Our Pigs

We eat a lot of pork in our house and decided that it was worthwhile to get some pigs to finish out for slaughter. We started researching the types available and found a breed called the American Guinea Hog (not to be confused with a guinea pig).

 

Like the other livestock we have (cows and goats), the Guinea Hog is considered a heritage breed by the Livestock Conservancy. There is some dispute of there actual origins but they are considered one of (if not the) oldest breeds in the United States.

 

These are primarily grazing hogs and are not known to tear up pastures like some of the other breeds. They are also considered very good for meat even though they grow a little slower than a lot of today’s more common breeds. Like the Devin Cow, this is part of the reason that they have fallen out of favor; because they do not make for a great large scale commercial livestock breed.

 

Once we settled on a breed, we started looking for available stock. The particular group that we found happen to be retired racing pigs. Yes, you read that correctly. They were racing pigs. We had no idea this was a thing. Apparently it is a pretty lucrative endeavor because the folks that had the pigs had several travel trailers with their racing logos and had trips planned to two different states for the month. They explained that the pigs are trained with an Oreo cookie to enter a racing gate (like horse racing gates) and are dressed in racing silks (see the photo) before they race a 160 foot track to get another Oreo. They travel to state fairs and events all over the country with pigs that start racing at just a few weeks old. At about two months old they are retired because they are too large to handle for the races. We ended up with 5 gilts (females who have not yet been bred).  
 

We have decided that we very much enjoy their personalities and hope to find a breeding boar that we can lease.