ian

[kiwi kev]

Thanks ian

[RedBullHorn]

Thanks ian

...or you could do the general village farmer way. (my way too)

1,2,3,1

1 sack - #1

2 sacks - #2

3 sacks - #3

1 sack - #4

Finish 7 sacks - Sell !

[kiwi kev]

Thanks rbh was wondering if any one knows of a really good farming supply shop in sakon nakon

[pigeonjake]

heres a couple of pictures of the march buch that mac my wife went to collect on monday,

i dont no the weight but worth 850bht of any ones money,

take care

jake

[jompa67]

Good job, Jake,

850 is crazy cheep. I cant produce piglets closet to that price even if I have 5000 sows.

Our production cost at weaning including only food and medicine is around 850 bath. Check attachment.

[thoongfoned]

Good job, Jake,

850 is crazy cheep. I cant produce piglets closet to that price even if I have 5000 sows.

Our production cost at weaning including only food and medicine is around 850 bath. Check attachment.

hi, a couple of questions. how many days old when you take the piglet from the mum? and what would be the average weight at said day?

yes jake that is very good price! looking at the photos the piglets look between 6 - 10kg ? maybe afew smaller ones too. how old are when you take them to your farm, if you don't mind my asking.

Edited March 8, 2014 by thoongfoned

[jompa67]

I try to keep them to 28 days, but if I need the cage, i weaned them at 21-24 days. 28 days and an average of 7 kg at weaning, is a good target. But the result depends of many thing like litter size, sow parity, quality of milk. If I have reach my target mating(insemination) for the period, and my sows look strong and healthy, then i postpone weaning until i start mating again.

Edited March 8, 2014 by jompa67

[IsaanAussie]

28 days is the right answer according to most industry research. Well at least it is the point where the piglets don't get any real extra benefit from the sow, but the sow starts getting pulled down by the piglets. If you creep feed from 10 to 14 days and the piglets are eating well on the feed then you can take them off a bit earlier. My view is wait until the piglets are consuming solids as well as sow milk. That way the change to a solid diet is not as abrupt and there is less chance of scouring and the runs.

Edited March 8, 2014 by IsaanAussie

[pigeonjake]

hi,

i dont no how old they are when we get them,

we just go to our pig lady who has them at her place and pick wht we want then she lets other people have there pick,

we get first pick because we buy a lot from her,

sometimes ive said on here before they are small, if this is the case i just put them on human milk as well as creep feed, dosnt do them any harm,

we allways have them on creep feed for a month when we get them, then just change them over to 01/,,,,02 ect,

all im saying is that at 2300bht a piglet i cant see any profit left on the pig,

my sun feed prices round here are oo feed.770bht ,,01,,,710bht,,,,02,,,470bht,,,,03,430bht

now if you take red bull horns method,,1231 sell,

youll get over 6000bht with the price of the piglet added,,no profit in that for me,

it took me a long time and a bit of struggling to find my contacts,

im now looking for contacts for cheaper feed,ie buying it direct from a feed mill

take care all,

jake,

ps, ive said it on here before too that the piglets i get are rejects from the big farms,

but theres an old saying in england,

one mans rubbish is another mans gold,

it is in my case,,lol

[pigeonjake]

just another thing ide like to add,

now many on here no im no expert,lol

but i do think that people try to make this farming harder then it is,

when my grandfather used to keep pigs in the uk, he used to go round the schools and hospitals, large companies and get all there slop,go to farmers and buy pig potatoes, all fed to the pigs,

i no you cant do this now,

its not a science let the people who supply the feed do all that,

i was looking on the internet about pig farming in the USA they have a lot of land and grow a lot of corn, they put the pig poo on there land to help with the corn,

so i thought, we must be able to buy corn here, off me and mac went, found one place,8bht kilo but they wouldnt bag it,

so found another place, 7.5bht kilo and they will bag it, so we buy it from them by the ton,

ill tell you a little story now,lol, bare with me,

i had been reading how you soak the corn for 12 to 24 hours, so i thought i could put anything in the water, malat, vitimins ect, got me thinking big time,

but the first time i soaked it in plain water,after 24 hours looked at it and thought no way im throwing that water, so i got a little ram to add in and small rice,cut rice,

well when i gave this to the pigs at lunch time they went mad on it,

i feed 3 times a day, so the next lunch time i fed normal food,

then i said to mac come and see this, the pigs had all eaten, they were all laying down relaxing,

they heard me getting this stuff out, and if i dont move from this pc again they ate it like mad,

im not joking they can be full but they will come and eat this mix,

and it looks the part,

so ours now get, baged food in the morning and evening, but at lunch time they get the corn, with a little ram and small rice mix,

its will take in vitimins, malat, most things you put in the water, and at 7.5 bht a kilo its good value, when you think ram is 6bht, and we all no that after 3 or 4 days ram isnt much good at all,

i feed ram to our chickens and ducks mixed with water and again small rice, they have this once they have eaten there laying feed,

this farming game over here is all about trying things out, next time im at home for a long spell ill try a pen of 10 pigs on the corn mix right from the start, well after there creep feed,

take care all

jake

[thoongfoned]

