Independence Homestead

This is the second post in our piglets series where we detail how to care for piglets.  Today’s topic: castration!

One tough thing about raising pigs is the meat from males may get boar taint if the male isn’t castrated. There’s mixed information as to whether or not American Guinea Hogs develop boar taint. Even if you are willing to run the risk, some processors won’t process uncastrated males. So we have found it’s worth it to castrate the little guys. This takes scalpels, antiseptic, and mostly a lot of determination. We get our scalpels from Tractor Supply (not the castration kit- just a pack of scalpels). Antiseptic we have in our animal care kit. The determination, well, we muster up enough of it.

Here’s a photo from our latest castration, where you can see the supplies:

Let’s just pretend our castration process is as effortless as in this video:

Our goal is to castrate that well someday! We’ve found when we castrate larger (older) piglets, the only drawback to the method shown in this video is the piglets are heavy, and holding them upside down is tough. Plus a lot of energy is spent suspending them rather than restraining them. For bigger piglets, we lay them on their backs on the ground, cover their heads, front legs, and belly with a towel, kneel on the towel to hold it and the pig down, and then hold the rear legs down with our hands. Oh yeah- castrating is a minimum of a two person job, three is better. Hence the lack of photos of the adventure!

Our recommendation for castration is to watch a few videos, make sure you have all the tools ready, and pick a time where you’re not rushed. The process itself is stressing, so stay calm. The mental challenge of cutting into a piglet and castrating him is half the challenge, really. Be prepared and you’ll do fine!

Read all the posts in our piglets series here.