Farmer focus livestock: Chris Fogden

Being without pigs has been hard work. With the first in-pig gilts for the restock coming in on 25 March, our few days empty after the last weaning on 12 March were spent getting the last batch of farrowing huts and fenders washed and disinfected along with a lot of other equipment that would be easy to overlook.

The plan was to share the work equally between the three of us and to keep the pressure washer going for all the daylight hours available. Each farrowing hut takes 30 to 40 minutes to do thoroughly and out of the total of 220, there were 66 left to do. A combination of factors, involving mainly a large family and an overgenerous benefits system, made my long-serving farrowing specialist decide he would leave my employment at nil notice, leaving “Old Faithful” David and me to get the job done. Cheers, Paul.

By washing at the weekends to make up for the day away, I was also able to get to the BPEX “Change for Success” conference. I was glad I did, as every paper was relevant, useful and stimulating. Then followed the annual Nuffield Business Group meeting, this year at England’s only whisky distillery, where catching up with progress of the other participants’ businesses and charitable work over the past year was fascinating and humbling. All I could report was cutting turnover by 70% through ceasing finishing pigs.

It will be good to have some pigs back on site. We still have 220 single-farrowing paddocks to set up, mostly before litters are due to arrive in mid-April, when I look forward to reporting on some good litters. The success of the new herd is more than ever in my hands, as it now looks like I will be in charge of farrowing.

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