Leaving comments here is a a great way to reach me with questions. I read and reply to comments. No posts are too old – one of the wonderful things about the internet.
Retail Direct: We do sell directly to individuals – See the Product menu above. We do not have a farm stand or store front so there is no option of coming to the farm to browse what is available in the freezer. We sell out completely most weeks so there is very little stock in the cooler – we keep most of our stock on the hoof in the fields. If you’re looking to buy in small quantities please visit the many fine stores that carry our products. Also see the Literature page for our brochure, order form and other information. To get the best price buy whole pigs through the CSA, a Whole Pig or consider the Farmer’s Basket.
Wholesale Direct: We primarily sell wholesale to local stores and restaurants throughout Vermont. If you would like to carry our products please see the Wholesale page in the Products menu.
Wholesale Distributors: We do not sell through wholesale distributors since we have our own established weekly delivery route throughout Vermont.
Farm Tours & Visits: We’re not setup to do farm tours. We are happy to show you the pigs from the driveway when you come to pickup piglets or CSA orders but nobody is allowed to walk in the fields for bio-security reasons. Please visit our Farm Blog for stories and pictures from our farm from all the seasons of the year, leave comments and ask questions. See the various Virtual Tour posts in particular. Also check out the Tag Cloud, search box and and Favorite Articles lists in the right column. Want to visit and pet farm animals? Visit Shelburne Farms in the Burlington, Vermont area or Friendly Farm in Dublin, NH for great family fun. They are setup for animal petting and such. They have tame animals that are used to being handled by visitors and will make for a wonderful family outing.
Internships: We’re not setup to do internships or apprenticeships. There are many how-to articles on our Farm Blog that explain how we do things. Look in the right hand column on the blog for a list of favorite articles. If you’re interested in raising pigs check out the Pastured Pork discussion group and the excellent book “Small Scale Pig Raising” by Dirk Van Loon. [Froogle, Amazon]*
Questions: Please leave questions on the various blog posts. I can answer with much more detail in writing and I can provide you with links to more information. It is fine to leave questions on old posts that are relevant to your question or if you’re not sure where then simply use the FAQ. I read all comments. By leaving questions on the blog in comments the information gets shared with others who will have the same questions. This benefits everyone. In fact, I may already have answered your questions. Try the search function in the upper right hand column, the tag cloud a bit lower in the right column, the list of favorite posts, most commented posts and such.
Email: walterj@sugarmtnfarm.com — Best way to reach us.
Mailing Address:
Walter & Holly Jeffries
Sugar Mountain Farm, LLC
252 Riddle Pond Road
West Topsham, VT 05086
Phone is not a good way to reach us as we are generally outside in the fields or woods and we go to bed early. Please do not call after 7 pm even to leave a message. That is family time before bed time and then we’re to bed early. Please do not call me with questions about how to raise pigs, how to vet your pig or to chat. I am really, really, truly not a phone person. I do email and comments on the blog. With the written word I can carefully think out my response and provide links to additional information. See the Questions section above for how to ask questions and find information. If you have a question about ordering and would like to speak with Holly about buying then call her at four-three-nine sixty-four sixty-two in Vermont. The best time to reach Holly on the phone is noon to 2 pm or 4 pm to 7 pm and not on Wednesday or Thursday as she’s generally on the road doing deliveries those days.
I hope you enjoy my blog, a taste of farm and family life in the mountains of Vermont. Perhaps if you are close buy you’ll be able to also enjoy our pork through local stores and restaurants as well as buying directly from use through our CSA, roasters, live piglets or other pork products.
Buy Locally, Think Globally, Do Good, Live Well & Prosper.
Cheers!
Walter, Holly,
Will, Ben & Hope
The Jeffries Family
*Note that I have no affiliation with the book sellers. These are just search patterns that generally will find used copies of this book for you.
I know you’re just launching on wordpress, but I have a request.
I am currently starting your blog from the beginning. When I go to an archived month, it only shows 3 exerpt posts at a time, starting from most recent. In order to read chronologically, I have to click “older posts” a bunch of times in order to get to the beginning of the month.
Since they’re exerpts, I think it would be fine if you listed the entire month or at least half a month per page on the archives. It would sure make catching up on your blog a lot easier. :)
Thanks,
-Ruth
Ruth,
I’m just barely setting up the blog on WordPress. In the old one it did what you ask and in time I’ll make WordPress 3.0 do that too. It will be a while as WordPress 3.0 hasn’t actually been officially released, I’m using a Beta version, and I’m not yet even on my normal domain for the blog, I’m using a test domain so as to not interfere with my original blog install and links. I just switched it from summary to full posts so that will help.
