02/27/2026
Let’s clear up a common question we get asked all the time! 🥩🤝
We’ve had several folks ask how meat processing works for our farm, so we figured this was a great opportunity to share a little behind-the-scenes education for anyone unfamiliar with how small farms operate.
At Horner Acre Farms, all of our animals are raised right here on pasture — living calm, low-stress lives with access to fresh air, grass, and humane handling every single day until harvest time.
When that time comes, we do NOT process animals on our farm.
In fact, meat that is sold to the public must legally be harvested and packaged at a USDA-regulated and inspected facility.
That’s where two businesses we truly appreciate come in:
🐖Washington County Meat Packing
🐄 Piedmont Custom Meats
These processors handle harvesting and packaging under strict USDA inspection standards, ensuring food safety, humane euthanasia practices, and respectful handling of livestock. We are incredibly grateful for the care and professionalism they show because it’s literally just Grant and me out here feeding, planting, hauling, fixing, birthing, growing, and running the farm — there simply aren’t enough hours in the day (or hands on deck) for us to process animals ourselves….nor is that how small farms legally sell meat.
We love working with both of these meat processors due to their quality packaging, meat cut presentation, availability for our schedule (even if it can be last minute at times because we run out of meat so quickly 😅), and friendliness of their staff and owners!
Long story short:
Our animals are raised here.
Our meat is processed at licensed USDA facilities.
And every cut you purchase is inspected, regulated, and handled responsibly from pasture to plate. 🍽️
We love educating folks about where their food comes from!
