Butchering Time!

Today we started butchering the chickens. Just the ones we put in death row last night.  The process goes as follows:

Step 1: Get two chickens from death row and place in the killing cones, head first so that their heads stick out the bottom.  Grab their head and make two slits right below their ears (above their ears because they are upside down).  This will sever the two main arteries and they will bleed out.

Me and two chickens bleeding out in the cones.

Step 2:  After they have bled out, we scald them in 142-152 degree water to loosen their feathers. Any warmer and the skin and fat will begin to cook, any cooler and the feathers won't get loose.  When the feathers come out without any effort (usually around 1 minute) they are ready for the plucker.

Getting ready to dunk them in the scalder

Chickens in the scalder

Step 3:  When the feathers come out easily, place them in the chicken plucker.  With the hose running, turn on the chicken plucker and hose the chickens down as they spin.  In 30 seconds they will all plucked.

The chicken plucker ready for action

Click on the video below to see the plucker in action.

Step 4: After they have been plucked, we bring them over to our stainless steel table to remove the innards.

Our butchering table

Step 5:  After they are all cleaned out, we place them in a cooler filled with cold water to start the cooling down process.  After we finished all 10 for today, we bag them in grocery bags and put them in our refrigerator overnight to allow them to cool down and for the rigor mortis process to set in before freezing.  They have to rest for a day or else they will not be as tasty.

Today's work

Closeup of chickens

Tomorrow we will do 10 more.  This is all the room we have in our refrigerator each day for chickens.  If we had another fridge, like we used to have in the garage, we could do more in one shot. Oh well, tomorrow's another day.

Time to Butcher the Chickens!

Tomorrow the chickens will be eight weeks old.  Time to get them butchered.  Yesterday, one died from an apparent heart attack, it weighed 6 1/2 pounds, a good weight.  Today we were waiting for our friends to return our chicken plucker and it arrived , so tomorrow we can begin.

We captured 10 chickens and placed them in "death row" so they won't eat or drink anything for at least 12 hours to clean out their insides (intestines, crop, etc).

10 chickens on "death Row"

We also got the butchering area ready for the chicken cleaning. This consists of: the killing cones, the turkey fryers used with 142 degree water to prep the chickens for plucking, the chicken plucker and the stainless steel table.

Our Chicken Plucker ready for Action

The killing cones will be nailed up between two trees

We still have all the aprons, gloves, water thermometers, knives , etc from the last time we did this almost 3 years ago.  So we are all set for tomorrow. We plan to start with only 10 to see how tired we get and how long it takes us.  If the weather hold we should be done by the end of the week.

Landscaping Work

Been trying to get our gardens back in shape after a year of neglect.  Its starting to look good.

Taken on April 13, 2013

Today May 24, 2013

Big difference a month of growth and hard work transplanting makes. The tractor in the background is up on jacks being repaired.  Some problem with the front end.  You can see what I am doing on it at skutel.blogspot.com.  I just started and trying to find out how to take the front knuckle apart.

A beautiful iris blossomed today

The patio and perennial garden

The vegetable garden is in, I will take pictures when it stops raining.  Hope everything survives the deluge!

Meat Birds at 5 Weeks

The meat bird are getting big & juicy. 5 weeks old now.  The fox is still hanging around so we may keep them in the coop & yard rather than putting them in the tractors.

"I know I am going to be dinner someday"

They are eating so much now that we can't keep enough bags of food on hand. Seems like we are always making a trip to the grain store.  Can't wait till they are done!

I Think It Really Might Be Spring!

Its amazing what a difference a few months make.

The Fire Pit in the Snow

Same Picture Today

Everything is finally turning green and a few of the flowers are starting to bloom.

The First Iris in our garden

Ground cover between the patio & deck

May is a magical month where everything seems to come alive.  It a completely different world between May 1 and Memorial  Day.  This is New England where the scenery is constantly changing. 

Chicken Movies

I thought that I would post a few movies of the chicks in the coop. They are fun to watch.

Chicks: Two Weeks and Getting Bigger

The chicks are getting big really fast!  I changed out the little peep feeder for the large feeders that they will be using when they are place outside.  I also hooked up the Plasson Bell waterer, they will also use these outside.

Large Feeders & Bell Waterer

I opened up the door to the outside run to see if they could be coerced to go outside. No luck yet!

I am always amazed at how fast they grow, in just two weeks they have a lot of wing feathers already.

Almost fully developed wing feathers

Stay tuned for next weeks update.