Should I order 100 meat chickens?

[ChickenCanoe]

If those calculations are correct, it would benefit to get a ton of bulk feed. The problem is storage.

 

[Hummingbird Hollow]

Another question I didn't see answered was whether you'd actually eat 100 birds over the course of a year and whether you have the room to store them. Idealy for me would be a out 52 chickens per year or one per week, but I don' thave the freezer space to do more than about 35, unless I have nothing else at all in the freezer.

 

[Elke Beck]

Another question I didn't see answered was whether you'd actually eat 100 birds over the course of a year and whether you have the room to store them. Idealy for me would be a out 52 chickens per year or one per week, but I don' thave the freezer space to do more than about 35, unless I have nothing else at all in the freezer.

I am with Hummingbird Hollow: Where do you put 100 birds that are ready to be processed over a period of no more than 1 month? 15 birds challenged my freezer storage.

 

[happydog]

I never got as far as calculating freezer space. Where the heck would you stash 100 birds after butchering, to wait out their rigor mortis? I use a barn fridge that is completely empty. It's hard to fit 50 birds in there. You'd need 2 empty fridges to store 100 birds.

I don't use a freezer for chickens, I keep them in the root cellar. In mason jars.

I feel kind of sick just thinking of processing 100 chickens.

 

[carolinagirl58]

I packed my 18 birds into coolers full of ice (drain plug open for drainage). It didn't really take that long to butcher them (there were 3 of us working) but it was very time consuming yesterday to cut them all up and vacuum seal them. Plus it put quite a load on my three freezers handling that much meat at once. We originally bought 40 Cornish rocks but they turned out to be Leghorns pullets so Tractor supply gave us new birds (let me keep the pullets). They gave me 21 meaties and the rest in pullets. I am SO happy that I did not have 40 meaties to process at once!!! I think in the future, I'll get maybe 12 at a time.

 

[V-NH]

I have a chest freezer just for the chickens. I hope that it is enough space. The only issue is going to be finding a place for them to sit for 3 days. I definitely don't have the space for that at the moment, so I will have to think about it.

 

[happydog]

I'm thinkin' you're gonna be very glad you didn't get 100 chickens. LOL

 

[BCMaraniac]

I'm thinkin' you're gonna be very glad you didn't get 100 chickens. LOL

X2

 

[carolinagirl58]

I'm thinkin' you're gonna be very glad you didn't get 100 chickens. LOL

X3

now that I have grown and processed my birds, I am glad Tractor supply made a mistake the first time around and gave me 40 Leghorn pullet chicks instead of 40 Cornish Rock chicks. when they replaced them, I got 21 Cornish Rocks and the rest in a sexlink laying pullet variety.

 

[V-NH]

They finally arrived. I got 26 and one died about two hours after arrival. I wasn't surprised though, it was much smaller than the others and didn't seem capable of walking. Processing day is set for July 30th. I'll have a team of four people helping and I am hoping to get all 25 done in a single day. I am about to butcher 3 pekin ducks by myself tomorrow. It will be my first time butchering an animal, so I hope it goes well. I have watched tons of tutorial videos and read a lot on this site and other sites, but I still feel totally unprepared to actually do it.