Hello Folks

We will have Large Black Pigs avaialable to be sent for butcher at the end of April/First of May..  While I will do my dead level best to make sure this is a reasonable price, I can not begin to compete with the cost of cheap factory farm pork in the stores, but I will make sure my prices are under the current market value of large black in the ottawa valley, she has excellent free range large black pork available. (here is the link to the site to the largest large black pork breeder and seller of pork to compare prices)

Let me count all the ways that make this pork different.. cuz there is lots of them..

First off the mother was bred at a older age then normal, she birthed in a big old pen (no birthing crates on this farm) and she had eight wonderful healthy babies we didn’t lose any, and she was a amazing and excellent momma, we did not clip wolf teeth, we did not dock tails and we did not alter the male piglets (of which there were two, we butchered the boys early and used them for our own use) all the piglets being raised for pork for sale are gilts, there is no risk at all of boar taint.

The piglets were allowed to stay on mom for weeks longer then is considered the norm, till mom herself started to show us that she was weaning them, they had a creep hole between their pen and their mother’s which we just closed off at weaning time, so there was No stress at all in this regards.

They have been on a pig grower ration but they have also been eating fresh food from the farm/garden/cellar and freezers, they have been eating hay and freshly sprouted grains along with freshly done sprouts, so while they have been raised in winter, they have had as much fresh food as possable, they will continue to have this, part of the reason they are not going to be ready till end of April at the earliest is that I want to finish them on milk for the last month along with fresh sprouts/grains. Girl will calf in March and I will use the extra milk to create some of the most tasty pork you can get!

There have been a goodly number of video’s made of the piglets, one a week till they reached the eight week stage, they are a active, happy mob of piggy grunts at this time, and I do promise more video’s as the time gets closer, its just right now, the barn is really dark for video and I can take pictures of cold shivery pigs in the snow if you want but give them a choice and they head right back inside and to their big warm piles of bedding. There are at least ten or so video’s of the piglets to date.

One week old Large Black Piglets, a piglet eye view

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0R-I3Vq-08&feature=channel&list=UL

These Piggy s are trained to move with boards, and to follow a shaking grain bucket, they have large amounts of straw bedding to play in and sleep in, to date they have used just over 3 900 pds strawbales and I expect they will go though at least two more before being ready to go..

I will allow folks to reserve a quarter or half or whole pig, I am aiming for around a 200-240 pds live weight, give or take, we will see how fast they pack on the pds with the milk finish, I am looking at 3 dollars a pd, this will cover the transport costs as well as the growout etc but WILL NOT cover the butcher costs, or if you want to order bacon, ham or sausage costs etc, you will be responable for paying those costs including the tax that will be charged on it, what you choose to have done will effect that end price. It will be only what the butcher charges of course.

While I can provide a number in terms of a flat butcher cost, and a flat cutting cost, if you want tradional has one price, european cuts have a different price per pd and there is a cost for the bacon or ham or sausage costs per pds on top of that, given that info, I will be happy to a) share recipes and help you get all your own pink salts and info so you can do this at home or b) help you figure out what you want so that you can tell the butcher but given the fact that what one chooses to do with the pork will greatly effects the end costs, by easily 50 to 100 dollars per pig depending on what the buyer wants..

Having said that, it will give you the buyer great flexablity on what you want to bring home, I have a awesome hauler and a good local small butcher and I will do my best to see that you come out as happy as I have using him to date.

We have a total of six piglets being grown out, 3 are currently reserved, which leaves a total of three pigs available at this time.

I will reserve with small deposit depending on if I know you from the blog and or how much you are wanting to buy, please leave a comment and I will get back to you..

For my regular folks, this notice will be going up once or twice a month from now till the end of april or so, hope you won’t mind that I am looking to find a farm gate market for my unspoken for at this time pork..