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

[chicksooner]

I believe Dr. James is from Spiro, he posted that at least once on the thread.

He is a long ways from me.

 

[wlhtx]

Bee, just to show you that women aren't ALWAYS the chicken processors. Here is a picture of my great-great grandfather plucking a few of his birds. I think this was taken in the early '40s. He died shortly after. I always thought this was one of the coolest pictures.

 

[aoxa]

Bee, just to show you that women aren't ALWAYS the chicken processors. Here is a picture of my great-great grandfather plucking a few of his birds. I think this was taken in the early '40s. He died shortly after. I always thought this was one of the coolest pictures.

That's an awesome picture. What does he have in his hand? It looks like a box.

My grandparents were fox farmers. There are plenty of processing pictures of foxes. They have a baby picture of me laying on my belly on a bunch of fox fur skins (buck naked no less! lol)
Both my mother and father grew up on some sort of farm. My mother a fox farm, and my father a multi-purpose farm (mostly cattle) but they raised chickens and pigs as well.

 

[Beekissed]

It sure is!!! I've never seen a man process a chicken in my world...only on YT vids. The first time I saw a man do so was this summer when I was teaching some to do it...the women learned it quicker and had smaller hands, so maybe that is why it's mostly the women who do this in our family.

 

[aoxa]

It sure is!!! I've never seen a man process a chicken in my world...only on YT vids. The first time I saw a man do so was this summer when I was teaching some to do it...the women learned it quicker and had smaller hands, so maybe that is why it's mostly the women who do this in our family.

Makes sense. Our hands get into those cavities better. My grandfather did all the killing and the kids did the rest with my dad growing up. The women did the cooking and housekeeping (and taking care of the men). Times have changed.

 

[wlhtx]

I don't know what he has in his hand. The original of the picture is pretty small, so I can't magnify it clearly enough to totally make it out - but I think he is holding the carcass and his left hand is slightly inside the cavity. What always got me is that he is out there in a button down shirt and slacks. Apron too - of course, but when we processed I wore the oldest, scruffiest clothes I had on hand. I was too afraid of getting messy.

 

[camilleathome]

So we processed. All 25 birds no issue at all thanks to the plucker. We are going to cost share one with a friend who has a small farm 10 minutes away. We'll split the cost and share it.

So yeah.. I took some photos. I assume I don't have to warn about the graphicness since this is a processing thread. I took killing pictures as well, so skip if you do not want to see. The knife was AWESOME! Was very happy with how it cut and had very quick bleed outs.





Note: I had someone hold the legs because I forgot to get zip ties. I don't let go of the bird when they are bleeding out. They've gone back up into the cone and pinched the artery enough to live while I plucked two chickens.. Never again.


The vampire Pennies.. They were licking the blood under our feet.




Scalding at 150f

after scalding I dip in cold cold water and test feathers to make sure they were scalded long enough, yep!


Plucking








All it took was 2-5 minutes to pluck.


Sitting in ice water before gutting


Removing the legs


which Henry gladly claims.. not all of course, because he'd get sick

The rest of the images turned out quite dark. But yeah. It was a great day, and we did 25 birds.

Thank you for letting me help and teaching me. Its always great fun getting to spend the weekend with you two! The way we did slaughtered the chickens was nice because there was no stress or fuss with the chickens. They only ever thrashed AFTER the heart stopped. The chicken was absolutely delicious as well! I actually convinced Al NOT to roast the whole chicken(Knowing him he would eat half a chicken in one sitting) As I wanted to make the yummy chicken last XD.

 

[camilleathome]

Makes sense. Our hands get into those cavities better. My grandfather did all the killing and the kids did the rest with my dad growing up. The women did the cooking and housekeeping (and taking care of the men). Times have changed.

