Postcard from a Slaughterhouse: The Ones that Got Away

By Joe Cloud

One of the more fascinating things about working as a meat processor for a large number of small farmers is the diversity of their livestock. I never quite know what to expect from day to day.

On New Years’ Eve alone we had heritage Gulf Coast and Highland Cheviot sheep; Berkshire, Duroc, and Tamworth hogs; and Black and Red Angus cattle.  One Gulf Coaster was a large ram with an excellent curling rack of horns, which his owner had us save for his sons.

I completely understand that sentiment: visitors to my home are met at the end of the driveway by a large bony skull with great down sweeping horns, placed strategically where it can scare the bejesus out of unsuspecting guests when the glare of their headlights catches the thing on a dark night. The skull is what remained of a small group of Scottish Highland cattle that passed through the T&E plant.

A few weeks ago we had two of the most unusual animals I have ever seen in our barn. The owner had called to say that he had a couple of mature Texas Longhorns and asked if we’d be able to process them. “Sure, bring ‘em in" was our reply.  I wasn’t at T&E Meats when they arrived, but I was definitely impressed when I finally saw them.  Most cattle have prosaic numbered ear tags, but the tags on these animals set them—and their owner — apart. They had names, not numbers.  The black and white female was “Queen of Spades,” and the magnificent yellow-brown bull was “Gingerbread Boogie.”

His horns were an amazing 62” from end to end. And don’t think for a minute that he didn't know where those tips were. When I first went out to see him, he walked up to the door of the pen. I had heard that he was tame, so I put my hand through boards, thinking he might want his chin scratched. Well, he jumped back with a snort, glared at me, then very deliberately and slowly swung his head, bringing the left horn tip to where my hand had been. “Bam!” He slammed the tip against the stall door with impressive power.  He deliberately brought the right horn tip around and repeated the  gesture, then stared at me as if to say, “Now we understand each other, don’t we?” 

Queen of Spades lifted her tail and had a pee. I watched as Gingerbread Boogie tasted her urine, sticking his tongue in the stream, then curling his lips back and inhaling deeply to catch the fine aromas, like a wine aficionado with a premier cru Burgundy.  Bulls do this to see if the cow is coming into heat. Here he was in the abattoir, and he was enthusiastically thinking of one last fling. I admired his spirit.

We ran the kill floor the following day when I was away at a meeting. I called in for a progress report, and my staff told me that things hadn’t gone well. Gingerbread Boogie’s horns were too long to make it up the lane into the knock box, so they had called his owner to come take them back home.

I can’t say I was sorry to hear that they were back on pasture.  We have work to do, but we admire the animals and their beauty too.

Joe Cloud is a partner in True & Essential Meats, a small slaughterhouse in Harrisonburg, Va.

Organic Heavyweights Back Vilsack

In an interesting move, a number of heavyweights in the organic food and farming world have launched a website supporting the nomination of Tom Vilsack as secretary of agriculture.

The people behind this effort include Denise O'Brien, the organic farmer who ran for secretary of agriculture of Iowa; Walter Robb, co-president of Whole Foods; Gary Hirshberg, founder and CEO of Stonyfield Farms; Bob Scowcroft, executive director of the Organic Farming Research Foundation; Wayne Pacelle, CEO of the Humane Society of the United States; and many others.

I'm curious that this coalition felt compelled to take this step -- presumably to counter the criticism of groups like the Organic Consumers Association and possibly to leave open the door to Vilsack's office, once he is confirmed. As Scowcroft says on the site:

In recent weeks I have spoken to many of my colleagues in Iowa and toothers in the sustainable and organic agriculture communities nationwide. They spoke of a governor who listened seriously to their concerns and when politically possible provided workable solutions. Mind you I have no illusions concerning how “Washington works” and the challenges facing a USDA (never mind the nation and the world!) mired in systems that are unsustainable and in many cases broken beyond repair. The agro-industrial status quo will not easily give up its hold on power. Nevertheless many of us are working hard to advance highly qualified candidates for the Deputy Secretary and the under secretary positions. Governor Vilsack and the Obama Transition committee have taken our nominations seriously, and I believe they are working to bring a number of these candidates into the new USDA leadership.

Have Your Say: Organic Grazing Rule Comment Due Dec. 23

By Samuel Fromartz

If you've finished your holiday shopping and want to get your activist juices flowing, consider this for a minute: a crucial deadline is coming on Tuesday for comment on regulations for grazing organic livestock.

