Title: How We Move Pigs Without Stressing Them: Wild Apples and a Hog Cart

Moving a group of pigs is one of the more humbling jobs on a farm. Moving 70 of them, each approaching 300 pounds, across a road is the kind of thing that can go wrong in a hurry. This is the story of how our team member Terron did it calmly, by himself, with a hog cart and a few buckets of wild apples.

Meet Terron

Terron joined our farm team from Jamaica, where he is a farmer in his own right, raising pigs and cows. He is a childhood friend and neighbor of Keygon, another member of our team.

Like many farmers in Jamaica, Terron had never used electric fence, or managed animals with frequent moves to fresh pasture. So his first season here was a steep learning curve: operating the tractor, managing the brooder, moving chickens on pasture, helping with farrowing, raising and weaning piglets, and fencing pigs out in the field.

Moving day was a clear picture of how far he has come.

Why Pigs Are Hard to Move

Our pigs are rotated to fresh pasture regularly, and this group had grown larger than we expected. They finished the field they were in, and their next pasture was across a road.

If you have ever tried to herd a pig, you know they are not like cows. With cattle you can set up a laneway across a road and call them across. Pigs love to explore, but rarely where you want them to. Chasing them only makes it worse.

So we asked the question we always ask: what is the simplest, easiest, and least stressful way to get this done?

The Hog Cart

Our answer was a piece of equipment called a hog cart. It is essentially a livestock trailer whose wheels are controlled by the tractor's hydraulics, so the whole floor can be lowered to about ground level.

That detail matters more than it sounds. A pig is a short, heavy animal, and climbing up into a standard trailer is exactly the kind of thing that makes one balk. With the floor at ground level, they simply walk on.

The Apples

Here is the part I love most. Terron noticed the pigs were fascinated by the fall apples dropping from the wild apple trees on the farm. So he collected buckets of them, tossed them onto the hog cart, and let the pigs follow their curiosity on board.

No chasing, no shouting, no crowding. Roughly a dozen pigs at a time walked onto the cart for the apples, rode the short trip across the road, and walked off into their new pasture.

He moved the whole group by himself, with no more than some brainstorming from me.

Why Stress Matters

Getting the pigs across the road was the goal. Getting them across without stressing them was the achievement.

Managing stress in our animals is one of our top priorities. It is stressful for the people working with animals when the animals are stressed, and stress is also one of the biggest contributing factors to illness. Reducing it is the best tool we have for happy, healthy animals.

That matters all the more on a farm like ours. These pigs are certified organic, part of our first group raised under organic certification from birth, which means we do not reach for routine antibiotics or chemical dewormers. Prevention is not one option among many for us. It is the whole approach, and low stress handling is a big part of it.

A bucket of wild apples will not solve every problem on a farm. But it was a good reminder that the calmest solution is often the one that works with the animal rather than against it. Thank you, Terron.

You can read more about how we raise our animals here.