
China’s Breeding Giant Pigs That Are as Heavy as Polar Bears - jelliclesfarm
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-10-06/china-is-breeding-giant-pigs-the-size-of-polar-bears
======
Merrill
>Big Bill, the largest hog ever recorded at 2,552 lb (1,157 kg), was a Poland
China. Poland Chinas rank highest in U.S. pork production in pounds of hog per
sow per year.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poland_China](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poland_China)

However, "Poland China" has nothing to do with China, and it is a US breed
originating in Ohio.

Hogs grow quite large. Due to the shortage and the rising prices, farmers are
letting their hogs grow larger, rather than marketing them at the usual
weights. The meat may be a little fattier and not as tender in the older
animal, although Chinese cusine may not care about that. But it's not like
they are genetically engineering giant mutant pigs.

~~~
technotony
> it's not like they are genetically engineering giant mutant pigs.

No but they've gene edited pet dwarf pigs: [https://www.nature.com/news/gene-
edited-micropigs-to-be-sold...](https://www.nature.com/news/gene-edited-
micropigs-to-be-sold-as-pets-at-chinese-institute-1.18448)

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jjcm
Are they more efficient though? Right now the average seems to be 4kg of grain
per kg of pork[1]; if these large pigs require 5kg per 1kg of pork, then does
them being bigger create any benefits in a shortage? Another question is
growth rate - how fast are they growing? Someone correct me if I'm wrong here,
but their end size seems to be one of the less important factors in the mix
when it comes to efficient pork production.

[1] [https://www.theguardian.com/business/2012/sep/02/era-of-
chea...](https://www.theguardian.com/business/2012/sep/02/era-of-cheap-food-
over)

~~~
erudition
Your intuition is spot-on. Feed conversion efficiency drives profitability in
the pork industry. The average live weight of US hogs at market is right
around 280 lbs., not because the animals can't get larger than that, but
because growing them beyond that size cuts into profits as efficiency drops.

I think pigs-as-big-as-polar-bears was just an opening hook to draw in
eyeballs that would otherwise have skipped over yet another headline about
African Swine Fever (ASF), which is covered in the second half of the article.
ASF is the real meat of this story (pun intended, sorry) and the most
significant factor currently impacting Asian pork production.

~~~
drewmol
>The average live weight of US hogs at market is right around 280 lbs., not
because the animals can't get larger than that, but because growing them
beyond that size cuts

For reader reference a full grown sow can weigh 500+ lbs, a full grown hog can
weigh 1000+ lbs and live 20+ years (~900M heartbeats). Livestock pigs reach
market weight in 6-7 months.

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axaxs
Not an overly helpful comment, but this is loosely the premise behind the
movie 'Okja' on Netflix. It was an interesting idea and made you see both
sides. Weird it seems to be coming true.

~~~
ethbro
True story: I stopped eating pork after watching Okja and reading up on pig
intelligence.

That final scene... oof. ( _bawl_ )

~~~
pnutjam
I heard this joke when I was young and never really got it until I was older.
\---------------

A TV reporter became lost on the back roads and stopped at a farm to get
directions. As he was talking to the farmer he noticed a pig with a wooden
leg. “This could be a great story for the Six O’Clock News. How did that pig
lose his leg?” he asked the farmer. “Well”, said the farmer, “that’s a very
special pig. One night not too long ago we had a fire start in the barn, and
that pig squealed so loud and long that he woke everyone, and by the time we
got there he had herded all the other animals out of the barn. Saved them
all.”

“And that was when he hurt his leg?” asked the journalist anxious for a story.
“Nope, he pulled through that just fine.” said the farmer. “Though a while
later, I was back in the woods when a bear attacked me. Well, sir, that pig
was nearby and he came running and rammed that bear from behind and then
chased him off. He saved me for sure.”

“Wow! So the bear injured his leg then?” questioned the reporter. “No. He came
away without a scratch. Though a few days later, my tractor turned over in a
ditch and I was knocked unconscious. Well, that pig dove into the ditch and
pulled me out before I got cut up in the machinery.” “Ahh! So his leg got
caught under the tactor?” asked the journalist. “Noooo. We both walked away
from that one.” says the farmer.

“So how did he get the wooden leg?” asked the journalist. “Well”, the farmer
replied, “A pig like that, you don't eat all at once”!

