Any other hog people?

I do farrow to finish. Growing up we only finished and
everyone else in the family is dead - I'm left doing it how we
always did it and it has always worked fine for me. Don't claim
to know it all. I had a thought today as I was dealing with
animals.

I had a couple of calves to run through the chute - one to band. When I do anything with caIves I grab the tail and hold it high - it really calms them and they stand still for everything. I wasn't raised to work "with" the animals - if they were a deal you got the hot shot.

I've never known of any calming position or technique with hogs - is there such a thing? I had a piglet that I missed when castrating yesterday so I cut him today. I always have someone hold them upside down against their chest and then I cut them. They still wriggle. With a chicken you hold them upside down and they calm. Every animals has something that works. Like I say, grandpa was more of a "do it by force" kind of person. He loved animals but was very old school. No Temple Grandon for him. Nothing you do will make it fun for the pig, but maybe I'm unaware of something.

Oh, and I cut the pigs no later than a week old. They aren't a huge handful, but when you have a bunch to do it is tiring.

If there's a way to calm a pig, I've never heard of it. Growing up, we always castrated around 25 pounds. Grab 3 or 4 ankles with one hand and lay them on their side with a knee lightly pressing their head into the ground. They don't wiggle much in this position but they sure do squeal! If they get too big to handle like this, gab their hind legs, straddle the body with them facing behind you and squeeze them between your knees. Either way, it takes 2 people-one to hold and one to cut.

The only method that I have ever see or used to castrate hogs is by holding them upside down. We seldom if ever castrated that young though. I think we usually castrated them around a month or two old. Old enough that you could stand at a 3 foot tall gate and hold their hind quarters above the gate while pressing them against the gate with your knees. If they were large enough they could still touch the ground with their front legs and all you had to focus on was the firm pressure to the back. Any smaller you could generally support their weight on your knees. I do not know if it was the hanging upside down or the possible breathing restriction, but outside of a little initial kicking they would calm right down. This has worked for my family for 40+ years.

The earlier you castrate the pigs the better as they heal faster

We always castrated within a day of birth and at the same time cut the teeth and injected their iron shot.

Just hang the pig over a fence by back legs and go to work...we did ours at 2 to 3 weeks

Although we always had the sows in farrowing crates, we always castrated within 24 hours if possible. We castrated, cut teeth, notched ears, and nnalert that first day.
This was on my FIL's farm. He had about 4000 sows so there was usually 5 to 20 or more litters a day so you had to stay on top of it.
I'm a firm believer that there is less stress on the pig the earlier you get it done. Bob

I"m small time (5 sows twice a year). I castrate at 7 days (that"s the goal not always able to get right on that 7th day). I just hold them upside down in one hand, use the thumb to push the testicles up and use their legs to sorta" squeeze beneath themselves. Then use the other hand and a scalpel to do the castrating. They squeel a lot, but don"w wiggle around too much. Iodine them and done, takes longer to catch them than to accomplish the task.

if you castrate when they are small enough holding them upside down works best blood rushes to their head and knocks some fight out of them. as for giving shots in the neck, hold them by the head, with your pointer finger running along their head and folding their ear over their eye. use the rest of your fingers under their snout to hold their head, the squirmy ones usually fight a little but it helps if you put their legs against your chest, lets them know they are not falling and they usually push against you a little bit. for the really squirmy ones squeeze your hand a little, it wont completely block their airway but restrict it enough to make them quit fighting after a few seconds

Our neighbour had a device made to castarate them. It looked something like this, but I think he had a bracket on it so he could mount it on the plywood sides of the farrowing pen.