Farmer Focus Livestock: Chris Fogden prepares for last pigs to leave
A lot seems to be happening off the farm at the moment and that could be because, with little stock on site, I have had more time to notice it.
Various shenanigans from processors involving abattoir closures, and withdrawals contributing to the DAPP pig price, have done little to hold prices down. The weakened currency means, in sterling terms, the UK is the lowest cost pigmeat producer in Europe.
Increases in productivity might help to keep us there, but it could easily be wiped out by a reversal of currency movements. We are down to the last batch of sows with suckling piglets. Their weaning day will be a landmark for me, as it will be the first time since November 1987 I will have no pigs to look after.
Back then, just fresh out of Harper Adams, I took delivery of the first of 60 Camborough Blue gilts.
The new intake of in-pig Rattlerow Landrocs will start to arrive on 30 March, and are due to start farrowing a fortnight later – 21 years, almost to the day, since my old herd started farrowing.
I hope and believe the next few years in the pig job will be as good as my first few and not as demoralising as the latest. The mild weather has helped with the washing, repair and disinfection of equipment.
It makes a change not to be tightening bolts with numb thumbs, in driving snow. So far, we are ahead of schedule for a seamless turn round.
The absence of a quad bike has meant I have had to rescue our old fencing barrow from the nettles. Surprisingly, it hasn’t made the job of dismantling the pig paddocks much slower, but it has made me feel a lot older.
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