Culling... To eat or not to eat? the bigger picture...

[leeyuh]

Quote:
I would recommend watching a video about it first. That's what I did, I feel like it made it easier.
This is what I watched, there's two parts to it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vy_vutu5qO0
Also it helps when you have someone helping you, like in the above video.

I think once you get your first one out of the way, it will get easier.

Good luck!

 

[Niss]

and true as well, savingpurple

leeyuh--you KNOW the dog to be rabies free, right?

Thankfully I have a friend that swears it's easy and offered to help the first time. I read an illustrated how-to by a guy that more or less skins them and takes only the breast and thighs, but when I said something to my farm raised F-I-L he swore up and down I'm crazy and you can't do that. Have you guys tried it that way? Does it save work? Seem waistful?

 

[jbs]

This has been a very interesting read for me. I became a vegetarian 14 years ago because I was so disgusted with factory farming. Now that my husband and I are keeping chickens ourselves, it seems natural that we'll get to a point where we'll be eating them - probably not the 14 chicks we have now that have already been named, but maybe we'll distance ourselves a bit more from the next batch (I think that there will be a next batch). Some of the vegetarian foods that we eat are produced in factories, shipped from California or the UK (Quorn products), and it seems more natural to eat chickens that we raise here on our own property. Watching Joel Salatin kill and process chickens in the documentary Food Inc., it looks like something that I could handle. But I think I'd need to do it the first time with someone who knows what he or she is doing, and probably with someone else's chickens.

It's a lot easier to pick up a chicken at the grocery store, but that chicken was raised in such horrible conditions, it's just not right. Many people are uncomfortable with factory farming, not just vegetarians, and if we want to get away from that, more of us need to get comfortable processing our own birds. JB

 

[onthespot]

Saves a lot of time, and is not very wasteful at all. That is probably 90% of the meat, with 10% of the work. It is easy to just pull the skin back from the breasts and cut them out. and teh legs are SO much easier to skin and cut off than the wings., with ten times the meat. I don't like wings, backs and butts, myself. That's what's left after you take the breasts and legs.

 

[tiny529]

Thank you for this thread! We just recently got our first ever chicks (they should be moving out to their coop this weekend!) When I first got them, it was completely with the understanding that they would be pets who provide us with breakfast. They would be pets to the point that our coop and run is massive for the number of chickens we have figuring that we'd add to the flock every few years to make up for the girls' lower egg output as they aged.

But then I got to thinking... I won't eat veal because of the way the calves are treated... So why would I eat chickens bought from the store knowing that they are treated horribly? We eat chicken every week but I never stopped to consider what I was eating at all. So now we are talking about doing meat birds too. At least we could give them a nice life before we offed them. My husband said that he'd do the killing as long as I did the plucking. I assume he'd to the gutting too, but we haven't really reached that part of the discussion yet.

My husband actually says things like, "Who are you and what have you done to my wife?" I was raised by city-dwellers who are so anti-killing ANYTHING that they actually believe that anyone who DOES kill things is psychologically disturbed. That attitude stuck with me until fairly recently (at least within the past 5 years). I'm wondering what sort of pariah I will become when we start doing meat birds. None of my family will ever want to come here for dinner again!

Since we are still in the discussion stage of meat birds, I haven't come to a conclusion about what types we will do (I do the raising, my husband does the killing... Yeah... He'll do the gutting too, even if he isn't aware of that yet.

) I like the idea of the quick maturing breeds but then I fear that I will be raising chicks constantly as we don't have enough fridge/freezer space to do a year's worth of birds at one time. So we might do a mix of quick maturers and heritage breeds and slaughter throughout the year.

 

[leeyuh]

Quote:
Yes, no rabies, but good question!

It may seem wasteful to just take the breast and thighs, but, I HIGHLY recommend making chicken stock from the less meatier, unpopular chicken parts and carcass. Necks, wings if they are small, etc. Me and the boyfriend both agree we have never had richer, better tasting chicken stock. I bought a few tuppowares and filled them up, put them in the freezer, and take them out to thaw as needed. It is amazing and it turns quick weeknight meals into some of the best dishes ever. There are tons of recipes online.

 

[Oregon Blues]

Oh, man..... you guys are throwing away the Buffalo Wings? That's the best part of the chicken.

 

[off-grid hen]

The more I read this thread and others like it, the more I want to get meat birds. I think I would go with freedom rangers or dual purpose other than the cornish crosses, but we'll see. My 5 year old will hear part of the discussion, and says, "I don't want to eat my best chicken Max" (yeah-she's a hen named max). I explain that we raise Max and the other hens for eggs, not for meat, but that we will raise chickens for meat some day when he's older.

My husband always hunted deer because he felt that he couldn't justify his own meat eating without it. He just can't stomach someone else doing his "dirty work". I see my hens parading around the yard and in the run, and it gets harder every day to eat meat from the store. I know I want to do this, just not sure when.

I am very fortunate to have farms and smaller animal raising operations near me, I need to drive only 2 miles and I can have fresh beef. My uncle raises buffalo. We have venison that I helped to dress in the freezer. 2 women I work with raise beef, pork, chickens, turkeys, geese, and ducks for meat. I only to drive by their farm stands and pick up a package of meat or a whole bird from the chest freezer. I think I will ask to watch/help the next time they are "doing the chickens". I am getting closer all the time.

I think that if people had to raise, kill and clean the animals that they eat that we as a society would be much more responsible about our food. Even just raise and kill one animal for food. Then people would have a tangible reference to how much meat they consume, what takes place before they consume it (feeding, housing...), what gets wasted, etc. There is so much disconnect bewteen ourselves and the food chain. I find it sad, really. So sad, that it shamed me into getting chickens for eggs- just for now.

 

[savingpurple]

Leeyuh.....thank you for that video.....watched it. Not as bad as I thought til the end,a nd that was just as bad as I had envisioned it...LOL

I agree with the one post, thatin the future, I will not get as attached, and spent alot less time with them. Meat chickens I could do. They are only here a short amount of time, and I would probably take and have them processed any way? Who knows......not there yet

 

[Noymira]

This is a great thread. I've been dealing with the same thoughts myself. We are planning on harvesting our own birds (I should clarify, my husband will not do the killing, I will), but I'm having trouble deciding between raising a separate flock of freedom rangers next year, or just using our roo and hatching a bunch of chicks in the spring to build a larger dual purpose flock we thin down every fall.

Luckily there is another BYC member not too far from me who said she'd have me up next time she harvests a few roos so I can learn how. I grew up in a declining farming family and while I've never killed anything in my life (except some fishing when I was a kid), we certainly ate cows that my grandfather raised, and my brother raised turkeys for a few years as well. We also happily accept any game meat given to us in the fall and winter by the hunters among our family and friends.

I love animals and enjoy our chickens, but we did not name them and they are not pets. While the laying hens will probably be a bit pampered, any extra roos or nasty hens will be seen as dinner only. I won't say there will never be a hen who might win a special place in my heart and not be on the chopping block, but I think that would be the same no matter what animal I am raising.