To prevent livestock euthanasia, effort brings hogs to WNC families to slaughter

The Covid-19 pandemic has hit Eastern North Carolina hog farms and processing facilities particularly hard, and many in the hog business are resorting to euthanizing the animals as their demand chains filled by restaurants and school systems have dried up due to statewide closures.

“I’ve been in agriculture all my life — 35 years with this group — and I’ve never been asked how to kill and bury hundreds of thousands of hogs until now,” said Bill Yarborough, agricultural programs administrator for the N.C. Dept. of Agriculture.

“But we don’t have storage in this country anymore. When you get rid of schools and restaurants, which is 60-65 percent of the red meat’s business, where are you going to go with it? These hogs have no place to go.”

As one solution, WNC Communities teamed up with the NCDA to facilitate a way to prevent some hog euthanasia and simultaneously get inexpensive quality meat into the hands of WNC residents facing financial and food insecurity.

A second live hog sale was held Thursday at the WNC Regional Livestock Center in Canton. Farmers and farming hobbyists rolled up with large-animal trailers and other makeshift cages to claim their reserved hogs at market price.

The pre-order-only sale of 170 hogs, through nonprofit organization WNC Communities’ online Farm Fresh Pop Up Shop, sold out in a matter of 24 hours from June 3 to 4.

“There are more people in rural North Carolina that know how to do this — slaughter a hog — than people think,” Yarborough said Thursday morning at WNCRLC. “We are making something available to people who know how to use it. This is more about being self-sufficient than anything else.”

At $110 per 270-pound hog, the price was too good to pass up, especially for those in rural North Carolina who are versed in the proper practice for humane slaughter and processing.

Word spread quickly about the sale, before WNC Communities even had a chance to advertise it. People came from several counties across WNC to take advantage of the bargain prices Thursday, driving from Haywood, Henderson, Buncombe, Madison, Cherokee and Swain.

Henderson County farmers Gary Steiner, co-owner of Bee-utiful Farm and Garden, and Matthew Griffin, of The Garden of Griffin in Etowah, combined for Thursday’s largest order. They had to make two trips to get all 27 pigs back to Henderson County.

“When I was made aware of the price for these pigs, I just thought, ‘Wow, I know that’s a good price for pork; I can’t even feed my own pigs for that.’ I sold a few of my own pigs to be able to purchase some of these through the hog sale,” Steiner said.

“This meat will go to friends and family and will provide pork for 35-40 families for about six to 12 months. Price-wise we’ll be giving people an opportunity to get pork for a fraction of the price of what you can get in the store.”

Yarborough said he had to defend the sale more times than he cared to, as some questioned whether the sale participants would know what to do with the hogs. He stood his ground that it would be a successful venture, given the history and experience of WNC residents.

“Out of the 180 hogs last week, I can count 162 that are already in the freezer or curing,” Yarborough said of the first hog sale. “We know what to do with it.”

Another Henderson County resident, Josh Blackwell, a plumber and farming hobbyist, is one of those who knows the proper techniques for humane slaughter and processing.

“We always raised our own animals to eat and it’s just better; the food is better and you know where it’s coming from,” Blackwell said. “It’s a fair price for the pig. I’m getting the hogs for different family members that want the meat but don’t have the ability to raise it.”

Blackwell brought three of his four sons with him to pick up their four hogs.

“People should know how to take care of themselves, but we’ve raised a generation where, your meat comes from a grocery store. I’m not saying anything bad about that, but I think it’s good if you’re able to survive on your own,” Blackwell said. “I’ve got four boys, so this gives them a chance to see the process, so if they choose, they can do it.”

Steiner said he and his wife also grew up butchering and processing their own meat and continue that practice now as they raise pigs and cows on their Mountain Home farm. Each 270- to 280-pound hog will yield about 170 to 180 pounds of meat.

“I just see it as a huge waste for these pigs to be composted. With the demand that was here, I decided, I have a building that I’m finishing up that could serve as a location to butcher and process the meat,” Steiner said.

“With all the butchers around here within a five- to six-hour radius booked up until 2021 with people wanting to stock their freezers because of Covid-19, we’ve been saying we’ve got to figure out someone who can butcher around here if we have another crisis like this.”

Steiner and Griffin originally placed an order for 40 hogs, but because of the weight limit on the 18-wheeler bringing the hogs from Goldsboro, the original count of 180 hogs had to be reduced to 170. The pigs gain about 20 to 25 pounds per week and by the time Thursday’s sale happened, 180 wouldn’t fit on the truck.

The two Henderson County farmers will pick up the remaining 13 pigs during WNC Communities’ third hog sale, happening Thursday, June 18. Keeping with the pattern of the first two sales, WNC Communities Executive Director Jennifer Ferre said the third sale was sold out by Friday afternoon.

The Farm Fresh Pop Up Shop online ordering system was originally created in May by WNC Communities with funding by Dogwood Health Trust for the sale of low-cost 40-pound boxes of processed chicken to WNC residents.

The heart of the endeavor was along the same lines as the hog sale: to circumvent the slaughtering and composting of good chicken by facilities in the state while providing the people of WNC the opportunity to purchase meat at low cost.

“The success of these sales shows the infrastructure that we put in for the chicken sale was applicable to other products,” Ferre said. “We had the capacity, we were ready, and we were able to help these pig producers out East and our people here in the mountains, which is the one thing we’re working to do — improve the quality of life of WNC Communities.”

If there is enough demand for a fourth sale, Ferre said WNC Communities will make it happen. For more information and to stay up to date on information about hog and other sales through the Farm Fresh Pop Up Shop, visit https://wnccommunities.org.