Grazing? Regulations? Before you click away, consider that organic dairy farmers have been fighting for at least 8 years to get a regulation in place that insures products like organic milk, remain organic. And that is important for a lot of people who drink organic milk -- the best-selling product in the organic market.

Here's the gist. We think of organic animals out on pasture, munching grass on an organic farm. But in the past, organic regulations required only that cows have "access to pasture" which was less than the words suggest. Some big operations flouted the rules, keeping their cows confined rather than out munching good, fresh grass. Access was a gate that was sometimes open, but mostly closed.

OK -- so after years of fighting, regulation writing, comment periods in which dairy farmers descended on Washington and asked for tougher regulations, the USDA's National Organic Program actually came up with one.

Parts of it are quite good, requiring at least 120 days on pasture and 30% nutrition from fresh grass. Farmers applauded. I called it a "big win for organic integrity" in a couple of media interviews.

I still view it that way -- but it needs some basic changes, ones which if they aren't made will actually have the effect of knocking the majority of organic livestock farmers out of the business.

How so?

Well, first off, the proposed regulation would require that cows be outside all year long. The common practice of putting them in a barn or a livestock pen in the winter when no grass is growing has been written off in favor of keeping them on land called "sacrificial pasture" during the non-grazing season.

That means that when the ground is frozen or covered in snow, the animals will be corralled onto a piece of pasture that is then sacrificed. The word is well chosen because the ground will be trodden, manure will accumulate and a good section of pasture will be lost probably for good due to soil compaction.

In rainy regions, like northern California or the Pacific Northwest, the situation may well be worse. Cows will be kept in muddy fields, causing manure runoff into streams, and potentially endangering the health and welfare of the animals.

"There's no recognition of regional or climate variations," Albert Straus, the owner of Straus Organic Dairy in Marin County, California, said. "If this goes through, there is a good chance we will no longer be organic."

He noted that keeping the animals out on pasture year-round contradicts state environmental regulations meant to prevent manure run-off during the winter rainy season.

In the northeast, the sentiment is much the same.  "Very few farmers use something like sacrificial pasture during the non-grazing season because they just don't have the land base, or the right soil type," said Ed Maltby, executive director the Northeast Organic Dairy Farmers Alliance, who was a vocal proponent for a new pasture regulation.

Instead, in places like Vermont and Maine, many organic dairy farmers bring their animals into barns for the coldest winter months, or keep them in barn yards where manure can be removed and fresh hay bedding provided. Then, when the grass is growing again in the spring, the cows are put out in fields.

In short, while many proponents were overjoyed that the USDA finally acted on getting a new pasture regulation, "it was way too perscriptive," said Jim Riddle, a longtime trainer of organic certifiers who served as chairman on the National Organic Standards Board that recommended new pasture regulations.

"To require an animal to graze during the grazing season does not require the level of detail in this proposed rule," he said.

There are many other issues with the regulation, but I will mention just one more -- a requirement that does away with grain finishing of organic livestock. Now, although I'm a proponent of grass-fed beef, a requirement that limits does away with grain finishing of organic beef animals would quash the organic meat market. (It does so by requiring 30% nutritional intake from pasture during the finishing period as well.) 

The result would be to block a lot of farmers from raising organic livestock and further shift the market to overseas producers in Australia and Uruguay who export organic meat to the U.S. market. (Yes, even with the growth and awareness of local foods).

Why do some U.S. organic farmers finish their animals on grain? Because they want to receive the premium they get with a "choice" USDA label, which requires the fat marbling that comes with grain finishing. They can avoid that if they raise grass fed animals and sell them direct to the public, but as much as I applaud that nascent movement, it is a minute portion of the market. Many Americans still want marbled beef, even if they are looking for the organic label.

"If the regulation stands, a lot of livestock farmers tell me they're going to get out of organic," said Dave Carter, another former NOSB chairman and executive director of the American Bison Association.

But it isn't just an economic issue. Riddle said that animals can be raised responsibly and organically and still be finished 120 days on grain. "An organic animal finished on grain is significantly different than a conventional animal finished on a CAFO," he said, because of organic requirements that ban antibiotics, hormones, and ensure environmental and humane animal treatment.

The National Organic Coalition came up with a compromise that allows grain finishing for 120 days but also requires the animals have access to pasture. At first glance, this imperfect compromise makes sense.

