Looking like November

I'm way behind on photos and farm updates, but as the slaughter date approaches, (should be November 18) I thought people might like to see how the animals are progressing.

The foreground pigs are staying out of Sam's garlic beds in the background thanks to the tiniest of electric wires they have come to respect as the law.

The oak trees and orchard trees are letting go their leaves as the days get short, the temperatures drop, and the pigs come to their full size.

Look back at early photos and you'd hardly know the pictures were taken on the same farm.

Your pig farmer

After a good morning steelhead'ing on the White Salmon River.
He can walk there from our property, but don't ask him exactly where.

What is a pork share?

Check out this link to get a clear picture of what a half pork share is.

http://sugarmtnfarm.com/blog/uploaded_images/PorkCutsChartLarge.jpg

Here at the Davis Family Farm we usually kill the animals in November, just as they're tipping the scales at around 200 pounds. It's a sad day here, even though we go in knowing how the pigs will come to their end, it's still not much fun.

They get slaughtered here, then delivered to Gartner's Country Meat Market in Portland.

In 2009 we charged $2.45, in 2010 the per pound price was $2.75, hanging weight which is what they weigh on the hook, before the bones are taken out or the fat trimmed.

An average half pork share ends up costing about $300 once you've paid for the animal, the slaughter, cut/wrap/cure.

For more information on custom exempt meat production, check this link:

http://agr.wa.gov/Marketing/SmallFarm/DOCS/7-SellingBeefPorkGoatAndOtherMeat.pdf

Mid-summer

Enjoying some shade under the pear trees.

Moving Day

Home sweet home is moving across the way, into a fresh field of peas and barley.







This unwilling participant in the move needed more than a few words of encouragement. Once they tired of the pig rodeo, Sam and Reed surrounded him with a section of a mesh fence and got hands on him. Hold a pig like a baby and it fairly screams, but pick it up by the hind leg and it's got no further complaints.

Close-up

It's hard to deny that this guy is a favorite on our farm.

Gwenyth helps the pigs settle in

Gwenyth helped the pigs settle into their new home, with lots of scratching and some fresh peas from the field.

Two good farm dogs, Coco & Fudge

Pear orchard - with peas and barley

Here is the pear orchard, planted in peas and barley. This forage will be first on the menu, supplemented by grain from our new silo.

When the pears ripen the pigs put their little hooves on the trunks of the trees and rattle the branches with their snouts to drop the fruit.

Later in the season the oaks that border the orchard drop acorns that the pigs will choose over anything else. Friends and neighbors collect these for us on their own properties, knowing that the pigs are nuts for them.

It's great to see something thrive in this orchard, which when we arrived was beaten into weedless submission by decades of herbicide and pesticide applications.

Meal time

Here's one of the feeding areas. The blue barrels are water tanks with little on-demand spigots on the other side of the wall. The pigs trigger the water when they bump their snouts against the spigot.

Bits & pieces

Here is the new-to-us silo, which will help us be more efficient feeding the growing number of pigs.

It had a previous life in the sheep operation run by Sam's parents in Goldendale, WA. It's been unused over the last 15 years, but will soon be tipped up onto the concrete piers in the background and loaded with grain.

Sam's garlic

It will be ready in August.

For now we are eating garlic scapes on everything, including my mother-in-law's hearth oven pizza. Delicious and beautiful.

Modern farmhouse

Looking north from the orchard.

Sam built this house on the site of the old packing house that burned to the ground around 1980. My brother Joe designed the house to stay warm in the winter and cool in the summer.

Historic farmhouse

Looking west from the orchard sits the historic farmhouse, built in about 1910, this was a rental house for over 60 years and many people around the gorge called it home at one time or another.

Sally and Mike are the tenants now. They are passionately engaged in making music, documenting local history, appreciating and creating art, and generally building community.