DIY HUMANE way to Kill Slaughter Chicken (Stun-kill, Gas)

[bobbi-j]

What Tyson does or does not do processing their birds is up to them and the USDA.

If you want to use a hatchet, a guillotine, a pair of pruning shears, or what ever method you want as far as I'm concerned it is your choice and I don't have a problem with it.

With that said, here is my position. If I am going to go to the trouble of raising a bird I want the technique used to dispatch the bird to be as stress free as possible to the bird, as it is my understanding that if you kill a bird that is stressed then the meat quality will suffer. I don't know for sure if there is any difference between taking a bird out of a cage slipping it quickly into a cone and slitting it's throat quickly induces enough stress to cause a stress problem with the meat, but if it did, then I can see that if you could stun the bird (rendering the bird unconscious) before killing him then that might very well be worth the effort.

I would think that a bird that is caught and killed immediately or stunned immediately would have about the same amount of "stress". Think about it. If I grab my chicken and it's head is lopped off right away, it experiences stress for what - 30 seconds or less? However long it takes to get her to the stump and her neck between the nails and then it's over. If I grab my chicken and get her positioned to "stun" her, she's being held for roughly that same amount of time, experiencing stress for that same amount of time before she's rendered unconscious and doesn't know what's going on anymore. I'm not saying one way is better than another or anything like that. Just that it seems like the stunning process is just one more step. I cannot attest to the fact that meat quality is affected if they're stressed or not. I'm not sure how it would. I do know that the chickens we raise taste much better than what we can buy at the store, and that's the bottom line for me.

 

[RogerShoaf]

I would think that a bird that is caught and killed immediately or stunned immediately would have about the same amount of "stress". Think about it. If I grab my chicken and it's head is lopped off right away, it experiences stress for what - 30 seconds or less? However long it takes to get her to the stump and her neck between the nails and then it's over. If I grab my chicken and get her positioned to "stun" her, she's being held for roughly that same amount of time, experiencing stress for that same amount of time before she's rendered unconscious and doesn't know what's going on anymore. I'm not saying one way is better than another or anything like that. Just that it seems like the stunning process is just one more step. I cannot attest to the fact that meat quality is affected if they're stressed or not. I'm not sure how it would. I do know that the chickens we raise taste much better than what we can buy at the store, and that's the bottom line for me.

OK I see your point, but lets change a few variables.

You have one electrode on the thumb and the other on the finger.

Your chicken has been placed in an isolation box the day before and the lighting is dim and the bird is at rest.

You reach in and pet the bird and this causes no stress as the bird views you as the source of food.

As you are rubbing the birds head one electrode is on each side of the head and then ZAP. The bird is now zonked out. Hang in the cone and slice the throat.

Now consider the same thing but no zap. You pick up the bird and place it head down in the cone, grab the head stretch out the neck and slice away.

I do not know for certain if the short period of time it takes to place the bird in the cone is enough to scare the bird and cause a hormonal release or not. It just seems to me that it might.

Taste test might be an effective method of determining the matter.

 

[dadtochickenfan]

I would think that a bird that is caught and killed immediately or stunned immediately would have about the same amount of "stress". Think about it. If I grab my chicken and it's head is lopped off right away, it experiences stress for what - 30 seconds or less? However long it takes to get her to the stump and her neck between the nails and then it's over. If I grab my chicken and get her positioned to "stun" her, she's being held for roughly that same amount of time, experiencing stress for that same amount of time before she's rendered unconscious and doesn't know what's going on anymore. I'm not saying one way is better than another or anything like that. Just that it seems like the stunning process is just one more step. I cannot attest to the fact that meat quality is affected if they're stressed or not. I'm not sure how it would. I do know that the chickens we raise taste much better than what we can buy at the store, and that's the bottom line for me.

I do agree with the "one more step". I certainly believe in Murphy's Law and adding steps increases the chances of something going wrong. Having said that, I do see some utility in stunning. I have put down some excessively flighty birds in the past. It would have been cleaner and safer if the bird was still. Maybe I missed it in the posts, but I would like to hear about someone that has stunned and how did it go.

 

[RedPulletMama]

Hello,
im unsure where to put .(mod pleae relocate me if wrong location) i will post the Humane way i find and plans..

I be Tommy..

sorry this is kinda long. when it comes to killing any thing it should be done properly and i am covering my bases..

