One of our farm projects over the last couple weekends has been to build a “hoop coop” for the meat birds. Our intent is to use it as a chicken tractor for them.
After doing some research, Bengt settled on roughly using this design. I think in part because we already had the necessary stock panels. We use them for creating temporary pastures for the goats occasionally and have plans to use them more permanently in the future.
Our parts list:
- 5 1×4’s ($3.82 each)
- 4 2×4’s ($2.76 each)
- 1 box of medium fence nails ($3.24)
- 1 box of large fence nails ($3.34)
Grand total of $40.10 with tax. I don’t remember how much the stock panels actually cost us, and the poultry netting, zip ties, hinges, and latch are things we always seem to have around. I think we also came out with an extra 1×4.
We still need to put up the tarps, roosts, complete the front wall with poultry netting, and add a “handle” for the tractor to pull it. Unfortunately we also realized that we did the bottom wrong and will need to add skids. The plan is for the meat birds to move in to the hoop coop this next weekend. I’m a little nervous because it’s been getting relatively cold at night still and this design provides less protection from the colder temperatures than the range house.
Baby chicks have arrived (again)! Our 36 Cornish Roasters arrived early this morning along with F3’s order. We got the call at 5:11am and drug ourselves to the post office. We ordered enough to score a “double-wide” box this time! As usual they tumbled out of their shipping box and went right to work eating and drinking like little fiends.
I also realized I had forgotten to mention that this past weekend we went to a bakery that was selling off food grade barrels (from storing artificial sweetener) for rain water catchement. It was a steal compared to the $80 or so most folks charge for olive barrels that have been turned in to rain water catchement so we stocked up and got a couple for F3 as well.
We are excited to work on this project since it will (hopefully) alleviate the need for hauling quite as much water up and down the hill, especially now that the pink flock is up there by the goats. The goal is to catch the water in large enough quantities and then truck it up the hill to keep us going for as long as possible. We are only starting with a few while we work out the system. I’m hoping to be able to build a gutter system on the goat barn so we can collect water up there as well.
Seed starting is under way in our kitchen. In an effort to spare some counter space I got out my trusty folding craft table and have it strategically placed under the skylights. I had quite good luck starting seeds under the skylights instead of supplemental lights last year so I’m trying it again, although I’m starting earlier this year. We’ll see how it goes. I’m using a warming mat on and off since we heat with the wood stove meaning the house temperatures aren’t particularly consistent. I’m using the GrowVeg.com planting time lines which has been really handy. I have both the backyard garden and the raised beds all laid out. It definitely appeals to the planner in me.
Right now I have some greens, leeks, and onions starting. The greens, arugula and mustard, are up and the leeks/onions are just starting to emerge. Next up I need to start: eggplant, cabbage, lettuces, and more greens. I need to dig out more seed starting trays though. They are all still buried in the greenhouse and garage.
Our next flock of chickens is due some time this week. We moved “Pat” the rooster up behind the goat barn with the rest of “flock #2″, otherwise known as the pink flock now, so we could clean and sanitize the brooder box. After repeatedly looking for appropriate leg bands for the chickens I gave up and went the zip tie route. It’s cheaper and accessible. As I understand it the challenge is that they can tighten further and cause damage so we’ll keep an eye on them. So “flock #2″ was given the hot pink zip ties. I plan to give our spring break laying flock the yellow zip ties.
“Pat” got his own special blue marker so we can keep an eye on his integration. He really didn’t know what to make of the situation having spent his entire 3 months of life in the brooder box. First he challenged every hen that approached him (and they came right back at him) which resulted in a small cut above his right eye and several mouth’s full of feathers. He seemed to settle down a little when he realized they weren’t out to get him in the first place. We took care of some other chores when an unexpected downpour occurred. We ran up the hill, because we’d left their feeder out of the shelter, to find “Pat” standing around indignantly in the rain. Bengt ushered him in to the roosting range house in the hopes that he’d pick up on the routine the hens had long since figured out.