I try to keep them to 28 days, but if I need the cage, i weaned them at 21-24 days. 28 days and an average of 7 kg at weaning, is a good target. But the result depends of many thing like litter size, sow parity, quality of milk. If I have reach my target mating(insemination) for the period, and my sows look strong and healthy, then i postpone weaning until i start mating again.

so say that 28 day 9 piglets a mum at 7 kg. first I would say that at 9 weaned you should get a lot more than 7kg at 28 day. say 7kg at more like 16-20 day taking into consideration good bad mum ect.... increase the feed for the mum, some mums will eat upto 12kg aday. split the feeding into 3-4 sittings.piglets should only need extra milk powder ect.... if the mum has 16+++ (will save small money) make sure during first 5 days that the piglet sleep area is well heated and has mats ect.. to keep warm and the warmth in.

like people say the "weaned" time weight can be from 15 - 35 day, 4 kg - 35kg depending on the people or country.

if you were to take the piglet from the mum early ( some people would say toooooo early) sayfrom 15 - 18 day (depending on size piglet) you stand a better chance of getting the mum back into breading in a short time. ie. catching the next cycle. save money on food,electric ect.... over the years you can save loads of down days this way. don't know the size of your farm but doing the above and taking the piglets tosay a foster mum with good temperament and milk will also work. a mum can look after 14 piglets easy at this age.

the extra food will help to maintain the mums during and after the birthing process. also look at the feeding during pregnancy, this can turn those small new born piglets into nice sized piglets - can make all the difference if you start from day one with a good strong animal.

on my wifes farm I would expect a mum with say 10 - 12 piglets at weaning time ( 17 day) to have an average of 6.5kg. the best I have every seen is 12.8kg at 20 days with the mum, this would be a small litter say 8 - 10. the piglets will have only drunk the mums milk and have excess to water and food. good milk is the key. a good mum could produce as much milk as a good milk cow in aday!

[IsaanAussie]

Is that 12 kg of lactation feed, or banana stalks per day eaten by ONE sow? In Thailand? WOW a lot changes in a year.

[jompa67]

Here is a link to a nice article in tree parts about piglets and weaning.

Article text:

If we had asked this question to veterinarians, specialized technicians and swine producers a few years ago, the immense majority would almost certainly have answered that the best age for weaning is at three weeks. However, there are continuous changes in swine production and its evolution questions this old belief with respect to the weaning age. In this article I will try to explain why in many production systems the weaning age is being put back to 28 days in order to achieve the objective of producing a minimum of 200 kg of weaned weight per productive sow and year. To achieve this objective a herd that weans at an average of three weeks (18 – 23 days) with an acceptable weight of 6.5 kg LW must wean 30.76 piglets/sow/year while the same herd weaning at 28 days (25 – 30 days) with a weight of 7.5 kg needs to wean 26.66 piglets/sow/year. For 27 – 30 days (in the case of weaning on more than one day per week) with 8.0 kg it is necessary to wean 25 piglets/sow/year.

Weaning is an enormous change for the piglet and a great change for the sow. First we are going to analyze the changes that the piglets undergo, then the changes that correspond to the reproductive sows, and to finish we will make an economic analysis.

Milk is the ideal alimentation for lactating piglets, it represents an important contribution of essential nutrients for the growth of the piglets, it gives the piglets a certain immunity and stimulates their physiological development. If we compare milk with feed we can observe the following:

- Milk production reaches its maximum at 21 days and it remains high up to nearly 5 weeks of lactation. Weaning at 25 – 30 days does not take place when the sow already produces less milk, but when the piglets are suckling when the production continues being very high (8 – 10 kg per day).

In short: the piglet must learn to “look after itself”. The stress is an additional factor which makes it difficult for growth continuation and for the absorption of aliments during the first 3 – 5 days after weaning.

The separation from the sow is accompanied by characteristic and loud cries (grunts/calls) from the piglet that are produced immediately after weaning. The frequency and tone of these “calls” has been used as a method to evaluate the level of stress suffered by the piglet at weaning. The piglets that are colder and that feed more poorly cry more loudly and more frequently. The frequency of the cries is higher at the beginning of weaning, however, the piglets that wean at 3 weeks make more “calls” (3.6 c/m) than those weaned at 4 – 5 weeks (2.3 – 2.9 c/m).

All these arguments lead us to believe that with respect to the piglet it seems reasonable that weaning at an average of 28 days is better than at 21 days. First, the difference in weight in piglets weaned between 3 and 4 weeks is 0.5 – 0.9 kg per piglet in favour of those weaned at 28 days. The productive data of piglets weaned at 4 weeks are better for its future productive performance of posterior phases. This efficiency in the weaning phase (weaning – 20 kg LW) is expressed by an improved growth of 5 – 10%, improved transformation rate of 1 – 5%, and improved mortality rate of 20 – 60%. In the fattening period, in field tests of industrial production systems with many animals, we have seen that an improvement in weight at weaning of 0.5 kg leads to an improvement of 1.5 – 2.5 kg at the same age at the end of fattening when the slaughter weight is 100 kg LW. All this leads us to conclude that a suitable weaning weight for the optimum performance in the growing and fattening phases should be at an average minimum of 7.5 – 8.0 kg, with no more than 10% of the animals weighing less than 6 kg LW. This objective is achievable by weaning at 28 days and is very difficult if weaning is at 21 days.

