At Wolfe’s Neck Center for Agriculture & the Environment in Freeport, ME, our commitment to regenerative agriculture extends beyond how we care for the land. It also shapes how we raise, process and use the animals that are part of our farm.
Our 626-acre campus is home to an Organic Dairy, along with diversified livestock including goats, sheep, chickens and pigs. These animals spend their days on pasture, where they contribute to the health of the land through grazing and manure. Each animal also plays a different role within the larger farm system.
Our pigs are particularly valuable members of that system. Throughout the spring and summer season, they spend time in areas of campus where their natural behaviors can benefit the land. Their powerful snouts help uproot invasive plants in woodlines and disturb compacted soil in pastures, creating opportunities for new growth.
Raising animals for meat is also a responsibility. When our pigs reach their desired size and weight, they are transported to a local slaughterhouse for processing. Some are processed into retail cuts, including bacon, ground pork, sausage and ribs. Others return to campus as “splits,” two large halves that contain nearly the entire animal from head to tail.
From there, our culinary team takes over.
Butchering
Butchering is skilled, physical work. It requires knowledge of the animal’s anatomy, experience with different cuts and an understanding of how the meat will ultimately be used.
Working with whole animals gives our culinary team the flexibility to determine exactly how each pig can best support our catering, programs, events and Farm Store. Rather than starting with a predetermined list of cuts, the team can work with what is available and plan accordingly.
Bones are also cleaned, treated appropriately and used in stocks or sold as dog bones, finding another use for a part of the animal that might otherwise go to waste.
That sense of responsibility is an important part of our meat program. Raising an animal for food means recognizing the full weight of that relationship and taking care with every step of the process.
Farm Store
Retail cuts from our pigs, along with beef and lamb, are available seasonally at the Wolfe’s Neck Center Farm Store. Visitors and campground guests can take home meat raised, alongside fresh produce grown in our vegetable fields and greenhouses.
For us, selling meat is about more than offering a local product. It creates a direct connection between the animals raised on our campus, the people who care for them and the people who ultimately eat them.
That connection is part of what makes farming regenerative. The goal is to understand how each piece of the system fits together and to find ways for the land, animals, farmers and community to support one another.
From pasture to processing to the Farm Store, our meat program gives us another opportunity to practice that philosophy, while honoring the animals at the center of it.
