The owner of Maple Lane Farms in Charleston, where the meat was processed, said Thursday that Canarr had done nothing wrong.

“It was more my fault than his, that’s for sure,” said the owner, who declined to share his name. “The girls that labeled it had the wrong label on it. It went out and didn’t get caught, and the state found it with the wrong code on it.”

The labeling issue happened last fall and was discovered this spring. In June, state inspectors told Canarr that they wanted to recall and destroy all the meat he had left from those pigs.

They also told him that they were going to “retain” two more pigs he had brought two months ago to the processing company for slaughter until a determination could be made on the production process of those animals, according to a signed statement that Canarr submitted on July 2 to a compliance officer with the Maine Meat and Poultry Inspection Program of the Maine Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry.

Canarr said that his beef is not with the processing company, which he said is going to make the small farmer financially whole. He estimates that the frozen meat would be worth about $1,000 at market.

“They made a mistake. These things happen,” he said.