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Rhodie Ranch

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I scored yesterday. There is a group on FB about local farmers in Southern OR. A young gal posted that she had pork bones to give away. It took a couple of hours to respond to each other, but bottom line is I went over to this tiny pig farm, about 20 min from me. They have some milking cows and some fields she said had triticale growing, which was gorgeous in color. Anyways, there is a box of frozen almost thawed bones. 30 lbs. It was a sow of her's that she got tired of her stinking attitude (pun intended) so she went to freezer camp. She was a good mother with her litters, but she was getting more dangerous at almost 600 lbs. I took half of the bones cus one other gal was coming.

We talked, while she had a baby on her hip, her grandmother with dementia in a tiny bedroom, and her dad coming in from milking, thinking I was a Visiting Angel for his mom. She has 12 sows and all of the current piglets are spoken for. The issue is when they are ready, how will the buyer find a butcher shop. The shops are booked for months on end. She has reservations for future litters too, but again the bottle neck is how to slaughter and part up when its time. There is a butcher shop within walking distance of my home and he's booked into January, his listing says. So if you're growing out something, better stall long enough to be able to time the final stage with a schedule of a shop. Doesn't matter if its a ranch kill or a haul and drop....there are few left who do this kind of business.

I put as many of the bones into the crock pot when I got home and smelled it cooking all night long. Its a rich and creamy broth. cats and dog got the bits and pieces. I have the rest of the bones on ice and will go up to the ex's today to get them refrozen and into my freezer there.

I traded the young gal some heirloom beans from Russ from a few years ago. Also gave her some Loves Lies Bleeding seeds. I felt good about the trade/barter.
 

baymule

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We booked the lambs in January. They went this past week, not in June. Lol I booked the pigs for August when we got them in February. I tried to book the calf we have coming in August for March 2021, but they were already booked into May 2021 and not booking any more. So I called a place an hour away and they were booking in March 2021 and I got a date for the calf we don't even have on the premises yet. Worse comes to worse, I can do it myself. I have slaughtered and processed deer, feral hogs, domestic hogs and plenty of chickens. A steer would be a LOT of work, but push come to shove, we could get it done. We would have to buy more ice coolers, that's Southern style of hanging a carcass.
 

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