reflection of first time chx kill

[NorthwoodsChick]

I like deer hunters that harvest does. If a deer herd gets overpopulated you can have a lot of problems: disease, overgrazing, more road kill, and such. Harvesting a buck removes one deer. Harvesting a does removes her and the two fawn she will probably raise the next year. You can't manage a deer population by just taking bucks.

so true.

As I've told my husband, you don't eat the antlers.

DH has never gotten a deer (possibly this fall we'll get some revenge for our devastated orchard), but I've often been given deer. Those trophy bucks are like venison-flavored chewing gum. Really suited for nothing but jerky or sausage.

I was fortunate to draw a bull elk lottery tag in MI last year. Got a very nice 5x5 bull that DNR said was the largest antlered elk they had tagged for the year. His dressed weight was a shocking 400 lbs. He was hanging out with a young 3x4 atypically bull that was also taken weighing a whopping 550 lbs as the scale didn’t go higher. The reason, I learned, was weight loss during the rut… my bull was b-u-s-y!! And it was the toughest meat I have ever had.. the tenderloin was even tough. pressure cooker? ha..not much better. The hormone surge and fat loss of this bull toughened him up, so we have a ton of jerkey and sausage now. It was a good experience though so not complaining.

 

[HenriettaPizzaNolan]

Some developments in the east that are too densely-populated for shooting have actually hired bowhunters to thin the herd.

In the city where I used to live in Ohio, they passed an ordinance that if a deer comes on your property you are allowed to shoot it with a bow. This was in a suburb. It seemed to help a little but there's still a ton of deer. I don't think there were too many bow hunters in the suburb lol. But I think that was a really cool idea that could be effective in a lot of places.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Deer bag limits vary in Arkansas by zone, it's not the same statewide. A typical bag limit might be 3 or 5 deer but no more than two bucks. They are trying to reduce the number of doe but most people take bucks only.

 

[o2bgreenntx]

Yes, get a few layers. Lost my sweetest EE, Noodles, to predator last week. She was always the first one to greet me and loved to ride next to me in my golf cart. Absolutely broke my heart.
Thank goodness I had "back-up" hens to keep me focused and still in the game.
All my best to you!

 

[Iluveggers]

In the city where I used to live in Ohio, they passed an ordinance that if a deer comes on your property you are allowed to shoot it with a bow. This was in a suburb. It seemed to help a little but there's still a ton of deer. I don't think there were too many bow hunters in the suburb lol. But I think that was a really cool idea that could be effective in a lot of places.

That’s crazy. We would have 4 or 5 already if we could do that!

 

[Cackel Shack]

The first few times processing chickens, we put them in the freezer for several weeks, maybe even a few months, before eating them. The passage of time helped, as well as the intermingling of the chickens in the freezer, so I didn't know who was who when I pulled one out.

Now, I'm fine with eating a butchered chicken after the standard 2-3 day rest period in the fridge. I just got more comfortable with the entire process as well as knowing that, if I'm to eat meat, this was a preferable way of going about it. At this point, I find supermarket chickens hard to eat -- less tasty and I know their lives weren't the best.

That's a good idea to put the processed chicken in the freezer for several weeks or months before eating it. If I can not put a face or a feather to a bird, then it wouldn't be so hard to eat it.

 

[3KillerBs]

That's a good idea to put the processed chicken in the freezer for several weeks or months before eating it. If I can not put a face or a feather to a bird, then it wouldn't be so hard to eat it.

I generally find that once I get them undressed they look enough like a grocery store chicken to not mind eating them.

 

[Dinogrrl]

Yeah that's definitely not a bad idea. I processed my first chickens in September of last year, had them labeled as to the breed, age, and sex since I wanted to do a sort of taste test to get a better idea of what breeds I wanted to pursue in the future. Into the deep freezer they went for storage. Then due to a variety of circumstances, my taste-testing team wasn't available until nearly nine months later, by which time I could barely remember what any of the chickens had looked like and had to actually reference my code list to see what pieces came from what type of bird! I don't plan to wait that long between processing and eating them again in the future but for the first time bunch I do think it helped to put that space between things.

 

[bobbi-j]

I’ve been raising and processing chickens long enough that I label them like this:

(In case you can’t read them they say, Fricassee, Stew, Earl and Dumplin’)

 

[Iluveggers]

I’ve been raising and processing chickens long enough that I label them like this:
View attachment 3195983
(In case you can’t read them they say, Fricassee, Stew, Earl and Dumplin’)

Those look huge! What breed did you process? (& how big are they actually).