Enjoy the back posts.
Cheers,
-Walter
Hi Walter,
I was wondering if you could give some guidance on choosing which of your female pigs to keep for breeding. Someone told me that if you count the number of teats, that corresponds to their litter size. Is that true? Do you base it on this? Their disposition? Other attributes?
Thanks for any advice you can give!
Kathy, Yes, teat count is definitely one of the things to consider when selecting breeders. Teats on a boar really do matter as it is an indication of how his daughters will produce, just like teats on a sow. We look for even, well developed, large numbers of teats. All of our breeders have at least 14 teats and some have 16. More teats means more capacity to provide milk although how large the breasts develop also makes a difference. Temperament is another very important characteristic for us, we want calm gentle animals. Marbling (as seen in the offspring) is important. Strong legs and feet, symmetry of body, strong muscle development, length, ham and shoulder size, rate of growth (days to finisher size) are also key characteristics to consider. Once the gilt has her first litter and becomes a sow you’ll get to see what her piglets look like and that then becomes a factor in deciding to keep her (how she milks, mothers, farrows, how big the piglets wean, how many, etc).
I found your blog in searching for some way to create something large but lightweight with a semi-smooth concrete look. To be specific I’m trying to make a decorative sphere of about 2 ft diameter. I was thinking of using a 24in. vinyl sport ball as a mold. If I use one of those hypertufa recipes I think it will still be way too heavy for me to lift and plop onto my coffee table. (no need for it to be waterproof though.)
I saw that you have experimented with a super light weight foamy type of concrete mix and I think this would be perfect. Do you have a homemade recipe that would fill the bill? I’ve never done anything like this so I’m really unfamiliar with some of the ingredients you mentioned in your blog or where to buy stuff like that too. Thanks for any help, ~Kelly
It will be heavy at that size. I have played with using styrofoam beads, foam peanuts, air entrainment and such as described on my blog post here. You’ll need to play with it. Soap helps to break the surface tension on the beads. I would suggest a fiber cement and possibly ferro cement. You might want to go with fiberglass instead.
Hi Walter…I love your blog and I hope you recieve this mail. My sow farrowed 2 weeks ago and one of her pigs has a fluid filled lump on her hind right leg. The best way I can describe it is like a small water balloon or, excuse this, breast implant. She does not appear in pain and is behaving normally, I think.(this is our first birth experience). The vet has said it is a cyst and to leave it. I am worried that it is an abcess and should be drained. it seems as though it is getting bigger. have you had any experience with such a thing. Any insight would be great. Thanks!
It does sound like she got a breast implant. The doctor may have missed in the placement… :)
Seriously though, it sounds like a fluid filled cyst. I would wipe it down with iodine or something to clean it and then lance it with a clean scalpel or razor blade. I have had pigs where I didn’t do this and they were fine, others I took care of it. See Cystine. She was covered in these but they went away and by the time she was full size she looked absolutely normal. Not issues at slaughter. In either case, I’m incline to drain it.
Hi Walter,
Your blog has been extremely helpful over the past few months. Thank you for taking the time to write.
I have two gilts and a barrow. They all appear very healthy: they run around, eat normally, their poop looks healthy, and they dive right in to rooting up a new spot of land. However, one of the gilts started shaking/trembling a couple of weeks ago and I don’t understand what it could be. I have asked many others who have raised pigs and they are stumped. As I said, she acts and looks completely healthy other than the shaking. It almost looks like she is shivering but she does it on warm, sunny days in fresh, dry pasture as well. Please let me know your thoughts on this.
Thank you for your time,
Lucas
The two things that come to mind immediately are:
Salt sickness – a lack of access to water and too much salt followed by free access to water can cause the brain to swell causing fits. Not good news. Maybe she’ll get through it if it isn’t too bad. Generally they walk in a circle and end up leaning against something or in a corner. Shivering is common. Continue to give limited amounts of water to baby her through it or harvest her now as a roaster or what ever size she is.
Toxic plants – in the fall especially some plants become more toxic and the available forage decreases so animals are more likely to consume something toxic. Making sure she has plenty of good food, removing toxics are things that help. For the immediate, penning her up for a few days with good food may solve the problem and if that works it indicates this was the issue.
Good luck!
Great blog. Thank you for all the farm tips. THey have been a big help in getting our homestead going.