Im new here and new to raising and the dreaded Slaughtering and even procesing

i have 2 problems LOL

i have read up on different Kill methods,
Breaking the Neck (swing it around or however)
Ax its head off
hanging and silting throat
Making a Funnel for it and slighting throat..
to all of those not no But xxxx NO!!!!!

my problem with all those.
its a personal kill (ill remember there eyes), and it will not be dead instantly.. while draining.. after sliting
its not my car oil i can just uncap and wait a minute.. this is a life im taking to continue mine..

i have heard of a funel that had a stun feature but haven't found any more info.. but it would be alive going into it getting nervous. so no to that

however i could put it in a funnle after it dead just so i dont have to be cruel after the kill (hanging upside down by feet thats sad no mater how i look at it)

the more i think about it im thinking gas or stun kill..
it would be an impersonal Kill..and thats better not ok but better

the more i think about it if i did the prosesing i think the chicken needs to be COLD.. warm ikk.

so my thoughts are..
making a Nitrogin or Co2 Gas Chamber (thats easy Styrofoam cooler or bigger custom built box) and both gases avail cheaply. my concerns are does gassing like this hurt at all or do they just get sleepy.. and a Co2 detector as long as it starts beeping i know it hit enough ppm to kill (for the testing part)

the stun-kill is another option
the problem with that is

and my problem with designing a DIY stun-kill i have to test it and im not willing to test on animals....
i heard bout electrocutions not working and hurting the person. so that could hurt my chicken..
if i can get a source that tellls me what voltage, at what hz, and amperage and where on body to design box for (one they would just walk threw and poof.. nothing holding them or attached

and yes i have thought about having someone else do the processing however the kill would be bad there in my eyes..
i would do the kill and bring dead to them..
so it wont suffer at all....as u see no mater what i do i have to figure out the kill part

economics has lead me to Raising my own Eggs/Meat..(how crappy is that Americans so broke they have to revert to farming) im a geek if any thing not a farmer

and the KFC crap pushed me over the fence.
so i normally wouldn't even consider killing an animal..

thanks for your time.. any thoughts will be apreciated..

I prefer a shotgun. That's how you kill a turkey, quick and painless when hunting. Why not, its how we do and all our friends around here just go with that also for their chickens.

 

[bachbach1]

What Tyson does or does not do processing their birds is up to them and the USDA.

If you want to use a hatchet, a guillotine, a pair of pruning shears, or what ever method you want as far as I'm concerned it is your choice and I don't have a problem with it.

With that said, here is my position. If I am going to go to the trouble of raising a bird I want the technique used to dispatch the bird to be as stress free as possible to the bird, as it is my understanding that if you kill a bird that is stressed then the meat quality will suffer. I don't know for sure if there is any difference between taking a bird out of a cage slipping it quickly into a cone and slitting it's throat quickly induces enough stress to cause a stress problem with the meat, but if it did, then I can see that if you could stun the bird (rendering the bird unconscious) before killing him then that might very well be worth the effort.

What do you think happens when you hit a bird with electricity, it jolts it whole body. It is the opposite of stress free. If you dont believe me go buy a cheap stun gun and hit yourself with it, then write about your experience. It is closer to the gates of hell type experience, the last thing you will call it is stress free. The poultry industry doesnt use electricity because it is the most stress free way to do it, they do it so the bird wont be flapping around when it gets its throat cut, and so it wont still be alive when it goes into the scalding bath a few seconds later. Electricity doesnt have anything to do with stress free, it is powerful, wicked feeling intrusion beyond all words, try the stun gun, it will change your mind. One place I worked I carried a stun gun, and to qualify to carry, you had to be shocked by one in order to know what to expect. I wouldn't do it again for $10,000. I would rather be beaten by a baseball bat than to be hit by a stun gun again.

 

[RogerShoaf]

What do you think happens when you hit a bird with electricity[?]

I think the bird passes out. Since it is killed immediately after getting shocked the bird remembers nothing. Other effects would be that the muscles would contract.

As far as your analogy to being hit with a stun gun that is a little different. The stun gun is designed to cause the muscles of the body to contract many many times over a short period of time to incapacitate a person. It is designed to give pain and the recipient if he does pass out does so from the pain. The post shock effects are similar to extreme exhaustion.

Almost 20 years ago I had a nerve conduction test where a needle was inserted in my arm and one in my arm. I was then zapped and the device measured the resistance of the nerves. Most of the jolts caused a minor amount of pain and one of the jolts caused pain that would have got me to talk under interrogation.

Then they did the other side and I knew what was coming. Let me tell you that was something else, knowing in advance had me sweating bullets.

I have also been shocked with 110 and 220 volt line power and that was not fun either.

So I know that electricity can cause pain from firs hand knowledge. I will also accept the proposition that if you stunned a chicken and then let the bird recover the chicken might not feel so good when it woke up. But I don't feel that stunning and then killing the chicken causes the chicken any more pain than just quickly dispatching the bird.

 

[bobbi-j]

Hello,
im unsure where to put .(mod pleae relocate me if wrong location) i will post the Humane way i find and plans..

I be Tommy..

sorry this is kinda long. when it comes to killing any thing it should be done properly and i am covering my bases..

