Pigs!

(My lovely wife Masako, our infant daughter Kate, and Wilber the pig.)

Pigs!

Every family should have a pig. Well, any family that eats meat (pork) should have a pig.

We have 3 pigs and they are now about 75 or 80 lbs, up from 25 lbs on March 21 - Incredible! But the cool thing with raising a pig is that table scraps and food refuse from a family of 4 will provide more than 3/4 the feed for 1 pig. If you think recycling glass is efficient, it does not come close to a pig. The amount of household garbage that is food refuse is much more by volume than you might imagine, and your pig will happily consume it all, and give you some very fertile soil in the process. One 240 pound pig will give you about 160 pounds of meat when dressed out, certainly enough pork for a family of 4 for 1 year.

Pigs do smell pretty bad - actually really bad. Our pigs are 300 yards from our house and we can smell them if the wind is right. They really could not be rasied in anything other than rural country side. But they do have their advantages for the small holder, self sufficient farm. Besides eating all our food waste, our pigs are digging up and fertilizing a significant portion of next year's garden better than any garden tractor. We move them by rearranging metal hog panels and fence posts that we bought from the local farmer's co-op. After a couple weeks on a 16 x 32 foot area we move them, and they leave behind well loosened, fertile garden soil.

Pigs are not for everyone (my sister keeps a kosher home), but they are incredibly cheap  and easy to raise.