Pictures of Processing Set Ups

[Brunty_Farms]

Quote:
It's nice to work outside too, especially if you have a nice clean set up. It took me a while, but I finally figured it out. I used to use two saw horses and a pice of plywood covered in plastic... all while standing in mud from all the water.

 

[danschicks]

You know, a thread with pics of processing set ups would get a tremendous amount of hits. Especially if it was named "processing set ups".

Right now I could post my plastic table, an old turkey fryer, beer coolers, and my bare hands, but I think I'll wait to post pics until I see what this year's station will look like. Even though I can hand pluck clean rather quickly, I will be upgrading my plucker system to a PVC cap and bungees on a drill. (of course it will be mounted to the tailgate of my pickup truck.)

 

[pdpatch]

We use my shop, near the overhead door, But then again I am still picking up feathers from this last fall.

The counter top I used was from an old mobile home. I had saved it for years to make a dark room but never got the dark room done, then started doing poultry on a small scale.
The back splash was made from some polished aluminum light fixture reflectors.

Tom

 

[joebryant]

Quote:
Wow! Jeff, I'm really impressed with what you do and the ways that you do it. Read your website and BYC page. Sure wish you lived close to me, Anne'd buy a processed chicken every week.

 

[Fort Orpington]

My husband used our old sink vanity counter top for our processing table. It worked great, but we only had six birds to do. Here is our picture:

 

[Brunty_Farms]

Quote:
Change the title in your thread to... Let's see your processing set ups.... I'm curious to see how others do it to. There is more than one way to skin a chicken'!

Yep, bare hands are a good tool!

 

[Brunty_Farms]

Quote:
Wow! Jeff, I'm really impressed with what you do and the ways that you do it. Read your website and BYC page. Sure wish you lived close to me, Anne'd buy a processed chicken every week.

Thanks for the compliment... I just figured out how to put pictures on the BYC page and the website will be getting replaced. Hopefully by April, but a brand new website from scratch is not easy.

I checked your page out too... that coop is awesome. A lot of hard work and thought went into that. Like Fort Knox!

 

[Sunny Side Up]

Check here: http://www.habitat.org/cd/env/restore.aspx to see if you have a ReStore near you. It's a second-hand shop run by & for the benefit of Habitat for Humanity that sells all sorts of building materials & housing supplies. You could find a nice bit of countertop to use for your table, maybe even a sink & faucets too.

My set-up is simple, I usually only do 4-8 birds at a time. I have a reclaimed metal porch swing frame for the killing station, there's a 2X6 bolted lengthwise across the top that has 3 home-made cones screwed onto it. There are also hooks to hang scalded birds for plucking. I use wire tomato cages to hold buckets beneath the cones to catch the drips. I have a metal milk crate to hold the scalding pot, and a big sheet of plywood up on two tall sawhorses for my work table. The table is covered with tarp as I work, and cleansed with bleach afterwards. I just use the hose with a trigger sprayer, use a C-clamp on the table's edge to hold it handy, and have the table slightly slanted for the water to drip off at one end. It really doesn't get all that muddy or wet with just a few chickens to do.

 

[CARS]

We process our chickens out side, but I do have a sink in my house's basement that worked great when we processed our quail.