The red-colored Husum pig

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Boar piglet
A four year old boar

The Red & White Husum Pig or Danish Protest Pig (officially: German Saddle Pig - Department Red & White Husum Pig) is a rare, endangered breed of domestic pig .

features

The red colored animal with its wide white horizontal stripes and the beginning of a white vertical stripe is similar to the colors of the Danish flag, the Dannebrog . With increasing age, boars can develop thick hairs. The animal becomes about 92 cm high and weighs a maximum of 350 kg.

Breeding history

The animal was bred at the end of the 19th / beginning of the 20th century when the Danes living in North Friesland were forbidden to hoist the Dannebrog after the Prussian and Austrian occupation of Schleswig and Holstein . The Danish farmers living there did not want to have the red and white national flag banned. In protest against the ban, they bred a new type of saddle pig with existing saddle pig breeds, which was allowed to run around in the front yard and thus “show the flag”. Hence the name "protest pig". Original breeds are probably black and white spotted Holstein and Jutland marsh pigs, the English Tamworth pigs and red and white splits of the angler saddle pigs . In 1954 the Red Holstein Husumer was recognized as a breed, but after a birth was recorded for the last time in 1968, the breed was considered extinct.

It was not until 1984 that pigs appeared again that corresponded to the old breed image. The Red Holstein Pig interest group was founded, which continued to breed these animals. The Förderverein Rotbuntes Husumer Schwein eV exists since 1996 and officially marks and records the stocks. Breeding stocks can be found, for example, in the Berlin Zoological Garden , the Hanover Adventure Zoo , the Arche Warder zoo near Kiel, the ZOOM Erlebniswelt Gelsenkirchen , in Dalmsdorf (Mecklenburg), Hof Lütjensee and at the Archehof Blumencron. The Hagenbeck Zoo in Hamburg, the Dortmund Zoo , the Krüzen Zoo and the Nature Life Ranch in Schwabenheim also keep small populations. In the Archeregion Flusslandschaft Elbe also takes care of the preservation of the breed, there the Danish protest pig is kept near Amt Neuhaus. Today around 140 specimens live worldwide. The state of Schleswig-Holstein promotes the preservation of the breed because of its cultural value, although it is no longer the pure-bred form, but only mixed breeds, which, however, again correspond to the old breed image due to strict breeding selection.

  • The thick hair can be clearly seen

  • A Husum sow in Dortmund Zoo

  • Two piglets

  • Husum sow with piglets

literature

Web links

Commons : Rotbuntes Husumer Schwein  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files