The main point -- the new regulation is a good one: it requires that animals graze. But it should be rewritten to be less prescriptive, so that farmers can actually meet its requirements and it achieves its broader goal; that is, getting animals out on grass but also protectng their health and the environment during the non-grazing season.

A number of organizations have the means for commenting to the USDA (with proposed language). Here are a few:

- Northeast Organic Dairy Farmers Alliance
- National Organic Coalition
- Organic Farming Reseach Foundation
- Organic Consumers Association
- Cornucopia Institute

But remember, comment is due Tuesday, so read this and act.

Image link: NODPA

Obama's USDA Secretary "Maybe Won't Suck?"

Obama's pick of former Iowa governor Tom Vilsack as Agriculture Secretary set off a round of criticism in the blogusphere, because many of us were hoping that a more progressive leader would have a shot. It wasn't to be. 

Unlike his visionary pick of Steven Chu as Energy Secretary, Obama tapped a centrist with a long cozy relationship with Monsanto -- the GMO king -- a soft touch on CAFOs (factory animal farms) and a taste for corn ethanol. These might be called the three deadly sins of sustainable agriculture.

The indefatigable Kerry Truman over at Huffington Post has a fine round up of all the criticism, but then does one better: she actually contacted someone who worked with Vilsack for years, Denise O'Brien, the organic farmer who ran for Iowa's Secretary of Agriculture in 2006. O'Brien's comments are illuminating, because she actually tried to shift the status quo in the heart of corn country. She found Vilsack listened, and even offered his support when she had a shot at state office. Sadly, she lost.

I won't summarize her sentiments -- just click on over on the link. The upshot?  Maybe the dial shifts a bit with Vilsack. But for it to go further, advocates of a very different vision of food and farming will have to keep up their work. Recall, after two decades of pushing for reform, it's still the early innings on the national stage.

Organic Sustainable Department of Food?

Jim Riddle, a former chair of the National Organic Standards Board who is now organic outreach coordinator at the University of Minnesota, tells me he is actively seeking a position at the USDA.

If he is named as organic adviser to the secretary, or head of the Agricultural Marketing Service, this would be a big gain for sustainability. Riddle worked tirelessly for years on the NOSB, trying to keep organic food truly organic. And he did that while working in partnership with the USDA -- not an easy feat. He has trained organic inspectors since the late 1980s and walks the talk.

"My wife, Joyce, and I have lived off the grid since 1984, producing all of our power from the sun, wind, and woods, living in our owner-built, energy-efficient earth-sheltered home. We raise a big garden and put up much of our food. For us, sustainability and green living are not just slogans – they are a way of life," he says.

I already noted that Kathleen Merrigan of Tufts is angling for a major post in the department. If Obama is serious about change -- in the food and agricultural sector -- these are the type of appointments his team should make, mirroring the encouraging news of Nobel Laureate Steven Chu to head the department of energy.

As for agriculture secretary, Nicholas Kristof put it well in the NY Times -- it's time for Obama to shift the focus of the department away from agribusiness interests and put it squarely on food.

He also linked to a petition advocating several names to head the department -- which I previously signed. The Ethicurean blog also has a good post summing up the leading candidates, the gist of which is that no front-runner has emerged.
- Samuel Fromartz

A Video Interlude from the Troubles

Whatever those troubles may be.

The backstory on this project, Playing for Change, is at Bill Moyers Journal, starting at 3:45 in the piece . (Thanks for the tip, Ron).

Food for Thought: Holiday Book Picks

Uncertain Peril

Clare Hope Cummings

"It comes down to this: whoever controls the future of seeds controls the future of life on earth.” Claire Hope Cummings isn’t afraid to snap her readers to attention with statements like that, but between wallops her writing is thoughtful, nuanced and carefully argued. She presents two books in one: first, a twisted history of how agricultural seeds have gone from public to private, particularly through genetic engineering; second, a hopeful vision for the future inspired by what Cummings sees as the central character of seeds—generosity. Uncertain Peril is a thorough primer on seed-related issues, but its excellent research and unusual narratives makes it a good read even for a seasoned farmer activist. - Lisa M. Hamilton

Closing the Food Gap
Mark Winne
You've heard the gripe: sustainable foods aren't accessible. But that doesn't mean they can't be. Mark Winne worked on getting good, healthy, local food into poor communities for decades and offers a sobering primer in this book. He doesn't just offer in-the-trenches stories of setting up farmers markets and food banks but of dealing with the political, economic and cultural impediments of feeding low-income communities. One solution inHartford: simply altering a bus route so poor residents could get to a decent grocery store. Another in Philadelphia: building out independent inner city grocery stores. In other words, solutions exist. They just aren't off-the-shelf. 