Hi Walter! A friend of mine connected my blog to her page, and when I went there I saw your blog & remembered your name! How have you been?
Good. We’ve been working on building our butcher shop. It was doing the research for slaughter years ago that had led meat to learn about the USDA’s plans for NAIS.
Hi Walter,
I had a question about pasture raised pork. We are an organic dairy farm in Western P.A. and we also raise organic beef on pasture. The flavor of the beef is significantly better when raised on pasture but you do sacrifice some of the tenderness. We also raise Berkshire pigs and some of the folks that I have spoken to about pasture raising them have said that I will not get the increase in flavor as much as the beef but I will get the loss of tenderness. Have you found that to be the case?
Thanks
Joe
We raise our pigs on a combination of pasture/hay and dairy. See here for details on diet and such. We have no problem with toughness. The meat is juicy and tender. Additionally, the dairy gives the fat a slightly sweet flavor – delicious.
Hi Walter.
Quick question I would assume you have an answer to. Just speaking to friends, they have expressed an interest in purchasing pork from me when the pig are large enough to slaughter. I know I can home slaughter for my own use. Obviously in order to sell “pork”, it must be inspected and processed by a USDA approved facility. Is it allowable for me to sell a live animal and then help the customer to slaughter and process the animal as long as they are the end user of the meat? This would avoid the additional cost of transport to a slaughterhouse as well as the cost for slaughter and processing.
Did you ever notice that slaughter and laughter are only differ by 1 letter? The English language sure is funny sometimes.
Thanks again for all you help.
-Larry Kingman AZ
To sell it one must get it state or USDA inspected in most locations in the United States. I don’t know of any exemptions. There is an exemption that they are working on in Vermont for on-farm slaughter. It passed but I do not think it is fully implemented yet. Check with the Arizona meat inspection department or department of agriculture in your state for details at your state level. I would avoid playing in the grey areas. It just isn’t worth the risks.
I had noticed that close spelling on laughter. There are a lot of funny ones like that. Then there are names. The head of Fish and Wildlife in Vermont was John Buck. In NH the governor is John Lynch – NH is the last state where capital punishment is by hanging. Ironies.
Just wanted to let you know that I used some of your info on a post that I wrote about m quest to eat a whole pig in 2011.
http://www.notafoodie.com/2011/01/22/eating-wilbur-or-the-year-i-ate-a-pig-the-rules/
Next time I’m up your way, I’d love to stop by!
You have a great site, thanks for the pork cut chart! We are still quite new to the processing part of pig and pork production, I just built a smoker and did a few pieces the other day. They came out great but, I wonder if you may have some tips on better smoking practices?
Colin, I’ve never smoked but someday I would like to learn.
Please help, I live in IL and am interested in purchasing a 1/2 or maybe 1/4 of a pig. I was wondering do you ship to IL? If not do you know anyone in my area that you would recommend.
Michaelynn, we don’t currently have pork available for shipping. Go to http://LocalHarvest.org and type in your zip-code. That should bring up some local sources for you. If you don’t find any, let me know.
Hi Walter & Holly,
I just happened upon your site, and wanted to say thank you.
I don’t eat any meat, and haven’t for the past 22 years (of my 37). Most of my friends and family do, however, and I have no real issue with others eating meat. My sadness and disgust arrises from the most commonly used methods of raising/slaughtering ‘feed animals’ so, naturally, it is SO wonderful to see farmers who are humanely raising their animals. I just wanted to let you know (as hopefully others have) that there are those who don’t eat meat who genuinely appreciate what you are doing within the industry. I’m sure it can be challenging. Thanks, also, for blogging about it and so helping to educate.
Thank you.
Hi,
Curiosity is driving me to contact you. I found your site after viewing this article
http://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/local-news/auckland-city-harbour-news/4796275/Zero-waste-and-one-happy-pig
and then wondering if a similar zero waste initiative could get a foothold within Central Vermont. Would your farm be interested in food scraps for your pigs? If so, how many pounds could you use?
Who knows what could happen? It seems like it could be a win-win for everyone.
Shannon
We currently work with several local businesses taking their “wastes” which are actually very good food for livestock. I would be interested in more. We do have to be careful of a few things such as we can’t take post-consumer wastes because of disease issues – everything must be pre-consumer wastes. An example of pre-consumer wastes is the whey we get from the local cheese maker. An example of post-consumer wastes that we had to decline is plate scrapings from a local school cafeteria. We also have to watch out for foreign objects such as broken glass and the like can not be in the feed or it could hurt the animals.
