It is the dream of every farmer to raise a record-breaking boar up to 300 kg. But is this livestock management economically reasonable? Let's try to figure it out together.
Perfect weight and age of slaughterAnimals are kept on large pig farms for up to 6-8 months. Small farms are ready to feed pigs for up to a year. Fast-growing pigs (those who most likely reach weight of 100 kg) are Pietren, Duroc, Hampshire, red and white belt breed, Poltava meat breed.
And who is better to feed: pigs or boars? During the Haus Düsse experiment in 2018, technologists found that boars had the best average daily gain, carcass weight. The pigs lagged behind due to the amount of food eaten during sexual hunting, which occurred at 5 months.
Precocity and the value of the average daily growth of piglets directly depend on:
- genotype. Specialized meat breeds or commercial hybrids grow the fastest;
- sex. Boars gain weight more actively, especially after castration;
- housing conditions. Even the level of ventilation, floor, watering system and placement of feeders have an impact. For example, keeping on a lattice floor increases the absolute increase by 10%;
- feeding quality. If you feed even a high-breeding pig with cheap green fodder (pumpkin, zucchini, grass, corn stalks and silage), it will not gain 110 kg by 6 months.
If after 9 months the weight of the animal does not change for 2 weeks, it's time to kill it. The animal has reached its biological limit and further can only gain fat.
When starting to feed animals you should give preference to the fast-growing specialized meat genotypes. They intensively increase muscle mass for up to 8 months. At the appropriate level of feeding with complete feed up to 8-9 months, they get a marketable appearance, reach slaughter condition.
If you feed a pig for too long, it stops gaining
muscle mass, but actively increases fat. Such an individual will be less valuable, because you will not get much meat from it, and it will be too fatty.