Im new here and new to raising and the dreaded Slaughtering and even procesing

i have 2 problems LOL

i have read up on different Kill methods,
Breaking the Neck (swing it around or however)
Ax its head off
hanging and silting throat
Making a Funnel for it and slighting throat..
to all of those not no But xxxx NO!!!!!

my problem with all those.
its a personal kill (ill remember there eyes), and it will not be dead instantly.. while draining.. after sliting
its not my car oil i can just uncap and wait a minute.. this is a life im taking to continue mine..

OK I see your point, but lets change a few variables.

You have one electrode on the thumb and the other on the finger.

Your chicken has been placed in an isolation box the day before and the lighting is dim and the bird is at rest.

You reach in and pet the bird and this causes no stress as the bird views you as the source of food.

As you are rubbing the birds head one electrode is on each side of the head and then ZAP. The bird is now zonked out. Hang in the cone and slice the throat.

Now consider the same thing but no zap. You pick up the bird and place it head down in the cone, grab the head stretch out the neck and slice away.

I do not know for certain if the short period of time it takes to place the bird in the cone is enough to scare the bird and cause a hormonal release or not. It just seems to me that it might.

Taste test might be an effective method of determining the matter.

That does change the picture, if one does put the chicken in an isolation box (we don't) or if one handles their chickens and they are used to being petted (ours aren't). We just use the chicken grabber, snatch one out of the run, lop off the head, (the stump is right next to the run) and we're done. I put the carcass in a 5 gal. bucket to keep it from bruising when it flops. Again - I'm not saying either way is better, I just wondered how much of a difference it really makes.

 

[Beekissed]

That does change the picture, if one does put the chicken in an isolation box (we don't) or if one handles their chickens and they are used to being petted (ours aren't). We just use the chicken grabber, snatch one out of the run, lop off the head, (the stump is right next to the run) and we're done. I put the carcass in a 5 gal. bucket to keep it from bruising when it flops. Again - I'm not saying either way is better, I just wondered how much of a difference it really makes.

I agree. My birds are not used to being handled, so I just take them off the roosts the night before, truss them and leave them in the coop bedding for a morning slaughter. That way there is no chasing and they don't have to leave their flock mates, they can still move around but not run away when it's time to pick them up for the killing cone. There is no undue noise, chasing, over stressing the birds...just calm, quiet, easy movements that do not cause them to get excited. They rarely ever make a sound throughout the whole process.

I don't think an extra step in there of zapping the birds would add to~ or take away from~ the low stress process that happens on butchering day here. Again, I think this is one of those things folks come up with to make themselves feel better about killing the bird but doesn't necessarily do anything of benefit for the bird.

 

[bachbach1]

No way, the electricity is overpowering, once it rips through their body, and they are near death, or dead, they go out. My whole point is that electricity inst pretty, or kind. And a stun gun without getting technical is the pattern of electricity that is best at stunning, HENCE "STUN GUN" Granted it is fast, but it isn't pleasant, if you think differently, try the stun gun on yourself, I have fealt one, you will change your mind, you might have to clean out your pants too. I have also hear it makes hormones and secretions come out of glands that are instantaneous and involuntary ejected, because of loss of body function, from the electricity.

The common misconception is that stunning with electricity is some type of kindness step, and many people believe that. These people have never been hit with a stun gun, of they are delusional about electricity. Just to be totally blunt there is no pass out to it, and there is no pretty or kind way to take an animals life. All you can hope for is fast humane kill and that is simple.

The best meat quality I have found, combined with clean kill, is to whack the head with a cleaver, drop the bird into a cone, and let it bleed out, then the work starts.

 

[GBov]

No way, the electricity is overpowering, once it rips through their body, and they are near death, or dead, they go out. My whole point is that electricity inst pretty, or kind. And a stun gun without getting technical is the pattern of electricity that is best at stunning, HENCE "STUN GUN" Granted it is fast, but it isn't pleasant, if you think differently, try the stun gun on yourself, I have fealt one, you will change your mind, you might have to clean out your pants too. I have also hear it makes hormones and secretions come out of glands that are instantaneous and involuntary ejected, because of loss of body function, from the electricity.

The common misconception is that stunning with electricity is some type of kindness step, and many people believe that. These people have never been hit with a stun gun, of they are delusional about electricity. Just to be totally blunt there is no pass out to it, and there is no pretty or kind way to take an animals life. All you can hope for is fast humane kill and that is simple.

The best meat quality I have found, combined with clean kill, is to whack the head with a cleaver, drop the bird into a cone, and let it bleed out, then the work starts.

Have you yourself SEEN an electrostunner used? Not, have you extrapolated from your own experience of being hit with a shock and imagined what its like for the livestock but actually seen the tool in use?

I have and have to say, it looks the bee's knees in the right setting. When the stunner is applied the animal goes stiff and then totally limp. No thrashing about or struggling at all. The throat is then cut so the animal will bleed out WITHOUT feeling it! As the heart is still pumping at that point a total bleed out is achieved.