So today we had planned on processing a few birds, they are DP's. and almost 17 weeks old. we watched and went through a lot of step by step instructions/videos and we definitely thought we had this in the bag. We got all set up and the troubles started as soon as we grabbed our first bird.
We decided on a barred rock roo, well dh went to go pick him up and the first thing it did was turn around and fight?? he pecked my dh real hard and jumped at him and dug his nails into him. well we finally subdued him and I calmed him down (dh too, cause he was pretty mad) well moving on to doing the slitting, I won't even go there, lets just say everything and anything that could have gone wrong went wrong,
Once it bled out we decided we would try both plucking and skinning and see which one we preferred before going ahead with the other 36 birds that need processing.
well the plucking was going real well but kinda slow, since I have never done this before. and then the bird got super hard (rigor mortis) and I had a hard time plucking the rest of him. And no matter how many times we redunked him I couldn't get the feathers or pin feathers out. so After 30 minutes or so I decided the skin had to come off cause the bird was taking too long and it needed to go into cold water, mind you it is not hot out today, in fact we had the heat on last night.
well the skinning process was a mess and a half. but we got the bird done and it got everything out on the inside without damaging the bile duct or the intestines.
Our second bird was a columbian roo, we went straight to skinning and that was a bit easier but the legs and wings were real hard to do. thought it was a bit easier it still took us nearly an hour from the time we chose the bird to getting it inside the cooler.
I obviously and clearly have some clue of what I am doing, but I am too darn slow!!!!!
Was anyone else this slow on their first birds?? Tomorrow I have a few people (avid hunters) coming over to help my dh and I process 11 turkeys, that are between 30 to 40 lbs I am a bit scared of finding myself standing out in my field at midnight still processing turkey :-S mind you these guys have done wild birds and other big creatures many a time so I won't be alone.
Ema
We decided on a barred rock roo, well dh went to go pick him up and the first thing it did was turn around and fight?? he pecked my dh real hard and jumped at him and dug his nails into him. well we finally subdued him and I calmed him down (dh too, cause he was pretty mad) well moving on to doing the slitting, I won't even go there, lets just say everything and anything that could have gone wrong went wrong,
Once it bled out we decided we would try both plucking and skinning and see which one we preferred before going ahead with the other 36 birds that need processing.
well the plucking was going real well but kinda slow, since I have never done this before. and then the bird got super hard (rigor mortis) and I had a hard time plucking the rest of him. And no matter how many times we redunked him I couldn't get the feathers or pin feathers out. so After 30 minutes or so I decided the skin had to come off cause the bird was taking too long and it needed to go into cold water, mind you it is not hot out today, in fact we had the heat on last night.
well the skinning process was a mess and a half. but we got the bird done and it got everything out on the inside without damaging the bile duct or the intestines.
Our second bird was a columbian roo, we went straight to skinning and that was a bit easier but the legs and wings were real hard to do. thought it was a bit easier it still took us nearly an hour from the time we chose the bird to getting it inside the cooler.
I obviously and clearly have some clue of what I am doing, but I am too darn slow!!!!!
Was anyone else this slow on their first birds?? Tomorrow I have a few people (avid hunters) coming over to help my dh and I process 11 turkeys, that are between 30 to 40 lbs I am a bit scared of finding myself standing out in my field at midnight still processing turkey :-S mind you these guys have done wild birds and other big creatures many a time so I won't be alone.
Ema
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