Ideal hog market weight has changed

The new economics in the livestock business has hit the hog industry particularly hard.

It wasn't but a couple of years ago that hogs sold for $55 a hundredweight and corn was $2 a bushel. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that marketing hogs at heavier weights made all kinds of sense. With cheap grain, the extra gain was very profitable.

The equation has drastically changed. Hogs are now selling around $40 a hundredweight, and corn is $5 a bushel. You lose the least by selling hogs at the lowest-possible weight.

This flies in the face of recent trends in the high end of the pork business. White table cloth restaurants and upper crust meat shops are selling pork from purebred hogs, because these are the only ones available with enough fat to give the meat maximum flavor and tenderness. Since the campaign of the last 15 years or so to market pork as "the other white meat," pork has become so lean that it affects tenderness and flavor.

This most recent economic decision to market hogs at lower weights only exacerbates this problem. If pork is too lean to develop tenderness and flavor at recent market weights, the problem will only get worse at even lower weights. Taste and tenderness comes from more time on corn, a costly proposition with $5 corn.

Pork fat is tasty. No one has yet figured out how to replace lard in authentic green chile or pastry. It makes far flakier and more tender pie crust, tarts, bagels, etc. than low cholesterol, unsaturated shortening does. The same is true of the meat.

Despite the economics, pork producers would be well-advised to pay attention to taste and flavor. That's what sells the meat, not color or low price.