rearing to kill.......

crackcrack30

Anyone on here rearing calves to kill when fat for the freezer ?

Thinking of buying a nice docile heifer/ young cow and petting her around/near to the house.....

Breeds/cross and weights results ect. appreciated....

Are the days of milk for the home long gone?........

(P.S i'm no hugh wherthing scutterscald)

cheers cc30

marizpan

We reared a jersey calf to six months last year. Killed out at 120kg deadweight. Great marbling and butcher was able to hang for 4 wks as there was enough fat. A great amount of meat for a family of four for a year. I think a bullock is just too much meat. Will do again this year. Cost very little to rear as the cow helped reared him n still plenty of milk for the house. Butcher cost €150

Boardnashea

Oooh that sounds good! I was thinking of getting back into smaller stock but home beef. Mmmmmm. Can't do it on my own land but I'm sure I could organise something. Is it still veal at 6 months or are we into beef at that stage?

marizpan

The calf was a byproduct of our house cow. Was worthless to sell so we decided to rear him instead.
Not much experience of beef breeds, not something we would consider as higher costs etc. At six mths its Rose veal. Almost as dark as beef, very tender and milder beefy taste. He was Autumn calved so spent his last few months indoors. If we have a heifer calve again, we would sell her n raise a dairy bull calf with our own milk. Very cheap good quality meat n reared over a shorter time frame. Didn't have to bother with castrating or behorning

bbam

We have two pigs off to slaughter on Thursday... Can't wait, they're going to be fully cured as we don't want any pork...

Plan is for next year to rear an Angus Heifer for the freezer along with two more pigs....

We had a Heraford heifer this year which we thought about killing but then prices were so good we sold her and made a nice few bob instead

Muckit

My only concern would be how do you ensure that you're getting all your meat back from the butcher? :rolleyes: A few chops here, a few chops there....

Askim

my pigs are slap marked on both hams & i get them back just split in half, only way, don't know how you could ensure beef or lamb was yours, Dna would be the only way

you could get a butcher to home kill, in winter for you & hang yourself high in a shed

marizpan

We have a great relationship with our butcher n hundred percent trust what we get back. He takes a lot of pride in his skill. I wouldn't send animals to a slaughter house though for that reason

reilig

Askim wrote: »

you could get a butcher to home kill, in winter for you & hang yourself high in a shed

You can't do that I'm afraid.

They can only be salughtered in a licenced slaughterhouse which is Dep of Ag and EPA monitored. All meat in these places have to be stamped (used to be by a A dep of Ag vet, but I see recently that ordinary officals are doing it now too).

Tora Bora

reilig wrote: »

You can't do that I'm afraid.

They can only be salughtered in a licenced slaughterhouse which is Dep of Ag and EPA monitored. All meat in these places have to be stamped (used to be by a A dep of Ag vet, but I see recently that ordinary officals are doing it now too).

When the euro goes down the sewer, one of the benefits hopefully will be, that rules and regulations made by the elite to control what the little people do, day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute will also go down the sewer.
Farming families have reared, fed, and slaughtered all classes of animals and fowl, for centuries, to the highest standards of safety and security, using traditional methods. May that day come back again sooner rather than later:) (well, to be frank, some of us never really took much notice in any case:cool:):D

clonmahon

Tora Bora wrote: »

Farming families have reared, fed, and slaughtered all classes of animals and fowl, for centuries, to the highest standards of safety and security, using traditional methods. May that day come back again sooner rather than later:) (well, to be frank, some of us never really took much notice in any case:cool:):D

+1

Askim

reilig wrote: »

You can't do that I'm afraid.

They can only be salughtered in a licenced slaughterhouse which is Dep of Ag and EPA monitored. All meat in these places have to be stamped (used to be by a A dep of Ag vet, but I see recently that ordinary officals are doing it now too).

I think you can kill a pig at home, but meat can only be for your own family, can't vive any away.

I have heard opinions that say yes & ones that say no, where could one get a definitive answer in writing ??

Might ask my local butcher

A

reilig

Lads, in reality, you can do anything you like in the privacy of your own home, slaughter animals, grow crops that might not be legal etc. etc.

You can do it, but it isn't legal.

I posed this question here before. If you are a legit farmer, keeping records and herd profiles like you should be, and you slaughter one of your own animals in your back garden. How do you record this animal in your herd register?

Not to get into a rant, but we have rebuilt what was a shambles of a meat industry in this country caused by Mad Cow Disease and foot and mouth. This was done by setting up an extensive and expensive meat and feed traceability scheme. This involved building up trust in our meat buyers by showing them that the meat they are eating can be traced from farm to fork.

Now I can see everyone's reasons for being allowed to slaughter a lamb or a pig at home for personal use. But all it takes is one clotty person to screw it up, someone to become violently sick or (god forbid) die from ecoli or another disease caused by bad handling of food and we hit world headlines. We lose our worldwide meat markets, and we lose all of the good work done in meat traceability for the last 10 years.

For these reasons I hope that the day of home slaughtering animals will never come back again - I'm pretty confident that they won't.

