Getting to work
First we take off the head. It went to our friend at the Mexican farmers market, who was quite happy to have it for a gift. 
Not quite so delicate work.
The final product, ready to be cleaned up and taken to the market.
Hog class pics 14.0
Moving the pig into the shop
Transferring from the tractor to the hoist
Inside and ready for the next phase
Hog class pics 13.0
The blood, ready to go into the fridge and keep for blood sausage later in the day.
One Lehman’s scraper, well used. 
A pure pink pig, ready to move into the shop for the next part.
Mas buena vista
The sky on December 6 when it was 80 degrees. I had cut down three trees, caught the woods on fire and put it out, broken a 6 figure piece of equipment, corralled an errant calf back into the pasture with its mom, and loaded and unloaded 14 cases of bananas. This was after working a 10 hour day and before taking SWMBO out for date night. Pretty fun day.
I didn’t however have time to take a picture of anything so thanks to Alice for sending this picture to me.
Feedback from our hog class
We conducted a survey after our class and had good comments and feedback from everyone however one of our students took the time to write a hand written thank you card. I was very honored he took the time, especially since we worked Eric and Stephan like rented mules the entire day. They were the first to jump in to help on everything we did and were a pleasure to have in our class. 
Hog class pics 12.0
Finishing up the scraping
The final scrape
Update on NCDOR regulations on farmers and registration
I posted here about how the NC legislature had made it a bit harder on farmers by requiring them to register for sales tax even if they didn’t collect the tax.
Well there has been an update and its good news. I have posted the entire email thread below for your information.
Great news! Yesterday the NC Department of Revenue released guidelines regarding the new law on specialty markets. In a nutshell: Farmers who sell only the products that they produce on their own farm DO NOT HAVE TO REGISTER.
“In sum, farmers market vendors do not have to obtain a NCDOR certificate of registration to sell their own products at farmers markets, so long as the vendors are selling only their own farm products. If vendors are reselling any farm products grown by another farmer, they must obtain a certificate and remit the appropriate amount of tax to NCDOR. The change does not revise the new requirement that farmers market operators keep a daily registration list of vendors.”
Please read Jake’s explanation below. Yeah!
From: Jake Parker
Sent: Thursday, February 13, 2014 12:02 AM
To: Debbie Hamrick
Subject: NCDOR changes re: farmer’s market registration
Debbie,
As we discussed, the NC Department of Revenue (NCDOR) issued new guidance yesterday afternoon regarding the General Assembly’s recent revisions to the State’s specialty markets law. Those revisions, as you know, imposed new requirements on farmers market operators and vendors.
Under the revised statute, N.C.G.S. 66-255, farmers market operators are now required, among other things, to maintain a daily registration list of vendors that includes each vendors’ name, address, and NCDOR certificate of registration regardless of whether the operator leases or merely provides space to vendors. Until this afternoon, NCDOR was interpreting the statute to require farmers market vendors to have a certificate of registration, even if the vendors were exclusively selling their own farm products, which are exempt from sales tax.
Yesterday afternoon, NCDOR updated its “Specialty Markets, Flea Markets, Fairs, Festivals, Sporting Events, Entertainment Events, and other Events Sales and Use Tax Information and Requirements” webpage to clarify the responsibilities of certain farmer vendors under the law. An excerpt from the revised webpage appears below. The full webpage may be accessed at: http://www.dornc.com/taxes/sales/specialty.html.
Excerpt from NCDOR’s “Specialty Markets” information and registration webpage:
“A farmer that only sells farm products produced by the farmer is not required to obtain a Certificate of Registration. A farmer that purchases products for resale that are not produced by the farmer in the capacity of a producer is required to obtain a Certificate of Registration. See Sales and Use Tax Technical Bulletin Section 9 for more information.
In sum, farmers market vendors do not have to obtain a NCDOR certificate of registration to sell their own products at farmers markets, so long as the vendors are selling only their own farm products. If vendors are reselling any farm products grown by another farmer, they must obtain a certificate and remit the appropriate amount of tax to NCDOR. The change does not revise the new requirement that farmers market operators keep a daily registration list of vendors.
Please feel free to forward this information along to anyone you know who may be interested in the matter. As always, let me know if you have questions.
All the best,
Jake
Jake Parker
Legislative Counsel & State Legislative Director
North Carolina Farm Bureau
PO Box 27766
Raleigh, NC 27611
(919) 987-1244 (o)
(919) 605-5603 (c)
Twitter: @jakeparkerjr
Hog class pics 11.0
Scalded, now onto the scraping.
Plenty of room for everyone to get in on the action. 
Hog class pics 10.0
Into the scald tank. Water 145 degrees which felt good on this cold morning. 
Working the hog back and forth during the scald to make sure that every area of skin was properly scalded.
Getting ready to come back out
Our first written review of our pork
As you hopefully know we are in stock and selling pork from last years hogs. One of our customers and great friends, Ron H, send me the above picture from dinner last night and his feelings on how the pork tastes. I didn’t include the entire email, just the following excerpt.
“Again, I stick with my earlier description. Ninja Cow Farms Pork Chops
are not pork chops but rather Pork Steaks! They are the Filet Mignon of
pork.”
The rest of the email was equally as complimentary. This isn’t “the other white meat”. This is what pork is supposed to taste like before factory farming was invented.
We still have some pork chops in the freezer, along with side meat, bacon, smoked ham, breakfast sausage, ground pork, etc, etc. Shoot me an email if you want to buy some pork. You can see all of our wares and the prices on our pork page.