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Of the four San Angelo, Texas-area meat packing plants that were once open for business, only Lone Star Beef and San Angelo Packing are currently in operation. These two slaughterhouses specialize in beef. Ranchers and feedyards with sheep or goats have had no place to ship them the last couple of years except to a slaughterhouse in Greeley, Colo., or some other out-of-state facility. However, a little excitement has been generated lately by the activity around the old packing plant near Rowena, east of San Angelo.
One day when goats showed up in the pens by that plant, my interest piqued even more. It turns out that Jorge Correa is managing the old Stmbe Packing Company for custom slaughtering jobs. Jorge named the new business RPI - Rowena Packing, Inc.
Jorge knows his way around this packing plant.
"When I was 10 years old, I had the school bus driver drop me off at Strube's in the afternoon so I could salt the hides," he said. "Strube paid me 15 cents a hide." Jorge explained that he continued to work at Strube's through his college years. He worked in the plant, which killed sheep and goats until it closed. Jörge also has experience as a federal meat inspector.
Now he processes sheep, goats and hogs at Rowena Packing and currently employs about 18 people. Jorge has been very busy as he starts up a new business, but he has a pleasant personality when you talk to him. He hopes to increase his custom orders, which could be for 100 animals or more. But if a person asks for one or two animals to be killed, Jorge refers them to the local locker plants. He said, "We're doing a little bit of killing on our own also."
Jorge knows there's a market for wild or feral hogs, so he's processing a few of them and...