“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 human 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 contaced 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.