Pig Auctions Heritage Highlight

Pig Auctions at the Show

On 25 March 2024, some of the Show's poshest porcines will be front and centre at this years ‘Pigs and Pinot’ stud pig auction – following a Show tradition that stretches back at least 125 years.

As the Agricultural Society’s Grounds at Moore Park were gearing up for the 1899 Royal Easter Show, Sydney’s Evening News announced that auction sales for ‘pigs and fat stock’ would take place during the Show on April 4. It may not have been a particularly grand event, but at the time a commission of one percent from all Show auction sales was paid to the Society and so it was a tradition set to continue.

From 1922 pig sales were referred to in the Easter Show catalogues, ‘In the event of any pig being unfed, or any sty being in improper condition at any time while the pig remains on the Showground, both before and after the pig sales, the officials of the Society shall feed and attend to the pig.’ From 1927 to 1929 though no pigs at all appeared at Show, as swine fever swept the state.

By 1950 pig populations had recovered and prices for stud pigs were going through the roof. The Land announced in June 1950, ‘Record prices for all breeds of stud pigs sold by auction at the 1950 Sydney Royal Easter Show were obtained by Charlie Rowling, Homebush pig salesman’. Charlie had been selling pigs at the Royal for 22 years by then and he’d never experienced such competition at auction.

From 1956 a special section at the beginning of the pig section of the Show catalogue entitled ‘Public Auction Sale of Pigs’ announced that all breeds would be sold over the course of three days. From then on pig auctions featured regularly and in the 1970s and 80s detailed brochures entitled ‘Catalogue of Stud Pigs to be sold by auction at the Pig Pavilion RAS Showground’ accompanied the printed schedules for the pig competitions.

In 1997 the last pig auction to be held at the old Showground at Moore Park was conducted by Partridge & Harvey Stud Pig Agents. From 1998 onwards, following the move to Homebush, pigs that had been exhibited at Show continued to be sold on site until 2018.  In 2019, with drought ravaging much of NSW there was a serious drop in the number of pigs at Show that year and in 2022 the pig competition was cancelled altogether after a disease outbreak.

But back better than ever in 2024, the pig competition is big. You can pat a pig, wash a pig, get educated in baconomics, or perhaps even buy a pig at the inaugural ‘Pigs and Pinot’ – this year’s Sydney Royal Stud Pig Auction.