The crazy downpour definitely left everyone out of sorts. Bengt was shoveling the brooder box contents in to the compost pile and I had come inside and taken off my filthy socks. When I heard the rain start, it was an instant WOOSH and I went running around the house all out of sorts trying to find clean, dry socks and an appropriate coat so I could run outside to help. Later that night, Bengt went to close the chicken coop by the house for the night and only found 10 chickens (12 live in that house). I had trouble believing a predator had made off with TWO hens, particularly when we were around doing chores all day. He made a quick round around the house and discovered two hens snuggled up against our front door (on the porch). It took some orchestration between the two of us to convince (or carry in one’s case) the two nervous, nearly blind hens to walk to the back of the house to the coop in the dark and rain. They probably would have been okay on the front porch, but I can’t imagine they’d have liked it any and I certainly don’t want to encourage it.
So the brooder box is all clean and we have a new bale of shavings standing by. Sometime this week we will get the 5:30am wake up call from the post office informing us our chickens are ready to be picked up. These will be the snowy white meat birds, and are due to be grown enough to move out of the brooder box by 4 weeks, just in time for “flock #3″ or the “yellow flock” to arrive, the last of our laying birds for this year. I’m really not looking forward to two more rounds of “failure to thrive” but what can you do really.
Our “new flock” which maybe I should just start referring to as “flock #2” is now 11 weeks old. It’s crazy to realize they are about 3 months. They are due to start laying at about 6 months old. We came through everything with 21 hens and 1 rooster. Yes, another rooster.
A few weeks ago we moved them out of the brooder box and in to the fenced garden as a holding spot until we could go pull some temporary fencing for them up behind the goat barn (today’s chore). One of the last chickens I picked up to carry from the brooder to the backyard screamed something awful when I had a hold of her. It was a bit strange, but not entirely unusual. Just as I released her over the fence with the other’s I saw a gaping wound at the base of her tail feathers. I was mortified as I realized I had blood on my hands and jacket sleeve. No wonder she was screaming, I had been holding her such that I was probably touching the wound. I started yelling for Bengt in a panic (don’t all these stories involve me yelling to Bengt in a panic?) and he came around with the last two chickens. I pointed out the one with the wound and we watched as another hen walked right up and starting pecking at the bloody area. The one with the wound just went in to a submissive pose and allowed it. Chickens are so mean! Bengt went in to the garden to retrieve her and we immediately went in to chicken hospital mode. Once he had her I took a look at the wound and it was about the size of a half dollar and there was no skin. You could clearly see the muscle structure entirely exposed. It was terrifying. We put her back in to the brooder box and raced off to the feed store to look for antibiotics and get her clean shavings. The best I could come up with to do was to give her a clean environment, boost her natural healing process, and hope. So we did exactly that. We couldn’t find an appropriate antibiotic so we gave her a dose of tetracycline before realizing that it wasn’t going to really help (it’s for respiratory infections) and quit. We tried to find iodine tincture to rinse the wound, but it’s nearly impossible to purchase these days since it can be used for nefarious purposes and eventually I gave up in utter frustration. As the days went by she appeared to be healing so we just kept her isolated and let her body do its own thing.
A week or so later some friends and I were outside and heard a strangled crowing sound. I thought it was Boots, our current rooster, on the other side of the house but it seemed like it was coming from the garage. I was certain that the chicken in the brooder box was a hen (I don’t know why) so I dismissed it. The next weekend we were stacking wood and filling the wood bin and it started up again. This time it was clearly coming from the garage. Sure enough I caught “her” in the act. Darn it! I’ve never known a rooster to crow so early, but granted my experience is somewhat limited. He was only about 2 months old at the most. I don’t need another rooster! Add to that, that it appears to be an Americana rooster. We have a somewhat love/hate relationship with the Americana/Araucana chickens. They lay beautiful eggs and the variety of plumage makes them interesting to look at but they are a light breed so even the rooster is hardly worth slaughtering and we haven’t found them to be particularly hardier or, uhm, strong on predator evasion? We often joke about the saying ‘you only have to run faster than the slowest’… they are clearly often the slowest.
