Processing Dual Purpose Roos Tomorrow Morning

[gg706]

I am purchasing a straight run of chickens thinking I would attempt to butcher the roos and any others that I dont want to keep. I have never done this before...I am concerned I wont be able to do it, or that I will try my first and it will be so tramatic that I wont be able to do the rest or eat chicken ever again. I do feel that it is more responsible to raise them and butcher them humanely. Afterall a chicken is being butchered for you to eat....I am just not sure if I can do it....I have watched butchering videos I am not that bothered by it however I am not the one holding the knife ending somethings life. Do you think about the butchering when you are cooking up the chicken dinner later on. Any advice? Any thoughts?

 

[wyoDreamer]

Quote:
My advice is to not focus on "ending its life". You have raised this bird to be your food, so focus on the fact that it had a good life with you and will serve its purpose well. As said on here before - it had a good life and one bad day. It deserves a good end so be confident in yourself and do it as best as you can. Being timid and worried about the process may make you hesitate and screw up at the wrong time.

What method are you going to use? Personally, I prefer the killing cone - just because it holds the bird still and both hands are available to do the deed. It also seems to contain the mess. I helped my cousins on butchering day when growing up and they just cut the head off and let the birds flop around the yard. That was not cool.

Also, be prepared with a frozen pizza or something else for supper that night. After butchering and cleaning up, I am always too tired emotionally and physically to cook much for supper. And the smell stayed with me until the next day. You will also want to let the birds rest before cooking so they will be tender.

 

[Smiles-N-Sunshine]

Quote:
Totally agree with you on the ethics. Eating means killing, whether it's a chicken or a carrot.

I would recommend dispatching just one bird the first time, then you can wrassle with your conscience, reflect and learn from any (hopefully few) mistakes, and then try it again another day. Or become a carrot-murdering vegan.

Another suggestion is leaving the bird in the freezer for a while, until it becomes more of a "what" than a "who". And don't name it!

Bryan

 

[LilyD]

Quote:
When it is time to butcher I try to do it as humanely as possible. It does bother me a bit that I am taking a life and I am sad the day that I do it but I understand that since I am an omnivore and not willing to stop eating meat that this is a much better solution for me than eating the chickens from factories. What did it for me was watching the video from the Tyson factory online and how badly abused they were as they were being processed. So many things can go wrong doing it that way and it's not nice at all for the birds. The way that we process is harder on us but easier on the chickens in the long run. It's the way it should be.

I don't cook chicken for a few days after processing but when I do cook it I really don't think about processing at all. Once it's packaged and in the freezer I really can't tell anything about it other than the type of meat so it's easy to be distanced from it. The whole while though I do keep reminding myself to be thankful for what we have and how lucky we are that we can raise good food rather than just buying food from the store and risking poisoning.

Don't get me wrong I get way attached to my roosters (I think they have more personality than hens which makes it harder come processing day) but I allow that to happen because I want to make sure that even though I will eat them they feel loved and cared for until the very end.

 

[LilyD]

Quote:
Totally agree with you on the ethics. Eating means killing, whether it's a chicken or a carrot.

I would recommend dispatching just one bird the first time, then you can wrassle with your conscience, reflect and learn from any (hopefully few) mistakes, and then try it again another day. Or become a carrot-murdering vegan.

Another suggestion is leaving the bird in the freezer for a while, until it becomes more of a "what" than a "who". And don't name it!

Bryan

Bryan,

I totally agree with you. The first time I processed by myself without any help I only did two. I started with the first one and went all the way through the process, taking my time and then gave myself a bit of time in between that one and the next one. We also have a rule that we don't eat meat on days that we process. It gives us time to rest our systems and by having something mellow rather than a heavy meat meal we make sure that the stress from the actual processing will not make us feel sick and turn us off meat altogether.

I think mainly once we have finished we feel physically and emotionally drained and it takes a while to get over that.

 

[gg706]

Quote:
My advice is to not focus on "ending its life". You have raised this bird to be your food, so focus on the fact that it had a good life with you and will serve its purpose well. As said on here before - it had a good life and one bad day. It deserves a good end so be confident in yourself and do it as best as you can. Being timid and worried about the process may make you hesitate and screw up at the wrong time.

What method are you going to use? Personally, I prefer the killing cone - just because it holds the bird still and both hands are available to do the deed. It also seems to contain the mess. I helped my cousins on butchering day when growing up and they just cut the head off and let the birds flop around the yard. That was not cool.

