GRAPHIC PICS of my day learning to caponize

[coyotesmommy]

http://www.poultryhub.org/anatomy-and-physiology/skeletal-system/
Ribs

There are seven pairs of ribs originating on the thoracic vertebrae. The first, second and sometimes the seventh do not reach the sternum, their other attachment, while the third to sixth and sometimes the seventh do. The third to the sixth have two segments:

1. Vertebral segment
2. Sternal segment

All except the first and last have uncinate processes projecting backward over the outer surface of the next rib and connected to it by a ligament, thus adding strength to the thoracic cavity (uncinate = hooked or bent).

 

[coyotesmommy]

 

[McButterpants]

I have 5 rooster in all, so I will have some practice before I get to Big Red, but you never want one to die, but it is inevitable I know. Last night I picked each roo up and placed them in my lap to feel the ribs and that was much easier than the big fat roaster I got from the store. I removed most of the feathers from the left side they do come out easy, when the boys got uppity I just cupped my hand over their eyes and head and they settled right down. Studying them made me feel more comfortable and took the nerves away which made them more at ease as well.
Last night I took the food up around 7 pm, then this morning I sequestered all of the boys put them upstairs in a large dog crate with no food or water and will get up nice and early in the morning and start the process. That way it is no food for 36 hours and no water for 24. Does that sound right? Keep your fingers crossed and say a little prayer for the boys.

Thats plenty of time to empty the intestines - do keep a few paper towels or other wipes around during the procedure - they come in handy. Sometimes you will find some congealed blood within the cavity which can be removed by twisting the end and sometimes the boy have an "accident" (it will be small if it happens). I also used a toddlers sock to cover the birds heads when I was working on them, they didnt like it at first, but it seemed to calm them down (I did try without too). The advantage of the sock was its ease of putting on and that it stayed put and out of the way, prior to that I was covering their heads with a wash cloth - as much so they wouldnt give me the guilt stare as to calm them- but they kept throwing that off.

 

[coyotesmommy]

Good luck and keep up posted on how it goes.

Thank YOU Kassaundra, if not for your wonderful thread I would not have ever even attempted.

I will let ya'll know how it goes.

 

[Kassaundra]

Thank YOU Kassaundra, if not for your wonderful thread I would not have ever even attempted.

I will let ya'll know how it goes.

Your welcome, but this thread would not have been possible w/o my mentor. I just hope it goes well and you are able to keep your boy a long time.

 

[coyotesmommy]

Well I tried I had five roosters when I woke up this morning at 5am at 8 o'clock still have five. It's not that I didn't try I tried..... But just not good enough with a scalpel, the spreader I bought I think was too big, this dark red blob popped out, kept trying to break the membrane that was like wrangling snot.... So I gave up took my super glue to seal the wound and YES.... I did glue myself to the chicken...... That was the only cut with the scalpel that was good. Well I guess my boys are off to Craigslist . Thank you again everyone for you wonderful information And experience.

 

[Kassaundra]

Sorry it didn't work out for you. I have done 2 on dead boys and neither one went well, but they were bigger then I would normally do. I think I am messing up on where I am cutting, and I would like a smaller spreader too, I'm wondering about grinding off one or two of the teeth on my spreader.

 

[Jitamon]

Wow, Im learning something here

 

[coyotesmommy]

Thats plenty of time to empty the intestines - do keep a few paper towels or other wipes around during the procedure - they come in handy. Sometimes you will find some congealed blood within the cavity which can be removed by twisting the end and sometimes the boy have an "accident" (it will be small if it happens).

That must have been what that was!!! AfteIr I got thru to the muscle and found my right spot ( I thought) and cut into the muscle this dark red blob popped out I tried to wipe it away but it just coming back or not leaving at all.... so I thought THAT CAN"T be good, then couldn't get the spreaders to fit so before I did even more damage I cut my losses untied the boy and gave him a hug and put back.

 

[McButterpants]

Yes, I had that happen on several birds. When I couldn't dab it out with a paper towel I found I could usually lift it with forceps. Another possibility, which happened to both myself and my friend was that some of the birds seemed to have abdominal muscle attached to the back of the ribcage between that and the internal membrane. This also had the appearance of bloody blobs/ tissue, however I found that I could simply slice through and proceed. I greatly preferred using a #20 scalpel (curved blade) over the #11 (pointed blade), but again I was being too timid at first with the amount of pressure used to make the incision. Once I began to "commit" it became much easier. I noticed that my friend was mirroring my experience of being overly timid as well. I think this is instinctual for those of us who have never operated on a living creature. I did find that being firm and even when making hte cut reduced stress on the bird, made for a cleaner and less bloody incision and was much quicker than having to make repeated cuts through multiple layers of tissue. I do think this is counterintuitve. I suspect that everyone here like myself cares a great deal for our animals, and none of us want them to suffer at our hands. This is the reason we are afraid to make these cuts. I did not grow up on a rural farmstead where this might have been (or once been) a part of daily life, but I suspect someone who did would find it much easier from the get go.
I will say that it became easier with practice, and while I am still suturing (far and away the most time consuming part) the birds and going in from both sides I can now easily do a bird in 15 min or less. Once confidence is gained in the technique it is fairly straight forward and easy. I did "practice" on both processed supermarket chickens and some CX's that were about to be processed at a commercial facility. What I noticed was that besides being significantly larger than my birds finding the correct position was much more difficult in these chickens probably because of the extra breast meat and larger thigh muscle.
On my birds I find that placing my thumb on the top of the thigh and sliding it down while exerting a little pressure (a little - not trying to poke a hole with your thumb) allows me to feel the lower rid and work my way up from there. I did have a couple of birds where I sliced through a small amount of thigh muscle (the birds were not fully stretched) - the patients revoverd very quickly and are all doing fine (except for this heat). Yet one more thing - if you do end up going through a higher rib - you can often still remove the teste, as understand the main reason for going through the lowest 2 is to be able to do both from 1 side, which when I did I believe resulted in the few slips I may have now. So if you are committed to doing the bird from both sides, not as big a problem. If you see lung tissue you are way to far up, as happened to my friend, but even in this case I was able to stitch up those birds where he did this, allow them time to heal (2 weeks) and them go back again. A second withholding of food may slow development down further, but he isn't in any rush either.
Lastly the birds do heal remarkably well. I removed stitches after 14-20 days and now another 2-3 weeks later the birds have not only completely healed, but I couldn't even find incision site on most of them.
Good luck to everyone who is willing to try this, and please keep posting I am learning more from this forum and the other archived threads on the subject than I did from all the other material I read.
Oh and Kassandra a special thank you for starting this one! - yes grinding down the weitliener retractor seems like the thing to do I am going to do this with mine. The other "issue" I had with them is their width - you have to push tis through the ribs, pinching the "teeth" together helps some, but I am going to try and thin mine out as well. There is an instrument called a Gelpi retractor that I ha vent tried, but think may work better if the points are filed down.