So the new rooster is still in the garage and likes to crow at us in the evenings when we come and go doing chores. We are trying to decide on a name for the rooster. So far we’ve toyed with “Pat” on account of the ambiguous identity. We closely examined his wound a few nights ago and it is all covered with skin and emerging feathers except a small spot about the size of pencil eraser that still has a scab on it. It’s going on 4 weeks now I believe. We plan on keeping keep isolated until the next flock of baby chicks arrives (the meat birds) and are hoping we can reintegrate him with his flock after that. We certainly don’t “need” another rooster but hopefully he’ll help protect them… that is if they don’t try to kill him again.
We are proponents of using the whole animal when the decision is made to slaughter. Like many folks this wasn’t something we were exactly used to to start with. Slaughtering our own chickens last year defintely encouraged us to start doing a little more research in to the uses of “offal” (or giblets in the case of chickens). This will be at least a two part post with the first being mine…
Chicken stock:
Necks and feet make particularly unctuous chicken stock when combined with your left over cooked carcasses or raw backbones from parting out a whole chicken. (Heads can also be used in stock making.)
The best trick I’ve learned with regards to homemade stock is to start a freezer bag for vegetable ends and pieces and add scraps to the bag as you make other meals. Your vegetable bag can contain: “butts” of celery, carrots, and onions, onion/leek/shallot skins, herb stems, garlic pieces, and/or any other vegetable or herb pieces that you would enjoy flavoring your stock. It’s a great way to use those vegetables that aren’t appealing enough to go on the plate but are far from spoiled. I also start freezer bags for chicken carcasses and pieces, as well as separate bags for fish/seafood and beef. (When buying whole seafood make sure to ask for the heads, backbones, and tails when having them filleted. There is loads of flavor in there still.)
When you acquire enough material, normally a gallon freezer bag is a good amount, of vegetables and/or meat you are ready to make stock.
Add to a large stock pot, necks, feet, carcasses (broken up as best possible) along with a few carrots, onions, and celery OR your vegetable scraps bag (frozen is fine) along with 5-15 peppercorns, 1 or 2 bay leaves, and small amount of salt. Add enough water to cover the material by several inches. If you prefer a lighter stock, add more water. If you want a denser stock I recommend reducing it further, see the next part about “demi-glace”, rather than using too little water. Bring to a boil, and then reduce to a simmer. Simmer uncovered, on the stove top or wood stove for as many hours as you have patience for, or a minimum of 1 hour. Strain and discard the solids. You will need to either skim the fat from the stock for immediate use or cool the stock and remove the solidified fat (easier). We freeze our stock in vacuum sealed bags for later use. Be aware that your homemade stock will likely cool to a gelatinous consistency. This is due to the actual gelatin in the carcasses and feet in particular. It will add a body and depth to your stock that you’ll never get out of canned broth or bouillon cubes. We prefer to under salt our stock so we do not risk it becoming too salty as it reduces and instead salt the stock in its final application.
A note on chicken feet: chicken feet have to be “declawed” and the skin removed before cooking. You can normally tell if this has been done if the feet are a pale, creamy color instead of a yellow or grey/brown color. Scalding the feet will allow the skin to be peeled off pretty easily. The claws have an exterior claw kind of like a cap that can be removed by pulling the wrong direction on the claw. This also helps insure that the feet are clean and no dirt remains.
Chicken “Demi-glace”:
To maximize storage space and for more versatility, we simmer our stock for a couple hours, strain and discard the solids as before, and then return the stock to a simmer on the stove top to reduce further to create a “demi-glace”. Once reduced to our liking, we cool to remove the solidified fat, reheat to liquefy, and pour the demi-glace into silicon ice cube trays (the solid plastic ones are hard to get the sauce back out of once frozen). We freeze the trays, and once frozen, remove the cubes to a zip top freezer bag. The demi-glace can be “rehydrated” to a stock by adding water, or can make a wonderful quick sauce or rich gravy as needed. The cubes make it very easy to grab just a little bit at a time.
