About Us

We are a family of four from Wisbech, which is on the Cambridgeshire/Norfolk borders. We have 2 children - Samantha who is 12 and Harry who is 3.

The name Bramblebee is our Kennel Club affix for our Border Terriers, which we have kept, worked and bred for the past 15 years. It seemed only fitting that our pedigree pigs should be named the same! In 2008 we purchased an old 22 acre orchard. We never really intended to keep livestock on this piece of land, but after much deliberation between ourselves, once most of it had been cleared, this was the direction we decided to go in.

Although we are new to keeping pedigree pigs, Paul is not new to keeping pigs. When still at school, Paul did his work experience on a very intensive hybrid breeding and pork herd that were all kept indoors. Then once he left school he took on 2 part time jobs, one on a chicken farm in the mornings and the the rest of the day with a small herd of large white x welsh free range pigs. Eventually the part time job on the Chicken farm became a full time job, but Pigs never quite left our lives fully as we occasionally reared a few for the freezer.

Maria is not new to animal husbandry either being a qualified Veterinary Nurse, who is passionate about animal welfare. Our pigs are raised to the highest welfare standards, in groups, outdoors, where they are allowed to carry out 'normal' pig behaviours.

To start off, we weren't too sure which breed to go with, but as Paul is the director of a top fruit farm growing apples and pears, this swung our decision to go for the traditional orchard pig - the Gloucester Old Spot. A week after Christmas 2008, we brought our first two pedigree 'in-pig' Gilts from Adrian and Claire Ballard from Cornwall. Jet and Molly settled in incredibly well and so the story began ........

We now have around 50 pigs here of all ages and still growing and also a small herd of Dorset down sheep.

This Autumn we brought in 2 pedigree Welsh in-pig gilts to try for our customers who like a lean meat, as this is still a rare breed, even rarer than the old spot  we are also helping this breed, we have already tried some welsh x old spots and was very happy with the results, now we will try the real thing.

We now have decided to stay with just our first breed the old spot, they suit us and our set up the best. So in September 2010 we decided to go for our TSG status.