Ninette area Hutterite Colony wins the Brandon Hog Days pork quality competition

On December 7 and 8 the Brandon Hog Days Committee held its annual provincial exhibition with 140 exhibitors and 1000 additional people, mostly producers at the Keystone Centre. Hog Days is a showcase for the hog industry in Canada. Along with the exhibits Hog Days featured two days of industry expert speakers and a pork quality competition.
The pork quality competition had 30 entries including producers from across Manitoba and Saskatchewan.

The Wellwood Colony of Ninette received the grand champion trophy, the Sprucewood Colony of Brookdale took second place, Boundary Lane Colony of Elkhorn received third, fourth went to Plainview Colony also of Elkhorn and fifth went to the New Haven South Colony of Stonewall.
Carcass competition organizer Ron Bazylo said the quality of the pigs were extremely high this year.
"There was not much difference between the first and last place winners."
While the last four to five years of hard times in the Manitoba hog industry, decimating a once-vibrant industry, the committee is happy with the results of this year's competition and hope for an even more successful competition in the years to come.
The committee thanked the generosity of the pork quality competitors as they make it possible for Hog Days to donate many sides of pork to local charities. The Samaritan House and the Brandon's Women's Shelter received this year's donations in time for the Christmas season.
This year's pork quality competition judge, Dr. Bob McKay told Farmscape.ca the competition showcases the industry's top quality pork and allows producers to see how their breeding stock stacks up against the breeding stock of their peers.
"The very simple aspects are we look at the yield, we look at the index, we look at the weight," said McKay. "Those are the three criteria that are used to evaluate value of carcasses whether you're at Maple Leaf or at the Hylife plant in Neepawa. What we add, meat color, texture, marbling, the quality of the belly and how big the loin is and you have to have that."
He said years ago, the shows only had the index, the yield and these quality measures received only trivial amounts of points and if a producer had a really good yielding carcass, he pretty much had the show wrapped up.
"Now you have to have a good quality carcass. It makes it a whole lot better show in the sense that quality does come out. We're not selling pigs, we're selling pork," said the judge. "The meat has to be lean and nutritious. If it isn't we're not going to sell it abroad. We export the vast majority of what we produce. If we haven't got a quality product people aren't going to buy from us, so quality has to come into the equation. It is that important."
As part of Hog Days in Brandon, the committee also featured the second annual make and bake competition with 140 entries where ladies and men entered in five different categories to complete for prizes.
"The addition of the Best Make and Bake to Brandon Hog Days has added a whole new outlook to the spectators. It has created an entirely new market of spectators to the event," said event organizer Helen Waldner. "The intention of starting this portion of the event was to attract ladies to the event – but it even created some creative competition from the men." •
— By Harry Siemens

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The Wellwood Colony hog people happy after winning the Grand Champion carcass in the 2011 Hog Carcass competition in Brandon, MB
Prize winning carcasses at the Hog Carcass Competition in Brandon.