I'm not saying that anyone here would act in an irresponsible manner. I'm sure that the majority of people who home slaughter do it in a clean and healthy way. But if the rules on home slaughtering were relaxed, there would always be one gobsh1te who would rim it. Rules on slaughtering are for the greater good of all who produce meat in this country.

Final part of the rant. Look at Germany last year where chic peas became contaminated with ecoli and 30+ people died. All it took was 1 unhygienic person.

fodda

Tora Bora wrote: »

When the euro goes down the sewer, one of the benefits hopefully will be, that rules and regulations made by the elite to control what the little people do, day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute will also go down the sewer.
Farming families have reared, fed, and slaughtered all classes of animals and fowl, for centuries, to the highest standards of safety and security, using traditional methods. May that day come back again sooner rather than later:) (well, to be frank, some of us never really took much notice in any case:cool:):D

I like most others relish the end of the EU but the one thing i would never want to see is a relaxing of animal welfare and food hygiene regulations.

Do that and the first thing tomorrow morning those who couldnt give a monkies will move in to make a quick buck and then there will be disaster........the result being there will be no confidence in how safe the food is which will just drive people back to the major shops in their droves.

Also i think any food which is supplied to the public in any form has to meet regulations regarding its safety and if anybody fell ill after you supplying them food.....:eek:

reilig

fodda wrote: »

Also i think any food which is supplied to the public in any form has to meet regulations regarding its safety and if anybody fell ill after you supplying them food.....:eek:

+1
Totally agree.

I'd also add that its not just supplying food to the public. What happens if someone from your own family fell ill after eating home slaughtered meat. At least if the meat is traceable, you have some recourse to the producer/slaughterer

clonmahon

reilig wrote: »

What happens if someone from your own family fell ill after eating home slaughtered meat.

That would be a problem with storage, handling or cooking. Don't matter where the meat came from it has to be stored properly, handled with care when raw and cooked properly before eating.

With all due respects you are repeating the same line as the authorities. There is a different scale of risk between a skilled and experienced artisan who has total control over a process from beginning to end and a large industrial scale meat killing and processing plant. In one a skilled person has total control, in the other hundreds of unskilled workers have a hand in a complex production process.

In exactly the same way there is a difference scale of risk between cooking a meal at home for 4 people and catering for 1000 people.

There are lots of examples of industrial scale food production killing people, but I don't know of any example of small scale artisan food producers killing people. Can anyone supply any examples.

Several posters have blamed the EU for what is an Irish problem, I am no fan of the EU but if you visit continental countries like France and Spain they have a thriving artisan food sector that is by Irish standards very loosely regulated. This is because the authorities recognize the different scale of risks, whereas here we don't.

reilig

There's a huge difference in scale between between a skilled artizan producer and a factory. I agree. But if everyone has free reign to slaughter animals in their own back garden and "hang the meat in a shed" as pointed out above, then you'll have both skilled and non skilled people "taking a chance" and slaughtering for themselved. All the meat industry needs in this country is one bad story in the press and the multi-million Euro meat industry which is currently booming in this country will fall flat as a pancake.

Nobody has issue with a skilled artizan producer slaughtering meat. But everyone who has a pig or a lamb to slaughter is not an artizan producer - nor can all of them be artizan producers.

I may be repeating the sam line as the authorities, but its the truth!!!

Meat traceability in this country is in a good position which benefits both the producer and the consumer. This traceability scheme should not be allowed to be compromised because a small percentage of people want to be able to slaughter their own food!!

clonmahon wrote: »

That would be a problem with storage, handling or cooking. Don't matter where the meat came from it has to be stored properly, handled with care when raw and cooked properly before eating.

With all due respects you are repeating the same line as the authorities. There is a different scale of risk between a skilled and experienced artisan who has total control over a process from beginning to end and a large industrial scale meat killing and processing plant. In one a skilled person has total control, in the other hundreds of unskilled workers have a hand in a complex production process.

In exactly the same way there is a difference scale of risk between cooking a meal at home for 4 people and catering for 1000 people.

There are lots of examples of industrial scale food production killing people, but I don't know of any example of small scale artisan food producers killing people. Can anyone supply any examples.

Several posters have blamed the EU for what is an Irish problem, I am no fan of the EU but if you visit continental countries like France and Spain they have a thriving artisan food sector that is by Irish standards very loosely regulated. This is because the authorities recognize the different scale of risks, whereas here we don't.

Muckit

Well said Clonmahon. It's important people keep things in context and make fair comparisons.

I'm sick to the back teeth of the amount of bureaucracy, red tape and scaremongering in this country. You can't fart without having to fill out a form.... well, almost.:rolleyes: It does nobody any favours.

I think it'd be much nicer to see alot more farmers processing their own produce and selling it locally. Cut out the middle man. You get to meet face to face with the end customer and supply exactly what they are after. It would not alone solve alot of economic issues, but may in some way help to address the major issues of isolation and depression that we have in our rural communities.

The penny would drop alot quicker with both the farmer and the customer that farming is indeed a business and a very important and vital one at that.

All big multinational meat processors and supermarkets have done for us is remove us from reality for the last few decades. Yes it brought us convenience, but at what price?

fodda

How many people died or were ill from infected meat and it's products in the days before regulations? Truth is nobody knows. TB was a major killer and meat inspections through regulations have stopped this. Milk is another example.

