Alright people, if you’ve been reading my blog at all you’ll be surprised by what is to come. I’m starting to feel like a weirdo. Yup. All the stuff I’ve been doing and I’ve never felt particularly weird about it. This pig thing though, it’s starting to make me feel weird.
Am I the only one “free ranging” pigs with other animals? Am I the only one not having any problems with it? It’s so easy. I have the laziest system set up in the entire world. This is awesome, because I am essentially lazy at my core.
I have considered that it is the area that has made me so successful at this. We have 40 acres. We have wheat fields in front of our acreage. Our neighbors houses are placed so that there is maximum distance between our properties. Our road is only used by 3 families. Also, it’s Wyoming, old wheat fields that have been over grazed since being developed into residences. In short, there is pretty much nothing to eat off of our property.
So, perhaps I am not having any problems because there is nothing tempting my little piggies to wander. Maybe I’m just lucky. I don’t know. All I know is I open the gate in the morning and all of my animals come pouring out. Chickens, ducks, geese, peacocks and pigs. They all hang out together in the barn until release. Then the smarter chickens follow the pigs around waiting for them to dig up delicious morsels.
The pigs themselves wander here and there. We have no fences around our acreage that would keep a pig in except for those around the barn and yard. A few times they’ve gone to the end of our property to nibble the weeds around the road. We escort them back when they do. The neighbors are used to the sight of fat black pigs wandering about. At night they put themselves up and I shut the gate again. A few times I’ve heard coyotes close and have gone out earlier to lure the pigs back to the barn with a bucket of treats. This is, of course, not because I’m worried about the pigs. It’s because I’m worried about all the birds who would be left with the gate open until the pigs returned. The pigs can handle themselves. Our dogs are terrified of them.
As I watch YouTube videos and read blogs of various people I notice pigs are treated with suspicion. People seem afraid they’ll eat the other animals or escape to never return. I admit to being surprised by this attitude and it makes me feel…well….weird.
I should also note I don’t feed them except when absolutely necessary. We give them our food scraps but otherwise spring, summer and most of fall they are on their own. Get out and find food or starve!
I don’t want to mislead you all though. We had a dog break in and kill our chickens. When I went in and started making a pile with the bodies I woke the pigs up. They went to work destroying all the evidence aka eating the dead chickens. I don’t know that I would leave someone actively bleeding out there with them. However, I’ve seen them wait and watch a chicken die. They didn’t approach it until it was actually dead. Then they ate it no problems. Pig morals.
They’re just wandering in this picture.I took it from our living room. I love watching them meander.