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

[Tomtommom]

The ideal method is the one that you can use with confidence. Crushing a head is great.. if you can do it. I'm sure a bird with a semi-crushed head is going to disagree with it being quick.

There's a method that put a knife in through the roof of the mouth (where it's split) straight into the brain. Quick, relatively painless.... but if you can't do it right.. it could suck, badly. There was a bird that lived for years after being almost completely beheaded.....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_the_Headless_Chicken

Wikipedia isn't a great source, but if it's true.... YUCK and OUCH.

 

[LindaB220]

One thing I can tell you that when my husband had a heart valve replaced nearly 3 years ago, he was sitting in a chair beside his bed the day after surgery, and went into complete heart block with a 13-second ventricular pause. What that means is that for 13 seconds the chamber of the heart that pumps blood to his brain stopped, so the blood going to his brain stopped. This was recorded on the telemetry monitor. I was at his bedside when this happened, and he didn't lose consciousness for 13 seconds.....but he did lose consciousness....probably about 5-6 seconds. Then that chamber started pumping and he regained consciousness. That is the closest comparison I can make regarding an abrupt cessation of blood flow to the brain.

My God, you must have been terrified. Glad the outcome was good. Whew.

 

[Beekissed]

The ideal method is the one that you can use with confidence. Crushing a head is great.. if you can do it. I'm sure a bird with a semi-crushed head is going to disagree with it being quick.

There's a method that put a knife in through the roof of the mouth (where it's split) straight into the brain. Quick, relatively painless.... but if you can't do it right.. it could suck, badly. There was a bird that lived for years after being almost completely beheaded.....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_the_Headless_Chicken

Wikipedia isn't a great source, but if it's true.... YUCK and OUCH.

I've tried it...it didn't work and the birds were still alive, looking at me, as brain tissue and blood poured out of their mouths. I scrambled every bit of brain they had in there and it didn't kill them, didn't make them pass out and didn't do anything but make me sick to my stomach. Never again will I try pithing. And, yes, I put the knife where it was supposed to go..the actual brains were coming out the mouths so I'm figuring I hit the brain and all it's various components as I scraped, cut, and cored out all discernible tissue in the skull.

 

[jajeanpierre]

Now..ya have to ask yourself this...if someone just cut off your head and then told you to blink, are you really going to acquiesce to that request? Seriously? If you had conscious thought enough to weigh the question and give an appropriate response, wouldn't you also surmise that they can't kill you if you don't comply with their requests? Isn't it more likely the blinking was happening anyway as a result of neurons firing haphazardly due to the decapitation?

Are we going to believe the documentation of people who are crazy enough to decapitate people in the first place? The scientists, I can believe as they are recording data and have the equipment to do so, but a blink at an executioner's doctor is not what I call hard evidence.

While I agree that the EEGs attached to the rats is a much more robust scientific model than a doctor observing an execution. Regardless, the rats' brains were functioning for almost 4 seconds. That's a long time.

http://www.todayifoundout.com/index...riefly-remain-conscious-after-being-beheaded/

http://science.howstuffworks.com/science-vs-myth/extrasensory-perceptions/lucid-decapitation.htm

http://www.damninteresting.com/lucid-decapitation/

 

[jajeanpierre]

One thing I can tell you that when my husband had a heart valve replaced nearly 3 years ago, he was sitting in a chair beside his bed the day after surgery, and went into complete heart block with a 13-second ventricular pause. What that means is that for 13 seconds the chamber of the heart that pumps blood to his brain stopped, so the blood going to his brain stopped. This was recorded on the telemetry monitor. I was at his bedside when this happened, and he didn't lose consciousness for 13 seconds.....but he did lose consciousness....probably about 5-6 seconds. Then that chamber started pumping and he regained consciousness. That is the closest comparison I can make regarding an abrupt cessation of blood flow to the brain.

Gosh that must have been scary!

I collapsed at my husband's bedside in the recovery room as he was recovering from heart surgery. My heart stopped for a long time--something ridiculous like two minutes. (Best place to have that happen--in the recovery room of a heart surgery hospital!) They admitted me overnight because there is a risk of a heart attack when your heart stops for a long time--something like that. One minute I'm seeing stars and the next I'm on a gurney beside my husband in the recovery room with a crowd of people around.

