So last year was our first year raising and processing out our spare cockerals and roosters.
We attended Mother Earth News Fair last summer and one of the topics we covered was raising and butchering your own chickens emphasis on butchering. One of the key speakers we saw was a woman named Meredith Leigh. She was a butcher for years and taught us in her talks not only about the most humane way to process a chicken but also about the concept of ethically raised meat.
So after learning as much as we could and doing a lot of research we decided we felt the most humane, cost effective and least traumatizing for us the birds and the meat we would be getting from them, would be the killing cone and bleeding them.
We have found this to be a very kind way of doing it. The sharpness of the blade and sureness of the stroke is of upmost importance. Be sure to get under the feathers of the neck as they make the cut dull the knife and make it more difficult.
We bought large broiler/medium turkey sized shrink bags(which we love!)
I am very blessed that my DH2B does the killing although I do plan to learn in the future.
We find that without having to stress the birds by shipping them to be processed it also improves the quality of the meat. We currently have only done heritage breed dual purpose birds(both hatchery and a few heritage stock, more on that later)but we do hope to do a group of Cornish cross and maybe some freedom rangers soon.
Now to describe our process. Due to the birds we've raised we have allowed them to get between 6-18 months depending on breed, size and temperament. We have tried some brined and some not brined we rest them for three days in the fridge before freezing or using. We had one that sat for 7 days bagged in the fridge and was completely fine when we brought it out to roast.
We breed specifically for temperament and making sure they are handleable. A stressed bird is not a good eating bird. They free range with the flock until they begin to cause problems with the hens(last summer we had approximately 24 6 month old cockerals running around with the flock with no problems). Once they begin causing trouble and get out of hand for our roosters to manage they get placed into either our smaller coop and attached run or another run we have in a building. They are generally all put into runs on grass for some time before processing, unless one is a real piece of work or the pens are all full. In the future we plan to make tractors they can grow out in after getting to be a handful. The calmer ones are often let back out with the flock after they stop acting like teenagers that just saw a girl for the first time. The exercise and grass improve the flavor and I love knowing our boys get to be real chickens and have good lives. Not that the penned ones don't they get grass clippings and scraps and feed and hard boiled eggs. Eitc.
The day or sometimes two before processing they are moved to one of two runs to make them easier to catch. These are the same two runs they were probably in when they were younger. They of course have water(feed if they're in there more than a day) we like to give them a little feed right before processing as we find it helps the crop be loosened up. We grab the chosen bird and carry him around until he is nice and relaxed and many even fall asleep. Yes it's hard bc they trust us(me especially) so much but I know it's better for them than a stranger. We get a sense of pride in knowing our birds' final moments are one of calm. We stroke them and talk to them before, during and after we place them in the killing cone. We make sure they are calm in the cone. At this point I walk away and DH2B gets them used to the feel of the back of the blade. Usually two mock strokes and the third is the sharp side. The rest of the process I help with without much trouble.
We take off the head. We then scald and pluck them by hand although we have skinned a couple of them too. We have just found a plucker for rent so we are planning to do that this summer and finish a lot off faster. Hopefully in the next year we can build a plucker. We gut them and rinse them and finish off the processing. Finally we bag them and then set them to rest.
I use both my mother and grandmother's knowledge as well as an article someone shared on BYC about cooking heritage birds. You'll have to search for it as I have only been able to find it twice. It's a good read if you can find it. I might look for it later.
Now for a list of the breeds and mixes we've done.
Cuckoo Marans (hatchery)
White Rock(hatchery)
The above boys were jerks and pretty young, right around six months, one rock was a really nice size the other pretty scrawny. The Marans boy was decent.
We also at the time had a massive Silver Laced Wyandotte roo(who developed some people aggression after we had already hatched chicks from him) He later gave his life to protect a broody chick from a predator before he could be processed. However we were able to process all of his male offspring. All of the females were sold off to layer only flocks.
That SLW roo was massive at just 12 months when we lost him he was about 12 lbs. I believe he was a mix of hatchery and heritage stock. At the time we had him over EE, Orpingtons (both American buffs and English blacks), and a few other breeds. We did not get any pure slw cockerals from him. All females.
We discovered that the cross of the SLW and and the Orpingtons got huge massive and very meaty pretty quickly.
I also want to mention none of his offspring showed his aggression however the hens we breed him to were all extremely docile, gentle and tame(although only a couple were kept around for approximately 1 year- which is about when he started his)
We processed out the last one a couple months ago at just shy of 1 year. He was so big he almost didn't fit in the turkey bags we bought!
After losing that roo we got another line of SLW but they haven't been as good of producers they are more show quality. I want to find a good mix of beauty and heritage stock. We lost all of our SLW but one last summer to predators. The last girl was rehomed.
We now have more English Orpingtons and have found that an Orp crossed with EE really improves their size and meat value.
We have also processed a few pure ee boys and slw/EE mixes all good.
We now have some juvenile heritage Buckeyes that we are excited about and I'm hoping they will be a great meat breed or perhaps we will try a couple crosses for meat.
