Feeding Pigs Alfalfa. benefits and drawbacks?

first year raising a hog.

We have a Berkshire, her name is Carrie.

Carrie is 3.5 months old. she weighs 60 lbs. we feed her 2x daily, once in morning once in evening. at each feeding she gets 1.5 lbs DuMor Complete hog/sow pellets, 2 lbs "pig mash" that consists of 70% alfalfa (bale) 20% cracked corn and the other 10% is whatever fruit and veggies come from our garden, that are not "perfect" for us to eat.

all of this "pig mash" sits in a 5 gallon bucket with just enough water to cover it. we also toss in the "lees" (leftover yeast and sediment) from my wife's wine brewing, about once a month.

I have researched Alfalfa and pigs quite a lot. I have seen a wide range of answers, but none that convince me they come from experience or scientific research.

she seems to love the mixture. we are raising her for butcher. I have seen several conflicting stories about whether or not alfalfa works for or against weight gain. and if so, what kind of weight gain (fat vs meat)

I read here often, but have now joined. I am interested in "permies" opinion of this.

thanks!

Welcome to Permies!
I know she's for meat, but she's a cutie.
I'm sure there are more experienced people here that can give you some advice. I also found this Permies thread about alfalfa feed which may help.

The feeder pigs always got a straight grains mix of some form.  But we fed the sows a mix that was mostly ground alfalfa with just some grain.  It was done to reduce to reduce cost and also to slow weight gain for the long haul in the breeding sows.  They were still big healthy pigs and seemed to like it for feed as well as the grain.  At the peak we were feeding about 2 grinder mixer loads a day.  If it was grain it was typically about 9600 lbs of ground grain per load.  If it was the hay/grain mix it was about 4000 lbs per load.(about 4400 to 4700 I think but less sure of this number)  I was in 7th grade at the time and when I got home from school I ran 2 mixer loads most days before supper was my chores at that point.  But I since I was a kid without enough interest in the subject I can't say much more.  The pigs always seemed happy and even in cold weather didn't lose weight.  At that point we were farrowing 120 -150 sows and feeding  babies  to market weight.

The hay was chopped up 2 different ways.  1.  Grind the right amount of grain first because hay first sometimes bridged in the grinder mixer and didn't stir right if it was done first.  Then change to the hay screen and slide about 3" or 4" slices of small bales into the grain feed chute till it was in too.  2.  The hay from the loafer stack went into the big tub grinder and was chopped to about 2" stuff.  Left a huge pile of ground hay.  After the grain was in the grinder mixer then the chopped hay was forked from the pile into the grinder.  It never fed good and I hated doing it that way.  Hay screen was about 1" holes in the grinder mixer so it was basically cutting everything in half again from the tub grinder.

All feed we fed the pigs was dry mix.