In order to ensure your piglets get the best start in life, you should supplement their foraging diet with some high-quality hog feed.
While they are just little, offer your piglets a feed that is 18 – 21% protein. Once they are off to a good start, move them to a hog-grower that is 16% protein. Throughout this entire time, surround them with good hay for their enjoyment. Put it in their food, in their house. You will want it to be available and familiar to them.
The problem with trying to grass feed pigs is that they don’t naturally eat hay. They will forage, but they are not foraging for grasses. They are foraging for bugs, slugs, grubs, and roots. This is why God gave them shovels on their faces. Yes, they will eat and kill the grass in no time, however, they are after the roots more than the blades. Allowing pigs to root around and find all these underground delicacies will make your pork chops better.
Pigs are unique animals in that when they are raised on pasture, obtaining a significant portion of their diet from foraging, their meat will be exceptional. Sheep and hogs share the fact that, when raised where they can forage, they will not only be more nutritious, they will also be more tender and a superior overall product.
Another problem with trying to get pigs to consume hay is that they can’t until they are older. Their systems are not mature enough to properly digest and absorb the nutrients from hay. Most breeds of pigs can begin to get some sustenance from hay by the time they are 4 months old.
Pigs are smart,they naturally will turn to everything else in their pens for food before turning to hay. You can give them hay, but you can’t make them eat it. The bottom line is that pigs don’t naturally want to eat hay and they weren’t designed to live on hay.
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