I have very much enjoyed my first few months as Chairman of the Club and was happy and proud to be part of the team from the BPA promoting British Pigs at World Pork Expo in Des Moines, USA in June. Prior to the trip a whole new set of posters were designed for the Traditional breeds, and these all went down well in the States. The Berkshire one was particularly admired and now has been reproduced in a smaller size for Sharon to sell at the shows. (Hopefully we can reproduce it in the newsletter at some point and perhaps sell it by mail order to raise further funds for the club.)

The Berkshire pigs at the World Pork Expo were there in large numbers for Show and Sale. The classes were for pigs born on or after 1st October 05 and I found the pigs at the show much different from the American Berkshires I remembered from visits in the early 80*s. These now looked much like many other American pig breeds - with massive bone and highly muscled, and tail set low. Many of the underlines struck me as uneven, with variation in size and spacing of the teats. The colour markings varied greatly - from all black to large patches of white on some pigs. I spoke briefly with the judge who was judging the breed for the first time. He did not see markings as a priority but said he would take some account of them if judging two pigs that in other respects were of equal merit.

In the sale the top price paid was $9,500 for the Grand Champion, with the reserve Champion making $5,750. A lot of the remaining pigs made around $475 and a large number were unsold.

It was interesting however that several of the visitors on the stand said that these "show* Berkshires were not necessarily representative of all American Berkshires. One breeder, who supplies a restaurant in San Francisco, claimed his herd were much more like the traditional English type and indeed some of the Berkshires we saw on a visit to Dr Hofman's herd were less extreme. (See pictures elsewhere in newsletter).

Since we were in Des Moines Al Conover has been here to look at the British Berkshires and to investigate setting up a nucleus herd of them in the States. We need to follow this up and try to get him to come back around March or April to look at as many January litters as possible. I strongly believe that our Berkshires have a lot to contribute as I understand from Al that their sows usually farrow 10 at most and rear only 7 pigs.

At our ASM earlier this year Nell O*Conor suggested we should hold a Berkshire boar exhibition displaying all 7 boar lines and the history of each line. This was achieved at the Great Yorkshire show last week with 5 of the lines entered in the classes and the other two brought to the show.

A big vote of thanks goes to our Club Secretary, Sharon, for ensuring that all lines were at the show and for bringing the extra two not entered in the show. A special poster showing boars from all the lines was done for the show and I am very grateful to all the breeders who helped me with pictures for that. Thanks are also due to Vaughan Byrne and Marcus Bates who provided information for the history of each of the boar lines. Our Vice Chairman Dave Shaw liased with the Yorkshire show, who this year were almost oversubscribed with pig entries. It was great to see so many Berkshires entered for Brian Eeles to judge, and all in all it was a very enjoyable show. Congratulations to Dave 4 Maureen Shaw for going on to qualify their Female Champion Berkshire gilt at the show for the Pig of the Year Final, and to Jo 4 Hector Wykes-Sneyd for success with their Berkshire Januarys who were 2nd in the Interbreed Traditional pairs with the Shaw's in 3rd place, out of a large class won by Club member Bryan Merry's Middle Whites. Jo & Hector were also runner up in the Male section of the Young Pig Interbreed Competition at which the overall winner received the new John Mason Memorial Trophy, presented on this occasion by Prince Charles.

Before the start of judging all exhibitors gathered in the ring to pay their respects to our late Chairman, John Mason. It was an impressive and moving occasion.

On the Tuesday evening we all got together over a glass of wine or beer to hear our former President and now Hon. life member,Vaughan Byrne, expand on the history of the boar lines and to tell us a great deal of the origins of the female lines. I was pleased that Ron Fieldhouse was able to join us and he made several contributions to the breedline history trail. It was a most interesting evening and Vaughan and I hope to get more of this down on paper for the next news letter and website. I would also like to think that in due course we can find some old photographs to go with this information. If you can help over any archive material please contact Vaughan-his new email address is: vkbvrne@googlemail.com.

I look forward very much to seeing Berkshire members at Hatfield. Please come and find me in the Sheep section or Children's Farm and Pet area as these are my main responsibilities at this show. I also look forward to seeing as many of you as possible at Newbury show where Chris Penrice will be judging our Champion of Champions.

Finally Christine Coe and I will be representing the Berkshire Breed at the BPA. If you have any concerns that we should raise please get in touch with one of us.


Viki Mills, Chairman.

You can contact Viki at Gillhouse Farm, Zeal Monachorum, Crediton, Devon, EX17 6LE, by e-mail using victoria.mchugh@virgin.net or by telephone on 01363 82465 or 07843 301903.