Starting out feeding

When you first get your pig do you feed free choice up to 150 lbs. or do you weigh an get the weight gain per day you or looking for.

I keep them on full feeder till 125 # then I switch to hand feeding 2 times a day and wiegh every week all along

We do not use a Full Feeder. We will fill there feed pans or troughs up in the morning and and night just as long as they know that there is feed in the pan. You can tell if they are eating well or if they have gone off feed. Then depending on the hog at 125-170 lbs you can start limit there feed to 2lbs in morning and night.

depends on the age of my pig and what i plan on doing with him. my older hogs that i have that I keep back for the kids to show. If there barrows around here then they can only weight 280, I hand feed them start to finish. My gilts for the all shows i might leave them on a full feeder longer because there is no weight limit for them. But still i basicly hand feed all the way threw. I can hold them better or i also get more weight gain when hand feeding. I weight them every week. My yorks hand feeding i can get 3 to 3.5 lbs aday gain hand feeding.

I always hand feed. With hand feeding twice a day you know exactly what your project is eating, if the pig cleans it up quickly add a little more to the next feeding untill you get max. cosumption. You will also be training your animal to clean up its feed. With this the animal will eat more and give you more gain.

This year we received a selffeeder and son still handfeeds, however he loves the use of the selffeeder because it keeps the feed drier and he doesn't have to chase the bowl around in the mornings....I guess he's got more time in the PM

We have fed both ways; self feeder and hand feeding. I prefer hand feeding lots better for the same reasons everyone above has mentioned. One thing I believe though is that you need to be weighing weekly to see where you are with weights to know were you are with your rations. Keeps those surprises at the end to a minimum.

we just brought home three oct. bred showpigs for a fair date of 04/23/12,Got milk x Full dimension york sows. we have them on free feed they are @ 60lbs now. Using showmaster starter. We are fairly new @ this any more suggestions start-middle and at showtime.

Happy Holidays!!!!!

thanks

I am not a big fan of showmaster feed, except for there starterfeed wich is really good. With that said I feed Honor L200 19.5% till they hit around 120-140. After that I mix L200 19.5% and L200 16% half and half. When they hit 200 I'll leave them on the mix or if they are to hard, or are tight I will give them strictly 16%. If they need more gut in them, I will add 8 ounces of Depth charge to there feed about 4 weeks from the show. If they need more pop, especially with barrows I will give 2 ounces a day of the paylean pre-mix 3 weeks from the show. If tou need more cover I would use the Heavyweight, which is 70% fat. It is a new product the is water soluable and very tastey to them. It has a milk base and has cocanut oil in it. Hope this will help.