BSE.....can you imagine if there wasnt strict regulations in force regards this?

If anything regards food there should be no relaxation of any regulations just to suit somebodies fancy of a home kill especially as they work.

One bad event is all that it takes.......look at the most recent in Ireland.....contaminated animal feed and i think all exports of pork were banned in the countries who accepted them.

reilig

The issue of large meat processing facilities and supermarkets should not come into this topic. There are loads of local and small slaughter houses which will salughter and process your animals for a very fair price.

Legalising home slaughtering also opens up the meat industry to use and abuse of growth hormones. Meat would be untested and untraceable.

If you are a farmer producing cattle for beef, the removal of the traceability scheme would be the worst thing that could happen to you because 100% of the countries that import Live animals or meat from ireland only do so because of the traceability scheme that exists. Its allright allowing home slaughtering and selling meat locally, but considering that we consume less than 15% of the meat produced in this country - what do we do with the 85% left over??? If we don't have a 100% traceability scheme, nobody will want to buy it from us!!

As a farmer, i feel that supporting the removal of the traceability scheme would be sh1tting on my own doorstep!!

Muckit wrote: »

Well said Clonmahon. It's important people keep things in context and make fair comparisons.

I'm sick to the back teeth of the amount of bureaucracy, red tape and scaremongering in this country. You can't fart without having to fill out a form.... well, almost.:rolleyes: It does nobody any favours.

I think it'd be much nicer to see alot more farmers processing their own produce and selling it locally. Cut out the middle man. You get to meet face to face with the end customer and supply exactly what they are after. It would not alone solve alot of economic issues, but may in some way help to address the major issues of isolation and depression that we have in our rural communities.

The penny would drop alot quicker with both the farmer and the customer that farming is indeed a business and a very important and vital one at that.

All big multinational meat processors and supermarkets have done for us is remove us from reality for the last few decades. Yes it brought us convenience, but at what price?

Muckit

reilig wrote: »

The issue of large meat processing facilities and supermarkets should not come into this topic. There are loads of local and small slaughter houses which will salughter and process your animals for a very fare price.

Legalising home slaughtering also opens up the meat industry to use and abuse of growth hormones. Meat would be untested and untraceable.

If you are a farmer producing cattle for beef, the removal of the traceability scheme would be the worst thing that could happen to you.

As a farmer, i feel that supporting the removal of the traceability scheme would be sh1tting on my own doorstep!!

I wasn't the one who brought up about the meat industry! But seeing as it was brought up, well.... factories are a big part of it!

As for traceability, it's coming off your own farm, how bloody traceable is that!!?? And of course there would still have to be paperwork and regulation. The farmer would be HACCP and HSE registered. I never talked about deregulating anything, just taking back more control.

My original post was about having too much paperwork and needless bureaucracy and relinquishing too much power to the meat processors and the likes. I wasn't saying we need to get rid of it altogether!

reilig

Muckit wrote: »

I wasn't the one who brought up about the meat industry! But seeing as it was brought up, well.... factories are a big part of it!

As for traceability, it's coming off your own farm, how bloody traceable is that!!?? And of course there would still have to be paperwork and regulation. The farmer would be HACCP and HSE registered. I never talked about deregulating anything, just taking back more control.

My original post was about having too much paperwork and needless bureaucracy and relinquishing too much power to the meat processors and the likes. I wasn't saying we need to get rid of it altogether!

I can do nothing but agree with you. You are correct. There is too much paperwork and bureaucracy. I would 100% support home slaughtering if farmers were HACCP trained and HSE regulated, and to add to that, if farmers had proper facilities for storing and disposing of offal and blood (instead of land spreading as was done up to 15 years ago). They would also have to have proper hanging facilities (cold store etc). But what is the difference between this and the small scale slaughter houses that already exist across the country?

I assume that these are the type of facilities that Clonmahon would also advocate for artizan producers?

What about testing? Would you agree that all meat should be tested to prevent hormones and diseased meat from entering the food chain?

My greatest concern is that people whould start slaughtering pigs, lambs and calves in their back garden, throwing bits of offal to the family dog who is licking up the blood, hanging meat in unsealed and unchilled sheds where flies could lay eggs on it and vermin could feast off the drip. This is how it was done in the olden day. I wouldn't buy meat from an artizan producer if I knew it was being produced in this manner. Would you??

fodda

Muckit wrote: »

I wasn't the one who brought up about the meat industry! But seeing as it was brought up, well.... factories are a big part of it!

As for traceability, it's coming off your own farm, how bloody traceable is that!!?? And of course there would still have to be paperwork and regulation. The farmer would be HACCP and HSE registered. I never talked about deregulating anything, just taking back more control.

My original post was about having too much paperwork and needless bureaucracy and relinquishing too much power to the meat processors and the likes. I wasn't saying we need to get rid of it altogether!

That's ok then what if you get qualified as a slaughterman by attending whatever courses and exams there are and your premises are passed fit for meat processing? Then you pay for the meat to be inspected before passing it on for consumption.

reilig

fodda wrote: »

That's ok then what if you get qualified as a slaughterman by attending whatever courses and exams there are and your premises are passed fit for meat processing? Then you pay for the meat to be inspected before passing it on for consumption.

