Processed my first duck and goose

[Poultrybonkers]

The drake which was aggressive towards the other ducks had at least an inch and a half testie is that normal the plucking of the duck was insane! When i got to the goose i decided to skin it. I dont know whats worse plucking or skinning! The gander was aggressive towards me and i had way to many males. Never again will i be doing duck or goose or turkey as the one turkey i did was 29lbs live and i had to do that myself. Urg!!

 

[Habibs Hens]

i did 10 ganders once and man was that a killer

was up till midnight cleaning up

i decided to skin aswell as plucking without a plucker is insane

although skinning is just a fraction easier but only a fraction as geese are so tough skinned that pulling the skin you need to be a weight lifter and then need to make sure not to rip meat away from the breast when pulling the skin

glad you got yours done


sorry it been a while since i did a duck so cant remeber the size of the testies but my ganders where tiny


one thing to remeber though dont cull in one large scale, cull a bird processess it then move to next

as the cooler the bird gets after death the harder to skin it

the bird must be fresh and still warm for a easy skinning

 

[Oregon Blues]

I'm not sure skinning a goose is much easier. Skin is very tight and needs to be cut off.

For geese, I scald, then put them into the plucker, which gets a lot of the feathers. Then they are hand plucked to get off all the remaining feathers we can get off. Then into the duck wax to get the pins and small feathers.

They come out beautifully. It is a lot of work, but roast goose is worth it.

Scald water has to be at least 160 degrees and scald takes a lot longer. It is a big project to get water down to the skin of a goose.

My son skinned some old ganders that will be made into sausage. He thought it would be less work then setting up the scalding pot and plucker. He says next time, he will bring out the equipment and not try to hand skin.

The problem with teh plucker and geese is that the geese are too big to tumble well.

 

[Habibs Hens]

I'm not sure skinning a goose is much easier. Skin is very tight and needs to be cut off.

For geese, I scald, then put them into the plucker, which gets a lot of the feathers. Then they are hand plucked to get off all the remaining feathers we can get off. Then into the duck wax to get the pins and small feathers.

They come out beautifully. It is a lot of work, but roast goose is worth it.

Scald water has to be at least 160 degrees and scald takes a lot longer. It is a big project to get water down to the skin of a goose.

My son skinned some old ganders that will be made into sausage. He thought it would be less work then setting up the scalding pot and plucker. He says next time, he will bring out the equipment and not try to hand skin.

The problem with teh plucker and geese is that the geese are too big to tumble well.

i think its down to technique

i can skin a goose quite easy and i do it by hand

one thing for sure is i never have help holding the goose while i pull

never had to use a knife to skin an animal yet

well tell a lie i skinned a cow with a knife but never a sheep or goat lol

but then doing chicken for so many years i got the technique down to a T

infact i processed and skinned and chopped a Roo chicken today in less than 10 mins

from live bird to chopped in a freezer bag

 

[neverbdone]

I don't know about geese, but I have the magic trick for the ducks. If you have ever tried one by hand you know how impossible it is to pull the feathers. There is a fantastic easy trick I learned.

Take a large pot of water and a couple blocks of wax (the kind for canning) and melt the wax in the water so you have a couple inches of wax on top. Take the duck and ruffle (pulling) the feathers away from the skin so the wax can get under the top feathers. Dunk the duck in the wax/water shaking it around a couple times till it has a thorough wax coating down to the skin. Hang the duck for cooling. After a few minutes when the wax tacks off well (not cold just completely tacked off) then gently peal the feathers off to a perfectly cleaned skin. And the best part NO PIN FEATHERS!!!!! So so darned easy.

I couldn't believe it myself the first time, but it works like magic. If I ever raise geese I will try it on them as well. I'm going to try plucking turkeys this year, but I will have wax on hand if I need it.

 

[yinepu]

I don't know about geese, but I have the magic trick for the ducks. If you have ever tried one by hand you know how impossible it is to pull the feathers. There is a fantastic easy trick I learned.

Take a large pot of water and a couple blocks of wax (the kind for canning) and melt the wax in the water so you have a couple inches of wax on top. Take the duck and ruffle (pulling) the feathers away from the skin so the wax can get under the top feathers. Dunk the duck in the wax/water shaking it around a couple times till it has a thorough wax coating down to the skin. Hang the duck for cooling. After a few minutes when the wax tacks off well (not cold just completely tacked off) then gently peal the feathers off to a perfectly cleaned skin. And the best part NO PIN FEATHERS!!!!! So so darned easy.

I couldn't believe it myself the first time, but it works like magic. If I ever raise geese I will try it on them as well. I'm going to try plucking turkeys this year, but I will have wax on hand if I need it.

I prefer duck wax.. it's not as brittle as regular paraffin wax

 

[Habibs Hens]

I prefer duck wax.. it's not as brittle as regular paraffin wax