Pig Slaughter

Pig Slaughter

We don’t process our own pigs.  We do our own chickens and our deer.  Not Pigs.  We like bacon and sausage and ham.  I don’t know how to smoke bacon or cure ham.  So I let our local Professional Processor do it.

The pickle is that the pigs have to be delivered “on the hoof.”  This means alive and walking.  This means that no matter how badly you want to shoot your pigs in the head and drag their muddy, fat, stupid carcasses onto the trailer……. you aren’t allowed to.  They have to show up at the butcher alive.

It has been raining in Kentucky for 3 years straight.  OK, maybe not 3 years.  It has rained a ridiculous amount, nonstop, for about 2 weeks.  This means my pig pen looks like this:

Anyone want to go in there & move some pigs?  Huh? Huh?

Well, we had to.

Unfortunately, in Kentucky, at our favorite processing place, they shut down the processing of all animals from the end of October until January…. all except deer.  Because a lot of folks in Kentucky hunt, but not a lot of them like to get their hands all dirty cutting up their own deer, they take it to a Processor.

Our Processor is buried in venison from the first of November until the first of January doing nothing but deer processing.  If you have a cow, goat, sheep, or pig you want them to process – you have to get it there by the end of October or wait until January.

I refuse to continue  swimming with the pigs until January.  This means that even though it has been raining non-stop for as long as I can remember and our farm is a muddy, swampy disaster, we are going to load some pigs & take them to be processed.  Oh Boy.

And, it was raining.

And, the pigs were not cooperating.

And, the pigs weigh 250 pounds.

And, I do not weight 250 pounds.

And, the world is a swamp filled with pig excrement.

And, the pigs WOULD not get on the trailer.

And, the butcher said they had to be delivered alive.

Me:  “Hi.  This is Candi.  We are having some trouble getting out stupid pigs into the dang trailer.  Can we please, please, please shoot them int he head and bring them to you already dead?”

Uhhh…. he said no.

So, we couldn’t shoot them in the head.  Dang it.  Home processing is sounding better all the time.

Let’s load some Pigs!  We’ve got some helpful, willing children, an empty trailer, and pigs.

Let the games begin!

I wish I had some pictures of the pigs not going onto the trailer.

But because I like my husband & want to stay married to him I didn’t get my camera out and start taking pictures.  He was not having fun.

My poor, 6 foot,  160 pound husband was single-handedly – trying to load 3 large swine onto a little, red trailer.   The kids and I pretended to be helpful by holding boards, smacking pigs in their butts, cheering him on and praying.

It took 30 minutes move the pigs 15 feet.

15 feet.

Stupid pigs.

We had to get the pigs from their pen to the cow paddock (which was only 15 feet away) and they would not move.

This was because the idiots were afraid of the concrete sidewalk.  Terrified.  They stopped at the small patch of cement like it was a brick wall.   There was no other route.  They had to cross this small 3 foot section of sidewalk.

We tried EVERYTHING to get them to cross that sidewalk.   We bribed them with food.  We bribed them with water.  We slapped them in the butts (which they didn’t even feel by the way).  We pushed, we pulled.  We got out the hose.  Nothing would get those hogs to cross that sidewalk.

I suppose they got the picture, and figured they better take matters into their own hands.  Since they didn’t want to cross the sidewalk and we were certainly not giving them any other options the pigs figured they should just remove the thing.

Yeah.  So, the pigs decided to excavate the sidewalk so they wouldn’t have to walk on it.  While we pushed, pulled, slapped, and sprayed; the pigs were busy using the shovels on their faces to dig up the sidewalk. So, now, in addition to my farm being a swamp, there is some repair word to do on the barn sidewalk because the pigs thought it was evil, scary and needed to be removed.  UGH.

I’m not sure how we (AHEM, I mean DH) got those pigs to cross the sidewalk.  I’m pretty sure it involved a large board, plenty of shoving & my husband now needs a good chiropractor.

All 3 pigs were finally in the cow paddock and we just had to get them to step up 8 inches into the trailer.  HA!  Good luck.

I think this is when I called my processor, to see if I could bring him dead pigs.  First he told me, “No.”

After he stopped laughing, he gave me some useful advice.  He said, “If you shove their heads in a bucket you can back them anywhere you want.”

He was right.

We (DH again) shoved all their heads into buckets (one at a time) and backed their large butts onto the trailer.

Finally, after what seemed like 8 hours, we were loaded up and headed out.

See the trailer back there behind the truck?  There’s 3 stubborn, muddy, soon to be dead pigs in there.

Once we arrived it was downhill.  We backed our trailer up to the chute & opened the door.

Out came the pigs.

DH had to get in there and give the pigs a little encouragement.  Poor husband.

This one decided to lay down and not move.

I don’t really blame him,

It’s never a good sign when someone paints a number on your back.

There will be plenty of bacon this year.

I’m considering throwing DH’s jeans away.  He has other jeans.

Anyone want to come help us load pigs next year?

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-Candi