I posted this article on MSNBC Newsvine recently in a discussion about McDonald's announcement it had decided against using meat from unethical pig farms
The Chief, I am confused. Earlier in your post you you mentioned free range sows can accidentally lay on their piglets, that stronger sows will bite or bully weaker sows, or that free range pigs fight over food.
Did you or your father provide adequate food for your animals?
You sound like you and/or your father followed a strict regime for your ..okay..sows. Do you mean if a sow is slow to consume her food or is slow to react when food is supplied, she will have to go hungry as the food is quickly gone? Do you mean a sow has to go hungry because she's small and weak, as the food is supplied only in one container?
The solution to your problems is to provide enough food for your pigs, and provided in many containers so that they don't have to fight to stay alive.
I too came from a pig-rearing family. My father had up to a hundred at a time and he never caged his pigs or sows.
Pigs are always hungry and fast eater. Yes, occasionally I observed some smaller pigs got chased away by bigger pigs during meals, but nothing serious. The chased-away-pigs could and did rejoin the group to continue eating, as my father was not stingy with food for his animals.
As for the sows smothering its piglets, I also don't agree. The piglets had less, much less, a chance of being layed on by their mothers in the open than in the stalls, though the piglets can move about through the gaps at the bottom as you said. And the chances of mothers not recognising its young in the open is very rare.