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

[Sally Sunshine]

Same house here Sally, My people think they have to eat meat with every meal.

I know right! BBQ chicken and biscuits are not for breakfast mom???? since when???

 

[Beekissed]

Well...got my chicken killin' done for the season and am just finishing up the canning. Not a bad turn out, all the cockerels had tons of fat, not something I'm used to seeing on roosters, especially free range. This cockerel band ate almost entirely off of range and lived out in the honeysuckle thicket, only came into roost...to be this fat on foraged foods speaks highly of their foraging ability and the availability and quality of our range.

A total of 37 qts of chicken from 10 roosters, packed tight, and three qts. of squirrel. I added some fat and organs to the jars of squirrel to give them some more fats in the broth. Should all be excellent eating...clean, young, flavorful meat.

The new pup looked pretty gory, with blood spattered all over his head and face...that greedy thing gulped 7 chicken legs, four heads and licked up all the blood. Now, that's what I call feeding raw!

Old Jake only got one leg.

The house smells of chicken stock and it feels good to have all that meat stored back for the winter. I still have plenty of jars from last year so I have a goodly amount of chicken on the shelf....12 qts from last year at current counts, 2 qts of rabbit, 12 qts. of deer, 1 qt. of squirrel already on the shelves. That gives me a total of 67 qts. of various meats on the shelf after tonight's canning, taken right off this land.

Considering Mom and I aren't real big meat eaters(maybe once a week in the winter, less in the warm months), that's a full on plenty and should be enough to feed any family and company who come to call or to share with the same.

Y'all don't know what you are missing if you aren't eating your own home raised meats...there's nothing to compare with them in any store. So much flavor, so very healthy and organic....and so very cheap.

 

[CaseyV]

I know right! BBQ chicken and biscuits are not for breakfast mom???? since when???

Lol, let me offer a salad and i have 2 of these

 

[fisherlady]

Well...got my chicken killin' done for the season and am just finishing up the canning. Not a bad turn out, all the cockerels had tons of fat, not something I'm used to seeing on roosters, especially free range. This cockerel band ate almost entirely off of range and lived out in the honeysuckle thicket, only came into roost...to be this fat on foraged foods speaks highly of their foraging ability and the availability and quality of our range.

A total of 37 qts of chicken from 10 roosters, packed tight, and three qts. of squirrel. I added some fat and organs to the jars of squirrel to give them some more fats in the broth. Should all be excellent eating...clean, young, flavorful meat.

The new pup looked pretty gory, with blood spattered all over his head and face...that greedy thing gulped 7 chicken legs, four heads and licked up all the blood. Now, that's what I call feeding raw!

Old Jake only got one leg.

The house smells of chicken stock and it feels good to have all that meat stored back for the winter. I still have plenty of jars from last year so I have a goodly amount of chicken on the shelf....12 qts from last year at current counts, 2 qts of rabbit, 12 qts. of deer, 1 qt. of squirrel already on the shelves. That gives me a total of 67 qts. of various meats on the shelf after tonight's canning, taken right off this land.

Considering Mom and I aren't real big meat eaters(maybe once a week in the winter, less in the warm months), that's a full on plenty and should be enough to feed any family and company who come to call or to share with the same.

Y'all don't know what you are missing if you aren't eating your own home raised meats...there's nothing to compare with them in any store. So much flavor, so very healthy and organic....and so very cheap.

Sounds like your pantry is in good shape! A job well done that has to make you feel good just seeing the stocked shelves! what breed of birds did you butcher? I must have missed it in your previous posting... 3.5 qts per bird is quite a bit, so must have been some good sized boys. Do you include any bones in your jars or is it all deboned? I have been adding a wing to pints and a leg to qts and it does give it a deeper flavor.

 

[Beekissed]

These are heirloom genetics WRs and WR mix birds, big ol' boys at 5 mo. I was thinking of penning them up the last two weeks and fattening them up, as they've free ranged all this time since 2 wks and have put a lot of miles on those legs, but I'm glad I didn't now. Those birds were coated in fat...don't think I've ever seen that on cockerels of other breeds and I'm hoping this is a common occurrence in the WR cockerels. I already knew the hens were like that...seem to stay hugely fat on very little feed and free range. I love that in a breed! Saves me money and gets me lots of cheap, high quality food.

