You will not find heritage breeds being raised at the big hog farms but you do find a bunch of little guys with under ten sows raising them for the gourmet market and game ranches.
The guys who are just getting by and doing it for the love farming.
They also gutted the "right to farm" act so it does not apply to the little guys. Only the medium to large farms.
Not to toot our own horns but we are the ones keeping the rarer breeds of animals and plants alive. The Bradford Watermelon, the Ivan Tomato, The Kerry cow, American ginseng, American Guinea Hog, even the American Chestnut all us. The big guys may feed the world but we keep the gene pool alive and healthy so they have something to draw from.
It would be nice if they would leave us alone to do what we love.
The change in swine genetics has been troubling.
My Dad had a good “Farmer’s Hybrid” line that he was selling to the big boys. They looked like good solid hogs.
The hogs today look short, over muscled, and way to lean. We let ours run outside 12 months a year (With shelters). The new lines would die of exposure. They yield great, but to be honest the taste is to bland for me.
The genetics are way to narrow, way to much in common. My late grandfather always warned us about getting the lines to close. Seems like the big boys have forgotten basic animal husbandry. And it will bite them.