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A good knife is the first step, but get yourself a knife steel, even the pros use the steel regularly. I was using one of those filet knife sharpeners (red plastic with ceramic rods), but I let my buddy use a steel on my blade, it was like a switch was turned on!!

You have to decide what's important to you when you raise pigs. Commercial feed is formulated to grow the pigs to market size as fast as possible, but the quality might suffer and the pigs themselves might suffer as they put on more weight then their bones and joints can handle. I worked with...

There is non-stick bandages that they use at the hospital on wounds, it comes in sheets, it's a mesh that has some kind of jelly on it. My first thought is to get it to dry up ASAP, then use a zinc cream to keep it moisturized to promote healing.

Calving rates for AI are 70%, for sexed semen it's even lower. Or it was about ten years ago.

I grew up on a dairy so I love Holsteins, but now if I were to get a dairy cow it would be a jersey. I just really hate basterdize dairy cattle with beef cross bred.

No, don't do it Reason 1.your husband isn't on board Reason 2.Its going to take a lot of your resources.

Pigs will "feel" with their noses, they will push on anything that moves. They'll make associations with food, so don't let them see you as a source. Don't expect livestock to be pets or act like a dog.

This is late, but there's a spray that you spray in their noses that can stop fighting, you'd find it at a ag supply store. Or you could try rubbing any kind of scent into their noses and over the new pig. If you plan to mix them there is no time that's better then the other

I grew up on a farm with registered Holsteins, if there was a injured bull calf that we had to keep he got a name (all the heifers had names). My dad was a stonch conservative (Canadian political party), the names were the leaders of the other parties, we had Jean's, Preston's and Stockwell the...

IMHO straw is like laying rebar in the manure, you get one monolithic slab. I keep telling my wife no straw in the chicken coop. Shavings can be shovelled and turned periodically.

You could also use a hammer for blunt force, or buy a bolt gun (blitz kerner is cheep)

My experience is a sow that's not in heat will scream rape to the high heavens if a boar tries anything.

Gestation is 115 days for pigs, but since you don't know when they were bred it probably won't help

Are your boars keeping cool? Have your other sows ever had litters before? Have your boars had litters before? Are they all housed together? Can you get your boars semen tested?

My wife bought an Appaloosa about a year ago, she had always had shoes because of a crack in her front hoof. She was giving her a feed supplement, I think it was "hooflex", but not the conditioner (I just picked up a pail for her and it wasn't the right stuff. But she doesn't have shoes on...

If she is going to be used as a farrowing sow I think your doing it the right way. Commercial breeding stock is rasied just like slaughter stock, grown way to fast for the structure = joint issues.

I think I would like Landrace, not because of taste but the looonnnggg loin

I manage a commercial boar herd, when I cull a load of boars I never do anything special, just chase them all on the trailer, I do try to have enough so they don't have too much room and the banging that goes on is loud. We did try once to cut off the tusks of the boars, but it was a gong show...