The saying goes that animals on family farms have one bad day in their lives: the date they are taken to the slaughterhouse.
But Marc O’Clair believes an animal’s last day doesn’t have to be bad. The former science teacher from Fayette learned to butcher from a student’s father when he couldn’t find someone to come slaughter his Highland cattle, and now he and his teenage son visit Maine farms to process cows, pigs, goats and sheep in their barnyards.
“They’re herd animals,” he said. “They want to stay with their friends and their family, so separating them from the group is super stressful. That’s not what you want for your animals.”
As far as he knows, he’s the only slaughterer in the state who visits farms. Sam Margolin, based in Norway, became the only one to do it for poultry several years ago and plans to add four-legged farm animals soon. He also is a game meat butcher during hunting seasons.
Both men believe the mobile model is more compassionate for livestock, easier for farmers, produces better meat and is a necessary service for people raising animals to feed their families. It’s rare in New England, but they hope to see it expand. The need is real, especially as existing slaughterhouses remain backlogged since the pandemic.
More small slaughterhouses and processing facilities have opened in Maine over the past few years in response, but some farmers still wait months for an appointment or travel hours to reach one.
The specifics of on-farm processing are different for poultry and four-legged animals. For both, the processor kills the animal outside and cleans it, skins or plucks it, guts it and prepares it in an outfitted trailer. Both men have processing shops at their homes for some animals, or can drop off meat to a farmer’s preferred butcher.
They operate under an exemption of Maine’s inspection laws allowing “itinerant slaughterers” to visit farms and process animals for the farmer’s personal use.
Meat sold commercially must be slaughtered and processed in facilities inspected by the USDA. Custom processors in Maine such as the mobile units are exempt from this, but have to register with the state and follow its requirements for sanitation, slaughter method, meat handling, water quality, waste disposal and recordkeeping. Inspectors periodically review the processors.
Four-legged animals can be processed on-farm if the meat is only for family consumption or through shares (a “not for sale” sticker is required), while small poultry farms can sell custom-slaughtered meat onsite from a farmstand, market or share with a disclaimer label.
That model can be a lot easier for people raising animals at home for themselves or a small community.
O’Clair said he respects the butchers who have stationary facilities. But they offer different things, and it often doesn’t suit very small farms. Most of O’Clair’s clients only have one or two animals to process.
In addition to the backlog, larger slaughterhouses may require a minimum number of animals. Rounding them up into a trailer is often difficult, stressful, time-consuming and expensive, especially for older farmers or those with physical limitations.
The drive could then take hours. In that time, the animals are distressed over separation from their herd, the journey, hunger and a strange environment. Studies have found that high levels of stress hormones before slaughter negatively affects the meat, a difference the mobile processors have noticed anecdotally in livestock.
Poultry also regularly die in transport, and losing several birds makes a difference to a small-scale farmer.
Birds aren’t fed for a day beforehand to prepare them for processing, and Margolin recalls seeing them cannibalize each other and eat their own waste in livestock trailers. It almost made him quit farming.
Slaughtering and processing at home might seem like the obvious alternative, and for some farmers it is. It’s hard, physical work, and the equipment costs add up quickly for a small operation.
It’s not easy to kill an animal, either, even for the professionals. Both Margolin and O’Clair take each death seriously, and remind themselves that they try to offer the most painless end possible. They also focus on the fact the animals were raised to be food.
“It’s nothing I want to revel in,” Margolin said. “It’s a hard thing. Marc and I carry that with us.”
That intensity might be one reason why there aren’t many butchers entering the field right now, which is a potential hurdle to getting more mobile processors.
Then there are the labor shortages faced by many Maine businesses — Margolin’s wife removes the organs from the chickens in his operation.
O’Clair sees another challenge in the fact that there isn’t a tradition of mobile slaughter in Maine like there is in Australia, New Zealand and the western United States; sometimes, people don’t realize that the business is legal.
Despite that, Margolin feels the two butchers are on the road to success already, and demand is steady.
Mobile processing trailers could work for other agricultural or aquaculture products that need packaging too, especially in a large, spread out state with many smaller farms like Maine, according to Margolin.
“The basic model is making it more accessible to grow your own food,” he said.
Margolin said his phone rings all the time, and he schedules appointments for just a day or two each week, leaving the rest open for the last-minute calls and emergencies that will fill them. O’Clair has never advertised except for one Facebook post when he started out three years ago, and he is booked until March 2025.
Margolin is reducing the radius he’ll travel as demand increases, and hopes one day he won’t have to tell anyone “no” but point to another processor closer to them instead.
Both butchers are enthusiastic about training new people and sharing their knowledge with anyone who’s interested in learning or joining the field.
There’s room for dozens more mobile businesses just for poultry, Margolin said. He hopes he and O’Clair can serve as a case study that could be replicated across Maine and New England.
