Having a pig processed is one of those things that is incredibly easy and straightforward once you’ve done it once or twice but manages to be the source of untold anxiety the first time. If the processor gives you instructions, they tend to be about as clear as a duck pond. So, here’s a pretty good run through of what is expected of you when you take a pig to the processor.

I’m assuming that you have already grown the pig out and have a drop-off date at your chosen a butchering facility. If not, you should definitely start there.

Load Your Pig

We have to start somewhere, right? Getting the pre-bacon on the trailer is the hardest part of taking a pig to the processor. Huge pig farms that supply national meat companies have several thousand square foot barns with chutes and employees who drive a hundred sunlight-deficient pigs onto an 18-wheeler’s double decker stock trailer. We have me, Will, a couple of kids who might be more hinderance than help, temporary fencing, and a stock trailer.

Our favorite method actually takes place the day before our drop-off time. Even if the drop-off is in the afternoon, we still prefer to load the evening before.

How We Load Pigs

1. Be late with the pigs’ dinner. We have fed once per day and twice per day, and all that is important is that you’re late to feed them by a solid couple of hours. Don’t make them completely skip a meal. A truly hungry pig can be a dangerous pig, and I like to remain relatively perpendicular to the ground when working with livestock.
2. Back the trailer up to the fence line.
3. Distract the pigs for the next step if necessary. Our pigs respect the electric fence enough that they will not rush it even when we are actively messing with it. If you have a lower grade fence charger, you may need to give the pigs an appetizer to hold their attention for a few minutes.
4. Drop the electric fence to the ground and cover it with a stall mat or rug or basically anything your pigs are willing to step on that completely covers the electric fence. Yes, this method does require grounding the fence out, but we don’t have any worry about escapees because pigs are rather food motivated.
5. Open the trailer and use hog panels or pig boards to close off “escape routes” if needed. This depends on your trailer and fence set up. If pigs can’t see the escape route, it doesn’t exist.
6. Put dinner in the trailer. Make sure you use whatever you normally use to transport feed from storage to their bowl or trough. We use a 5gal bucket. They recognize the 5gal bucket. The 5gal bucket is full of grain. The 5gal bucket goes into the trailer. The pigs hear grain fall out of the 5gal bucket.
7. Pigs go into trailer.

It is that simple. Step 7 may be as quick as a few seconds. Our most cautious pig ever took about 30 minutes before she climbed all the way in. As long as the dinner is in the trailer, the pig will eventually go into the trailer. If you are loading multiple pigs simultaneously, it may be more difficult to get them all in the trailer at the same time, but if you’re patient, it will work. You may have to get more grain though. I’ve never seen a feeder pig turn down an extra meal.

Other Methods

Another option is building a temporary chute and using a pig board to “push” pigs up a ramp into your trailer. We do not use this method because butcher-ready pigs are entirely too much bigger than I am. See above about my perpendicular preferences.

At the end of the day though, the only thing that really matters is that you got the pig on the trailer…and also that the pig cannot get itself back off the trailer. That would be counterproductive. Of course, such a thing has never happened to us.

_{Right, Will? The gate has never been left unlatched where a gentle push was all it took for the pigs to be freed in the middle of the driveway 30 minutes before we were supposed to be on the road to drop them off. Isn’t that right, Will?}

Driving to the Processor

Hauling a trailer requires a certain level of defensive driving. You don’t have the get up and go you may be used to, and let’s face it: the other drivers on the road are stupid. Keep with the flow of traffic, but make sure you put plenty of space between you and the vehicle in front of you. Don’t be surprised to get dirty looks if you’re hanging out in the fast lane going the speed limit. Better yet, probably stay out of the fast lane. Livestock don’t get seatbelts. Swerving and hard braking can be life-threatening for them, and most processors require the animal to walk into the facility.

Our experience is with Virginia, North Carolina, and Texas. While I could tell you what our specific laws are in regards to hauling swine across state and county lines, unless you’re in the exact same situation, it won’t be helpful. Make sure you go to your state’s website and read the requirements and ordinances that will apply to you and your situation.

What to do at the Processing Facility

We prefer to park next to the building and physically walk in to the office to let them know we have arrived for drop off. It would be ridiculous for a facility to have an issue with this. If the facility doesn’t have an office, pick a different facility. They need somewhere to take your money and cut sheet. If that location is in the alley next to a rundown shack, run.

Always check that the place is clean when you walk in. If the scent of rancid meat hits you like a sledgehammer when you open the door, just close it and leave. Better to find a new butcher and wait for a new appointment than take the risk of eating something spoiled.

If nothing (besides anxiety) makes you want to run for the hills, let the lady at the counter know you’re there to drop off, and she’ll tell you where to go. It’s usually around the backside of the building. You’ll back the trailer up to some sort of ramp or holding pen and open the gate. An employee will be there waiting for you. If you aren’t confident in your ability to back a trailer, just ask the employee if they have someone willing. It’s really not a big deal.

The counter lady may have asked you to fill out the cut sheet before the actual drop off, but in our experience, you have to go back to the office to fill it out afterward.

Cut Sheets Aren’t Written in Greek

Unless you’ve never read one before. In which case, they might as well be. Every processor has their own cut sheet, but they all have several things in common. First will be your information. Obviously this information needs to be accurate if you expect to actually receive a product in a few weeks.

Then it’ll list the different cut options. You’ll probably see pork chops with thickness options. Somewhere it’ll list ribs where you can pick between spare, st louis style, baby back, etc. This is where it gets tricky. There are several cuts that are mutually exclusive. For example, you cannot have baby back ribs and bone-in porkchops. Why? Because the bone-in part of a porkchop is the baby back rib.

Also, the cut sheet will probably have a place on each line that lets you say how many of each cut you want in a package. So if you want your porkchops to come as 4 to a pack, that’s where you notate it.

If you’re a visual person, the Bearded Butchers have an outstanding video on YouTube teaching exactly how a pig can be cut. It’s 45 minutes long, but by the end of it, you’ll know exactly what to ask your butcher for. If you’re more of a reader, check out How to Fill Out a Cut Sheet.

Finally, if you still aren’t sure how to fill it out, the office attendant should be willing to thoroughly walk you through it. Just tell her that you’ve never done this before and you’d appreciate a little guidance. If she’s an ass about it, just don’t use that processor again.

Wait for the Call to Pick Up

Once you’ve signed the cut sheet, you’re done for now. Go home and wait. It should take at least a week before the processor calls you to tell you to come get it. If you ordered something that takes longer (liked cured and smoked hams), it may be 2 or 3 weeks before it is ready. Over the phone, they should be completely willing to tell you the weight of your animal and how much you’ll owe upon pick-up.

After you get that call, you’ll have up to a month to go pick up your meat. If it is a long drive in August, don’t expect to just put your boxes in the bed of your truck. Take a few coolers, or keep the boxes inside the cab. All of your meat will have been stored in the processor’s freezer, so it should be frozen solid when they load it into your vehicle.

When you arrive, you’ll need to pay your tab. We expect to pay $250-300 per pig. Listen to the numbers they give you. If you dropped off a 6-month-old pig and they say it had a 500lb hanging weight, something ain’t right.

Once you’ve paid, the processor will load your car. Those boxes have 30-40 lbs of meat in them. You should get at least 4 boxes back from a 250lb hog.

That’s it! Take your boxes home, transfer the meat to your freezer, and enjoy the fruit of your labor for the next several months.