First Run of Cornish Cross Meat Birds and Super Excited!

[CrazyTalk]

Mine go in the compost pile. There's no sense in throwing out all that protien.

 

[duluthralphie]

Mine go in the compost pile. There's no sense in throwing out all that protien.

Good Idea,

I was going to throw them in a pile at the back of my property where they would naturally compost then I started worrying about the smell of rotting feathers bring in predators.......

 

[CrazyTalk]

Just bury them in and they'll be fine. Compost piles are good like that.

While I was burying some in the other day I hit an unhatched goose egg from this spring's hatching season - still solid (until the shovel hit it) - now that's a smell.

 

[JessicaThistle]

For clean up we just hose everything down. The table and sinks that I use are bleached for sanitation as i feel like they spend the most time in contact with the meat. I sanitize before I start and after I finish. We have a compost pile for lawn clippings from my husband's business. Feathers go there. Everything else is bagged well and goes in the trash can and off to the landfill though. We make sure to do processing the night before garbage day for that purpose.

If we had a beer fridge, we'd use that for resting but we don't. Last batch I used two small coolers and it was hard jamming 20+ chickens in them. This time I borrowed a huge cooler from a friend. It's like 80 quarts. It fit all 24 chickens with room to spare. Yes lots of ice is a must. I get blocks and crushed. I think one huge cooler is one my shopping list before next time.

 

[Double Kindness]

Ok, b/c we get an extra paycheck this month, so now is the time for me to get everything we need!! Your help and experience mean everything to us!

I have several home depot buckets. I'm going to order that table on amazon and knives? We have sushi knives, chefs knives, a big cleaver (I'm a foodie, so lots of kitchen stuff!), we keep them extremely sharp.

My bf is super duper handy, he has a metal workshop out back with tig welder, milling lathe, sandblasting box, kiln all the toys for a machine shop... so what all would be super handy or wish you had on hand. It's a lotta chickens and ducks in a month from now to process. We have a huge compost pit that I could probably hide bodies in in case one of my crazy friends snapped j/k. It has a wooden lid with ventilation it's behind my barn attached and my raised garden bed/double enclosed meatie/duck run. We put heavy things on the lid.. and are still actively catching predators.

I was thinking of spraying bokashi on the meatie run/duck run area, mucking it out well, and moving some of the compost into where the meaties are to let it do it's thing until springtime.

I need to research deep freezers, my bf says we gotta get a brand new one, we worked so hard on raising these chickens and ducks, we'd hate to lose it after processing. The bigger the better I guess. Since we've got meat rabbits too.

 

[Catie79]

Just a quick video of my chicks at six weeks old.

I present The Running of the Meatballs. Guest appearance by my little helper.

There are four feeding stations, but they all have to bum rush the first one they spot. They spread out about five minutes later. Very mobile bunch, they all get to work in their pasture after their morning ration of crumbles has been devoured. They're doing a great job turning over the leaf litter in their pasture and we're starting to see new plant growth.

 

[KCMOLisa]

Cute, Catie! Mine are wild things at feeding time too. They're five weeks old. Sometimes I worry that they're running way too much because they seriously run marathons around here! I was not expecting near the level of energy that mine have.

 

[JessicaThistle]

Ahhh Catie: I adore it!! They are perfect!

I saved one of my cx and housed them with my two white silkie hens. She has made buddies with them and they carry on their daily crazies. Today she ran up to me and I grabbed her up and gave her some serious snuggles. Did she talk about it? Oh my goodness, she sang about it the whole time! She was a happy girl!! I love CX!!!

 

[Double Kindness]

Awww Jessica, that is such a sweet image you painted in my mind, thank you! I'm thinking I might order 25-50 cx in late feb-mid march to fill my freezer that will be running low on chicken by late May when I will need them gone to use that area for my food garden to plant in the ground mother's day/ 1st week of june. I'll probably start my garden plants inside under some t5's end of Feb to get them good sized by the time they go outside.

We're getting so excited to eat meat we raised, my bf is especially looking forward to muscocvy ducks, freezer camp date is set for 5 weeks from now. We have that much time to gather the supplies needed.

More questions- what about air chilling chickens when resting them before freezing instead of on ice or in ice water... does anyone have any first hand experience with the difference in the finished meat texture/taste?

What are you putting the chickens in before freezing them? Freezer paper? Vacuum sealer? Ziplock? Did you buy poultry specific bags? What about cutting them up before freezing, or leaving them whole? Skinning the feet/legs, how difficult is that, any tips? I'm looking forward to making the best chicken stock ever with their feet/legs, bones etc. I have lots of huge giant stockpots ready to put to work.

We're planning on feeding cleaned guts/entrails/heads etc to our 2 greyhounds as part of changing them slowly to a barf diet of raw foods and bones, we pick up our whole hog weekend after next.

 

[duluthralphie]

I need a another freezer!

I have three freezers all full and I still have 16 CX's and 30 other birds to put in a freezer.....

MY CX's are so cute at 11 weeks, BUT HUGE!

They are all happy and seem in good health. They are free ranging all day, some even get 200 ft or so from the pen...

They run for their food every evening and even try to fly, which is fun to watch. One had to take three attempt to jump over a 12 inch board!

I hope to get a video of them coming to feed this evening..

I am still only feeding them once a day. I do throw scratch out on the ground in the morning for all the birds.