Hog Harvest

[mannytheseacow]

Well today was the big day. The day to put the hogs out of my misery as George said. It's been an all day event and I'm whooped. Forget about mixing cob, doing two pigs in one day by yourself will kick your butt.

The two girls were over 300# each. I ended up with about 65-70# of unusable organs that I don't care for. Some parts I save for catfishing and I saved all the bones to boil and pick to make confit. All in all, I'm still over 500# of meat. This puts me at $0.94 a pound. The great thing is that this isn't the $0.99 a pound confinement pork at the grocery store. This is the real deal, fattened on squash, apples, and acorns.

The barrel scald worked great (Thanks Matt)! I was able to scrape the Berk in about 30 minutes. Unfortunately the Tam was too big for the barrel so she got skinned. I didn't have a propane burner so I just but the barrel up on some cinder blocks and got a good wood fire going under it. My neighbor was nice enough to let me use his tractor to hoist.

I've already got a ham in cure, though it's 32# and will probably take 2 years to dry out. Also got some Canadian bacon curing and blood sausage in the poach as I write. There's something poetic about frying up some onions and apples (what the pigs were often eating) and mixing it with their blood and putting it back into their intestine for a black sausage.

That said, it was a hard day. I got pretty attached to those two, especially the Berk. It was really hard to put them down. Such is the circle of life, though. I'm not complaining about the grilled tenderloin I'm eating right now. It was kind of a good feeling sewing rye, oats and alfalfa down in their pasture this evening. Getting it ready for next year.....

[George Collins]

I so wanted the timing to workout to do a home slaughter this past winter but alas, 'twas not meant to be.

I can only imagine how exhausted you are right now: when we home butchered last year, I had a few guys helping us and it was still a mountain of work butchering just the one. Doing it yourself definitely does save a fair sum of money. I've toyed around with the idea of going to work for my butcher for a few months to learn how to do a really professional job.

Your return on investment was better than mine by a considerable margin.

Perhaps next year all us interested in raising pork can have a contest to see who can produce the cheapest pork for home consumption.

[mannytheseacow]

That's funny you say that, George. I was just thinking about how I should find a bin on craigslist so I can take advantage of the fall grain prices. If I put it away now and can keep it dry I can lower my feed costs significantly. It all depends on the year next year, too. We had a good crop of berries, acorns and apples this year following last year's drought. I bet next year they won't be so plentiful.

I bet we're pretty close on costs by the time I dispose of all the bones. There's a considerable amount of weight there. I've got the heads for headcheese, too, but pound for pound most of that goes away by the time you hit the finished product.

I'm just catching up on some of the old posts about home curing. I've done quite a bit of butchery and curing, though a great deal of it was in a commercial setting. I've never used that tenderquick stuff, I always use the pink salt or nitrite for a long dry cure. I'm a little more hesitant to do it at home where I don't have climate control and fans and such. How has your dried hams turned out? How big were they and are they ready yet? I think I just going to dry one. For one thing they're all so darn big and for two I don't want to gamble off all my ham!

[matt walker]

Manny, good lord man. You did both hogs on the same day by yourself? I, well, like George I can only imagine how drained you must be. Physical work alone, that's huge job. Add in the emotional component and it's truly heroic. I'm impressed and inspired. I tend to do everything alone to a fault, and that's something I always wrote off as something I couldn't do solo.

I would be interested in your challenge George. I will think on that over the winter, I might be ready for another go at hogs next year. We'll see. Manny, did you get it all cut and wrapped and in the freezer as well? Amazing. Congrats on a big fall job behind you. Soon enough you'll be relaxing on the warm bench with all the chores done for a bit.

[mannytheseacow]

[mannytheseacow]

Holy crap, this is how you do it:



*Warning- this is graphic*

[George Collins]

Thanks for sharing that. I love watching skilled hands work.