Start with

Two feeder pigs (they do better with a roommate), 8 weeks old, from a farm you trust. Duroc, Berkshire, or a hardy cross. One pig is lonely and noisy.

Housing

A hut they can nest in, plus a paddock you can move. Electric fence — two hot strands, trained on a training wire the first week — holds pigs on oak mast. Woven wire they will lift. Shade and a wallow in July are not optional; pigs don’t sweat.

Feed

They will eat almost anything edible: surplus milk, whey, kitchen scraps (no raw meat if you can help it), windfall apples, squash, corn, soaked oak acorns. Finish on mast in the woods if you have it — that’s the old Ohio Valley way. A 250 lb hog ate a lot more than people remember. Budget feed or mast.

Water

Gallons a day in August. A nipple or a deep trough they can’t flip. Frozen troughs in January are a twice-daily chore.

Breeding

Don’t, the first year. A gilt and a boar is a different operation (farrowing crates or a very good hut, crushed piglets, etc.). Buy feeders until you are ready.

Health

Worm incoming feeders if you have product; if not, rotate ground and don’t keep pigs on the same pad year-round. Lameness on concrete — give them dirt. Heat stroke: water them, shade them, don’t move them at noon.

Predators

Coyotes on small weaned pigs. Once they are 80 lb, mainly dogs and people. A hot fence and a hut.

Harvest

Late October–November, cool weather, 220–280 lb live. You want a cold night for hanging. See Process → Goat & hog.

Pork · Lard · Bacon / ham / sausage · Hide

Never feed raw plate meat or neighbor-dog remains. Keep pigs out of the septic leach field. A hog in a wallow next to the well is how families get sick.