I have man hands(Like ive only met one man with bigger hands than me and he was a 7 foot giant!). And although I could do it it was tougher than you two XD

 

[jajeanpierre]

I put them in a killing cone facing away from me, I secure the cone in a lower position then where you put it to slice the neck, for easier aim. I secure the feet, this makes them more calm and less likely to remove themselves from the correct position. I let them settle down for a few minutes, when I return the are generally calm so I remain quiet w/o sudden movements. They generally are hanging upside down but have there head raised so their neck makes a "u" shape. I gently place the business end of the gun just behind the BASE of the comb where it attatches to the head, then move the gun just about 1/2 a finger width below that and aim for where the beak would be (you can't see the beak, but in the general area of the beak) If their head is to high or at a wrong angle you can gently nudge it to the right angle w/ the gun, take your time make sure of your aim, the chicken isn't going anywhere. If the aim is good they will almost instantly go into the death throes.

When you say, "facing away from me" what do you mean? Is the bird presenting it's back or it's belly to you? Would it be correct to use the same path as books describe for pithing, except instead of starting from the mouth, start from the back of the head?

I hate to ask you again--I should have bookmarked your pictures!--but can you send me the pictures of your set up again, please. I PROMISE I'll bookmark them!

 

[aoxa]

Don't you love when you can convince someone who has been raising CX for years that they can be free ranged and CAN act like chickens?

The Cornish cross I've butchered up to 20 weeks still made good fryers. Tenderness IMHO is more a result of the birds activity than age. Why are Cornish so "tender" (personally I find them watery) for so long? Watch them, they do nothing but sit in front of the feeder and eat. They move around very little. Therefore, the result of using their muscles less is a much more "tender" bird.

It's been a few years since I've raised birds a fryers but I do prefer the Freedom Rangers over the Cornish Crosses.

I really wish people would stop stereotyping this meat bird.. If they do this, it is your way of raising them that makes them lazy, not the bird themselves

My free range meaties at 6 weeks.

You can see them at 12 weeks here. I haven't uploaded it to youtube, but my birds were anything but lazy. Most delicious chicken I have ever tasted. Very good flavour and the tenderness to die for.

I'll be honest I've never seen Cornish x's behave that way. I have a 10x18 brooder house, just has human door on it. I've open the door at approx. 6-8 weeks of age (depending on weather) and they have the whole place to roam and they might venture out a bit, sit and eat some grass and that is about it.
I'm 51 years old and between my folks and I we have probably raised and butchered 5 thousand in meat bird in that time frame.

I'll take that as a compliment.

I am very strict on their feed intake. Mostly for my wallet. I don't want to feed them 20 pounds to butcher each. Not with our feed costs what they are.

I restrict it to what they can eat in 5-10 minutes after 2 weeks old. They eat twice a day. In the morning and at supper. I soak my feed and it doubles in volume. They drink far less water that way, and saves me more money.

They are loose to free range at 2 weeks, so they forage most of their feed intake. As you can see in the video, no one is starving. They are highly motivated to eat, so if you take away the feed dish, they have no other choice but to act like chickens. Leave a food dish full, they will become zombie chickens who never move and eat until they can't move anyway.

If you can free range, next time try it that way. You will be pleasantly surprised at the efficiency of this hybrid meat bird. They can free range, and are the best foragers I have ever seen. Running around chasing butterflies and digging for grub. Really awesome to watch. I did hate feeding time, because they would eat so fast they would gasp - but run they did. Forage they did. Dust bathe they did. They were chickens.

It was a compliment. They definitely look and act like a chicken does. It makes sense if limiting the food they would actually get off their fat little bums and go look for food. ;-)

It's just me know at home, kids grown, wife, well that's a whole other story. ;-).

I share an order of chicks with a couple people at work and maybe I'll get a half dozen or so Cornish to raise with my layer chicks and use your method. My layer chicks once that door is open and get over their fear of the big wide open outdoors are out the door first thing in the morning and don't come back til dusk.

Win!!! Love that Someone is going to try a new way of raising them. I would never have tried raising them if it wasn't for Beekissed who proved to me it was possible to free range them (which is of the utmost importance to me).