As to how many pounds could we use? Not sure. Currently our animals primarily eat pasture/hay and whey. They are nowhere near satiated with the the other treats they get like the apple pomace, boiled barley and occasional treat of bread. With the number of pigs we have now they could probably eat about 1,000 lbs a day as a rough guestimate. Transportation becomes the other issue.
Hi Walter, I’m interested in raising pastured pigs at our Ontario farm, and so all your posts about dealing with winter has been extremely helpful. What about winter fencing? Our electric fencing gets buried in snow.
To a very large degree the snow itself is our winter fencing. Alternatively use stock panel or pallets with a hot wire inside if you have a small area. Another trick is turning off the lower lines as they become snow covered so they don’t leak electricity and lower the fence voltage. During the real cold of winter there isn’t much conductivity in the snow but come spring, like right now, where the lower wires are in wet snow this becomes a bigger issue.
HI, I am in the Glover/Derby part of vermont. Is there any one that does AI for sows in the area? I have 3 that I want to breed very soon. Im looking for an AI service , such as Select Sires does for cows. Thank You
I don’t know of anyone in New England doing AI for sows. I would ask the Vermont Agency of Agriculture. They may have some leads. I have read that it is fairly easy once you learn to spot the heat.
Hi, we were wondering if you would or could sell some semen? we are caught in a tight spot. Our sows are going into heat this week and we need to get them bred. Another option, is if you know someone that does AI for sows in the area. My sows are in Glover Vt. We are just trying to find someone in a hurry. My wife has done AI alot in the past, so we just need some semen and straws or someone to just go and do it for us. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank You
We don’t sell semen. Interesting idea but I’m not sure if I want to milk boars… :) I’ve read about it with bulls in Jame’s Harriet’s All Creatures Great and Small… I don’t know of a local source. We sell breeding boars. You could let them do their job. Wait until you’re sure and then eat them if you don’t want to keep them. People are very happy with our boars. See here.
Hello, I have been an avid follower of your blog for several years now. The information and lifestyle you share is amazing. In early winter we harvested our first meat from the small tamworth herd we keep. We have eaten most of the meat, save the bacon, which I have not yet cured, but wish to do so shortly. I have bought a couple books on smoking meats and making sausages. Have you any recipes or methods of curing or smoking the bacon or sausages that you would be willing to share?
Try this home recipe as a brine for hams and bacon.
I am new to pigs. I have 2 beautiful sows who have farrowed once about 10 wks ago. We weaned at about 8 wks. They are sisters and have always been together, in 16 ft pens. On dirt. One morning one of them had (and still does) a limp tail. I don’t think they were docked what so ever. It looked like she had 2 teeth marks, one on either side of her tail just above the base. Her anus also looks “loose” and protrudes a little as well as her vagina. I thought she might be in heat and the other sow bothered her. They have been seperated ever since (about a week-10 days). The vagina is still “open” and loose looking. Is this prolapse?? We have touched her and she does not seem to be in pain. There is no crowding and plenty of water.
Biting could cause prolapse or prolapse could cause another pig to investigate and bite. Hard to know now. If she is prolapsing I would slaughter her. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
I thought that I would let you know what is happening with our sow. She keeps switching between looking better and back again. Now that enough time has gone by I can clearly see that she has been somehow injured about 4 to 6 inches above her tail. Instead of having her beautiful big fat round butt, it drops off like her spine is gone and then proceeds to her tail which is still limp. I think she may have suffered a spinal injury. I believe she has been bred, and am hoping for the best, I love her so and her piglets were amazing. Maybe a few of you could put SunShine on your prayer list!!! Thanks, Wendy
Hello,
I saw that you built your own home for a very good price. I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions about it, as I plan on the same type of project. I am merely twenty-one and could use all the wisdom I can get. ~ Andrew.
Fire away with questions. Do read the Tiny Cottage posts. You can leave questions on the appropriate posts – I read all comments and respond to questions. If you’re not sure where to put a question put it on the main cottage page. To get to the first post about the cottage go here and then you can move forward to newer posts.
I accidentally found your site. I love your pigs. We had cows growing up here in California in the central valley. I love that you treat your animals with respect and dignity.
i just found this website and i wanted to know how can I purchase a pig!
Depending on what type of pig you’re looking for check out the following pages:
CSA Pigs as Quarter pigs, Half pigs, Whole pigs and a Decade-of-Pork.
Pork in all its glory.
Piglets to raise yourself.
Breeders to start or improve your own herd – bred gilts & boars.