 - Samuel Fromartz

The Mad Farmer Poems
Wendell Berry
The lines in Wendell Berry’s latest book braid together the author’s many voices—wry satirist, defiant agrarian, gentle naturalist. Together these short poems aim to address, somehow, a world he finds both perilous and filled with beauty. “That is the glimmering vein/of our sanity,” he writes, “dividing us/from the start: land under us/to steady us when we stood,/free men in the great communion/of the free. The vision keeps/lighting in my mind, a window/on the horizon in the dark.” - LMH

Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper
Fuchsia Dunlop
I came upon this book, subtitled “a sweet-sour memoir of eating in China,” after cooking with Fuchsia Dunlop’s excellent cookbooks on Sichuan and Hunan. A Brit foodie with a serious Jones for Chinese cuisine, specifically street food, she finagled her way into cooking school in Sichuan. From there to the far flung kitchens she visited, she honed her craft and immersed herself in a culture. Two caveats about this engaging book: first, you must love Chinese food, real versions of which are rare in the U.S. Secondly, you need a strong stomach for things we wouldn’t eat but which she eagerly pops in her mouth. If those are met, I see no better way to learn about the phenomenon that is China rising than through her food. - SF

Pet Food Politics
Marion Nestle
You're pet food isn't only pet food. It's intimately connected with the human food chain, as Marion Nestle shows in this short, incisive read. She weaves together the various strands of the melamine pet food disaster in 2007 and shows how the weak links in the (pet) food chain put our food at risk. If you're a pet owner who wants a primer on the incident, this is your book. If you're concerned about pet food that isn't just fed to pets -- well, this book is for you too. - SF

American Farmer
Paul Mobley and Katrina Fried 
This hulking, oversize book is a bear to get off the coffee table and into your lap, but it's worth it. The more than 150 portraits of farmers and farm families from throughout the United States are gorgeous, saturated with color and character. Organic-minded foodies might be disappointed to find it focuses on more conventional farmers, but that's the book's strength: it offers a sympathetic yet honest portrait of the whole spectrum of American farmers, not just the ones who make it to the pages of the dining section. - LMH

Cookbooks

Fish Without A Doubt
Rick Moonen and Roy Finamore
No food is more intimidating to cook than fish, which is why people tend to save it for restaurants. That's a shame because it's actually one of the most versatile and fastest-cooking proteins around. Still, if sea creatures intimidate you, Moonen is your man. He balances challenging recipes with work-a-day meals in this lovely book, with a big emphasis on tips: that is, how to buy, store and work with fish. (The big winner in my book: paillards, or thin slices, of wild salmon seared on a cast iron grill in a minute or two. My five-year-old gobbles them up.) Another bonus is that every fish in this book is sustainable, and with so many options there's really no reason to eat anything else. In short, this book is an indespensible kitchen companion. - SF

Barefoot Contessa Back to Basics
Ina Garten
Everyone has their go-to cookbooks. Well worn and batter-splattered, with recipes you eventually know-by-heart. Ina Garten’s Barefoot Contessa Cookbook is one of mine. That’s why I was genuinely excited about her new Back to Basics. Garten’s all about flavor. Her take on simple still means elegant enough for company, but stress-free for me. Not so confident in the kitchen? This cookbook is one you can lean on, offering tips from how to garnish to an FAQ in the back answering questions on raw eggs and kosher salt. - Clare Leschin-Hoar

Renewing America's Food Traditions
Edited by Gary Paul Nabhan
Gary Paul Nabhan has been on a mission of connecting food to place, and in this gorgeous book zeros in on vanishing heritage foods. Organized around region, he offers foods from a once rich and diverse culinary landscape. The stories about these folk and Indian foods make for good reading, and while the recipes sound exotic, they were once as common as corn chips are today. A few that caught my fancy: "Broken crab and Choppee okra stew," "Crow bison cattail stew," "Cape Cod cranberry scones," and "Choctaw persimmon pudding" -- the latter, an immediate possibility since the fruit is now in season. - SF