~~~
dunstad
How awful. Imagine if the subject of this was a dog instead, it would anger so
many people.

~~~
tempestn
Indeed, that's kind of the point.

~~~
Judgmentality
Social mores are part of being human. We're full of all sorts of contradictory
beliefs and principles. Trying to reconcile all of them will quickly make you
a crazy hermit.

On the topics of pigs, dogs, and pets; most people don't realize how
intelligent and affectionate cows are. Dairy farmers often love their cows
more than their dogs. And the farmers that have dairy cows and other cows have
this mental barrier where one group is food and the other is family. I bet
most people that have eaten a hamburger have never pet a cow.

This is not some meat-is-murder tirade - I'm not even vegetarian. It's just
neat to think about the assumptions that construct our worldview.

~~~
rjf72
> I bet most people that have eaten a hamburger have never pet a cow.

Given that most Americans have definitely never pet a cow, and I'd go as far
as to propose most have probably never even seen a cow in person, that's
probably a very safe wager. But what percent of people that _have_ pet a cow,
would you wager also do eat beef?

~~~
pbhjpbhj
Per your last sentence, I'd have thought vegetarianism would be much higher
amongst city dwellers.

~~~
dpark
I’ve read that vegetarianism is _far_ less common among people who grew up
on/around farms. The claimed reason was that people who grew up away from
farms are heavily influenced by movies and television that anthropomorphize
animals. People who grew up near farms don’t equate animals with humans so
much.

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latchkey
I've traveled extensively, by motorbike, in the northern vietnam region
bordering southern china. I started in the south of vietnam, which has pigs,
dogs, cats, buffalo, chickens, ducks and everything else you can imagine just
running around wild.

At some point as you travel north, you stop seeing pigs by the side of the
road. You start to cross checkpoints where they spray your tires and places
where they've put chemical (disinfectant) soaked hay on the roads that you're
expected to drive over. You see signs everywhere warning people to spray
things down.

The swine flu is real.

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4ntonius8lock
Such a strange article.

It has two facts:

1- There is a shortage of pork due to recent outbreaks

2- Large pigs have been breed in China.

The article then seems to insinuate that 2 is due to 1. But the article offers
no stats or even any evidence that there is a causal effect.

Worse, the article seems to imply large pigs are a Chinese thing, when America
holds the record for large hogs. Mostly large pigs are bread as male breeding
pigs and to compete in local events (as therefore as part of a pig breeders
boasting status). As far as I'm concerned, large pigs are not breed so much
for consumption (though they will be consumed eventually)

Just very odd. Absolutely no journalism in that article. It just mentions two
facts and draws fuzzy conclusions from it filled with innuendo. I'm not sure
Bloomberg was ever a very quality source (as say the Washington Post or NYT),
but I'm quite surprised at the trash rag style they are putting out lately. I
also wonder why it's making the front page of /.

~~~
wyxuan
I think you are just slandering Bloomberg. The Chinese are growing pigs to
become bigger because they are in need of pork, in sacrifice of taste.
America’s record pigs are just for that, to get a record.

~~~
4ntonius8lock
I looked it up.

China's pigs average of 110 kilos. The only stat mentioned in the 'news' piece
(other than things like 'up to') is producers wanting to 'increase size by at
least 14%'.

Average pig weight in america at slaughter is 127 kilos.

The giant pig from the image is likely a competition pig, just like in
America. As far as I know, it's not economically effective to raise pigs past
a certain point if it's for meat production.

See how you were jumping to conclusions and even inserting things that were
never mentioned 'in sacrifice of taste'? That's what I meant in my critique
and why I called the style 'trash rag'. News pieces like this are filled with
innuendo and are intentionally kept nice and broad so each person can read
into it whatever they want.

Reminds me of the song:

We can do "The Innuendo"

We can dance and sing

When it's said and done we haven't told you a thing

We all know that Kraft is king

------
bayesian_horse
Size doesn't matter that much. Food-to-Meat conversion and the time to market
normally matter more, in terms of profitability.

Also, the bigger the pigs get, the worse their health will be. Unhealthy pigs
don't survive to market, convert their food less efficiently, get rejected at
the slaughter house or their meat suffers in quality.

Next problem: You want similarly sized pigs for efficient slaughtering. Those
"polar bears" won't fit into a standard line. But I guess China isn't that far
into their agricultural industrialization yet. They are apparently also
playing catch up in terms of food security and management of animal diseases.

The last two points are hampered by the general lack of transparency.

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colordrops
Kind of an odd comparison considering most people don't have an intuitive
understanding of the size of a polar bear.