I remove the breast and that part of the bones are giving to the dogs but the rest is canned with the bone in. It's just easier to debone when it falls off the bone after you remove it from the jar. And the bones add nutrition and flavor to the stock in the jar, so it's a win/win. Sometimes I'll only fill the jar with thigh, leg, and breasts and then use the rest of the bits for stock, rendering the fat to use for cooking other things...usually I'll do that for when I can up hens. Just not used to seeing this much fat on roosters, so I may have to use that same technique on them from now on...they definitely have the fat for it.

 

[fisherlady]

These are heirloom genetics WRs and WR mix birds, big ol' boys at 5 mo. I was thinking of penning them up the last two weeks and fattening them up, as they've free ranged all this time since 2 wks and have put a lot of miles on those legs, but I'm glad I didn't now. Those birds were coated in fat...don't think I've ever seen that on cockerels of other breeds and I'm hoping this is a common occurrence in the WR cockerels. I already knew the hens were like that...seem to stay hugely fat on very little feed and free range. I love that in a breed! Saves me money and gets me lots of cheap, high quality food.

That's great! I now have a line of WR which are huge, the original source was from Maine, I believe.... the roosters are huge but thankfully very friendly and the hens have been decent layers and one of them has been broody twice in her first year and successfully hatched and raised broods for me. I am setting up a pen to separate them since I got an additional 3 pullets this summer. Hoping the roosters aren't too big to be effective. I plan to leave one rooster with the egger flock and the other will go in the breeding pen, also wanting to put the WR roos over a few of my Silver Pencil hens to see if I can get some more broody hens who are big with the added bonus of all of the unnecessary cockerels being big and meaty.

 

[fisherlady]

wr rooster at about 6 months, standing to right of mature black australorp rooster

 

[Beekissed]

WOW!!! Those roosters look better than anything I've ever seen in regards to WRs....who's line are those out of????

 

[fisherlady]

WOW!!! Those roosters look better than anything I've ever seen in regards to WRs....who's line are those out of????

It was a line out of Maine, I believe, sold some stock out to a breeder near Pittsburgh and I got hatching eggs from him for my broodies. Mine actually have finished out just a bit bigger than his(maybe 6-8 oz difference) and about an inch taller at the back. Don't know if I just got bigger examples of the line or if it was from being broody raised, those guys got hauled all over the place by their mama from the time they were 3 days old, so lots of good muscle and bone building. I gave 2 to a friend who does a lot of meat birds out east and she just loves them, they roam her place and are laid back like ours are. Hoping now that I will have a few more hens it will be practical for me to get them into a breeding pen. I am interested to see if any of the pullets gets the broody bug like the one older hen did....she made a very imposing broody!
I would like to get one or two hatches of pure bred a year and otherwise use them to improve the size of the barnyard birds. I do love them showing some broodiness, since I only hatch with broodies it will make for more self sustaining birds in our flock.

 

[Beekissed]

Well, you sure got some good genetics there! Impressive size! I'm only doing broody hatches from now on also. Always did before, experimented with incubation last year and decided it really wasn't for me, and am returning to broodies for good. God blessed me with two offspring out of an old broody hatchery WR in her 5th year of age~bred to this breeder WR~and those two pullets went broody their first spring, along with a BA/WR mix pullet of the same hatch, so I had three good broodies and an additional Del broody this spring. Pretty much my entire little flock went broody this past spring.

My breeding goal is to keep a broody gene going but to cull any that go broody more than once per year, each spring. The BA mix pullet attempted to go broody again in late summer, so she's on the cull list for next year....she did not return to laying after raising her brood, she went broody not long after, busted her in the spare pen and then she molted(she's still a pullet, mind you) and has still not laid since laying her clutch for hatching this spring. Off with her head! I'll use her this spring to set some eggs if I need to, but after that she's disposable.

I want broodies that raise their family and then get back to laying. My two pullets from that old WR hatchery bird did just that and are laying daily right now. I'm working from them and their daughters only with my breeding in the spring and I'm stepping it up a bit....going to try another experiment that will take the broodies even further towards a landrace type behavior, but under management. I'll let y'all know if that experiment pans out. Can't wait to see how it all goes this spring, as I think I'll be able to hatch more and increase the hatch rate with this new experiment, if all goes well.

In short, I want hens that go broody each spring, raise a family, then go back to laying until next spring. That seems to be in line with nature and how the wild ground dwelling fowl do it...produce a family each spring to insure the species goes on and produces it in the appropriate season for optimal growth out on forage before winter.