We are going to raise a limited quantity of pasture-raised, natural, meat birds for on farm sales this year. In order to do so we’d like to approximate interest through tentative pre-orders. There are a lot of unknowns at this point, including final weights, ratio of “Fryers” to “Roasters”, etc.
Our meat birds are treated the same as our laying hens. They will spend a maximum of 4 weeks in a brooding environment (heated and protected) and then spend their remaining time ranging and receiving supplemental growing feed. They are not medicated or treated with antibiotics.
These are not your store bought factory chicken. We’ve raised that breed and we have pledged never to do it again (You can read our experience starting here). This year we are going with the Jumbo Cornish-X’s little brother the Cornish Roaster. They take longer to mature and are in between a standard breed and the Jumbo in size and growth.
Once you’ve read all the details, there is information for pre-ordering at the bottom of this post.
We are targeting slaughter/pick-up dates of:
“Fryers”
- Saturday and Sunday, April 17h and 18th
- Saturday and Sunday, April 24th and 25th
“Roasters”
- Saturday and Sunday, May 8th and 9th
- Saturday and Sunday, May 15th and 16th
- Saturday and Sunday, May 22nd and 23rd
“Fryers” – Fryers will weigh an estimated 3-4lbs, but size is not guaranteed. They are priced per lb. to account for variances. Fryers will reach slaughtering weights in approximately 8 weeks. Fryer chickens should be more suitable for quicker cooking applications (i.e. pan frying).
“Roasters” –Roasters will weigh an estimated 7-9lbs, but size is not guaranteed. They are priced per lb. to account for variances. Roasters will reach slaughtering weights in approximately 12 weeks. Roaster chickens are more suitable for longer cooking applications (i.e. oven roasting).
Details
Bird(s) will be picked up on farm on designated slaughter day and time. Your bird(s) will be humanely slaughtered by hand, plucked, and eviscerated. They will be ready to go immediately in to your freezer or oven. They will only be available whole (no parts). Final bird weights will vary and are determined after processing. If you are interested in all or part of the offal/giblets* from your bird please let us know.
Price $4.25 per lb. (dressed weight).
* Offal/giblets includes: head, neck, feet, heart, liver, and gizzard. Please understand that eviscerating poultry is a delicate task and we do our best to ensure that the offal is as complete as possible.
If you are interested in purchasing a LIVE bird ready for slaughter, please let us know. Price $2.50 per lb. (live weight).
Pick-up Dates/Times: Processing dates and times are predetermined, but will be finalized a few weeks prior to slaughter. We will contact you in the few weeks prior to each slaughter to arrange a pick-up date/time. Tentative pre-orders will be contacted first come, first served.
Regulations require that the birds are picked up within 4 hours of slaughter, or cooling/refrigeration standards apply. We kindly ask that you be on-time for your pick-up date and time to ensure that we remain in compliance. Changes to dates/times must be made 24 hours in advance.
—
If you are interested in pre-ordering please send email to farmers@miscfarm.com with the following information. We will contact you a few weeks prior to slaughter dates to confirm your interest and pick-up dates/times.
How many FRYERS are you interested in (# of birds)?
How many ROASTERS are you interested in (# of birds)?
How many of EITHER are you interested in (lbs. or # of birds)? [Please specify if lbs. or # of birds]
Contact information
Name:
Phone:
Email:
We celebrated the return of the sun this year with a dinner among friends and family and a resolution for the coming year. Our resolution is to not purchase any meat of unknown origin/treatment (and by that I really mean origin/treatment that we agree with). The big thing we are currently challenged by is pork. We don’t have any friends raising pigs that we are aware of and haven’t ventured in to that yet ourselves. It wouldn’t be quite so bad but our daughters managed to eat through the last three packages of bacon while they were here so we are out. It’s nearly impossible to find sustainably raised bacon because the demand far outstrips the supply and is completely out of balance with the idea of utilizing the whole pig. People just consume far more bacon than they do other pork products. We know of at least one farm locally that sells pork belly during the market season and year-round from the farm. Since it’s not cured or smoked people don’t seem to know what to do with it so it’s generally available. So we will probably embark on trying to make our own bacon in the near future to fill the gap and/or look to purchase a half pig this year.