~~~
capsulecorp
Totally agree, they should have measured it in golden retriever units. This
giant China pig = 15.74 golden retrievers! /s

~~~
linksnapzz
Unclear what could et more stale dinner rolls and discarded bakery pizza, a
single scalar 1100lb megapig or a massively parallel array of sixteen hungry
goldens.

The golden retrievers would eat it faster though; my impression is that pigs
tend to chew and take their time....

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JeanMarcS
Okja ?

[https://m.imdb.com/title/tt3967856/](https://m.imdb.com/title/tt3967856/)

------
fouc
The meat-eating utilitarian vegetarian tries to pick meat from larger animals
over smaller animals. Since you get more meat per unit of pain inflicted.

So Beef > Pork > Chicken. But if pigs can be bred to be as big as cows that
helps a lot!

~~~
throwaway07Ju19
As someone who accidentally killed a small bull while working on a free range
ranch, I can tell you that cows are surprisingly sentient and sensitive. The
dead yearling's mother-cow howl-moo'ed the rest of the day and into the late
evening. Her moos of agony still haunt me.

I defy you to find 1 chicken in 1000 that is capable of suffering this at this
level.

~~~
wil421
If it was chickens they’d be doing the killing instead of you. They don’t call
it pecking order for a reason.

~~~
mr_toad
If there were one ton chickens running around they’d probably be killing us.
They’re not that far removed from their ancestors.

~~~
yesenadam
There were half-ton "chickens" in Australia 5 million years ago. 10 feet tall!

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dromornis_stirtoni](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dromornis_stirtoni)

Or the even heavier Elephant birds in Madagascar until 800 years ago.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elephant_bird](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elephant_bird)

------
thrower123
Most of the people that I've ever known who grew pigs only kept them for a
year. The sow would have a litter in the spring, they feed up the piglets all
summer, then slaughter them before winter. Pigs are pretty easy and efficient
sources of protein grown like that - on a family-scale farm you have plenty of
excess produce and food waste anyway.

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murat124
Isn't the availability of water resources a great concern for polar bear size
pigs? Pigs are known for their high water needs and I imagine XXXL pig would
even need more.

~~~
blakesterz
Good question. I wonder how that scales? Do 3 100 pound pigs need more or less
than a single 300 pound pig? What about food as well? Maybe even waste, is
there less or more or the same coming out?

~~~
throwaway07Ju19
What about from an ethics standpoint ? Is there less _suffering_ when you
compare a single 300 pound factory farmed pig to 3 100 pound pigs ?

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pugworthy
Warning - auto-play videos abound

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anonthrowaway28
1\. Pollution of air, water, and soil (feces-spraying ponds)

2\. Antibiotic resistance in humans because of overuse in pigs (it doesn't
have to be the same medication, only the same/similar pathway mechanism)

3\. Pandemics (zillions of pigs kept in close proximity to each other and
humans)

4\. Climate change (2nd or 3rd most anthropogenic source)

5\. Some other hippie reasons

6\. More expensive than plant-based food

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russdill
More relevant than ever. Some More News on Feral Hogs coming for your
children:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9MTMCo8JbQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9MTMCo8JbQ)

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sAbakumoff
Griffins already did it
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEo0wnKoixo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KEo0wnKoixo)

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wvlia5
Okja

