Processing Day Support Group ~ HELP us through the Emotions PLEASE!

[DaveMorey]

How do you get 110lbs of feed for $35, is it where you live?
Here a 50lbs bag is $20 and my freedom rangers are going through that in a week!
I started FF the other day, but it's not long enough to have noticed a difference, though they seem like they are eating just as much if not more...

I am getting my feed at TSC for $16 a 50lb bag. According to my records I have gone through only 110lbs thus far. If I fed my birds more often they would eat me out of house and home. My biggest concern was flipping so I cut their feed to 3X a day so they don't eat themselves to death. I have only gone through 2 full bags and a small starter bag so far. I am sure when you factor time and labor it will never be cheaper to grow it yourself. But it was important for me to do it so my children could have the experience and also to know where my food came from.

 

[dutchbunny83]

Okay, thank you.
I may be feeding too much.
I expected it to be more and obviously more work.
Which is fine.
But at $20 a bird as opposed to $4 something needs to change because I can't afford home grown chicken at that price, it's like $7 a lb on the bone!

So you like your cornish cross?
We had them once and after 2 weeks gave them away.
We live in the city on 1/3 acre. We did let them free range, but they were leaving disgusting poop EVERYWHERE so we needed to put them in the run.
The Freedom Rangers are leaving a lot less poop everywhere and smelling less.
I may have had a bad batch of the cx, but the ones we had were gross. I have heard other people really like them.
I do love my FR's, probably too much. There's a massive rooster that we really can't keep, but he may just get a death pardon because I am so in love with him!

 

[aoxa]

Okay, thank you.
I may be feeding too much.
I expected it to be more and obviously more work.
Which is fine.
But at $20 a bird as opposed to $4 something needs to change because I can't afford home grown chicken at that price, it's like $7 a lb on the bone!

So you like your cornish cross?
We had them once and after 2 weeks gave them away.
We live in the city on 1/3 acre. We did let them free range, but they were leaving disgusting poop EVERYWHERE so we needed to put them in the run.
The Freedom Rangers are leaving a lot less poop everywhere and smelling less.
I may have had a bad batch of the cx, but the ones we had were gross. I have heard other people really like them.
I do love my FR's, probably too much. There's a massive rooster that we really can't keep, but he may just get a death pardon because I am so in love with him!

I love my CX, but if I had them on only 1/3 of an acre, I'd probably like them a whole lot less. Their poop is very gross. The sheer mass of it. They stink less with FF, but not entirely stink free. I think you need a lot of room for CX not to notice the poop. Once they were outside I didn't notice it at all.. Unless they let one out right next to me. The sound.. lol

Feed here ranges between $17 - $20 a #50 pound bag. I worked it out to .37 cents a pound of food. According to a chart I found on feed conversion for CX it was 20 pounds each bird at 8 weeks if free fed. If I calculated feeding my birds 20 pounds at .37 cents a pound that's $7.40 per bird. + $1.30 for cost of each chick = $9.10. But since I free ranged and fed soaked feed it worked out to $6 per bird. I free range my entire flock together, so I can't guess what the others consumed of what was being fed, but that amount is included in the $6 average. Also included a portion of the barn's utilities to the meaties for heat and lighting in the first two - three weeks before they free range.

 

[dutchbunny83]

Okay, thank you so much for the information.
I need to calculate out how much I give them instead of just feeding them whenever it's empty.
I do let the freedom rangers free range some, but on 1/3 acre there's really only so much grass they can eat.
I do throw scraps out to them and buy fresh greens like kale and chop it up and give it to them which they love.
My husband is in the Army so we're kinda stuck here for now, but we REALLY want to have some more land and some bigger livestock.
I keep telling myself 13 years to retirement...

I just started FF, so hopefully that makes a difference.
Under $10 a bird is doable, but up in the $20 range we really can't sustain even if it is better.
Do you solely rely on your own meat or do you buy some too?

Thanks so much for the help!!!

 

[wlhtx]

Okay. Today is the day. We've been putting this off for the past 4 weeks or so, but we are processing 3 older hens and 4 young cockerels today. (Was supposed to be 5 cockerels, but we lost one to a predator Friday night.) These are all DP birds - 4 marans, 1 BR, 2 JGs. For those that remember the discussions from a month or two ago, our 9 yr old RIR hen (aka my 7 yr old son's favorite chicken) is not on the cut list today. As a family we decided to do these others first, and then determine her fate a little layer on.

