Half pig share- how much

Recently some of my new customers have asked? When I buy a pig half or whole, how much do i get?  Below is a typical break down of what comes with a half a pig share. Double it for some idea of what a whole pig would yield. This is most likely more info then you ever wanted to know about a pig and its parts but if you have questions about something just ask!  We Normally Reccomend 

Farmer George in Port Orchard his basic Butcher Cost is $30.00 plus he charges a .55 per / cut and 

wrap fee. We can you get you his Price sheet for all his services or you can just stop in in his shop

in Port Orchard, Their Address: 3870 Bethel Rd SE, Port Orchard, WA 98366

Phone:(360) 876-3186  or you can use any other butcher if you want as long as the other party buying the other 1/2 pig agrees to that butcher and his or her fee schedule.

The short answer

There are about 23 pork chops from a half pig, 2 roasts, 1 ham, 8 lbs of bacon slab, 3 lbs of spare ribs, 9 lbs of ground pork, totaling about 75 lbs in the freezer for half a pig. The chart below gives you a quick graphic view. Click on the image for a larger graphic so you can read the small print. This can vary with the individual pig as well as how thick the pork chops are cut and such.

Do be aware though that you are able to grow out your pig as large as you like it with in reason. Butchering a 1200 pound pig could be quite costly! Pay attention to butchering costs...they generally charge by the pound. Most butchers are reasonably tooled for about a 300lb pig. 

The long answer

As a pig gets larger there is more fat to trim off. A typical slaughter weight is between 250-300 pounds. A 250lb pig will yield on average about 180 lbs of hanging weight. If you just take the prime cuts you will get about 120lbs of meat in the freezer. If you take the whole pig home - nose to tail - you will get about 160lbs of meat in the freezer. Nose to tail includes: hocks, soup bones, lard, liver, jowls (like bacon), head, trotters (feet), and other bits. If you do your research up front, or watch the videos on our butchering page you will see that you can use the blood and just about every other part of the pig to make something edible out of.

The joy of having a big ole piece of meat in your hands is that you can have it cut up any way you like! If you take a look at the chart below a sampleof different cuts available. Different butchers might offer different cuts. But you can ask for things like sausage in links or paddies with all sorts of different seasonings which will be created from all the left over bits of your pork. Perhaps you are interested in more ground meat and less big hams. Or you might want a tenderloin instead of pork chops. 

No matter what cuts you ask for, you are most likely going to be asked by the butcher how much sausage you want. Left over bits become sausage. This is sausage in bags of around a pound each - not links. You can get links but that costs a tad more. This can be used for meat balls, chilli, American chop suey, spaghetti sauce, breakfast susage patties with fresh pastured chicken eggs, etc. Most butchers offer several options such as: plain, sweet Italian, mild Italian, hot Italian, or maple. For a standard cut there is only about nine pounds of sausage so stick to one type of seasoning.

Here is a rough break down of what you might expect in a half a pig share. 

Pounds	Cut
13	Pork chops 1″ – total of 23 pork chops, 7 packs of 2 + 3 packs of 3
3	Spare Ribs
9	Hamburger/Sausage ground meat in 1 lb packages
15	Fresh Ham – easily brined or sent for smoking
8	Fresh Bacon Slab – brine & slice or send for smoking
10	Shoulder Roast
4	Butt Pork Roast
5	Stew Bones – good for dogs if you don’t make soup or stew
8	Fat – you can render this or feed it to dogs or chickens
75	Total pounds of cuts in the freezer

A typical pig will yield 60 to 70 pounds of cuts. Since our pigs are pasture raised, heritage breed animals, they are real live createus - thus they have some variance rather than the cookie cutter uniformity of factory farmed products.

Two other terms around pig weight that you might have is hanging weight and live weight. 

Hanging weight

The hanging weight is the combination of both the left and right side of the pig. This is usually measured without the skin, the head, or the feet. Some places measure the hanging weight with the head, skin, and feet which yields a higher hanging weight. Without the extra parts you lose some meat, pork rinds, etc. But with all the extra parts your hanging weight is higher. It is important to know how the hanging weight is determined at your butcher and how they calculate the hanging weight as it will impact your bill.

The processing is a big part of the cost of a pig. If you process the pig yourself, the butchering or both the butchering and the slaughtering, you save yourself a lot of money. It's not too hard to do.  it's not a task most folks are up to but if you are up to a challenge and feel you may have the know how for example if you come from a Hunting background and have dressed out a deer before then you may be up for it. And the tools needed are relatively cheap! You can processing a pig with just knives. But having a low cost bone saw is certainly helpful ($20-$30). If you want fancy cuts such as having bone in pork chops you might want a meat band saw and possibly a grinder.

If you weigh your pig with the skin, head, and feet attached, the hanging weight will be much higher than the total cuts weight. The difference is somewhere between 10-20lbs. If you don't intend to use the head, feet, and skin - that is up to 20lbs of trash that you are paying for!

Live weight

The live weight concept is buying a whole, live, breathing, snorting, pig. They tend to weigh more than any other variants.

The Advantage to buying a Whole Pig

Pigs can be raised to any size!

