Blood Feud: the Hatfields & the Mccoys (2014)
“The half-wild razorback hogs flourished in this arrangement because they could feast on the rich mast of steep hillside forests—acorns and beechnuts, chestnuts and hazelnuts. Territorial, the hogs didn’t often wander far from home, and each farmer made specific notches in the hogs’ ears to identify his own.
In autumn, farmers herded their hogs back home for fattening and slaughter, branded the ears of the piglets, and released the latter to the wilds. They butchered the adults, rendered the...ir lard, and cured their meat for winter use. Identification marks sometimes became difficult to discern as the hogs grew to maturity, their ears growing along with their bodies.1 But, like herders the world over, most farmers could identify their own animals by sight.
Many have snorted at the idea of a stolen hog’s triggering a bloody feud, but hogs in the Tug Fork Valley in the nineteenth century were no laughing matter. One hog more or less could make the difference between surviving the winter or starving to death before wild greens sprouted in the spring.MoreLess
In autumn, farmers herded their hogs back home for fattening and slaughter, branded the ears of the piglets, and released the latter to the wilds. They butchered the adults, rendered the...ir lard, and cured their meat for winter use. Identification marks sometimes became difficult to discern as the hogs grew to maturity, their ears growing along with their bodies.1 But, like herders the world over, most farmers could identify their own animals by sight.
Many have snorted at the idea of a stolen hog’s triggering a bloody feud, but hogs in the Tug Fork Valley in the nineteenth century were no laughing matter. One hog more or less could make the difference between surviving the winter or starving to death before wild greens sprouted in the spring.MoreLess
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