Could You or Do You Raise Your Own Meat?

[Shellyann36]

I grew up in the country and my family always raised chickens and hogs for food. The families would get together each year (when I was much younger) and kill the hogs and package the meat up and they would do the same for the chicken several times a year. Even though I grew up this way I was never allowed to see or participate because of my age. My uncles were the driving forces behind this way of life and after they died the tradition died with them so I totally missed out on everything.

In the past few years we have had chickens and ducks for eggs but we never killed any of them for meat. I really want to get into growing our own organic meat. I would like to raise ducks, chickens and rabbits for meat for our family. I am worried that I could not go through with the whole process of killing it and preparing the meat. If I did manage to kill and prepare the meat I am unsure if I could eat it afterwards.

I must add that in my opinion taking the meat to a processing plant would be costly and not within my budget.

Does anyone else raise their own meat and process it? If you don't are you thinking about it and do you think you could go through with it?

 

[Ellyn]

In the past, I really couldn't. I mean, I agreed that killing was wrong and bad, and recognized that living things could be killed, so I wouldn't want to kill any living thing. I was vegan for a time, but fell off that wagon when my meal plans weren't up to snuff and it was just immensely inconvenient for my family and friends.

Then, I read The Vegetarian Myth by Lierre Keith, which I think has the best-articulated personal philosophy of how death really is a part of life. If she had only stopped with that, then it would be one of my very favorite books, but she then goes on to justify meat-eating using shady facts and lies to support her agenda--which was very disappointing. And Keith's feminist outbursts in that book could be hilariously inappropriate at times, and this is coming from somebody who's gotten deep enough in contemporary political theory that I'd actually be open to learning how the nutritional value of a bowl of cereal is affected by the patriarchy...which Keith never clarifies, it's just like, "cereal sucks because of men I hate them both". But otherwise... for this particular topic... highly recommended.

This also reminds me of the scene from Like Water for Chocolate (a series of short stories prefaced with recipes), where the main character has to kill a pidgeon or something and only injures it instead because she tried to be gentle, then it's like, nooope, you can't be gentle. You've got to be brutal to be kind and kill it quick. Can't take the death, get out of the kitchen...

I don't trust my hand strength at this time, though, so... if there were a miniature guillotine, it might seem morbid, but that's what I'd use. I know that there's a device for breaking the necks of rabbits. I think I would need a lot of practice doing that with my bare hands to be successful, and I definitely have a horror of failing--for the animal's sake! I don't want to just injure them with my incompetence so they suffer.

 

[Shellyann36]

In the past, I really couldn't. I mean, I agreed that killing was wrong and bad, and recognized that living things could be killed, so I wouldn't want to kill any living thing. I was vegan for a time, but fell off that wagon when my meal plans weren't up to snuff and it was just immensely inconvenient for my family and friends.

Then, I read The Vegetarian Myth by Lierre Keith, which I think has the best-articulated personal philosophy of how death really is a part of life. If she had only stopped with that, then it would be one of my very favorite books, but she then goes on to justify meat-eating using shady facts and lies to support her agenda--which was very disappointing. And Keith's feminist outbursts in that book could be hilariously inappropriate at times, and this is coming from somebody who's gotten deep enough in contemporary political theory that I'd actually be open to learning how the nutritional value of a bowl of cereal is affected by the patriarchy...which Keith never clarifies, it's just like, "cereal sucks because of men I hate them both". But otherwise... for this particular topic... highly recommended.

This also reminds me of the scene from Like Water for Chocolate (a series of short stories prefaced with recipes), where the main character has to kill a pidgeon or something and only injures it instead because she tried to be gentle, then it's like, nooope, you can't be gentle. You've got to be brutal to be kind and kill it quick. Can't take the death, get out of the kitchen...

I don't trust my hand strength at this time, though, so... if there were a miniature guillotine, it might seem morbid, but that's what I'd use. I know that there's a device for breaking the necks of rabbits. I think I would need a lot of practice doing that with my bare hands to be successful, and I definitely have a horror of failing--for the animal's sake! I don't want to just injure them with my incompetence so they suffer.

So Ellyn you are saying that if you knew that you would be physically capable of doing this you would raise your own meat and process it?

I often ask my Mama if she would do it again and I get an affirmative NO out of her. She remembers how much work it is and how much easier it is now to go to the store and pick up a whole chicken that is already processed. My whole concept is organic meat that I know what is being fed. The prices of organic meat in our area is way out of our price range.

In many ways I see that it could be impossible for our family to accomplish this if my husband was not on board. He would have to do all of the heavy lifting of the projects and I would essentially be the helper. I was just wondering if more people had experience at this.