This is not an article about the breed. Loads of resources exist on this already:
Instead we just want to explain why we chose this breed of pigs.
2014 - The First Pigs
We started with 3 Berkshire pigs. These were just weaners for fattening, and they produced amazing tasting meat, if a little fatty. We even finished some of these on peaches from the local veg shop and the meat was like nothing we have ever tasted, it was amazing. Its not an economical way to finish pigs but the meat was incredible.
2015-2018 - Experimentation
These are probably our experimental years, we didn't breed any pigs, but we went around trying the growth and temperament of the following:
Berkshires
Tamworths
Gloucester Old Spots
Saddlebacks
Various cross breeds
We settled on the Saddlebacks as they fitted our requirements of great tasting meat/sausage, as well as capable of getting the size for bacon. We found with the other breeds:
Berkshire - Great tasting meat, but very hard to keep the fat content lower. Maybe now we have more experience we would be better at monitoring this?
Tamworths - Males get taint too easy (meat tastes off) and the meat in general was not as good as the Berkshire
Gloucester Old Spots - Just not a great pig to keep in our opinion, not got the meat flavour we were looking for
2018 Onwards - Breeding
With the Saddlebacks as our chosen breed we then embarked on a breeding journey. Why? We wanted to have our own say in how our pigs looked and behaved.
Our key focus areas have always been:
Great temperament - with kids about we need to be sure we don't have any issues with them being around the kids
Good conformation of the breed standard, and for us this means no white feet at the back and a great straight back
Support of rare blood lines within the breed
As of 2024 we have 3 breeding sows, that are Rose and Molly bloodlines. These are some of the rarer one for Saddlebacks, and in particular the Rose line is in need of some serious help. We did our first show in May 2024 and won second for one of our Molly gilts, a really proud moment for our pig breeding journey.
Our love of the Rose line began with Agnes - the original diva of our herd. Now living out retirement at another farm, she was an amazing mum to many many piglets and was a fixture of the farm for years. However we now have her grand daughters and great grand daughters coming through and they are better each time as we work to get them as good as possible, whilst keeping their characteristics of massive shoulders and a cheeky attitude.
Molly lines make amazing mums and we have just had another Molly litter with 11 lovely piglets running around the place.
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