What Are Gloucestershire Old Spots?

Although if old paintings are to be trusted, there have been spotted pigs around for two or three centuries, the Gloucestershire Old Spots have only had pedigree status since the early 20th century.

They were very popular in the Berkeley Vale of Gloucestershire, England, where they were known as the Orchard Pig. They grazed in the apple orchards, clearing up fallen fruit. They lived outside throughout the year being tough and hardy although also quiet and easily handled. These qualities are prominent today.

By the way, for those of us who aren’t British it’s pronounced “glostersheer”…

Pork and Management Characteristics

The Gloucestershire Old Spot is a meaty animal with a broad and deep body and large hams. It’s bacon is half meat making it incredibly tasty. And the marbling; oh, the marbling! A GOS pork chop looks more like a beef ribeye! GOS pork is red colored just like beef and marbled; the marbling keeps the meat from drying out during cooking and adds taste as the fat renders. Like our Large Blacks, and unlike the pork you buy in your food store, Old Spot pork just never dries out! The skin also makes incredible crackling! Older folks describe GOS pork as tasting like it did when they were kids; like it did in the “old country”.

GOS are ideally suited to an outdoor, pasture based system. Provided they have a warm and comfortable hut they will thrive outside all the year around. Except on the coldest of days, our pigs sleep together in hay or in the forest. We provide huts which they use when they do need to get out of the cold. They can also endure the hottest of days as long as they have a wallow or sprinkler in which to cool off. They do have white skin and do sunburn so it is important to provide some type of shelter from the sun.

For most of the year our Old Spots get no supplemental feed. They effectively use the grass, forbs and browse available on the pasture and forest as their sole diet. The only times we give them supplemental feed is when the sows have farrowed or during the winter when green forage is not available. This ability to live naturally on vegetation makes them very inexpensive to keep and gives their pork a delicious, natural taste.

GOS Breeding Structure

The Gloucestershire Old Spot is a very rare pig and in the past has been subject to inbreeding that has caused problems. With a rare breed, it is critically important that we save as much of the diverse genetic material as we can. The way that we try and do that is to avoid inbreeding and linebreeding. For the Old Spots, we use a system that categorizes each pig by bloodline and color group. To minimize inbreeding, we breed a sow from one color with a boar from another particular color group. This can get confusing, so here is a link to a guide on how this works.

As you learn more about this, keep in mind that here at Homegrown Acres we have the Red, Blue and Green groups. We can provide breeding pairs from these color groups.