Farmer markets marijuana fed pork

Farmer markets marijuana fed pork, A Washington pig farmer has come up with a new twist on 'grass-fed' meat by feeding his animals left over leaf trim from a nearby marijuana farm.

William von Scheneidau, owner of the BB Ranch in Seattle, came up with the idea after the owners of a weed dispensary told him they had extra stems, stalks and leaves to get rid of.

Marijuana was legalised in Washington last year, leading to an explosion in production. But it is usually only the buds - the most psychoactive parts of the plant - which are consumed.

The rest of the plants are usually thrown out, or made into compost.

Sensing an opportunity to tap into the lucrative stoner market, Mr Von Scheneidau asked the weed farmers if he could take what they were planning to throw out to feed to his pigs.

Mr Von Scheneidau's 'Pot Pigs', as he calls them, have already proved a hit with customers, with meat selling out before the batches are even processed, NBC News reports.

'I feed them marijuana for the last two months of their lives, and they've been happy, happy as hell,' he told the news network.

Despite the relatively weak effects of the cannabis leaf trimmings, he says pigs just lie around, barely lifting their heads - much like human stoners.

That might be a reason for his remarkable finding that the animals that eat the dope gain weight 20 per cent faster than those fed on more conventional diets - even though they consume the same amount overall.

The fast weight gain leads to a more marbled and fatty texture to the free-range pork, which usually goes on to be processed into products like bacon and prosciutto.

Mr Von Scheneidau, who refrains from smoking the herb himself, told NBC that customers taking part in 'blind bacon tests' described the meat as 'more savoury'.

'The flavour of the fat is extraordinary, [customers] love the marbling of the fat,' he said.

It is not the first time the enterprising pig farmer has experimented with unusual feeds for his animals.

He also adds beer and even vodka to their troughs, bringing whole new meaning to the phrase 'party animals'.