ALERT!: Please note that this blog post is about our experience as a family butchering our home-raised hogs. There are graphic photographs and descriptions contained, read at your own discretion. Please also note, that no hogs were harmed in the making of this post. Yes, two were killed and butchered, but no hogs were harmed. They lived a very good and happy life and just had one bad day.
Remember back in December when we brought these two cute little piglets home with us?
Remember back in December when we brought these two cute little piglets home with us?
Here is how big they got...
We enjoyed taking care of them, feeding them and watching them grow. At first it was mainly Ethan and Noah's job. Noah named the black one Hamlet and Ethan named the white one Sally Trotter. But as they pigs grew into hogs it became primarily Ethan's job. We lovingly call him our pig boy. If you've read the Prydain Chronicles, you will remember the pig boy, Taran. If you haven't read them, I recommend them and so does Jacob.
We enjoyed taking care of them, feeding them and watching them grow. At first it was mainly Ethan and Noah's job. Noah named the black one Hamlet and Ethan named the white one Sally Trotter. But as they pigs grew into hogs it became primarily Ethan's job. We lovingly call him our pig boy. If you've read the Prydain Chronicles, you will remember the pig boy, Taran. If you haven't read them, I recommend them and so does Jacob.
We were surprised to learn that pigs do not overeat. But we did observe first-hand where the expression "eating like a pig" comes from...they are greedy and let nothing get in their way when food is what they want! We have heard that if you slip and fall in a pig pen and lose consciousness the pigs will eat you. Fastidious Ethan would get frustrated with how messy they were. He would pour the milk or slop out into their bowl and they would dart in and let it run down their heads as they blissfully indulged.
We spent time with them daily and gave them lots of back-scratches, joking that we were tenderizing our bacon ahead of time!
This was their 16' x 16' pen that we moved around to pasture them in to help us dig up one of our pastures to rehabilitate it.
This worked well to get the soil all tilled up but eventually all the new spring growth was too tempting for them and they were big and strong enough that the pen no longer held them back and they got loose. The fencing around the pasture behind the barn has a lot of broken sections that the pigs could escape through. We had an adventurous day trying to keep them in until Steve and the boys got home from the factory and could help us get the fences pig proof. After that they enjoyed having the run of the pasture. We were hoping they would eat all the weeds infesting this pasture, but after they uprooted it all, it would just keep coming back. We have since learned that it is poisonous hemlock.
This worked well to get the soil all tilled up but eventually all the new spring growth was too tempting for them and they were big and strong enough that the pen no longer held them back and they got loose. The fencing around the pasture behind the barn has a lot of broken sections that the pigs could escape through. We had an adventurous day trying to keep them in until Steve and the boys got home from the factory and could help us get the fences pig proof. After that they enjoyed having the run of the pasture. We were hoping they would eat all the weeds infesting this pasture, but after they uprooted it all, it would just keep coming back. We have since learned that it is poisonous hemlock.
When they reached about 200 pounds each we listed them on craigslist hoping to get some money out of them to put towards the house payment. Apparently there is no money in hogs. We were told by a neighbor that you are lucky to break even. By the time the hogs were getting nearer to 300 pounds we decided to take the ad down and butcher them ourselves, though we had little idea what to do. Our neighbors offered to help us butcher in exchange for a quarter of the meat. We gratefully accepted their offer.
The day before we took some more pictures to see how they have grown. Here is Naomi saying goodbye.
She is respectful but she is not sad. Though our hogs were very docile due to all the human contact, they were not cuddly. It was not hard for any of us to choose to butcher them. We want our children, and ourselves, to make the connection of where our food comes from, to not blur the line of distinction between a human life and an animal life, to be good caretakers of the creatures under their care and to instill in them a solid work ethic and drive home the principle of there being a reward of satisfaction and fulfillment in work.
We enjoyed giving the pigs a happy life and happy it was! The kids enjoyed giving the pigs treats. I enjoyed the uber economical aspect of keeping pigs. And the pigs thoroughly enjoyed all of our gifts and scratches.
We all went out together after explaining to the children what would take place. It was not violent. It was humane and quick.
We dragged them over to our machine shed where we weighed them and skinned them.
Hamlet weighed 260 and Sally Trotter was over 280. Our neighbors skinned Hamlet to show us how and then Steve and Emily skinned Sally Trotter. Emily really enjoyed the process of skinning and did a great job!
We hung them from the rafters, covered them with sheets and left them to hang overnight to let the animal heat out of the meat. The next day was butchering day. Everybody helped and it was a fun day together as we cut all the meat and processed it for freezing. This year the science course we've been doing together has been anatomy and physiology and I was very pleased to hear the children discussing in amongst the regular conversation, just as natural as you please, proper names for parts of the hog's body and pointing out and demonstrating specific things we've learned about to one another and the younger ones who listen in to our studies. Steve was able to cut up a heart and let the children see the four chambers and all the workings that is just like a human heart.
Molly and I cut the tenderloin into butterfly cuts.
Ethan and Noah made our sausage.
Naomi enjoyed taking some of the photographs.
We enjoyed giving the pigs a happy life and happy it was! The kids enjoyed giving the pigs treats. I enjoyed the uber economical aspect of keeping pigs. And the pigs thoroughly enjoyed all of our gifts and scratches.
We all went out together after explaining to the children what would take place. It was not violent. It was humane and quick.
We dragged them over to our machine shed where we weighed them and skinned them.
Hamlet weighed 260 and Sally Trotter was over 280. Our neighbors skinned Hamlet to show us how and then Steve and Emily skinned Sally Trotter. Emily really enjoyed the process of skinning and did a great job!
We hung them from the rafters, covered them with sheets and left them to hang overnight to let the animal heat out of the meat. The next day was butchering day. Everybody helped and it was a fun day together as we cut all the meat and processed it for freezing. This year the science course we've been doing together has been anatomy and physiology and I was very pleased to hear the children discussing in amongst the regular conversation, just as natural as you please, proper names for parts of the hog's body and pointing out and demonstrating specific things we've learned about to one another and the younger ones who listen in to our studies. Steve was able to cut up a heart and let the children see the four chambers and all the workings that is just like a human heart.
Molly and I cut the tenderloin into butterfly cuts.
Ethan and Noah made our sausage.
Naomi enjoyed taking some of the photographs.
Sweet little Stephanie in her stroller.
Bacon!
Bacon!
Emily helping cut the meat.
Molly carefully trimming fat for lard before we cut the ribs into sections.
We ended up with about 400 pounds of meat total, so 300 pounds in our freezer of our own home-grown meat. It cost us about $1.00 a pound and we know how it was raised and cared for and what went into the making of the meat.
It was a great experience as a family and now we know how to butcher hogs so we can do it ourselves next time!
Not much left. Look at those hams!
We ended up with about 400 pounds of meat total, so 300 pounds in our freezer of our own home-grown meat. It cost us about $1.00 a pound and we know how it was raised and cared for and what went into the making of the meat.
It was a great experience as a family and now we know how to butcher hogs so we can do it ourselves next time!
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