There are already loads of small scale slaughter houses like this in existance across the country

Funsterdelux

Am I right in saying that its completely legal to kill your own hens (poultry) to eat?

And what makes them different to say lamb/pigs/beef?

Other than not been mammals!

clonmahon

reilig wrote: »

But if everyone has free reign to slaughter animals in their own back garden and "hang the meat in a shed" as pointed out above, then you'll have both skilled and non skilled people "taking a chance" and slaughtering for themselved.

This is true but no matter what regulations you impose this is happening anyway, people are slaughtering their own meat up long lanes.

reilig wrote: »

Nobody has issue with a skilled artizan producer slaughtering meat.

But the authorities do have an issue because they demand that a slaughterhouse which kills one animal a day must be kitted out to the exact same standard as a plant that kills thousands per day. They demand the same standards of a housewife making 10 cream sponges to sell at a car boot sale as they of a bakery making 3000 cakes a day. This is a total failure to recognize any difference in the scale of risks involved.

reilig wrote: »

Meat traceability in this country is in a good position which benefits both the producer and the consumer. This traceability scheme should not be allowed to be compromised because a small percentage of people want to be able to slaughter their own food!!

Again with all due respect this is where you are not comparing like with like. If offal from one of your animals ends up being used in some processed food product that kills people in Japan, there is a need to be able to trace it back to its source and remove it from the food chain.

But if some one rears and slaughters an animal in their own garden (as I have done in the past) and they are killed by the end product, there is no traceability issue. The chain starts in that persons garden and ends in their kitchen.

I totally accept your point that complex modern industrial food production processes need bullet proof traceability and rigid safety standards. My point is that to apply the same standards to a simple small scale food production system is witless and disproportionate

clonmahon

fodda wrote: »

TB was a major killer and meat inspections through regulations have stopped this.

The elimination of TB was not to do with meat inspection, it was antibiotics and the provision of proper sanitariums to confine patients that. In fact the incidents of antibiotic resistant TB are on the rise worldwide.

fodda wrote: »

BSE.....can you imagine if there wasnt strict regulations in force regards this?

BSE was caused by industrial agri business not by small scale food production.

fodda wrote: »

One bad event is all that it takes.......look at the most recent in Ireland.....contaminated animal feed and i think all exports of pork were banned in the countries who accepted them.

Again the point is the scale of risk involved with big scale complex food production systems. Big scale production and distribution big scale risk.

reilig

clonmahon wrote: »

But the authorities do have an issue because they demand that a slaughterhouse which kills one animal a day must be kitted out to the exact same standard as a plant that kills thousands per day. They demand the same standards of a housewife making 10 cream sponges to sell at a car boot sale as they of a bakery making 3000 cakes a day. This is a total failure to recognize any difference in the scale of risks involved.

Slaughterhouses just have to meet the same HACCP rules as a large scale meat plant. HACCP inspectors don't care if the kit used for slaughtering the animals is 100 years old or brand new - just as long as it is clean. Are you saying that just because a slaughter facility kills one animal per day, it shouldn't need to be as clean as a facility which kills 100 animals per day?

Your example of the sponge cakes isn't a great one. You, as a buyer of sponge cakes at a car boot sale would expect that the cakes be produced in as clean an environment as a factory producing 3000 cakes per day. If you heard that someone got food poisoning after buying one of the cakes at the car boot sale last week, then you wouldn't be inclined to buy one there this week?

fodda

clonmahon wrote: »

The elimination of TB was not to do with meat inspection, it was antibiotics and the provision of proper sanitariums to confine patients that. In fact the incidents of antibiotic resistant TB are on the rise worldwide.

fodda wrote: »

BSE.....can you imagine if there wasnt strict regulations in force regards this?

BSE was caused by industrial agri business not by small scale food production.




Again the point is the scale of risk involved with big scale complex food production systems. Big scale production and distribution big scale risk.

So nobody ever died or got ill in the old days from eating infected meat or drinking infected milk?

And it was the (infected/contaminated/bad) animal feed fed to animals which caused BSE.........just like you may have done when feeding your home reared but my point was the parts of the animal getting into the food chain where they arent allowed to now because of strict regulations.

Tora Bora

fodda wrote: »

I like most others relish the end of the EU but the one thing i would never want to see is a relaxing of animal welfare and food hygiene regulations.

Do that and the first thing tomorrow morning those who couldnt give a monkies will move in to make a quick buck and then there will be disaster........the result being there will be no confidence in how safe the food is which will just drive people back to the major shops in their droves.

Also i think any food which is supplied to the public in any form has to meet regulations regarding its safety and if anybody fell ill after you supplying them food.....:eek:

I mean our own meat, for our own consumption. Obviously not for sale, or supply. Not a hope.
There is no law whatsoever against, going out and shooting wild duck, pheasant, etc, etc, for your own table.
Likewise there is no law against, pulling a trout or salmon out of the river and cooking it, or freezing it for that matter.
There is no law against going down to the shore and hauling in makeral, and cooking or freezing.
The law preventing the killing of a pig or a sheep or two, is for ones own consumption, is out and out bullsh1t.
I have never, ever in my life heard of food poisoning from home slaughtered meat. The fact that it's for your own table, concentrates the mind, on matters of hygiene etc.
Our forefathers did it to perfection, and fed their families, with the best of meat. Why can't we? Because some beurocrat says so:(

reilig

Tora Bora wrote: »

I have never, ever in my life heard of food poisoning from home slaughtered meat. The fact that it's for your own table, concentrates the mind, on matters of hygiene etc.

