It seems that our farm is the exception, as such a high percentage of our labour force is women. We examined many of the historical tasks, and I will say with a great deal of confidence that mechanization is at the root of this change. An example is a classic hay bale weighing between 35 and 65 kg. We never used such baling equipment, we use round balers that produce half-ton bales that are handled by tractors. In the UK, most feed gains were delivered in 55kg bags, but we have it delivered in mini silos by the ton. The difference is that commercial farming requires less physical strength. The only part of the farm that requires brut strength is the meat processing plant. Granted, our initial labour pool was dominated by women, as picking is the most important activity on the farm, but as the farm grew, almost all our new jobs were first offered to our current employees, the two idiots we recently fired proved that hiring outside our usual labour pool was a mistake! I have a
Just so that I am clear, pigs need a good diet, I got many comments that a forest does not provide pigs with a proper alimentation. While this is true if you are seeking to create a sustainable pig farm, and it does lead to a lower growth rate, pigs on our farm do not principally breed for the rapidity at which they gain weight. However, we are fully aware that protein has to constitute about 25% of their diet, and that there are essential vitamins and other nutrients that they have to access. Guess what, our ecologist and biologist goal is to ensure that they have access to these in the correct proportion. In a nutshell, we watch our pigs, we provide certain supplements and our pigs are healthy. The four bruisers we culled were removed because of their difficult disposition. Forest-grown pigs have longer life cycles than pigs raised on grains. It was always the compromise we were willing to make because their primary duty is clearing the forests. We had 28 on the old farm,