Local Butcher?

[chazen328]

Does anyone know of a butcher/processor or is there someone you would recommend in Nebraska? I need to cull my flock before winter but I don't know that I have the "intestinal fortitude" to do it myself.

Thanks for the help,
Crystal

 

[zorba1]

I am not there, but if you have a flock you should have thought of this before hand.
We always butchered during a molt when the feathers were coming out on their own.
But there is a very good way to do it anytime.
When you cut a fowl's head off, the muscle's tighten up and the fowl be it chicken, turkey, duck, goose, etc must be quickly scalded to loosen the feathers.
The easiest way is to get a rod of steel about 1/8' in diameter and sharpen one end really fine.
Not a piece of wire; but stiff, strong steel. We used stainless steel.
With two people one holds the fowl's body while the other preforms the killing.
With one person you hold the body under an arm or pull the head forward out of a cage.
Hold the birds head firmly on both sides and stick the steel point swiftly in to the birds mouth, and up in to the brain. Death is instant and the muscles will relax with this procedure.
The feathers are easily removed without scalding.
After i left the farm, and the army, i became a hippie and war protester.
I ran a 1,760 acre farm, we had a commercial broiler operation of 200,000 chickens, our own USDA slaughter house, in which we butchered 5,000 chickens a day. We had a store, It was vastly more profitable to slaughter our own. We had big freezers and refrigeration run off our homemade methane digesters. Chicken manure and straw mix produced a lot of methane.
In an operation this big cutting heads off was not an option. We needed the instant kill and natural feather release.
I killed 2,500 chickens a day, five days a week. And about 300 hogs on Saturdays using a double edged sticking knife. It was a job, you get used to it quickly.
I shot and killed my first steer when i was eight and helped grandpa and my uncles skin it, dress it and cut it up.
You can buy these stickers, most are like a T, they have a handle and long shaft. They are very easy to use and it is quick.
One more tidbit, We took the chickens out of the cages and hung them upside down, we wedged their feet into an overhead V rod which was move able on a rail. When hung upside down the chickens were very calm, i quickly grabbed their head and stuck them, it took about two or three seconds. Four people hung them, two stuck them, four removed the feathers on a revolving bristle drum, four gutted and cleaned them, two boxed them and two pushed the boxes in to a flash freezer.The blood was very value-able and was collected in gutters to drums, to be dried and sold as blood-meal.
We had buyers for the feathers, blood and the guts, feet and heads. Our store was in a college town, we sold the chicken and pork there with crafts we made on the farm.
We were about 200 hippies more or less and it was the best period of my life.
In those days hippie life was all about Ecstasy, either through drugs or sex, we choose sex. Drug use was not as popular as the media portrayed it. We had a lot of sex and orgies.
In my opinion if you cant stomach killing, you shouldn't be raising livestock. Besides butchering for food, there are times when you must put an animal out of its misery.

 

[chicken pickin]

I would call all your local feed stores. Chances are they may have contact info to a local processor. I found my local processor through 2 of my towns local feed stores(though Im not using them its just a just incase). Also try craigslist maybe in the farm and garden section or place an ad your self on craigslist seeking the service.