Question

by Carolyn
(Riverview Florida)

I was trying to find out how much grain to give my pet hog a day. She was 200 lbs underweight when she was rescued. Now she is about 500 lbs and needs to go on diet.

Help.... I do not feed her a lot. She is fed once a day also.

***************************************************

Carolyn,

You don't say what breed of pet hog you have which is therefore difficult to gauge exactly what it should weight at this stage, or how old it is.

You also haven't said what type of grain you are using to feed your pig with either, but I am guessing you are using corn. However, this won't give her a balanced diet. She should also be getting sunflower meal and a calcium and protein supplement.

Grain will help increase her weight if you give her too much. On average, a pig should have 2 kg (4 1/2 lbs)corn a day.

How old is your pig? This will determine how much you should be feeding her. If she is more than 12 weeks of age and you need to put her on diet then do not feed her more than 0.9 kg or just under 2 lbs. of corn a day.

Make up the balance of her diet with vegetables and root crops. Allowing her out to pasture would give her access to additional vitamins and help reduce her grain intake. However, this may not be practical in your case.

Sweet potatoes are a good food if you wish to replace the corn in the diet however, if you do decide to replace these for the grain you will need 4 kg (9 lbs) of sweet potatoes to replace 1 kg (2 1/4 lbs)of grain.

As a rule of thumb, it is always advisable to check on how your pig is growing to make sure that you are not overfeeding or underfeeding your pig.

Here is a guide of age and weight for pigs:

Aged 4 weeks - weight 5 kg / 11 lbs
Aged 8 weeks - weight 13 kg /28 1/2 lbs
Aged 14 weeks - weight 29 kg / 64 lbs
Aged 20 weeks - weight 52 kg /114 1/2 lbs
Aged 26 weeks - weight 82 kg / 181 lbs
Aged 28 weeks - weight 100 kg / 220 1/2 lbs

Regards
Kathryn
Countryfarm Lifestyles