This Little Piggie Stayed At Home

A flitch of bacon hanging in the kitchen will do more for domestic harmony than a thousand Methodist tracts and sermons. William Cobbett

Tom Hodgkinson writes: I set up this site in order to draw attention to the confusion around keeping and killing pigs at home. It’s my intention to clarify the law on this matter so people have a clear guide.

Last November, we killed two pigs at home and shared out the meat in our household. But one morning, following my description of the killing in a Sunday Times article, we were visited by a man from the local environmental health department, who told us that we should have had the pigs killed at the slaughterhouse.

We argued that it is more humane to kill them at home: one moment they are happily snuffling, the next they are dead. There are none of the inevitable stresses of the slaughterhouse. No one doubts to that the taste of the meat is better from home-killed pigs.

I was sent a pile of material from the Food Standards Agency, accompanied by a stern letter ticking me off.

However, Three Counties radio contacted DEFRA who say that it is in fact lawful to kill your own pigs at home. You can eat the meat and share it out with your household, but you would not be allowed to sell it on the market.

This is perhaps where the confusion lies, as Food Standards consider giving food to your family to be a version of putting on the market, even though no money changes hands.

If anyone has any experience in this matter and would like to offer their views, please do so via the contact form on this website.

41 Responses to “This Little Piggie Stayed At Home”

michael said:

You can kill a pig at home and eat it. But you should not. This is what the man from the local environmental health department meant.
Nicola said:

You know Michael, it’s not a problem to be able to buy everything you want…pork, lamb, chicken, x-rated toys… the problem is, why I have to pay a lot of money for something I can do better, with more care and in a friendly way? Here, in Italy I don’t want to produce more rubbish, so, like Tom, I rise my chicken, my vegetable, I produce my bread and my soap… zero waste and a lot of fun! Oh! For everybody… I’m not an elderly Hippie gone on dope or a new-ager, till December I was a manager in a big restaurant in the town centre, good smile, good hairdress, manicure and all this stuff… now I’m in vacation.

For the discussion on topics: I don’t really know how it works, here in Italy. I think the same as in England. A neighbor of mine, told me you can kill just one pig a year and not by yourself… the same for chicken, but they close an eyes for that…

Good work!

Nicola (torino, Italy)
Georgina said:

Hi,

I have no pigs but I like wildboars. They are pigs, aren’t they, but I’m not sure how they are killed other than by shooting them. Is there anything against that? I don’t think so. If you go out with your guns and your dogs and shoot things to eat you don’t need to take a slaughterman with you. You just shoot them and eat them. Same with pigs.
Georgie, Hants
Sally Jacob said:

Good to know that Defra are as dumb as ever!! Keep on rearing your pigs & giving them a happy life & “happy” death at home!
If more people reared their own pigs, sheep, chickens… et al, then not only would we have tastier, safer food but happier animals. To say nothing of the pleasure of the taste of said animals.
Rise up & protest about this antiquated, ludicrous petty-foggery to ensure that we can live freely & raise our own livestock freely & slaughter them humanely at home.
I consider the authorities who insist that we all follow the letter of the law to be unworthy of eating great tasting home-reared, home-slaughtered & home-butchered meat.
Let them eat cheap & nast meat from a supermarket & hope they all get tummy bugs, or, at the very least, incredible heartburn & indigestion!!
michele hutchinson-brown said:

Loved your article , having just watch a program on tele Thurs 20 March about Spain and Iberico Ham I went out an bought some the next day NOW THAT IS REAL FOOD. I say lets make it possible for owners, farmers, small holders etc to Kill and Sell there own meat/animals by a registered slaughter man just to keep the diesese thing under control. Thanks Tom love your work

PS says this article appears 23 feb 2007 i read it 23 march 2008.
Valerie Aldred said:

The only way that we can do what you rightly suggest which is to rear and humanely slaughter the animals that we have fed and cared for and given a happy and safe life, is to move abroad. More and more and more of our rights and liberties are daily being withdrawn from us and we all sit back in quiet acceptance. We now live under a near dictatorship dressed up to look like a democracy and the saddest thing is that the other lot don’t promise anything better. Keep on plugging and you may just get there in the end. Good luck!
anonymous said:

I grew up on a livestock farm & have a degree in Agricultural Animal Science. I am no stranger to the small local abbatoirs that used to exist & have also worked on contract to a supermarket in their ‘meat processing’ division – no suprise to hear that this involved a handful of enormous slaughterhouses. Enough on my dreary existence.

I am in favour of home slaughter when the individuals can engineer a humane dispatch. I also feel that more help should have been given to small local abbatoirs to meet the standards imposed by the government. The large units are efficient, but not necessarily better – especially when livestock travel such ridiculous distances.

