Farming - revisted

Hmmm.... So the best laid plans of mice and men...
Remember how I mentioned a week or two ago that we'd be getting pigs in the fall?  Well that assumption was on the fact that I couldn't find a local breeder for the heritage breed I was looking for and the assumption that the particular breed I wanted grew as normal pigs grow.  Both were not true.  So, my dear farmer friend (who is also searching for a replacement for soon-to-be-in-the-freezer "Sausage" the pig) did a little more digging and found a very local breeder who would sell us all the piglets we wanted for less than half of what we were expecting.  We're going to check out the operation tomorrow, but it looks promising.  The one, tiny little caveat: the sow (mama pig) is due in a few weeks, not in the fall like we were planning.  So.....we talked through the timeline.  As it turns out, this particular breed takes about a month longer to reach 'market weight' than other commercialized breeds - 7 months instead of 6.  We are also pasturing our pig for as much of the growing season as we can to save on feed costs and also create a higher quality meat, which also adds another month onto the weight gain.  So we're looking at 8 months instead of the anticipated 6, which makes spring piglets perfect for our timeline.

You see, pigs are rooters.  Nature's roto-tillers.  They will take a compacted, grassy plot and turn it into soft tilled up dirt in a few months, with no gasoline required.  And you  get to eat them when they're done!  This was our original purpose for the pigs.  We wanted to allow them to till up the garden for us over the winter, while adding manure and turning straw and hay into the soil as well.
And we have an affinity (read: love affair) for sausage and bacon.
So, getting spring piglets means we can give them high quality pasture over the summer, then move them into the garden in the fall and let them work it up, then butcher them around February, giving us time to let the chickens take a turn in there eating bugs, weed seeds, and smoothing the dirt a little.
As my calculus teacher always told me: Work smarter, not harder.
So, we are going to a pig showing (?) tomorrow to see the very pregnant sow and make sure she's what we want in a pig.  My friend is going to retain one of the gilts (girls) from the litter and purchase a breeding boar to keep (not eat - yet).  Then we'll have piglets twice a year to raise up and eat.  My freezer has never dreamt of attaining such an exalted position as holding all that pasture-raised pork :)
Oink, oink!

PS - The picture is of the breed of pigs we're looking at: Hereford Hogs.  Very pretty, very tasty, and lots of bacon.