Bentheimer country pig

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Bentheimer country pig in the Nuremberg zoo

The Bunte Bentheimer Schwein (or Bentheimer Landschwein ) is a breed of pig from the Grafschaft Bentheim and the Emsland . The colorful Bentheim pig is threatened with extinction. Nowadays this breed is gaining increasing importance because, in contrast to the highly bred pigs, it is characterized by better meat quality . The proportion of bacon is relatively high, the meat itself has a high intramuscular fat content , which has a positive effect on the sensory qualities of the meat (taste, appearance, frying properties). The colorful Bentheim pig has larger black spots all over its body, is precocious and fertile.

The story of the colorful Bentheim pig

Beginnings

Bentheimer sow cutting the piglets Bentheim piglets under a red light lamp
Bentheimer sow cutting the piglets
Bentheim piglets under a red light lamp

The story of the colorful Bentheim pigs begins in the middle of the 19th century. At that time in Germany the women farmers were responsible for keeping pigs on the farms . In addition to the predominant white country pig breeds, the keeping of colored and piebald breeds was popular with them. The Bunte Bentheim pig was a fertile, frugal, stress-resistant and undemanding pig breed with good maternal characteristics. The piglets were easy to sell on the markets because of the good meat quality - and not least because of the spotting.

Original breeds

In northern Germany at that time people were obviously no longer satisfied with the performance of the current domestic pigs and around 1840 they began to cross lofts into the so-called march pig, a variant of the European country pig. These included Berkshire boars and Cornwall pigs from England. Today's Lower Saxony counties Grafschaft Bentheim , Emsland and Cloppenburg as well as the Westphalian Wettringen can be seen as places of origin. The colored piglets with floppy ears that fell from the above-mentioned crosses were used for breeding. Very occasionally piglets with a yellow-reddish color with black spots appear in litters. A precise explanation has not yet been found for this. It is believed that temporary crossbreeding of Tamworth pigs or unwanted covering by wild boar boars are responsible for this.

Heyday

The colorful Bentheim pigs were married in the 1950s. As easy and cheap to keep and extremely fertile animals, they provided meat of excellent quality, which was also in great demand after the difficult times of war. The breed was officially listed in a nationwide herd book .

Decline

With the appearance of the economic miracle in Germany, consumer habits changed. Low-fat meat was now in demand, which the Bunter Bentheimers could not supply due to the “unfavorable” meat-fat ratio (compared to the proportion in today's pork). Pig breeding also changed - a few “commercial races” took the place of earlier, regionally adapted races. The herd book was closed and the number of breeders of the Bunted Bentheimer pig decreased drastically. Ultimately, only the breeder Gerhard Schulte-Bernd from Isterberg in the county of Bentheim stuck to the Swatbunten attitude and over the years tried to convince authorities and farmers of a coordinated further breeding and marketing. In the 1990s he kept practically the entire remaining stock of the Bentheimer pigs. With only around 100 breeding animals left in Germany, this breed was highly threatened with extinction. Schulte-Bernd's tenacity, the return to strengthening regional culture and thus animal husbandry (preservation of important genetic resources) are now leading to a new bloom for this old breed of domestic animal.

In 1995 the Bentheimer Landschwein was declared “ Endangered Livestock Breed of the Year ” by the Society for the Preservation of Old and Endangered Domestic Animal Breeds (GEH) .

future

With the founding of the Association for the Preservation of the Bunted Bentheim Pig, the development of a nationwide herd book with the recording of all remaining stocks in Germany, the development of a coordinated breeding program and a modern marketing strategy, the future of this pig breed worth preserving should be given a long-term perspective.

Association for the Preservation of the Colorful Bentheim Pig e. V.

Bentheimer Landschwein (in the museum village of Cloppenburg )

The history of the “Association for the Preservation of the Bentheimer Pig e. V. “is still young. On March 1, 2003, the founding meeting took place in the Nordhorn Zoo . Owners, breeders, lovers and friends of the colorful Bentheim pig met to determine the future areas of responsibility and activities of the association:

  • Development of a nationwide herd book
  • Recording of all animals kept in Germany
  • Support and advice for breeders and those interested in breeding
  • Creation of a breeding program
  • Development of a marketing program
  • Application for funding and grants
  • PR and public relations work for the Bentheim pig

The establishment of a nationwide herd book was a great success. The breeding population has noticeably recovered from 50 (2003) to 572 stock animals (2008). In 2008, 88 herdbook farms were registered in 13 federal states. There have recently been more breeders in the Netherlands and Luxembourg.

Usage today

As interest in the breed began to flourish, the colorful Bentheimer is now increasingly used again in food production and gastronomy. In August 2014 there were again 410 herd-book sows and 90 boars in Germany. A large foreign population of 400 sows exists in the Netherlands. This is also promoted by the general trend towards "slow food", as the inclusion of the Bunter Bentheimer in the "Ark of Taste" shows. The meat of the Bunter Bentheimer is also used in the scene and upscale gastronomy, as well as for the production of premium foods such as B. the Westphalian bone ham , the Ahlen sausage and other sausage and ham specialties.

literature

  • Tobias Böckermann : The colorful Bentheim pig. History and future of an old livestock breed. Verlag der Emsländische Landschaft e. V. (Sögel) 2014, ISBN 978-3-925034-49-7 .
  • Ralf Deckers, Gerd Heinemann: Recognizing trends - shaping the future. From future knowledge to market success. BusinessVillage, 2008, ISBN 978-3-938358-78-8 .
  • Anja Kastner, Karl-Heinz Waldmann, Waldemar Ternes: Influence of acorn feeding on the aroma of air-dried raw ham and raw sausages. In: Fleischwirtschaft issue 03/2008, pp. 105–109.
  • Cora Kolk called Sundag, Joern Wrede, Ottmar Distl: Analysis of the population structure of the Bentheimer pig. In: Archiv für Tierzucht 2006, pp. 447–461; available at: http://www.archanimbreed.com/pdf/2006/at06p447.pdf (accessed on August 11, 2010).
  • Louis Ollivier et al .: An assessment of European pig diversity using molecular markers: Partitioning of diversity among breeds. In: Conservation Genetics 2005, pp. 729-741.

Web links

Commons : Buntes Bentheimer Schwein  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Buntes Bentheimer Schwein ( memento from April 18, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) accessed on March 27, 2012
  2. ↑ Ulrike Schäfer: REGIONALMARKETING II Pig as an image bringer , in: Sparkasse No. 06/2009, p. 22.
  3. ↑ a b Micaela Buchholz: New Chances for Old Races , in: Allgemeine Hotel- und Gastronomie-Zeitung No. 07/2009, p. 20.
  4. ↑ Tobias Böckermann: The colorful Bentheim pig. Sögel 2014.
  5. ^ Teresa Johanna Bless: Successful in gastronomy. Developments and trends in German food culture. ISBN 978-3-8366-1016-2 , p. 93.
  6. ↑ Joachim Schalinski: Passenger in the Ark of Taste - Slow Food ennobles the colorful Bentheim pig , in: Lebensmittel Zeitung No. 22/2006, p. 64.
  7. ↑ Joachim Schalinski: Swarming for a classic , in: Lebensmittel Zeitung No. 21/2009, p. 48.
  8. ↑ See e.g. B. Anja Kastner / Karl-Heinz Waldmann / Waldemar Ternes: Influence of acorn feeding on the aroma of air-dried raw ham and raw sausages , in: Fleischwirtschaft 3/2008, pp. 105–109.