Butcher day

Today was a full day of butchering for the wife and I. 2 dozen broilers, eight and a half weeks old. Most in the 5 to 7 pound range. A few real big ones for sure. It was hot out, but we got them in ice baths in the basement by 10am. We will shrink wrap them in a couple days, they are in the fridge now.

Good eats, should be tasty.

About the nastiest job I've ever done, lol. Chicken is one of my favorite foods but after a day of plucking chickens I'm not able to eat it for about a week.

K snow check planet whizbang out, I built a plucker, it works awesome

Yep, definitely no where near the top of my favorite jobs list.

looks like you know what you're doing

I've seen a few of those. We only do a couple dozen a year, hard for me to justify the room and expense of building one. I don't have the motor here, would have to source that. But yeah, it would save a ton of time.

We ate so much chicken when I was a kid, I won’t hardly touch it today. Fried, baked, chicken salad, shake and bake. Mom burned me out lol.
It was a cheap way to feed a big family.
I can eat it, but I’d rather not lol.

Gonna can any?

Fake it til you make it

We've done this a few times, and my dad did hundreds as a kid and he taught me.

Never canned any meat. We freeze them whole. One of these days we will buy a pressure canner and try meats.

Once you do it, you'll love it.

The Ag Extension Service here has a plucker that you can borrow, it is an absolute game changer, you scald the bird and drop it in the plucker and in about 30 seconds you come out with a cleanly plucked bird. It took less time to drive to the office, pick up the plucker, process the chickens and take the plucker back than it normally would have taken to just process the chickens and you avoid most of the aggravation and smell.

We butcher around 100 to 150 a year depending on # of pre orders and how many my wife wants in the freezer. We bought a plucker a few years ago, heat water and scald on a 2 burner camp stove. I honestly don't mind buturing chickens. It goes quick and is a fare profit.

They grew up fast, are they Cornish Rock hybrids?

Used to raise 100- 150 every year when I was a kid. Grandpa, brother and I would butcher and Grandma would wash and ice bath them. Normally do them all in 2 days.
Just butchered 2 turkeys the other day and only one that helped was my 7 year old boy.

I built one of these about 12 year ago

works well it will do 2 birds a minute actual run time is only about 30 seconds , but you have to get that scald right

I will buy chicken before a day doing that again

Bet that Strongman training helped you breeze through that whole process ….

They are called "jumbo broilers", not sure what kind of cross they are. They grow fast and are dumber than a stump.

Well done! I just finished a batch the other day. I prefer cooler weather, so I waited a few extra days to butcher when the temp dropped from 90* to 70* after a rain. That makes the whole process more enjoyable. My Wife bought me a Yardbird drum plucker a little over 3 years ago. We have processed around 600-650 birds with it. It definitely makes the job go by faster. I prefer raising batches of 25-30 birds at a time. We try to find the Jumbo Cornish Broilers when we can. We routinely process our excess heritage roosters at 16 weeks of age, and they are no where near the size of the Cornish cross.

Great process, Pintail. I built a little tractor sized for 24, works well for us. Those plucked do look like the ticket, we just don't do that many. I would have preferred cooler weather, but we both work and the birds were getting plenty big. I have heard these broilers can start dying off after 9 weeks, so I wanted to get the job done.

Are those Texas shrink bags? We started using them a couple years ago and they are awesome. Clean, neat and very nice looking.

I raise my meat birds on pasture. Ours are typically 9 weeks old when I butcher them, as they grow a bit slower on pasture than being cooped up with a feeder. I have kept a Jumbo Cornish rooster and hen alive for over a year, just to see if I could. The hen would lay a tiny white egg ever 2-3 days. With Cornish birds, I'm a firm believer in let them be chickens, and they will free range well. I lock them up at night, and push them on new pasture the next morning.
Yes, I really like the Texas poultry bags. They work great, and are cheaper than vac-sealing each bird. I like that we can order custom labels to say whatever we like. I use them for my rabbits too. I think it makes everything look more professional.