My wife and I are talking about getting and raising a couple of pigs for the first time next spring. We have a lot of questions and would appreciate hearing about your expierence's. Flat land around the house is limited, we are in Vermont, so I'd like to fence an area on the wooded hill behind the house. I can get goat fence, 330 feet for a good price, and use existing trees instead of posts for some of it. The hill has a lot of slate so driving posts would be difficult. This should give me a pen that is roughly 80 x 80 feet. Is that to big? to small? Also, how large should the building be? Right now we are thinking at least 2 maybe 3 but if it goes well we might want to raise more if things go well. Do we have to worry about predators? This summer I've caught and killed 13 skunks, 4 'possums, 1 coon, and 1 grey fox. I know there are coyotes around but have yet to see/catch any. I am mostly concerned about when the pigs are still small. What do you feed them? I had heard of using day old bread as a supplement along with garden scraps. Finally, how do you deal with slaughtering/butchering? There is a slaughterhouse about 20 miles from us that I have heard good things about but I don't know if I'll have to kill/gut them before bringing them over. I guess I'll have to call and find out. I don't have a problem cutting up deer but I have no idea how to butcher a pig and I'd hate to miss out on some of the good cuts because of it. We would also like to have the hams and bacon smoked and we don't have the equipment to do that.
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