I have. A neighbour died in 1984 from food poisoning from a bull calf that he slaughtered. He died from HPS (Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome). Google it.

So if someone came to your house for a meal, you wouldn't feed them the home slaughtered meat, you'd go out and buy traceable stuff?? :rolleyes:

Tora Bora

reilig wrote: »

I have. A neighbour died in 1984 from food poisoning from a bull calf that he slaughtered. He died from HPS (Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome). Google it.

So if someone came to your house for a meal, you wouldn't feed them the home slaughtered meat, you'd go out and buy traceable stuff?? :rolleyes:

There was a documantary on RTE or TV3 a few weeks ago, about processed meats. Likes of ham joints, ham as in sliced ham, etc, etc.

Must try to find it, and post a link if it is on RTE player etc!

I don't know if you or anybody on here saw it, BUT, if you did, you would really, really want to think about if you want to continue eating it, or feeding it to your children!!

I know, sliced ham for sandwiches since we saw that program, is a thing of the past.

Basically you are eating very appetising looking, and very tasty meat .......... BUT, it's essentially chemically induced look and taste!!

clonmahon

reilig wrote: »

I have. A neighbour died in 1984 from food poisoning from a bull calf that he slaughtered. He died from HPS (Hantavirus Pulmonary Syndrome). Google it.

So if someone came to your house for a meal, you wouldn't feed them the home slaughtered meat, you'd go out and buy traceable stuff?? :rolleyes:

Clarify this for me. According to Wikipedia "Humans may be infected with hantaviruses through rodent bites, urine, saliva or contact with rodent waste products". Did he contract this through eating the meat or handling it.

reilig

Tora Bora wrote: »

There was a documantary on RTE or TV3 a few weeks ago, about processed meats. Likes of ham joints, ham as in sliced ham, etc, etc.

Must try to find it, and post a link if it is on RTE player etc!

I don't know if you or anybody on here saw it, BUT, if you did, you would really, really want to think about if you want to continue eating it, or feeding it to your children!!

I know, sliced ham for sandwiches since we saw that program, is a thing of the past.

Basically you are eating very appetising looking, and very tasty meat .......... BUT, it's essentially chemically induced look and taste!!

I saw that. It would make you think twice about buying meat.
Luckily I never have to buy any meat. The local slaughterhouse will legally slaughter cattle, lambs or pigs for us. They will cure bacon, and chop and label all other meat ready for the freezer. For the prices charged, you could not afford to do it yourself, and it is all done legally. TBH, most farmers in our area will not buy meat from shops, but will instead have their own legally slaughtered!!

reilig

clonmahon wrote: »

Clarify this for me. According to Wikipedia "Humans may be infected with hantaviruses through rodent bites, urine, saliva or contact with rodent waste products". Did he contract this through eating the meat or handling it.

I don't honestly know!

Buy I can confirm that he died!

The post mortem carried out on him found traces of HPS on the meat in his stomach and this is what was given as cause of death.

Tora Bora

reilig wrote: »

I saw that. It would make you think twice about buying meat.
Luckily I never have to buy any meat. The local slaughterhouse will legally slaughter cattle, lambs or pigs for us. They will cure bacon, and chop and label all other meat ready for the freezer. For the prices charged, you could not afford to do it yourself, and it is all done legally. TBH, most farmers in our area will not buy meat from shops, but will instead have their own legally slaughtered!!

Well, I rest my case than. You and your neighbours, and all the rest of us, bust our bollox, to rear and feed animals to exacting and tracable standards. Nothing at all wrong with that. I am in favour.

Now, you will send a couple of animals for the freezer, for your own use to the local abbatoir to be slaughtered and packed etc,. Fine, no problem.

Now all the other meat you produce goes to the "system", and ends up on the supermarket shelves in all kinds of slices, and cuts, and so on.

After all your hard work, complying with standards, your perfectly natural healthy well produced meat, gets tumbeled around in a centrifuge for up to 22 hours, injected with water, injected with chemicals, tumbeled again in the centrifuge, injected again with more chemicals, packeged and landed on the housewifes table!!!
The meat on the table according to the documentary, is 20% injected water and chemicals, by weight!:mad::mad::mad:

Now, fcuk it, I see no sense whatsoever to this, total bullsh1t system!!

clonmahon

reilig wrote: »

Slaughterhouses just have to meet the same HACCP rules as a large scale meat plant. HACCP inspectors don't care if the kit used for slaughtering the animals is 100 years old or brand new - just as long as it is clean. Are you saying that just because a slaughter facility kills one animal per day, it shouldn't need to be as clean as a facility which kills 100 animals per day?

