Approximate Hog Weight...making it easy for you.

Folks often guess the weight of a hog. Some are pretty close, some are grossly in error and others purposely embellish.

Keep a cloth tape with you and take a Heart Girth Measurement for an estimated weight that is almost certain to be more accurate than your best guess. Place the tape just behind the front legs, snug it up and read the measurement.

Put this formula in your phone (for easy reference) or just snap a pic of the corresponding weights I have provided here and refer to that. In time....you will develop a reasonably good 'eye' for judging weights and you might be surprised to find out how many of the 300 lbs. hogs you've killed... were really 180-200 lbs.

Hope this helps.

180....wag....

No, this Sow was actually pretty fat/heavy. Nothing in the first pic to offer any scale.

Here is the tape measurement and the following pic of that Sow ‘hanging’.

You might be able to see my rifle leaning up against the tree.

Simple...

Heart girth __ inches times 10 minus 200.

My measurements always range in the 50 - 60 inch range...

Hah, no need for a tape then!

You can just 'reach' around them and verify an approximate weight.

Guess I am buying a tape today on way home.

Cut off the first 20" of tape again? Its the only way to be sure.

DNS always brings that tape that measures short...




Shhh...

I may try to remember that. I've just been going with 30 inches = 100 Lbs, each additional inch adds ten pounds.
It amounts the the same thing, just a matter of what's easier to remember. The math isn't difficult either way.

Thanks for sharing this. Guess I will have to start carrying around a tape measure now.

Thanks Flint, we'll check that out on the next few and report results.

On most hogs...most places, it is surprisingly accurate. When I first started using the method (probably 10 years ago) I made it a point to weigh the hogs and compare. I stopped weighing after a couple dozen...because the tape method was pretty darn close.

I'm sure my scale isn't 100% accurate, but the figures were plenty close enough.

Naturally, there will be places where hogs have better habitat than others so some variance is to be expected.

Also, pregnant Sows will weigh more than the tape suggests, since they are 'heavy' aft of the area (heart girth) to be measured.

Boars with especially long hair (particularly if caked with mud) will come in a bit under what the tape suggests...because you can't pull the tape tight enough to the hide.

Still, it serves me well for most hogs.

Thanks, like guessing fish weight I always try to guess light, now I will use this formula.

My vote for a sticky thread at the top.

So that one weighed 280?

No.

That tape is not pulled tight as you would do by hand. I was trying to photograph the 'procedure' and used a spring clip to hold the tape in place while I got a picture.

I am sure the tape would have measured a good 2" less if held by hand. I recall that particular Sow was a large one (even for where I live). Something between 250-260 lbs would be about right.

Mature (older) Sows around here can easily exceed 200 lbs.

I will take better pics of the next big one I kill. You really need something of known scale in the picture to get a good idea. And I'm NOT talking about someone posing 8' behind the animal causing 'forced perspective' but something of known size in the same focal plane.

We have big hogs in Deep East Texas.

Even the Sows can get pretty chunky.

http://extension.oregonstate.edu/coos/sites/default/files/howtocalculatepigwtusingmeasuringtape.pdf
http://www.thepigsite.com/articles/541/weighing-a-pig-without-a-scale/

reminds me of the hog i messured with the 20" girth...
put the tape down & before could do the equation, the hog disapeared...

Ya'll take the fun out of guessing...