Born on 19 July our three British Saddleback gilts (young female pigs that have not produced a litter) were weaned from their mother by their breeder last week. In advance of their arrival we prepared a pen, complete with electric fence, sourced a metal ark (thanks to neighbours Lucy and Chris Wilson for that) and stockpiled food and bedding.
I'll talk more about the breed, food and the economics in later posts but here are the rules we're getting used to.
Whether you keep one pig or a commercial herd you need to be registered with Defra. In the event of a disease outbreak, the precise location of all livestock is essential for effective measures to control and eradicate highly contagious viruses (based on the experience from the foot and mouth outbreak in 2001).
The first step was to register our land with the Rural Payments Agency (RPA) to obtain a County Parish Holding (CPH) number. That was actually done some time ago so our neighbour could graze his livestock here. A CPH, for example, 12/345/6789, confers no rights, but aides efficient administration as call centre operators will use it as a means to identify our farm. The first two digits relate to the county we live in, the next three relate to the parish and the last four are unique to to us.
With a CPH we could collect our pigs.
When they arrived the next step was to call Animal Health at Defra and obtain a Herd Number. This is a code, unique to our pigs, that helps to identify the individual animal. It is most obvious on the yellow tag seen on the ear of all livestock over a certain age. Our Herd Number was issued over the phone and associated paperwork should arrive by post this week.
The pigs were collected from a farm outside Thirsk. Each one, still wearing the ear tag applied by the breeder, was identified and its unique code annotated in the livestock movement log for that farm. Then she and I completed the 'Report of a Pig Movement made under the General Licence for the Movement of Pigs (AML2)', a four part form, that details the movement of the livestock from her CPH to ours, including the journey time. The breeder keeps a yellow page, we keep our pink portion for six months and send the top, white, element to North Yorkshire County Council's Trading Standards Animal Health team in Northallerton. Oh, and the fourth part, the blue copy is kept by the transporter, in this case, us.
The process is intended to provide a window to observe the health of animals being transported on an industrial scale around the UK and Europe, hence the journey time aspect and other questions the forms pose relating to vehicle cleanliness.
Easy really; but it's not over. Once the pigs arrive (in fact the same would be said for one pig) a 20 day standstill is triggered. That means no pigs may come or go from the farm. A serious consideration if your livelihood involves buying and selling pigs at market. The standstill rule is six days for cattle, goats and sheep (this effects our neighbour who has cattle grazing here). Aimed at minimising the spread of disease clearly pigs are highlighted as high risk, or if you look at the matter another way, particularly resilient and likely to shoulder illness for longer unobserved.
All of this will get easier with time and it won't detract from the fun of providing a happy life for our weaners, as we become accustomed to being pig keepers. Next time, more about the pigs favourite topic, food...
The first step was to register our land with the Rural Payments Agency (RPA) to obtain a County Parish Holding (CPH) number. That was actually done some time ago so our neighbour could graze his livestock here. A CPH, for example, 12/345/6789, confers no rights, but aides efficient administration as call centre operators will use it as a means to identify our farm. The first two digits relate to the county we live in, the next three relate to the parish and the last four are unique to to us.
With a CPH we could collect our pigs.
When they arrived the next step was to call Animal Health at Defra and obtain a Herd Number. This is a code, unique to our pigs, that helps to identify the individual animal. It is most obvious on the yellow tag seen on the ear of all livestock over a certain age. Our Herd Number was issued over the phone and associated paperwork should arrive by post this week.
The pigs were collected from a farm outside Thirsk. Each one, still wearing the ear tag applied by the breeder, was identified and its unique code annotated in the livestock movement log for that farm. Then she and I completed the 'Report of a Pig Movement made under the General Licence for the Movement of Pigs (AML2)', a four part form, that details the movement of the livestock from her CPH to ours, including the journey time. The breeder keeps a yellow page, we keep our pink portion for six months and send the top, white, element to North Yorkshire County Council's Trading Standards Animal Health team in Northallerton. Oh, and the fourth part, the blue copy is kept by the transporter, in this case, us.
The process is intended to provide a window to observe the health of animals being transported on an industrial scale around the UK and Europe, hence the journey time aspect and other questions the forms pose relating to vehicle cleanliness.
Easy really; but it's not over. Once the pigs arrive (in fact the same would be said for one pig) a 20 day standstill is triggered. That means no pigs may come or go from the farm. A serious consideration if your livelihood involves buying and selling pigs at market. The standstill rule is six days for cattle, goats and sheep (this effects our neighbour who has cattle grazing here). Aimed at minimising the spread of disease clearly pigs are highlighted as high risk, or if you look at the matter another way, particularly resilient and likely to shoulder illness for longer unobserved.
All of this will get easier with time and it won't detract from the fun of providing a happy life for our weaners, as we become accustomed to being pig keepers. Next time, more about the pigs favourite topic, food...
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