WHILE the pork industry has come under a lot of pressure from imports and corporatisation over the past 20 years, the McDouall family has stuck with pig production as part of their mixed farming operation in the Horton Valley.
Baden McDouall runs the operation at Upper Horton along with wife Jen, while his father Arthur has just retired.
Baden and Jen’s two sons, Daniel and Will, are also involved in the operation, although Daniel is currently studying agribusiness at the University of New England and Will is in his final year of high school.
Pork is one facet of the McDouall’s enterprise which also includes cattle finishing and cropping across the operation’s 1300 hectares.
The McDoualls have about 180 sows in their operation and turn off 3500 to 3600 pigs each year.
Mr McDouall said one reason they had stuck with pork production was that it was linked into the other enterprises in the operation.
“We use the effluent from the pigs for fertiliser, and as a result we have no need to use phosphate fertilisers,” he said.
“We’re also able to use the grain produced in the operation for the ration for the pigs.”
While the effluent is currently spread in liquid form, Mr McDouall said they were moving to composting it and spreading that.
“Being able to compost it will reduce our water use, and also give us the benefit of being able to use it on our other property as well,” he said.
The McDoualls have also installed a 30 kilowatt solar power system, meaning the operation is self-sufficient for electricity.
Mr McDouall said they didn’t use gestation stalls and all sows were group housed, except for a four-week period while they were lactating and until the piglets were weaned.
The piglets were weaned at about four weeks of age, and Mr McDouall said they were usually turned off at about 20 weeks of age, with a carcase weight of about 75 kilograms.
The McDoualls supply the majority of their animals to the Bangalow Sweet Pork label, which Mr McDouall said was served in some of the top restaurants from Townsville in North Queensland down to Sydney.
The McDoualls have started their own brand, Horton Valley Premium Pork, and are looking to supply butcheries in North West NSW.
While they have only just started with the brand, Mr McDouall said they are currently supplying four butcheries in the North West, and they hope to expand.
“We’re aiming to get one butcher in each town in North West NSW to stock our pork,” he said.
“Eventually we’d like to try to take it direct to the customer.”
The family was in the process of building Ecoshelters on another property and developing a line of free-range pork.
“We started as a free-range operation and then moved to an indoor system because the pigs did better indoors,” Mr McDouall said.
“But now there’s a portion of the market that wants and is prepared to pay for free-range pork, so we’ll give it a go and see how it goes.”
Mr McDouall said they would look to purchase pigs from other free-range producers to finish, rather than trying to breed their own free-range pigs.
The breeds used in the operation were mostly Large White and Duroc, while there was also a small amount of Landrace genetics.
The operation bred its own first-cross females from a group of “grandparent” sows, using PIC bloodlines, which make up about 15 per cent of total sow numbers.
These first-cross females are then joined to terminal sires, with a combination of both AI and natural mating used in the operation.
Mr McDouall said they transported their pigs to Frederickton, near Kempsey, to be processed.
