From Birth to Butcher

on using the whole animal, and the origins of Wild Irish Shepherdess

This piece describes where I’m coming from in wanting to make use of the whole animal when we’re butchering. A sort of sweeping overview on the why, not the how—that’ll come later. I go into details that might be a little bit sensitive for some, but I urge anyone who keeps or eats animals to read on. So much that is wrong with our food systems today is tied to a disconnect from the origins of our food and to hide from the things which are hard to see only serves to disconnect us further. Disgust is a learned response that can be unlearned.

We raise our own meat for the connection it gives us to our food. To know our food, how it was raised and everything that went into it. I know I’m not unique in that. I’m sure we all come into homesteading/self-sufficiency farming to deepen or rekindle that connection with our food and the land it grows from, as well as to aim toward a more sustainable and self-reliant way of living. And that way of living requires that we make the best and most frug…