No I'm not saying it shouldn't be clean, I'm saying that a skilled artisan working alone has complete control of the process. This is different, very different to hundreds of unskilled workers on a production line. The risks are not the same, the conquences of a f**k up are not the same. The traceability issues are not the same. In France and Spain they recognize this and treat them differently. Here we do not, we apply exactly the same standards.

I can cook meals in my kitchen at home for my family and visitors and I have never poisoned anyone. I do not have stainless steel worktops, I do not have tiled walls and floors, I do not have two sinks, I do not have two fridges, I do not have soap dispensers. I have a very basic kitchen but I understand the risks involved in preparing food and manage the process accordingly. I could quite safely produce a small amount of food for sale in my primitive kitchen without risk to public health, but if I did the absence of the above mentioned facilities could cause a problem with the HSE. My point again is that once the enterprise is small and the amount of produce being produced is small, and the person knows what they are doing the risk is small, even if the facilities are primitive.

reilig wrote: »

Your example of the sponge cakes isn't a great one. You, as a buyer of sponge cakes at a car boot sale would expect that the cakes be produced in as clean an environment as a factory producing 3000 cakes per day. If you heard that someone got food poisoning after buying one of the cakes at the car boot sale last week, then you wouldn't be inclined to buy one there this week?

But here's the thing housewifes and school kids do produce small amounts of food in domestic kitchens and sell it at car boot sales and farmers markets all over the country. But I have never heard of anyone getting food poisoning from it. I have however heard of lots of cases of food poisoning in restaurants and we all know of cases of food poisoning that were caused by products made in factories.

Muckit

The italians and the spainish must be killing each other left right and centre with their Prosciutto and Iberico hams :rolleyes:

Out in Italy last year I walked into a BAR (sounds like a paddy irishman joke!) ..anyway... and they had ham hocks hanging up behind the bar.

Forget your salted nuts, you could have a few slices while enjoying your tipple, which I did. I'm still alive! This meat is uncooked, yes it's dry cured, but not a fridge in site!

clonmahon

Muckit wrote: »

The italians and the spainish must be killing each other left right and centre with their Prosciutto and Iberico hams :rolleyes:

Out in Italy last year I walked into a BAR (sounds like a paddy irishman joke!) ..anyway... and they had ham hocks hanging up behind the bar.

Forget your salted nuts, you could have a few slices while enjoying your tipple, which I did. I'm still alive! This meat is uncooked, yes it's dry cured, but not a fridge in site!

Thanks Muckit this is exactly my point, on the continent the authorities recognize the difference between small scale and industrial food production and treat them differently. Here they make the same demands of both.

I have a friend who is a ex-butcher and went on holidays in Spain, he was amazed at the way raw meat was sold outdoors in markets, on stalls, with not a fridge in sight, in a warm climate, if the HSE saw you doing that here they would shut you down. But as my friend said what's the problem the meat will be cooked.

BeeDI

Muckit wrote: »

The italians and the spainish must be killing each other left right and centre with their Prosciutto and Iberico hams :rolleyes:

Out in Italy last year I walked into a BAR (sounds like a paddy irishman joke!) ..anyway... and they had ham hocks hanging up behind the bar.

Forget your salted nuts, you could have a few slices while enjoying your tipple, which I did. I'm still alive! This meat is uncooked, yes it's dry cured, but not a fridge in site!

Exactly. Well said.
Walk down many of the side streets of Paris, and see the local food markets. Plenty of meats, of all kinds on open display. Nobody dying as a result. That's in a hot, dirty polluted city!!
Now if that were in Ireland, you would have a government employed busy body, reading the law, and if you were lucky giving you, a half an hour to close up shop!:( We have become, complete and utter door mats for Europe, for them to wipe their feet on. No other country applies these kinds of nonsense laws like we do.
Pity our regulators didn't police the rotten parts of the economy, like the banks, and the financial regulators office, and the central bank, and FAS, and a few more of the totally discredited organisations over here.
There is a lot of people paying a heavy price for the failure of these organisations, and none that I heard about suffering any consequence from eating a home killed broiler

reilig

Lads I agree with all of your sentiments and thoughts on home slaughter for your own use. Yet noone has suggested a way that we can still protect the traceability scheme that is already in place - a traceability scheme upon which all of our beef, pork and lamb exports are intrinsicly built on.

Its not Europe that have enforced all of these conditions on our meat production - it is ourselves. Because we have this traceability, other countries aren't afraid to import our meat. Countries like Spain, italy, france, egypt don't need this traceability system because they don't export meat. However, if our ability to trace meat from farm to fork disintegrates, countries like Spain, france, Italy and Egypt won't even look at out meat exports.

As I said above, traceability and the conditions that come with it are an inconvenience for those of us who want to eat our own animals. But if you are a farmer producing animals for meat then tghis traceability system and all the red tape and paperwork taht comes with it is your bread and butter!!

If we are allowed to home slaughter, what's to stop Muckit from killing a calf and selling it in quarters to his neighbours. Or what's to stop Tora Bora from home killing a pig and selling it out of the boot of his car at various markets.

While Muckit and Tora Bora would be very reliable people and ensure that the highest standards are met, what's to stop some Joe Soap dirty clotty fecker from raising 50 pigs on waste offal (cow stomachs etc) collected from the other various home slaughterers (It was happening in loads of places before pig herd numbers were brough it), killing them in his back yard, having no regard for hygiene or standards and selling the whole lot for cash out of the boot of his car for cash at various markets.