Responsible local abbatoirs with adequate storage for maturing meats could provide high quality meats to whole communities – not just to those fortunate enough to be able to rear thier own beasties.
Sylvia Lingwood said:

I was in the middle of adding my comments to the campaign when it cleared down, so I’m afraid that you may have an unfinished article. Please let me know if anything reached you? – if not I’ll send again
Many thanks
Ben Moe said:

I think you’ll find (according to the Humayne Killinges Act 1673) that you are allowed to slaughter your own pigs, as long as you only use dynamite to do so.
Nick Doll said:

Food and drink programmes in the UK delight in showing us the practice of French and Spanish farmers slaughtering their pigs on the farm and preparing mouth watering sausages and hams as a result. We should insist on equality of opportunity within the EEC ! Come on Brussels do something worhwhile for a change.
angelo (Italy) said:

I read your site (the idler) today, and I found it interesting and refreshing. Then I stepped by this other site of yours. In Calabria, the Italian region I come from, there still is the habit to breed the pig and then sloughter it at home, although it is forbidden by the low.
Here is a story from the tradition I wanted you to know:
Once upon a time in a farm there was a pig. He lived in the pigpen from where every day he could see and make fun of the donkey who worked hard under its heavy loads: “You see” he used to tell him “you work so hard and I am here, fed and spoiled, doing nothing but enjoying the pleasures of life!”
Finally, one day the donkey stopped by the pigpen and replied: “You know what mate, I don’t think you’re the same of last year’s!”

Thanks for the things you write, I entered your site among my favourite ones.

Ciao, Angelo

PS: The Patron Saint for pigs in Italy is Sant Antonio da Padova and in Calabria all pigs are named Antonio (‘Ntò)
alex scrivens said:

You really couldn’t imagine any thing less pastoral.. tall fine chickens running freely on a Welsh hillside farm, a bunkhouse for walkers with their own free range eggs, mountain streams and birch woods… but soil association guidelines for chicken rearing required exorbitant investment and thus prevented him from gaining a valuable organic label…so no market for him at Brecon county market.

Trouble is, food snobs think that organic eggs are in some way better then eggs laid by the bantams out in the back shed…we all know the truth here…only warm eggs with chicken poo on them taste best..especially if they were laid in the back of an old morris minor.

Food snobs…you’re the reason why it’s so crap here.
Roger said:

I am an Environmental Health Officer and my understanding of the law is that it is possible to kill a pig at home provided that only you or your family eat it. As a qualified inspector won’t have looked at the carcass, the meat it is technically classed as “unfit for human consumption” for the purposes of sale. The definition of sale is wider than just the exchange of money, and the definition of family seems to be a bit of a grey area.

The legislation is there to protect the vast majority of the public who buy their meat without knowing anything about where it comes from and I would support this wholeheartedly (the legislation, not the industrialisation of the meat industry!). It should not however criminalize smallholders who wish to take the responsibility of food production into their own hands and I do not believe it was ever intended to do so. This seems to be a good example of conflicting opinion in an area of complex legislation so I will contact DEFRA, LACORS, the FSA and others to try to get some sort of definitive answer for you. If, as I suspect, the answer is that you can kill your own animal subject to a few provisos then I will see if we can put the do and don’t bits into the sort of English that normal people can understand.

Remember it’s always better to ask forgiveness that to seek permission!
P.McArtney said:

Why don’t you leave animals alone and eat Quorn instead ?

I am bloody sick of parasite farmers bellyaching about their supposed dilemma. We subsidise these buggers to the hilt to produce animals whose meat is full of steroids which pass into the human food chain. If they can’t make a profit without sponging off the tax payer it’s time they sold off their farms to property developers. Great Britain has a housing shortage after all. Where’s John Prescott when we need him ? Clout an agri-yob for me Mr P.

Then of course, there’s the fact that animal farming contributes enormously to pollution. Do the decent thing; go vegetarian or vegan.
justin said:

eat Quorn?
as a processed, refined and packaged food, that Quorn is just as, if not more polluting than a small holder’s pig. that pig eats food scraps and grubs and poops good fertilizer. then he or she is slaughtered and butchered at home. how is that polluting?
Roger said:

Brilliant! Almost as good as Texas trash.
Louise Holt said:

I would like the right to humanely despatch our pigs at home please.
David Taylor said:

I have three little pigs fattening on a patch of land behind the orchard and looking forward to their share of the windfalls. They will get their apples and much more besides. Is it true that the only food you can legally give your pigs is that dull grey pelleted rubbish from feed merchants? Well, sod it – my pigs have boiled up vegetable peelings, cheese rinds, soggy tomatoes, stale bread crusts and old uncooked pastry scraps, all mixed up with any curdled milk, oil from tuna tins and other mouth-watering delicacies available to stimulate their taste-buds.
And when all the windfalls are all gone and their playground has been rooted into a fertile sea of mud and their straw-lined shelter is getting a bit too small to accommodate all three in comfort, then I’ll come along and take each one for a short walk to a quiet spot and bring his short, happy life to a swift conclusion with my rifle. His last thought will be “Mmmm, treats!” Treats for us, too. We must resist the meddling bureaucrats with their hypocritical talk of ‘animal welfare’ and public health. If we want to eat meat This is how it’s been done for centuries and how it should be done. Mass production is the obscenity, not domestic production. And if the North Devon District Council environmental health department would like to debate the pros and cons, I’d be more than happy to do so over a cup of tea (and a bacon sandwich) any time.
DCT
simon king said:

i have two pigs and afford them all the respect and comfort that they need and i can think of,
when it is their time to be dispatched then the same will apply.
this political correct mad system with wich we constantly have to dance to its tune has layn waste to many old wourld practice and skill and i for one am sick of being told what i can and cant do in my own holding.
more and more people are going to keep livestock and tend their gardens for food out of having to , so leave us alone to grow our own food and in turn we our selvs will grow…..
Eswapu Moses said:

Its really painful when my sow died of swine fever.I loved this sow because whennever it produced piglets i would sell and i get money to meet my needs like buying my seif cloths,paying part of schoolfees and others.It died at the age of 4 years and her name was MAMA.
Guy Lorent said:

Each winter I have two pigs, that I give the first names that pops into my mind. Sometimes weird, like the name of my kids, sometimes a bit more funny like Queen and Elisabeth. They are meant to be eaten, but I insist on giving them a life as respectfull as possible. Even the butcher that comes to my place to help cutting them in skillfull peaces cannot hit them or swear at them. To avoid that, I learn my pigs to come out of the stable quietly and walk around a bit in the garden. Of course when they are excited they jump and run. Not every butcher appreciates it, but I love it, we just eat a little less black pudding that year. All this is a bit illegal, but off course totally harmless, like mentioned before.
j cooney said:

having just bought my first two gilts with the intention to eventually eat them, I feel very proud of myself for doing so after reading the prevous comments. Its also nice to know there are some normal folk out there doing the same thing.
Mary Fisher, Yorkshire, England said:

The current (Nov 08)issue of Country Smallholding has, on pp 52/3, a pertinent article about the anomoly over the law on killing chickens.

It’s well worth the effort of getting out and buying a copy. If your stomach can stand it, that is.
Sheryl said:

I cannot agree more with the comments received here, especially about the killing and the feeding of the pigs. We have a rescue centre for animals and a supermarket offered us their bakery waste and veggies for the pigs.
We were told by Trading Standards that we could not do this as we could be accidentally allowing them to eat bread that may have been contaminated with meat products! What? At Sainsbury’s? I think not.
My son then went to college and guess what the pig nuts are made of? BAKERY WASTE!
The laws in this country are an ASS and I for one feel that the time has come for those of us who are being told what to do by the beaurocrats should find our spines and write letters, make phone calls and highly publicise our plight until everyone is aware that we are not willing to put up with it anymore.
The credit crunch will force more people into producing their own food (thank god) and we need to make life as easy as possible to do so.
Jade Chappell (Mr) said:

This all makes for very interesting reading, there can never be enough of these kind of forums, comments and conversations. I’m a big believer in trusting my own instincts when it comes to law; we all know whats right and wrong !
Rearing meat for your own consumption seems like a very basic and natural instinct to me; and my own common sense tells me not to try to slaughter a fully grown pig with a .177 Gat Gun ! ( a .410 shot gun would do the job nicely though )
The law as i understand it is- you can rear your own porkers and slaughter them yourself, but only you and your immediate family can enjoy the fruits of your labour ! But to be honest who the bloody hell’s going to know if your mate pops round on saturday morning for a bacon buttie !
Make your own decisions in life, and be responsible for your own actions ( and be discreet !)
As Mrs Fisher mentioned ‘Country Smallholding’ is well worth a look – Jan 06 issue has a cracking (or crackling!) article on all things to do with home slaughter of Pigs, not sure though, if its still available.
Hannah said:

I always thought you could slaughter at home providing you:
a) do the job yourself; and
b) eat the resulting meat yourself.

i.e. the person who slaughters it is the only one who can (legally) eat it and only if you plan on selling any of the meat or sharing it with family, friends and neighbours must the animal be slaughtered in approved premises.

Don’t tell the man from the ministry but homeslaughter is what I do and what I will go on doing.

