Chickens eat fish?

[motoclown]

I just got a pressure caner cooker, one of the nice gals around here sent me a fish canning recipe,
that I will be trying out this spring.

Mine eat live minnows, and we freeze the extras for a treat.

 

[HoneyNBenNKids]

Quote:
So you can for your chickens?! That's a GREAT idea!!! Would you share your recipe? I'd like to can all those stinky fish we'll get during the summer to use during the winter!

....I wonder if you can dry them too?.....

Honey

 

[flowerchild59]

I can see them eating fish, no problem, but I would worry that any scraps left in their pen would attract vermin and coons and the such???

 

[motoclown]

No, I haven't caned for them yet, but why not.
I'm going can crazy this year..

"A couple of things first:

Use only 1/2 pint or pint size canning jars. It is my understanding that quart size jars will not cook thoroughly enough to be safe. I like to use wide mouth jars. They are easier for me to scrub clean. Make sure there are no chips or dings in the canning jars, particularly on the rim. If the lid does seat evenly the jar will not vacuum seal.

Processing time rule of thumb: 10 pounds of pressure for 100 minutes when under 1,000 feet elevation from sea level. There are charts for adjusting the cooking pressure above 1,000 feet . My neighbors have GPS in both of their cars. Parked side by side one GPS reads 930 feet, the other GPS reads 970 feet. The OSU canning expert strongly recommended I cook at least at 11 pounds of pressure. The weights for my pressure cooker come in either 10 or 15 pounds. I use the 15 pound one.

I boil the canning lids in a pot of water on the stove for a few minutes before draining and putting on the jars. The jars and rings I run through the dish washer on the high heat/sterilizing setting.

Here is how my husband and I can:

We work on the counter above the dish washer so we can pull a few warm jars out at a time. A cutting board, fillet knife and plenty of paper towels are on hand. My husband will cut chunks of fish that will loosely fit in the jars but are at least a 1/4'' below the rim. This way there is plenty of room for the lid to compress when it vacuum seals. I wipe the rims with a dry paper towel, place the lid and screw on the ring. Our pressure cooker has a metal riser that goes on the bottom so the jars are not sitting flush on the bottom. After the bottom layer of jars is loaded in the cooker I add enough water to come half way up the jar. Not to the jar rim, it might seep in. Jars are stacked on top of the first layer until the cooker is full. Our cooker holds 24 wide mouth pints. The lid is locked on and burner turned on. It will take a awhile to get up to temperature and the air to be forced out. Once the cooker is at the right pressure I start the timer for an hour and forty minutes. Since I use a stove on our porch for canning I will have some project I can work on there while keeping an eye on the burner and pressure gauge. Sometimes the burner needs a little adjusting. After an hour and forty minutes I turn off the heat and leave the lid locked tight. We have learned the hard way that if the pot is not cool to the touch on the outside the heat inside is still high enough that the jars will break when the lid is unlocked. If we start early enough we can do 2 runs of canning a day.

To can smoked salmon or albacore I following my normal brining procedure and smoke the fish about an hour before loading into jars and then the pressure cooker. If I am going to freeze the smoke fish I cook it a bit longer.

Canning fish scraps for the animals we simply cut the small mouth bass in chunks. Heads, tails, fins go in the jars. There is a fair amount of meat in between the salmon back bones so those are cut so they fit in the jar, Fins, skin, and meat scraps are added in. The heads are so big I freeze them then boil as needed.

Hope this is helpful. Like I said earlier, please double check some other canning resource in case I missed anything. Enjoy!"

 

[franklinchickens]

After reading this thread, I decided to throw out 2 trout heads we had. All of the chickens came running and came to a screeching halt. They circled them suspiciously for a minute or two, then backed away slowly. Fish was not a hit for our group! Go figure - they'll eat just about anything else.

 

[Miss Lydia]

mine like canned wild caught salmon they get it about once a week.

 

[Kurczak]

Hi, I didn't notice anyone feeding chickens clams. Is that O.K.? Our clam boil is 4 days old and everyone is sick of eating it so we're thinking of tossing all the potatoes/corn/clam leftovers onto the lawn for the chickies tomorrow. We are just worried if it's safe for them. .. . . . . . We're definitely going to have a few more clamboils this summer after a decent break from it so it would be nice to know if the girls can enjoy the food.

 

[walkswithdog]

The list of what chickens don't eat is far shorter than what they will eat. Lol. Dairy, other than yogurt, can be hard on their crops' bacteria balance if given too much too often, but they love cheese and yogurt. Clams and worms have a lot in common. They'd eat em. Mine loved just about anything we ate, spaghetti was a screaming hoot. Chicken fish shrimp clams, burger, turkey, bugs, mice, frogs,

 

[Kurczak]

Thank you for the quick answer, our girls will enjoy some clam boil in the morning )))
We like to spoil them. Same with loving the spaghetti here, we often joke they must be Italian.

(The rooster, however, will not enjoy it one bit as he was extremely rough with the girls and he has a butcher's appointment tommorow.

)

 

[jenifry]

When I clean walleye, sauger, bass, or trout, they get all the cleanings, minus the skins. In my opinion, they don't really eat the skins, and they stink after a while. They love the raw meat... if you strip the meat small, they will go crazy like they do for worms. Dad told me that they will eat anything we do.