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["Robert Walton" <waltonrp AT gmail.com>]

> Ray, I'm curious.  How to you kill the pigs when they are ready to butcher. 
>  The curiosity is not morbid.  I've actually thought about this.  If I ever 
> actually make the move and have meat animals.
>

Do you mean Rob? If not, here is how I kill them, but I'd like to hear
from Ray also. A 22 rifle. I like to shoot from just behind one ear
aiming at the eye on the other side. They drop fast and then you stick
them.

Last year we killed both here, one we hung over night and then cut up
ourselves into nonstandard cuts that work for the pot and grill. The
other got too big, so I ended up dropping it here and a neighbor took
it to his well set up operation and scraped it. We worked a deal so he
dunked, scraped, hung and made sausage out of most of it. I gave him
some fat from mine to make up for his skinny sausage hog.

> I remember the basics of butchering from rabbits, deer, and such.  But, how 
> do you actually end the life of the pigs.  You are probably younger than 
> me, but if you just recently bought the homestead, was it a big deal to 
> accustom yourself to killing small animals.

Actually, it was harder to castrate than it will be to kill them. I
grew up on a farm and that probably helps. I know a lot of homestead
types around here that can't kill a chicken. My grandparents taught me
that people were put on earth to care for animals. Then when you need
to eat, you dispatch them in a way that they don't suffer. It took a
little getting used to after 25 years of eating meat that was killed
for me.

I do the goats the same, just aim from the back of the head (between
and behind the horns) to the forehead. They drop fast. Hang and bleed.
I have 3 wethers from spring that are ready. I'm just waiting for a
good cool spell here.

>
> I hope I asked the questions in the right way.  I am a meat eater and every 
> animal I eat from the butcher or grocery has to be killed.  But, at my age, 
> I have thought about , other than with a pistol, which I think  I could 
> still do, I don't know how comfortable I'm going to be, with this part of 
> homesteading.  bobf
>

The benefit to killing your own is you know how clean the food is. If
you drop a chicken carcass on the ground, you know to wash that one
well and cook it good. If one in the supermarket gets more dirty than
the USDA allows (and they do allow), you have no clue.

I also know that the animal did not suffer to live or suffer to die. I
know what it ate and how much.

Rob - Va