I don't know about decapitation. It would seem that you should lose consciousness really quickly, but the rats brains were working just fine for almost four seconds. But then, I bet my unconscious brain was working just fine, too.

The first quote in the previous post has a quote from a neurosurgeon, although the doctor is unnamed.

 

[gigelus2k13]

When I had to harvest my first rooster, I went to the source of all wisdom (youtube) and stumbled upon the video of a lady taking and cleaning a hen. Her method, which I think is by far the easiest, is the jugular cut. The bird is tucked between one's legs and, because she has so little blood in her body, she passes out very quickly, giving just one reflexive jolt at the end. The blood flows in one place (which in my case is the root of the apple tree), no mess no scary commotion, very easy; just sharpen well that knife so that it cuts instead of ripping.

OTOH, for many of us it's never easy...

 

[LindaB220]

When I had to harvest my first rooster, I went to the source of all wisdom (youtube) and stumbled upon the video of a lady taking and cleaning a hen. Her method, which I think is by far the easiest, is the jugular cut. The bird is tucked between one's legs and, because she has so little blood in her body, she passes out very quickly, giving just one reflexive jolt at the end. The blood flows in one place (which in my case is the root of the apple tree), no mess no scary commotion, very easy; just sharpen well that knife so that it cuts instead of ripping.

OTOH, for many of us it's never easy...

Ah, I've seen that one. The humane way to process. It will be fine as long as you only have one or two. Quiet and serene.

 

[Tomtommom]

I've tried it...it didn't work and the birds were still alive, looking at me, as brain tissue and blood poured out of their mouths. I scrambled every bit of brain they had in there and it didn't kill them, didn't make them pass out and didn't do anything but make me sick to my stomach. Never again will I try pithing. And, yes, I put the knife where it was supposed to go..the actual brains were coming out the mouths so I'm figuring I hit the brain and all it's various components as I scraped, cut, and cored out all discernible tissue in the skull.

Seems there's really no ideal method. Just better and worse methods, I guess.

Ah, I've seen that one. The humane way to process. It will be fine as long as you only have one or two. Quiet and serene.

We were trying to go for that one..... Yeah, didn't work for us. I had visions of the bird passing serenely. Instead he stared at us in anger as we fumbled.

Not for us.

I have not done the cone or the axe.. The last one went really well with the broom stick, so I was planning on sticking with it.

I've got a half dozen plymouth rock chicks that will head to freezer camp when they start crowing.. Might end up letting hubby have a try with a cone. He's been wanting to try that way... I can't imagine the bird getting into the cone quietly.

 

[BCMaraniac]

Seems there's really no ideal method. Just better and worse methods, I guess.



We were trying to go for that one..... Yeah, didn't work for us. I had visions of the bird passing serenely. Instead he stared at us in anger as we fumbled. Not for us.


I have not done the cone or the axe.. The last one went really well with the broom stick, so I was planning on sticking with it.


I've got a half dozen plymouth rock chicks that will head to freezer camp when they start crowing.. Might end up letting hubby have a try with a cone. He's been wanting to try that way... I can't imagine the bird getting into the cone quietly.

They get into the cone pretty easily. It is simply a matter of getting them by the feet and hanging them upside down, letting them settle. T hen l lower them into the cone, reaching up into the bottom of the cone to straighten their neck if they tuck their heads going down into it.

 

[Beekissed]

They get into the cone pretty easily. It is simply a matter of getting them by the feet and hanging them upside down, letting them settle. T hen l lower them into the cone, reaching up into the bottom of the cone to straighten their neck if they tuck their heads going down into it.

Yep...what she said.

The whole process can go as calmly as you want it to go~ or as noisy, messy and stressful as you want to make it. I like my processing days to be quiet and serene, so all movements are deliberate and unhurried, all birds given a chance to calm down before being placed in the cone and a moment to become adjusted after being placed there. Death is bad enough without turning it into a stress filled squawk fest.