The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

Time has not been good to us here at Honey Bee Hill Performance.  I'm sorry for the long period between posts but a lot has been going on, and sad to say, a lot of it has been less than ideal.  We'll start with the good, and see where it goes from there...

Over New Years, my brother decided we were going to butcher and scrape our first hog.  We've never done it before.  We've read about it in books like Foxfire and Henry Stephens Book of the Farm, but the actual practice had thus far eluded us.  

He picked a smaller pig from our July litter, because they were going to do a pig roast for the New Years Eve party.  He never really did grow that well after he had been stepped on, but he was big enough to feed a few folks.

I will say that this was probably the shaggiest, hairiest litter I have EVER SEEN.  He had probably 3 inches of coat on him.  THICK hair.  For those of you who know us, you can see dad here is in fine shape.  This is pre-bovine-attack.

So, we knew the theory was to pour boiling water over the pig.  Why pour? Well, we also knew from our reading that prolonged exposure to boiling water would actually do the opposite of loosen the hair, and would go so far as to set it to where we couldn't get it off, and we were very afraid of that.

So, Mo thought the best way to do this was hanging the pig up.  Remember, first time.  He had purchased these bell scrapers for the job, and we were heating water on a turkey fryer.  For those wanting to do this, I recommend a much larger vessel for heating water.

The steam made it hard to see, and the odor was less than pleasant.  Wherever the boiling water landed, the hair did loosen, but as it cooled going down the pig, there was a lot of wasted water we felt.

We did as much of it as we could with it hanging, but it kept wanting to slide loose, which didn't help matters.  Scraping was hard too.

Then we got smart, and put it on a table. The water was able to cover a greater area at that point, and we found that scraping was MUCH easier.

This is the pig almost finished.  They then gutted him and torched what little fuzzies were left on his feet.

The finished pig in the back seat of my brother's car enroute to the New Years party. 

Now for the bad...

As many of you are aware, our crossbred sow that we were counting on for a litter for the kids did not take when bred to what was a sterile boar.  She was hormonally crazed, and was jumping our purebred hereford gilt that was bred to Hershel from Shipley Swine.  The purebred hereford did take. However, the sow which was twice her size roughed her up so bad that the placenta detached, and the hereford litter was in essence aborted...  So no purebreds.

It gets worse.

The ugly. You know that 'guaranteed bred' sow we drove all the way to Missouri to purchase?  Well, turns out the guy only used the word 'guaranteed' because he didn't actually think anything was wrong, and he didn't mean it.  So when she wasn't bred, we didn't get any of our money back, and he actually wanted us to keep paying on her.  His reasoning was that in purebreds, the litter is worth only 40 percent of the asking price.  But, this wasn't purebred, and more importantly, I bought the sow for the litter, so to me, that litter was 100 percent the asking price.  One thing led to another, and he wanted us to have her butchered and send him the meat, which of course, when you have 1600 dollars invested in a pig that isn't putting out any piglets, you're not going to send the guy meat.  As a woman with fertility problems, the sheer idea of killing an animal without first seeing WHY they're not producing hormones is abhorrent.  Could it be that she was 60+ pounds underweight with ribs showing and two giant abscesses on her back legs that had blown out with raging infections... maybe?  Just maybe?  

Anyway, infections are cleared up and we've got 40 pounds on her. You can still see ribs, but she is improving.  Urine is being tested to see what is going on with her hormones, and if she can be salvaged.  The guy asked if we got her to cycle would we send him more money for her, and Kevin asked the guy, "And if she doesn't, are you going to give us a refund?"  The guy said no, so Kevin said no.  Kevin asked him, "You have to ask yourself. What's your guarantee worth.  A guarantee is your word.  What's your WORD worth?"  

The guy tried to put it in automotive terms, like it somehow would make things better.  He said if you got a loan on a car, and wrecked the car, you're still responsible for paying for the car, and that's true.  But Kevin pointed out that you typically have insurance on said vehicle, which is your GUARANTEE that the vehicle will be paid for if something happens to it.  Then the guy tried to criticize Kevin for coming all the way to Missouri, but I pointed out the message log between the fellow and myself.  When he first told me how much he wanted, I backed out and said that it was too rich for my blood.  The guy came after me and said she'd be a good investment and would do payments and encouraged me to consider it, knowing full well where we were from and our reluctance to make that kind of investment in a hog.  Anyway, end result... we have a pig with no babies, 2 tons of gestation and lactation feed with no litters on the ground, and our budget for the year absolutely fubar.

I don't think the guy meant for any of this to happen.  I just think he's a really really poor businessman, who doesn't even own a 250 dollar ultrasound machine, who probably needs to improve the conditions his animals are kept in.  I also think it was partially my fault for not demanding to see good pictures of the sow before we traveled 1800 miles on the word of someone I did not know personally.  When we have crap happen in our business, we have to eat it, because it's not our customer's fault.  It may not be our fault either, but that's the risk you take when you're in business.  A guarantee is your word.  What's your word worth?

I will say that perhaps the bright side to all of this is that we have had a wonderful group of people come together to make sure our children will have good, competitive pigs to show.  I want to let this be a shout out to some true gems in this industry, who really do make it all about the kids.  

To Surface Showpigs -- Thank you for holding our hand through this entire experience, and for helping Tiffany and Levi have some animals to show.  This guy is a real hero when it comes to kids in 4-H.  His willingness to work with the kids is just beyond compare, and he's a true example of someone who's not in it for the money.

To Travis Meyerholtz -- Thanks a million for helping us with the craziness of inducing and all that entailed, and for hooking us up with K and T showpigs.  

To LG Genetics -- Thanks for answering my million questions and your support.  

To Heather and Lee Helvey -- Thank you so much for just being there, crossing your fingers, cheering and commiserating when things didn't go the way we had hoped.

To Mark and Kambe Mabry -- You guys are great. Will be crossing our fingers for May pigs out of Outreach, and hope to get some Hamps next year from you all.

To Rickey Heavilin -- You're a saint, and thanks for your support and help.  We appreciate it so much.

To Clesie Hines Davidson -- For making me realize I'm not alone in my suffering.  Friends bonded in misery and hope for the future. :)

And Lisa Brooks and Edith Wade -- For letting me vent, and giving me good tips for the future.

If I've missed anyone, I'm sorry.  It's times like this when you are able to look around after the dust settles and see the gems shining for who they are.  Sometimes, I think that the only way to learn these lessons is the hard way.  Here's hoping that Fall of 2014 and Spring of 2015 is a few octaves higher than this year. :)