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By Jan Clatterbuck
Rappahannock News Staff Writer
Six years ago John Kiser traded his Washington, D.C. life to become a Washington, Va. pig farmer.
While in D.C., Kiser owned his own technology search company—Kiser Research Inc.—and had been a “weekender” in Rappahannock for about 30 years. He loved the county so much that six years ago he decided it was time for him to change his lifestyle, and enjoy life doing what he liked.
Kiser sold his company and off he went to the beautiful sights of Meadow Green Farm in Slate Mills, Va.
Over the years he got to know Bryant Lee of Washington, and there is where he bought his first pig—Miss Piggy. She was a true pet and he kept her for at least seven years before what he called “the eucharistic feast of oneness between man and beast.”
He then raised just two pigs for awhile. Last year, he got serious about raising pigs. He decided to go from the pet stage to the small commercials scale with 12 to 14 pigs. This year, he has 65 pigs of various sizes and five sows, he said, to produce real net revenue.
Kiser’s pigs get all the iron they need right from Meadow Green’s rich Rappahannock clay soil. Kiser’s Yorkshire pigs are raised on grass, grubs, fruit deemed unpalatable to fussy humans, fresh Kiser kitchen garbage and according to season, small amounts of antibiotic-free grain and com.
No herbicides or pesticides have touched his pastures for years. The only fertilizer comes from the animals themselves. They have lots of space and therefore a low stress environment. They roam, they dig, they graze. Kiser let his pigs be pigs.
“They don’t get fat fast gorging themselves on antibiotic-laced feed,”he said, “but slowly and naturally on our high protein fescue grass.”
Kiser pigs are not confined. They are raised as close to their natural condition as possible.
The pigs live in a luxurious, historic 19th century barn when it is too cold or hot to be outside. They have shelters available as well.
Kiser said he does not medicate his pigs except in cases of acute illness “which has not yet occurred. We do not ring, castrate, clip their eye teeth or dock their
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