Pigs can be raised to just about any weight. You just need to ask the farmer that is raising the pig. If you want more or less pork for your freezer you can ask the farmer to grow your pig for a bit longer. The farmer will be happy to do this for you as they make slightly more money on the already sold pig. Most local butchers are not big industry workers. They are not held to the same tight tolerances in their animal processing methods. If they have a bigger or smaller animal to process they will figure it out! Got a big family like us...buy big pigs for your freezer!

Goodby Sampson

Last Thursday, Oct. 5th we said goodby to our boar Sampson.
We sold him to a farm in Chicum,Wa.to be a new daddy there.
We wish him well, so long old friend

A NEW LOOK

Hello folks, So with all the controversy on Facebook, over the last week, I have decided update
the ariel veiw with lines that show the exisitng fence improvements. The black line shows the property
line where a fence has been erected. The pink line shows the remainder of the property line to be
fenced. The RED LINE shows where the cross fence that I  have been working on for the last
three weeks. The short GREEN LINES show where there are or will be gates installed for access
to the western portion of the farm.The RED LINE FENCE also borders the east side of the drainage
ditch for the swamp/pond to the south of us. I hope this clarifies any confusion as to the nature of my
fence building activities as I have been accused of being relictant, lazy, or ignorate and begrudringly
building of Fence to contain my livestock.

New Pigletts

Our Sow Savanna finally farrowed. She Iniatlly had 10 but one got caught in some afterbirth and suffocated.
The other one disappeared about a week later. We think it got out between the gate and got carried away by a coyte.

These Pigletts should be ready for sale as wiener pigs 2nd week in Sept.

Eggs Eggs Eggs

http://www.localharvest.org We have Eggs for Sale . Please come by and pick up some fresh free range eggs Please see my ad on local harvest for more info Thanks

New Additions

We had New additions to our pig family in March. Guinevere Farrowed she iniatally had 8 but 3 died during birth  and then 2 more died several days later. But now 2 months later, we have 3 fine wiener pigs. There are 2 females and 1 male.

Just a FYI we named them Curly Joe, Lucy and Ruby

Tamworth Pigs

Tamworth Pigs

  Tamworth hogs are known for hardiness, foraging activity, and rapid growth rate. They produce a lean meat that has been described as flavorful and tender. The sows are excellent mothers, farrow litters of 10 – 15 piglets, and provide good quantities of milk for their large litters. They have a mild temperament.

  Tamworth Pigs adapt to a wide range of climates. Their active foraging make them a good choice for consideration in outdoor or pasture-based swine production. Their gentle nature lends them well to the small-scale, independent producer.

History and Origins

The origin and history of the Tamworth breed is obscure and many hypotheses have been put
Forward.  The Story goes like this,

 In 1812 Sir Robert Peel imported to his farm in Tamworth, England  some pigs of Irish Orgin
Of these pigs Peel crossed the Irish pigs with the local pigs of Tamworth at that time.
Long, lean, and athletic, these pigs are probably the most direct descendant of the native pig stock of northern Europe. These dark red and grisly pigs were found largely in these Midland counties. of Stafford, Warwick, Leicester, and Northhampton. In this region, there were dense forests of oak and beech trees where the pigs were kept to forage in the autumn and winter.

 This new cross breed was expected to find their own food, especially mast (or acorns) of oak and beech forests. Long heads and impressive snouts enabled these pigs to be efficient foragers. Long, strong legs and sound feet give Tamworth pigs the ability to walk for considerable distances. Ginger red coats make the pigs adaptable to a variety of climates and protect them from sunburn. Tamworths have an active intelligence, and they are agreeable in disposition. Sows are prolific, able to produce and care for large litters. The piglets are vigorous and often have 100% survivability. Both sexes of this breed reach a mature weight of 500-600 lbs (227-272 kg).

These  characteristics of the Tamworth reflect the breed’s centuries of selection for an outdoor life
and thus make an excellent choice for anyone who wants to have a more self-reliant low cost pig
to raise in a free range enviroment.

During the early to mid-1800s, The Tamworth breed was standardized  becoming uniform in type. The Tamworth was recognized as a breed by the Royal Agricultural Society in 1885 and fell under the authority of the National Pig Breeders’ Association of Great Britain.



The first Tamworths in the United States were those imported by Thomas Bennett of Rossville,Illinois in 1882. In the following decade, Tamworths were also imported into Canada and the breed gradually became known in both countries. The American Tamworth Swine Record Association was founded in 1887 with their national headquarters in Ames, Iowa. In Canada the Tamworth was admitted to the Dominion Swine Breeders Association Herd Book in 1893.

The Tamworth has two characteristics for which it was entitled to preeminence; i.e.; an unusual proportion of lean meat, and large litters of pigs; also that Tamworths will make as many pounds of gain, largely lean meat, from a given weight of feed as will hogs of any other breed. From these early imports, the Colorado agricultural College’s three year farm average for all sows was ten live pigs to a litter. A two-year old sow weighing 750 pounds had 18 live pigs at one farrowing, and a Tamworth at the Iowa Agricultural College raised 33 pigs in one year.
 


The Tamworth was traditionally considered a “bacon” breed, meaning that the pigs thrived on low energy foods but grew slowly. They produced meat and bacon that was lean and fine grained. The breed has an excellent carcass yield of up to 70% due to their fine bones creating a more productive meat to bone ratio for finished meat products.
 
The breed takes its name from the village of Tamworth in Staffordshire.

Here are First Three Tamworths we got them in December 2014,   They are Savanna, Guinevere and Sampson