- Mar 10, 2009
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Whew, what a process! My son and I completed butchering our first 5 Cornish-X this afternoon. All day yesterday I was apprehensive as I have never butchered (or for that matter purposely killed) an animal. Spent a good part of the day getting things set up and purchasing the needed materials.
I had culled the 5 camp attendees yesterday morning so they'd be ready to go for today. My son and I went out to do the deed. I grabbed the first hen, put her in the cone and cut the artery. Unfortunately since I'd not done this before I really didn't have a feel for how much cutting would be required so when she started to bleed I quit cutting. The only part of the day I feel badly about was I didn't cut her enough so she lasted much longer than I would have liked. I finally deepened the cut and she expired shortly there after. Lesson learned, I made sure to do a better job for the balance of the campers.
We used melted paraffin in the scalding water and boy did it make a difference. Made plucking very quick (forgot to add additional paraffin once and plucking was much more tedious).
On to the cleaning. Though it got easier with each bird, I still need practice but I was fortunate I didn't have any fecal leaks or bile duct rupturing - yeah!
I cut one bird into pieces and left the others whole - they're soaking in ice water now!
That's our story - wasn't as bad as I expected though the smell of wet feathers isn't what I would call pleasant! 5 down, 14 to go!
I had culled the 5 camp attendees yesterday morning so they'd be ready to go for today. My son and I went out to do the deed. I grabbed the first hen, put her in the cone and cut the artery. Unfortunately since I'd not done this before I really didn't have a feel for how much cutting would be required so when she started to bleed I quit cutting. The only part of the day I feel badly about was I didn't cut her enough so she lasted much longer than I would have liked. I finally deepened the cut and she expired shortly there after. Lesson learned, I made sure to do a better job for the balance of the campers.
We used melted paraffin in the scalding water and boy did it make a difference. Made plucking very quick (forgot to add additional paraffin once and plucking was much more tedious).
On to the cleaning. Though it got easier with each bird, I still need practice but I was fortunate I didn't have any fecal leaks or bile duct rupturing - yeah!
I cut one bird into pieces and left the others whole - they're soaking in ice water now!
That's our story - wasn't as bad as I expected though the smell of wet feathers isn't what I would call pleasant! 5 down, 14 to go!