Edited March 8, 2014 by jompa67

[IsaanAussie]

Good article and pretty close to my numbers.

[jompa67]

Don't forget to read all 3 articles. It is a very impotent connection between lactation length and number of born piglets.

[thoongfoned]

Don't forget to read all 3 articles. It is a very impotent connection between lactation length and number of born piglets.

yes good info here. when they do these studies on what size farms do you thing they are working on?

my point in posting before was to help drive down production costs, increase little weaned size and get some much needed extra kg.

happy weaning.

[kiwi kev]

Hi i have one pig in my mob of 12 about60 kg he spends most of the day sitting on his haunches at the feeder hes growing real well as i wpould expect he can walk but it seems to be with diffuculty if i tap him with a stick he walks ok is this normal behavior or would u think there ìs something wrong with him remember im new to pigs

[RedBullHorn]

Base on PigeonJake's numbers... on my method of 1,2,3,1

#1 - ฿770 x 1

#2 - ฿710 x 2

#3 - ฿470 x 3

#4 - ฿410 x 1

Total 7 sacks of feed cost is ฿4'030

1 Piglet cost "currently" is ฿2'300

Cost of 1 finishing pig is ฿6'330 "currently".

Current farmgate price is ฿75/kg.

Average finishing weight per pig is 105kg x ฿75/kg = ฿7'875.

Gross profit = ฿1'545/pig.

That was what i use to make with my herd of 200 pigs. There are 3 things that stop me to do it.

1. The big gap on farmgate prices, too volatile and the seasons different can be ฿20/kg. Like when the price trend going from ฿78/kg down to ฿58/kg.

2. When finishing pigs fight and if 1 pig dies, the profit of 6-7 pigs are gone.

3. My wife complains too much on the bad smell the pigs left on me and clothing when i come home from the farm.

If prices are good, i will make between ฿1'200 - ฿1'800 gross profit per pig ( x 200 pigs ).

On average pace, between ฿600 - ฿900 per pig. Average variable cost per month is ฿2'300...Cheap !

P.S = I forgot to mention... Mine are all certified piglets from certified nursery, so i get prices only lower by ฿2/kg from CP announced prices. With guarantee buy back as contract farmer.

Backyard farms will get very much lower prices from the 'sharks', that's why villagers get no profit base on the above mentioned method as total cost is above ฿6'000...

Edited March 13, 2014 by RedBullHorn

[pigeonjake]

i would just like to point out that not all farms will get 75bht farm gate price,

we dont, they say that is just for big farms, we only get 70bht,

but also that is why i like to pay 850bht for my piglets,

ive said on her before when i do retire i will build a shop and try and sell our own pork, or even buy a motorbike with side car, ice box on it and send mama out, ive asked her about this and she has said ok,

jake

[RedBullHorn]

P.S = I forgot to mention... Mine are all certified piglets from certified nursery, so i get prices only lower by ฿2/kg from CP announced prices. With guarantee buy back as contract farmer.

Backyard farms will get very much lower prices from the 'sharks', that's why villagers get no profit base on the above mentioned method as total cost is above ฿6'000...

[OBCMO]

Hi Jake,

As you know cost management is very important part of the process. You have told us several times there are piglets available 850 THB per head . Let us know where we can evaluate and perhaps buy few hundred piglets for starters.Waiting for contacts.

-OBCMO

[pigeonjake]

yes that would be good,

i dont lie ive got no need to lie,

but do you think im going to tell you were i buy my piglets from?

come on were in this to make money,

i tell you,

you go see my pig lady tell her youll pay her 1000bht for her piglets,

and gues what im out of business

dosnt happen like that,

it takes a long time to get suppliers get to know people who will help you,

sorry mate,

this little piggy isnt saying a word,

if you want, ill buy a load,keep them a month and you can buy thrm from me for 2000bht a head

jake

[OBCMO]

The answer I was expecting. Cannot blame you. :-) I do not want to impact you business in any negative way. If the provider is willing to sell I am interested. If you are middle man I am ok with it as well. It is all business as you said.

-OBCMO

[jompa67]

I think the gate price is close to 80, at least up here in korat. Our sow provider that use to visit us a few time every month to check up on our sows, told us that our gate price is to low (76 bath). He had work for Betagro in the past so we told him to check for buyer. We have got 5 new potential customers this week. They all tell the same story. There is so little pigs on the market so the price is going up.

Government fixed price is not working. I guess it is same for piglets. Right now it's chaos on the market. Grab as much as you can before it's to l8