Robin Boles

Sometimes trying to live sustainably can feel a lot like offering to help someone move. It takes a lot more time and effort than you expected, inevitably unforeseen obstacles complicate things, and you may end up questioning your choices.

Take the first and (probably) last time we raised pigs, or what in our family has become known as “The Pig Fiasco.”

We are meat eaters, so we try to be responsible meat eaters. To do this, we do the work to harvest as much of the meat that we eat as possible. We have successfully raised many rounds of chickens, and every fall, Tyler tries to fill our freezers with venison. Raising pigs seemed doable while providing another opportunity to educate our kids about the responsibilities that come with eating meat. 

We learned about employing pigs as “nature’s tractors,” rooting up the soil and clearing an area, which could then be cultivated for growing food. The added benefit of their manure amending the soil as they rooted out wild plum, burdock, thistle, and quack grass from our future garden sealed the deal. Why didn’t everyone keep pigs?!?

After what felt like plenty of research, which involved a great deal of reading and zero contact with pigs or conversations with anyone who had actually raised pigs, we determined we were ready.

We found organically fed pigs for sale on Craig’s list just outside of Eau Claire. Berkshire pigs to be precise, the exact old-world variety our research suggested was best suited to our needs: bacon. Sign us up!

Tyler attached homemade side panels to the bed of his truck crafted from some old garage doors he had recently replaced and wanted to keep out of the landfill. Repurposing at its finest! They were the perfect length and lightweight. Probably unnecessary in our opinion but surely sufficient to contain our two pigs for the journey home, their being members of the class of animals known for wallowing away the day in a pit of mud.

Upon our arrival, we quickly realized what we missed in the ad. A subtle but important distinction, one small word, but one of large consequence: “pigs” not “piglets.”  We were greeted by two, large, uncastrated adolescent male pigs.

One might think a 150-pound pig would be unable to jump from the ground into the back of a Chevy Silverado, but I’ve seen it happen. Twice! Apparently, when confined with two grown men, a young boy wielding a staff and a farm dog, they are amazingly agile.

In a moment of clarity, our flimsy makeshift side panels suddenly seemed woefully inadequate for the ride home.

The farmer begrudgingly provided us with a plywood panel which he likely regretted later but was the sacrifice he was willing to make in the moment to get us and those agitated boars off his hands. Using a hodge-podge of ratchet straps, we lashed the plywood over the entire operation, crossed our fingers and hit the road.

Contrary to our visions of adorable young piglets lounging peacefully in the bed of straw we had provided or even cowering in the corner, paralyzed with fear, it seemed as if these giant, bristly creatures might launch themselves from the bed of the truck at any moment; their large snouts working and pushing through the garage door panels as if they were made of cardboard.

Luckily, we arrived home without incident, and Sven and Ole gladly leapt from the truck into their new pen with the awkward grace of a pair of sumo wrestlers.

Yes, we name the animals destined for our dinner plates. A part of responsible animal care is making sure they have a great life and naming them helps us create a stronger connection. I’m asking them for the ultimate favor, why not make their life enjoyable before that time comes? In return, they’ll nourish me and my family. And honestly, if naming them makes saying goodbye trickier, well, it's also okay for us all to exercise that muscle a little bit as well.

To that point: My mom came to visit mid-summer and spent a lot of time feeding Sven and Ole apples from our orchard. Imagine my surprise when she announced one evening before she left that Sven Piggie, as she endearingly called him, was her soul mate.

For most of the summer, Sven and Ole did exactly as we expected: Ate, rooted, wallowed, and grew bigger and bigger and bigger.

By fall, the garden plot was mostly cleared, the pigs were enormous, and it was time to face the part of the arrangement we had agreed to from the start. Despite my mother’s proclaimed love for Sven Piggie, the slaughter and butchering took place as planned and went surprisingly well. We filled the freezer with racks of ribs, shoulder roasts, pork chops, sausage, and enough meat to pull a muscle patting ourselves on the back.

Then we decided to make bacon.

Though we had never made our own bacon, all that reading we had done made it sound straightforward enough. Cure it, smoke it, cook it and enjoy. What we failed to glean is that it is also quite easy to ruin several hundred dollars' worth of premium Berkshire pork belly with far too much salt and smoke.

Still unaware of our folly, we optimistically chose to make BLT’s with that first round of bacon. We harvested lettuce and the best heirloom tomato from the garden and made a fresh loaf of bread to pair with what was to be our crowning achievement of the whole summer: Our own homegrown bacon.

Imagine biting into a damp, salted, smokey strip of sponge. Oh the humanity! Sandwiches were cast down in disgust. Words were said. Dreams had been dashed.

Tears may have been shed at the supper table that night, not for the loss of Sven or Ole but for the hope that bacon had held for us and the utter disappointment it provided.

If it wasn’t quite what we had planned, we had our own selves to blame. Much like helping that acquaintance move: yes raising Sven and Ole turned out to be a lot more effort than we expected, yes unforeseen developments complicated things along the way (I’m still not sure if my stepdad knows that Sven Piggie stole my mother’s heart), and yes we most certainly found ourselves questioning our choices.

But, ultimately, the pigs did exactly what we had hoped: they cleared land, fertilized a future garden, taught us and our kids valuable lessons, and filled our freezer with meat. We, on the other hand, turned it into a fiasco.