Part of the beauty of blogging is that you end up getting hooked up with other bloggers. I’ve mentioned and posted about Walter at Sugar Mountain Farms before. His is a blog I follow and one that I model ours after. Simple, non-commercial, informative, and humorous. I do follow other blogs as well and today I read a great article on Ohio Farm Girl Adventures in the Good Lands blog. It is on processing your own pig, the how and the why. It mainly addresses the act of shooting the pig, which frankly is the hardest part. Nobody wants a bad kill, and as someone who not only had a bad kill, but had it in front of a whole class of people, I can attest to that fact. That bad kill still haunts me.
She also has really good links to what you’ll need, how to go about it, etc. If you have done as I’ve had some other folks do, read Joel Salatin’s book, buy a few pigs and stick them out back, and NOW you’re trying to figure out what to do with them, then this is a good article for you to read.
If after reading all about it, you just can’t go through with it, then look up your local custom processor to get your pig processed. It’s going to be the best pork you’ve ever had.