Roasters for roaster and suckling pigs.
If you’re looking for a pet pig then I strongly suggest reading these posts about pet pigs. We raise farm pigs which get very large, eat a lot of food and produce a lot of manure. Great for a a farm but not so great as a house pet.
Hi, I was wondering where I could find a Pork / Cow butcher style book / pulldown (basically pictures and explainations for the cuts of meat)
-I had a dream that this would be a school-style wall pulldown or poster. :)
Thanks!!
You might be interested in The Meat Buyers Guide : Meat, Lamb, Veal, Pork and Poultry which is put out by NAMP North American Meat Processors Association. For a short cut see my own chart which you’ll find on our Literature page.
Hi, Wonderful site with tons of great information. We have raised a few pigs at a time for a couple years. We are thinking about getting into breeding and raising on pasture. If we don’t have access to dairy would grain be a good supplement? Do you have problems with coyotes or raccoons with the little piglets running around on pasture? We had some chickens that the raccoons got to in the barn. We have had trouble with coyotes getting lambs in the past also. We currently raise beef on pasture and hay. Do you know if pigs and cows would be good together on same pasture?
Thanks
Grain works. The grain feeding of pigs developed as a way of transporting the food value that was being produced in the plains states to the cities. They put the grain into the pigs and make hams & bacon to get a value added product.
We don’t have a problem with predators because we have a pack of livestock guardian herding dogs. They’re pretty emphatic to the pigs that they need to stay in their pastures and they’re extreme about enforcing their now competition clause with the predators – to the point where they eat any predators foolish enough to violate their rules. Fencing helps but won’t stop predators. It really takes fence plus dogs to do the job right.
I have heard of people keeping pigs and cows together. We kept sheep with our pigs for years (we’re currently sheepless) and we also have chickens, ducks and geese free-ranging on pasture with our pigs. We found that during lambing season it was wise to separate the ewes who were about to lamb from the pigs so they had privacy. A newborn lamb is too tempting for a pig to pickup and see if it might be edible.
Hi,
My curiosity about Husky cement mixers led me to your blog.
I really love your farm and you look like a really nice family. It may seem strange, but I just thought I’d say “Merry Christmas.” All the best with your endeavours.
Josh from Nelson, BC, Canada
As everyone else, LOVE you site and the gathering of info from everyone that shares!
I noticed that your site does not have a “follow your blog” via email… i.e. where I would get an email saying you have a new post. Is there a reason you don’t use this function? I’m just playing with WordPress for a blog related to our farm, and trying to figure out how to set it up. Was just wondering if you found a disadvantage to that auto post feature.
We raise Berkshire Hogs, milk our Jerseys and LOVE the fact that there is no waste… excess milk goes to the ‘conversion” factory!
stay warm, Amy
from a very warm, sunny winter in Northern Calif
I just haven’t found a tool I like for doing that yet. If anyone has a favorite plugin for WordPress for doing this then let me know.
Was curious. What’s your ratio of boars to sows in your herds? Also how do you detrimine which get held back as potential keepers? Lastly do you keep the keepers in the herd they were born in or put them in the other herd(s) ?
We have about one breeding boar per 15 to 20 sows typically. Sometime I’ll write a very detailed post about the many scoring criteria I use for picking breeders.
What do you guys do with the pig heads? I have made head cheese a few times with some heads but didn’t get any this year from the person I usually get them from. He didn’t raise any this year. Many farmers throw the heads away after they save the ears and snouts for dog treats. The trotters too. I would be interested in some heads and feet. And intestines for chitterlings.
Hi Mark, We sell the pig heads – great price. Check out the Order Form on the Literature page. There are two in the freezer now and they’re also available fresh. The price on the order form is jowl off and normally the butcher splits them in half. If you would like the head whole just let us know and that can be done too with an advanced order. For a little more you can get them jowl on (jowls weigh about 1 lb per side so just add that – see the Oddments on the order form. We also have pork long bones and soup bones, liver, kidney, heart, trotters, hocks and other delicious parts on the order form. Tails are all currently going to fatty acid research. Unfortunately we can’t currently do intestines, stomach, lungs or blood as the butcher doesn’t have a HACCP/PR for that as required by the USDA. We may do those in the future when we have our own on-farm slaughterhouse and butcher shop up and running. Stay tuned!
Oh, good. I would love to take the couple of heads you have frozen and maybe some other bits and parts you have in the freezer. I would like the jowls on but at this point would love any. Could I stop by Tomorrow?