progress

It is more than 37 years since LeeAnn and I started the hog business on this yard by bringing in three bred gilts in 1977.  Since, through thick and thin, we have not been without hogs here.  Sometimes it was very tough, but in the beginning and for the next twenty years or more, it was at least simple.  Quality boars could be bought next door.  Feed came from the elevator and not only was the corn and soy conventional, oats and barley was available from the elevator's bins if we desired.  Grain prices were pretty stable.

Now boars, usually in the form of semen, must be imported from across the country.  Dread diseases such as PRSS are a constant worry, and there seems to be an endless supply of them due to the way our livestock move globally.  The feed mills do not even carry oats and barley anymore, we must seek it out ourselves.  And worse, they do not sort gmo corn and soybeans from the conventional crops, so that if we want feed clean of these attributes, we must seek it out ourselves and pay a premium for it.

Hogs are harder to breed, due to the fact that the industry has run way over to the ultralean breeding (thank you, livestock show judges) and it is difficult to source non lean breeding stock.  Also impacting fertility, according to some very trustworthy researchers with nerve enough to go up against Monsanto, are the gmo feedstuffs, which cause digestive upset and changes in the uterus and testes.

As we try to work through this maze of difficulties, it is a real comfort to have customers that cheer us on.  Thank you.