We decided to set a “January resolution” as well. Partly out of necessity. We had decided we would wait until after the holidays and try to do some overhauls on our spending so we could try to save some money to reinvest in to the property. Couple that with the travel expenses, septic repairs, and truck repairs in the last 6 weeks or so and we could really do with a good dose of belt-tightening. So for January we have resolved not to buy any food or go out to eat. Realistically it’s not zero, but as little as possible (for example, we need flour so we will buy that or buy wheat berries to mill our own). Through the winter we often “slack” and get a weekly delivery of organic produce to fill in some of the gaps (it’s not all local, sadly). We are keeping the weekly produce delivery, but it’s a relatively low cost and good value. It also has the effect of keeping us out of veggie ruts and forcing us to try new things. We figure that the challenge should have positive effects on both our wallet and our waistlines. We also could use a little eating down on the freezer/pantry. I tend to buy stuff on deals and stockpile like the end of the world is coming. We want to make room in the freezer for a nice local spring lamb or two and that pig I mentioned. It’s also hard to justify growing/canning more food when we still have plenty from the previous year (or two).
I’ve been plotting and planning for this year’s back yard garden already. I’m using growveg.com which looks very promising. We are also discussing building raised beds for the front yard garden instead of using all of the containers. They work relatively well but look like a cluttered mess. I’ve resolved to only buy seeds that are really needed this year. The last two years I’ve gone browsing through the seed catalogs in the dead of winter and ended up with all kinds of things I don’t need (they are sneaky that way, sending the catalogs when you are yearning for just about anything green and growing). So far eggplants and celery are the only thing on my list that I need to buy. To help avoid the over purchasing I’m also going to pick them up at the local garden store instead of mail order so I can’t justify making the shipping costs worth it as a reason to buy more seed.
The new flock of baby chicks is just about a month old now and doing great. They are whizzing around the brooder box still and we had to upgrade their feeder and water fount to larger sizes to keep them from emptying them while we were at work. We were just discussing this morning where they are going to range and the housing situation. We may free range them even though I had originally decided not to, just because we really need to do more clearing before we have space to fence and the tractor has been out of commission for several months (seems like a trend around here).
So far this winter has been really good for our current laying flock. Of the original 13 purchased we have all but 1, but we still have 1 from last year’s flock. It seems like we’ve typically lost more than that. We started with 12 or 13 last year and by the time they were laying we only had 8 hens and 1 rooster. We currently have 11 hens and 1 rooster. Egg sales have been going very well and we have far more demand than supply most of the time. It always disappoints me to tell someone I can’t sell them eggs because I think they are just the most wonderful things and everyone that wants them should get an opportunity. So I look forward to the new flock starting to lay and giving me more inventory to work with.
We are still planning on getting another flock this spring and I’m hoping to include a few laying and/or meat ducks in the order as well as some chickens for meat again. We won’t be doing the cornish-x again so I haven’t quite decided on how I want to approach things. I can either get a straight run of the hens we want and hope the roo to hen ratio isn’t too far off, or we can order sexed roos and hens individually. I think it costs about the same either way. I’m also eliciting assistance from our oldest daughter (10 later this January) in helping to select some of the laying hens. I’m excited to see what she chooses. At some point we need to invest in an incubator and just hatch our own chicks. We’ll get there eventually.
I’m practically counting the days until mid-February when I can start my seeds!
This will be a bit of a catch up post. 
I’ve posted a few new pictures of the new laying flock at 3 weeks of age. They are getting quite active now. We’ll give them another week before opening up the other half of the brooder box. For now we’ve been keeping them enclosed to half the box partly to conserve heat because it’s been so cold. They are getting quite a few feathers in, but their little neck and arm pits are still down and you can see down poking out in between their tiny little feathers.
