Hereford

R. U. Weber of LaPlata, Missouri was the first to breed for the pattern, and from about 1902 to 1925 farmers in Nebraska and Iowa, John Schulte of Norway, Iowa among them, worked the type up together. In 1934 a selection of the hundred best animals from five herds became the foundation stock, and the National Hereford Hog Record Association formed the same year, drawing 450 members in its first decade, mostly in Illinois, Iowa and Indiana.

Numbers fell hard in the 1960s as commercial production moved to three-way crosses that had no use for a purebred with a paint job. The breed became popular with youth livestock programs because of the markings and the temperament, and that is much of what carried it.

The color is the standard: deep red covering at least two thirds of the body, with a white face, two or more white feet, and pale ears and underline. The ears are lop and hang forward over the face, the frame is medium, and the Conservancy puts boars at 800 pounds and sows at 600. Market hogs reach 200 to 250 pounds in five to six months.

Docile, rated for beginners. Sows are prolific and attentive mothers with large litters, and the breed suits both extensive and intensive management.

Meat: bacon, loin, chops, roasts, ham and sausage. They graze and forage well and mature early, which suited the farm-scale production they were built for, and the markings still earn their keep in the show ring.

Ordinary hog-keeping, with one exception the color dictates: the white skin of the face and legs sunburns, so pigs on pasture need shade or a wallow.

The Hereford graduated from The Livestock Conservancy's Conservation Priority List in 2024, and the climb was recent: fewer than 2,000 breeding animals in 2013, a move from watch to recovering in 2022, then graduation. Graduated is not the same as common; the population is still small next to any commercial breed.

Ask for the registration. The National Hereford Hog Association, now administered through Certified Pedigreed Swine, keeps the book, and because the color pattern is the breed, the papers are what separate a Hereford from a red pig with a white face.

The trade is that the industry moved past them. Hereford pigs are moderate in growth and leanness by commercial standards and numbers are small, so the market is shows, direct sales and breed conservation rather than the commodity barn.

Recent sale prices on HoofnHorn, where there are any, are further down this page.