Pigs

Weaners, gilts and the boar a small farm shares:

the pigs that move between farms do three different jobs. Weaners, piglets just off the sow, go to fatteners who grow them out on concentrate, and Azuero’s fattening units draw many of them from family breeding farms further west. Gilts are young females kept back to breed, and a sow that has already raised good litters is worth more to a breeder than any gilt. The boar is often shared between small farms and moved on before inbreeding creeps in. Commercial pigs are mostly Landrace and Large White crosses for their mothering, with a Duroc or Pietrain sire for a leaner carcass, while the patio pig of a family farm is often a cross nobody wrote down.

Fattening pen or farrowing house:

fattening weaners is the easier start. They arrive, eat and leave, and a roofed concrete pen with a drain, a hopper feeder and nipple drinkers is the whole set-up. A hopper the pigs work themselves wastes less than an open trough, and that matters because animal feed is most of what a pig costs to raise. Breeding is a bigger commitment: the sow needs a farrowing crate or a pen with guard rails so she does not lie on her litter, a heat lamp in the piglets’ corner, and someone close by when she farrows. Plenty of farms keep a sow beside their chickens, but a fattening pen is rarely right for a mother.

Biodigesters and the slurry from a pig pen:

pig waste reaching the La Villa and Estibaná rivers put Azuero’s pig farms under close watch, and a pen that washes straight into a stream is a problem for whoever owns it next. A biodigester, a sealed bag or tank that takes the wash water, turns the slurry into gas for the kitchen and a liquid fertiliser for crops, and small farms in Los Santos and Herrera have been adding them. On a used one, check the bag for sun-cracked seams and punctures, the inlet for a blockage, and the gas line and valve for leaks.

Spotting a poor weaner or a rotting farrowing crate:

see the pigs on their own farm at feeding time, when a sick one hangs back from the trough. A litter should be even in size and bright, with no scour staining the back legs. A cough, scabby skin rubbed raw on the walls, or a soft lump at the navel or the scrotum, which is a hernia, are reasons to walk away. On a breeding gilt, count the teats: at least six evenly spaced pairs, none flat or inverted, and legs that carry her freely on concrete, because a sow that goes lame stops breeding. A boar should have two even testicles and litters to his name. Used kit fails where urine and manure sit: the bottom rails and floor of a farrowing crate, the feet of pen dividers, the slide that adjusts a hopper. Galvanised steel outlasts painted, so scrape the paint at floor level and see what is underneath. Run water through every nipple drinker; one that drips or stays dry needs a new seal.

Weight, castration and the morning a litter travels:

give the number of pigs, their age in weeks and a weight, even one taken with a weigh tape round the chest, whether the males are castrated, the breeds behind them and the feed they are on, so the new keeper can change it gradually. Say when they were last dewormed and have the documentation that goes with them ready. Pigs cannot sweat, so hand them over at first light, load them on an empty stomach and shade the truck bed. A sow heavy in pig travels badly and is better moved once she has weaned her litter. For crates and feeders, photograph the welds and floor-level metal and give the measurements: a crate that will not fit someone’s farrowing house is no use to them. A smallholder near Santiago deciding whether to make the drive wants a clip of the pigs up and moving.