The weather has been unseasonably cold and dry. We dropped down as low as 10 degrees a couple nights, with several being in the 13 -16 degree range. The goats are in their coats and get hot water once a day, and an evening check to break the ice on their water bucket if it’s frozen. The “big girl” chickens have one of the brooder lights hanging in their coop for some extra warmth. They don’t seem too phased by things though. Their hanging fount (waterer) keeps freezing over so I’ve been putting a small feed bucket of hot water on the back patio for them each morning.
One morning I got up to see Sassy scratching around by the greenhouse. It was quite early and I was surprised that Bengt might have let them out that early. I said, ’oh, you let the chickens out already?’ and he looked at me quizzically and said he hadn’t. Well it turned out that he hadn’t counted the chickens when he put them in the night before and Sassy can tend to straggle behind. She had managed to spend the entire night outside of the coop and the low was 16 degrees! We ran out and opened the coop and she happily went inside, had some breakfast, and laid an egg. I suspect I know where she may have found a nice place to spend the evening…
The well pressure switch froze again. This happened during the winter holidays last year when we got about 4 feet of snow. Several other issues compounded the situation leaving us with out drinkable or hot water for a good part of a week. This time we were a bit more versed in the mechanics of all of it and I quickly granted Bengt permission to take the greenhouse heater to put in the well house. The water was flowing again with in 10-15 minutes and the hot water cleared up quickly thereafter. We either need to permanently fix this problem or get in the habit of making some adjustments to the well house for fall and spring. A permanent fix would involve relocating the water heater or the well so I suspect that we’ll just need to get used to it.
Sweet Pea Currant Tomatoes
I had been harvesting currant tomatoes up until as recently as a week ago from a volunteer plant in the greenhouse. It hadn’t really dawned on me that the volunteer was rooted in the ground so as soon as all this dramatically cold and dry weather hit the plant was a goner. It’s probably for the best though. We got the first electric bill with the greenhouse heater running and it was about 3 times normal. Ouch! The tomatoes were a lovely treat but not worth that much. It was certainly nice while it lasted though. I’m going to try growing some tomatoes intentionally in the greenhouse eventually.
So I suspect Sassy spent the night in the space under the now, well heated, well house.
To add to our winter “fun” our septic pump blew up this weekend. There’s been some challenges with the system (read: a lot of hacks), but it finally gave up. We don’t know how much the very cold weather contributed to it, but we are on limited water use until a new pump arrives today or tomorrow. We are sucking it up (and digging in to our credit cards) and having all of the known issues with the system addressed. It’s really unfortunate and the timing couldn’t be much worse, but the septic serviceman made a strong point that resonated well with Bengt: If a septic system is maintained properly, over it’s life it will STILL be cheaper than the municipal sewer in these parts. Hopefully this will be it for a few years for us.
We’ve been cooking over our wood stove more and more this winter as I try to get the hang of it or get the courage. It’s not a cook stove by any means, but it’s not too bad. I made my first attempt at biscuits last week and they turned out okay. It just makes more sense to use the heat for the house for other functions as well.
That’s a better segue, than from our septic woes… I also thought I’d share a recipe I just typed up for a friend. It’s a staple for us for a variety of reasons, not least of which is that it’s fast, tasty, and highlights high quality eggs!
(From “How to Cook Everything”)
Spaghetti alla Carbonara
Time: 30 minutes
Makes about 4 servings
1 TBSP olive oil
4 ounces minched bacon, preferably slab bacon, or pancetta
2 eggs
1 cup fresh grated parmsan cheese, plus more
1 pound spaghetti, linguine, or other long pasta
Salt and freshly ground black peper to taste
- Combine the olive oil and bacon in a medium skillet over medium
heat. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the bacon is crisp.
- Meanwhile, bring a large pot of water to a boil. Warm a large bowl
in the oven, or by filling it with very hot water.
