I have always felt that way about the pigs and the chickens. So very cute as babies, there is nothing more adorable and so much fun to watch as baby pigs just a week or two old, but by the time they hit 30-40 lbs, I was so ready for them to be gone or grown up. Probably had something to do with always finding a hole to get out at that age/size. Same with chicks, they go through that awkward/ugly stage of feathering in, etc., before they hit their grown up feathered in, attractive stage.... even the lambs are so cute then get half grown and I am okay with them being food.... I wanted to raise rex rabbits for their pelts, and meat, but can find no one to kill them and I don't know if I could. I can do a quick .22 shot but don't think I can do the blunt force knock in the head. I have done chickens, but the plucking is as bad as the throat cutting, if I had a plucker I probably would, but have a neighbor that does his own and doesn't mind doing my 10 or so at a time when he is doing his for a small price. I am in no way able to do a steer/beef myself, and am perfectly willing to pay someone else to get it done and returned vacuum packed and frozen. I have put down an animal before, and could do it, but the cutting up of something of that size is more than I want to tackle. It also is partly being alone to do it. My son isn't into the "sustainable thing" like I am. But he has so many things on his plate, I don't get bent out of shape. If there is/was someone else doing it, he has always been more than willing to help, so I know he could/would if needed. He has hunted and all but it is not a burning desire like some.