Fresh & Honest
Peter Davis
In this book, local-foods champion Peter Davis celebrates the growers who’ve been supplying his Cambridge, MA-based restaurant for years. While some of the recipes are ambitious for a home cook, plenty are satisfying and winter-hardy like the maple stout-marinated beef brisket or the gingerbread cake with fresh cream.  - CLH

Christmas Cookies
Lisa Zwirn
Sam already knows I’m baking-impaired and cookie swaps give me anxiety. That’s why I’m enjoying Lisa Zwirn’s new cookbook Christmas Cookies. Fifty choices aren’t overwhelming and range from lemon squares (my favorite) to chocolate peppermint cookies. - CLH

A Quiet Wave Building -- Food Insecurity

Poverty hardly ever makes the news, though it's getting harder to ignore these days, with the rise in unemployment and loss of 1.3 million jobs in the first 10 months of the year. The national unemployment rate is 6.5 percent, though for people 25 and older without a high school diploma -- a heavily low income group -- it is already about 10.3 percent and economists talk about the jobless rate peaking a full year from now.

All of which means "food insecurity" is growing. That bland term describes people who don't have enough to eat, never mind the good healthy food the readers of this blog aspire to. In a good summary, the Nation's editor, Katrina Vanden Heuvel, writes:

According to the USDA's annual report on food security, nearly one ineight Americans struggled with hunger in 2007 -- which means "36.2 million adults and children... didn't have the money or assistance to get enough food to maintain active, healthy lives." 691,000 children "suffered a substantial disruption in the amount of food they typically eat" -- a more than 50 percent increase from 2006 and the highest number since 1998.

Now, non-profits are running thin on donations and food banks are getting low -- precisely the scenario food activist Mark Winne presented in his recent interview with me. He elaborates his position in a recent blog post, saying the solution is not a dramatic increase in charity but rather a dramatic decrease in poverty at the root of food insecurity.

Hopefully the stimulus program under discussion by the Obama transition team and on Capitol Hill will do just that -- create jobs not just bailouts -- and not a moment too soon.

Meanwhile, if you want to see what's happening to the white collar workforce check out this chart of fourth quarter layoffs over at the WSJ blog Real Time Economics.

- Samuel Fromartz

Mind-Boggling Jersey Tomatoes, Circa 1933

Reading a post over at Ethicurean about the concentration of tomato processing in California reminded me of a picture in Ed Kee's Saving Our Harvest: The Story of the Mid-Atlantic Region's Canning and Freezing Industry. More than 1,000 independent canning operations were located in the mid-Atlantic at the end of the 19th century, feeding the East Coast. (Ed is an extention agent at the University of Delaware who generously gave me a copy of the book).

The photo above is of tomato trucks lined up in front of Campbell Soup Co. plant in Camden, N.J., in 1933 -- yes, this was the Garden State until the garden moved West. Here's one of the many labels in the book:

 

- Samuel Fromartz

A 75th Anniversary: I'll Drink to That

By Clare Leschin-Hoar

As if our current economic woes weren't enough to remind us of the 1930s, this Friday, December 5th, marks the 75th anniversary of the repeal of Prohibition. It lasted 13 thirsty years until 1933. That's reason to celebrate -- even if you might be feeling a bit pinched lately.

While I've never had to imbibe in any bathtub gin or homemade hooch, it's exciting to see some of the country’s best bartenders bringing back some authentic vintage-era cocktails made from ingredients like rye, applejack and plenty of gin.

In Boston, cocktail guru Jackson Cannon of Eastern Standard brushed up on his Prohibition history, and has been reviving cocktails like the Jack Rose, El Presidente, The Scofflaw Cocktail and the Monkey Gland in a year-long celebration. It culminates in a roaring Twenties-themed costume dinner and party Thursday night.

Speakeasy's have also sprung up. In New York City, there's cozy PDT, which stands for “Please Don’t Tell”. Don’t know where to find it? Head to hot-dog joint Crif Dogs on St. Marks Place and look for a vintage-style phone booth where you pick up the receiver and press the button. If you measure up, you’re buzzed in through a secret door where bartender Jim Meehan slings era-appropriate cocktails in a low ceiling room.

