Guts

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Theo

Theo

In the Brooder
9 Years
Dec 1, 2010
45
3
24
I am interested in raising 25 Cornish Cross for home butchering. I've butchered a few chickens over the years, and I have a buddy who has experience who will help, so I think I am ready for a project of this magnitude.

However, I am unsure how I will get rid of a biggish bucket of guts on butchering day. I have about 2 acres, one acre containing the house, a large lawn with fruit trees, the well (surface well) and the drain field. The other acre consists of some weedy pasture. This is located mid-Willamette Valley, so most of the lawn and pasture is marshy during our long wet season. The land is flat, and the well is on an almost imperceptible rise in the middle of the two acres.

How do you folks get rid of the guts after butchering? If you compost, layering the waste with dirt and green stuff, how do you keep from attracting varmints? If you dig a pit to bury the waste, how deep is sufficient, and how far away from the well do you dig the hole? Does it matter that the hole will eventually be in a marsh, leaching whatever mess is left in there, possibly towards the well? Do you have some other method of waste disposal? I have one elderly dog, and he is not up to eating a bucket full of chicken guts, although he might disagree. I do not have any livestock, other than chickens.

OK, you see that maybe I am overanalyzing this, and perhaps creating a problem where there is none. I'd just like to be prepared when the time comes, and hopefully not taint my groundwater with chicken waste. Your thoughts appreciated.
 
What type of soil you have will help determine how far it needs to be from your well. In sand it will travel pretty well but in clay it will be much more contained. That is a concern, especially in a marshy area. Obviously the further the better. But if you have an orchard, you should have an area that is not marshy. If you get standing water, that stuff could spread.

When I butcher I feed some of the internals back to the remaining chickens. I keep a separate bucket just for that and dump the contents of the gizzard in there, cut the crop into about 3 or 4 pieces and that goes in the bucket along with any contents, and open some of the guts to check for worms. I cut those guts into short pieces and that goes in too, contents and all. But I only save enough that I think they can finish off before dark, I don’t want to attract predators.

Even if you fed them all the consumables, which is highly unlikely with 25 butchered birds, you still have the feathers and other stuff to get rid of. On very rare occasions I’ve put that stuff in my compost pile, buried at the bottom and with a cover to keep things from digging in. Usually after butchering I’m too tired to work this hard though.

If it is fall I bury it in my garden in a part that is finished for the winter. By spring it will have decomposed and become compost. I generally bury it so the top is at least a foot underground and I still put a cover over that to stop digging animals. I use pieces of welded wire and hold it down with pavers.

Any other time of year I bury it in my orchard, just like in the garden, including covering it with wire and the pavers.

I dig these holes the day before so I have time to rest.
 
I"m down in Grants Pass, and part of my property is conservation wetlands
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. We have a well, but it's something like 40+ feet deep, so I'm not familiar with a surface well.

Like Ridgerunner, I feed some entrails back to the flock. My laying hens love butchering day! As soon as they realize that's what we're doing, they're right at the door raising such a ruckus. I agree 25 birds' worth is going to be too much, though. I also only feed what they're going to eat pretty much right then.

I'd use the offal to fertilize those fruit trees, or any garden you have. Those areas should be pretty dry. I don't think a couple piles spaced that far out would contaminate your water at all. I'd just bury them deep enough your dog won't dig them up--a foot or two should be fine. The idea to put wire over the spot is a good one.

So is the idea to dig the holes the day before! I'm stealing that one from you, Ridgerunner.

You can also just bag the offal and take it to the dump.
 
I eat heart and that day or the next since I let chickens rest a couple days .I use feet, neck, and going to try heads for stock . The rest goes in large wood chip pile not much smell and I have not notice critters dig in it yet.I try to keep a pile of wood chips for this use and other things.I just flag tree trimmers down when I see them and let them dump at my place.
 
If you save the neck, heart, liver, and gizzard you literally will have no more than a handful of 'guts' from each bird. I am a woman with small hands and can scoop it all up at once to put in the disposal bucket.

It won't take a very big hole if you decide to bury them. And how deep us your well? Mine is over 500'. No way any decomposing chicken is going to make it that far down!
 
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All of theses are great replies. Thanks! I have clay soil, so maybe digging a hole about 2' deep in my garden would do it. I can cover with fencing scraps and bricks. My well is only 25' deep or so, but the garden is more than 100 feet away, so perhaps the clay will contain seepage. I will make stock from feet and gizzards; I will be able to feed some of the guts back to my egg laying flock. It is sounding more manageable already.

And thanks, Ridgerunner, for the advice on digging the hole a day in advance. That is brilliant.
 
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Easiest thing to do with them is throw them away. I gave mine to my dogs, didn't really care about it taking a couple days for them to clean up. Not everyone can do that, and I only did 7 birds and 3 rabbits. If you want top feed the guts to the birds but have too many guts, you could always freeze some fire later. Separate out the good stuff, (hearts, livers, kidneys, lungs, etc, and whatever you aren't going to eat, split it up, givesome to the birds and freeze the rest. Bury the intestines, maybe mix in some wood shavings or other high carbon material to help balance it all out.
 
You might want to check into people who feed their dogs raw food, they might be interested. I know some of the sled dog people in the area feed chicken parts to their dogs.
 
Feathers probably burn ok, but stink. Guts could be incinerated with enough fuel, but will not burn on their own.

Anyway, it seems an awful waste to do that to me. Perfectly good dog food, chicken food, fertilizer, and you just burn it all....
 

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