Traditional Religious Family Meat Harvest For Educational Purposes

In many areas of the country (including ours) butchers are so overbooked that no one can get their animals in to be processed. We have five butchers within an hour of our home and all are a year out in their ability to schedule new animals. Food security is why raising SMALL animals is important. Small animals you can butcher yourself without fear of contamination or exhaustion. We wait until the weather is freezing at night and cool during the day to start the process. Once the animal (a pig in this instance) is air dried, salted, cured, and smoked we can leave it hanging in the smokehouse until we eat it. Once cured it stores fine in our summer smokehouse or kitchen. American Guinea Hogs, Mangalitsa, Kune Kune, and Juliana, are all breeds that stay small and don't required high protein feeds. In fact if you feed them conventional feed they will get too fat and die prematurely.