Does anyone do there own butchering?

[OneFineAcre]

I have watched a few pig butchering videos and while *I* have no personal experience, yep, it sure looks like a LOT of work even for a group of very experienced people. I'm with @misfitmorgan. $30 to kill, scald, scrape, gut and split? No thought necessary unless you have no way to get the pig to the butcher.

Go ahead and pay them to cut up, vacuum seal and freeze
Our local slaughter house doesn't do what others mentioned giving you pork other than your own
And they make great sausage

 

[Alexz7272]

@misfitmorgan I wish I could find a butcher around here to do that for only $30!

 

[NH homesteader]

Uh yeah that's what I was thinking. My husband charges $75 for one pig and $50 each if there are multiple pigs. It costs $90 to hire the local guy that will kill, gut scald and scrape.

ETA: those prices include traveling to your farm... So that's a bit different too.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

X2!

 

[misfitmorgan]

Yeah its $30 and you have to take it to their slaughter house. We had two pigs done there and we had one pig done at the USDA for public sale by the pound.

Go ahead and pay them to cut up, vacuum seal and freeze
Our local slaughter house doesn't do what others mentioned giving you pork other than your own
And they make great sausage

Because ironically that same guy would be another $228 roughly to cut, seal and freeze and we like to cut them up ourselves because we like to smoke our own hams, bacon, etc and make some charcuterie stuff.....he has offered before to save off the blood for us for making blood pudding but i havnt gotten brave enough to try it yet either making or eating it.

FYI $30 a pig is not his normal price...this is his "off season" so he will butcher for cheaper. Starting tomorrow which is opening day for bow season his prices go back up, normal price is $50 each. So you might look into that as well to see if a local butcher near you has an "off-season"..our off-season is the month of September and in the late winter/early spring. It would vary by location...September is an off season here because it is late enough after the fairs that 4-h animals are already done, most critters being raised to fill freezers are done and adult deer season hasnt started yet.

 

[farmerjan]

The local slaughter houses here also have "off-season" rates, and you can get a kill date alot easier too. Once hunting season comes in, there are very few slots available until after christmas. I try to do most of my stuff in June, July, Aug when there is less demand. Alot of people will wait til after the first of the year to do their beef, knowing that they will not get an appt. in the fall, and not wanting to feed too long through the winter. We have a big market animal show here in early May so they are swamped them and the fairs here run from July through Sept so there is some then. Hunting season varies by area and state so try to get done before or after.

 

[Baymule]

I haven't found an "off" season for butchering around here. We did find a custom butchering place run by Mennonites. Reading reviews on some of the other places where people didn't get their own animals back was enough to keep us away. We heard nothing but good from the place owned and operated by a Mennonite family. They processed our pigs and just recently, 3 lambs. We are very satisfied.

 

[Mini Horses]

Gotta love a good butchering facility!

 

[Ron Bequeath]

@NH homesteader Woah, that must be a lot of extra work! We do not do that in Eastern Europe (we're poor and need every bit of the animal, haha) I wonder what the taste difference is?

The taste isn't much different, the butchers here in PA skin when butchering because they just fasten the skin to a wench and pull it off, I like and prefer scaulding but you need a crew and don't forget to share, that's why you raise 2.

 

[Ron Bequeath]

Having lived on a farm for 68 years and as a youngin as far back as i can remember we would raise a hog, kill it, scald it, scrape it, gut it, divide it in half then quarters, take it in to the garage or house which had been cleaned, cut it into cuts, saving the various types of lard, ground and stuffed the sausage, wrapped the cuts, rendered the lard, kept the cracklins. Why did we scald? In your 7th grade biology book it says the skin protects the meat (muscle) from bacteria. Our hams and bacon always had a skin on them and mom would cut it off after cooking, extra cracklins that night. Now days its just easier for the butchers to skin. So.. now people do it on the homesteads.