If only 1 person contracted Ecoli from this guy's meat, what would happen to the whole meat industry?

Would all home slaughterers be honest and god fearing people??

If not, would it need to be regulated?

Tora Bora

reilig wrote: »

Lads I agree with all of your sentiments and thoughts on home slaughter for your own use. Yet noone has suggested a way that we can still protect the traceability scheme that is already in place - a traceability scheme upon which all of our beef, pork and lamb exports are intrinsicly built on.

Its not Europe that have enforced all of these conditions on our meat production - it is ourselves. Because we have this traceability, other countries aren't afraid to import our meat. Countries like Spain, italy, france, egypt don't need this traceability system because they don't export meat. However, if our ability to trace meat from farm to fork disintegrates, countries like Spain, france, Italy and Egypt won't even look at out meat exports.

As I said above, traceability and the conditions that come with it are an inconvenience for those of us who want to eat our own animals. But if you are a farmer producing animals for meat then tghis traceability system and all the red tape and paperwork taht comes with it is your bread and butter!!

If we are allowed to home slaughter, what's to stop Muckit from killing a calf and selling it in quarters to his neighbours. Or what's to stop Tora Bora from home killing a pig and selling it out of the boot of his car at various markets.

While Muckit and Tora Bora would be very reliable people and ensure that the highest standards are met, what's to stop some Joe Soap dirty clotty fecker from raising 50 pigs on waste offal (cow stomachs etc) collected from the other various home slaughterers (It was happening in loads of places before pig herd numbers were brough it), killing them in his back yard, having no regard for hygiene or standards and selling the whole lot for cash out of the boot of his car for cash at various markets.

If only 1 person contracted Ecoli from this guy's meat, what would happen to the whole meat industry?

Would all home slaughterers be honest and god fearing people??

If not, would it need to be regulated?

But nobody on here is suggesting or supporting killing at home, and selling on in any shape or form.
All we are saying, is home butchering in the time honoured and proven way, should not be illegal. Now I know it's not really practical or ok, in any shape or form for a beef animal.
But a few wethers, and a pig or two, and a round of chickens, geese, ducks. Let the Tesco's, and Larry Goodmans of this world, go on their merry profiteering way, with the rest of the market.:cool:

If we let them, they will stop us from planting the haggard, in the traditional way, using last years cow dung as fertilizer for the spuds and so on. All for the common good they will say, but in fact it will be good only for box ticking officials, and all the other controlling interests in the food chain of today.

reilig

Tora Bora wrote: »

But nobody on here is suggesting or supporting killing at home, and selling on in any shape or form.
All we are saying, is home butchering in the time honoured and proven way, should not be illegal. Now I know it's not really practical or ok, in any shape or form for a beef animal.
But a few wethers, and a pig or two, and a round of chickens, geese, ducks. Let the Tesco's, and Larry Goodmans of this world, go on their merry profiteering way, with the rest of the market.:cool:

If we let them, they will stop us from planting the haggard, in the traditional way, using last years cow dung as fertilizer for the spuds and so on. All for the common good they will say, but in fact it will be good only for box ticking officials, and all the other controlling interests in the food chain of today.

Clonmahon, Muckit and Beedi are all supporting slaughtering at home for artizan sales - or maybe I took them up wrong.

I thought this was the question that I asked in the last post, but here it is in another way.

If you allow slaughter for home only, how do you stop people taking advantage of an unregulated system and using this system to slaughter meat to sell on the side such as a market, door to door sales or on the black market and how do you stop people who may take advantage of this scheme and process diseased meat or meat which has been contaminated by hormones??

Isn't the way to prevent this to have a traceable system such as the one currently in place or can you identify another system that would be less regulated than the existing system but work just as good?

BeeDI

reilig wrote: »

Tora Bora wrote: »

But nobody on here is suggesting or supporting killing at home, and selling on in any shape or form.
All we are saying, is home butchering in the time honoured and proven way, should not be illegal. Now I know it's not really practical or ok, in any shape or form for a beef animal.
But a few wethers, and a pig or two, and a round of chickens, geese, ducks. Let the Tesco's, and Larry Goodmans of this world, go on their merry profiteering way, with the rest of the market.:cool:

If we let them, they will stop us from planting the haggard, in the traditional way, using last years cow dung as fertilizer for the spuds and so on. All for the common good they will say, but in fact it will be good only for box ticking officials, and all the other controlling interests in the food chain of today.

Clonmahon, Muckit and Beedi are all supporting slaughtering at home for artizan sales - or maybe I took them up wrong.

I thought this was the question that I asked in the last post, but here it is in another way.

If you allow slaughter for home only, how do you stop people taking advantage of an unregulated system and using this system to slaughter meat to sell on the side such as a market, door to door sales or on the black market and how do you stop people who may take advantage of this scheme and process diseased meat or meat which has been contaminated by hormones??

Isn't the way to prevent this to have a traceable system such as the one currently in place or can you identify another system that would be less regulated than the existing system but work just as good?

