The best way to weigh a pig is with a crated digital scale but they are expensive and beginner farmers can’t afford them. Many pig farmers has asked me how do we weigh our live pigs as we do not have a livestock scale. (Well we do but it is not suitable for pigs and the max weight is only 350kg.) There is a way and if your pigs are tame it would be a fast simple proses. Lets look at how to How to weigh a pig without a scale by only using a rope.
You will need 3 basic items to weigh a live pig.
- A soft measuring tape or rope that you can measure afterwards
- Food (for distraction)
- Calculator
First step in weighing your Pig
Distraction
Give you pig some food. Try and make it a treat like some sweet smelling fruit or eggs that will keep them busy for at least a couple of minutes. Usually your pig will stand sill and feast away on the food or treats that you have placed in front of him and giving you an opportunity to weigh them.
Start to measure the pig
While the pig is eating this is your one and only change to measure the pig. Make sure that you get then numbers right the first time so that you do not have to go back and measure again. If you fail to do it the first time, you would likely have to come back tomorrow to have another attempt.
How to calculate weighing a pig with a rope
- Get the length of the pig from behind the head to the beginning of the tail
- Now measure the Heart Girth and get the Girth Squared total
- Multiply Squared Girth with the length of the pig
Example:
Measure the heart girth and the length of the pig.
Lets say the girth is 1.2 and the length is 1.05 meters.
You need to square the heart girth of the pig.
To get the girth square you multiply 1.2 x 1.2 and this will give you a girth square of 1.44.
Multiply the Girth squared (1.44 meters or 144 cm) with the length of the pig (1.05 meters or 105 cm).
The total will be 1.512
The final step is to take the total of 1.512 and multiply it by 69.3
So in this case the pig would weigh 104.78kg.
We have tested this with many pigs and after deducting the estimated yield average was about 2kg up or down.
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What is69.3 represent
I don’t know the significance of the 69.3 ratio. This is just the way that I was taught. If anyone can help with this question it would be appreciated.
My files also use arround neck and back of earline to base of tail times the two meassurements and devide answer with 13 ,12 or 11 whether the pig is lean medium or fat.
I’m interested in joining the pig farming but i don’t have the guidelines
You are at the right place
I like pig farming but if l can get guidelines my dream can become true,l like it .