- Beat the eggs and Parmesan together in teh warm bowl. Salt the
boiling water and cook the pasta until it is tender but firm. when it
is done, drain it and toss it immediately with the egg-cheese mixture;
add the bacon and any fat remaining in the skillet. Add lots of
pepper; taste and add salt and more pepper if necessary. Serve
immediately, passing more grated Parmesan at the table.
[What follows is a relatively unfiltered description of our experiences slaughtering 14 Jumbo Cornish Cross hens that we'd raised with the intent of humanely raising and slaughtering chickens for meat. My descriptions of "the act" itself do not provide any detail beyond what is required to convey the actions we took. The accompanying images are really no more graphic than you'd see at a neighborhood butcher's shop with a few exceptions: Americans aren't accustomed to seeing their food with the head and feet still attached.
As with the images from the First Slaughter post, consider that this is a very humane version of what occurs with the prep of the meat you eat. I encourage you to read on and contemplate the choices you make with your food.]
A dull ache in every vertebrae of my back, my calves are burning, and I can’t move my neck. We’re standing over the cutting board, on opposite sides of the kitchen counter pulling off crispy bits of skin, white and dark meat, and shoveling it into our mouths. Just a bit of butter, salt and pepper at 350 in the convection oven and it tastes like this? This is amazing. Ouch, my neck.
"Fresh" chicken roasted for 30 minutes at 350F with butter, salt, and pepper.
An hour before, we were in the front yard off the edge of the driveway gutting this same bird. There’s no way I thought I’d bring myself to eat it today. Following the visceral, bloody, and somewhat disturbing experience, I was left with passable knowledge of chicken anatomy and a freezer full of vacuum sealed whole birds, halves, quarters, parts, and offal. Over the course of two days we slaughtered 14 Jumbo Cornish Cross chickens. Some parts of the process are pretty nasty and I was pretty sure I’d spoiled my appetite for poultry for the foreseeable future. But here I was… eating the chicken I’d just killed… and it was easily one of the tastiest things I’d eaten in a long time.
Having slaughtered a rooster, last year, we changed our approach. We learned a lot in the slaughter of Bucket. I quite simply hacked off his head with a big sharp chefs’ knife coming down on a stump. The results were pretty messy, as the involuntary flapping made it tough to hang onto him. The scalding water was too hot and had actually started to cook the meat. We devised a plan, learning from experiences and a fair amount of reading. We were ready.
Slaughter day. We woke up early and started the prep. Big Rubbermaid tubs, a folding table (our kitchen from Burning Man), a large propane burner and 30 quart stock pot, ice, some really sharp knives, cutting boards, Latex gloves, 5 gallon buckets, 1 gallon Ziploc bags, and some trash bags. After working through some kinks (cone too big, angle of cutting boards wrong, broken thermometer, water too hot, water too cold, need some chairs, better knife needed for this or the other, ran out of propane on this tank, need another bucket, etc.), the next two days followed the same pattern, one or two birds at a time.
Killing Cone
I built a small cone out of some galvanized roof flashing and a couple small bolts. The cone was affixed to the tree, with a 5-gallon bucket hanging below it. At first catching one bird at a time was easy, there were 14 of them and they were, I think I mentioned this once or twice, lazy and fat. I entered their little pasture, walked up and grabbed one. Walking back, I’d put it upside down through the cone, holding the feet, wait for the bird to calm down (the cone seemed to have this effect on them), and with the sharpest knife we own, cut through the jugular vein on the side of the neck. The blood would run down into the bucket suspended below, and half a minute later, the bird would pass out. This method is similar to the slaughter outlined in the Koran in preparation of “halal” meats.
While there is very little literature on humane slaughter of fowl, I endeavor to end the lives of any animals I kill in the most humane way possible. I’ve had a few muted debates with friends about the concept of “humane slaughter” and, while I agree the phrase is material enough for several comedy routines, it captures what I’m trying to do. Why raise an animal in a humane way, only to end its life in fear? Dr. Temple Grandin is an expert on humane slaughter of livestock and, while most of her work is geared toward large mammals, I found much of her writing useful. She’s published some simple guidelines, many of which seem like common sense (keep herd animals together as long as possible, don’t let them witness the slaughter of another, etc.), but are useful when considering what we’re doing and why. The method we chose for slaughter is condoned, by her, for most animals. She’s a really interesting person and I highly recommend looking her up, even if you’re only marginally interested in slaughter; she’s written books on autism and has a very unique first-person perspective on the topic.