We do not have a pot big enough, so we will not be plucking the chickens. We're just going to skin them. We don't eat a lot of fried chicken, and all the old girls are destined for chicken and dumplings, so we'll try our hands at plucking another time.

Oh my goodness. I was completely confident about this yesterday. This was my idea in fact, but now I'm starting to freak a little...

Our 7 yr old will be helping. (He wants to.) So, I HAVE to put on my brave mommy face.

 

[DaveMorey]

Okay. Today is the day. We've been putting this off for the past 4 weeks or so, but we are processing 3 older hens and 4 young cockerels today. (Was supposed to be 5 cockerels, but we lost one to a predator Friday night.) These are all DP birds - 4 marans, 1 BR, 2 JGs. For those that remember the discussions from a month or two ago, our 9 yr old RIR hen (aka my 7 yr old son's favorite chicken) is not on the cut list today. As a family we decided to do these others first, and then determine her fate a little layer on.

We do not have a pot big enough, so we will not be plucking the chickens. We're just going to skin them. We don't eat a lot of fried chicken, and all the old girls are destined for chicken and dumplings, so we'll try our hands at plucking another time.

Oh my goodness. I was completely confident about this yesterday. This was my idea in fact, but now I'm starting to freak a little...

Our 7 yr old will be helping. (He wants to.) So, I HAVE to put on my brave mommy face.

I wish you well in your processing. It may be difficult but with a youngster there that may be full of questions about "what's this or that" you may find the teaching part makes it less stressful. Best of luck today.

 

[katbriar]

Since I don't have a big pot I use a big cooler- it actually works really well because it holds the temperature.

Good luck, stay calm, don't expect perfection, and be proud. You'll learn from this effort (and all the ones to come after).

Let us know how it goes!

 

[Chambertin]

I think the largest *issues people may have are their own expectations.
If you want to give chickens a humanistic life then you better be prepared to get sick every time you think of turning them into food. I certinaly would get sick about raising a family of 4 only to turn them into dumplings after they hit 18. Wow, no wonder its so hard!
Take the normal slight aversion to death all living things have, then the feelings we are given as a culture, multiply that by the relationship you have with the birds, then the humanistic life.
That's a LOT of emotional weight.

I'd recommend changing that expectation to the best darn life a chicken can hope for, ever.
Then give them the best darn death an animal can hope for (remember death in the natural world is really ugly even for people) and let their life nourish your family to give more little birdies a better chance and better life than they could of ever had.

I've seen farms with no real fences before because they took such good care of the birds and animals (and had other means of predator control) that none of them would run off.
What they did have to do was keep the neighboring escapee birds out, because life was so good at that place word spread.
Oh and they processed right in front of the flock. Had chicken at darn near every meal too.

Death is the part of life we all want to forget but must come to accept in some way to have a normal life.
Darn paradoxes!

Give your birds a great bird life and if you want introduce them to some of the funner things we humans can provide.
Also dont feel bad when its hard or you dont think you can do it. Fear and hesitation are normal and can be tools to slow you down and cause you to focus on doing it right.
Dont panic and you can get through just about anything. Most of all, dont expect it to go like the videos (completely) every situation is different and the first time is always the hardest.
I'm reminded of a great comic line.
Caution, its a tiny bit off color:

Spoiler: Warning: Spoiler!

"Dont you want to go back and find the person you lost your virginity with and get with them again just to show them that you are Soooo much better now."

EDIT: *fixed a missing word and spelling goof.

 

[katbriar]

"Fear and hesitation are normal and can be tools to slow you down and cause you to focus on doing it right."

I feel the same way and have many times tried to convey this thought, but never this well. Perfectly said.

 

[lawatt]

hi, i've just been reading this thread for a while, haven't quite gotten to the point of trying out processing myself yet -- but wanted to chime in here on expectations re: cost. it sounds like a lot of people are able to raise their birds very economically, and that's fantastic, definitely a lot to learn from those strategies -- but if you compare cost of raising your own food to that in the grocery store, it's NOT guaranteed to be cheaper to do it yourself. the main reason many of us are interested in raising our own chickens is the ways that industrial animals are treated: insanely crowded housing, pumped full of hormones, etc. But also the scale at which those big industries are raising chickens allows the cost of each individual animal to be brought WAY down -- just like WalMart can sell you the same item as the local hardware store for way less, they are enjoying the benefits of economies of scale.

so yes, you CAN buy a chicken for $4 or $5 at most grocery stores -- but it's that cheap because of how its been raised. better to compare your own costs to the price of a locally-raised, free range chicken, which around here is more like $3-4 per pound.