Members of the greater Prairie City, Ill., community gathered for lunch in the hog house this week, as Ed and Allison McEwen held an open house for their new hog finishing facilities.

The two recently-finished buildings will house 2,498 hogs each; the first load of hogs will arrive this Thursday. McEwen is finishing hogs on contract for Tri-Oak Foods. For McEwen, the benefits are two-fold: the hog operation adds a sideline income and his family's farm benefits from the hog manure as fertilizer on nearby ground.

OPEN DOORS: Ed and Allison McEwen welcomed dozens of community members for lunch in the (very new) hog house this week. Sons Wesley and Luke were on hand, while Cole was in school.

"We looked at it as a business," McEwen says, speaking of his LLC investment partnership with his twin brother, Eric. "We did a cash flow statement as you would with anything. We figured costs and cash flow so it works out – at least on paper – before we did it."

McEwen also created computer models for the manure, so they'd know exactly how much they'd get and where it would go. Tri-Oak estimates the annual fertilizer value from one of McEwen's buildings at $25,000 to $26,000.

"We figure there's enough manure created per building per year for 160 acres, depending on the rate and timing," McEwen says. They have a 240 acre farm next to the facilities and a 120 down the road, and they're working with neighbors to utilize any remaining manure.

And while McEwen initially figured on one building, drilling the well and planning to add a second building down the road, he ultimately decided to build both now. He attempted to bore a well but didn't get enough water. A 780-foot drilled well ultimately yielded good water flow.

His efforts recently have been good for local business, with 1,500 yards of concrete poured for the two buildings. The concrete came from a local business, which said they'd poured more concrete in a week at his place than they had in the entire past year. Feed storage bins came from local Schuld/Bushnell bins, and all his feed will come out of the Bushnell-based Tri-Oak feed mill.

The building will house 2,498 hogs each, with 56 pens per building and 44 pigs per pen.

Iowa-based Tri-Oak Foods has contracted with 60 hog producers in Illinois, and an additional 190 in Iowa.