After the bird fell unconscious, I’d tighten my grip on its feet. “Death throws” are involuntary muscle spasms that cause the bird to flail about (the source of the phrase “like a chicken with its head cut off”) for 15-20 seconds. The cone contained the wings and held them against the body, which made this easier. The bird was dead, now.
Battle Stations for scalding, plucking,
We’d laid out our workspace in such a way as to let us progress with each of the bird through “stations,” each with a separate purpose. While I have the strong urge to define the process with a flow chart, swim lane diagrams, input and output charts, and SLAs, it’s pretty simple:
- Dead chicken goes into 140° Fahrenheit water and sits for 30 seconds. This loosens the feathers for plucking.
- Hot wet smelly chicken (smells like a wet feather pillow covered in chicken poop) goes into Rubbermaid tub filled with ice water. This keeps the chicken from cooking and helps to loosen the feathers. We occasionally had 3 or 4 floating around in the ice bath, gruesome looking.
- Kat pulls wet cold chicken out of cold water tub and starts plucking into a second Rubbermaid tub. This is much harder than it seems like it should be and Kat is much better at it than I.
- When the majority of the feathers were off, the chicken would be moved to the first of two cutting boards. Pinfeathers and as much stubble as can be pulled off is; wingtips are a particular bitch.
- On the same cutting board, I’d cut off the head (sharp knife, lots of pressure) and the feet. I got good at taking off the feet, at the knees, using a sharp knife I’d pop the tendons and separate the cartilage.
- Feet get the ‘skin’ and ‘toenails’ pulled off. The feet are a great reminder of the animals’ prehistoric roots… more reptilian than bird.
- Feet go into a bag for stock.
- Bird moves to second cutting board. At this point, it looks almost like the chicken you would buy in a store.
- Gutting the bird takes a little bit of time, though I got much faster by the end of the second day. In short, I start at the top, free the “top organs” and then do the other end.
- The trachea and esophagus can be pretty easily freed from the spinal column with hands. On day one, we didn’t feed the birds, and the crop was small and easily freed. The “crop” is a small sack that contains all the food the chicken has recently eaten. Think of it as a squirrel’s cheek pouch, it allows the chicken to take in more than the digestive system can handle. Day two, we fed them and the crop was huge and messy. Did I mention that these chickens really ate a lot?
- I would hang the legs of the bird off the table, over a 5 gallon bucket, cut a circle (or modified square, usually) around the “vent” (aka. butt), grab around the vent and pull. Put bluntly, this is nasty. I was basically pulling the entire digestive system of a chicken out, through its butt. It smells pretty strongly. I can’t describe the smell, other than to say it smells like chicken guts.
- There’s a lot of cleanup on the bird that occurs at this point, too. I pack the livers, gizzards, and hearts into an “offal” bag. I hope to make some pate or a Misc. Farm terrine; I tried each of these fried, that weekend, and couldn’t stomach it. The smell was… too familiar. Discarding the rest, including lots of little bits that took time to get out (lungs, for instance).
- What’s left is exactly what you’d get if you bought a whole chicken at the store. The only notable difference is that the neck has a little extra skin left on it. We either froze them like this or broke it down further to breasts, thighs, wings, etc.
All the pictures from the slaughter day are posted to flickr with annotation for each step.
This is just beautiful. I don’t know how to describe it. There are images involved, you have to take a look:
Thanksgiving. Since the beginning, Americans have connected the BOUNTY of the Land and the Goodness of Life to DEMOCRACY. Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison – farmers ALL – envisioned an agrarian society. We have since evolved into a VERY different kind of society.
Back to the Land
RSS Feed