(Mind you, the man from the ministry doesn’t carry much weight round here ever since arriving on a neighbour’s property and enquiring whether their bull was male or female (!) )
rob said:

I have only read the first few messages but a family story which I had from my mother – during WW2 my grandfather , a farmer in Northumberland , kept a few extra pigs for home consumption which were not on the Government records for supply to the war effort

When he was ready to slaughter them his brother who lived nearby and needed to be summoned to assist was informed by a telegram which said , to avoid suspicion from the local post office and authorities – ” The funeral will be on Tuesday “
Jen said:

How fantastic! To find a site with comments from people who are having the same dilemma as I! We have 3 pigs and need to slaughter 1. We live in rural Scotland so to take 1 pig to the slaughter house is ridiculous and so we plan to do it at home. After asking around, the general advice we received was ‘do it and just keep quiet’ but I am still concerned that as we are registered and have a holding number, our pigs are on record. What do i put down as to the reason we now only have 2 pigs?
Joyce said:

I found your article very interesting. We live in the U.S. and do not raise hogs, but we do raise and slaughter our own chickens and goats (and rabbits in the past).

I completely agree that slaughtering at home for personal use is far better for the animal than hauling it off to some strange place with the smells of hundreds of other frightened animals. Doing it at home is cleaner, more efficient, and affordable.

If your health departments are anything like ours, then yes it is true that you are not allowed to sell home butchered meats. The reasoning is that our homes are not inspected for cleanliness… I find this a completely absurd, having seen the filth inside industrial slaughter facilities. But then, the government was never one to rely greatly on common sense.

Keep fighting the good fight!
supaswag said:

Nothing wrong with killing pigs at home if a professional does the chopping up. Even better when they’re your own reared pigs. My grandparents used to get a pig once a year and a butcher came around to do the job with everybody helping him. Our family consumed the whole pig during the year. Nothing was wasted.
Hugh said:

Has anyone any thoughts about disposal of waste (guts and bones). Logically they are good fertility and I’m not one to throw that away. However we’ve had communications from DEFRA indicating that theonly thing we can do with the waste is pay to join the fallen stock scheme.

I think that at the root of this is a question about whether being issued with a hernd number makes us farmers or whether it is just an administrative number.
Hugh said:

sorry – HERD number
Karl Guevara said:

I was living some time in Colombia and had some pigs there, too. They were a nice company living and a great meal when killed by a friend who knows how to do it. Nobody suffered. Even the neighbors were happy, as everybody got their piece…

I think it´s good to promote the actual background of these things, so people know what to do and what not. This isn´t so much concerned with laws, as with ethics, I think.
Graham Meredith said:

Nobody mentioned this but little piggies, sows and the big snorters can be used as a heat source in winter as they do on remote Italian farms and elsewhere. If the swine are healthy ie. not living next to a slaughterhouse and other ill pigs in a battery. Then you might just get a good nights sleep listening to their snufflings! Then you can eat happy meat (why do the Spanish have a monopoly on cured “hamon”)?? We could do it in Britain.
Graham Meredith said:

As an addition to helping local industry in Britain why don’t we feed our piglets solely on acorns (surely delicious if you have a pig’s mind) to get that quality flavoured with apple pulp left over from the making of ye olde west country Scrumpy? Sounds quite appealing now we have to develop some skills/techniques of our own like the clever Spanish. Wind dried pig flesh with a nutty & apple flavour has got me grunting, snuffling and salivating all at the same time, backed with a hand crafted ale this could be heaven.
ian Rushby said:

the nice man is coming tomorrow. He will do a clean, humane job and my family will have real bacon to eat with real bread and scrumpy. Pas de probleme.
Brian actually said:

I like the pig logo, but this is kinda weird.

What are you up to, Hodgkinson?
Susan said:

If I had a pig that I wanted to eat I would have a professional slaughterer kill it. But lately I find meat of all sorts makes me nauseous, even free range.
Alex mumbled, or his stomach rumbled while he spoke, but we think he said:

I’m hungry. You should make your own bacon. I support you. We should slaughter a million pigs and cook them somewhere in public and feed them to folk, for free. Vegetarians might complain but I suppose we ought to stand up for our rights even if they dislike the smell of delicious bacon.
Seo said:

Seems to me you’re getting a bit confused Mr Hodgkinson. The smallholder’s rearing and humane slaughter of pigs – and other animals – is a noble pursuit. But what the legislation attempts to prevent is every allotment owner across the land inexpertly whacking the heads off their home-grown piggies, piling the blood and guts into a muddy corner and leaving them to fester. And then tugging away at the meat with dirty hands and selling it at the local ‘farmers’ market’ as glorious home-reared meat.
The bizarre rules about taking your beasts on marathon journeys to slaughter need to be changed, indeed. But the solution is NOT to allow everybody to do whatever they like with their animals and slaughtered waste. We do not want to return to the 18th century, whatever the romantic notion of that period may be – cities were awash with animal faeces and slaughter waste, and disease was rife as a result.
I P Freely said:

This little piggy grew up to be a bureaucrat.

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