Pig Processing November 14, 2018 @goldenoakfarm
WARNING: Graphic Photos!
On September 28th our pig (the dark spotted one), which had been doing wonderfully, stopped eating. We had an appointment with the slaughterhouse to pick up the other pig on October 3rd. We had to cancel it, a VERY bad time of year to be doing that. They assured us they would fit the pig in somewhere, if we did want to send her.
Over the weekend, our pig did not eat, drank a little water, slept a lot, and had a temperature up to 106.7. At times we thought she might die. She was never in discomfort, just hot from the fever.
On Tuesday, October 2nd she got up and was ravenously hungry. We had separated her from the other pig and so we started feeding her things like milk and kefir mashes. She had lost a lot of weight.
We kept the 2 separated because the other one was far too big already and when I called to make another appointment for that pig, they said October 31st was the first one. The problem? They could not pick the pig up. We’d have to find some way to get this 300+# pig to them.
We did find a trailer some friends had. They said they’d come pick the pig up on October 29th and take her to the slaughterhouse. I hated knowing she would be there for 2 days but it was the best we could do.
So the 2 pigs spent all of October getting bigger and bigger and bigger… Eventually we had to put our pig out with the other one. She was getting bored being inside and started tearing the barn apart.
On October 29th the pig loaded onto the trailer just fine, and loaded off just as easily. While I was gone doing that, my husband dropped our pig. This is what we saw when we got back. He has to skin the pig as his shoulders are too injured to do scraping of the skin. So he says it looks like an airplane propeller hit it.
Even with the skinning, the carcass had 1” of fat, which is perfect.
He got the carcass split in half and we got the halves hung in the cold room. They would hang there until Friday. I would clean the butchershop on Thursday with my helper friend.
We got an early start on Friday with my helper friend and we were done with the whole pig, weighed, packaged, and in the freezer with the butchershop cleaned by 4:30. We still had to grind meat for ground pork and to put the bacon down in the cure.
Cutting meat for ground pork
On Saturday we got the pork ground and packaged.
I cut anything of worth from the waste scraps for use for animal protein for the layers. We ground that and packaged and froze it. It gave us nearly 3 weeks of supplemental feed.
A couple days later we got the bacon into a maple and an herb cure. They are now ready to be washed, frozen enough to slice, sliced, packaged, and frozen in the next day or so.
Here are the stats on our pig:
She was a gilt just under 8 months old. Her hanging weight, without skin, etc. was 192. This gave her a live weight between 300 – 325. That’s pretty heavy! Ideal live weight is between 225 – 275.
We got 171 lbs of processed meat and bones. By selling the other gilt, which had a live weight of 351, the cost of our meat for the year is .57/lb. That’s higher than last year at .43/lb., but we fed them for 1 month longer.
You guys are amazing. You did warn me on the graphic photos... I read it anyway..couldnt do this myself but your self suffiency totally trumps my squeamishness.
It wasn't so long ago I was the squeamish one. But if I wanted a life out of the wheelchair, I had to change how I thought. When push comes to shove....
😍😍😍
Look at that meat! You're living well up there, and it's so inspiring to me. So well done!
My good friend @burntoblog is going to start pasturing animals soon, God willing. He's going full Salatin while I'm going more the food forest route. We plan to help each other, as the property he's eyeing is nearby, and I'll raise the fruits and vegetables while he raises the meat. Quite a lovely friendship.
Very cool about the barter! It has worked well for us over the years.