We also have and process quail.
We attended Mother Earth News Fair last summer and one of the topics we covered was raising and butchering your own chickens emphasis on butchering. One of the key speakers we saw was a woman named Meredith Leigh. She was a butcher for years and taught us in her talks not only about the most humane way to process a chicken but also about the concept of ethically raised meat.
So after learning as much as we could and doing a lot of research we decided we felt the most humane, cost effective and least traumatizing for us the birds and the meat we would be getting from them, would be the killing cone and bleeding them.
We have found this to be a very kind way of doing it. The sharpness of the blade and sureness of the stroke is of upmost importance. Be sure to get under the feathers of the neck as they make the cut dull the knife and make it more difficult.
We bought large broiler/medium turkey sized shrink bags(which we love!)
I am very blessed that my DH2B does the killing although I do plan to learn in the future.
We find that without having to stress the birds by shipping them to be processed it also improves the quality of the meat. We currently have only done heritage breed dual purpose birds(both hatchery and a few heritage stock, more on that later)but we do hope to do a group of Cornish cross and maybe some freedom rangers soon.
Now to describe our process. Due to the birds we've raised we have allowed them to get between 6-18 months depending on breed, size and temperament. We have tried some brined and some not brined we rest them for three days in the fridge before freezing or using. We had one that sat for 7 days bagged in the fridge and was completely fine when we brought it out to roast.
We breed specifically for temperament and making sure they are handleable. A stressed bird is not a good eating bird. They free range with the flock until they begin to cause problems with the hens(last summer we had approximately 24 6 month old cockerals running around with the flock with no problems). Once they begin causing trouble and get out of hand for our roosters to manage they get placed into either our smaller coop and attached run or another run we have in a building. They are generally all put into runs on grass for some time before processing, unless one is a real piece of work or the pens are all full. In the future we plan to make tractors they can grow out in after getting to be a handful. The calmer ones are often let back out with the flock after they stop acting like teenagers that just saw a girl for the first time. The exercise and grass improve the flavor and I love knowing our boys get to be real chickens and have good lives. Not that the penned ones don't they get grass clippings and scraps and feed and hard boiled eggs. Eitc.
The day or sometimes two before processing they are moved to one of two runs to make them easier to catch. These are the same two runs they were probably in when they were younger. They of course have water(feed if they're in there more than a day) we like to give them a little feed right before processing as we find it helps the crop be loosened up. We grab the chosen bird and carry him around until he is nice and relaxed and many even fall asleep. Yes it's hard bc they trust us(me especially) so much but I know it's better for them than a stranger. We get a sense of pride in knowing our birds' final moments are one of calm. We stroke them and talk to them before, during and after we place them in the killing cone. We make sure they are calm in the cone. At this point I walk away and DH2B gets them used to the feel of the back of the blade. Usually two mock strokes and the third is the sharp side. The rest of the process I help with without much trouble.
We take off the head. We then scald and pluck them by hand although we have skinned a couple of them too. We have just found a plucker for rent so we are planning to do that this summer and finish a lot off faster. Hopefully in the next year we can build a plucker. We gut them and rinse them and finish off the processing. Finally we bag them and then set them to rest.
I use both my mother and grandmother's knowledge as well as an article someone shared on BYC about cooking heritage birds. You'll have to search for it as I have only been able to find it twice. It's a good read if you can find it. I might look for it later.
Now for a list of the breeds and mixes we've done.
Cuckoo Marans (hatchery)
White Rock(hatchery)
The above boys were jerks and pretty young, right around six months, one rock was a really nice size the other pretty scrawny. The Marans boy was decent.
We also at the time had a massive Silver Laced Wyandotte roo(who developed some people aggression after we had already hatched chicks from him) He later gave his life to protect a broody chick from a predator before he could be processed. However we were able to process all of his male offspring. All of the females were sold off to layer only flocks.
That SLW roo was massive at just 12 months when we lost him he was about 12 lbs. I believe he was a mix of hatchery and heritage stock. At the time we had him over EE, Orpingtons (both American buffs and English blacks), and a few other breeds. We did not get any pure slw cockerals from him. All females.
We discovered that the cross of the SLW and and the Orpingtons got huge massive and very meaty pretty quickly.
I also want to mention none of his offspring showed his aggression however the hens we breed him to were all extremely docile, gentle and tame(although only a couple were kept around for approximately 1 year- which is about when he started his)
We processed out the last one a couple months ago at just shy of 1 year. He was so big he almost didn't fit in the turkey bags we bought!
After losing that roo we got another line of SLW but they haven't been as good of producers they are more show quality. I want to find a good mix of beauty and heritage stock. We lost all of our SLW but one last summer to predators. The last girl was rehomed.
We now have more English Orpingtons and have found that an Orp crossed with EE really improves their size and meat value.
We have also processed a few pure ee boys and slw/EE mixes all good.
We now have some juvenile heritage Buckeyes that we are excited about and I'm hoping they will be a great meat breed or perhaps we will try a couple crosses for meat.
We also have and process quail.
