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Thanks :) Will check it out.

I must've done something wrong... They didn't seem dead. They were flapping and cheeping and lifting their heads. And I cut through the throat. Took under a minute for it to stop, but didn't like it one bit. When I was 13, I was in an agricultural school and we had to process two chickens...

Yes I do hang them by their legs and then cut throat, but they flap and mess blood. I feel so sorry for them! I'm going to try and construct some kind of killing cone so that their wings are restrained.

Thanks for this "recipe" :) Your chickens are looking good! Good luck with processing. I didn't do any this weekend. Maybe this coming weekend. I need to construct a killing cone... The last batch I did were flapping and spilling blood all over the place while they were bleeding out (Is...

Whew! I had such a busy week Started with processing 6 of the birds over this past weekend, which took up a lot of my time, since I am not very experienced. They came out well, at 3 weeks and 5 days the one I weighed dressed at 600g (1 pound, 5 ounces roughly) without the innards. I...

They do look tasty, I agree! When I see them, I think: "Drumstick, thigh, breast, wing, stock, livers, hearts, gizzards... mmmmm" I eat it all!

The chicks are 3 weeks old today. Some pictures: A close-up of one of the chicks. I opened their cage for them to roam a bit today (supervised) They didn't roam very far and the poor things were traumatized by my layers! It's a big, scary world out there...

That's a great point about GMO. I tried to go GMO free, but once you become aware of it, you realize most things contain GMO or are raised on GMO feed. I try to cut back where I can, ie conscious reading of labels and going GMO free where I can, but when it comes to feed, it's just too...

I had the same problem. Started with one 10 liter (3 gallon?) bucket and it soon became too small. Added a 15 liter bucket (5ish gallon?) so now have two buckets. That is also going to be insufficient soon so I am busy sterilizing a big garbage bin... What I do is leave about one sixth of the...

Thanks. They still have plenty of space to run in that cage, so will stay there until they're a bit bigger. I'm still scared to let them out. I've lost much bigger chickens to mongoose and they are so fast. They run, grab and hide before you can even see them

Hi, and welcome Yes we are trying to figure out the same thing (at least I am still trying to figure it out)! You pretty much have the thread summed up well. My aim is to feed a good protein source, like leftover meat, and filling the rest with sprouted/fermented grains. I just haven't been...

I still have mine on fermented broiler starter only. I haven't been able to find a cheap source of protein for them, or cheaper than the broiler feed that is. Broiler feed here is R350 (About $35) for 50kg bags (110ish lbs) and just after I bought two bags at that price, I saw an...

How are your birds doing, Carol? Any pics to share with us? How's the experiment going?

Here are some pics of my meaties, who are now two weeks old and eating like little pigs! Luckily they're growing well too so I'm not complaining My hubby mowed the lawn today, and I threw the clippings in the 10 x 10 cage they now share with the rabbits. I don't want to let them free range...

I've read it may cause botulism, and from what I can gather it's only when rotten meat is used to attract the flies. Breeding Black soldier fly larvae is done by many, but I'm still researching it as I don't want to be feeding anything that can harm the chickies. I've been quiet the past...

So I found another alternative feed, or at least something I can supplement with... MAGGOTS (ewwwww). Oh well, getting them is simple enough, plus I found this link that says it contains around 63% protein. I'm talking about normal house fly maggots here, but Black Soldier Flies can also be...

Hmmm... I guess I could try a small amount of fish and quit feeding it a week or two before butchering. If it does taste fishy, I would know for the next batch. It's not that I don't like fish, I just don't see the point in raising chickens that taste like fish when I can catch fresh fish or...

Right, so no fish for my meat chickens then... If I want to eat fish, I will catch it/buy it for myself. Don't want to be raising chickens just to have them taste like fish!

Thanks, I've been stirring the feed that they stomp down, but it's happening less frequently now as well - these guys have massive appetites! I found some cheaper bone meal that I will order for them along with sprouting some grains for them, and I will continue to ferment some broiler feed for...

I've also only recently heard of Tree Lucerne and the farm selling it here had a sample of theirs analyzed when the trees are seeding (then the nutrient value is at it's lowest) and it still had almost 30% protein in it. Animals can graze directly from it, or in the case of rabbits, it can be...