The regulated system we have, takes perfectly good healthy meat, and processes it, to give it longer shelf life, and better appearance etc. And it miraculously gains weight in the process compliments of added water and nitrates.
I don't know Muckit or the others from Adam, but I'd be fairly confident, that a handful of chops I'd get from them would be a whole lot better than the shop stuff, regulation or no regulation.
You haven't addressed the issue of, regulating the home butchering of game or fowl or fish.
If it ain't right to butcher a lamb, surely it ain't right to kill a trout or a salmon from the local river.
Imagine the uproar there would be if the suits got as far as that with their self serving regulations.

Muckit

Did anyone read the editors page in yesterday's IFJ ?

One frustrated (and rightly so IMO) wrote in to tell of his story. A weanling bull had a mishap, which can happen, and broke his leg.

Off to the factory, but 'no' says the vet, can't tak him.

So straight to his butcher goes the farmer thinking he'I at least have meat for the house.

Same vet checks out animal and again says 'no'.

The animal had to be put down and disposed of. Now not alone is the farmer down the price of his animal, but he has the added cost of disposing of him.

Now I think this is just shameful.

It's a situation that could befall any of us, and this is the solution?? :mad:

clonmahon

reilig wrote: »

If you allow slaughter for home only, how do you stop people taking advantage of an unregulated system and using this system to slaughter meat to sell on the side such as a market, door to door sales or on the black market and how do you stop people who may take advantage of this scheme and process diseased meat or meat which has been contaminated by hormones??

Isn't the way to prevent this to have a traceable system such as the one currently in place or can you identify another system that would be less regulated than the existing system but work just as good?

I appreciate your fears reilig, that Irish farming is having a good run right now after so many hard years and you are afraid that just one major food scare and it all goes to hell again. No one wants that.

I think we need to learn from France, Spain and Italy all of whom have thriving artisan food sectors. I don't know exactly how the regulations work there, but they are much more relaxed for the artisan food sector than they are for industrial food sector. They recognize that the scale of the risk is different and regulate accordingly. We should just adopt their system and implement it here. The problem is that we will not.

fodda

The whole point of this is because of what? Can you please clarify?

Is it that you object to paying slaughterman/butcher charges to kill your home reared? These are skilled tradesmen with qualifications and/or years of experience, why would you object to paying for their services?

You want to try and undercut legitimate businesses who have gone to the expense and complied with all the regulations you object too?

Exactly why do you want to kill your own home reared when you have no experience or are willing to be trained or to comply with any regulations ?

clonmahon

fodda wrote: »

The whole point of this is because of what? Can you please clarify?

You are not quoting anything, what exactly are you seeking clarity on. We are nearly at post number 50 on this thread.

fodda wrote: »

Is it that you object to paying slaughterman/butcher charges to kill your home reared? These are skilled tradesmen with qualifications and/or years of experience, why would you object to paying for their services?

You want to try and undercut legitimate businesses who have gone to the expense and complied with all the regulations you object too?

Exactly why do you want to kill your own home reared when you have no experience or are willing to be trained or to comply with any regulations ?

You are making a whole series of assumptions here, without any knowledge. You have no idea what so ever of what my experience or qualifications are.

I have two points
1. If people wish to rear and kill livestock for home consumption, they will. Don't matter what the regulations are people are doing this up long lanes.

2. Applying the same regulations to artisan food producers as apply to industrial scale production is witless and idiotic.

Dusty87

All i know is my grandmother killed, cured and butchered home reared pigs and goats, with no qualifications. Her 7 children are fine healthy adults now, and id have no problem having a rasher or two from her back then. And were not talking years ago. She done her last pig 'Friday', 22 years ago.
Fodda, as a hunter, do you send your pheasants, deer, whatever you hunt to a 'professional'??
Im in no way knocking butchers, one recently did my pigs for me, but if someone is confident and able in doing it for home consumption, then why not??

fodda

It is quite simple Dusty as others have also explained.

This country is a large exporter of food and just one scare story is all it takes for importers of this food to close their doors to it. So this affects one of the businesses which employs many thousands and is a major part of the economy and the results of a scare are well proven.

Putting all this at risk for a few people to do their own thing is just not on.

As regards game i believe that anything you shoot cannot be offered for sale or to another person without going through a licensed game dealer who would obviousley have to check the meat before he offers it for sale.

I am not saying things are perfect but there is some organised traceability at present. Have home kill and nobody would know where anything comes from or is going and within hours the cowboys after a quick buck would be in operation and nobodies livestock would be safe anywhere.

sh1tstirrer

marizpan wrote: »

We reared a jersey calf to six months last year. Killed out at 120kg deadweight. Great marbling and butcher was able to hang for 4 wks as there was enough fat. A great amount of meat for a family of four for a year. I think a bullock is just too much meat. Will do again this year. Cost very little to rear as the cow helped reared him n still plenty of milk for the house. Butcher cost €150

So if the calf killed out at 50% that means that your 6 month old jersey bull weighed 240 kg liveweight. Even if he were 40kg at birth he would have to gain over 1kg/day to reach that weight. How much milk did you give him and what else did you feed him. I am just wondering as I had a few jersey bulls that were like trying to fatten greyhounds as I couldn't fatten them.