In Chicago, Violet Hour and their famed bartender, Toby Maloney are where locals go for speakeasy cocktails. At San Francisco’s stylish Bourbon & Branch, patrons can nurse whiskey mash in a room with red velvet walls, or they might hop over to 21st Amendment which is holding a "repealebration celebration" on Friday.

For the aspiring mixologist, here's a couple of recipes below the fold.

Scofflaw Cocktail
Courtesy of Jackson Cannon

1 ½ ounces rye whiskey
1 ounces dry vermouth
¾ ounce grenadine
¾ ounce lemon juice

Shake, strain into a chilled lowball, channel knife lemon twist over the glass, no garnish.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

& (yes, it’s called the “&” cocktail.)
Courtesy of Jackson Cannon

1 ounce Old Tom Gin
1 ounce brandy
1 ounce sweet vermouth
Dash of orange bitters

Shake, strain into a martini glass, no garnish.

Anatomy of a Thanksgiving Meal

By Lisa M. Hamilton

In celebration of Thanksgiving, I'm offering a photo essay that documents a unique raising turkey collaboration in the one-time poultry capital of California, Petaluma. A local Slow Food group, whose members wanted to raise heritage breed turkeys as part of the organization’s efforts to save endangered food species, got together with the local 4H club, which was focused on breeding another endangered species, young farmers.

"Sometimes when I explain what we do people look at me like I'm a monster," Cathy Thode, one of the project's organizers, told me. "I see it differently. We've raised these birds from day one, we know everything they've ever eaten, and we know that right up to their last breath they were never once mistreated. If you're going to eat meat, well, I think this is the way it should be done."

While some of the images are not for the faint of heart, if you eat turkey, the story is worth a trip.

Images: © 2008 Lisa M. Hamilton

Postcard from a Slaughterhouse

This post was contributed by Joe Cloud, a former landscape architect who took a career course change and bought a family-owned slaughterhouse in Harrisonburg, Virginia, near his family's farm. His partner in the venture, True and Essential Meats, is Joel Salatin, the grass-based livestock farmer featured in Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma. These small operations are fast disappearing (the former owners were in their 70s), meaning smaller farmers lack options to slaughter livestock. Cloud hopes to grow the business of sourcing from local farms but that is still just a small portion of the operation.

By Joe Cloud

As owner/operator of a small local slaughterhouse, I see a lot of pigs over the course of a month.  Some of them are raised in industrial operations in Pennsylvania.  We buy them to make sausage in my plant. The rest are brought in by small farmers from all over Virginia to be slaughtered and processed for sale in farmer's markets, at restaurants, and directly to consumers.

The pigs all spend a day to several weeks in the humble little barn behind my plant.  The moments when I go out to feed and water them are among the best parts of my day.  Alone in the cobwebby old structure, I talk to them, bring them their corn ration, and take a moment to just watch them being pigs. I like to touch the pigs while feeding them -- lay a hand on a round hip, feel the warmth and the coarse bristle against my skin.  Perhaps this is strange, knowing we will soon take their life, but I appreciate the sense of connection. This morning it was cold, and I had to smile looking at a pile of Joel Salatin's Polyface pigs peacefully sleeping in a big pile to keep warm.

It is fun to step into a pen full of hogs – and informative. Joel's little pig dudes run up eagerly like curious dogs, and immediately cover your legs with inquisitive round snouts checking out the smells.  No fear or shyness here. They run and jump around, snuffeling  excitedly.  Black, tawny, red, spotted, their coats literally shine with health. Glossy bristles give their bodies a bright sheen.

But when I step into a pen of industrial hogs, the atmosphere is completely different.  Sunk in a sleepy torpor, they lack awareness, and they startle with alarm. When you surprise a pig, they bark like dogs and scurry mindlessly around. Perhaps I should say hobble – many of them limp.  Raised on hard concrete, their feet and joints are malformed, and they live in pain. The deep sawdust in my barn is the best they have ever had.  Their white flanks and shoulders are covered with bloody scrapes – they have been fighting, working to establish their dominance hierarchies in middle age.  Unlike Joel's hogs who are raised together in their little band in the woods, the industrial hogs have no sense of a pecking order because they have not grown up together.

We'd like to process hogs from small local farms, but that isn't an option right now. There aren't enough hogs raised locally.  We bought a going concern with two dozen employees and customers to take care of. But the hope is to build these new local markets. Then maybe all the hogs out in the barn will be like Joel's. One day.
Image: T&E Meats