Top Notch Feeder Pigs was originally built in 1974 by John Salsbury of the Salsbury Chemical Corporation, and was stocked with Babcock genetics. Even though there have been many changes through the years, Babcock has remained the only breeding stock ever used at the unit. Top Notch uses Babcock's Closed Herd Internal Multiplication breeding program, and multiple site production. Breeding and gestation occurs in a room with 320 crates, and sows remain there for 40 days post-mating. A vasectomized boar named Cyclops is used for heat checking, and artificial insemination is used for approximately 80 percent of the total matings.
Gestation takes place in the remodeled old nursery, with four or five sows per pen.
There are eight farrowing rooms, each containing 11 crates per room. The nursery consists of eight fairly new Double L buildings, each holding about 250 head. Approximately 80 percent of the feeder pigs produced are delivered by Bill for custom finishing, then they are marketed to IBP in Waterloo. They buy all feed, but handle all the trucking, most of the maintenance work, and all of the manure disposal with a combination of both pits and a lagoon before moving to an outside in-ground storage tank. Jack Ruzicka does most of the final decision making regarding capital expenditures for Ruzicka farms and Top Notch.