Processing Day Support Group ~ HELP us through the Emotions PLEASE!

[aoxa]

well I figured it was on the skin as its before you cut into the bird and we rinsed afterwards and numerous times during processing them as well. bleach evaporates and the kids drink more in the pool and water at school than they would ever get from me cleaning a bird, so I went for it. well worth it too.

Not so much the bleach as the dish soap. I do have all natural dish soap now that I would be very comfortable using.

 

[Sally Sunshine]

Quote: there ya go, I think the odor neutralizer was all in the bleach to be honest, because I didn't use much soap at all. and I used Dawn. And I didn't think they stank till they got wet and p u did they stink like poopchickens! I felt better having that stench of dirty off my birds I was gonna eat fer sure! I bet I wouldnot have eaten had they still smelt that way, seriously they stank. gag stank!

 

[carolinagirl58]

Sally, were your chickens caged or free ranging? Mine were free ranging and honestly I did not notice a bad smell at any time during processing. The only bad thing that happened was the very first chicken in to the cone managed to squirt some poop high into the air and it landed on me. Yep....good way to start the day. lol. Hubby was amused but I wasn't.

 

[Sally Sunshine]

Sally, were your chickens caged or free ranging? Mine were free ranging and honestly I did not notice a bad smell at any time during processing. The only bad thing that happened was the very first chicken in to the cone managed to squirt some poop high into the air and it landed on me. Yep....good way to start the day. lol. Hubby was amused but I wasn't.

LOL I would be amused too!! ha ha!! Mine were in a run, large run. they were clean birds just big and had a real poop odor.

 

[Sally Sunshine]

oh and the cochin stank worse than the brahma, he was the first and then it was hard to get that stench out of my nose, so perhaps exaggerate the others???

 

[aoxa]

Mine didn't stink like poop.. It smelled like wet dog.

I did not with-hold food at all prior. I'm sentimental.. Thought they should have a last supper. No problems processing, and Susan & my MIL found it easier to find the crops.

I have some images of the parts after the killing.


Out set up sucked. I'll say that much about it. We couldn't boil the water fast enough, so we instead used a kettle to boil it and used the burner to keep water hot (150F or so)


The dunk and swirl.


The mask didn't help the smell.

It was beyond freezing that day too. Something like -10F out with wind chill.


Plucking


Processing.. We have an entire album on here for the gutting part:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/g/a/6336055/processing-extra-roosters-graphic/

 

[fisherlady]

For those of you who have had trouble with the smell.... A little trick you can try that I have unfortunately had need for over the years when dealing with unpleasant work situations.

Vicks vapo rub... small dab of it and rub it on your upper lip. It should help occupy your sense of smell while you are working on the birds.

some of the chap stick style lip balms with scents would do the same thing, and being in a lip balm stick type dispenser makes it easier to reapply also.

 

[aoxa]

For those of you who have had trouble with the smell.... A little trick you can try that I have unfortunately had need for over the years when dealing with unpleasant work situations.

Vicks vapo rub... small dab of it and rub it on your upper lip. It should help occupy your sense of smell while you are working on the birds.

some of the chap stick style lip balms with scents would do the same thing, and being in a lip balm stick type dispenser makes it easier to reapply also.

 

[BCMaraniac]

I put a bit of natural dish soap in the scald water. And I hosed the birds off really well before they got scalded. I figured no matter what we did, it was still bound to be cleaner than factory processing. When I butchered them, I was really careful to not cut into the vent. Also we fasted the chickens for probably 12 hours prior to help keep the fecal matter down. I think it really helped.

Exactly. The thing about "clean" is that it doesn't mean sterile.....did you know that the overuse of antibacterial soap and hand sanitizer has resulted in a generation of children with poorer immune systems?...but I digress.....

There are germs everywhere.....and people get along fine by and large with the germs on their farm/homestead/backyard/home. This is because your immune system has developed immunity to the germs in your environment. Did you know that before the development of antibiotics, women who gave birth in a hospital were more likely to die from infection than a woman who gave birth at home?? The woman at home was around "her" germs, and the woman at the hospital was around "other people's" germs, for which they had less immunity.

What do we talk about with our birds?? BIOSECURITY....which in layman's terms means "We'll keep our germs, and you keep yours" They have immunity to the normal germs in their environment, but stuff carried in by others is a different matter.

So we have biosecurity with the chicken we raise to eat.....we have lived with those germs for the duration of that bird's life. The chicken that comes into our house from the grocery.....not so much....that is where the pathogenic strains(the ones that make lots of people sick) of E.coli come from.....not the homestead. So on many fronts the chicken from the backyard is better than the commercially produced chicken.

 

[Sally Sunshine]

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