The Accidental Smallholder Forum

Livestock => Pigs => Topic started by: SheepMad95 on January 18, 2014, 06:59:25 pm

Title: Slap marks
Post by: SheepMad95 on January 18, 2014, 06:59:25 pm

Hi all..

I'm planning on getting some pigs in February for the freezer.

We had some two years ago for the freezer and they had the slap mark of the person we got them off. And the abbitoir said that it needed our own slap mark on them?

Is that true???

Thanks :)

Title: Re: Slap marks
Post by: hughesy on January 18, 2014, 07:06:34 pm

Yes when pigs go for slaughter they need to be tagged or slapmarked with the herd number of the holding that's sending them, ie yours.

Title: Re: Slap marks
Post by: SheepMad95 on January 18, 2014, 07:56:09 pm

Ok that's great to know! Do you know the best place to get a slap mark? I get my sheep tags from shear well.. Do they do them do you know?

Think I rather have the slap mark then tags

Thanks :)

Title: Re: Slap marks
Post by: hughesy on January 19, 2014, 08:44:37 am

Check with the abattoir first, some want them tagged, some want them slapped. I should imagine most of the tag suppliers will stock slap marking gear. Tagging is easier and less fiddly though it onlt takes a second when they're in the trailer ready to go.

Title: Re: Slap marks
Post by: Bionic on January 19, 2014, 08:59:28 am

My abattoir were happy to take either tagging or slap marking. We decided to do the slap mark and bought ours from Supplies for smallholders, although you can get them elsewhere.
Unsure of how to do it we didn't want to leave it until the last minute, in case it went wrong or we chickened out, so slap marked a couple of days before they went. If you do it while they are feeding they hardly flinch.
It didn't seem to show up much through the hair so we took the marking kit to the abattoir with us to be on the safe side. We needn't have worried. When we got the meat back the slap marks were clearly showing on each shoulder.

Title: Re: Slap marks
Post by: Bodger on January 19, 2014, 09:07:13 am

In the good old days when we had a big abattoir nearby that did pigs, the pigs were slap marked by the abattoir workers as you unloaded them and you merely noted the numbers that your pigs had been allocated.

Title: Re: Slap marks
Post by: SheepMad95 on January 28, 2014, 12:38:09 pm

Thank you everyone for replying :)
I'll will ring up the Abbitoir this afternoon to see what the prefer
And then I will start looking into buying it :)

Thanks all!!:)

Title: Re: Slap marks
Post by: JulieWall on January 28, 2014, 12:45:42 pm

I wanted to buy a slap marker but the place I usually buy from, Daltons, suggested checking with the slaughterhouse I intended to use first as some of them have their own requirements. As my choices were limited to two I phoned the one I anted to use and sure enough, they would only accept metal tags. they gave the reason as the scalding bath process and the metal tags standing up to it. I was very worried about tagging the pigs as by then they were too big to wrestle with, but I needn't have worried as they just carried on eating as I punched tags into their ears. Couldn't believe an animal would be impervious to pain when eating but they were :o