Also, be prepared with a frozen pizza or something else for supper that night. After butchering and cleaning up, I am always too tired emotionally and physically to cook much for supper. And the smell stayed with me until the next day. You will also want to let the birds rest before cooking so they will be tender.

Thank You for the input! I was going to hang it by its feet into a can with a heavy yard waste bag grab the head and hold it taughnt(spelling?) and cut the jugular with a sharp knife lower it a little into the bag and probibly not hang around too much until it was "done" killing up to 3 then rinseing with a hose =in the yard then dunk one at a time into 145 deg. water to losen feathers and pluck them one at a time. Is this correct? I am also going at it alone as my husband REFUSES to have AnY part in the butchering process however he said he would eat what I butchered. My neighbor who hunts deer...etc. has said he would do the butchering part I would probably pull feathers etc. for a price and some meat....should I take him up on that? He "rings" the neckk I guess slings them around breaking the neck seems horrible to me???? i have thought if I could do it I would order some corish X and fill the freezer twice a year we eat ALOT of chicken so it makes sense to be able to carry this out. I do get a satisfaction of supplying my own food from the garden ...not quite the same thing i know but I am hoping this would carry over into the chicken "project"

 

[Smiles-N-Sunshine]

I do get a satisfaction of supplying my own food from the garden ...not quite the same thing i know but I am hoping this would carry over into the chicken "project"

It's totally the same thing, in my opinion!

 

[brandislee]

Bryan (and all the others...) gave good advice, I just thought I'd throw in my two cents as someone who had a completely traumatic first time yet did it again.

My best advice is get help. Experienced or otherwise it helps to have more hands and another perspective (but obviously experienced help would be ideal).

Also, make sure you have the feet secured well and a cone is a good idea, as one of the most traumatic things that happened to me both the first and second time was that the chicken dislocated a wing, which popped through the skin... The first time I didn't have the feet secured well enough, and the second time my "cone" was too big (I used a burlap sack, I need to use something tighter).

However, no matter how traumatic it is I will still raise my own meat. The only other feasible option is to become a vegetarian (and I really truly don't believe that is a healthy way to eat, otherwise I'd be all about it...), because there is no way I can justify eating industrial chicken, which lives and dies under exponentially worse conditions than I could ever expose my chickens to, because I can't stomach doing the job myself. I'm super attached to my roosters (my first kills were cornish cross broilers, which was a good start for me because I wasn't at all attached to them)- it's harder with them because they are usually more friendly and have more entertaining personalities- but I know that sooner than later they will be coq au vin. Because rooster fertility begins to decline after 3 or 4 years, I believe, and no matter how much I enjoy my chickens I don't have the space or resources to become a chicken retirement home. Like every member of my household, from the kids to the dogs, the chickens have a job.

ANYWAY... I have a question for the original poster. I want to know how they all tasted comparatively. I really want to start a somewhat self sustaining flock, so I'm trying to find a good balanced breed. Pretty sure I'm going to start with Buckeyes, because they made my short list and there is a breeder nearby, but I am still interested in other breeds- who knows, maybe the Buckeyes won't work out for me.

 

[New2TheCoop]

Brahamas are a great dual pourpose breed. This is a roo that I processed at 10 months.

Before

After

I didn't weigh them, but these boys were very large. I dispatch my birds using a small hatchet. One pop & done.

 

[LilyD]

ANYWAY... I have a question for the original poster. I want to know how they all tasted comparatively. I really want to start a somewhat self sustaining flock, so I'm trying to find a good balanced breed. Pretty sure I'm going to start with Buckeyes, because they made my short list and there is a breeder nearby, but I am still interested in other breeds- who knows, maybe the Buckeyes won't work out for me.

I have gotten to the point that I can't eat the Cornish X or store birds anymore. The dual purpose birds have a richer flavor and really any way that I cook them they tend to taste better. They can get chewy if you don't rest them before eating them but I really haven't had a problem with that. I usually rest my meat after I freeze it in the fridge for about 4 days or so before cooking it and no matter how I cook it it seems to come out great texture wise. I don't notice any big difference between the Brahma, Cochin and Dellies. They are all raised free range until they get ready to process then they have the last few weeks in the bachelor pen so they don't pester the girls too much. I find that they do okay up until about 4 months and then they start giving the hens a hard time so I have to separate them.

My next bird I want to try are Dorkings I have heard that they have a unique flavor that is their own and different from other Dual Purpose chickens.